Fiya, Fiya, Fiya!!

Thank you New Prospect Baptist Church choir for our awesome outing to Kabuki. The kids had never been and had the time of their lives. OK.....when they weren't totally afraid and scooting 3 feet away from the table.


OK, in this video it really does look like Jacob is about to lose an eyebrow or two. Wow! The kids were so thankful to go to such a cool place. What a cool gift and a cool way to show their appreciation. We are very blessed.

Here are some more pics. Our chef was awesome. He was really cool and gave Claire extra food. Almost everyone tried to catch scrambled egg in their mouths. Um....not me. Sorry to disappoint you.

Everyone left unscathed

Well, Christmas was wonderful. We had 11 people in our home spending the night and it was great. I think everyone had room. Our moms slept up in Matthew's room with our younger three children. The kids were beside themselves. They drew names to see who would sleep with whom. One (lucky/unlucky) person who drew the couch "had" to sleep by themselves. Hmmmm.

Santa brought a few various happies, but the big present was the Wii from our moms. They went together and got a Wii and Wii fit with some other games. Oh......my......goodness. It is totally awesome. I had no idea it could be so much fun. Matt is back on Wii Fit skiiing right now. I have actually broken a sweat for the first time in a while. (OK, I am badly out of shape.) I acknowledge that. We did have a few brave souls who would get on the Wii Fit and do the body test in front of everyone. It checks your BMI, etc.

I did mine yesterday after everyone left. Yeah.......it is super cool. Very motivating. I have done yoga, balancing games like hula hoop, etc. skiiing, running with Matt, etc. Oh, I forgot step. I am in love. I have a pretty cute trainer, too. I was a little jealous when Matt picked the computer lady to be his trainer, so I picked the dude. (I am kidding....well, not really.) I call him Richard Simmons. We do yoga together.

My balance has gotten better since yesterday. I can tell. I also feel muscles that I forgot I had. My "core" is a little more toned. :)

Here are some pics:

It's the most wonderful time of the year......

This week is so glorious. I am home with my family, getting ready for Christmas. Beginning to wrap presents..... planning for Christmas Eve with our families.

The musical at church was wonderful. Amber and Jontyler from church did so great putting drama with the choir. We had a great group in the choir. The children had part in it, too. It was such a blessing. I could barely sing, but managed to croak out some notes. I basically just stood in the choir loft and watched everything around me and thought of what it all means. I just stood there almost crying several times. After the musical we had a great time of fellowship with the deacons, their wives and our pastor and his wife. Someone kept all of the children at church while we went to another person's house. :)

Now the kids are watching "It's a Wonderful Life". I need to get up and keep cleaning for our company. Remember, I said it was my Christmas present? It is coming together. I told Matt that I didn't want to stress this holiday, so I am trying to lower my expectations a little. I mean I want it all perfectly clean and organized....that's all. Is that unreasonable? :)

Tomorrow we are going to try to get out and get the whole family to do something for someone else. We are praying about what we need to do. The kids have been making a little origami, so maybe we can go to a nursing home with those and sing. There isn't a soup kitchen in Oxford that I know of. We are so blessed, we need to be doing for others.

Our good friend, Amber, was sweet enough to take our family Christmas picture. We are blessed because she is a professional photographer. It was great (sarcastic...) . You may know how it is. "Kids, you better sit there and act like you are happy!!!!!!!!" "Nobody move....and SMILE." OK, it wasn't quite that bad. Almost. I think it turned out pretty good, though. Not everyone's best, but the best of the whole group.

Hope your holiday is the most blessed ever. Take care.

Ahhh......medicine

Another thing that I don't take for granted anymore. We are so blessed here in America to have access to medicine. I did finally go back to the doctor and was told that I have walking pneumonia and pleurisy. I was given about 10 prescriptions. (a little exaggeration) I feel better now. Yea!

Monday night was supposed to have been our Kindergarten program, but it was canceled because of the incoming ice storm. Thank goodness we missed the worst of the weather, but if it hadn't been for that, I would have had to wait until Tuesday night to go to the doctor. I was so grateful to get to get that taken care of. The program has been moved to tomorrow night. Only 2 more days of school................

