Christmas!

Journal excerpts from the week:

Sunday, December 22nd: I gave Amber a haircut this afternoon. This morning while I was doing Amber's hair before church, I noticed a suspiciously short hacked section near her forehead. "Did you cut your hair?" I asked. Sheepish eyes answered me. "It was annoying me so I cut it off." Thankfully it was only a small section, but Amber did say she wanted shorter hair again, so I chopped and hacked at her insanely thick hair until I got it shorter and even across the bottom. It's totally cute. When I was done, the bathroom floor had more hair on it than I have on my entire head, and my thumb was red and aching from the pressure of the scissors. Amber's hair is that thick. 

Wintering

 Last week was dark and rainy and bleak. The temperature hovered one or two degrees above freezing, making it pure misery to set even one foot outside into the damp cold. I did five consecutive runs on the treadmill--a new personal record. This week we had less rain, which made life a little more pleasant in spite of the short days. We even had a sunny day where the temperature climbed up above 50 degrees! Spring-like weather around here in December is very rare, so we made the most of it.

Nashville Sister Trip

I went on a sister trip to Nashville last weekend! My sisters and I try to get away together every few years, and the stars aligned for a quick getaway on December 5-8. I have the best sisters in the whole world and I love them so much. After dropping Jay off at early morning seminary on Thursday, December 5th, I kept driving straight to the Tri Cities airport. One flight delay, two planes, and 14 hours later, I was in Nashville with my sisters, eating dinner at a barbecue restaurant. With two travel days and two Nashville days, our time was limited, and we definitely made the most of it:

Christmas Tree Quest

This was our ninth consecutive year of going to White Pass to cut down a mountain Christmas tree! We have gone to the same clearing off of the same forest service road for nine years and somehow we've found a good Christmas tree every single time. Jay drove the first 50 minutes to get some rare highway driving practice. We made a brief stop in Naches, WA at the Ace Hardware store to purchase our $5 (cash only!) National Forest Service Christmas tree cutting permit and to switch drivers. Jay would probably have been fine to drive all the way to our spot in the mountains, but I would not have been ok, since I get anxious even when Jeff drives in the mountains during cold winter weather. So Jay graciously stepped aside for Jeff to finish the last half hour of the drive.

Thanksgiving 2024

Thanksgiving 2024 marked one year since we moved into our house! The fact that we did not move all of our belongings from one house to another two days before Thanksgiving this year made this year's Thanksgiving Day much less exhausting than last year. But Thanksgiving is an exhausting holiday in general, so we still got plenty worn out! It's always worth the effort though. Being tired after doing traditions and making fun memories gives me a warm-hearted happy glow that I do my best to pause and appreciate in and around all of the work.