Christmas in Photos

We enjoyed our first Christmas in our new home.  Christmas day was beautiful--sunny, windy (therefore cooler than normal) and the perfect temp.  We both grew up with warm Christmas days, so it felt just like it should.  We were blessed to celebrate with Opa and Oma for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Here are some pictures from our celebration.

J opening his stocking
(he thought Papa's looked more interesting
and kept taking things out of it instead!)

B got a new game...Candy Land!

What did Oma get?
B was trying to guess, even though he had watched me wrap it!

Excited about new blocks

Opa excited to give B a gift

Priceless face

One for J, too!

J was SO excited about this gift from Opa and Oma.
He kept saying, "Baby!"

Probably the favorite gifts for B.
If ever in doubt, give him books. He LOVES them! 

J trying to blow up his balloon from his stocking.

Birthday cake for Jesus.  B was SO excited to sing
and help blow out the candles.

Thanks to gifts from second cousins,
the boys got their first tattoos...

J with his new car tattoo

Playing together with J's new toy

Christmas afternoon we drove up to the school, so the boys could play on the playground.
We got some good pictures while we were there.

Lake Sentani and the airport in the center of the picture

The clouds were really pretty

Beautiful views of mountains all around us!

A morning in our lives...

These two boys love playing together!

Getting them both to look and smile at the same time
 proved to be a challenge today....

What's J watching so intently?

Answer: A friend of our neighbors (8 year old) climbing the 30 foot palm tree....
Hoping the boys didn't get any ideas....

Treats this week

Someone sent us marshmallows!!  

Best way to eat marshmallows indoors...

Making Christmas cookies

B enjoyed decorating them!

Best smile EVER

B claimed he was cold and needed a blanket.
 It was 90 degrees...inside our house. :)

Christmas Crafts

We have been enjoying preparing for Christmas here in our house.  We have our advent calendar up and the boys are excited to participate in this fun event every evening.  Even though we are not in the USA's "Christmas saturated" (or materialistic?) environment, I seem to be more aware of Christmas this month than I have been in years' past.  I am excited to begin traditions with our little family and celebrate together the true meaning of Christmas: the birth of our Savior, Jesus.  I thought I'd share a couple of the ways we have done that this past week.

I skipped ahead in B's preschool material to the story of Jesus' birth (we started late in the year, otherwise it would fall at the right time anyway).  Part of this week's lesson was to create a nativity scene/set that the kids can play with.  They shared this link to a site with free printable paper dolls from the nativity story: http://www.makingfriends.com/biblecrafts/nativity_scene.htm
I thought that this was an awesome idea, so we printed out ours and laminated them.  In the past 4 days, B has played with them LOTS, acting out the story of Jesus' birth over and over.  What a great tool/toy for a preschooler, as he learns the true story of Christmas.  Here's a picture of ours...sorry for the poor quality, it was taken on my phone.

I also decided to try making a Christmas wreath, with my limited supplies...

Here's the beginning of the process:

And here's my final product.  I would have used green crepe paper...had I had it.  But hey, now my wreath can be for Valentine's day, too. :)

How are you celebrating Christmas in your house?

Preschool Begins

We have been in our new home over a month now!  The first 2 weeks after arriving was full of B asking, "What's next?"  He would literally go through each event of the day, asking me what was coming after that (i.e. what's after breakfast? what's after playtime? what's after lunch? what's after nap? and on and on).  After going through an entire day's schedule, he'd say, "OK. But what's after ALL that?"  It took me a while to put all the pieces together....our 3-year-old was BORED.  Bored, because his short life of 3 years has been full of exciting events....traveling all over the world, months on end of visiting family and friends, moving SIX times in just his lifetime!  And now that we have reached our "final destination" and have plans to be here for YEARS, he just couldn't quite grasp that nothing new was coming next.

So, through God's prompting, I realized it was time to start preschool at home.  I had already downloaded an awesome curriculum a couple months ago, so it was time to begin.  Here are a couple pictures from today's activities. The curriculum walks through Bible stories chronologically, with each week's letter and activities centered around that story.  So, this week (Week 3) is about Adam and Eve's Fall into Sin in the Garden of Eden.  The letter of the week is "a for apple" and today we made apple prints.  I don't have any paint, so we improvised and made vanilla pudding, then added food coloring to make our "pudding paint".  Biggest potential problem with this?  The ants were having a feast on B's apples....we stuck them in the fridge to dry and hopefully that will solve the problem!  B sure loved eating his apples afterwards, though, dipped in our edible paint! :)

Making apple prints from our "pudding paint"

And now B's question of the day?  "Can we do more preschool?"  I'm thankful for God's leading in showing me it was time for starting this fun adventure with my son.