Day 349: Preparations

Well, the relatives coming for Christmas arrive tomorrow, and it's not the usual band of merry man/woman/girls we know so well.  I'm NOT revealing it until tomorrow's blog though ;-)  But the house is clean, their gifts are DONE and wrapped, special foods are in the house!  I'm going out to a cookie exchange and ornament exchange with my MOMSnext group (an extensions of MOPS) tonight, so I'm typing part of this up earlier in the day.  The kids have worked on homework, willingly played their board game, read their books, played mad libs, had their screen time, and will have leftovers for dinner.  Jared's been "working" all day, which included a yummy lunch (see picture below).  The 3 guys that are part of the ministry he's working for, his dad and two others, had a big day of filming and meeting and what not.  The truck also got fixed, hopefully permanently, but they did a flush of some sort of the clutch system first to see if it's that before they dug in and started replacing more expensive parts.

Momsnext was great!  The ornament exchange went on forever!  And I was so happy to use the same tupperware I've used for every MOPS cookie exchange I've been in.  The leadership also served us a potato bar and chili and salad (with treats to eat, too) and gave each of us the book called "Jesus Calling" by Sarah Young.  It was definitely worth the bone chilling temperatures.  I know it wasn't as cold as PEI is right now, but it's pretty bad out there tonight.  It won't last forever though.  I'm just glad the snow hasn't melted yet either.  I'm hoping it never does! Lol.

The kids were giggling in Keturah's room today and this is why.  Justin crawled into Abishai's bed, and he wanted to have a sleepover with Abishai in the crib tonight!  We said no and that the older kids do NOT need to be getting in the crib.  But, it was funny to see!

Big boy wanted to carry a ceramic plate into the living room with his breakfast hashbrowns all by himself.  And he did!  I followed him of course.  And then he brought it back to the kitchen, too.  Growing up too fast!

Then he got into Justin's leftover ramen noddles (yes he eats them for breakfast), again in big boy ceramic mug with a big boy spoon.

Then two hrs later, he ate several slices of the infamous Henry Amish friendship bread!  Seriously, this kid eats a ton!  Mrs. Henry makes the bread often and gave it to us months ago and I froze it.  She's the mom of the Henry clan that we do Bible Bowl with.

Mrs. Comfy in our bed watching a movie and restringing a bracelet she go at co op.  She wanted to eat chips or another snack in the bed and I said no, I do not want crumbs in my bed!  Jared did see a mouse a couple of nights ago in the living room, so I'm determined to keep crumbs in the kitchen!

It's so cold that the porch can serve as the deep freezer for frozen pizza!  Yes, the bag has frozen pizza in it and it's sitting outside!

Uh, brrrrr.

Our household thermostat is set to 70.  This is the heater under my desk.  Because the desk sits on the outside wall, it's always 5-10 degrees cooler than the rest of the house.  Our electric bill did double this month though, so I'm trying to be more careful about when I turn it on and I don't use it 24/7.

18 hrs until guests arrive (12 hrs as I write this!)

Abishai running back and forth with the square balloon.

Aww, perfect moment.  Bookshelves with my mother's childsized rocking chair from her childhood, out tree, and then the big rocking chair that was my grandmother's and then my mom's.  The two rocking chairs sat next to each other at my Gramma's house for many, many years.

Ornaments for the ornament exchange, which seemed to go on forever because of a change in the rules last minute. Lots of laughs!

Cookie exchange!  Although, I guess the "must be homemade" rule doesn't apply to this group of women.  Oh well, I can't eat them anyway.

Cookies in the tupperware where they belong every Christmas.  Walking down memory lane here.

Update on how Indiana and I are getting alone: I'm a little more content.  Actually, I've been so busy that I just haven't thought about it much.  I did cry after reading a letter from a friend on PEI, and the snow does make me miss it more, but there's lots to be thankful for here, too.  The key is to remember that this is just a season, and we don't know if living here is permanent or not.  And maybe my "dreams" of traveling or being in other cultures full-time will come to fruition in other ways.  I just gotta take one day/week/month/year at a time.  As I heard on a podcast on the way to church tonight, we can plan and have a direction or goal to where we want to go, but God directs the steps that takes us there.