Family

Well.... hello there!  I haven't posted forever, I know, and I'm sorry :(    I guess I feel I've been too busy, or maybe just enjoying the holiday break way to much.  I really just haven't taken the time to type, and I haven't really felt like I had something good to say, or been inspired.  Either way, its nice to be back :)

Merry Christmas!  (am i a little late on that note????)   I hope your christmas vacation has been wonderful and relaxing (right.....  minus the stress of having to get gifts.... and decorations set up.... and being on time to parties and recitals... this note is basically for the moms ;).  We had a great christmas day yesterday, full of watching brothers and sisters get so excited when you're about to open the gift they gave you, siblings reading verses to the church out of the christmas story, and watching the last gift being given to you full of well money from the family.  Yeah, it was a pretty great day.  

 But i was thinking as I went to sleep on christmas eve.  I was excited about the next morning, with Santa coming :), and and the gifts to be given and received.  And as I was thinking, I thought about having all the gifts I would normally get on a christmas morning, but without my family.  It would be so lonely!  family makes it fun, and exciting, and puts the love in the holiday season.  Being together just warms my heart, especially seeing your siblings or parents get excited about a gift you're about to open, and our seven-year-old brother exclaiming that you're going to LOVE it. (doesn't it make you just smile to hear that, even f you don't know Brooks?)  that's what puts the fun and love in christmas, the sharing your RC helicopter (and then crashing it...oops), and taking silly videos with your new video camera you share with your sister, or hearing you're parents tell you how much they love their gift.  this all just warms my heart.

now it may sound like I'm saying that family is the reason for the love of the season, but I know that Jesus is the one behind it all.  His family, though, displays that all family is important throughout the holiday season.  Mary and Joseph had it harder than we (or I, specifically) could bear.  Mary, first of all, was probably between the ages of twelve and fourteen when being told she would have a baby and be married.  That's mine or caroline (my sister's) age.  I cannot imagine being told I was to have a baby, or even be married, right now. And then to know I was to have the SON OF GOD as my child!!!!!!!!  I can't even imagine it.  And imagine how Joseph felt.  He had been pledged to marry Mary, a virgin, and then it turns out she's pregnant.  How would you be feeling? Cause I wouldn't be very happy.  because back then, it was a huge deal if you were prego and not married. You could be stoned, or thrown out into the wilderness.  Then God tells Joseph that Mary is telling the truth, and the child is the Messiah you have been waiting for for hundreds of years.  whoa.  so then, you have to travel to bethlehem with a pregnant wife, which is, by the way, over a hundred miles away.  I don't even want to get into what they had to go through on the trip.  And then to be blessed, with a small child, the messiah, and holy son of god. Wow.  It's truly an amazing story.

Well, I just did a brief overview of the movie "Nativity story" (which I highly recommend) and our Sunday school class in december.  I hope it makes you think.

So i hope that hopes you see how important family can be over the holidays, and at any time.  Without family, we wouldn't celebrate christmas.

So here's what my family has been up to.... I just happened to get some of it on tape ;)  I hope you enjoy these, and I also hope they work : /  

The boys playing Just Dance 2

My brothers flying their helicopters in the front yard

P.S.  Pardon all the christmas boxes and such scattered in the background.  it's just the normal present leftover boxes, waiting to be burned in the fire :)

merry christmas and happy new year, from my family to yours.

Anna Leigh