We had a nice Christmas at home and then later at Uncle David's house with he and Grandma Carmen. I am trying to figure out how to convert my video...so for now, you'll have to settle for pictures...unfortunately I took more video than pictures.

What Child is This?

It's Christmas Eve, and the house is quiet...everyone is asleep, and I am thinking with excitement toward tomorrow morning...the stockings have been stuffed and are hung...the presents are wrapped and tied...everything is ready. We had our traditional Christmas Eve...we read the Christmas Story from the Bible, and each opened one gift. We talked about God's gifts to us...love, peace, joy, forgiveness, and heaven. What an awesome gift, that He would leave the beauty and perfection of heaven for each one of us. His motivation was sheer love and a desire for the Father to be reconciled with the creation that he so deeply cares for. Pastor Kevin spoke this past week about the "discussion" in Heaven when God was creating the world...Desiring to have fellowship and communion with mankind...knowing that he would give us free will, which gives us freedom to choose to love Him, as well as the freedom to sin...knowing we would need a Savior to rescue us from that sin...and Jesus stepping up during the conversation and saying "I'll go, send Me", all before man was even formed out of the dust of the ground. What an amazing plan...what total sacrifice...what great love. What child is this? This was not an ordinary child...this was and is Emmanuel...God with us...I AM...the one who was...who is...and who is to come! Happy Birthday Jesus...thank you for being the greatest gift of all.

The Twelve Days of Christmas (Parra style!)

On the twelfth day of Christmas my true love gave to me....

Twelve lawnmowers humming (my romantic small engine mechanic ♥ )
Eleven peppers roasting
Ten piles a-heaping (we have leaves...everywhere!!)
Nine loads of laundry
Eight gallons of milk (per week...we need a cow!)
Seven swarms a swatting (gnats!)
Six geese a laying (literally, over at Uncle David's)
Five molten wings (as hot as lava...only Luis can eat them!!)
Four crawling bugs (Palmetto, to be exact)
Three torque wrenches
Two fried tamales
and
A part for our lightning-struck stove

I Wonder as I Wander

Have you ever been wading in the ocean, walking out deeper and deeper as you face the horizon? Then, after being out there for a while, you turn around and face the shore, and you find that you have drifted far to the left or to the right of your spot on the beach. We begin to walk back toward our point of origin, now with our attention focused on a target, a definitive destination...the very thing that was lacking when we were facing the other way. Sometimes life can be that way, as well. We set out on a course that is right before us, thinking that we are completely in control, only to find that our intended course was not what was intended for us at all. We can get so caught up in the here and now. So captivated by the sights and sounds of those things that are only pleasing for a moment, but have no eternal value. Trapped by things that seem divine, at first glance, with mortal eyes.

Then, at other times, we feel as though we are drifting, wandering without a purpose or point. Our focus is fixed, yet when we momentarily shift our eyes, it seems as if we are going nowhere. Our path has taken twists and turns for no apparent reason at all. Our trek seems futile, at times, and we question each step. Then after a long time of walking, steadily fixed on the unchanging, immovable Mark, we are given a gift. We, for a moment, have the ability to see our voyage from the viewpoint of a high flying eagle. We see that the twists and turns were necessary shifts that had steered us away from danger...danger that we never even came close to...danger that we never even realized was there. And although these crooked paths made the journey a bit longer, and bit more curious, we are stronger and healthier because of them. We realize that what we perceived as walking blindly was actually a sanctuary paved through a mine field...a trail that we would not have chosen, had it been left up to us to choose. Yet every step, a precise calculation by the One who always sees the beginning from the end.

The difference in these two walks is not really in the walking at all. It lies in the point on which we are focused. The first, a vast sea of endlessness, beautiful to the eye, detrimental to the soul. The second, a firm foundation, unchanged by the rolling waves or shifting sand. Life giving, and secure.

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"For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope." Jeremiah 29:11 (New Living Translation)

God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen

I went out his evening, by myself, for a relaxing, testosterone-free, ladies Christmas party with some of the gals from church. I left my three "merry gentlemen" at home. When I returned, Luis was asleep on the bottom bunk, and the boys had beaten me to the door, putting in their snack requests....When I asked why they didn't ask Dad to get it for them, they responded "He said wait for Mom to get home". Ahhh...it was a heavenly three hours, while it lasted...