We had a lot to celebrate this month. It started with my nephew Eliot coming home on CHRISTmas Eve from Alaska.
Of course, the reason for the season and celebrating this month is the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We should be merry indeed!
I love all things CHRISTmas!
We also have a few other December birthdays (and one coming soon in January) to celebrate. Lyric and I weren't celebrating birthdays, but we we got to tag along with Mike, Gabrielle, Cokie and Darby to Fogo De Chao. Remi had to work, but I think she had a pretty Happy Birthday nonetheless.
Finally, we are celebrating our new puppy, Barkley. Cokie named him. He is a chocolate Australian Labradoodle. He is supposed to be like his parents, who are extremely smart. The breeders said he would make a good therapy dog (maybe we do need therapy!). He is supposed to be gentle, curly and large. We will see! Right now the kids are fighting over who gets to sleep with him.
This is Barkley's Dad. We are told Barkley will probably look like him.
And this is Barkley's Mom.
Barkley's litter.
Oh one more thing to celebrate...Shepard and Cokie finished laying my new wood floors! OMGoodness! Shepard loves working on the house!! How lucky/blessed can I get!!!
Shepard and Cokie laid almost all the floors downstairs by themselves. All Shepard can talk about is starting on the upstairs!
And what I've really been enjoying doing this winter--actually, love, love doing--is reading all (boxes) the letters my Mom saved over many years . Letters from my Grandparents, parents, Aunts and Uncles. They are almost all gone, so these letters are an amazing way to "really" learn about them all. There are even letters my Mom wrote her Mother when she was a teenager! Obviously, way before I was born! My Grandmother was in the hospital and my Mom wrote "I need to milk the cows. I sure don't want to." Then a letter my Mom wrote before I even learned to walk and how in my walker I stomped my feet in the dog food and made a mess. Sweet letters my Grandma wrote my Grandpa and how she couldn't ever live without him. Letters that my Grandpa wrote about which children he was pleased with and the few he wasn't. Letters my Aunt wrote my Mom about who my Aunt believed was demon possessed! Letters from another Aunt who had been to the alter to accept Jesus. Personally, I wasn't even sure she was saved. Another Aunt talking about getting through her hard marriage and divorce and bragging about all her new boyfriends. Yep, most are all gone now, but I'm learning a lot! : - ) In the end though they all loved one another and the letters are so sweet.
We e are but dust” (Ps. 103:14). David asked the Lord, “make me to know my end and what is the extent of my days; let me know how transient I am. Behold, You have made my days as handbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing in Your sight; surely every man at his best is a mere breath” (Ps. 39:4-5).
Job declared, “I will not live forever…for my days are but a breath” (Job 7:16), and James wrote, “you are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away” (Jam. 4:14b).
