Major Accomplishment

Today we made great strides in the wedding plans. We found what we hope is the perfect necklace for the bride. At one of our new favorite stores, Charming Charlie, if you can dream it is there. From the subtle to the over the top bling, they have it. Somewhere in the middle we found a great drop necklace to go with her dress.

I won't post a photo of our actual purchase but she did a little modeling of their great bling.

Since we had one of the bridesmaids with us along with the mother of the groom, we decided to just see if we could find a dress for the bridesmaids. As in true shopping, when you aren't really looking for something, you find it! We actually found two great options and I think we are all in agreement of one of them. It is cute, summer and most of all, it looks comfy.

Thanks to the bride's future sister-in-law for being such a great sport of trying on dresses!

The bride even tried on a couple of dresses just for fun, we even bought a super cute dress for her to wear to a shower or tea. This is not the one we bought - this is just her, "I should still be in choir dress.")

Wedding plans

Well, we are back to wedding plans time. I had decided I was going to focus on Christmas and put plans on hold until after December 25th. The main reason was the wedding needed my focused attention and not get blurred decisions from being so busy with the holidays.

Since Christmas we are making progress. I have shopped for a few decorations, not much. Today, the bride and I spent the morning updating some gift registries. She has registered for similar things at different stores. She decided on this so as to make shopping easier for guests. She did receive several items from her registries for her birthday or for Christmas. So, it was time to make sure those things were no longer on her wish lists.

I had forgotten how much fun it is to shop for things to put on a registry. She has asked for practical things, fun things and most of all some pretty things.

On the agenda for tomorrow - shopping for her jewelry! We plan to visit a great store in Murfreesboro, Charming Charlie. If you haven't been there, then you have missed a great chance to spend an afternoon shopping!

Hopefully, we might even look for Bridesmaids dresses.

Christmas Eve

The much anticipated Christmas Eve is here. We exchange gifts at our house on Christmas Eve so as to have a little less chaos on Christmas Day. We always go and have breakfast at my mother's on Christmas morning.

I think one of our traditions isn't going to happen this year, it has been sporadic the past few years. Our children always had to take a nap on Christmas Eve, usually while their dad was on his way home from work. No one could open gifts until a nap was in the books. As I think of this now, I don't know how they ever went to sleep. The anticipation level was always so high. Guess it did help that I would get them up early and have them busy all morning. There is no better way to start the Christmas marathon than with a clean room.

This Christmas Eve has been a great one so far. The kids and I did a little last minute shopping and now all the presents are wrapped and under the tree. Even the three I had forgotten. Hope I have found them all.

Merry Christmas to all our family and friends. We all hope you have a safe and happy holiday season.

Stop with the Christmas for a day

Yes, we put the holiday on hold around here on December 23rd each year. We must not forget about a birthday. 20 years ago today on a cold, icy night, we received an early Christmas gift. We were expecting her closer to spring - but she had other plans.

We are so blessed with two wonderful and healthy children. I can't imagine any Christmas gift being any greater. Happy Birthday to our baby.

iPad

Oh, I am so lucky. For an early Christmas present I received an iPad. I so love it. I can't wait to learn more about it. I have downloaded a few free apps, (if anyone has suggestions send them my way) synced my movies from my iTunes account, sorted the music I want to download, and downloaded a few books.

Yes, I said a few, I found some great classics that were free! I love to read and have not taken the time to read as much as I would like, I hope this will give me that nudge back to reading. My favorite book is also downloaded on my iPad. It was actually one of the first aps I installed, the Bible. I am so excited to have so many versions all in one place to reference quickly. I currently have the same ap on my BlackBerry, so I know it will be one of my favorites.

Off to enjoy my iPad a little more.

Merry Christmas!

Early Christmas Present

Sunday afternoon the snow began to fall. Large, fluffy flakes that seemed to not fall from the sky, come straight from the west. After a while, the flakes started to accumulate on the grass, trees, and finally the roads. It was a challenge to determine how deep the snow actually was on the ground. In places it measured just a 1/2 inch and in others several inches due to the drifts from the vast wind gusts.

I love the snow. A fresh blanket of snow always reminds me of Isaiah 1:18, Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. KJV

It saddens me to hear people say they dislike the snow, to me it is such a reminder of how we can be forgiven ours sins and have a new start. I am very thankful of the safety of our family who was out and about in this snow. Our daughter made it safely from work on very slick roads. Also thankful for the 18 brave people who made it to evening worship Sunday night. We usually have more than 10 times that many, but may stayed in due to the weather.

From the amount of wrecks we saw Sunday evening - I think the smart ones were those who stayed in. Now to just wait and see if we get more snow tomorrow as predicted. No matter if we see snow or not, tomorrow can be another gift from God, we must just enjoy the day as a present.

Cart before the horse

Things seem a little out of sorts. We began celebrating Christmas tonight with one side of the family. We did this to coordinate with the schedule of others.

Having a daughter with a birthday two days before Christmas, we have always tried to separate the two and hold off Christmas until after her birthday. This had been the practice while I was growing up with my sister, she has a birthday early in December. We never put up our Christmas Tree until after my sister's birthday.

With our daughter, we always tried to celebrate her birthday few days early, just so she wouldn't be getting presents all in one week. We love our daughter so much and feel very lucky to have her - we just want to make her feel special! 13 more days until she is 20! Where has the time gone?

Family time

Monday evening our power went out unexpectedly. Well, I guess when it goes it - it is never really expected. We had finished dinner, our daughter was working on corrections to a paper, nothing else really pressing planned for the evening.

In case you aren't in our area, it was really cold outside. The low Monday night was in the teens. So, power going out wasn't really a great thing. We have gas heat, but without electricity there is no fan on the heater to circulate the heat in our old farmhouse. We also use a couple of electric heaters to supplement our main heater.

After a while boredom set in. We ended up having a nice time reading. Yes, reading. With no television on I picked up King of the Road by Alex Debogorski of Ice Road Truckers. With my husband holding the flashlight, I began reading.

Sometimes we forget how much we take for granted and we forget to just spend time together. We truly enjoyed actually reading the book as a family. It was so nice, after dinner tonight we read a few more pages together.