Happy New Year!

I love that the New Year includes 'lucky' 13!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Cooper

The Mrowcas have an addition to the family, a sweet puppy named Cooper! We got to see him last night and he is oh so adorable! The kids ran to the door and greeted us very boisterously with "WE GOT A NEW PUPPY AND WE GET TO KEEP HIM FOREVER!!!" How it made our hearts glad to see them both so excited. Without further ado, here's Cooper...

I know they will love and take good care of each other.

Christmas Eve and Day

A highlight of the Christmas Eve service was watching Madelyn sing, surrounded by candlelight, she looked like an angel come down from heaven! I wish I would have taken a picture of her. 

Here are some pictures from our Christmas Eve get-together with the Andersons...

After dinner, Makenzie warmed up to Uncle Gary and loaded him up with gifts!

 We all got a big kick out of her little game.

A Doodle Pro! Just what he, I mean she, wanted!!!

 

Sweet Makenzie!

Sweet gifts from the East!

Sweet Kelly-girl!

Kisses for Mimi

Steve and Rich

And last, but not least, baby Brooklyn, just 5 days old!

We had a quiet Christmas morning, just me & Gary exchanging gifts. What a shock when I opened my last gift and it was a diamond necklace!!!! He pulled this one off to perfection. It is beautiful and brought me to tears. Then he gave me the card after and I struggled to read each word through the tears that were flowing... this is what he wrote:

"You are my diamond - the sparkle in my life. To me you are a precious jewel, a perfect wife, mother, and of course Grammy. I could not imagine life without you. When you look at your necklace, always remember that you are the diamond that God uses to reflect His light to the ones you love."

When I look at the diamond, I remember these sweet words but I also think about the man who spares nothing to make me and our family happy. He would do anything for any one of us and is the light of our life, the one we look to and rely on, the one who answers all our questions and calms our fears, the one who points us God-ward and reminds us that He is the source of everything we need, everything that will ever matter for both time and eternity...


"Now unto Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen." Eph. 3:20-21

Christmas Eve Brunch

Another year almost gone by. Fitting that Christmas brings us to that point, it really is the most beautiful time of the year! What could be better than being with family, exchanging gifts as a show of our affection and, most importantly, celebrating the true meaning - that Jesus Christ was born to save us from the penalty of our sin and give us hope, joy, peace, and eternal life! Oh how we need that in this crazy world! I'm thankful for His unspeakable gift every day and most especially at Christmas.

We had a fun-filled day on Christmas Eve with brunch and gift exchange with our wonderful family before early evening candlelight service at church. Claire was the first of the little ones to arrive and I had her all to myself for a bit while Gary, Mike, & Andi ran a couple last minute errands. Of course, I spent some of it taking pictures of her! Our little reindeer...

Then Collin, Madelyn, and Megan showed up followed by Ryan after work and GG. The kids are always so sweet with Claire but this time Collin really got into playing with her, it was the cutest thing! He played peek-a-boo with her then crawled around the house while she followed close behind.

 Collin is always thinking... he transformed the antlers into a beard!

HO HO HO!

Claire is still trying to figure him out!

Sweet cousin kisses...

 Claire shared the antlers with Daddy.

On to the gifts, Aunt Jannie's & Uncle Dave's first!

In case you wondered if she liked hers... she quickly exclaimed, "IT'S JUST WHAT I WANTED!!!"

 Collin got a Darth Vadar hat and sweater, pretty cool!

Claire got a darling denim jumper and turtleneck from Baby Gap but liked the wrapping even more!

 

Where's Claire?

Not one to miss a trick, she was keeping tabs on Mads and Collin!

GG was content just taking it all in.

Andi adored everything she got, she is so sweet and easy to please!

Meg got, uh hum, another pair of boots but who's counting?!

And Collin got one of the greatest gifts ever, a personalized Miller Mustangs fleece, he will be the talk of the Kindergarten class! So cute when he smiled after and said "at first I thought it was a ni-ni" then really cracked up along with the rest of us!

Gary, Ryan, and I were all there but managed to escape the camera. Sorry Ry!

Back in a few for another post on how we spent the rest of Christmas Eve...

Christmas Photo Shoot 12.01.12

We had a Christmas photo shoot on 12.01.12, the day our Claire turned 10 months. This is LOVE at the next level:

Sweet Claire, she is growing fast and such a joy!

Looking forward to her first Christmas.

 

 Our sweet Madsy girl! She was so excited to get 'pitchers' taken with Claire!

Hi Claire!

Our handsome boy!

 

Merry Christmas everyone!!!