Merry Christmas

I didn't get Christmas cards out this year and I feel bad about it. I have talked myself into doing one of those "letters" after the New Year and I am going to pretend that it was my plan all along! I didn't really run out of time, I had it. But when given the choice of cutting out paper snowflakes with my kids, or going to the North Pole of Texas with the family or spending time Christmas caroling (no matter how off key it was) with the teenagers at church, I decided the cards could wait...and wait....and wait. Then, I enlisted the help of Savannah. I signed 80 cards and Savannah practiced her cursive writing by writing the names of the recipient on each card. We got 80 cards done and we were only at the letter H. Whew! I was pretty much out of time to utilize the church post office so I reluctantly set aside the cards and pretended they would get done when they got done. And guess what? They never were completed. Funny how that happens.

So here's the plan....Hopefully in a few days, while I am in the beautiful state of Colorado, someone will snap a cute picture of my family all bundled up. Then I will make some great looking stationary with it and write a letter telling you all the little known details of our lives in 2010. Good enough??? I hope so...cause it's 11:14pm on Christmas day and the mail doesn't run tomorrow!

Truthfully, I haven't ever enjoyed a Christmas season the way I have this one. I felt more prepared (though not perfectly) and less stressed. There were only 3 days of the entire month of December that were crazy...that's better than normal everyday life around here! I am overwhelmingly grateful for the gentle reminders of the reason for the season these past few weeks. The opportunities that I was given to share the nativity story with my kids was something that I had prayed would happen. From cutting out the nativity from white copy paper to dressing up like the characters from Luke 2, the kids gave me a childlike perspective of the Christmas story. What a special time that was!

So now (11:26pm) with just a half an hour or so left before the official day of Christmas begins, I'm hoping my bloggy friends and family experience that same peace that came down over 2000 years ago....because if we there was ever a time we needed it, it's now.

Merry Christmas!