ending on a good note

The loss we have experienced recently made this Christmas with all the family that we do still have even that much more sweet.  We realized that Brandon had only used one of his two weeks of vacation this year, so we took off after our Christmas Eve service and did not return until after the New Year. -What a perfect break!  It was better than a vacation getaway because we didn't feel the need to do anything other than hang out with people we love (and of course eat A TON!).

Before we packed up, we did do our own little Christmas celebrating with Drew at our house.  We put out our cookies and milk by the tree for santa and sprinkled our reindeer food on the front lawn to entice them to come a day early for us, and it worked.  :)  It is fun to see Drew get more and more into the excitement of Christmas each year.  Though we have introduced a few of the cultural "santa traditions," it is also neat as he is able to understand more and more of what Christmas is really about; what it really marks from history.  We are really celebrating baby Jesus' birth and his willingness to come to earth to give us the most amazing gift ever - salvation from our sins.  We didn't do a ton of gifts at our house because we knew he'd be getting loaded up with things from both sets of grandparents and I have a feeling we will be splurging a little more than normal when the baby comes to cushion the transition.  Also, we stood around in Toys R Us one night, realizing that we gave out all but one of our good ideas on what he wanted to everyone else in the family and we did not want to just get stuff for the sake of having more "stuff."  We did come up with a handful or so of presents that he seemed pretty excited about.  Year three and we are still clinging to Veggie Tales as a favorite theme!

That night we made a late-night trek over to Toledo (for a third time in two weeks) so that we could wake up on Christmas morning with Brandon's parents, grandparents, and sisters.  We had a fun but very busy day exchanging gifts, eating yummy food, and hanging out with about 70 or so of his relatives.

After that, we continued on to Dayton and parked ourselves there for about 7 days!  What a fun time visiting our home church, having as many meals as we could fit with friends, and celebrating our third Christmas with my DeRosa family.  We turned New Year's Eve into Christmas Eve and followed with our Christmas the next day.  There are now 8 of us adults and 3 kids (and counting), which makes for a full house and oh so many presents.  -They were sitting out all week and you can imagine the struggle that Drew and his cousin, Lucas, had over not tearing into a few when no one was looking!  We have several traditions in the DeRosa family when it comes to Christmas.  Usually it starts with a service at church, but for some reason they did not postpone it an extra week to accommodate our schedule.  :)  They did, however, have a really cool New Year's service-type-thing.  We went as a family and took communion and prayed with one of the pastors and one of the elders and took some time to reflect on God's goodness over the past year/ for the coming year.  It was neat and personal.  Back home we had the much anticipated fondue dinner and I have to say that I did not leave much room for baby Benjamin.  After a few hours of sleep, we continued with our annual egg dishes/monkey bread breakfast, a family devotion done by my dad, stockings and presents, a lazy evening (spent watching OSU this year...sigh), and surf & turf dinner.  Lots of fun memories, but I'm still working on my excuse for Monday's doctor appointment when I tip the scale a little more than the planned 2 pounds.  :)

It is good to be home; to see what all we've missed while away, to find spots for all these gifts we brought with us, to deal with putting away Christmas decorations (though I feel like we hardly saw them!), and to begin looking at our last few weeks as a family of three.  This year has already begun with a lot of uncertainty and a lot of prayer to understand God's direction, but it is good to know that we have a whole lot of hope too!  So I'm concluding (and apologizing for) my monstrously-long post.  I think I'm getting a little wordy in my old age! (Yes, the big 3-0 will be here even before baby Nutter!)