Weekly: December 1-9, A Carolina Christmas Special

Happy December! We are really happy it's finally here - we're trying to not overcommit our time and do as much enjoying of the season together as possible with Christmas movies, baking, some outings,  and an advent devotional, our new addition is Randy the Reindeer... a friend of mine from work did this with her kids (one a former student of mine) with an old thrift store toy and then decided to make and sell them! We aren't Elf of the Shelf people but I was on board for a daily kindness challenge from this cute little guy. I feel extra sensitive to the emphasis we sometimes put on selfishness during this season and really want this to help us remember to look beyond ourselves. 

 (This is going to be a Carolina-heavy post... but it seems like that's the norm. It's hard to get a good picture of Liam because mostly he's just sitting around reading and he's not as interested in having his picture taken as he used to be/as his sister is - plus she has so many things going on!)

  

 We got a teeny little bit of snow with a lot of rain on December day 1, but it was still exciting to watch it fall!

 And December day 2 - it snowed for hours! It didn't really pile up because it was too warm but it was so fun to wake up to it and watch it fall all morning long! I didn't take any picture, but I did get a couple of videos of Carolina, who was the only one who went outside to try and play in it. 

Little Miss is about to lose her first top tooth, it's been hanging by a thread for 3 days and that hillbilly tooth needs to go ASAP - ugh. I'm so excited to see just how adorable she'll be with that little hole in her smile, but I am sad that those tiny baby teeth are going away, I know as soon as kids get those big top teeth they just look so much older. 

It was a good week - I finally got my classroom decorated for Christmas and we play Christmas carols while we work, we do Christmas crafts, and display a video loop of a crackling fire, so it feels very cozy. I do wish I wasn't working so much this month, and had a few more days at home before Christmas, but we are making the best out of it. We also managed to get a tree and decorate it, so now we are all ready for Christmas at home too! 

But the best news to come out of this week is that Carolina asked Jesus into her heart tonight. Our advent devotional was about Love and all about Jesus sacrificing himself because he loved us so much and wanted us to be with him in heaven. She was doing jumping jacks throughout the reading so I really didn't think she was listening. But after I put her to bed, Todd walked by her room and she called him in there and told him she wanted to ask Jesus into her heart "right now".  He called me in there and I helped her pray, just like I did with Liam. It was so special and so wonderful. I'm so happy for her and for all of us - her smile afterwards could not have been more beautiful.