Merry Christmas! We finished our Jesse tree today with the star on the top of the tree to represent Jesus! The girls really enjoyed making ornaments this month for each day of Advent and we plan on doing the Jesse tree every Christmas season!
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| James did an awesome job building the tree |
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| I put signs above each ornament to remind the girls(and me) what each ornament symbolized. |
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Hope your day is filled with the light of the Savior!
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| Christmas Eve 2010 |
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My mom invited us over for Christmas baking on Wednesday. It was so sweet to watch the girls bake with their grandma!
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It reminded me of another time grandma Christmas baked with Rilyn. Way back in Christmas of 2006. Look how cute-same aprons and everything!
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| December 2006 |
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| December 2010 |
Almost every Christmas for the past 9 years, my dad, Dr. Rick Erickson, has been presenting the “Star of Bethlehem” to thousands in Texas. He finally has put it on the web so everyone can watch it! It is so fascinating and really will blow your mind. How can you NOT believe in God after watching this is my question?!? Like did you know God tells the story of Jesus’ birth and death in the constellations? If you have a spare 2 hours, I would totally recommend watching this (first hour) and this (last hour) on your computer! And I’m not just saying this because he’s my dad!
Here is a little article on him from the past:
“Dr. Richard Erickson, Professor of Medicine at Texas A & M Health Science Center and Director of the Division of Gastroenterology at Scott and White hospital Temple, will present his multi-media program The Star of Bethlehem at the Central Texas College Planetarium this coming Tuesday evening, November 25, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m.
Dr. Erickson, who is an elder of the Temple Bible Church, is an amateur astronomer and loves both the physical and biological sciences. He is especially interested in teaching topics which help people to “reconcile” science and the Bible. He was naturally drawn to the subject of the star of Bethlehem when his daughter (THAT’S ME!) invited him to a presentation on it at College Station five years ago. He has been researching and teaching on this topic ever since then, and each year his presentation incorporates more of his findings.”
Before we went to Fort Worth early this week, we stopped in Grand Prairie to visit my sister and spend some time with her while James went to the Dallas Cowboys game. My sister treated the girls to a beauty mask and make-up tips. I was busy keeping Asher occupied when the girls came out of Jessica’s room saying, “use toner then moisturize!” 🙂
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| No, I did not ask permission from Jessica to post these pictures! |
After their make-up session (gold eyeshadow to pop Ella’s blue eyes and Rilyn picked out glitter pink and blue eyeshadow!), we decorated a gingerbread house. I bought a pre-built one this year and that was the way to go! The girls made Jessica do the windows and the doors with frosting while they did the roof and all the candy decor. Our house wouldn’t win any award, but it was fun!
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| frosting the roof! |
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| The windows had issues.
(Can you see Rilyn’s glitter eye makeup?) |
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| finished! |
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| time to eat the roof! |
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| Gingerbread house destroyed and eaten…5 seconds after they finished decorating it! |
Asher likes to introduce himself these days like this, “Hi! It’s me! Asher man!” Adorable.
We celebrated Christmas with James’ family on Monday in Fort Worth and I got a lot of cute pictures of Asher. He didn’t know what to do when it was time to open the presents. He just stared at the gift when we put it in his lap. It occurred to me that he didn’t remember last Christmas, (and the custom of opening gifts under the tree), but he does remember his Elmo birthday, so I started singing “Happy Birthday” to him and said, “Now open your presents!” Then he smiled real big and got the hang of opening gifts real quick! 😉 I know I confused the kid, and when we are singing Happy Birthday to Jesus on Saturday and eating cake, he will probably think it is for him!
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| my favorite picture of him |
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| He loved throwing the wrapping paper around! |
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| watching daddy play Angry Birds on his phone |
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| Papaw Bear throwing Asher around like a “sack of taters” |
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| Big Father/Son moment: first Nerf gun shot.
(This wasn’t even Asher’s present, this gun was a gift for his 31 year old uncle!) |
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This picture above caused much distress. (It was a parked tractor on the side of the road.) Not from Asher, he loved being in “the claw”, but Rilyn, who was on the side of the road crying because she thought we were all going to be arrested! “This is illegal!” she kept telling me! (Fyi, this was James’ idea. I am a “rule follower” like Rilyn and I would never of put Asher in there, BUT I will snap a quick shot of him if someone else puts him in there!) She literally had tears in the car on the way home from that night (we were looking at lights) because she thought the police would see our photo. She kept telling me to delete it. I finally compromised and told her I would show the photo to Uncle Eric (a police officer). 🙂
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Here I am Christmas 1981. The best thing about this picture is what my dad is wearing. He did not want to leave the 70’s fashion behind! (I’m about the same age as Asher is in this picture.)
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| my mom is pregnant with Jeff in this pic |
Here is James with his brother and sister, (James is holding Mandy.) Christmas 1985
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| awwwww |
Don’t you love gifts made for you by your kids at school? You never know what you are going to get! This year Ella brought home this handmade nativity. It’s sweet, in a “psychotic Mary and jagged tooth Joseph kinda way.” It looks like her teacher saw her “beautiful parents” and decided to draw baby Jesus’ face before it turned into the Addams family. But, I love it and I’ll look forward to putting it on display every Christmas (until Ella begs me not to put it up anymore!)
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| Ella’s Christmas gift to us |
We took a quick long, (quick as in 1 day, long as in loooong drive with a 2 year old) trip to the Fort Worth Botanical Gardens today to take our family portraits with a photographer from Minnesota, (who is also a blogger with 20,000+ followers(!) and the link I gave you takes you to a sneak peek at one of the pictures from today), who was in town just to shoot portraits. When I get those shots, I will definitely post, but for now, here are a couple pictures I snapped after our session was done.
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| lots of fall foliage! |
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| my Ella |
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| my Rilyn |
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| James took this one obviously! |
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| can you spot Ella?!? |
Rilyn and Ella share a long desk. One side of the desk is Rilyn’s drawers and the other side-Ella’s. I wonder if you can guess which drawers are Rilyn’s and which are Ella’s. 😉 (Hint: the answer can be seen on one of the papers in the drawers.)
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the paquettes 