Today was Claire's program at school. I took off at 11:00 to get to Oxford. The program was great. Her teacher is the choreography queen, so I steal a lot of ideas from her (being a music teacher myself). Claire was an elf. :)

We are going to have Matt's mom and brother, my mom and fiance' and my brother all with us Christmas Eve and then Christmas morning. Wow! We have never done this. Should be fun. I do get something for myself in the process. (Actually, subconsciously I think I did this on purpose.) Our house has to be cleaned from top to bottom. Yea!!!!! I have wanted this since we moved here. :)

Hope the rest of your week is wonderful. Merry early Christmas!

Happy Thanksgiving and Merry Christmas

Thanksgiving holidays were great. I am over my whining about being sick. (although I still am.....wahhhh.) It was wonderful seeing everyone.
Ron, Steve and Nana on Wednesday, the whole gang on Thursday. I could go into the whole story about how the toilet flooded about 30 min. before our company came to Mom's house and how they came in with their babies while we shop-vacked (do you like my new verb?) all the water from the foyer. Mom and I were laughing deliriously by the time we prayed and were eating.

We won't forget that one. Here are some pics. Claire had fun going around photographing everyone.

Friday we headed up to Mashulaville to see Grandma and Grandpa. Mamaw and Chris were there, too. We watched the Egg Bowl. ( Sorry, Mamaw.) Then we just hung out and ate some really good soup. I hated that I had to leave early Sat. morning to get Matthew back to work the Ole Miss basketball game.

Now we are decorating for Christmas, just watched Elf and are now watching a Child's Christmas in Wales. It doesn't get much better. :)

Have a great week.

We take our health for granted so much

I am realizing how much we often take our health for granted. I have been "sick" since about two weeks ago. First, I thought it was just a chest cold or allergies. I just know I have had a fever and couldn't breathe. I think I am getting better, but I have gotten a little down about it because I have just felt a little puny. I have to stop and think about what it would really be like if I had a real illness or disease. How would I cope? I think about God only giving us what He thinks we can handle. What does this mean for me? Does He think I can't handle very much? I guess He knows me pretty well. Maybe we adapt when we have to. I guess I have more on my plate to handle now than when I was a lot younger.

I am feeling better today and I am grateful.

Well, tomorrow is Thanksgiving. We are traveling tonight to Mom's where I will see two of my brothers. Friday we are heading to Mashulaville to see Matt's grandparents. Should be great. We hate that it is so tough for us to get away to see all of them during the school year.

I hope you all have a wonderful rest of the week. We have so much to be thankful for.

I decided to not be a real woman and leave the whole pumpkins alone and chose to use canned pumpkin instead for my pies. I am even going to do the no-bake thing where I use Cool-whip instead of baking a big cheesecake. I know..........I am a wimp. :)

His grace still amazes me

Today has been a peaceful day. I had prayed a lot about some situations at work that I was in knots over and didn't exactly know how they would work out. God just seems to orchestrate things in a way that is so much better than we deserve. It is overwhelming to think that He really does hold us in His hands.

Here is a picture of the plate I made at Clay Canvas. Not sure if I have shown this or not. This kind of shows what stage our kids are in now.
This week the second graders are putting on a Thanksgiving musical. I love the musical. It has such great music and the kids are so excited about it. I love Thanksgiving. My husband has been accused of being the grinch (by my children) because he doesn't want us to watch Christmas movies before Thanksgiving. I totally understand and am with him. We can't jip Thanksgiving.

We have about 8 pumpkins on our porch that came from the pumpkin patch and sat through October. I am wondering if I am woman enough to make pies out of them. I feel like a real woman when I cook things from scratch. I love all things pumpkin. Last year I was into pumpkin cheesecake making. I did use canned pumpkin then, though. :)
I can't wait until next week. Sunday after we eat a Thanksgiving meal together at church we are heading to Jackson. I bought Matt and me Third Day tickets and I am so excited to be going with some of our good friends. Yea!!
On a different note: Turkeys come in tomorrow. Wow. Just call me delivery lady. Hope I can get everything where it all needs to go.
Have a very blessed week.