It's About the Cross

CHRISTmas is about the cross.
I am determined to NOT forget why we celebrate Christmas. It is hard to do in today's society! Everything revolves around materialism. We love this song by Go Fish: It's About The Cross. And I found this impactful video to go along with it on YouTube. (I am not endorsing the website at the end, I haven't looked at it.) It reminds us of what Christmas is truly about. Christ's reason for coming down and being born: to save US by dying on the cross. Praise God that we do not have to suffer the penalties of our own sins; God gave us the opportunity to be saved by sending His Son Jesus to die and take the penalty from our own sin and put it on His sin-free Son: Jesus. Jesus is the ultimate gift! We just have to ask for it and believe in Him. Yup yup. :) Sooo... Merry Christmas and Happy almost Birthday Jesus. We will not forget why you came to Earth. Thank you!

The Sweetest Little Voice

This Kodiak resident put on a fantastic light display! :) For here especially , because it gets SO windy that not very many people put up lights outside. Many, including us, just put them up on the inside of the windows. lol. Yup, another Alaskan island random fact of life. :) SO, after Brandon's basketball game last night(which they WON! yay!) we took Zion over to see this house that we had heard about. You sit in your car (because it's too cold and windy to get out!) and tune in to a certain radio station set up just for this house's display and the lights go to the song. It was so fun. Zion LOVED IT! :) Here is just a quick clip that showcases his sweet little voice! :) Enjoy! Merry almost Christmas! :) xoxoxo

Applesauce

Here is the little man saying "applesauce". We think his intonation is just the cutest thing ever. He says it that way every time! hehe. I love it! Enjoy!

Santa

Waiting for Santa!



Santa.

We will not be promoting Santa to Zion. He will be someone that helps bring joy to people at Christmastime. Christmas to our kids will be based around Jesus and his birth! That being said, we have nothing against Santa. :) Lol. The base here had a WONDERFUL thing this year called The Winter Wonderland. I LOVED IT!!! You waited in a VERY long line, then as a family walked through the decorated locker rooms until you got to the pool, where you got into a raft pulled by rescue swimmers, went under a black curtain into the main pool area and entered THE WINTER WONDERLAND! It was awesome! The whole pool area was transformed by lights, Disney character decorations, fake snow, presents, real characters waving... and we were being pulled in a boat by rescue swimmers! I REALLY LOVED IT! :) Zion love it too! I think Brandon more got a kick out of how much Zi and I liked it! hehe. And then you got out of the raft and went out to Santa! :) He was NOT about to sit there alone with them, so low and behold... there I am. Ha. Oh well. He just STARED at them! Mouth open and everything! But anyways, we had SUCH a great time! Good job base Kodiak! (and Brandon, he got Voluntold to help... :) gotta love the military!)

AND every year the Chiefs here decorate a sleigh and take Santa around housing with the fire department. So those are some pictures of my guys waiting for Santa in front of our house. :) So handsome! It felt like we were in the North Pole. Cold! But it was lots of fun. Zion couldn't have cared less about the firetruck though. It was very funny. It was about to our driveway with the lights and sirens blaring, when a little boy with a little Yorkie dog came up across the road... what did Zion care about? The dog. hehe. ALL he was saying was "dog...dog... DOG!" It was very funny!

Okie dokie! There are a couple of our Christmas events so far! Hope you are SUPER DUPER blessed!

~Cortney

Christmas Lights

Oh the wonder of Christmas lights to a 17 and a half month old!!! He is thoroughly enjoying all of our Christmas decorations! The tree is especially tempting though and he just cannot grasp that all of the pretty balls on the tree are not for him and his enjoyment. Such a fun age though and we are just SO excited for Christmas morning! It is going to be wonderful! :)


What a wonderful little face! :)

Barometer Mountain

I thought i'd give you a look at the mountain that Josh and Brandon climbed back in July 2010. Not too long after Zion was born, Brandon and Josh decided to climb this mountain. They said they'd be back in a couple of hours...

4 hours later I got a call... that they had just made it to the TOP! Needless to say it was a bit more intense than they had realized! If you ask either of them about Barometer, to this day they will shudder. Apparently it was quite intense at some points and they questioned why they were doing this! (I am so glad I didn't know that!) They said it was like a goat trail that just goes straight up that ridge on the left. Literally straight up. So, as were were driving past Barometer recently for the thousandth time, I realized what an accomplishment that was for them! Good job Brandon and Josh for tackling this 2500 ft Alaskan Beast! :)

Here is a pic from a couple of days ago..

