Christmas Eve

As always, thinking of others is the best cure for the blues. This year, I signed on for the Angel Tree project and enjoyed the shopping expedition so much that I ended up buying gifts for 4 kids.

On Christmas Eve eve, I headed up north where the snow is sparse but the love is warm. My nieces were asleep (angels!) when I arrived, but the next morning they swarmed me with hugs.

My sister had designed and built a gingerbread castle for us to decorate - quite elaborate even before we put the frosting on!

I got to decorate one of the cottages (mine says "Noel"):

After the gingerbread houses, we went sledding nearby - my elder niece surprised us all by sprinting to the top of the hill and throwing herself onto the sled (tummy down, face first) and down the run.

The little one enjoyed sledding too, but wasn't ready to go by herself. Of course, she'd probably do better sledding alone, since her mom and I both managed to dump ourselves in the snow as we went down with her!!

Their church specializes in getting the parents involved in the Christmas pageant. So (for example) the three kings were really six kings -- three father-son combinations. In the choir of angels, my elder niece was accompanied by a mom angel, and in the rambunctious flock of sheep, my younger niece was attended by a watchful shepherd dad.