Christmas Eve

It's mid afternoon on Christmas eve. The decorations are up, gifts are all wrapped, the Christmas cards are finally in the mail. Chris is at the grocery store buying the final ingredients for Christmas eve dinner. We will be heading to Grace Baptist Church at 4:00pm for Christmas eve service. It's not our usual church, but Grace is a bit more traditional. Traditional is not what I want for a home church, but on Christmas eve it's kind of nice. Chris is kind of sad that we are not going to be celebrating Christmas with our family in WI this year, especially since we have been there three of the last four years. She is being a trooper though. We keep reminding ourselves that even though this is not our ideal Christmas, we need to make it special for the kids. We are making the memories they will have for the rest of there lives, so we need to make this good ones! Catie has inspected every package under the tree, comparing all of her's to her wish list, trying to figure out what could be in each package. She has related that several of them have her stumped. That's good I tell her. That way it will be more fun to open them! The WI clan are all meeting for Christmas eve at my brother Daves house. That is what I miss the most living out here during the holidays is being with the whole clan. We always have such a great time. I'm praying for a safe Christmas for all of us, near and far. Also that our soldiers over in the Middle East are safe and that they are able to have a meaningful Christmas even though they are far from family and loved ones.