Here is a picture from out of Zion's bedroom window when they were actually at the top!!! :)

(the trail is that ridge that you're seeing in the middle)

And then on a random sidenote: As I was dropping off mail the other day I thought this was a great look at island living. (Probably just because I am weird.) But everything is just broken down into On Island and Off Island! :) Not just the mail, but EVERYTHING about living here is either ON island or OFF and down in the "lower 48". I dunno. I liked the picture. :) Hope you do too and I'm not too crazy!

Lol. Sitting on mommy is such fun! :)
He loves to give kisses!!! Is this not the sweetest little face EVER!?!?!? :)

Riding his puppy like a big boy.

Some Snow & Grammy's Visit

Zion and Rascal watching me take pictures out the slider door. :)

AND the picture I took outside our sliding glass door. :) So pretty. This was the sunrise... at like 9:45am. I am so blessed to be able to capture this off of my back porch! Wow! Thank you Lord!

YaY!
:)
Zion LOVED Grammy feeding him her blueberry pie! :)
Having a cup on your head is serious business! :)

While my mom was here we actually had record snowfall and a blizzard! If we get 3 more inches of snow by Thursday(which should be no problem), then Kodiak will break the record amount of snowfall for November that was set in 1970! Wowza! And it made for some great visiting time! I loved having that much time with my Momma! :) We greatly enjoyed cooking Thanksgiving together (we actually did it twice, because we just couldn't wait!) and Brandon and Zion greatly enjoyed our cooking! lol. While Grammy was here we also played lots of board games, sewed a bit, cleaned and organized in preparation for the move, painted the living room and bathroom, laughed alot and had a blast with Zion! It was wonderful! God is so good and really knows the desires of our heart. Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We are so thankful for all of the MANY ways which God has and is providing for us! We are also so grateful for all of our wonderful family and friends that God has blessed us with! May you each be immensely blessed this CHRISTmas season! Love ya!

Random Acts of Zion

Silly boy loves my toes. hehe.
Food time!
He LOVES book time!!!


Zion LOVES playing at the park across from our house! Here are just a few shots of him enjoying his new-found freedom. Sadly, right after he discovered how much he LOVED it over there, winter really set in... but oh well, we'll hope for a couple of nice days sometime during our Kodiak winter! :) I think throwing the rocks is his favorite... what a boy. :)

Climbing!
"ooooooo...."
So serious!
On a side note... I hate Croup! Zion woke up in the middle of the night with it. :( He is fine, but it is so scary to hear your child struggling to breath. Thank fully I knew what to do since he had this once before in AZ when he was 10 months old. It was a crisp COLD night last night and perfect for taking him out at 3am and opening up his airway. Odd, but it sure works. He is such a sweetheart. Even when he was coughing that awful stridder cough, he was still smiling at us with confused eyes. Okie dokie. Just thought I'd throw that in there. Praise God he is feeling much better!

OH! And Grammy is coming tomorrow!!! Woohoo!!! (My mom!!!) :) Yay! Can't wait to pick her up on the Era flight tomorrow afternoon! :) She will make everything all better. :)

Trip to the Anchorage Zoo

We recently went over to Anchorage for Brandon's Fitness test for Customs and had the opportunity to take Zion to the ZOO! We almost didn't go because it was pretty chilly out, but we are SO glad we did! It was fantastic!!! (And the snow held off until after we came out of the gift shop at the end!) :) I'm sure you can tell in these pictures what an amazing time Zion (and Mommy and Daddy) had at the zoo! Enjoy these awesome animals that our God created!An Oomingmak... :) It was surprisingly short. It's about 3 feet tall... weird huh?

So majestic!
A Camel made for cold weather... I forgot the name... but very interesting!


Cool looking fox!An awesome WHITE Polar Bear! I think most of the polar bears I've seen have been green! :) Do you know why? ~*This is one of my favorite random facts! :) *~ Because they have hollow hair(not white) and algae can grow in there easily. Cool huh? Anyways, this was a true Alaskan Beauty.
LOVING the Zoo!I don't know why I found this FAT porcupine SO funny. But I did. It makes me laugh out loud just looking at this picture! :) It was so fat it couldn't fit inside of it's little house! :)
We had SUCH a wonderful time at the Anchorage Zoo! Zion was completely in his element the cold watching animals!
Zion and Daddy had SUCH a wonderful time watching all the animals!!! :) I love this picture!

Our Little Skunk

Yup, Zion was a little stinker for our church harvest festival! :) What a cutie patootie he is!!!