Hannah and Nathan got Christmas a little early from Granddaddy and GaGa. Uncle Daniel helped the day of assembly and they had three walls up when Hannah finally guessed that it was a playhouse!
We were so glad Uncle Caleb could be home for the better part of December. (Below) Hannah's friend Elle Udouj was in town from Greenville, SC. The girls had a great time in the new playhouse.
We had a very blessed December. The kids were alot of fun especially the week of Christmas. Ben and I decided to be very honest with Hannah and tell her that "Santa" was a game that people played and that we might play that game too, a little bit. But her gifts would be coming from Daddy and Momma, grandparents,etc. We of course celebrated the story of baby Jesus in many ways. Ben taught Sunday School at First Pres. Jackson for the month of December and Hannah loved going to her Sunday school class there. During worship, the Sunday before Christmas, Dr. Duncan referred to Jesus in the manger and Hannah turned to me, her eyes lit up and she whispered LOUDLY, " the MANGER!!!". Of course, I was caught between not wanting to squelch her enthusiasm but also being in the balcony with 150+ other people trying to listen to the sermon! Her enthusiasm didn't stop there as you can probably imagine,
"(gasp) That man (pointing) is tawkin' 'bout baby GEE-ZUS!" Yes, the little southerner is emerging. :)
"He's tawkin' 'bout the STAY-BULL!"
(in her ear) "yes, sweetie, that's right, very good! let's just listen now"
and on it went till we the sermon was nearly over. I finally got the whispers down to, well, a whisper.
At lunch, on our way out of town, we tried to grab something quick and two ladies sat down at a table next to us.
"Hey sweetie, aren't you pretty? What's Santa going to bring you?"
"Well, I already got all my presents (pause) and they're from Momma." she stated so matter of factly, nodding her head like they should have known or something. I tried really hard not to fall out laughing!
Hooray for free range, organic chicken eggs! They REALLY DO taste better. In the picture above, Mr. Hal Martin, owner of Abby Farms, is feeding his "girls" local goat milk. They like it cold apparently because when he finished pouring the icy slush in the bowl, he cut the jug open and let the other chickens peck at the frozen milk.
Our trip today was primarily so that the kids could help harvest the eggs. Hannah and my mom filled an entire basket! The chickens were friendly and continued to eat other interesting things while we were there...oats, corn, broken chicken eggs...yep...that one got to me...
Nathan was determined to touch the chickens, especially after one encounter with one of the red ones. Let me back up here on the story...Nathan had his 15 months shots this morning so he wasn't in the best mood to begin with. So when one of the red hens started to have a stare down, neck jerkin' contest with him, Nathan didn't back down! He took a swat at that poor bird before I knew what happened! The chicken was fine but it sure made for a good laugh. Nathan just looked at me and grunted when I "scolded" him.
This picture is fuzzy because when I was trying to climb over the chicken fence, I landed on my rear!! and the camera was around my neck so it messed up the focus temporarily. Go Beth.
The air smelled much nicer outside the chicken hutch. But we had a fabulous time. We went back to Mr. Martin's house where we traded in the harvested eggs for ones that had been cleaned and put into cartons.
