Christmas Celebrations

The month of December is always lots of fun for us and always very busy. Every Saturday, and some Sundays, we have Christmas parties with different sides of our families. I always love it and don't mind the busyness because there is such a fun aspect that we are celebrating Christ so much throughout that month. I'm always the person that loves to have the Christmas cards done right away and mailed the weekend of Thanksgiving and it just seems that starts off a magical month of rejoicing.

For the past few years we have been celebrating Thanksgiving and Christmas with the Hamstra side of the family at Thanksgiving. With so many people, and half from out of town, it works out to have one fun party. This year with Grandma having had the stroke over the summer, we held the party in the room upstairs at Oak Grove so it was more safe for her. We had a lot of fun playing games and sitting around chatting. Afterward we went over to Mary's house for desserts and grab bag gifts. I was wondering how I was going to handle have to leave Gram there by herself while we all went to celebrate without her but, as mom told me would happen, she was very tired by the end of the party and very much ready to go back to her room. I'm trying to take advantage of the time we have with her now as we had such a scare this summer. I also just so much enjoy the friendship that she and I developed since we moved here. So many things that I see God had in mind for this move.

Opening presents with Grandma
Me & Gram Hamstra

Another thing that was bittersweet this year was having my Grandma Ferguson home. My Ferguson grandparents had been traveling to Florida from Oct-April every year for many, many years now so we haven't been able to see them at the holidays. While we miss Grandpa, it was very neat getting to have Grandma around this year to enjoy the fun. I was thankful for the strength that I have seen in her the past few months that I know can only be coming from God; going through her first holidays without Grandpa and being someplace different. She has been attending church with my sister and my Aunt and Uncle and she's really enjoying it.

One tradition we always used to do with Grandma Ferguson when we were little was make Christmas cookies. A few of us decided that would be a fun thing to do this year with our kids with Grandma. We had a great time!One of the days at Jackson's preschool in December they got a special visit from Santa! The teachers let us know ahead of time so we could take pictures. I love Santa and while I know some families think including him takes away from the meaning of Christmas, our family does a great job of celebrating the "magic" of Santa while keeping Christ the focus. Our kids seem to really be able to grasp that; we are thankful!

Jackson was a very brave boy this year with Santa :) We actually went to see him again with Emma when he was at the American Legion and Santa looked at Jackson and said "I saw you at preschool!" Jackson was very excited he remembered him :)Alaina was a little skeptical of this big man in a red suit!
Jackson's preschool class
Emma got to do some special programs this year too! Our Love Notes Children's program this year was called "The Greatest Christmas Card in the Whole Wide World." It was all about the different ideas an traditions of Christmas and how we shouldn't forget Christ. It was a very neat program!
Emma was part of the greenery card and got to be a Christmas tree. She also had two lines this time and did them with pure Emma style ;)
She also had a wonderful Christmas program at her school this year. The theme was "Christmas Around the World." She sangs Christmas songs in 5 five different languages!
We took some fun pictures before we left because school gym pictures never turn out!

Since I'm Emma's room mom at school, I got to plan her Christmas party. It was lots of fun! Her teacher is so great!We had a couple of other Christmas event that we went to that we had a wonderful time at but didn't take any pics :( And since this post is getting so long and I've been working on it for a while, I'll go ahead and be done except for this one last thing......
We always let the kids eat cake for breakfast on Christmas morning to celebrate Jesus' birthday. This year Emma came up with ho, ho cake because since Santa works for Jesus to help share all His birthday presents, she thought He might think it was funny to have a "ho ho ho" cake ;)

Jack's First Deer

This has been Jack's second year of hunting and he finally got his deer! He has spent countless hours in his tree stand waiting for a deer to come along. I sit in the house at the window praying for God to just bless him with the excitement of this accomplishment.

Our good friend Rod fell from a tree stand last year and was hospitalized for several months with two severely broken ankles. Well, in the process of visiting with him during his recovery period, Jack and Rod got to talk quite a bit about hunting and Rod invited Jack to come with him for a weekend to a hunting lodge that he takes some of his family members to. The guys had a great time over the weekend hunting, playing games and cooking. It was almost like summer camp for grown ups!!

Anyway, Jack got his first deer while he was out there and was very excited to share this experience with Rod and his son Daryl. We are very grateful that during this time of a very poor economy we are able to be blessed with this opportunity for free meat to take care of our family. God can be so cool!!

Amanda and Stephen sitting in a tree........

I am so excited to write about the fact that Amanda is engaged!!! Stephen came into her life several years ago and they have been friends, but at the beginning of the summer they began to date and now they are engaged and I get to help plan her wedding for this April!

