Christmas, New Year, New Adventures

One "tradition" we started was to make sugar cookies and frost them and bring them to all the events we went to to bless people. Well, I followed a new recipe this year for our cookie-making-extravaganza since I wanted to stay away from cookies that offered us absolutely nothing good for our bodies. We decided to do corn-free, mostly organic molasses cookies. However, the recipe I followed was for a large family so it made about 100 cookies, and I am so used to doubling every recipe, that I accidentally doubled it. Hence, 200 Christmas cookies and over 8 hours of mixing, kneading, cutting, baking and frosting. Mariah helped me with with the baking... and everyone else helped with the frosting.

Flour everywhere.. table, floor, hair, belly...

Alyssa, the kids, and Alex helped with the frosting. 

The twins, Ahavah and Alecia, frosting away.

Elias ate 6 cookies... instead of frosting any... haha!

Hayven was very meticulous about how she frosted and how many of each cut out she frosted.

Here's a glimpse of the amount of cookies we made!

After our cookie clean-up, we let the kids open the family board games we got and we stayed up until 12am playing Sorry and Connect Four. It was a BLAST! The girls were all out to corrupt Alex in the game Sorry. :)

Christmas Eve morning we headed to the Fisher's house to celebrate Zoe and Hayven's birthday as well as do a small Christmas with them. The kids ran around and played while we relaxed and ate great food.

After the Fisher's house, we picked up Alyssa and traveled to Masha's house and met Mariah and Lorn Ross there. We spent the rest of the day relaxing, watching football, eating food, playing music, and opening presents. 

Christmas Eve evening, Paublo from Fargo, ND came to spend the weekend. Him and Alyssa were up 'til 1am building his 5 foot tall Barbie house my mom bought them. We had a blast!

Christmas morning my dad, step-mom, two little brothers, Mariah, Lorn Ross, Alyssa, Paublo, Nick, and our family of 6 crammed into the house and had a HUGE Christmas Brunch Feast. We did gifts and hours of worship until late into the Afternoon. 

Me and all my siblings -1.

Christmas night we went to spend time with Alex's side of the family. There was GREAT food, music and dancing. We had a blast!

Elias dancing with his grandpa Charles. 

 My dad took Paublo and Alex out to a movie that night. The next morning He took them to his storage unit to empty out all the tools he brought with him form Detroit. After that, Paublo went to have lunch with my dad and step-mom and ask them if he could have permission to court Alyssa! Dad said YES!!! They started courting the day after Christmas. 


For New Years Eve the following weekend, Paublo came to spend the weekend with us again. We went to the Perez's house for a great night of food, fellowship, worship and prayer. We prayed from 11:45pm and into the New Year praying over our country, our church, and our families. It was the perfect New Year Event. 

We went sledding and thrift store shopping New Years Day and came home and I made a large pot of organic, home-made hot chocolate with corn-free marshmallows. 

My little brother was too lazy to walk up the hill himself, so my girls tried to pull him up :)

Alex heads back to school this coming Monday after his 3 week break. We spent it doing things as a family whether going to the YMCA, the Science Museum, shopping, or watching movies and playing games. 

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A few exciting new things that the Lord is doing with us this year:

(1) I switched to a Birthing Center instead of going through a hospital for this baby. I knew right away this is where the Lord wanted me, but it was confirmed at the tour when they listed our "insurance" Samaritan Ministries as an insurance they're familiar with and accept. 

(2) My husband has been praying and asking the Lord to lead us to a Family Practice doctor that we can trust and that will listen to us and what we want as far as care for our family. He wanted to get ahead of this before our Health Care System got more hopeless then it is now and our rights start getting more and more stripped away. The nurse at my Birth Center suggested looking into New Kingdom's Pediatrics for the kids. Alex and I toured the place and discovered he offers whole family care. As he was explaining his vision and passions for his small, Christian practice, we knew this is exactly what we had been praying for.

(3) We believe the Lord is leading us to some recording studio to get my music professionally recorded. Someone offered to fund this for us and we have three or four options that we are praying over and waiting on the Lord's leading in. We are very cautious and want to make sure the Lord's leading us.

(4) Not such great news... but my husband cut his dreadlocks off that he's been growing since we got married :(. He needed to in order to find an HVAC job this summer. He wants to grow them back once he gets established and see's if he can keep them at the job the Lord leads him to. 

God is so GOOD! 

I am starting a new reading plan to read through the Bible again this year, as well as what we're going through on church Sundays and Thursdays. 

I want to spend more time praying and worshipping this year. 

I just want to fall more in love with my Jesus. 

I want my relationship with Him to be tighter this year then ever before. 

I want to be led by His Spirit more. 

I want to be walking in obedience and faith more. 

What are your goals this year?

Are they goals that will impact eternity?

Instead of "making ourselves better" or focusing om things we want to "fix" about our lives this year, let's just fall more in love with Jesus! He's all that matters.