M essiah,
E verlasting
R edeemer,
R ighteous
Y aweh...
CHRIST Man's
Answer to
Sin!
It is so hard to believe that Christmas has come and gone!
I hope that you and your family had a wonderfully blessed Christmas!
Here is a glimpse at ours!
On Sunday, we had our regular Church service, and then in the evening we had our Christmas Candlelight service. It was amazing! The music was wonderful! I will be posting videos of this on a later post.
There was wonderful fellowship!
On Christmas Eve we had to take Jon to be seen for his wrist; he hurt it at Church on Sunday, and it was very swollen. We were very relieved that it wasn't broken, just badly sprained.
In the evening we came home and watched "The Nativity Story" and then went to the 11:15pm service at a church in Strafford that Mom went to as a kid. Grace and I sang, and we all enjoyed lighting candles and holding them while we sang "Silent Night". This was a first for Nicole, and she was delighted to participate!
Christmas morning was exciting. We had drawn names for gift giving after Christmas last year, and had tried to keep it all a secret all year long. Well....that plan didn't work out so well.... some people tried very very hard to figure out who had who...and if you know our family well, you know who may be included in the italics. They involved others, and by Christmas morning, lots of us knew all. It was still very exciting and precious to see how each person thought of the other in a special way. Some gifts were simple.... some more complex. Some were practical....and some...were not! But everyone thought of their person with care and maybe even for some, sleepless nights...?
In the afternoon we were ready to head to Dad's parents to celebrate with them, Dad's 2 sisters, our 2 cousins, Dad's aunt and her daughter, and Brittany, Chris, Marlena and Annalie!
It was a great time had by all, and lots of food as always!
I was snapping pictures all day with the blog in mind, so here is the day in pictures!
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| Edward had Grace... |
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| Grace was first to open her gifts! She received a full box of goodies! "Hey, Mom, I was looking for where that wrapping paper went that I bought....." I look over a Grace's box. No more explanation needed. |
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| Runny nosed Rosie! We didn't have Rosie as part of the family when we drew names, so each person pitched in to get her something. I think she liked the paper more than the gift inside! |
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| Elisha opened her sweet and thoughtful gifts from Nicole...with help from Jon! |
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| Nicole had Elisha... |
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| OH NO! A rubber band gun! |
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| Mom had Jon... |
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| Rosie hung out in Grace's box for most of te morning! |
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| Jon had Nicole.... |
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| Mom was SUPER excited about her sewing box! |
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| Nicole got what she's always wanted...CAMO! |
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| Grace had Mom..... |
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| I had Dad.... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
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| Dad had Edward... |
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| Dad, why did you HAVE to get Edward a "prank kit"? Oh yes. I remember. It reminded you of your childhood days!! |
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| Doing the "Christmas Trim" with the Leatherman....Resourceful and Redneck! |
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| We're all ready for the trip to "Winslow Mountain!" |
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| Nicole and Marlie drawing together! |
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| What a full couch! |
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| Marlie loved the play food set we got her. Chris is building her a play kitchen, too! |
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| Annie fast asleep after eating! | | | | | | | | | | | |
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Madelyn,
ReplyDeleteBest compliments of the Christmas season and wish you a very blessed and a Christ centered New year.So great to know you through your profile on the blogger. I am also glad to know your interest in uplifting and encouraging the readers in the Lord through your writing the Blog "His Grace abounds". I am so encouraged to know that you have seven siblings which shows your parents love for the orphans. Well about me, I am in the Pastoral ministry for last 33yrs in the great city of Mumbai a city with great contrast where richest of rich and the poorest of poor live with a population of 18 million of which half of the population lives in the slums of Mumbai an those who live in the slums are the people who are poor, marginalised and socially, politically and economically oppressed. We reach out to such people with the love of Christ to bring healing to the broken hearted and give hope and future and purpose in their lives. We also encourage young people like you as well as adults from the West to come on a short term missions trip to work with us and have a life changing experience.We would love to have you come and work with us and be hands and feet of Jesus to bring healing to the broken hearted. You could encourage youth group of your church to prayerfully think of Missions trip to Mumbai. Well God willing I will be coming to the States in the month of June 2013 and will be so glad to visit to your place and your church Youth group too. In the past young people from the West irrespective of their Denominational background have come and worked with us and their lives have been never the same. If you are interested please write to me on the following email and my name is Diwakar Wankhede
Dear Madelyn,
ReplyDeleteI hope you have received my earlier comments sent some five minutes back which have not been published. Thanks for your blog "His Grace abounds". Great to know about your parents parental love for the orphans. Would like to be in touch through my email id