Palm Sunday and Uncle Matt's Birthday

Kristie King hosted our Resurrection Garden Party with our 3rd/4th grade SS girls this year.  Grace came to help me with the gardens and we all had a lovely time!  

And then Matthew Duncan had a birthday gathering!  Ice cream and candles...Kai is such the host!  His birthday theme this year was "Gear for his Man Trip of a Lifetime in August" and he got lots of outdoor survival necessities.  He's so excited about his trip!

3rd/4th grade girls

I am loving these girls that I get to work with on Sundays!  I taught the first two Sundays in December, and as we're working through the Old Testament we talked about Rahab's hope and then Joshua's obedience.  The blue "beer" cups that I'd had since Micah's first birthday (to build with, people!) finally got put to good use as the wall of Jericho and the girls built and circled and watched them crash again and again.  Then we donated them to Cara's collection.  :)

November Snow Weekend

And then the snow came...just a skiff, but enough to have everyone in Spokane want to cancel everything.  :)  Daddy took the boys up to Mt. Spokane to check the REAL SNOW up there (and to try out his truck in the snow, I'm thinking) and on Sunday our SS program had a service project day, getting ready for Family Promise--our classroom's job was to make flower bouquets and toaster pastries--and then we walked (in the snow!!!) to Didier's for a fun time for our girls class.

November snow is fun and all, but this mom was NOT prepared to deal with snow pants, gloves, and hats yet...

Ten Little Angels

Our church Christmas program took place on December 11th.  The toddlers got to sing the first song with the bigger kids--"There was ONE, there were TWO, there were THREE little angels..."  This is the group that waited oh, so patiently while the congregation worshipped for an hour before they were up...

We thought that Josh was probably too young to stand up on the stage with the rest of his class, but we were weighing what would cause the bigger frustration:  being on stage or not being able to be with Grace.  So, we went with it...

...and we hope that the audience focused on the sweet kids singing instead of the almost 2-year old who crawled for the drums and squealed when his mom carried him away from the stage.  :)

Grace did a great job.  She told us the day before that she was going to stand up on stage, but she WASN'T going to sing.  She didn't.  :)  But she stood up there the whole time--with wide eyes, taking in everything.  What a brave girl!  This always cracks us up about Grace--she knows the song forwards and backwards and sings at home constantly, yet whenever she's in new surroundings, she just takes it all in through those wide, blue eyes of hers--brows furrowed. (She inherited this brow-look from her Daddy!)

Our sweet friend, Ashlan.  She was dancing in the aisles during the rest of the program.

Thanks, Mrs. Hannah, for all your work in putting this performance together!  I am convinced there is nothing as precious as watching and listening to your kids sing to God.