It's a Wonderful Life

And it was a wonderful Christmas holiday!

We celebrated our first real family reunion, welcoming Oldest Daughter home after her first semester of college, as we celebrated TOGETHER the Advent of our Savior, Jesus.

Our traditional Christmas Eve supper of turkey and rice soup, cheeses, crackers, and all sorts of fun snack-y foods.

We also celebrated Tayta's 12th birthday with our traditional Christmas Eve morning brunch.















We slept...

Jet Lag

We played weird games with good friends





















Active Son and Artist Son submitting to the commands of Quelf.


We participated in a community service project with the youth...















Organizing donations for distribution to the poor

Post-project fellowship over good hummus, falafel, and mint tea at Hashem's

We enjoyed doing things we don't usually have time for...

Artist Son got started on his anticipated Christmas-break art project right after studies ended, and finished it the day before break ended.

Tiger, in colored pencil and acrylic

My fun-project wasn't quite so awe inspiring, at least not to most: I started coneflower, foxglove, and poppy seedlings.

On one beautiful sunny day we headed south to the ancient Nebatean city of Petra...

...and on another we had the joy of celebrating the baptism of three dear friends at the Jordan River, "Bethany on the other side of the Jordan".

(in case you're wondering, the water was really cold, but at least it was a sunny day.)


We enjoyed reading new books, individually:












And, together:



And the kids finally, finally got me to sit still and watch all of the Lord of the Rings trilogy--the extended version. All I can say is don't watch these on cold, dark nights--which is what we did--or the nights will seem colder and darker.



And now, the late nights and the late mornings must end as we return to 'real life' in the morning. I think I'll make some scones for breakfast, just to make the transition a little easier.