WooHoo.....What a RIDE!

Bruce teaching Harrison to ride his motorcycle. That was hilarious. Bruce is obviously too big to sit on this thing, but he would lean all the way forward and put his feet out behind him. He did pretty good. LOL


And here he goes! My dad told him they would ride together next year in the Children's Christmas toy drive. Wouldn't that be cute?

Christmas Part IV

After we did our family time Christmas morning, we got ready and headed over to my mother-in-law's home for Bruce's family get-together. We don't take our time passing out gifts one at a time there. It's like a feeding frenzy at the shark pool. LOL Paper flying and bows stuck to the carpet. Kids yelling, "Where's mine!!?? Children losing presents, parents say, "awwww, that's nice" inbetween servings of chips and dip and story telling. You know, total chaos. LOL

Harrison got this keen laptop from his Grandmother. He was so proud. He said now that when I'm on my laptop he can be on his. Isn't that sweet?


This is my niece, Brandy. She is a senior in highschool this year and has an identical twin. They will be going to UNC Charlotte in the fall....at least I know one of them is. Not sure about the other. Not really sure which one is going to Charlotte. At any rate, here's Brandy. LOL


Here's Hannah with her gift from, I believe, Brittany....the other twin.


This is my sister-in-law Cindy. She's a native born Brit, but has been in the states since she was a little girl.


These are Bruce's brothers, Bryan and Barry. His brother Mitch is serving in the Navy and he and his family were not able to be home with us this year. Maybe next year.


Here's Harrison getting hugs from Grandmother for the Blueberry candle he gave her.


This is Carl and Liberty. Liberty is married to Bruce's brother, Barry. Liberty and Carl are from the Philippines and miss their family back home, but hopefully, we have helped them feel at home here. Here they are sporting the BB gun and accessories we got him. Don't worry, they're soft pellet. LOL


Hannah bought Marie this lovely fruit plate set. Marie likes the fruity stuff in her kitchen. I thought Hannah did good picking that out.


Here is Brittany with the newest member of our family, Mackenzie. Some of them call her Big Mac because she's very........um.........thick? LOL She is absolutely precious. The cutest and sweetest little thing. Smiles at everybody and everything. That little babydoll she's holding, we bought her for Christmas. She loved it. Kissed it, hugged it, bit it, slobbered on it. It was precious.


And of course Grandmother's are always happiest with a little baby on their lap to spoil and pinch. Grandmother doesn't pinch hard....it's more like a sqeeze on the cheek. :)


I took a nap after all the hoopla was over. When I woke up, everyone was gone or heading out the door. We stayed a bit longer and I helped Marie clean up the kitchen. What a mess! But it was great. We had a wonderful time with our families. I hope you all had a great time with your families too.

God has blessed us in so many ways this year. Our family is just one of those blessings. We love you all!

Another Update On Daddy

Mom and dad just stopped by after daddy's doctor appointment with the bone doctor. He did break his wrist, but more x-rays showed he has broken his elbow also. Which prevented them from putting a cast on his arm because the port for his dialysis is in that arm. So they put a velcro splint on his wrist and he has to keep his arm in a sling for his elbow. Please keep him in your prayers. This will probably take a while to heal. Especially since he'll have to move his elbow in and out for dialysis. Bless his heart. :(

Christmas Part III

Christmas Day we awoke to the sound of whispers and giggles coming from Hannah and Harrison as they gazed upon the gifts too large to wrap. We came in to see their faces and Justin soon followed. Then we began our gift giving.......after scripture reading and prayer, of course!

Justin with his Tippman 98 series paintball gun and accessories. We got him a big box of paintballs. Now he can participate in getting himself pretty well bruised up the next paintball outing we have with the men at church. LOL


Harrison got this little motorcycle. He was really thrilled with it. At first he was somewhat nervous about riding it. Now he gets up every morning ready to ride!

Several months ago, Hannah saw this pink footlocker and began saving her money for it. I was sort of afraid it would get gone because there was only a few of them so I bought it and kept it in Bruce's building for Christmas. Such disappointment when she saved her money and they were all gone. Imagine her surprise when realized she got it for Christmas. She also got a motorized scooter which she has enjoyed very much.

Justin got a new leather jacket he really liked.

Here's Harrison with his stocking stash. YUM!

Hannah got the Creative Zen Microphoto MP3 player. It holds lots of songs and will hold all of her pictures that she downloads to it. She was thrilled with that. Her daddy has downloaded her music to it and her pictures. She loves it.

Justin's electronics have become congested in his room and he's constantly having to plug and unplug something so he asked for an outlet strip. Well, we took the cord out and wrapped it, making it a very long gift. He couldn't figure out what it was but was happy when he realized it was what he asked for.

