sweet savanna

When I was really struggling and had a particularly difficult day, I walked in my room and saw this sweet note on my bed.  Savanna has always had the most tender heart.  When I am sick she will repeatedly give me hugs and love and she does the same for everyone.  If she sees one of her sisters sad she is the first one to try to make them feel better and if she thinks someone has wronged them, she jumps to their defense.  Noticing other people's feelings is her gift and we love her tender heart so much!

gingerbread houses

 Once everyone was feeling better we made our gingerbread houses!  Savanna was sick for the gingerbread house day but her teacher was so sweet and sent the supplies home so she could make it at home.  She sent home enough supplies that all three girls were able to make a house!  Gingerbread houses are so much fun!

sickness strikes

 Savanna brought home a really nasty stomach bug and shared it with everyone except Jeff.  It hit them all in the middle of the night and they got it about 2 days apart from each other.  So I was up almost 24 hours days for about a week.  Good times.  On top of that I had a crown put in, that ended up turning into a root canal. It was not an easy month.  I tried so hard to look on the bright side, but I was full of anxiety about if the tooth actually needed a root canal, who to trust to do the root canal, if the pain would stop if I got a root canal, how we would afford a root canal, why my teeth are so awful in spite of how meticulous I am about flossing and brushing, who was going to get the stomach bug next, if everyone would be healthy by Christmas, and on and on.  When I was able to sleep, I would wake up in a panic sweating and out of breath and just full blown anxiety.  It.was.awful.  I felt like I was going crazy.  I could hardly get through each day and I just felt so alone.  Logically, I knew and recognized all of my blessings and knew it was anxiety that was taking over, but I couldn't stop it like I usually can.  I finally got my tooth fixed and thankfully, the pain went away with it.  Unfortunately, due to the high does of Advil I was on for such a long time, headaches became an even worse issue than normal once I was no longer taking it.  So I had to work through some pretty horrific days of immense pain and vomiting from the rebound headaches.  But once I got through those, things started to look up and I was slowly, slowly able to get back to feeling more like myself.  December really wasn't a fantastic month, but there were some good moments and I am so grateful for the unconditional love from

 my sweet girls.  No matter awful I felt, they were always happy to see me, pray for me, and tell me they loved me.  I am so grateful the sickness passed and that they were better by Christmas! 

christmas baking

 We didn't get much Christmas baking done this year, but I was grateful to have my three baking buddies for the baking we did do!  Heidi especially loves to bake when I give her the recipe and let her do it on her own.  She loves independence!  The girls always looks so cute in their aprons that Jeff's mom made them.  Baking with these three makes baking slightly more work, but way more fun!

school christmas party

I spent Halloween in Savanna's classroom helping so I went to Heidi's class for Christmas since the parties have always been at the same time and I can't be in two places at once!  I was at least able to stop in Savanna's classroom for a few minutes to give her a squeeze and see her make an ornament before heading to Heidi.  Heidi's class played a bunch of fun Minute to Win It games and had a little Christmas breakfast.  It was so fun to be with her and she and Caimbree were so excited to see each other.  I love being able to help in the girls classes every chance I get!

christmas program

Caimbree finally got to have a turn performing in a school program!  She was SO cute!  I loved every minute of the program and I especially loved hearing her sing her cute songs and watch all of her cute actions.  She is so shy I wasn't sure what to expect on the stage, but she did a fantastic job!  I always look forward to school programs and she was a joy to watch!  Love this angel so much!

christmas in downtown dickson

 Every year we look forward to Christmas in downtown Dickson!  We love this tradition so much!  Sadly this year we got rained on, but we were able to at least enjoy about an hour of the night.  Our friend from our ward, Katie Riggs, was singing for the tree lighting so we went to that.  The girls had made ornaments for the big tree on the square so we checked those out as well.  It started pouring before we could do carriage rides.  We were all disappointed, but hopefully next year we won't get rained out!  We love our town more and more with every year that passes!