Christmas Morning Joy

We had such a wonderful Christmas! We are so super duper blessed and thankful! Church was at noon, so we had extra time to just be home and enjoy our wonderful little family! Brandon made a breakfast casserole in the crockpot the night before, so I didn't even have to make breakfast! Awesome! :) And Zion coming down and seeing everything was such a fun experience! He was just in awe! :) Here are some pictures from our day! (Sorry they are in reverse order!) Hope you've had a wonderful start to 2012!

He loves opening presents now! :) (Opening gifts from Grandma Reed! Thank you!!! Love the hat!)
Christmas afternoon at 4pm: The sun is setting on a great day! :)
Off to church we go! :)
Loving this little cow that was on a truck from Grandma Miles... He just looks at it and says "awww....". So cute! He LOVES that truck! -THANK YOU! :)
Christmas morning candy in an adorable mug! Yum yum!
In our Christmas pj's! :) HIDEOUS picture of me...sorry. But this was our Christmas morning this year, so I thought I'd share! :)

From inside his Thomas tent! :) PURE joy!

Christmas morning books from Grandma Miles! (He loves them! THANK YOU!)
A bit overwhelmed with all the wonderfulness! :) And he LOVED his oranges in his stocking... one of the highlights of his morning! lol.
Our stockings this year... :)
This was taken Christmas Eve after Brandon and I had the joy of setting it up! We had such a good time being "Santa"! What a fun highlight of being parents! :)
We made cookies on Christmas Eve! Fun stuff!
For some reason he was rather afraid of the dough. lol.

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!