He was also thrilled with his Carolina hoodie.

Bruce asked for a new digital tuner, which I searched everywhere for and couldn't find. Apparently, this particular tuner was the hot ticket item for musicians this year. I went to seven different music stores and finally ended up having to order it from a music store in Minnesota. Who'da thunk it?

OK, now this was the funniest gift ever!! A couple of weeks ago, Bruce stood on something to change a lightbulb and what he was standing on broke. So he bought another one and we decided to get the kids one too. They needed one! Anyway, we got to thinking how funny it would be to wrap it up and put it under the tree. So we did. On the name tag, I wrote To Justin, Hannah OR Harrison. Whoever guesses the closest number, wins this gift. Bruce chose the number between one and ten, which was eight. Hannah said six, Justin said five, and Harrison said seven. Harrison won................................................

THE TOILET SEAT!!

Oh, such disappoinment. LOL, the looks on their faces were hilarious. When Harrison opened it up he snarled up his nose and said, "A TOILET SEAT?? A STINKY TOILET SEAT??" Bruce and I nearly fell over laughing. It was so funny.

I realize there were no pictures of me. I suppose I'm a camera hog. We did get videos though. LOL Bruce bought me a lovely necklace. It's a mother of pearl hibiscus with a blue topaz center. He also bought me a web cam. So if any of you have one, let me know and we'll chit chat sometime. It takes pictures and video clips too. Here's a picture of me after messing around with my new little camera. Not really flattering, but here it is just the same. :)

I asked for some new baking pans from Michaels and he bought me those. That was one of those practical gifts like Susan mentioned on her post and he wasn't sure if that was something I really wanted for Christmas or not. But it was and he got them for me. I've been using them everyday since and I love 'em!!

Daddy's Arm

Mishel from Season's of Life asked about daddy so I'll fill y'all in on him. Thanks for asking, Mishel. Daddy has fractured his wrist and has deep contusions or bruising in the wrist, elbow, and shoulder. He'll see the specialist Friday afternoon after dialysis. Please pray for him. He is in a good deal of pain. He is also having problems with inner ear which is making him very dizzy. He is on medication for that. Any prayer you offer up for him will be much appreciated.

:)

Christmas Part II

Sunday morning we went to church and I was expecting to teach Sunday school as I had been for the last few weeks. Mrs. Vondie had fallen and broken her foot and was not able to climb the steps to her classroom so I said I would fill in for her. It was the three year old class, which meant I had the cutest kids in the church. But when I got up there, Mrs. Vondie said she just couldn't take it any longer and had to be with her younguns. So alas, I said my farewells and went back to my own class with Bruce.

We did sing our two Christmas songs I shared with you. Bruce bought me a little camera for my laptop so maybe I can film the songs for you after all. Pastor preached on the Birthday of the King. Who is going to the party? And what gift are you taking for him? It was so good. During the invitation he had us sing the Happy Birthday song. Five hundred voices singing that quietly brought tears to many eyes including my own. It was very moving. Sunday night, Brother Johnny preached briefly as Pastor left for his mother's home in the Raleigh Durham area.

My family met at my parent's home and we had our Christmas celebration. We started out with prayer and food. Followed by a song. Then daddy read Luke 2 as he has done for as long as I can remember. He had a little Bible lesson with it. We prayed. Had another song in celebration of our Saviour. And then began opening our gifts. Here are just a few pictures of the very many pictures that were taken that night. There were many laughs during these six hours of festivities.

This is mom preparing our table of Christmas pickups. Yes, she's in her jammies....but she did dress it up with her pearls. LOL


This is my brother's daughter, Taylor. Her daddy is the one that passed away two years ago. We missed him this night of celebrating, but it was so good to have his baby girl there with us.


This is my niece Jessica and Jordan putting the angel that Harrison bought my mother on top of her tree. She had a teeny tiny one and that just bugged him deeply so he bought her one for Christmas.


Jordan, my niece Amber's boyfriend, bought her a new stereo CD system for her car.


My nephew Michael. He's my brother John's son. My mom had wrapped him a gift card about five or six different times beginning in a large box. The boxes kept getting smaller. It was so funny watching him open them.


Here is daddy opening the GIANT universal remote we bought for him. He's always losing the one he had so we found a gigantic one and gave it to him. Everyone cracked up at that. Bruce programed it for him before we left and he loved it. His real gift from us was an ipod docking station with clock radio. He loved it. Bless his heart. He had dialysis that morning and was feeling quite low. On top of that, he had fallen the night before and hurt his arm pretty badly. As a matter of fact, he finally broke down and went to the hospital for x-rays today. Still waiting to hear about that.


Mom holding the school picture of Taylor she gave her and daddy for Christmas.


Amber trying on the bathrobe we got her. It came with a sleep mask that said Sweet Dreams.