Amanda has been a part of our family and a huge part of my life for about seven or eight years now. God has a special place for her in my heart that I can't quite describe. It's almost like we are twins that were born in different years, in different towns, by different mothers........ well I told you it was hard to describe!! :)

Anyway, We've been very excited to add Stephen to our little clan here. We knew he was going to fit in when about half an hour after meeting us, he shared a chewed up, dropped on the floor apple with Jackson. He is a very loving person who absolutely adores Amanda. They laugh a lot and are comfortable with each other in any and every situation while challenging each other daily in their relationship with God. I'm so grateful that God has answered our prayers with this wonderful man who He has prepared for her.PS - Emma is the flower girl and Jackson is the ring bearer :) and of course, I'm the matron of honor ;)

Halloween

The scary Dinosaur Dragon
The beautiful TinkerBell
Not too much to say about Halloween this year except that we had lots of fun and got LOTS of candy!

We brought the kids to see all the great-grandmas as usual. They just love getting to see the kids all dressed up. Also, Amanda and her boyfriend Stephen came to spend the weekend with us as all. So many special people that we get to share so much fun with!
Grandma BGrandma HamstraGrandma GGGrandma FergusonJackson, Stephen, Amanda & Emma on our way to the Halloween parade.Jordyn, Cole, Kirstyn and their friend Katie stopped by to say hello and get a little candy :)

Emma Turns 7

So now for some catching up on the blog! Emma had her 7th birthday on Oct 13. She was very excited about this new milestone. Jack and I on the other hand, were not so excited. Seven sounds so much older than six. Five and six are still that little girl possible Kindergarten age but seven sounds so much more grown up. Guess we'll have to get used to this as now she already talking about eight!! Lord help us!

We got up in the morning and of course she was SO excited. She had a special outfit that we had bought for her birthday that she got to wear to school. Speaking of school........ she got to have anyone she wanted come to have lunch with her in her classroom at school. It was so fun!After lunch we got to go to the playground with her. Here is a picture of her with some of the girls from her class. (Yes, mostly Dutch children go to her school!!)After school we packed up and took her out to dinner at Red Robin. We let her bring a friend and she picked her friend Karissa.
When we got home we had family over for cake, ice cream and of course PRESENTS! Emma was very shocked and excited that Grandma Kathy got her Kit! Her very first American girl doll. Honestly I think they are way too expensive and not near worth the money but Grandma loves to spoil and Emma was very grateful and of course excited.We got her a guinea pig but had to give it to her a week early because that was when he was available. she named him Hooper like the guinea pig host of PBS kids. Sadly, Hooper dies this past Sunday. She was pretty upset but is doing better now.We are blessed with this amazing little girl. She truly is a gift from God. We have our struggles with her but she has an amazing heart for others and an amazing heart for God. She loves to memorize her scriptures for school and not only memorizing them but understanding them. She asks a lot of questions always wanting to make sure that she understands what things mean. She is now reading at over a third grade level and has only ever missed one spelling word this whole year. (the last test before Christmas break, must've been really excited because she hadn't missed it at home all week!) She is very eager to learn and always willing to share and help other (besides her brother of course!). I love the way she is with younger children. Always very patient and loving. What a bundle of joy we have in this child!

Coming up on a Clear Schedule

See pictured here my monthly calendar. Notice the bottom week (the week of New Years), it is actually clear!!! Not even everything is added onto this dry erase calendar because it won't all fit. All of the things that I do during the day aren't even added! So, that being said, I will be catching up on the blog in the next few weeks since i have a clear schedule. Thanks to those of you who have still been checking it :)

Just a quick update: No foster children yet :( Still watching Alaina :) Still caught up with my read through the bible :) :) :) Still having playgroup every couple of weeks :) Emma and Jackson are doing fine :)

Keep checking :)

Jackson's First Field Trip

Today we got to go to Harvest Tyme Pumpkin Patch with Jackson's preschool class. He was very excited and had been looking forward to the trip for awhile now.

Of course one the the most exciting parts was that he got to ride a school bus for the first time!!They had a "sandbox" but it was filled with corn. Now this is something I could get into to!! I've never let the kids have a sandbox because I don't want to have to strip them down every time they come in from going outside to play. (I know I'm terrible but they do have lots of other fun toys to play with outside!). This was fun and no mess!Of course he LOVED riding the tractors!They also had this fun water race game where you pump the water and try ot get your rubber ducky to the end first. Very neat!
They also got to watch a movie about how pumpkins grow. Not necessarily something that preschoolers are real excited about, but he did have fun picking up hay and throwing it at his friends :)

He got to go on TWO hayrides! He loves tractors (and pretty much everything "boy").We rode the hayride out into the pumpkin field and he picked out one for him and also a nice one for Emma.When we got back with out pumpkins, they had little kits for the kids to put a foam sticker face on their pumpkins. It was a very fun, easy way to decorate them, however contrary to the box sandbox statement above, I do like to get messy every now and then so we probably will be carving the pumpkins so we can have fun playing in the goo and the baking the pumpkins seeds.It was a very fun day that I got to spend with my little man. As he reached over and laced his fingers with mine to hold my hand and laid his head on my shoulder on the bus ride home, I was reminded how completely blessed I am to spend these days with him and watch him grow into the wonderful little boy he is. I am blessed to have children with manners and respect for others and a wonderful love for learning and fun. Jackson has been learning so much this year and I love to see him want to do homework and get so excited with himself that he counted to 100 without any help. I thank God for the blessing of these children.