MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU ALL!

Luk 2:10 - 14 Then the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger." And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying: "Glory to God in the highest, And on earth peace, goodwill toward men!"

I have heard it say that no single event has ever changed the course of human history quite like the birth of Jesus Christ.  He came to give us all not only eternal life, but to be our ever present source of comfort, love, and peace while we live our lives here on this earth.  There has never been a more perfect gift.  He came as a simple baby, born in a stable, without much materially to His name.  But His life here on this earth, and more importantly, His ultimate death on the cross, holds the power and miracle to change a human life forever.

I just want to take this opportunity to wish everyone of my new friends a very Merry Christmas and a New Year full of God's abundant love and blessings.  You have all added so much to my life this last year I don't think any of you could imagine.  It was a hard year for me as I adjusted to my daughter moving away and my "nest" finally be empty.  But God is faithful and good and He has filled my life with new opportunities and friendships.  I look forward to this new year and hope to get to know some of you even better, and maybe meet some of you face to face.  May you all enjoy your families and friends in these next few days and remember Him from Whom all these blessings flow.  Happy birthday Jesus!

CAN YOU ONLY IMAGINE THIS SIGHT!

HE WILL DIRECT OUR PATHS

 Proverbs 3 5 - 6  Trust in the Lord with all your heart. And lean not on your own understanding..In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths....


Today is Spiritual Sunday and I had already decided not to participate this week as my usually quiet house is full of family, as we have gathered to celebrate Christmas.  Not much time to spend on the computer.  But as I was doing my devotional this morning, I came across this verse, and felt I just HAD to share what the Lord has shown me this morning.

 For those of you who follow my blog at all know, Melody arrived on Thursday night to spend this week-end with us, as she and her husband are unable to come for Christmas this year.  Her brothers decided that rather than celebrate without her we would just escalate things and celebrate on the 19th with our traditional Christmas Day dinner and gift exchange.  This created a problem or two with me at first, and yet it wasn't long and I was completely "on board" with this plan.  Melody and I had many things planned for Friday, to include that evening going to the Candlight Pavillion for our anual fun dinner and a Christmas play.  We have been doing this every year since she was 3 years old.  Again, if you follow my blog at all you know, I am BIG on tradition and SLOW to change.  For at least a couple of weeks now I have been looking forward to not only our gathering on Saturday with the whole family, but also to Friday and "my day" with Mel.  These kind of days have become rare now as she has moved away, and when she does visit she is torn in so many different directions trying to visit and spend time with other family members and friends, it is hard to get much alone time with her.  But this visit was to be different as she had set aside the WHOLE day to spend doing the things we love to do together.  Shopping, lunching out, some baking, and mainly of course hours of uninterrupted time in sweet conversation.  BUT!!  When I awoke at 2:00 am on Friday morning it was not in excited anticipation of my day as I had planned, but sicker than I can remember being in quite some time.  Yes, I had the stomach flu.  The one sickness I just can't seem to fake it and just "move along as best you can" as I have always told my kids.  I was barely able to make it from my bed to the bathroom ALL DAY LONG, let alone any thing else I had planned.  I couldn't believe it was happening was all I could think of when I managed to think of anything at all besides how sick I felt.  Melody was there to "play nurse" which was my first thing I managed to be thankful for, and to do all the necessary shopping I needed STILL to do, which included 2 presents that were still left to buy.  But as the day wore on and I only became sicker (if that was possible) I began to except that our anual Christmas play was not to happen as well.  The tickets are non-refundable, not that going another night was a possibility anyway.  So that night my husband and Mel headed off with my middle son who filled in my spot and I layed at home sipping water and watching the Preacher's wife.  Not exactly what I had planned.  I will be honest with you all and tell you I was not only HUGELY disappointed, I was feeling pretty sorry for myself, and wondering just what the Lord had in mind "allowing" me to get this sickness at this particular time.  Yesterday morning I woke feeling soo much better I decided I might actually be able to function through the busy day ahead.  It did turn out to be a wonderful day.  I will tell you it was mainly do the fact that I have been blessed with such a wonderful family.  My husband not only COMPLETELY did the whole dinner (with some help from Mel and my grandson JD haha) himself, and it was WONDERFUL, he also did all the little things he just knew I would want done as well.  Got all my beautiful Christmas dinner dishes out, and cleaned and spent pretty much the whole day running around taking care of the things I would have usually done.  The grand kids all were excited and we all enjoyed ourselves just being together.  Both of my daughter in laws jumped right in to help out cleaning up etc., and I just kind of sat around chatting and visiting with everyone.  Everything may not have been like I had planned out, in fact far from it, but it was wonderful just the same.  This morning I woke up early and I am feeling almost totally myself.  I began reading my Bible and praying about this day and this verse in Proverbs practically jumped off the page at me.  Trust in the Lord with all of your heart...(even when you just really don't understand) lean not on your own understanding (even when all you can say is WHY Lord) in ALL your ways acknowledge Him, and He WILL direct your paths.  I am still not totally sure why the Lord let this happen but one thing I am very sure of.  Nothing happens by chance.  Maybe it was just to show me that sometimes I can lean on the others in my family to get things done and do them well, or maybe it was just so I might see and appreciate how much I am loved and blessed.   But this truth became very clear again to me this morning.  He WILL direct my path.  The pages of my life are being written by Almighty God Himself, and I will put my trust in Him.  Today is our LARGE extended family gathering today at my sisters house.  I am looking forward to it.  I am grateful it is today and not yesterday as I don't know if I could have made the long drive yesterday.  I have NO IDEA what this day might hold.  But I have comnitted it all to Him and trust He will work out all the details.  He WILL direct my path.  Here are a few pictures of our day yesterday.  Yes, my husband and Mel took several pictures for me KNOWING I would want to share them with you.  ENJOY.... I will not get the chance to get around and visit the other blogs who participate in this as I can hear the beginnings of people stirring,  But I will be by in the next couple of days or so.  To enjoy this posts, you can click HERE.  I pray that you all have a blessed day, and that we all remember to acknowledge Him in all we do.

