This is pretty much why it has been a while since I updated our blog. Usually, when Luke naps, I have a little time to do things. Usually, after he goes to sleep for the evening, I also have some time. Right now, most of my extra time is going to sleeping or just laying down. Morning sickness hit with a vengeance at week 6, but has been improving a little each week since then.
I am very grateful that this time I am at home. With Luke I was working 10-12 hour days for much of the pregnancy. Now, I get to control my day a bit more.
So, now onto Thanksgiving. We went to Nathan's sister's house and had a few other families Join us for a lovely meal. The turkey was smoked again this year and was quite tasty:
I brought this (the toasted almond, cranberry, citrus spinach salad and the fall M&M's):
And this:
Nothing that required too much cooking this year. :) Finally, my rolls turned out well. I nixed the use of whole wheat this year. No more dense rolls. My favorite was definitely the mashed potatoes. They were fluffy and buttery.
The kids all enjoyed playing with one another inside and outside and all around. Luke definitely loved spending soo much time with his cousin! This year, Luke was able to say Happy Thanksgiving in a way that we could understand.
On Friday, Bethany and I took baby Jane shopping (briefly and later in the day), while Nathan and Evan took the older kids to lunch and to play in the back yard. We all had a great time and pretty much finished up Christmas shopping.
Last night, Nathan, Luke and I all helped putting up the Christmas tree and decorating it. I wanted to wait a while, because we are really in the Advent season, but since we are leaving for CA in less than 2 weeks, I thought it would be ok this year. We do have our advent wreath out too. We turned on some beautiful Christmas music and got to work. Luke ran around saying "Christmas tree! Christmas tree!" and tried to pull all of the bells off of the tree. I was afraid that he was going to pull the tree down on himself- he doesn't know his own strength!
Luke has also been saying "Baby Jesus is born!" It is really a gift to watch him this year. He doesn't know anything about all the presents and hype of the Christmas season yet. he loves the simple things, the manger, the tree with lights, listening to Christmas songs with mommy and daddy. I want to preserve this as much as we can. Being a grown-up, I know how hard it is to keep the real meaning of Christmas alive when the world at large pushes glitz and gifts.
An add for a local store came in this week with an ad that said, "Bring the Joy home!" How about that? For just $19.99 plus tax you can bring joy to your own house. Not that giving gifts is bad. Really, it is one way that I can tell people that I love then the best. But the love that comes with the gift is the real gift, just as God's great gift to us was given in love.
Enough of my soap box. As I end this post, I will give you a glimpse of this year's photo Christmas card. This was one of the photos in the running, and is not cropped (note the boxes on the shelf in the background):
