Nativity Festival
Dode, me, Jacob, Isaac and another boy from church
Sunday night, we participated in the Living Nativity at the Festival of the Nativities. The festival was a huge event with hundreds of hours of planning behind the scenes. All I had to do was donate some artificial Christmas trees and our nativities. Sheri was in charge of decorating the gym and it looked great when she was done. She'd picked up our five artificial trees (too much after Christmas bargain shopping) and later Dode told her, "Whatever happens, make sure Miriam's tree doesn't get lost." She was convinced she'd never received it. Dode even made a special trip down to the festival when it was closed and looked at every tree in the place (at least 100) trying to find Miriam's tree. It was not to be found. When everything was taken down and returned to us, the tree was found on the shelf in the trailer, it had never made it out to be displayed! They tried really hard to make sure everyone made it home with everything they donated for the festival. Sheri brought two of my nativities home with our trees and trailer but one was still missing. When I went to pick it up, all I could find was the empty Styrofoam container it came in. Sheri had already told me that a few nativities had been lost and I figured mine was another of the casualties. Dode started digging through the boxes that were left and found it in someone elses' box. So, whoever Amanda is, she's missing a nativity. I know I got my own back since my shepherd was broken in half and re-glued.
We signed up to be part of the living nativity. I asked if Jacob could be Joseph. The person in charge smiled and said, "He'll make a great shepherd!" The boys found it quite embarrassing to stand their dressed up while people stared at them and took photos. They passed the 30 minute time slot we had by playing an "I Spy" game. They'd name something they could see, then the other would have to name something they could see that started with the last letter of the word their brother used. Dode whispered to me, "You know that's not a real baby don't you?" I was just doing as I was told, looking at the doll with adoration. Dode was supposed to show adoration towards the baby and me. I tried to get Dode to scoot in close to me so he'd look like he liked me. The photo above shows him after he moved in a few feet. I told him to put his arm around me, it's lightly resting on my shoulder. And, I'm not even a doll, I should be easier to appear to adore! The girls didn't have a part to play but my mom had come to see the festival so they walked around with them.
Leading up to the nativity festival, the kids marched in the Christmas parade in town.
Elizabeth passed out suckers
William and Miriam are behind her
Anastaya passed out invitations to the event
Miriam and her friend Paige dressed as angels. Under their angelic garb, they wore warm puffy coats. They realized they could painlessly bounce off each other and soon were sumo wrestling. Dode thought it looked pretty funny to have angles sumo wrestling.
Gingerbread houses
Thursday night I attended a women's Christmas party at church and while I was gone, Dode decided to build gingerbread houses with the kids. He used our left over Halloween candy, supplemented with some fresh candy from Haggen. Miriam wanted chocolate frosting so her house isn't made with traditional white snow. It must be in an area with lots of pollution! Miriam really wanted gingerbread men on her house but all Dode could find were green gummy army men. She stuck them in the mud in her front yard. She was almost OK with the substitution.
once the houses were finished, it was time to eat them
Miriam's house had an earthquake!
Time for a new hair style
After years of no bangs, Wednesday morning I got the desire to get some bangs. I didn't have time to get to a hair stylist so in between getting Miriam and William off to school, I kept going back to the bathroom to cut my bangs. A little here, a little there, soon I had bangs. I kept fine tuning them throughout the day and by the time Dode got home from work, I was 90% presentable. Dode said, "I thought you'd never go back to bangs." (I'm not sure if that was a compliment or criticism but I didn't delve deeper.) I told him, "I know, it's the danger of reading people's blogs!" I'm so suggestible. Isaac saw me and said, "Mom, you look like an old lady!" When Jacob saw me, he knew something was different but couldn't figure out what. He had a moment where he thought I'd been replaced by an impostor like invasion of the body snatchers. When he figured out it was my hair, he was greatly relieved.
before
after
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