For The First Time In Ten Years....

This is the first time in ten years I haven't been out shopping on Black Friday! Normally I am up and gone by 3:30 a.m. and standing in line when the doors open. Usually I am filled with an overwhelming sense to rush out and buy and frantic that my kids won't have enough; but not this year. I can only give praise where praise is due because I truly believe the Lord has answered my prayer and desire for me to not "forget" and get caught up in the hustle and bustle of the season. Now, that doesn't mean I have bought, but I am thrilled to say I have only bought three items, one for each child, and they only cost $10 each! It's just very important to me that my kids know and understand the reason we celebrate Christmas. I want them to be able to have fun with Santa, but don't want them to get wrapped up in the whole thing that they lose their focus. My 16 year old says I'm taking all the fun out of it, I'm just struggling with it. My three year it excited, every morning she wakes up and says, "It's Jesus' birthday!" We are starting a new tradition this year of baking a birthday cake for Jesus. I'm just looking forward to what the Lord is going to show me this year.

On another strange twist, my husband is the one that got out this morning! It was the funniest thing. He was out for a couple hours, and back home. He had been up most of the night not feeling well and decided to put his lack of sleep to good use. I told him specifically something I wanted, a Chronological Timeline Bible. LifeWay had it on sale for $19.99 this morning, originally it's like $50. I usually don't ask for stuff for Christmas, but for months and months it has been on my heart to study the Bible in a chronological time line; so I asked for it:)

We slept in the house last night for the first time in four weeks! I got the living room cleaned and we all slept on blow up mattresses in there; got the hallway mopped and wiped too; today I've gotten my room wiped down, swept and mopped and am working on wiping all Christopher's wooden train pieces down, toys, bed, and sweeping and mopping and still have Kaitlyn's to do today.

We put our tree up yesterday. I'm ready to get all our decorations out, but we have no furniture to put the decorations out! We have had to throw out so much, but, again, for some reason everything seems to be OK. It's hard to explain.

Well, my break is over and I have lots still to do.

Happy Black Friday!!!