Happy Birthday, Jesus!

We always make a birthday cake for Jesus and have it for breakfast on Christmas morning. We sing Happy Birthday and then eat!

We bake a dark chocolate cake--this represents our sin.

We put a white frosting on the top--this represents the purity of Jesus--He is our righteousness.

Then we use red hots to write Happy Birthday, Jesus on the top--the red represents the blood of Jesus that washes away our sin.


Oops! This year, Daddy got into the cake and began to cut the pieces before I took a pic. Oh well! :0)

Caleb Got A Guitar for Christmas!

Well, It Happened.....Finally! :0)

Hannah finally lost that 2nd front tooth! Just in time to sing the Christmas song! yeah! She did sing it immediately....All I want for Christmas is my 2 Front teeth. (so, should I wrap them up and put them under the tree???) She was sucking on a sweettart (special treat because she and Caleb were so good at WalMart today--yes, I bribed them!) and sucked it right out! She started laughing--we were in the van and I couldn't really see what was so funny. We were almost home, so once we got there I got the eyeful of the tooth and the empty gum.

She is a precious miracle!

Gray Family Christmas

We had Christmas with all of David's side of the family at Nanny Boo Boo & Poppie's last Saturday. We had a great time together. We ate and ate and ate some more! MMM, good!

Mark brought two guys from the Lazarus Project in Murfreesboro. We enjoyed getting to meet Mark and Thomas. They shared a little bit with us about what their rehabilitation program is like and what it's doing for them. Awesome!

We all brought homemade gifts--I think there were 15 or 16. We laid them out on a table and then one by one Poppie auctioned them off to the highest bidder. We voted ahead of time about some needs in our community and chose one to receive the $$. The Lazarus Project won and....in all we raised $161.00!

The auction was fun and a great idea--Kudos to Mom, Nanny Boo Boo, Esther for coming up with a fun and thoughtful way to share gifts!!!

Then Poppie read the Christmas Story from Luke. We read it aloud with him. At the very end (some already had left) we sang Christmas Carols. It was a wonderful evening together.

Our contribution to the auction: Dakota made the Ojo de Dios, David made the snowmen carolers. I knitted the 2 bags and made the herbal products.

Various pics of the vote and auction.....

Decorating Our Christmas Tree

Well, we finally got the tree up and the lights on it over about 3 evenings the first week of December. Then the next week, we finally had everyone here to add all the ornaments. Hannah really enjoyed it this year. We had our traditional meal of Taco Soup--one evening later--oops! We've had that traditional meal for the night we decorate our tree for about 8 years, now. (Post a reply if you'd like our recipe--yummy!)

Mercy (Hannah's kitty) decided the tree looked like a great place to roost--roost? Wait a minute, is she part chicken?? Hannah and Caleb just thought she was hilarious!

It's been not so funny now that it's all decorated to watch her in the tree. She's really good though, she's been trained to only knock off the non-breakable ornaments--yeah, right....but, I must say we've been fortunate for no breakage.

David telling the Christmas story.

The finished product!

Yes, that's baby Jesus with an angel above Him in our tree. We got the idea from Nanny Boo Boo. We liked it so much, we decided to add Him in our tree, too! How fitting, since it is all about Him!!!

Covered Wagon

These are pics of Hannah's project for her Pioneer Christmas Class that is online today at 11:00 a.m. Daddy and Hannah worked on this covered wagon last Friday night. They enjoyed making this together.

Latest Knitting Accomplishment

I just made a little handbag. It was a fun project and very different from a hat! I made mistakes (of course), but still am learning a lot. This will be auctioned off at our Gray Family Christmas Party on Dec. 19th. Instead of exchanging gifts this year, we are all bringing something handmade and we will auction them off. The funds raised will go to charity or a local organization in need.

Turkeys in Disguise

Caleb's.....

My name is Orkel the turkey

and I'm as scared as can be,

I'm wearing a disguise
so you won't eat me!

What am I?

Hannah's...

My name is Snowy the turkey
and I'm as scared as can be,
I'm wearing a disguise
so you won't eat me!

What am I?

