Christmas'08

The Cooper/Palmer/Leadfords
Mark, Jill, Katie (Jill's sis), Nathan (Jill's bro), Kelly (Jill's sis), Meghan (Jill's sis), Micah (Meghan's hubby), Kale, Grandma Judy (Jill's mom), Kate, PapaBob-o (Jill's dad), Jack

I don't have as much time to post so here's just a few pictures from our time here so far.

Kale and Rex - the tame fox that lives around Mark's parent's house. It's amazing how close these foxes will get!
Here's Mark's brother's dog, Sofie. She found the super soft tiger rug that Jack got for Christmas.

Jack smiling big!Our sleepy princess.Jack got this funny bib from Aunt Julie (Mark's sis) and Uncle Mike. Very true...Loving her pink puppy.Showing off the air craft carrier he got from Uncle Nate. He was excited.Uncle Nate also got Kate some of her very own princess make-up. Needs some MAJOR supervision! Kate loves it of course :)Here's my new Transformers! And my tonsils!

Thankful Thursday - It's Christmas!

*note* Because we are supposed to be traveling on Christmas day I wrote this blog a couple days ago and scheduled it to post today.

Christmas is here and I'm so thankful for many things! Here we go! I'm thankful... ...that Jesus came to earth. It's hard to imagine how a little baby in a manger could impact my life the way it has. It's a wonderful miracle.

...that we have the freedom to celebrate His birth openly. ...that I can teach my children that it's not all about Santa and presents (that lesson will be taught for YEARS to come I'm pretty sure).

...that I finally figured out how to make yummy carmel corn! ...that God provided money for us to spend on Christmas presents.

...for our beautiful decorations in our house. It's so warm and cozy.

...that we get (hopefully) to spend Christmas with family. It's gonna be a crazy, stressful, wonderful time!

...for Christmas carols, lights and candy! ...for people who love Christmas as much as we do and decorate their house all crazy so we can go and enjoy it!

...for Christmas Eve service. A time to pause and reflect on why we celebrate Christmas - and praise Him!

...for snow. Even though it makes traveling to see family so much harder, it is wonderful to see everything so pretty and fresh and new. (I really don't like shoveling it though)

...for children's faces when they open presents. There is nothing better then seeing their excitement. No wonder people fight in stores over dumb presents...

...Christmas parties. A great excuse to get together with friends and fight over presents.

One final note. I thought I'd share a little something I found on facebook.

**Christmas. The only time a year that we sit around a dead tree and eat out of our socks.**

Christmas Caroling

Sunday night (the 21st) we loaded up the kids and took them Christmas caroling with some folks from church. We did this last year and honestly it wasn't fun at all. We had two little ones, Ranger, a stroller and lots of snow. We froze to death, the kids were whining, it was difficult to push the stroller and the dog was a cute energetic puppy and all over the place. So let's just say we weren't sure how this year would go (we left the dog at home and added a baby).

Once we got to church we found out that there was one group that was going to a retirement apartment complex and it was going to be indoors. That's the one for us! So we drove there and actually had a great time singing for some really sweet people. They endured our singing and I think, overall, had a great time. Here's the "choir". Some of the lovely audience. They were so sweet and I think they really loved having the kids come and visit them. It was neat to see.
The little man sitting down got up after a few songs and went to sit at the piano. He accompanied us, from memory, on a bunch of songs. I think it was much better with the piano. We had trouble finding a singable key.
Kale waiting to run to the cookie table as soon as we were done singing.Our little friend Izzy already found the table!
Posing with cookies at their very pretty tree.

After singing inside, we all decided to hit a few houses in the surrounding neighborhood. By the time we got the kids bundled up, out of the snow (Kate LOVES to eat snow), and on our way, we sang at just one house before the rest of the team was done. It was quite comical. But we had a better time than last year.

Here's little Jack bundled up in my coat in a snuggly.He loved it! And I promise I did put a hat on his little bald head.
Ham and cheese posing for their picture.