Deck the halls...

Over the past few weeks, we have slowly decorated the house for Christmas.

\

We found our tree.

All the kids helped decorate - that hasn't happened in a few years.

ah- the finished product 

If you've visited the blog for past Christmases, you know that this picture pretty much looks the same every year.  I do not mix it up.  We add ornaments each year and may have to start decorating a second tree to accommodate my growing collection, but it would be a small tree.  I don't want to store any more.

On a grocery run, Julia won all three of these prizes from a claw game.  I stand corrected on my admonishments to quit wasting her money on that game.  However, who really needs tons of stuffed animals?

What is Christmas without music?  The dial on my car radio has been set to a station heavy on Christmas music since they started playing it. We still get to enjoy a school band concert for the Christmas season courtesy of Wyatt and Julia. I was not sitting where I could get pictures during the concert, but the school has this gorgeous tree, so I sought a good picture there.  People were waiting while these two goofed off and poked at each other until I was ready to draw blood before we finally got a decent photo.  Then I sat in the parking lot in traffic.  I should have just waited.  

The concert was amazing.  Their school concerts are so good that you just don't want to miss them.

I am slowly finishing the preparations for Christmas.  It's hard to get excited about it when the world is such a mess, but I have had a few things to remind me to anticipate this fun holiday.

Tears are falling, hearts are breaking.  How we need to hear from God.  You've been promised, we've been waiting....  - from the song Welcome to Our World

True more than 2000 years ago and true today. 

and I just love this:

It is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a child himself. - Charles Dickens