Hannah's Build-A-Bear

I am thankful that I got to spend some precious time with my daughter, Hannah. We finally got some time just the 2 of us to go and spend her gift certificate that she got for her birthday. We went to Cool Springs to the Build-A-Bear Workshop and she picked out this precious little bear. She named her Maya. She got to stuff her and give her a heart and then a bath. Then, we had the joy of picking out some outfits--since she saved all of her birthday $$ just for this! But....you know that just one or two would not do...... Yes, I'll admit, I'm a sucker when it comes to this sort of thing....so, Mom and Dad sprang for an extra outfit!!!

Maya in the "buff"

Maya and her new Mama!

Maya the ballerina

Maya the cowgirl

Maya in hoodie (hood up)

Maya in hoodie (hood down)

We also went to Baskin Robbins for Hannah's favorite ice cream--Rainbow Sherbet and I got to get my favorite World Class Chocolate. Yum, yum!

Hannah says "thank you" to:

A. DeDe, U. Andy, Avery and Landon
Mima & Papaw
A. Ellen
Mom & Dad
:0)

Hannah's Hat--Finally Finished!

She says that we must call her "Kit" when she is wearing the hat.

For those of you who do not know, the name Kit is from Kit Kittredge, An American Girl. It's a movie that we watched on DVD a few months ago.

Kansas City Trip

We had a wonderful trip to Kansas City. It was a loooong one. 10 hours in the van with an almost 3 yr. old....phew! It got a little hairy there at times with him screaming "I want to get out of this seat, now!" I couldn't blame him because I wanted to get out of mine, too!! But all in all Hannah and Caleb did very well.

Our fearless leader/driver who agrees with Pastor Steve Gray that cowards set the speed limits!

Reading the book, Riven by Jerry B. Jenkins

Watching a movie

I could not catch him still.......so the pic is a blur, but yes, that's Caleb in his seat.

I don't ever remember seeing the arch before.....got these pics as we were driving past

The St. Louis Arch was a sight to see......

We stopped for lunch as we headed out of St. Louis and here's the family sitting and eating on the curb at Taco Bell. We just needed a little exercise. David and the kids ran around outside while I placed our order. Then, we decided to just eat outside--it was a beautiful day!

Thought we'd send a little text to Mrs. Loretta with a pic....saying Happy Birthday. I'm not telling how old she is--hehehe! :0)

We learned so much truth at the "Burn Conference" at World Revival Church! It was a powerful experience for us all. The Rhodes' family was there, too. We actually got adjoining hotel rooms (and almost lost them one night due to the "noise" of our playing kiddos! :0) )

I put my camera in my bag once we got to the hotel and it didn't come out again. Sorry, I did not do a very good job of taking pictures!

We experienced some awesome time in the presence of the Lord. The services and prayer times were fantastic! Nothing like them. The conference Seminars were very truthful and made us really think about where we want to be in God. They gave us a hunger to be in His presence more and to seek revival with all of our hearts. We need to be revived! He's already doing it in us, but we want more!

Hannah's Singing the Christmas Song!

All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth......well, just one for right now anyway!





We were working on the building for our new church--Josiah Generation--and I grabbed her and started tickling her. I ended up sitting down and she was shrieking in my ear....so, I put my hand over her mouth and just kept tickling her. She kept shrieking and screaming and then she stopped and was making a funny face and putting her hand up to her mouth....come to find out....all that wiggling and my hand at her mouth made her tooth fall out. She was laughing and saying "I nearly swallowed it, Mom!"

Dakota's 18th Birthday!

Dakota turned 18 last Thursday. It's hard to believe. It was difficult to pin him down just to celebrate a little with him. We had cookies and ice cream with him at about 11:30 p.m. Wednesday night after the first showing of The Judgment at church. Then, we had dinner with Nanny Boo Boo and Poppie on Thursday evening and he ate and ran out the door to The Judgment recording. So, it was a whirlwind birthday celebration for him. We're hoping to take him to dinner and a movie some night soon.......

Hannah & Caleb made him some special cards.....

To King Cody....from Hannah

Sweet!

From Caleb