Family Christmas, 2009

It's early morning and as I sit here writing this it occurs to me how another Christmas has come and gone. We're at my mom-in-law's for the week and have been enjoying spending time with her and other family members. We had a great Christmas! Craig's cousin Paul, wife Aida and their two kids, Christopher and Kasandra, who are on break from college joined us for Christmas dinner. We exchanged gifts and had a wonderful time of fellowship and laughter. Paul offered up a beautiful prayer of Thanksgiving to the Lord for all His many blessings to us during this year and gratitude for His wonderful grace in each of our lives on a daily basis.

I am so humbled by all the lovely gifts that were given to me this Christmas. I'm amazed at how God shows His great love toward us through the many blessings of friends. Two gifts especially touched me this Christmas; a pair of beautiful, delicate pearl earrings given to me by my dearest friend Lis and a lovely pearl bracelet from my good friend Alice! Pearls happen to be my birthstone which I'm sure is why they chose them. It was as though Lis and Alice had gotten together and decided to get me pearl earrings with matching bracelet! Of course, that isn't true as one friend lives in Missouri and the other here in California and they don't even know each other, but certainly the Lord worked it out in His loving and divine way. :) When I think about the love God showed me through these gifts and others I received, I can't help getting tears in my eyes. Doesn't the Bible tell us that our Heavenly Father loves to give us good things? (James 1:17).

We spent yesterday afternoon at Paul & Aida's house, meeting an uncle of his on his father's side; Bob and his wife, Sue along with Bob's step-mother, JoAnne who is 90 years old! She was so sweet, so bright and told me how good she feels. After being introduced, I really didn't get a chance to talk to her again as she and my mother-in-law were looking at Dorothy's (my MIL) yearbook. Dorothy graduated in 1940 and JoAnne in 1937. Both had graduated from the same high school and discovered they had a couple of mutual friends in common. Paul's sister Laura was there, too. Craig and I hadn't seen her in several years and she looked great! The above photo of us is ~ (Front row, L to R: Me, JoAnne, Dorothy. Second row, L to R: Craig, Sue, Paul, Laura (Craig's cousin and Paul's sister), Bob, Aida. Last row: Christopher).

This morning we got up at 4:45 am and hit the road for L.A.! We've never left at such an early hour, but getting a head start proved to be worth getting up in what seemed like the middle of the night ~ we were back in L.A. by 11:00 am and beat the heavy holiday traffic. It's been a relaxing day and tomorrow it'll be back to the usual routine. But how good it is to spend time with family and to get caught up on each others' lives, talk about the "good old days" and make plans for the future. Merry Christmas and the best New Year of all!