I did this soo fast there was no time to check for errors, haha, PLEASE excuse any if you find them..I had some pretty cute captions for the pics, but don't know "what happened" OH well, you get the idea.

REASONS TO BE THANKFUL...

Tomorrow is Thankful Thursday and I will have to admit, I had a tough day...But even as I found this day unfolding, I did manage to find several things to indeed be thankful for.  I have proven this fact to myself many times over the last several years of my life.  There is ALWAYS something to be thankful for, even if you REALLY have to dig sometimes, haha.  I will warn you in advance that this story is LONG and somewhat draining.  I considered nipping it down (as my sons would say) but I am writing this for myself as well so that I will have a record of this day to look back on.  Plus, I think sometimes for me it is just good to go back through hard days in my head, looking for where the Lord blessed me.  To find other grateful hearts, click HERE...

My day started out EARLY (5:30 a.m.) as I had many things I wanted to get done before my son dropped off my grandson Cody as 9:30.  As I quickly scurried about making our bed and picking things up (where does all the "mess" come from?) I prayed and tried to plan out my day.  I ate a hurried breakfast and straightened the kitchen, annoyed now with myself that I had decided to leave the dinner dishes from the night before, as I now had quite the little chore ahead of me.  I finally finished that up and started up my washing machine.  I showered and dressed and began the TOTALLY ANNOYING task of trying to track down a UPS order that SHOULD have arrived yesterday.  I PAID for it to arrive yesterday, but it had not come.  I did a lot of my shopping online this year do to my arthritis making it difficult to get around.  I have decided NOT to do that again.  Not only was it difficult to see what I was ordering, all the different packages arriving and trying to remember what I had done etc., was not something a somewhat disorganized gal like myself should be on.  Figuring out that it was to be delivered sometime today between the hours of 10 and 2 presented a dilemma to my day.  First of all I had to leave to pick up my grandson from KG at 11:30, and had a hair cut appointment for him at 1:30 and plans to have the kids pics taken after that.  I arranged for a my middle son John to be here today while I was gone so that someone would be here to sign for it which this particular shipment was requiring.  THANKFULLY it was the ONLY one that had required a signature, or online shopping would have REALLY been dumb.  Anyway, I was THANKFUL that he was able and willing to do this, HOWEVER, AGAIN, the package did not arrive.  This will mean a repeat of this problem tomorrow.  Now to top it off, this is not even things I need for our Sat. gift exchange/Christmas, it is presents for my husband's birthday which is tomorrow.  However, the fact that it is my wonderful husband's birthday tomorow is definitely another reason to be THANKFUL.   How I praise God for this man.  I can honestly say I am quite certain I don't deserve him, and am eternally grateful that he has put up with my high maintence ways for 35 years.  I love him beyond reason, and my life has been blessed abundantly because of him.  But, on with my day.  My oldest son calls me quite frantic with several problems that have cropped up unexpectantly for him and wants to bring the baby over early.  I tell him that is fine and am THANKFUL that I had gotten up early and got at least a few things off my "to do" list before the baby arrived.  However, my son brings the baby in his jammies, needing his breakfast, and already kind of tired and cranky.  I fed the baby, bathed and dressed him, and began trying to get him to take a nap before it is time to get his brother from school.  He just didn't cooperate.  He is cutting 4 teeth and was just out of sorts.   At this point I am re-considering rather or not I should even attempt to get Christmas pictures taken of the boys.  He naps about 15 minutes.  SIGH....Then it is time to go get Jeffie from school.  He was soo happy to see me.  Another reason to be THANKFUL...He was soo excited as he had been sent home with a gift for me from his teacher for helping out in his classroom on Thursday mornings.  It was an absolutely darling gingerbread man box for holding cookies or whatever.  Again, soo THANKFUL for her thoughtfulness.  I took the boys home and fed them their lunches.  Cody seemed to be in a much better mood, so I decided to head out on my planned day.  The hair cut went well.  Definitely THANKFUL....We headed over to Victoria Gardens which is a fairly new HUGE outdoor mall.  The whole thing is like a small town city.  It is decorated beautifully for Christmas and you can hear Christmas music playing wherever you are at.  Things are pricey here and I don't shop here often to be honest, but it is very pretty and I do love to at least stroll around and look at things.  As I pulled into a parking place I noticed that the baby had dozed off.  Not sure what to do as I knew he needed the sleep, I considered just driving on home.  