Merry

Merry Christmas Eve and a Merry Merry Christmas Day!

This tribe of six is loving celebrating together.

Happiness all around.

Wishing you all the same.

The celebrating continues on tomorrow . . . 

It's Never to Late and A Bunch of Pictures

It's never to late for a good idea.
Especially one that is easy.
I know Christmas is almost here but you probably even have everything you'd need for this idea.
My friend Marshalene, from Oklahoma posted this idea on her blog.
I love it.
We'll be doing it on Christmas Eve.

The idea is called prayer bulbs.

You take the top off of a bulb ornament and on a small piece of paper you write down one prayer request you have and then put the paper in the ornament.
On another sheet you write down a praise item or thing you are thankful for that happened in the year.
Put the lid back on and hang it on your tree.

Save the bulbs till next year and when you get your ornaments out next year you reopen the prayer bulb and read what each person wrote.

Isn't that the neatest idea?
I think it will be neat to see what things kids are thankful for and what things their little minds want to pray for.

Now for a bunch of random pictures.
I've been doing a little "hands on" research on a dslr camera.
My sweet friend let me play with her Nikon for a couple days.
Nikon or Canon that's my question?
I had so much fun with it.
Here's some random shots I took from our couple of days.

We wrapped up the semester with some school parties and events and now we've been enjoying our days off of school.
Some may or may not have still been in pjs in the middle of the afternoon while frosting these cookies; others might be in their 5th or 6th outfit of the day.
The weather has taken our white snow and left us with the cold mud mix but they don't care.
For the most part we've spent our days inside.
My to do list still sits at my desk but I'm trying not to care either - everything that has to be done really is done.
We spent tonight eating around the Christmas tree and reading Christmas books - it's one of my favorite traditions.
I hope you are all enjoying some traditions - new or old - enjoy your hours leading up to Christmas.

Best Idea Ever

Best idea ever, I have to share it with you.
It's not my idea.
It's a gift idea for your child.
I'll share the link with you from where I got it but I'm warning you it's a challenging post to read.
Might make you mad - just saying. Click here to read the entire post.

We teach our kids to give in so many ways.
We do it differently all year long.
Two weeks ago we pulled up to a light and a homeless man was sitting there.
It was after school so we had after school snacks with us in the van.
The kids saw him and said, "Mom give him our snacks."
So I rolled down my window and gave him a bag of cheetos, a sunny D drink and a slim jim and said, "These are from my kids." He was appreciative and said "Tell your kids thank you so much."
It was touching to say the least.

Fast forward a week and we were at the same light.
No homeless man.
All of a sudden Coleson popped up quick and said with such enthusiasm, "Mommy that homeless man got a home; he's gone." He was full of so much excitement for that man.
How I wish it was that simple.
It made for a great conversation.

Sorry, I got side tracked.

Here's the idea:
You give your child money as a Christmas gift that they get to GIVE away to someone in need, to someone that Jesus would want them to help.
They get to choose how to do it.
They get to decide where.
How cool is that?
They get to be apart of showing God's love to someone.
I get teary thinking about it.

I love the idea of creating that giving experience for my kids.
I don't know about you but when I give something happens within me and I want them to experience that as much as possible.

I don't know how we'll do it yet or how much.
You could do $10 or $100.
You could warn them ahead of time that the gift they are about to open is a gift they will give away.
You could let them brainstorm places they'd want to give the money too.
We (I) might be surprised what they think of.
They might respond sort of weird because it's a unique gift; not like the normal gift.

I LOVE giving gifts so this gift has me so excited and anticipating Christmas.

How do you teach your kids to give?
I'd love to hear ideas.

Santa Picture

This picture is so funny to me for so many reasons.
For one; they don't believe in Santa, never have.

( I know some of you just gasped; it's ok, the kids are fine. Some of you just had the thought "party poopers" in your head. Let me assure you we party plenty at this house of 6. The kids all know the story of Saint Nick and are happy to play along with your kids. We have great imaginations here. Other than the year one child told another that they were infact correct that Santa WAS real but that he was now dead, we haven't ruined Christmas magic for others. It's sort of fun to see them knowingly look at me when a friend of theirs is talking about Santa; it's like we are sharing a little secret. ha.)

Anyways, back to the picture.

Right before we went in Jason told them to remember not to tell him he's not real because he might not even know he's not real.
They thought that was hilarious.

They proudly wore their shirts they made in school.

Crazy about these two boys. They make me laugh EVERY SINGLE DAY.

Today on tv it said, "Feliz Navidad".

I asked them if they knew what that meant and Coleson said, "Yeah, Taco Johns."

Hmm?

My twins are growing up so much faster than I ever dreamed they would when I held them for the first time.  (Sniff sniff)

This time of year I'm always reminded how fast the seasons fly.