Merry Christmas!  

This year has been so full, and happy, and BUSY.  Even when we don’t have anything on the calendar, with so many people in the house, it always feels alive and BUSY.  But that is a good thing!

Nick moved work positions this year.  I never know his “official” title, because they seem overly complicated and politically correct and this one is no different.  He was put over an expansion project at this Kellogg’s plant.  This past month and for the next two weeks is the execution period and it has been busy and stressful for him.  We have hardly seen him and we have had lots of popcorn for dinner with a pajama party-movie night to help  keep me sane when he leaves before we are up and comes home after we are in bed.  With all of that, he still seems to manage to find some time for us and all the other obligations he has.

Brynli is in 6th grade this year.  I think she is excited that it is her last year in Elementary School!  She is doing great in school.  Everyone tells her that she looks just like her mom and she is young enough to still take that as a compliment!  She loves to dress up for school and accessorize (she might look like me, but she is much more fashionable than her mom).  Other than fashion, Bryn loves to cook and bake and I love it.  She is such a big help with everything, but especially with feeding this bunch of wild banshees.

Arwyn is in 5th this year.  While she and Brynli usually get a long well, Ari likes to make sure that her interests are different from her sister!  If we let her, her only interests would be watching tv and playing video games.  Luckily for her, she rarely gets to do those things, so she is enjoying  (forcibly) piano and (of her own volition) basketball.  All of the kids like to read, but Ari, more than anyone, can usually be found hiding from mom somewhere (trying to avoid conscription to some chore) reading a book.  

Chance is in 3rd grade.  While the girls seem to enjoy school, Chance tolerates it.  He is good at it, but insists he is bored.  Then again, Chance is bored a lot at home, so it probably isn’t just School.  For all that Chance tries very hard to cultivate a real reputation as a clown, a boy and a tease, he has a soft heart and people are always telling me what a sweet, good boy he is!

Chase is five and missed the Kindergarten cutoff by only a few weeks.  I am happy he missed it.  I love having Pierce and him home with me to keep me entertained and to play with each other.  Going places during school won’t be the same when Chase isn’t with me.  Chase makes friends with everyone, everywhere we go.  He loves to talk, and if he doesn’t have something to say, he’ll make something up just so he can say it.  He is a bright boy, so while it is obvious, at times, that what he is saying is pure…. um….. imagination, he says it in such a way and with such assurance that it is hard not believe his blarney.  It is even harder not to laugh!

Pierce is well loved and he returns that love on all of us with smiles and hugs and words.  He loves to run and does it everywhere, always starting out with a superhero pose and swing, before taking off.  He always tells us “I won,” even when we didn’t know we were competing!  Pierce is also a bright one, with a good vocabulary.  I don’t know if it was because of a plugged ear drum (we hope) or something else, but despite his vocabulary it is hard to understand what he is saying.  It is made harder by the fact that I’m trying to interpret his speech into simple phrases and he is using words I don’t expect him to know.  If Chase doesn’t having me laughing, Pierce does!

There isn’t much to share about me.  All the chaos and my advancing age has me loosing a little bit of my mind everyday- but I couldn’t be happier.  My life is pretty simple, caring for my family and trying to do a few other things along the way, so there isn’t much to share.  

We got the Christmas decorations out dunning Thanksgiving break.  We have two nativity sets and the girls helped to set them up.  Since the moment they have been set up, we have fought a battle with the younger boys to keep them from messing with the nativity.  I finally gave up, but Brynli kept fixing the figures so they were evenly spaced and facing forward.  She would then rant and rail at her younger brothers and as soon as her back was turned, they would crowed the masses back around the baby Jesus, with their backs to us.  One day, after Brynli had again fixed the set, it was obvious that the boys had come behind and “fixed” her fix.  I shook my head and wondered why, with all the Christmas decorations and presents to bother, this was the one that they kept messing up.  Why couldn’t they leave the figurines evenly spaced and facing outward?  And then what had been obvious to me since they started it, finally clicked in by mind and heart.  They were making sure that the focus of the nativity scene, and all of its’ characters, is on the Christ Child.  I hope that when our family has the opportunity to see our Savior and worship him, that we don’t do it evenly spaced and facing outward, in order to look our best.  I hope we crowd forward and in, close to Him.

Merry Christmas!