But looking at little Jeffie's face and knowing his excitement I decided to try to slip the baby into his stroller and pray he kept sleeping....yeah right....he weighs 24 pounds and you don't "slip" him anywhere.  At least I don't.  He woke up, and just lets just say, he was a little grumpy.  SIGH....I get him into the stroller and go into a store where I was going to see about getting the boys matching shirts for their picture.  They had a video going that the boys were enjoying and 15 minutes later I had the cutest little shirts you have ever seen, and they were 30% off as well.  Again, quite THANKFUL for that.  I managed to get the boys into their shirts and even changed the baby's pants.  Then considering I still had some time before the picture appointment, I decided that the baby really needed some new shoes.  His were definitely too small and besides they didn't match their shirts very well.  I got him a nice, really cute pair and they were 1/2 off!  I was finally on a roll.  I headed back to the picture place deciding I would just wait out front of their shop which faces the big Christmas tree and Santa's house and lots of decorations for the boys to look at.   Little Jeff was as good as gold.  Cody?  He was done.  Nothing at all was satisfying him at this point, but the appointment was in 20 minutes, SURELY I could make it till then.  I finally decided to let him out of his stroller and let him maybe walk around for the next 15 minutes or so.  In many many ways, THANK GOD I did this, as when I lifted him out I quickly realized he had messed his pants getting IT all over practically everything.  His pants and new shirt were covered, it was in his stroller etc.  I was somewhat hysterical at this point.  My sisters had met me there (with their grandkids), and my sister Diane and I headed for women's bathroom there where we had to strip him and practically give him another bath.  Cody is a very strong baby, and very strong willed.  He was difficult is the only nice way to say he was making this little chore exhausting.  We finally got everything all cleaned up, diapered him, and as I was reaching for his diaper bag I remembered that I had not grabbed him a spare outfit for just such an event as this.  I am somewhat out of practice as you can tell.  Well, after washing out his clothes and putting them in a gallon baggie (how did I manage to remember that you might ask?  Well, I didn't...my sister had one in her grand daughters bag THANKFULLY is the answer to that) we headed outside again as I wondered what I should do.  Get in my car and drive home should have been my answer.  But for some reason at that point (I have been known to be stubborn too) I was NOT going to leave after all of that without my pictures.  So I went back into the store and bought him another really cute outfit to wear.  Now the fact that he is actually in desperate need of clothes (he is growing soo fast) helped take the sting out of that.  I hurried back (by now my knees are sooo done) and re-dressed the baby.  It is time FINALLY for my appointment and I headed into the store and began the "wait".....What in the world I could have ever been thinking?  OF COURSE you will wait, even with an appointment...it is Christmas time and they are sooo busy.  By this point Cody is simply totally wild.  I have given him everything I can toss him from my purse and each item is given 15 or 20 seconds of consideration by him and he tossed to the floor.  He cries.  I pace...and just as I have FINALLY decided, you know what, this just wasn't meant to be, they call our name.  I practically limp over thinking to myself Jeffie will have to do this by himself, Cody will NEVER cooperate.  Here is where I felt the Lord took mercy on me and decided to reward my diligence and desire to have a cute Christmas picture to add to my collection, as Cody suddenly morphed into a dream baby.  He smiled (THANKS to his cousin Jackie) and they actually got several REALLY cute pictures of the boys together.  I was VERY VERY THANKFUL for that.  I picked out a couple of pictures and was THANKFUL that I managed to stick to my goal of buying very few of the pictures and just got a couple of cute poses of the boys.  If I had a scanner (which I don't right now) I'd show you just how cute they were, making all the hassle worth it.  My daughter-in-law arrived shortly after we were done with the pictures.  We were planning on having dinner and then letting the kids play in  the "snow"  they manufacture every night.  I was sooo tired, and sooo done I was wondering if I would have the strength for this.  Little Jeff however was soo looking forward to this, and had been soo good all day that I couldn't bear to say I was leaving.  And after all, Leah was there now to "handle" the baby.  Well, within a few minutes we discovered that due to the economy they were NOT doing the snow this year.  Sooo, we let the kids play for a while and I did take a few pics of the kids by the gorgeous Christmas tree.  But this didn't really work out either as the lighting was bad and no matter what I did I couldn't get the red out of their eyes.  Soo, I only have one to show you but you will at least get the idea. 

