The Spirit of our Christmas Season

• The ornament tradition.... this years' ornament(s) were personalized blocks & wooden initials painted by the kids. I also found a nativity to add to the tree.

See if you can find the army men that Thomas and Wesley added just because...

• Gingerbread cookies. Wesley squealed with delight cutting the dough with the Christmas cookie cutters. We ate dough, shaped cookies, ate dough, shaped cookies, made a mess, burned a batch, & had a BALL. (While we baked cookies, Christina was at her friend's house baking cookies and Wayne took them to deliver the cookies to a new girl in their church class who had moved in that day).

• The nativity. We were the recipients of a nativity 12 Days of Christmas. I just wonder if they heard the brawls that took place as the kids tackled each other, each wanting to discover the next piece of the nativity...and discover WHO was behind this act of kindness. The givers always got away! This nativity will always remind us of the joys of giving anonymously and receiving acts of kindness.

• Gifts from the heart....

To: Grace

Love, Wesley (& mom)

A Mod Podge'ed sketch book cover

To: Dad

Love, Christina

A drawer organizer filled with some of dad's favorite goodies

To: Mom

Love, Caroline

A Caroline-made soft red scarf (I opened this 1st thing and wore it ALL day long)

At our church Christmas party 10 days before Christmas, Grace told Santa she wanted a dollhouse. Wayne got to work and made a 5' unfinished dollhouse for the girls to decorate and enjoy. Such a good daddy! Lots of pictures to come....

To: the whole family

Love, mom

A published version of the 2008 blog posts on our family blog. LOVED this.

To: Grace & Caroline

Love, mom & dad

Custom made hand stamped charm necklaces to match Christina's (made by Angela Henrie)....I told Angela our girls nicknames, favorite colors, the kind of necklace I had in mind, and she came up with these darling necklaces....

The COUSINS gift exchange!

Thomas is going to wear his Hawaiian shirt from cousin Christian on his first day back to school. Christina shared her CTR ring making kit with her sisters. They turned out cute! The Moody cousin gifts were a hoot.

Wesley loves his "I Spy" book & we all loved fun things from the PNW Menzies.

A large canvas from Macy Robison Photography featuring our family at the lovely Camp Joseph in Sharon, Vermont.

With all of the commotion and craziness we seem to create on a regular basis, I love the peaceful feeling of this photograph. It brings to mind our family reading challenge from last summer, my quilting projects (we're sitting on one), lots of great family memories at Camp Joseph, and above all our underlying love for one another. Thanks so much, Macy!

To: Grace & Caroline

Love, mom

Pencil rolls for Grace & Caroline for their new church bags & a crayon roll for Wesley for church. The multi-colored pieced fabric behind the pencils has iron-on vinyl found in the fusible web section at Jo-Ann's (you just iron it on--so easy). Wesley's crayon roll was made for chunky crayons and has lots of iron-on vinyl.

To: Christina

Love, Thomas

A movie ticket to see the upcoming Percy Jackson movie with him since they both read & loved the Percy Jackson books last summer.

A play mat/quilt for Wesley and his cars, featuring Fenway Park, the Boston Temple, Modern Pastry, and lots of local favorite sites. Here's a sneak peak (I'm still adding finishing touches)....

With love, mom

• Christmas evening I was laying in bed surrounded by 4 of our children and Thomas said, "This was a great Christmas. I can't believe how good it was. I feel like I have so much (& that's not due to present overload) and that I'm just going to tell Santa to give to other kids next Christmas." Grace chimed in, "Me too! I want to give all of my presents to someone my age who is poor." We talked about refining our focus next Christmas season to help those in need and give to one another. I can't believe that our children, as young as they are, really are feeling the Spirit of the season & coming up with meaningful ways to celebrate the life of Jesus Christ. This Christmas was wonderful, and I have a feeling we've got many more beautiful Christmas seasons to come.

"The best part about Christmas is being with family." - Caroline 12/09