Daddy bought mom a laptop. She was totally thrilled with that.

So we got her a VERY NICE laptop tote. She loved it. It's black with all pink trim and pink plush inside.


Hannah got this nice luggage piece with her name on it from my parents.


My brother John and his wife Jenny gave Bruce this knife. And let me tell ya, this thing is SHARP! Honestly, it scared me.


When I was a little girl, this was my favorite book. I would have daddy read it to me over and over. I would take it to him and say, "Read my birdie?" And he would. Well, over time the book was lost between moves and he found it a few weeks ago and bought it for me. When everything had died down a little at the house, I snuggled up with him and Harrison and he read it to us. It was fun.


Taylor and Hannah


I asked for feather pillows this year and my parents got them for me. It's been so nice sleeping on them. So comfy!


John was told that his gift was in the carport. What a letdown it was when he realized that daddy's motorcycle was not it. LOL


But he was happy with the Kenmore refrigerator my folks bought for his basement so he doesn't have to go up and down the stairs when they're living it up by their pool in the summer.


This is my niece Jessica on the left with Taylor and Hannah.


Harrison with some sidewalk chalk which he is playing with on the driveway even now as I type this post.


My lovely sister-in-law, Jenny. She's sweet and feisty.


Justin's watch from mom and dad.

We had a really great night and I'm so glad that we were able to keep focus on the Lord. It's easy to get lost in the excitement of gift giving and laughter. But so important to remember why we have this special celebration. This birthday of a King!

Christmas Weekend Part I

Saturday morning we had our bus ministry Christmas party. You could feel the excitement as each child came off the bus. They knew there would be something special for them that day. Our church does an angel tree. We took pictures of each of the bus kids and placed their face on an angel. The people in our church were given opportunity to choose an angel and buy a Christmas present for a bus kid. Pastor also wanted the children of the adults that worked in the bus ministry to be put on the angel tree. So our own children were excited too.





DIVAS!



This little girl's mother passed away last year and she was wearing a T-shirt with her mother's picture on it in memory of her. She's the sweetest little thing too. I just love her to pieces.

This is Lizzy. She's cute as pie and sweet as she can be.

This little girl loves Justin. She says they're going to get married one day. She handed him her coat, which you seen thrown over his shoulder and said, "Baby, hold dis." The look on Justin's face was hilarious.





Singing songs

Being good

puppet masters

Brother Tim was Brother Daniel's hands for If You're Happy And You Know It.

The Faith Bpatist Puppets.

Nicole and Cheyenne leading the Pepsi Cola song.

Mom playing the piano.

On their way to eat their lunch of BBQ, chips, and dessert.

HURRY BROTHER JOHN! CALL OUT SOME NAMES ALREADY!!!!!

Oneil, Germaine, and Brandon. These three boys are very special young men. They are precious. They come from very rough places but I have high hopes for them. They are filled with potential. Brandon wants to go into the military. I don't know what Oneil and Germaine want to do, but I have a feeling they're not going to stay where they're at.

BROTHER JOHN!!! PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!

What's taking him so loooooong??

Brother Ken picking on some girls

Bruce enjoying his lunch

Bubba, our Pastor's dog. I think Bubba just came for some petting and BBQ. :)

Justin and my beautiful mother

Finally! He's passing out the gifts.



Some of our teens that work in the bus ministry. Leanna, Justin, Nathan, and Clayton.

Some more of our teens....Jamie, Justin, and Leanna.

Harrison is holding his gift while Joshua is doing the bunny ears over his head. I know we shouldn't have a favorite child in the bus ministry, but I can't help but love Joshua to pieces. He's so young and has so many problems at home that no child should have to deal with. If I could bring him home and just give him love, I would.

Holding up their gifts for pictures for the people at church to see.



On your mark, Get set..........

GO!

Harrison got the Lightning McQueen car.

Judging by Hannah's expression here, I could only imagine she got something really nice. And boy did she!

A pink saphire and opal ring. It is gorgous!

Here they are holding their gifts up amongst the papery mess!

Such happy faces!



We received a phone call when we got home from bus ministry and our neighbor wanted the kids to come over because they had something for them. What a nice surprise that Justin got.........

a BANJO!!! He was so excited about that. He's already been picking it and it sounds terrific!

Hannah didn't want in the picture for some reason. Maybe her hair was messed up. I don't know. But she and Harrison were given $20 gift cards to Wal Mart. Harrison bought a bathrobe with his. He had seen it the night before and wanted to get it. He knew exactly what he was going to purchase with his giftcard. Hannah is saving hers. I'm sure she's waiting for the after Christmas sale. She's good about that.

We had a great time Saturday and I'll post the rest of our Christmas pictures later.