I am sorry this was soo long, and soo draining, and for those of you who have stuck with me to the end of this I just want to say that overall I am GRATEFUL for this day.  I got my darling Christmas picture.  I had a few experiences that I know I will laugh about someday.  God is good and I am GRATEFUL that I am in the position I am to enjoy my grandkids.  Even when they are teething and fussy.  I am GRATEFUL for my wonderful husband and am excited to celebrate his birthday tomorrow rather his presents come or not.  And I am GIDDY as my Melly is coming tomorrow.  How I have needed her this week.  Not only on this wild day, but for 100 little reasons as well.  Yes, God is soo good to me, and I am as always soo GRATEFUL.   Just look at all the RED thankfuls and gratefuls in my day!

How darling is little Jeffie's shirt and smile?

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CAPRI ANGELINA CLASS

Today, Monday December 14, 2009, is my precious grand daughter Capri's fifth birthday.  She is my youngest son James's oldest daughter, and has brought sooo much joy and happiness into the hearts of her parents and her grandparents, it could never be measured. 

Capri is the big sister to both JD and Donatella and is such a big help to her mama.  She is bright and enjoys attending her Pre-K class 4 days a week.  She has been blessed with a wonderful imagination.  She can weave an elaborate game of make believe out of "whatever" she can find to play with.  She has only to close her eyes and she becomes whoever it is that has caught her fancy on any given day.  Recently, her love is for Fancy Nancy.  For those of you who are not familiar with this wonderful character, let me just say, she is glitsey and sparkly and fancy in all she wears, says and does.  Soo much fun for a "girly girl"  5 year old.  Her birthday party Saturday was done based on this theme, and everyone who attended had such a good time.  There were crowns for all the girls to wear, and face painting and games, a pinata full of candy, and many other goodies and sweets, and a cake that really was too pretty to cut, made by Kristi @ Yoursugarrush.  Larissa, Capri's mama, read all the kids some Fancy Nancy books while they munched on some popcorn.  Larissa, who had obviously read those books once or twice, haha, did a wonderful job keeping the attention of all the kids, along with most of the adults who were there.  It was a perfect way to celebrate the life of a sweet little girl who has captured the hearts of all who know her. 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY my sweet Capri...Grandma loves you soo much!!  May the Lord bless you and keep and make His face to shine upon you now and forever more. 

Here are some more pictures of this little cutie, and a slide show I put together of her party.  ENJOY...

FANCY NANCY

A BUTTERFLY..LOOK AT THOSE BLUE EYES

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SNOW WHITE

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Make a Smilebox slideshow

OBEDIENT CHILDREN

 Ephesians 6 1 - 3  Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Honor your father and mother, which is a first commandment with a promise: that it may be well with you and you may live long on the earth.  

