On December 17th, we left back for the US for summer/Christmas holiday. We were there for a month staying with family. We did a lot while there, so I'm going to give you snapshots of our activities instead of lengthy descriptions.
My parents picked us up at the CVG airport the evening of the 17th, after a long but uneventful trip. The boys had been asking for Skyline chili, so off we went - and did it ever taste good!
Brian and I were excited to see our church family at Immanuel the next day, and it was as wonderful as we expected. We miss belonging to a choir, and there just isn't that option anywhere close to where we live. Praise bands are the norm here, which isn't our favorite style. We were happy to see a lot of our friends. In fact, my only complaint about the whole trip is we didn't get to see them enough.
After a quick lunch at Izzy's (mmm, Reuben) we were off to go see Harry Connick, Jr.! We found out that he was playing a concert at the Catholic church in Richmond, KY. Shout out to my mom and sister-in-laws for letting me know and obtaining the tickets! We never figured out why he was at a small church for his only holiday concert, but I could've cared less. The concert was amazing. He had his standard combo and a gentleman playing the guitar. Oddly enough, the highlight for me was when he played piano with the guitarist on "The Old Rugged Cross." I never knew that song could groove, but groove it did. I'll never be able to hear that song without remembering that concert.
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| Close enough to see his hands very well |
A few days later we went to Southern Lights with my sister's family and my parents. The Kentucky Horse Park has light displays all over, along with Santa, petting zoo, and...
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| Nath took his job of holding on to Jackson seriously |
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| Wrangling three boys for a pic is hard work! |
The following picture isn't from the Horse Park. We spent a few nights at my sister's new house. The boy cousins had a blast romping around together. As you can imagine, it got very loud at times. Here's what happened when we told our boys to put on their pajamas.
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| Sometimes you just have to do the opposite of everyone else |
That's the perfect picture for the first time he brings a girl to see Aunt Kristi!
Aunt Elaine was kind enough to hold off on decorating Christmas cookies until the boys were able to help. They had a blast decorating, until they were tired. I'm glad we were able to keep this yearly tradition going!
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| It's important work placing Red Hots in the right spots! |
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| Caught red handed! |
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| Love the lip bit in concentration |
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| He likes sprinkles |
This was the first Christmas we haven't had the morning as our little family, which felt a bit weird. We opened presents from Santa, then went to my parent's church. It was a nice morning, just a bit different.
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| "How did Santa know I've always wanted this?" |
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| Not quite awake yet |
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| Cousins with stockings |
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| Grandma brought back pink rattlesnakes from the Grand Canyon |
As a side note, the boys took their snakes on the plane back to Australia. They had the snakes poking their heads out of their backpacks. We got some odd looks and I kept an eye out for Samuel L. Jackson.
This post has gotten long enough, and I haven't covered several things. I"m going to break this up into two posts and try to post more tomorrow. Good night - or G'Day for most of you!
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