O Come O Come Emmanuel

"Advent should be dark and tense. The world desperately needs a Savior, and in advent we should feel the weight of that longing."
One of my wise pastors, Mike Cosper, wrote this on facebook and it has made me think a lot over the past 2 weeks of Advent about how we celebrate and what we focus on.




Advent Season is upon us and this year we have been a little more diligent about starting more traditions surrounding Advent. We really want our children (and ourselves) to be reminded of the birth of Christ and also the longing that we still have for Christ to return.

We have been doing a little combo Advent Calender/Jesse Tree thing with the girls. We put the Jesse Tree Ornament inside the calender (and sometimes a special treat). Ruby pulls it out and colors it as we read the corresponding story and sing a Christmas song/hymn. So far she likes O Come O Come Emmanuel and Angels We Have Heard On High. Not sure what I am talking about when I say "Jesse Tree"? Check out this link from Passionate Homemaking blog.

Ruby coloring one of her ornaments

I have also been reading the Christmas story to Ruby almost daily (they say repetition is good for little ones). We mostly read from the Jesus Storybook Bible but sometimes we have read from a little book my mom gave us called (i think) The Story of Jesus. I pick different parts from the story and find coloring pages online to color. So, the first day we colored a picture of the Angel Gabriel talking to Mary...one day we colored a picture of Joseph and Mary when they arrived in Bethlehem. This has been great to help Ruby remember more details of the story.
This is an old picture of Brian reading to the girls.
Also, here is a more recent picture of the girls. There will be more to come hopefully this week.

Party Time

 

A few pictures from Telia's first birthday party with friends and family!

Happy Veteran's Day

Happy Veteran's Day to my Dad, Brothers, Uncles, (late) Grandpa, (late) Grandad, (late) grandparents of mine and Brian's. Here are a few pictures of my Dad and Grandad.

Happy Birthday Telia Abigail

One year ago today (at 3:31 pm) we got to meet our beautiful second daughter Telia Abigail. We have had a great year with her and although we didn't get much sleep until she was 10 months old, we wouldn't change it for the world. We expected Telia and Ruby to be similar babies and they weren't at all which has taught us a lot of humility. We are looking forward to getting to know Telia's personality even more this year as she strives to keep up with her big sister and gets to know her new little baby brother or sister (oh yeah, we are pregnant again).

A look back at Telia's First Summer

Halloween Weekend

We had a lot of fun this past weekend. Ruby got to dress up several times, party, and go trick or treating.

Friday we had a pumpkin painting (although we were late and missed that part) playdate with some friends that we used to have baby playdates with. Ruby was very happy to dress up in her Cinderella costume that she borrowed from her friend Ellory.

I tried to make Telia one of the little mice friends that Cinderella has but not so sure it worked out for us.

Saturday we went to a fun, outdoor, family friendly Halloween party with friends from Sojourn. We convinced our 3 year old that she didn't want to be Cinderella but rather.....wait for it.......Gangrene (like a gang that is green). Needless to say we didn't win a prize for this but at least we did something...2 hours before the party we weren't even dressing up. Thanks Ems/Quillo's/Quillo's for the awesome time. Ruby said her favorite part was the hayride.

Brian showing Ruby how to roast a marshmallow all the while wondering if a flaming marshmallow was going to come flying from one of the other kids' sticks. He thought this was the scariest part of the evening.

And on Halloween evening we decided last minute to take Ruby trick or treating in our neighborhood. We are so glad that we went out and got to talk to some of the neighbors. Ruby loved giving candy away and going up to doors to say "trick or treat."

Bouncing Around at 7 months