Merry Christmas!

"Do not be afraid, for I bring you good news of great joy for everyone! The Savior-yes, the Messiah, the Lord-has been born tonight in Bethlehem, the city of David! Luke 2:10-11

Holiday Happenings

We have had a lot of fun this Christmas Season, but to be honest it has gone by so fast and I find that every year I do a little less! Hopefully, it isn't that I am becoming lame since I am tired and overwhelmed with life, but in fact, it is because I am trying to just enjoy and savor the holiday (read: hopefully). So far we baked some cookies, but they were gone within two days, so I don't think that counts. Usually we have cookies to last us into December and give many away. I planned on making more today, but the clock skipped a couple of hours on me (it has been doing this a lot lately) and I couldn't get it done.
Lucky for me, this year I didn't have to sweat over a favorite family tradition of making homemade gingerbread houses. When we started this tradition I was a mom of 3 under 4yrs. and somehow I found a way to make at least 5 homes for our friends to come over and decorate with us. Every year, the tradition has tapered down a bit. The next year, just one friend came over, the next just our family.....and last year, I think I stooped to buying a kit from the grocery store (only to be saved by an invitation from friends to decorate houses at their home)! Anyway, this year we hit the jackpot! Grandma and Grandpa Halverson took Brad's and our family to the Farm Kitchen. This place is great! They are a working organic farm that has a beautiful backdrop for many local weddings. Every 1st Sat. of the month they have a breakfast they serve that is just amazing. At Christmas, you can sign up to come and decorate homemade gingerbread houses (I forgot to ask if they were organic)! It was perfect; there were gobs and gobs of candy for the kids to eat, I mean decorate with. The best part was that I didn't have to clean up when we were done or worry about candy canes getting stuck between our bamboo floors.

Happy Lucia Day -Dec. 13th

So I am late posting this, but just wanted to wish you a Happy St. Lucia Day and a very Happy 30th Birthday to Ingrid! St. Lucia is celebrated in most Swedish homes by having the oldest daughter dress in a white gown with candles on her head, delivering coffee and rolls (in our case pepparkakor cookies) to the family early in the morning. Greta has done this in our house for at least the last four years and this year she could pretty much do it all on her own. I set up the coffee to go off on it's own so all she had to do was pour it for Daron and I. First she visits her siblings and gives them cookies with battery-operated candles on her head in complete darkness and then they all come up to our room singing the Lucia song. It is so sweet. She then celebrated this day and shared it with her class at school. December 13th falls on one of the darkest days of the year in Sweden and St. Lucia is known for bringing goodwill. My sis-in-law has shown me so much goodwill this week and has really been a blessing to me. I am so thankful for her, especially today on her birthday!

The Jag Tree Farm

The first Sat. of Advent is when we usually go and get our tree. This year it was a little different for us. We hopped in our car, drove around the block, and settled on this nice tree right in front of our house! This tree farm had the perfect tree! You see, there is a tree that is growing too close to our house and it needed to be taken down, so we decided that now is the perfect time and we could savor it inside a little longer! We still haven't cut the bottom down and hopefully our neighbors don't notice it, but we have some beautiful boughs you can come and cut down if you need any garland! After our tree cutting ceremony, the nice people that lived at this house gave our family some hot chocolate (since that was the only drawback for the kids in getting the tree at our house instead of the usual Christmas Tree Farm.

A walk in their shoes....

There is a family from WA, that I have met from a friend, that is traveling over in Ghana right now to adopt their 2 yr. old and 4 yr. old. She really captures the emotions of the first time meeting your children, the excitement and fear of being in a new country, and the ups and downs of the adoption process; as well as in life! Check it out if you want to get a feel for what we have in store for us. The link I connected you to is their survival guide for visiting Ghana- I will have to make sure I sleep with my mouth closed. Ever since watching the Lindsey Lohan Parent Trap, I am scared of accidentally swallowing a lizard............you will have to watch the movie if you don't know what I mean. That camping scene is Greta and Ella's favorite part!


By the way, this is why I haven't posted in awhile. I am too busy reading this blog and imagining!

Chaos

There is a bit of chaos going on here in kitsap county. Roads, schools, and offices closing early everywhere. All the snow that we got yesterday and Sat. is gone and melted into the streets, as well as many more inches of rain today(I am talking between 8-13 inches here in Kitsap in one day)! There is flooding everywhere and there is also a lot of wind, which was causing power outages yesterday and today. Where we are located, our home should be fine without any flooding, but there are many friends of ours that are not in the same boat. Hopefully tomorrow things will have been cleared up a bit and water levels going down so the repair can start. Check out some of the water coverage at komotv.com

They say we don't get snow.......HA!

Today was a snow day! We loved having the snow, but we were also bummed because we didn't get to have church today. Kind of different when you have to cancel the one Sunday that you meet a month as a whole church. Of course, we were trying to make the decision all day, and as soon as we called it off, the weather changed from snow to rain and the roads were much better. We personally really wanted to have church, but didn't want to put people in a dangerous situation. We meet at 4:56 PM and we didn't know if the roads would be icy and it would be dark driving home. Earlier in the day, I had seen numerous cars in the ditches and people are uncomfortable driving here with all the hill. I know it was the right decision, but it stinks and because we were waffling all day, I feel like I didn't get to enjoy the snow! I hate being indecisive, I wish I could change........