Dirty Santa and a Thankful Heart

Hmmm… so it has been a while since I last wrote. I promise to try to do better.

Life has been busy with Christmas, Christmas and more Christmas.

A new tradition has been birthed at a few of our family Christmases.

Dirty Santa.

I must admit, in the past I have not been a big fan of dirty Santa. There just seemed to be something not very nice about stealing other people’s gifts. Guess how my dirty Santa experiences always ended… that’s right, I always ended up the proud owner of the worst gift brought to the game.

I was determined this year to fare better.

I drew awesome numbers 2 of 3 games. As we played the game my heart raced with excitement. I felt like the little girl so many years ago playing wahoo with my siblings determined to earn bragging rights, failure to do so would inevitably end in a stream of tears. Of course, not getting the desired gift wouldn’t make me cry at least not on the outside! :) I have grown some since I was a kid!

Once I got my eye on the prize I strategized and stole until the gifts were mine! I even stole from my mom a few times, is that wrong?! I ended up with really great gifts.

Now, I know that this isn’t what Christmas is really all about; however, it is really nice to get together with family to share in games, fellowship and life. I think we should do this more than once a year! God has given us so much! We should celebrate Him and His goodness on a daily basis and make special occasions for celebrating Him too. I think that God is pleased when we celebrate Him and share His goodness with others.

Thank you God for Your Son Jesus. Thank you for being the creator of everything good in our lives. I pray that we would live our lives sharing Your goodness with family, friends and strangers.

Fridge Monster

Gracie has been lurking around the refrigerator a-lot lately.

On several occasions I have joined her, stooping down on my hands and knees to see what is so fascinating under the fridge. Quick glances under the fridge revealed nothing spectacular.

However, desperation entered into Gracie today. I walked into the kitchen to find her trying to squeeze under the fridge. Now Gracie is a small cat. She squeezes into a-lot of tight spaces. An attempt to squeeze under the refrigerator, however, could result in a stuck situation.

Seeing her desperation, I once again joined her but this time for a more thorough look. Upon analyzing the situation, I saw that there were a few toy mice stuck under the fridge. With the help of my broom I began reach for the long lost mice. This is what I found.....

One mouse, two mice, three mice.... wait, eight mice and two rubber bands?! No wonder Gracie was going crazy, all of her toys had been eaten by the refrigerator. I guess we are going to have to make some kind of toy guard so that the fridge monster can no long feast on the cat toy delicacies.

At least for now Gracie is content having her toys back.