Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas . . .

Greetings from Willmar, MN! We are here for the weekend celebrating an early Christmas with the Roisum side of the family - it's so fun to be here at Christmastime - you can always count on Minnesota to have some snow, and Grandma and Grandpa Roisum's house is so festive. Mark's brother and his family joined us today, and we had a GREAT day - opening gifts, eating tons of good food (and had two coffee runs to Dunn Bros.!), chatting, and it was just fun seeing all the cousins play together. Now the kids are in bed, we all have full tummies and we're just relaxing.

Tommorrow we head home, and will celebrate Christmas at home - for the first time! - just the four of us. We'll go to our own church on Christmas Eve, have a special dinner, watch The Nativity Story with the kids, then spend Christmas morning at home, and in the afternoon will head out to Spearfish to celebrate with the Horaks.

So, this will be our last post before Christmas - I'm putting the computer and all other responsibilities away for the next several days and am going to focus on the two most important things in my life - my precious family and my Savior, Jesus Christ, who is the reason we celebrate. My prayer for you, our dear friends, is that you will have a peaceful, purposeful Christ-filled Christmas.

"For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever." Isaiah 9:6-7

WHEW - Breathing a Sigh of Relief!

WOW, we had a crazy week last week - and especially the weekend! It's just been one thing after another - we made it to all 8 parties last week (that I mentioned below), and everything else we had on the calendar. Amazing - I didn't think we'd get it all done! The kids did great with all the events, but got pretty worn out. Noah, who hasn't napped in months, has had naps on Sat., Sun. and today after school. He needs it!! The highlights of the week were the kids' two Christmas programs - school and church and a party we had here last night for church, which was really fun. The kids also attended two birthday parties (which we may have skipped, but they were for two of Jack and Noah's favorite people so we couldn't miss!)

Anyway, by the time everyone was gone last night and we'd cleaned everything up, I was so happy and at peace that we made it through an insane week and that now Christmas can just be about family. Nothing on the calendar this week (except my MOPS party tomorrow morning) and it feels SO GOOD. This morning I worked in Noah's classroom for a little while, came home and leisurely read the Sunday paper, then did a little wrap-up shopping - it was a such a great, non-stressful day! Tonight we're having our own little Monday Night Football family party - the kids have been looking forward to this all day - the Vikings play . . . . hmmm, someone . . . shoot, can't remember, Mark wouldn't be very proud of me! :) Anyway, I'm making the kids favorites for supper, and they had naps after school so we're going to let them stay up and watch the game. Then I gotta keep wrapping and start thinking about packing. We leave for Minnesota on Thursday afternoon - having Christmas with Mark's family over the weekend and returning home on Sunday to have our first Christmas at home. Kinda hard on our families, but we felt it was important for the kids, so we're looking forward to starting a few traditions of our own!

Closing with several pictures . . .

Here's Jack and Noah in front of our 10 foot tree - initially I thought it was way too big, but now I love it. Jack says he wants to leave it there permanently . . .

The school Christmas program - I can not describe how adorable this was - all the kids were dressed up as some part of the nativity. The amount of effort that went into this program was just staggering. Both Jack and Noah were sheperds. Jack is the last kid you can see on the right (maroon with gold sash), and Noah is in dark gray, to the above-left of the star sitting in the chair.

Jack doing the bells . . .

Noah doing the motions to the cutest Christmas song I've ever heard - a tear-jerker!

At church, right before their program on Sunday.

Jack saying his lines (couldn't get one of Noah, I had a bad angle!)

Hope you have a great week!

He Asked! She Said YES! (of course!)

Congratulations Josh and Marcy!! This is my "baby" brother and my future sister-in-law Marcy - we had big excitement around here this weekend after he proposed on Saturday. Marcy already seems like part of the family - she has fit in so well with all of us, there won't be much of a transition, which is awesome. I'm SO very happy for my little brother, who has snagged a wonderful Christian girl, and I'm also very happy for Marcy, who is getting one heck of a guy! :) We are all so excited and have already started pestering them about PLANS. More to follow in that area - they are just soaking up the moment right now, which is what they should be doing! We love you guys!

Tonight we had the kids' Christmas program at their school - it was THE CUTEST thing EVER! Oh my word, we just loved it. Little kids singing their hearts out about Jesus - there is just nothing like it. It was just the best. Jack and Noah did so well, and were so proud. Their "substitute" grandparents (our next-door neighbors) came with us since we didn't have any other family around, which was really special for Jack and Noah. I took lots of pictures, but haven't got them uploaded yet, so I'll post them once I get that done.

We are in the midst of an insane week - between the four of us, from now until Sunday, we have 8 parties to go to, in addition to several other things happening this week. Not sure how we are going to survive this, but we're jumping in head first, and we'll see where we end up! May have to eliminate some things as we go, depending on how the kids do. Even the fun things can be exhausting! 'Tis the season!

Have a great week!

Decorating and a Celebrity

We spent much of the weekend finally decorating for Christmas - I say finally because we have been looking at a huge "naked" tree all week! Finally got the lights on it on Saturday (took me 3 hours!! - It's a 10 foot tree) and then we finished decorating it with ornaments today. It always feels like a lot of work, but I always LOVE it when we're done. We don't follow any "theme" with our tree - it's just full of stuff we love - things that are special and have memories to all 4 of us. Some of our favorites are at the bottom of this post.

In other news, which I wanted to post last week but didn't get around to it - we had big excitement around here last Monday when we realized Jack had a "story" with an illustration published in the local newspaper on Thanksgiving!! The newspaper asked the local elementary schools to submit directions from the students on "How to Cook a Turkey." Zion's lunchladies sifted through the entries at our school, and submitted the ones they thought were "worthy," and then the newspaper chose 50 from the community to be published - one of which was Jack's! We missed it somehow on Thanksgiving, but when Jack returned to school on Monday, his teacher had it proudly displayed in their room - I felt awful that we missed it!! Anyway, Grandpa immediately went down to the paper and bought 6 copies. Here's Jack with his picture (it's on the left side of the paper) - looks pretty proud, no?

I'm sure you can't see the type, so here's what it says - "My Grandpa went hunting. He shot three turkeys because we have a BIG family. Grandma and Mom cook it for 50 hours at 50 degrees. Then they put butter and salt on it. We also have corn on the cob." Okay, so he has his facts a little mixed up - Grandpa was quick to point out to the GF&P officer in his office that the shooting ocurred DURING turkey season last spring - not now, in the off-season! :) And mom doesn't really have anything to do with cooking the turkey - that's all Grandma's doing, so I thought I should give credit where it's due! Anyway, it was funny for us to see what he came up with.

We're headed into our last fairly "normal" week before Christmas - starting next weekend, the calendar really gets crazy. Hope to enjoy some peaceful moments before then! Closing with a few of our favorite ornaments - obviously this one would be MARK'S:

This one is Jack and Noah's - it's lights flash along with the music it plays -

And this one is probably the oldest on the tree - this is one of mine from when I was a little girl - I remember getting SO excited every year when this one came out of the box. He's been chewed on by a family dog, and he's kinda funny looking, but I was attached to him, and he's been on every tree I've ever had! Look familiar, mom and dad?!?