4 days and counting...

Well, the countdown to Christmas is blurring by at breakneck speed! I wonder where the time has gone. At the beginning of December, I was so on top of things...a gift plan for the girls was in place, shopping began, Christmas pictures were taken and cards were beginning to be sent! Then in a blur, 2 winter festivals, a cheerleading camp, holiday parade, a chorus concert, a band concert, a quick trip to Texas for Ryan, a run out to EPCOT for dinner and the amazing candlelight processional (with Kirk Cameron doing the reading) and girl scout meetings all happened and POOF! Here we are: 4 days left until Christmas and starting to feel the stress...despite the stressful part of the month being over!



The funniest things this month have been Cassidy's emerging independence (I say that like it's peaking through, when really it's barrelling down like an 18-wheeler on an icy mountain road) and Lily's increasing mobility (also resembling an 18-wheeler on an icy mountain road). Cassidy is now picking out her own clothes, with decent fashion sense. She's determining what she wants for lunch (within reason), and she is learning to use the potty (it's about time). Lily can now pick out an object and army crawl toward it with amazing accuracy and speed. If she gets "off course" a quick roll one way or the other usually does the trick and she's back in the groove and scooting along! There are moments when she looks just like Cassidy did a couple of years ago, but she is definitely her own little person! She's an incredibly laid back, sweet and adaptable baby. Lily is just the light of my life!



Ali, Erin & Katie finished out 2007 in school today. They enjoyed parties and gift exchanges. I'm glad to see that all of the political "correctness" hasn't gone out of the schools. They celebrate everyone, but at least they celebrate.



In closing, this is a wonderful and magical time of year. I hope in the hustle and bustle of the Christmas season that we all take time to remember why we really do all this. More than 2000 years ago, God gave us his son. And so, it is this life we celebrate and honor during this time of year. Jesus IS the reason for the season! May God bless you all!

We wish you all a safe and happy holiday. Merry Christmas!

-Laurel

A month later...

WOW! It's really been a month since I last posted? A recap of the last month: it's all a hazy fog. We've been so busy. Alison is in a play this Christmas at her church. Erin and Katie are singing in the school chorus. Ryan's finishing up another semester in school. I'm coaching a wonderful group of cheerleaders at Bellalago (Erin and Katie's school) and leading a troop of 10 little Brownie Girl Scouts. Cassidy and Lily are "the easy ones". Ryan and I thought we were down-right footloose and fancy free for an entire weekend when we only had the youngest girls!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Jeff was home from training for the weekend. We fried up a couple of turkeys and my mom roasted one. My parents, brothers, sis-in-law, nephews, niece, uncle and next door neigbor blessed us with their presence and contributions to our feast! We had a great time. Lily slept through dinner. Katie and Bailey got courage and joined the polar bear club by jumping into our pool sans heater. It was 64 degrees and they turned blue pretty quickly! Katie in all of her infinite wisdom decided to take a shower to get warm...clothing and all.

We wrestled the 5 kids to the mall last Saturday for Christmas pictures. It was a bit of a challenge, but we did get a few pictures to turn out! We created a pretty cute Christmas card and hope to get those out in the next week or so.

That evening Ryan and I actually had our first post Lily no kids date! We went to Ryan's company holiday party. While the party itself was similar to a convention luncheon, it was nice to dress up, get out and have a nice dinner without the interjections we usually get from having 5 little girls! The next morning we took a couple hours to do some Christmas shopping for the girls before coming home and putting up our lights and tree.

So, that's been the month in retrospect. We have another few busy weeks ahead of us. If I don't get an update on, please have a safe, happy and blessed Christmas and a very joyous New Year!

And I'd like to wish a very big congratulations to three wonderful families:

Congratulations to Aunt Jamie & Uncle "Einstein" on their new bundle of joy, due in July! Congratulations to Emily, Brian and Joseph on the announcement of Baby #2, also due in July!
And Congratulations to Autumn, Ben & Aiden on the addition of baby girl Heidi on Nov. 30!!!

We love all of you guys and couldn't be happier that someone else is having a baby for a change!

Laurel, Ryan, Ali, Erin, Katie, Cassidy & Lily