The Mirando Perspective: A Reflection of Christmas 2008

It seems like the older I get the quicker time goes by. I remember very clearly last year, as I was packing away the Christmas decorations, thinking, 'I'll be putting all of this back out soon.' And boy was it true! Christmas is an exciting time for our family. I have such good memories of Christmas' past and I always think of what it will be like at our future Christmas'. We love decorating, baking, spending time with family and dear friends. We recognize this holiday as a celebration as our Savior's birthday and what His birth means to us. Most of all, we enjoyed Christmas Eve at our church this year and look forward to being there every Christmas Eve. There was no more appropriate place to be than in our Sanctuary reflecting on Christ's birth and worshiping Him. Then coming home and having our annual family spaghetti dinner, then having the boys open their jammies for that night. It seemed a little more relaxed this year because we had all the gifts wrapped and ready. Nick had a few last minute things to do but it wouldn't have been the same if he didn't. We actually forgot to put the cookies & milk out until about 15 min. after the boys went to bed. By the time we got upstairs Roman was asleep so Dal came down and helped me get them out. We weren't about to get Rocco stirred up. Christmas morning Roman came down about 6:30 and Dal & Rocco followed about 20min. later. The smell of monkey bread was filling the house. I fix monkey bread every big holiday & for Dal's birthday. We let the boys open one gift each from Santa until Stephen (my brother) and his family arrived. Then it was chaos! Fun, clean, chaos! Everybody played and/or napped while I prepared our yummy meal of Prime Rib w/au jus (new to us this year - yummo but I missed my turkey and/or ham), mashed potatoes, cheesy green bean casserole, croissants and cranberry sauce. I love cooking these meals. We enjoyed our family all day then some of our dearest friends came over for game night. Tony & Trisha Thomas & 2 of their 3 boys. We played 'Catch Phrase' for hours, a game Santa brought us! We ate way to many sweets and laughed so hard our heads ached. Lastnight we brought in the new year with Tony/Trisha, their kids and Carl/Deanna and their son until almost 1am. I am thankful for what God has blessed us with. Faith, family, friends, my job, our church, our sweet church family. 2008 was a good year. Thank you Lord! I look forward to what You have in store for us this year. I know it wasn' as good for some of our friends, but I pray that this year will bring many blessings their way. So as I packed away my Christmas decorations today I thought, 'I'll be putting all of this back out soon.' I hope my boys remember the traditions that have been carried on through our family and the new ones we have started. I hope they remember that we always had monkey bread because they loved it and they want their wives to make it for their families. Or will they come home for Christmas? So many exciting thoughts.. Well, goodbye Christmas of 08! Now it's time to finish the planning for Dal's 6th birthday party! I can't believe my Dal is turning 6! Seems like yesterday I was praying, asking God for Dallon. That's another blog in itself, lol. Thanks for reading! God bless you in 2009!!

Just added a few pics:
The Vii Nick bought us for Christmas. This is my brother laughing at us:

The aftermath:

Roman said that was the real Santa at Regency because he was the one he asked to bring him Lego Batman. He also kept saying, "See Daddy? We didn't even have to pay a dime for it since Santa brought it!"