Nutcracker Bound

The girlies went to see The Nutcracker at the community college with Grandma this past weekend. They enjoyed getting all dolled up for the performance and Joely couldn't pass up the opportunity to "crash" their picture together. He is getting this little brother thing down to a T!

Excuses

Bet you're all wondering when I am going to stop with the excuses (well all two of my readers, that's probably all I have left due to my "hiatus")? I'm not sure when the excuses will stop but I'm going to give it an effort, not making promises for a best effort but at least an effort.

It's been a very interesting but life changing Fall 2010 for the Hively family. At the end of the day GOD is good and He is very good to us. Let's just say I have the very most amazing husband anyone could ever ask for and am so thankful for what an amazing man of God he is. I am so excited for the future God has for our family. I will be very thrilled to be past this "test" so that I can start sharing my "testimony" and helping others.

I'm enjoying being back to work again, well at least most days. Except icy, snowy days like today. Our St. Louis Memory Walk left us with a little money to make up so I threw together this little Holiday Fashion Show at Plaza Frontenac in an effort to raise a little more funds before the end of the year. That's been keeping me busy for the last two months and after last Wednesday night I finally took a breath and now I am so excited for Christmas!

The family is doing wonderful! Corey's job is going very well, the girls are doing great in school, Joely is talking up a storm...little words but still so sweet to walk into the room and see his big smile and hear him say "Hi"!

We lost my 88 year old great-aunt about a month ago. It was difficult to close that chapter of my life, she was the final link to my grandparents on my Dad's side. She lived a good life and I feel blessed that I had the opportunity to spend a lot of time with her and the chance to minsiter to her in her final days. Thanksgiving weekend, we started what we hope to be an annual family trip to Jefferson Barracks National Cemetary. We had a great morning visiting our family members gravesites and reminicsing about the good times we had with them adn the impact they made on our lives. It was great to get my parents, siblings and Jamie's Dad together for this trip!

My Omi (my Mom's mom) is still battling colon cancer and we did not get the most promising report the week of Thanksgiving. My grandparents were unable to make it to Thanksgiving dinner at my house, my Omi doesn't get out much except to go to doctor appointments and chemo treatments. Corey had the brilliant idea to make them a dvd of all of us preparing the feast and then my Mom delivered it to them along with Thanksgiving dinner that weekend. It was fun to make the home movie just for them! My Omi was in the hospital this past week but she allowed me the opportunity to visit with her while she was there (I haven't seen her since June). What a wonderful gift, I'm so happy she was up for a visit. My grandparents have a wonderful outlook on the diagnosis and we are just going to continue to stand in agreement with them and lean on what the promises of God are and what His word says!

So all that's left is the burning question for the day. We were watching The Grinch Who Stole Christmas last night (Jim Carey version) and the conversation goes like this:
Aly: "Hey Dad, one question"....
Corey: "yes"
Aly: "Does the Grinch have a penis"?

Seriously? Only my kids would be wondering about the Grinch's "junk" underneath all that fur!