I have been going through the book of Ephesians recently in my personal devotional time.  It has always been one of my favorite books, and though I have of course read and heard this verse many, many times, I found myself really dwelling on it and wondering why the Lord felt that this particular commandment was SO important that He included with it a promise such as this.  Children, OBEY your parents...sounds simple enough right? Children are to obey their parents.  Pretty basic.  But as I was really thinking about this I began to see that IF a child is to obey, he must first be taught obedience.   Anyone who has ever had a child does not need to be told that you do NOT have to tell that child how to be willful, naughty, or unkind. That all comes built into our sin nature through Adam, and therefore comes very naturally to us all.

Teaching our children obedience is perhaps one of the most important jobs any parent ever faces. From the time our children are old enough to understand a simple command or the word NO, the process begins. We all know of course the purpose behind telling our small children not to run into the street for example. We understand the dangers and possible disasters that lurk there and so we are quite firm in our commands that teach them the necessity of obeying that particular order. I remember very clearly it was THE ONLY TIME I ever had to swat Melody's little bottom when she was growing up. She was definitely old enough to understand what NO meant, stay by me, etc. But she willfully ran away from me and directly into the street. Now there was no car coming and no immediate danger, but that of course was not the point. She chose to disobey me and run into the street and received the immediate consequence of a couple of swats on her little bottom. She did not do that ever again. Now, she learned the consequences of disobedience quickly, unlike her older brothers, haha, but that is not the point I am trying to make. She may not have fully understood all of the horrible things that could have happened to her as a result of her disobedience, but she was able to quickly understand the immediate consequences of not obeying her mother. 

As parents we have the responsibility of teaching our children obedience. They can never understand how to obey God as they grow and mature, if they are not taught this at a very young age. There is always consequences (sooner or later) for sin.

I recently spent some time volunteering in the Kindergarten classroom of my young grandson. Truthfully, I was somewhat horrified at the blatant disobedience of some of the children. Obviously, no one expects a 5 year old to act any older than a 5 year old, but it was very clear to me, that a few of these children were not being taught much of anything at all. The confusion and occasional downright wildness in the classroom made it very apparent that these children were not being taught by their parents (or whoever it is fulfilling that role in their little lives) the importance of obedience. That teacher truly had her hands full as she tried to keep the class in order. How many parents too I wonder would blame this poor woman, or the other children, for the lack of obedience and respect that their own children have failed to learn? I fear for these children and for their parents expectations of their futures. Almost everything that child might ever hope to be or accomplish hinges on their ability to learn to obey.

As we grow into adulthood obviously we no longer owe our parents direct obedience. But we do owe them honor and respect. I know as I got deeper and deeper into my role as a mother, I learned to understand my own mother better, and my respect for all she went through and endured grew into a healthy appreciation for her. Yes, children must obey their parents, and parents must teach their children to obey.  And this all comes with a promise...it will be well for all of us and we will live long here on earth.

As we grow closer to the birth of our Lord, I hope we all our keeping our focus on Him.  I know for me I have found myself caught up a time or two with just the busyness of the season, and have lost my focus and therefore my peace.  How easy it is for me to get off track.  Thank God He understands me, and loves me even when I am busy being a Martha instead of a Mary.  Hope you all have a wonderful week.  To read the other inspirational posts that are being shared this week click HERE...Many thanks to Charlotte and Ginger for hosting this event.

MARY DID YOU KNOW?

Today is Then Sings My Soul Saturday and I decided to share another one of my favorite Christmas songs.  It just kind of sums it all up for us.  Today Jeff and I are traveling down to San Diego to celebrate the birth of our precious little granddaughter Capri Angelina.  She will be 5 years old on Mon.  She might be the sweetest little thing I have ever come across, but then Grandma can't be very obvjective, haha  She lives in a world of make believe and dress up, and her imagination carries her to places that keep not only her entertained, but those around her.  She finds whatever she can around the house for her various games and weaves her elaborate vision of reality.  I took this picture off of her mother's blog page as I just had to share it with all of you.  She is playing "Mary" here.  Her mother's dish towel is on her head to create her "look" and she is using her little sisters dollie for Jesus.  An empty box of wippies is the manager.  I LOVE it...Her parents have been talking to all of them about the birth of Jesus and what Christmas is all about, and as always Capri has put herself in the role of that wonderful woman who was blessed to be the mother of Jesus, the Savior of the world.   In my opinion it just doesn't get much better than this...

