Advent, Advent time is here...

and I feel like I'm slowly losing my mind. My office at work looks like a bomb went off in it and I'm always running around like a maniac. I suppose this is all to be expected for this time of year. Because of the above this is just going to be a mish-mash post of updates.

1.) I'm tired of craft projects. This last week I spent the evening with 8 homeless children who were staying at our church with their families. I prepared an evening of crafts. I actually really loved doing this. These kids were all so great and you could tell that they were starved for some attention.

There was one mother though who was just ridiculous. She's 23 with 4 kids ages 7, 5, 4, 3. She totally ignored her kids the entire night and instead focused on making her own craft. If was as though she was another child. Then I was telling the kids about my twins at home and she heard me and proceeded to tell me how much she wanted twins. She then asked for advice on how to make that happen. She's heard eating yams helps. Oh good lord woman you already have 4 kids and you're currently homeless the last thing you need is twins.

I left that night with a grateful heart and a heavy heart for the kids who don't have a home this christmas, for kids born in less than ideal circumstances. I hope all the families currently without homes can find jobs and places to live soon.

2.) On tuesday I also found out a friend of my from high school's brother committed suicide. My heart aches for his wife and family. It's been on my mind a lot. Suicide is just one of those things that haunts me.

3.) More craft time on Saturday with the kids of my church at our hanging of the greens event. (Have I mentioned I'm over crafting at the moment).

4.) Our car is still broken. It's going to cost so much to fix. We can't decide now if we keep putting money into this car or try to find a replacement.

5.) On Friday Marcus and I went on a date. We went out to dinner and then we went to see "Christmas on Broadway" (although it wasn't actually on broadway). Marcus bought us front row tickets and holy we were so close to the stage it was uncomfortable because we were so close to the performers. I kept telling Marcus we were going to get kicked in the face.

It was a great show though. Singing and dancing to Christmas music just my kind of thing and Marcus liked it too!

6.) Getting pictures for our christmas cards has been a huge ordeal. We took the babies to have some studio pictures taken on Tuesday which was just didn't work at all. Emerson wasn't having anything to do with pictures and Eli was just being a ham. He kept laying down and twirling around and running all over. We've since attempted 3 photo shoots on our own. We did end up getting some that will have to work.

7.) We took the babies to see Santa. Eli was really curious about this guy. He touched his buttons and his jacket, Santa's belt. Emerson on the other hand was just hostile. She wanted nothing to do with him.

8.) I've been trying to be very intentional this advent season about actually taking some time to remember what advent is all about. I found a really great daily devotional for the season call Watch For the Light which has a different reading each day. Some are better then others but I'm really enjoying it and recommend it if you're looking for a more theological reflection on the season.

9.) I finally read A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens (and I loved it!) and now I'm in the mood to just read Christmas themed books. Any recommendations? 

I think that's about it. Oh, tomorrow I'm fasting because I'm having a capsule endoscopy on Wednesday. I get to swallow a tiny camera and it will take pictures of my insides. Which I actually find fascinating and frankly I'm just glad it's not another colonoscopy. Stupid Crohns.