Christmas 2009

Christmas at our house was great! Oh, it wasn't great in the amount of presents that we had for one another because to be truthful there we jokes about wrapping some boxes so that others would not know how little we had under our tree. That is fine, we were challenged with the effort to keep the girls so busy so that they would not realize how little they were going to get. It worked. We decorated, were creative in what we did for others so we cooked and wrapped and created things and there were surprises in what we gained this year that were soooo pleasurable the meaningful that I wouldn't want to take that away from each of us. Our tree broke and if you notice is just leaning in the corner of the picture. The stand for the tree broke and we just didn't want to waste our limited resources on a tree so we were HAPPY that we had this one. It fell in the night and broke a few ornaments but you know we cleaned it up and made a decision. That tree made it through the season and has now joined the Christmas Tree graveyard to be remembered in our silly little way in our pictures.


We slept in leisure and kept our morning going as long as possible. Much different from the days with 13 children at home and each of them taking a turn at unwrapping a present so that we could all enjoy the delight.

We counted our blessings not the packages this year. We reached out to those that were hard for us to do that for but we did and we have that memory and free feeling spirit of giving when it is hard to give. We ended our year in a way that made us proud of who we are and pleased with what we can achieve.