A New Decade

Ten years ago I welcomed in the new millenium with friends at The Bound'ry, a Nashville hot spot (well, at least it was a hot spot 10 years ago...) I even remember the cute little black velvet outfit I wore. There was no question that I would be awake at midnight to ring in the new year.

Tonight I am welcoming in this new decade at home with some appetizers (baked brie, spring rolls, hot ham party rolls, and strawberry trifle,) the UT bowl game on the TV, and 2 little boys currently dressed in batman costumes beating each other over the head with styrofoam swords. I am already wondering how late I will have to stay up to keep JW from making too much fun of me. Ahh, the changes that happen in 10 years!

The media has made much talk about how this past decade has been kind of a downer for our country. September 11th got the decade off to a pretty bad start. The events that followed have changed many lives permanently.

Personally, these past 10 years have been pretty good for me. I welcomed my two precious babies into the world, and it just doesn't get any better than that.

I know the next ten years will hold many changes for our world and our family. I look forward to watching my boys grow and I pray that I will be open to the changes that God sends our way.

I could use this opportunity to make a list of resolutions and post them here on my blog for all to see like many other bloggers. But, I won't because they are all the same resolutions as many of you have: healthy eating, more exercise, weight loss, saving money, etc... Why set myself up for failure? I will instead chose to be pleasantly surprised when some of these things actually come to fruition. (see, I just listed them anyway...)

I wish you all well as we ring in this new decade. Thank you for taking the time to read my thoughts.
Happy 2010!

Christmas Craziness

In the past week, we have survived 1 Christmas program, 2 school Christmas parties, 1 firm Christmas party, Christmas with my Aunt and Uncle from West TN, trip to Kentucky to see JW's aunt and extended family, and 1 playdate today with 6 kids in my small house! And we made all these goodies today! With some homemade Chex Mix thrown in there too. Whew! It has been busy, but fun. In them midst of all this my Nana is in the hospital with pnuemonia. She contends that she will be out in time to fry the country ham for Christmas morning breakfast. We'll see about that...

Hopefully we will survive the next 3 days of Christmas chaos and then stay at home and relax until the New Year. That is my plan.

Life is good and we are blessed. The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. He is new every morning. Great is His faithfulness!

The boys and I made our Gingerbread House today. We have done this the past 3 years now. One of my friends gave me a great tip- Hot Glue Gun!! Forget the icing that comes in the kit- just go with the glue gun! It was so much easier and everything really stuck instead of kinda sliding apart! I think it turned out pretty cute.

We made cookies today too. We thought we would need some to leave out for Santa. I was tired of the Christmas trees, so we went with stars and angels. The stars just have a simple icing with red and green dots and the angels have icing with yellow sugar glitter halos. This was my first time to try angels and I really like how they turned out- much prettier in person. The picture doesn't really do them justice b/c you can't see the glitter very well.

December Update

This is just a short update with a few pictures.

We have had a busy couple of weeks. We went to the Santa Brunch yesterday after church with my parents. It was lots of fun. They had a craft table and cookie-making table for the kids. The boys were really excited about talking to Santa this year. The boys then went home with my parents and spent the night while we went to our Life Group Christmas Party last night. Having Life Group adult-only once a year is really nice. We laughed that we could actually enjoy eating and have a real conversation without 15 kids destroying the house!

I thought this picture of the boys with Santa turned out great!
This was my first attempt at making Christmas tree cookies. It really bothered Will that the trees had no ornaments, but I didn't have much time Saturday morning before our get together. I hope to try again this week...maybe....maybe not...

Ryan in front of the tree in his snowman pajamas

Ryan and Will in their Christmas pajamas

Welcome December!

It is a perfect December morning here- bright, sunny and cold. My car said 29 degrees as I drove Will to school this morning. It was beautiful to see the frost covering everything.
I must admit, I am glad to see November move on its way. We spent the first 2 weeks battling pnuemonia in Ryan, then Will ran a fever for a few days as well.
Although I do feel a slight panic as I realize Christmas is only a few weeks away, I still welcome it. We already have lights on the house, one tree up, and my gingerbread houses are coming out of their boxes. (I'm pretty sure JW has watched "Christmas Vacation" twice already.)
I try each year more and more to downplay the gifts of "stuff" and the ridiculous marketing and money-spending side of Christmas, and instead focus on the decorations, traditions, and family side of Christmas. We will build a gingerbread house, bake cookies and make Chex mix together. Will is already busy crafting Christmas items and is excited about our Elf on the Shelf making his appearance. It is a joy to see Christmas through his eyes. Ryan is mostly excited about getting to wear Christmas pajamas every night!

On another neat note, JW's firm moved into a new building last week. The Pinnacle at Symphony Place is a beautiful new building downtown across from the Schermerhorn Symphony Center. Nashville is really making some beautiful new additions to downtown. I am looking forward to going down there Friday afternoon to see the new building and his new office. We are also going to try to see the Georgia O'Keeffe exhibit at the Frist Center that ends in January while we are downtown.

We are all so blessed with our health and family. Hug your kids and have a great day!