Christmas 2010

So I have to start by praising God for one of the best Christmases EVER!!! Christmas 2010 started with a week full of spending time with old friends. Of which I was reminded that old friends are some of the best friends. We then kicked off family Christmas festivities by going to my dad's house for Christmas Eve day. I cherish my time with my dad. We don't see each other much but when we're together, it's special.....really special. He blessed us (my sister, stepbrother, and I) with a solid silver coin made in 1928 that had been passed down to him from his great grandfather. The simplest gift ever but the sentimental value in it was beyond explanation.

My sister Patrice, my dad and I

Us with my grandmother. Doesn't she look great to be 77?

Christmas festivity #2 was at our house with Jason's dad's side of the family. Always lots of laughs with them. They are hilarious and I enjoy spending time with them. Destiny was wired (as you can see in the pics) about Christmas and Santa coming all together.



After we went to bed on Christmas Eve, Santa made a visit to our house with lots of gifts for a pretty cool little girl. Destiny left him a cookies, milk, and a pretty cool letter with inventive spelling. I LOVE this stage in her life. She has quite the personality and we are so blessed to have her.



Christmas morning brought a very excited little girl around 7:30 AM, which is way too early for me but seeing the excitement in Destiny's eyes made it all worth it. Our Christmas tradition is to call my mom and dad when Des wakes up and we wait for them to get here to see what Santa brought. Destiny was very excited. We all got great gifts, some of my favorites were the snowman dish towels and tall coffee mug (yes, I know....I'm getting old) from Jason and Des and of course my new Glee volume 4 CD....AMAZING music!!!

After opening gifts at home, we loaded up and went to my mom's house to celebrate Christmas with my two sisters, BIL, and future BIL, niece, nephew, mom and dad. We all opened gifts together and then enjoyed a wonderful lunch. After all the struggles this year, Christmas seemed to be a little more special this year. We all knew and recognized how blessed we were to have mama with us even in the middle of the fight against that nasty thing called cancer. And I think God blessed us a little extra with the first white Christmas in a REALLY long time. That snow caused us to have to postpone our tradition of Christmas night with Jason's mom because she wasn't able to get here from Blairsville because of the snow. But it also brought something really cool.... a whole family sleepover (minus Brooke and Levi). We all stayed up late laughing and talking and just enjoying each other's company. I woke up on Sunday morning to the smell of my mama's homemade biscuits. I don't think there is any better smell than that.  : )     We then spent the rest of the day lounging and laughing and then we played in the snow and finished the afternoon off with a couple rounds of "catch phrase" which is ALWAYS dangerous with my family. We came home around 5 or so and unpacked and put away all the gifts. I finished the day with a huge smile on my face and in my heart. Thank you Lord for your many blessings, especially for a sweet mama like mine.

As I look back over our Christmas festivities, I can only think of one word to describe it.......BLESSED. I am SOOOOOO grateful for God's blessings over my life and for my family. The coolest thing is that we still have one more Christmas get together with Jason's mom's family. So we get to extend this Christmas holiday. I have alot of thoughts brewing in my head about 2010 so watch for another blog coming later. But for now, Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!