Our church youth group took a trip to Liberty (about an hour and 15 minutes away) to do some snow tubing. It was a youth trip, but adults that came along could bring their younger kids as well. So, our whole family went, as well as the girls’ friends who live behind us. Leah was happy to be included.
We had a great time. Hard to believe we live so close to snowy mountains and we’ve never done anything like this until now. Thanks to the Glen Mar youth group for setting this up.
We’ve had a lot of snow days this year. No big blizzard, but several days with enough to play in (and enough to need to shovel). Usually Jen and I do most of the shoveling, with perhaps a bit of kid help until they get distracted and start playing. This snow in late February was the first time they shoveled all the way until the end. That may have had to do with the offer of cash payment for their work…
Yesterday was Youth Sunday at Glen Mar. This was Molly’s first year classified as a youth (since she’s now in middle school), and she jumped in with both feet. She joined the planning committee putting together the services for the weekend, and also participated in all 3 services on Sunday morning. I’ll start with the 11:00 contemporary service (which is what we’re normally involved in), and then jump back to the traditional ones.
At 11:00, Molly joined the band. She’s sung with the band before, but this was her first time being the lead singer for a song. She was fantastic!
She also showed off her personality welcoming everyone at the beginning of the service, and of course helped out singing all the other songs as well. Nice job Molly!
But the 11:00 service was not the only service she participated in. At both our traditional services (8:00 and 9:30), she sang in Joyful Noise, our youth choir, and played in the youth orchestra.
So, she planned the services, sang in the choir twice, played in the orchestra twice, welcomed the congregation, and sang in the band including her first ever lead. I was a bit worried she was biting off more than she could chew (I mean, she’s just a 6th grader - barely in the youth group), but she did a great job at everything.
In addition to her Concert Orchestra, Molly joined the Symphony Orchestra at school. This group includes 6th-8th graders, and combines strings with winds, brass, and percussion. They meet at 6:50am before school every Tuesday and Thursday, so these are some dedicated kids. And it was a joint concert with Leah's elementary school orchestra.
Here are our two orchestral musicians after their concert together.
Leah had her first orchestra concert in January. The 3rd grade orchestra at her school did a great job, especially Leah on her cello. And it was a joint concert with Molly's middle school, so we got to see both of them in the same night (I’ll post about Molly tomorrow).
In addition to the video, I got a couple of pictures. Leah was not nervous at all before her first orchestra concert.
Not sure where this expression came from as they prepared to play.
The 3rd grade at Leah’s school only has 3 classes, but almost all of the kids chose to join the orchestra. So it’s a big group.
Our Christmas story continued much like the Biblical one. Visitors from afar arrived with gifts, though not gold, frankincense, or myrrh. G’Mom and Grampa flew up two days after Christmas to spend 8 days with us and continue the Christmas celebrations.
Molly has been on several overnight trips this Fall, and both girls spend the night out frequently, so these new duffles were very much appreciated!
Back in November, Jen was invited to a party to make creative wood signs. She came home with the how-to and decided to make wood signs for several family members. It was definitely a joint effort. I decided that simply screwing together some boards from Home Depot would not do. So, I bought some rough hardwood (this is Ash, others were Red Oak), milled them, glued up a panel, cut, stained and sealed them. Jen created the design and painted. If you have a keen eye, you may have caught a different version of this in the Christmas Day opening presents pictures.
We don’t see too many movies in the theater, but we’ve been excitedly anticipating the release of Mary Poppins Returns. So, we bought our tickets early and all headed to the theater to see it.
We love going to the movies with reclining cushy seats. It was G’Mom and Grampa’s first time in a theater like this.
Grampa’s birthday fell during their visit, so we made sure to celebrate. We had saved a turtle cheesecake from Molly’s pie sale with her middle school just for the occasion.
And there were lots of little fun activities around the house, like this elephant wood puzzle.
After a late night, the girls didn’t wake us up too early in the morning. Once they got up, the first thing they found by their stockings was a smaller Squishmallow to join their largerone.
Unicorns and fleece onesies are all the rage, so these pajamas were a big hit.
Since Grams was in the hospital, we changed things up a bit. We all met up at our house to celebrate together. Our house was also conveniently the closest to Johns Hopkins hospital, making it easy for us to go see her for Christmas Day hospital visits. Sorry, no pictures from the hospital, though I do have pictures from our house.
Molly brought down her R2-D2 droid to entertain Max, and it certainly did capture his attention.
Even more surprising than moving the celebration to our house, our tradition-keeping family decided to go non-traditional. Tacos for Christmas were delicious (though there was still pumpkin pie for dessert).
After lunch, we opened presents. Charlie got a Squishmallow too.
Molly’s been saving her money to buy a Nintendo Switch for some time. She was much of the way before Christmas, and hoping Christmas would put her over the top to buy one. I knew she would get enough, so I secretly bought one on a Black Friday sale and hid it away. So, after getting enough money, she started asking when we could go somewhere to buy one. I promptly became the store of Chad and let her buy it right then. She was very excited.
After helping put on several church services (2 for Leah, 3 for Molly), we had a couple of Christmas Eve traditions to enjoy. First, the girls opened 1 present. This is a Grammy tradition, and generally happens at Grams house. Since Grams was in the hospital and Grammy had visited earlier in the month, Grammy left us with a gift to keep the tradition alive. This was the first time this has ever happened at our house. The girls were excited for this Harry Potter themed gift.
Also per tradition, the Jen made the girls new Christmas jammies to wear. They look very comfy.
