All l Really Want For Christmas

As we continue to prayerfully wait for the news on our future children, we continue to pray for them as they wait on the Lord's perfect timing to bring them into their forever family. Their wait is soooo much harder than ours I know!!

Still, I had visions that we would be celebrating this Christmas with at least news of them. Yet we continue to pray during the waiting. And we continue to celebrate God's incredible kindness and love during this season.

And we are having soooo much fun celebrating the love of Christ this season. I still marvel how Caleb did not know how to complete a recent school assignment that asked him to list 10 things he wants for Christmas. We do not make lists for ourselves (and the kids do not in any way feel they miss any fun or excitement). We have lots of other lists...that hopefully share the love and kindness of the Lord with others during this season. We are overflowing with His goodness to us and are trying to humbly share that abundance with people in our lives.

Here is how we are staying busy with some old and new traditions:
1. The kids and I have been busy making treats and cards for our neighbors (those that live on our street and those that are homeless downtown).
2. Today we built on an old high school tradition of mine, and we painted the nativity scene on some windows in our house
3. We went to the best live nativity ever a couple of weeks ago (Bethlehem Revisited in Waxahachie) and we went to the Neiman Marcus parade. These two outings have become the kids' favorite musts every year!
4. We have a really cool collection of nativity sets. And we keep the baby Jesus figures kept away until Christmas morning. It is really sweet to see how anxious Caleb and Hannah are for the arrival of Christmas by even this small tradition...they beg every day to put the figures out:)
5. The kids LOVE driving to look at Christmas lights. Any best spots in Dallas to recommend?
6. And the kids continue to love dressing up as characters from the Christmas story and acting it out.
7. Oh and they love, love, love watching the same old holdiay shows we watched as kids....Rudolph being their favorite!

I love traditions. Beau and I both have fond memories of childhood Christmas parties and traditions, and it is so fun to start building family memories with our kids. We look forward to many years building memories with the family that the Lord is building for us!