The Great Christmas Tree Mishap

HERE COMES CHRISTMAS!!!

Yes, I know. We haven't had Thanksgiving yet. Which is why I have to tell you the funniest story behind our "fake" tree, and why I'm putting up Christmas this week. Let me take you back to our first year of marriage...

This was also the first year I experienced being the wife of an AAU basketball coach. Well, it was always tradition in my house growing up that we decorated the house for Christmas the weekend right after Thanksgiving. But apparently basketball people don't care much about my personal holiday traditions, and in our first year of marriage I discovered that there was an out of state basketball tournament scheduled the day after Thanksgiving and through the weekend. No thank you. I did not want to go and support my husband's coaching, I wanted to stay home and put up Christmas! So, I rebelled and I pouted and I stayed home. And then I did what any rational wife would do. I went to Lowes and bought the biggest, most grandest synthetic Christmas tree I could find, and was determined to put it up all by myself. But there was one tiny little problem. I bought a 9 foot tree and we only had 8 foot ceilings. Just a minor mishap I concluded. I decided to not be deterred in my effort to have the most beautifully decorated Christmas home by the time my husband got back Sunday evening. That way I could prove my point that I was justified in not going to the tournament. In other words, you better believe I tried my best to smash and squash that tree into place. And yes, it ended up looking just like you are picturing. It didn't quite come to a nice triangular point at the top. Rather it looked more like something went horribly wrong about 3/4 of the way through. And never mind any space for a star on top. Well, eventually over the weekend I rounded up someone to saw off the top of the tree. It still looked quite disproportional, but at least now it fit in the house. And Jake did come home to a Christmasy decorated home - complete with the focal point of an obnoxious, ginormous, non-symmentrical tree jammed into our living room.

Now every year as I put up this same tree, I unfold all the branches and giggle as I think back to the story behind it and of how God has grown me up since then. And yes, I learned my lesson. Now I always decorate our house BEFORE Thanksgiving so I am free to sit at basketball games the weekend after - without being mad that I'm not home decorating for Christmas. :)

Christmas in Pictures

Some serious snowy fun!

 

Cutest thing you've ever seen or what?!?!

It's hard to tell from the pictures, but this hill (located in Ames, IA) is SO steep!  Jake guessed they were going about 25 mph on the way down! 

 

Rough ride - Justice lost his hat!

Poor Jasara!  Check out her first ever ride on the sled.... 

 

She came out without even a scratch and was just fine except she decided that her first sledding ride would be her last!  She hitched a ride up the hill with Justice and was content to sit and watch from the top the rest of the time!

Jayla hitched a ride too! :)

Our house sits at an angle and all the snow blows in this huge drift right across our front yard.  It is the perfect recipe for a snow fort!

 

Putting the finishing touches on Jesus' birthday cake!

Loved hearing the following conversation in our house on the afternoon of Cmas Eve...

Jayla: “I can’t wait to open presents!”

Jennifer: “I can’t wait until Jesus comes!” (She thought Jesus was coming over to our house that night! :) 

JJ: “Hey, do you guys know that Christmas isn’t about presents? It’s about Jesus’ birthday. He died on the cross for our sins and that is the gift he gave us.”
♥

Christmas Eve cuties!!!!!

Celebrating hope, peace, new life, and freedom in Christ our Savior!

A little Wii dance party at Great-gram's!

Jasara likes to snuggle with my grandma - her great-gram.  I think she reminds Jasara of the cozy, comfy African ladies. :)

"As you celebrate the wonder of My birth in Bethlehem, celebrate also your rebirth into eternal life.  This everlasting gift was the sole purpose of My entering your sin-stained world.  Receive my gift with awe and humility.  Take time to explore the vast dimensions of My Love.  Allow thankfulness to flow freely from your heart in response to My glorious gift.  Let My peace rule in your heart, and be thankful."
~Jesus Calling~

 

Annual Baking Day!

Each year around Christmas we do a baking day with my Mom and Grandma and whip up all sorts of goodies! This is pretty much the only time of year that my hands see any sort of baking as I usually take short cuts and buy pre-made cookie dough or items from the bakery. I do, however, come from a long line of bakers, so it feels special to have my children learn the ropes from the more experienced ones. I also couldn’t wait for our Ghana girls to get in on the action this year and experience the joy of having fun family traditions. Here are some snapshots of our day!

The kids love to have the job of dropping in the m&m’s! Jennifer with my Grandma, now her Great-Grandma!