“Mary, Did You Know”



Mary, did you know
That your baby boy will one day walk on water?
Did you know
That your baby boy will save our sons and daughters?


Did you know
That your baby boy has come to make you new?
This child that you've delivered
Will soon deliver you


Mary, did you know
That your baby boy will give sight to a blind man?
Did you know
That your baby boy will calm a storm with His hand?


Did you know
That your baby boy has walked where angels trod?
And when you kiss your little boy
You've kissed the face of God


Mary, did you know?
The blind will see
The deaf will hear
And the dead will live again
The lame will leap
The dumb will speak
The praises of the Lamb


Mary, did you know
That your baby boy is Lord of all creation?
Did you know
That your baby boy will one day rules the nations?


Did you know
That your baby boy is heaven's perfect Lamb?
This sleeping child you're holding
Is the Great I Am

Hope you all have a wonderful day.  To find the others whose hearts are singing today, join Amy and click HERE.


 

THANKFUL FOR MEMORIES

Today is Thankful Thursday and to tell you the truth I was going to skip it this week as I have been soo busy and soo behind.  But this morning as I read some of the other posts I found myself inspired to write what has been on my heart as well.  You can find the other wonderful blogs HERE...Pour yourself a cup of coffee or tea and read as many as you can.  You will be soo glad you did.

As I wrote about in a previous post, we are going to do Christmas a little differently this year.  My daughter Melody lives in New Mexico with her husband Mike, and is not coming for Christmas.  Her husband is a dairy farmer.  This is a 7 day a week job, and between he and his father, one family member pretty much has to be there everyday to both oversee everything, and to just be there to solve any problems that might arise.  I've learned soo much about what is involved in this business that truthfully NEVER occured to me before.  I never went much past the reality of driving to the store for a gallon of milk, or a some wonderful cheese.  But that's another post, haha...Anyway, Mike's father is coming to California this year as his father is not doing well at all, so Mike and Melody will have to remain at home.   It was to be pretty much the first Christmas EVER that we were not all together.  Now, Melody is coming by herself for 3 days the week-end before Christmas, so that she can spend a little time with all of us for the season.  I've been soo busy feeling sorry for myself that she wasn't coming this year, that I missed the blessing that she will be here AT ALL in Dec.  Once my sons (she has 3 big brothers) heard that she was coming for a brief visit, they completely forgot their disappointment that she wouldn't be here for Christmas Day, and began to make other plans.  The next thing I knew our Christmas had been changed to the 19th.   My youngest son is coming up from San Diego with his family to spend the entire week-end with us as well.  My middle son will  be here too for the entire week-end.  And my oldest son lives 5 minutes away with his whole family.   We will not only be able to have our Christmas dinner and gift exchange together as we always have in the past, we will have MUCH more time to enjoy being together as well.   The little ones will not be exhausted as they usually are from their early morning Christmas morning excitement either. We are planning on decorating Christmas cookies and making a gingerbread house, which there would have never been time to do together in the past.  For years and years at our house (when our kids were older anyway) we have always had the tradition on Christmas Eve of going to church together, and then having dinner and getting into our PJ's for one gift, and then we would make hot chocolate and watch George C. Scott's A Christmas Carol together.  For the last few years it has just been Jeff and I and Melody, but this year we are planning on putting all the little ones to bed, and then watching  this wonderful movie together again.  I am soo excited to revive this old tradition.  The next day we will go to my sister's house for our annual extended family Christmas celebration with all their aunts and uncles and cousins.  Melody will leave for home the next morning in plenty of time to get home to her husband to make new memories and traditions with him for Christmas.  On Christmas Eve this year we have decided to travel down to San Diego and spend the day with my youngest son's family and go to church with them and then have dinner over there.  Something we have never been able to do in the past as I have always had so much to do for Christmas the next day and we were going to be getting together then anyway.  I am looking forward to this new plan MUCH more than I ever thought I might be.  The kids will be soo excited.  I am not sure what we will do Christmas Day.  Maybe not much of anything at all.  Who knows, sleep in and relax the day away.  But today I am grateful for memories.  Not only for all the old ones I have been busy remembering these last couple of weeks as I have been pulling out my decorations and going about the various different Christmas rituals we have always enjoyed, but for all the new ones that are sure to come as we again gather together to celebrate the birth of our Savior.  I have been soo blessed this year and cherish the memories He has given to me.  I pray I never forget them, but more importantly that I never forget to be thankful.