More Christmas

Rob and I have had a tradition of making lefse (lef'-sa) "a traditional Scandinavian potato-based, soft, flat bread. It is made by combining potato, flour, butter, milk, salt and water. The dough is rolled very thin and baked on a hot, dry griddle. It is a Scandinavian delight and very versatile. Spread it with butter and roll up for a quick snack. If you have a sweet tooth, sprinkle one with a little sugar and add a dash of cinnamon. Serve as a bread with meals, a coffee-time snack or roll-up with your favorite lunchmeats and cheeses." ......we almost did not this year, but having heard of my family making 3 batches last week and knowing that Rob will not be here to do it with me next year. We decided to do it on Christmas day. So as soon as the kids were down for a nap we started. Of course we were not able to finish it all during that time, but they really enjoyed helping too.

Then we had some friends from church come over and they brought a drum set for Garrett. Emma stated that the drums were "her" favorite gift. Naturally we do not have any drum sticks lying around, so they have been using wooden spoons.

Christmas

We spent this Christmas with just the 4 of us in Casper. Even though I was a little sad this morning that we were not with any extended family, I am glad we had the opportunity to do be in our home. Because our lives become so busy it is nice to have the relaxing time together, and appreciate it since we know Rob will be gone to Kuwait next year.

Since we did not have any picture to send out in our Christmas cards I thought we could share our Christmas eve picture. We had our Christmas eve service at church, full with children's pageant and all. That is the first time we have done any kind of Children's program since we have been here. We has almost 20 kids there, and about 60 people in church, the first year we were here it was about 15 people and the second year it was about 20 with with 6 of them being my family. It was a blessing to see, even though we do not measure God's work by numbers. It actually threw Rob off having so many people. We were very blessed to have our new neighbors, Brooke and Cody come. Cody told us the night before that he had only been to church maybe 5 times. So we are excited to see if in this next year we can share with him more who Christ is and how he can be saved.

The new wagon that Emma and Garrett received from my sister and her husband was a big hit. They spent about 2 hours in it after Rob got it set up. I don't know if you can tell or not but it is windy out here today, and for the last several days it has been too. It blew all our snow away. So no white Christmas.

But we are very blessed with how God loves us and cares for us, and for the gift of Jesus Christ and eternal life through his death on the cross.

Christmas blessings to you all!!

Rainbow over a "big rock"

A friend of ours took this picture near Independence Rock, which if you did not know is about 70 miles from Casper. Those who were privileged enough to grow up playing Oregon Trail on the old Apple Computers in school, will remember it was beneficial to make it to Independence Rock by the 4Th of July so you could make it through the mountains before the snow began to fly. Whenever we have visitors they usually get to go out to "the rock" on their first visit here. Seems like we have not been out there in a long time, guess we need some new first time visitors "lol". But to sum it up this is not a picture of Independence rock, but it looks similar and is near by, and has a really cool rainbow coming down over it. Some time when I can find one of our Independence Rock picture I will post it too.

Just sharing pictures

Life has been good. God is always blessing us and with us. I have not put much effort into my blog lately, but I did just get my Christmas cards send out. So I thought I would share some photos. The first one is Emma and Garrett with their cousin Jackson, Jared's little boy. Then the next one is Thanksgiving day and the kids with Rob playing some annual Thanksgiving day football. Then Emma and Trisha, making some cookies Finally Garrett getting his hands in the dishwater, he just loves to do this and I had to finally capture it. It is adorable how he rolls up his sleeves as soon he gets his chair up to the water.

Emma's prayer

Emma has been coming to church with me about since she turned 3, in June, and she loves going up front for the children's message. We have a college student (Josh) who does the message and he is very fond of Emma. He always asks if one of the kids would like to pray to close their time and this time Emma volunteered. Josh made a big deal of it and announced something like this: "OK everyone can I have your attention, the pastor's daughter is going to pray." Emma did a great job, although I could not hear her very well, she mentioned being thankful for her dad and her friends. We had just studied David and Saul being friends in Sunday school, so I seemed like she had really caught on and was thinking about that. It was on of those moments that melted Rob's and my heart.

Mmmmm...oatmeal (don't look if you are queasy)

Sorry this was just too funny not to share. This is typical Garrett eating. If you know Garrett you know he really likes to eat, but as much as he likes to eat he also likes to play in his food. If I do not take it away and he is done, he decides to make a masterpiece of it.

We like to pose...but not always look at the camera

Emma just waned to have her picture taken with Garrett. She is sporting her undershirt. Lately she has wanted to have as little clothes on as she can. Usually when I go in her room after her nap, she is in a swimsuit or gymnastics outfit. Then Garrett is holding onto his "maymay," we are not sure what that comes from, but it means his blanket. That one is his favorite he loves to rub the raggy ends between his fingers, but he will usually take whatever is available.