Christmas Recap

I just wanted to thank everyone for your well wishes and responses to our big news!  It's been a very interesting road for us and we are really looking forward to welcoming a baby into our family.

For Christmas, we drove up to Dallas to celebrate the holidays with our friends and family.  It was really wonderful being able to spend Christmas with family.  The past two years, we've been abroad and have had to make do celebrating Christmas in the tropics by ourselves.  I think what really makes Christmas Christmas is the time you spend with family.  I mean Christmas is centered around God's love for us, which He demonstrated by giving us the ultimate Christmas gift, his son Jesus Christ who would later die on the cross for the sins of all mankind.  So, Christmastime is a time to celebrate the birth of Christ, but also a time to spend with your family and understand God's love through the love of your own family.

We had a great time seeing all of Aslik's family, since the last time we saw them all was about 6 months ago. Aslik and the boys managed to squeeze in a round of golf on Christmas Eve.  In the meantime, the girls watched "While You Were Sleeping" and heckled the boys from the porch when they got to the 17th hole.

 Beau, the bulldog, trying (but failing) to stay awake and catch Santa on Christmas Eve.

Apparently, he didn't do a good job because the next morning, Santa had dropped off quite a few presents. Guess everyone was good this year!

Baby Slik even got a few gifts and his/her first stocking!

Our Christmas family photo

By the time we were done opening presents, it was snowing outside.  We actually got a white Christmas!  My first in many years...it was wonderful!

The next morning, the snow was still on the ground.  We tried to go "sledding" down the hill with makeshift cardboard sleds, but it didn't quite work.  I slid about 6 inches and got stuck.  Guess there just wasn't enough snow for that.

Although the sledding idea failed, I did get to do some "ice skating" instead.  Because Dallas doesn't really have snow plows, the snow in the cul-de-sac in front of the house had iced over and was like an ice skating rink!  I had some fun gliding around.

Luckily, the main roads weren't too iced over so we were able to make our drive home.

It was so great to celebrate Christmas with our family.  It was also super exciting because our Baby Slik got his/her first presents!  I know adopting is a bit different than when you're expecting, but every "first" is just as exciting!  2012 was another great Christmas and I can't help but feel blessed when I think of all the love and support our friends and family have given as we walk through this adoption process.