Well, cliche as it may sound, I can't believe that 2013 has come to an end! Here are a few pictures from the past couple weeks...
Eli's class Christmas party:
His class... LOVE these kids!
This picture is blurry for some reason, but this is a rare picture of Eric and me! :) We went to our favorite restaurant (Eden) for my birthday with Kelly and Phil.
SO thankful for their faithful friendship!
Eli all dressed up in his "worker gear:"
Christmas morning. That bike by the tree is my favorite thing. :) We couldn't wait to see Eli's reaction to his new, bigger bike.
This is so blurry, but I still love it. He was THRILLED. He's been asking for a bigger bike for months now! Hours and hours have already been logged riding this new bike.
We do three "tree presents" and stocking gifts. Eli's second present (after the bike) was a tether-ball. Eric had already put the pole in the backyard (which Eli thought was an oddly-placed fence post), so we were able to play on Christmas morning!
Last tree gift: a crossbow (that shoots rubber darts, of course)! This was probably the biggest hit.
One of Eric's gifts was tickets for us to go to a Sidekicks (Dallas' professional indoor soccer team) game. Eli was just as happy as Eric was. :)
Stocking time! (my favorite part!)
We had a really, really nice Christmas. After our little family time, we headed over to my parents' house for brunch and more gift-opening. It is a blast watching all the kids open gifts and then play with them all together. And after that we all just hung around and played before making a big Christmas dinner together. It was a relaxing, fun, memorable day- just perfect!
Every year at the end of December I try to think back over the year, evaluating the good things and the bad things, how we've grown and developed as a family, areas that I've seen the Lord work in my life, and the (MANY) areas where God has shown me I need to change. Overwhelmingly, we have seen the Lord's guidance and care in our lives this year. He answered some big prayers, gave us some really fun memories, worked in each of our hearts, and eased us so faithfully through our big transition to Eli going to school and me going back to work full time. We look back on 2013 with gratitude and pray that the lessons we have learned of God's faithfulness sink deep into our hearts. And we look forward to 2014 with anticipation, asking the Lord to continue to mold us into His image as individuals and as a family.
Happy New Year!
