Christmas time in 2010

Yesterday afternoon I'd planned to pick up some face powder at Macy's in the mall and while there, find out why my cell phone wasn't ringing. But when we spied the backed up traffic entering the mall, we decided to brave Kohl's, Target and Lowe's instead. My sweet husband bought me a lovely necklace (that I got to help pick out!) at Kohl's. Target sold us wine-bottle sized bags for our Artmil customers' rolled up gift calendars. At Lowe's, I bought my tool-loving husband a new level (that he got to help pick out!) He found one that also came with a free ratchet!

In the evening, we spent a relaxed four hours over at Craig and Martha's with the whole Miller Clan, minus 12. The 30 of us ate delicious soups, meats, dips and goodies while we chatted around with one another. Then people started passing out gifts. There are three new family units as of this year, and Claire made gifts for everyone as well! Jen showed ultrasound photos of their baby girl, due in May. We gave out boxes of old photos, gleaned from Grandma's albums, to each of the 5 main branch families, along with aromatic wax-dipped pine cones and altered domino ornaments ordered from Tracy's Miller Manor Designs. Baby Jack is adorable at 6 months. He eyed the antics of Arthur and Will, ready for sure to join in next year! Claire played piano selections in the living room for her visiting Grandma. Mark brought in his newly bought Gretsch guitar for all to see. Alan and Kathy invited any to join them at the theatre at 10 pm to watch True Grit.

Today, Christmas Eve, Annie called this morning to say they were buying paint to paint their living room at that very moment! After breakfast, Dennis and I had a wonderful hours-long conversation about how to hone our business and personal lives to better suit the direction God is taking us. After a quick lunch, we outsmarted mall traffic by parking at Vista School and walking over! Powder bought and cell phone remedied, we walked by a store that Dennis thought we should check out. An hour later, we walked out with six lovely new garments for me. Then we found Arthur his first pair of Rockports before heading back to our car at Vista.

Tomorrow we plan to open gifts in the morning and play Arthur's new games with him. Arthur and Dennis are each getting new basketballs so I imagine they'll try those out if it isn't raining. We plan to make cabbage rolls for dinner sometime, and Skype with Paul, Annie, Keith, Bethany, Evangeline, K2, Zach, Kaley, Keziah and Zion altogether at 5 pm. Perhaps we'll even take some pictures to add to this post!