Christmas, New Year's, and Return to Schedule

Christmas - The 3 Kings arrived. The boys were very concerned that the Kings wouldn't show up and had a real difficult time going to sleep. They finally fell asleep around 10:30 pm.

Through out December they had come across some consequences due to their behavior. The month was one of learning for parents as well as children.

Visit to Uncle T-Bone and Auntie M's house - On Christmas Day, we visited and stayed with Uncle T-Bone and Auntie M. Uncle F came from Utah to spend Christmas as did Grandpa and Grandma Locey. We stayed the weekend together. Boys played with cousins, swam in the heated hot tub and not heated pool, and were blessed with remote control cars from the Auntie M's family.

New Year's Eve - During our break we cleaned out closets and the garage. We were invited to our neighbor's for New Year's Eve.

We talked. The boys played games. We came home for a New York midnight.

We celebrated by lighting sparklers in the backyard.

New Year's Bowling - As is tradition, we went bowling, and everyone got a strike.

After bowling, the Earls invited us for a turkey supper.

Pruning - Always in January over winter break, we prune the trees. We have 6 grape vines, a blackberry bramble, and 9 deciduous trees.

Before dark we had prune and chipped 7 of the trees, pulled out old blackberry stalks and burned them, and cut back 80% of the grape vines making 11 wreaths to dry and chipping the rest of the excess. The chickens also got a clean house as well.

Back to School - We went back to school and started off great. No one was late the first week. Yesterday we were late, and today Hurricane stayed home from school with a croupy cough and a cold sore that he didn't want to pop at school. Underfoot called about 45 minutes into school to see if he could come home too.

Día de Los Tres Reyes Magos - The 3 Kings show up in the rest of the world 12 days after Christmas.

We prepared for the Kings, and they came bringing small treats of gum, soda, and cookies.

We had a nice family supper that night with Rosca de Reyes.

 

YSA Activities - YSA stands for Young Single Adults. We've been asked to minister to this group through church. Even though there is a congregation specific to this age group of 18-30 years old, the meeting place is 45 minutes from where we live in one direction. We hosted a supper and watch a devotional by Russel M. and Wendy Nelson. Nineteen YSAs came for supper, a devotional, and food. We hope to build faith and strength for this group.