We have been in full Christmas swing around here. All my shopping is done. Yay! The presents are all wrapped. Yay!….I even have all the stocking stuffers ready to go. Yay, Yay, Yay!!! Please don’t hate me 🙂

I love that with all that done we can just slow down and really enjoy this season. The kids have been LOVING our advent activities. But I seriously think the highlight of their day is the Christmas story they get to unwrap each night and read together by the tree. I love that it’s the little things that always seem to make the biggest impact 🙂

We have also been enjoying the Christmas tunes. Today while driving my all time favorite Christmas song came on “Do you hear what I hear”.

Some of the things I love most about the Christmas season are the traditions we have started as a family.
While some of them are simple and fun- like the new pajamas we open on Christmas eve to wear on Christmas morning, others are so much more than that…. like the Cookie Countdown we started a couple of years ago.
Last week Evan asked me if we could please deliver our cookies to the homeless again. Oh how my heart swelled at not only the fact that he remembered but also that he was hoping that we could do it again. When I told him of course we would his face lit up. “Awesome! That was so much fun!”

Could his response have touched his mama’s heart any deeper?

This year we are going to add in a couple of new traditions…

i saw this on pinterest. 
i adore it.
the end.

I lost her today.
It was probably for less than 30 mins… but it felt like hours.

We were at Evan’s hockey practice. The whistle had just blown and we were getting ready to go down to the dressing room. The girls had been chasing each other up and down the arena bleachers and as I looked up I saw Selah running towards me… but Abby wasn’t behind her.
When I asked where her sister was she just shrugged her shoulders.

I didn’t panic, as many times she will wander off and I’ll find her happily playing nearby.
I circled and checked down the long hallway. I called into every dressing room and checked all the possible hiding spots… but the longer I looked, the faster my heart beat.