The Christmas Spirit (or the lack of)

Dan and I joke that all we have to do to ensure foul moods in all our children and in us is put Christmas clothes on them and then proceed to say, "It's picture time!". You can have one without the other and everything is fine, BUT if you combine them--forget it! The normal problems seem to arise like getting the camera to focus when the kids are actually smiling and getting the kids to not move after I put them in the right place or getting them to look at the camera. EVERY YEAR these are the issues--you think we'd learn.

Cute, but look at the lovely blinds in the background.....

Check out Nathan's frown--I think I threaten to take away the DS if he couldn't "be happy" about taking pictures.

The threat worked, Nathan has a smile and Joel and Ellie look adorable, but oops I cute Nathan's head off. At this point I gave up! Fun times, fun times...maybe next year I'll remember to not combine the two instead of dreaming that this year it will be different.


I just can't give up on the idea of pictures in Christmas clothes this year. So, as we're leaving the church I try again---don't think that will be the picture to send out!

Happy 4th birthday my sweet ballerina!

Elizabeth is a ballerina at heart! She loves to dance with her daddy to "Cinderella" by Steven Curtis Chapman. So when it came time to decide what kind of birthday party we should have there was no question. We were blessed to have two of our high school students, Grace and Laura, who dance with the Performance Team in the Dancing for Joy program (they are quite good, and I'm not just saying that because I'm biased) come dressed to the hilt with makeup and hair done. After we colored, made necklaces, did our hair, make-up, and fingernails Grace and Laura taught them a dance and they performed it for all the moms (and Dan). We had a great time and I'm sure Ellie will want the same thing next year!

Happy 8th birthday Nathan John!

It is our tradition in the Pursley household to hang streamers up on the bedroom doors for our kids to wake up to on their birthday. This year, Nathan reminded us and told us to not forget to do that after he went to bed!

Nathan and Austin getting ready to be "given" water. They were reinacting Indy's father being sick and Indy getting a special kind of water to heal him.

One of Nathan's best buddies, Austin, has his birthday 2 days after Nathan's (the same day as our nephew's). So, this year we decided to have an "Indiana Jones" party together. I used my emotions (and not my brain) and thought we shouldn't leave anyone out and invited all the boys from the class and some from church (Austin's family goes to our church as well) and well all of them came and we had 16 2nd graders! Thank God it wasn't at my house (sorry Kim) because you all know how that would have freaked me out.... Dan saved the day and had amazing activities for them to do. I couldn't understand why my husband, the youth pastor who has 50 middle schoolers in one room for an 1 1/2 every week, was freaking out about 16 2nd graders. Well it was quite a show and let's just say Nathan and Austin had a blast (and so did all the other boys). Happy Birthday Nathan!

Joel the Kindergartner

This month has been filled with celebrations for Nathan, Dan, Ellie and I couldn't leave Joel out of the postings, so I'm writing about him first. Joel is quite the artist. I bought a sketchpad for him a while ago and he has now filled that and used a ton of computer paper to draw his pictures. I was just commenting to Dan that every time I turn around the fridge has another picture he has drawn. He loves school and is just "scary smart" (Dan's mom came up with that expression). He has the memory of a computer--and I'm not kidding. He's reading and spelling already and loves to be the "helper" at school. Will you pray with us that Joel will always use his abilities and gifts to honor the Lord and to serve other people?