Today was a great start to our little 2 week Christmas break.  I must admit the day started much earlier than I had hoped, but what can you expect when you have a 5 year old and 1 year old.  I know one day I will miss these sweet 6:30am Saturday mornings of cuddling with 2 of my favorite people on earth (of course the 3rd favorite person, in no particular order, was still sound asleep in bed) so I remind myself to cherish them every chance I get.  Once my 3rd favorite person did wake up (with a little help from myself and the boys of course) I got to spend 2 blissful hours of shopping all by myself.  It was WONDERFUL but I did realize on this blissful trip of mine that I am much less productive with my time when I'm by myself.  There is just something about the threat of knowing that at any given moment sweet Denton could decide abruptly that he is DONE SHOPPING and end my trip that forces me to be quite efficient when I have the boys with me.

When I realized my blissful 2 hours were coming to an end, I rushed home so Chad could get Dax to basketball practice.  Sometimes I just think, "seriously do I have a child old enough to go to basketball practice?"  It seems so weird.  Where in the world does time go?  While they were practicing, I took Denton to get his hair cut.  This little outing would be considered anything BUT blissful.  He screamed and cried the whole time as though he thought the kind lady with the scissors was going to seriously injure him.  It was painful for me and I'm sure for the 30 other people in the room as well.  He redeemed himself though by being a perfect angel throughout my trip to 2 malls afterwards.  That's what I love about my sweet Denton.... you just never know what you are going to get. He is definitely not shy about letting you know what he thinks.  Honestly in his short 20 months of life he has taught me a thing or two about speaking my mind when necessary.  He has a gift of it!

Finally tonight I got to have dinner and spend some quality time with sweet girlfriends.  Each of these girls lived in Hatley while I was the RD there and some were RA's during those years.  I LOVE being with these girls.  It is incredible to get caught up on life with them.  Some are married and have made their homes here in Oklahoma as teachers and professionals, and others have ventured on to different things like missions on the other side of the world or creating a new life in FRIGID upstate New York.  There are three consistent things woven throughout each of their lives 1)is the unwavering faithfulness of God and 2)is their unwavering commitment to serve Him and finally 3) is that they are just flat out FUNNY! I love to just sit back and listen to the stories of their day to day lives.  It reminds me of the incredible blessing I have to work in a job that constantly shapes me in to a better person because of the relationships I get to build with others. 

Tomorrow is day 2 of Christmas break and it holds a lot in store.  After church we are heading over to celebrate Christmas with Jake, Amber, Emily and Audree.  Dax bought his sweet little friend Emily a no bake oven for Christmas and he is SO excited to give it to her.  He has seriously been talking about wanting to get her this gift since before Thanksgiving.  I hope she is even half as excited as he is when she opens it!  Then tomorrow night is the big surprise Student Development Christmas party.  We were told to dress warm and casual for whatever we might be doing.  Warm and casual..... what does that even mean?  I'm sure whatever it is, it will provide for a good story afterwards so it will be worth it.  I'm going to try to post some pictures of my sweet friends from their days in college since we didn't get to take any updated pictures tonight and I will be sure to post before and after shots of Denton's new hair do.  For now, I'm going to end this ridiculously long entry and say good night!

Here's a picture of me and 3 of the girls at a wedding right after their junior year.  This is beautiful Caleigh, beautiful Sara, and beautiful Kelly.

 Here are Kelly, Kendi and Sara on their graduation day. Seriously, aren't they beautiful???!!!