December

Alex took some photos in December of Durham - pretty with the snow.  

I made some salt dough ornaments for the young women to paint, to give to a local nursing home.  The kids helped paint some of them to hang on our tree too.  

The kids had Christmas programs at school.  It was nice to see them do the nativity at school - which isn't allowed in the US anymore... in the US, it seems that you can't even say Christmas anymore - they're "holiday parties" or "holiday singing" (and they sing songs like Jingle Bells instead of Away in a Manger.)  Nice to see that England hasn't taken God out of the schools.  Savannah got to be an angel, and Weston was a shepherd.  

We also had a Christmas party for the kids at church.  They all got a small present from Santa.  We had a special musical program on another night - I don't have any pictures from it.  But I sang a duet of "Do you have Room?" by Shawna Edwards. 

Do you have Room?

We tried to participate in Light the World program that our church does every year.  There are different scriptures and suggestions for each day of December for things to be a light to those around us (or to bring the light of Christ into our hearts and homes).  One of the things we decided to do was give treats to all of our neighbors - not just our next door neighbors, but everyone on our street.  I think there were 16 neighbors near us, so I made sugar cookie Christmas trees that we delivered. 

All of the teachers got little bags of chocolate.  And we had a special gift given to us - a candle with a picture of our family on it.  Loved having that to light our home during the year and particularly during Christmas.  That candle was also great for our Christmas Eve devotional when we read the Christmas story, sang hymns, and celebrated the birth of our Savior.  Our candlelight singing is a family tradition that is my favorite part of Christmas.   

The kids were excited for Christmas morning of course.  We warned them that they probably weren't getting as many presents this year (or smaller items), since everything had to either stay or go home in a suitcase.  They seemed okay with their presents.  Nathan got some very expensive tickets to a premier league soccer game.  (I'll talk about that game in another post.)  Their stockings were full of snacks!
 

This was my favorite gift given to me: a little piano that plays "Amazing Grace" - thanks Aunt Jane!