 

Justice and JJ were a team...Justice dolloped...

 

....and JJ dropped.

 

A little while later….lookin’ good ladies...

 

Almost there boys!

 

Peanut butter cookies – these are the ones that you put a Brach’s chocolate star on top – MY FAVORITE cookies! Yummo! Jasara loves, loves, loves to keep busy with items in her hands – she has been this way since we met her in Ghana. She enjoyed the job of covering the dough balls in sugar!

 

Of course, the kids’ favorite is getting to do the cut out cookies. We usually start these in the middle of the day once we are all warmed up and in game mode!

 

 

Jayla's tray of creations!

The sprinkle queens!

 

My cut-out cookie pictures of JJ were taken on my phone and won't upload for some reason, but he enjoys this part too!  Every year he makes a giant candy cane cutout. :) 

At one point we were all busy doing something and all of a sudden we looked over and Jasara had climbed up in the chair, grabbed a hunk of dough, the rolling pin, and a cookie cutter and was ready to make a cookie all by herself! She started trying to roll out the dough as she had been observing my mom doing, so my Mom gave her a quick lesson!

 

Like this, gramma?

 

 

Jasara worked with her dough for a looooooong time – probably at least 25 minutes straight. After she got it just how she wanted it, on came the sprinkles for the finishing touch!

 

Jasara's African cookie!

 

Pictures From Thanksgiving Break

Oh how I LOVED having all of the kiddos home over Thanksgiving break from school!

The atmosphere felt so much more balanced with the boys home! :) Not to mention that the girls love to play with their brothers! I did not hear one of my kids say “I’m bored” even once! There was always someone to play with, something to giggle about, or a goofy new game to come up with.

We are still enjoying the game “Zingo!” that the kids got for Christmas last year!

They can play it by themselves and usually get a couple of games in a day. For those of you adopting, this game is a fun way to teach your English learners a few words. Jennifer loves this game and is so proud that she knows how to say all the pictures in English now. :)

 

One of the things that we always do the day before Thanksgiving is decorate our house for Christmas. We head to a tournament in KC straight after Thanksgiving Day so I like to have “Christmas up” for when we get back. A tradition that we started with the kids a few years ago was that we got them each a small tree for their rooms, and every year they get to pick out an ornament from the store to put on their tree. This year the kids were more into it then they have ever been, asking me days in advance about when they would get to put up their trees! Here are the yearly comparisons from this year to last year…

And here are this year’s ornament picks…

Once again, I love how the kids’ personalities come through in their picks! This year Jayla was on a mission to find a ‘rainbow puppy’ ornament as she is really into rainbows right now. Currently Jennifer tags along with what Jayla likes, so she picked out something similar. [Justice was this way too until his personality really started to blossom about a year after he was home – until then he followed whatever JJ and Daddy liked]. Jasara went straight for the gingerbread man as soon as she saw it on the rack. She held it up to her chest and did not change her mind the whole time that we looked at ornaments! JJ picked the boxer hog because he is really into fighting/wrestling right now. And Justice’s pick really surprised me, until it clicked in my mind that he is our gift giver! He LOVES to give gifts, so how appropriate that he picked out the presents. :)

 

I wish I would have videotaped Jennifer and Jasara helping to decorate their tree for the first time. They were jumping up and down - so thrilled - and it was hilarious watching how proud Jasara was to put her gingerbread man on her tree! She kept going back into the room to look at the tree and touch her ornament after it was up. I did get our big tree up in the living room as well, but it wasn’t without a few snuggling intermissions!

A few more pictures and vids from the past few days…

 

Sing it girl!

Jasara is the first of Daddy’s girls to take a prolonged interest in the basketball!

Here’s a video clip of JJ reading to me among some backround chaos…

And here is a real quick clip of Jayla and Jennifer being goofy – Jayla had found out that Jennifer doesn’t like snakes!

Jayla has taught Jennifer how to do the ‘pretend read’ technique…here is a video of Jennifer trying it out which is hard to do when you have a limited English vocabulary!

Cool cats.

Serious studs.

I’ve started giving Jasara a front row seat during my cooking, and this has really helped her episodes of crying/worrying/whining for food when I am preparing meals. :) It keeps her mind busy watching me chop and stir and mix.

We got to do some swimming at the hotel this weekend….it’s so fun to get to do this during winter time! Daddy got a good ‘ol African sponge bath from Jasara…

Jennifer got some swimming lessons…

And JJ got dunked!

Who would have thought? :)