Random Christmas Pictures

Enjoy some truly random snapshots from our Christmas season.

Dayna and her cousin Ruby in their matching Christmas monkey pajamas

The first step to baking is washing your hands. The second step is putting flour on your nose.

Wilson family by the fireplace

After spreading Christmas cheer at the neighbors and being given a cookie with VERY green frosting

Dayna got to watch a lot of Christmas movies at Papa and Nana's house. This one is the Santa Clause.

Making a gingerbread house. Whose brilliant idea was royal icing?

More baking with Nana

Dayna got a surprise early visit from Santa, who came to reassure her that he knew she was in Oregon for Christmas

Dayna's new big girl bike

We finally got a smiling picture with Santa

Still Working on Grace.

Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many. Hebrews 12:14-15

This familiar passage hit me between the eyes last night. It hurt. Bad.

I'm not always the best at being peaceable. I'm irritable, grumpy, and like to get my way. Then, when I get together with people who don't see eye to eye with me, I tend to withdraw (and not always with the best attitude.) So...while I'm busy being disagreeable, I'm also not being holy. How can people see the Lord when I'm behaving like this.

And so, I'm sitting here writing in my blog and praying that I will be more agreeable, even with those who disagree with me (while not compromising my values), and praying against any bitter root that might grow and create trouble, causing the very people I should be loving to miss the grace of God.

The Heart of Christmas

When Christ set aside his divinity to become a man...SACRIFICE

Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross! (Philippians 2:6-8)

Making this sacrifice to provide a way for man to be reconciled to God, our sinfulness being made righteous and the relationship healed...RESTORATION

All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:18)

A little miracle happened at my parent's house yesterday. One of my nieces has been stretching her wings of independence and spent the last few years finding her own way. This way has not necessarily reflected the values she learned when she was younger, and in the course of recent family history, there has been a lot of pain involved in many hearts. This past year, my niece moved across the country to continue her education.

It looked like another Christmas without the whole family together (which is bound to happen more and more as the family grows up, gets married, moves away...)

Meanwhile, another niece (younger sister, in fact), has been saving her money from a minimum wage paying job at a fast food restaurant. She worked out some details with her sister, got a little help from my parents, and managed to buy a plane ticket for her sister to come back to Oregon for Christmas (remember the spirit of SACRIFICE?)

Unbeknownst to my sister, her daughters managed to pull off this surprise for a remarkable Christmas reunion. In the first moments at the doorstep, as reality began to register, there was not a dry eye as we witnessed this beautiful moment. A moment of RESTORATION.

I don't know what choices my niece will continue to make as she finds her way, but I hope that she knows that she is loved unconditionally.

When Did I Get So Busy?

December...birthday (Dan), significant anniversaries (Dayna's referral, our engagement), bittersweet anniversaries of loved ones leaving this life (my Grandma and Uncle)...not to mention Christmas.

When did December become so crazy? Maybe it's always been this way. It's a good crazy, though. Snuggling early in the morning by the light of the Christmas tree; making gifts for our daycare provider and speech teacher; decorating sugar cookies; sending Christmas greetings. These things take time, but I can't imagine leaving any of them off our December agenda.

I guess it's not that I'm complaining about the busy-ness so much as I'm wishing I could linger over all these activities and take more time for reminiscing. But December continues rolling along, and so must I...

Take 2

Well, I ended up not having a program without a dress rehearsal. Instead, I ended up with yet another snow day and an 11 day weekend. So...here we go again. Dress rehearsal is in an hour, program is Thursday...we'll see how it goes!

Snow Days

I'm trying not to stress, as I have absolutely no control over the weather.

But, truth be told, I'm really concerned about going back to school tomorrow.

Last year, we changed our program format at school and no longer do a traditional holiday program. Instead, we offer different music demonstration opportunities throughout the year that better fit our district's curriculum and standards. Parents don't always understand the work it takes to pull off a program...we spend an entire quarter of the school year learning less than 5 minutes worth of music. There is precious little time to teach musical concepts, much less assess any learning.

So, to still offer a holiday musical experience, we started doing a "Singalong" last year. It's short and sweet, doesn't take a lot of prep work out of classroom time, and parents still get to see their children dressed up and singing Christmas and winter songs.

Thing is, parents hated it last year. I got a lot of flack from parents because they didn't see their children on stage. So...to further pacify our community, I've planned and planned and spent sleepless nights trying to figure out how to get kids in front of the audience without the Singalong becoming a full-blown program that lasts over 2 hours. And...the brilliant this is that I really did come up with a solution!

Problem is...it's a rather elaborate plan that works on paper and we haven't seen if it works in reality. Further problem...snow days yesterday and today.

I'm getting peppered with emails from teachers who want to change program order, etc., and we're going into this "less stress" performance tomorrow without a rehearsal.

So, if you read this before tomorrow...please pray for the following things:

1. A positive attitude on my part, as I really can't control anything else anyway.
2. Accepting, gracious responses from my colleagues and our audience.
3. That the kids don't pick up on any of my stress and that we just have fun.

Thanks!

Funny Twilight Article

http://www.wired.com/underwire/2009/11/twilight-lessons-girls-learn/