Christmas Factoids

Some little Christmas facts about me...

When I was little, I would spend the whole year leading up to Christmas, learning all the squeaks in the floor so that I could get from my room to the living room without being noticed...if you get my drift ;-)

Most Christmases I would be so caught up in my new toys I would completely forget about eating...sometimes skipping both breakfast and lunch.

I'm the best present wrapper in my house...somehow my mom never quite had a knack for it, judging by the fact that packages would spontaneously pop open while under the tree...and I'm talking when they hadn't even been tampered with! Not that my brother and I really minded...

One year, my little brother received a big, blow-up robot that you could kick around and box with and it would pop right back up because it had sand in the bottom.
It was a lot of fun, and the Christmas morning he got it, I was wearing a long, floor length skirt that I didn't particularly have a lot of mobility in as far as how I could stretch out my legs. Of course, being the klutz that I am, I didn't take that into consideration as I spontaneously, full-on kicked the robot...literally pulling my feet out from under me!

I never had a chimney growing up and always worried about how Santa would get in...my mom continually assured me he preferred to use the door anyway.

I give gifts to quite a few people on Christmas...the thing is, they don't always get them on time...I prefer to make people gifts that are inspired for them...that way they mean more ^_^

I am the best person at guessing what gifts are through the wrapping.
And I happen to be correct about 80% of the time...
My powers of deduction are astute to say the least. ;-) haha

The only present that has truly stumped me, was my friend Caitlin's large-and I mean this thing was an arm-full of a box-Christmas present that was so heavy, we carefully lugged it to a scale to discover it was little over 20lbs (it was 3rd grade, back then, 20lbs was heavy haha). We never did figure out what it was before Christmas...

We always have to make sure that all the Nativity pieces are where they should me...we have a cat who likes to steal the donkey.

My family's Christmas tree is barely 4ft tall and as old as I am. It always makes things interesting when you have to improvise new ways to hold it all together every year.

Our cats have a thing for our tree...they seem to enjoy climbing into it and perching...as well as a particular fancy they've acquired for some ornaments we no longer put out...for that very reason.

Hoping you're all having a blessed Christmas!

Blessed Birth of our Savior

Flyleaf's Christmas Song

A frightened, virgin, teenage girl
Receives a message that defies the laws of this world
All she can do is weep and nod
She's to bring into this world
the Son of God

God's angels sound their trumpets
And blow their horns
Tonight the long awaited Savior is to be born
The goodness bound by satan it has been torn
With this baby's precious brow ready for thorns

A star appears fufilling ancient prophecy
There's an ounce of fear as wise men follow faithfully
The virgin Mary brings forth the human savior
And this future king sleeps soundly in the manger
Soundly in the manger

God's angels sound their trumpets
And blow their horns
Tonight the long awaited Savior is to be born
The goodness bound by satan it has been torn
With this baby's precious brow ready for thorns

Tonight He is born so one day He can die
To heal hearts that are torn and live the perfect life
So He hang upon a cross and we can take His life
So we can live as sinners
And He can pay the price
Tonight He is born so one day He can die
But He will rise again

God's angels sound their trumpets
And blow their horns
Tonight the long awaited Savior is to be born
The goodness bound by satan it has been torn
With this baby's precious brow ready for thorns

Merry Christmas

Well peoples, its hard to believe but Christmas is upon us.

2010 almost up.

I don't know where this past year went, but 2011 is nigh upon us.

Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us

Tomorrow Wait, scratch that...
Today is Christmas, the day on which we celebrate the birth of our Savior.

Despite the glamor, superficiality and all around commercialized scene that has become Christmas, JESUS is the reason for the season.

"Unto us a Savior is born, unto us a Son is given..."
-Isaiah 9:6

After all, it is CHRISTmas, right?

After tomorrow, Concrete & Grace will be sporting a new design courtesy of myself...of course, the one which I will be putting up will probably be replaced shortly after that with the one I am currently working on and hope to maybe even have it up first anyways.

I seem to be dreadfully fickle when it comes to the look of my blog...

Well...I am off!

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good...er...morning ;D

Capturing Creation Photo Challenge Day 6

Day 6: Let there be land animals and man...

"And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.
And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." --Genesis 1: 24-27

Its that time again, for another installment of the Capturing Creation Photo Challenge from Yours Truly.

Since this week is Day 6 and therefore the focus being land animals and man I had to dig through my pictures to find something suitable.

Last week, it was birds of the air and creatures of the sea...which I had to improvise with because not only am I a shoddy living creature photographer, but I'm also landlocked!

This week, I decided to use pictures of the only animal and person I can seem to take reasonably good pictures of...my cat and myself!

this, is Paws:

She's not exactly cooperative but shes surprisingly photogenic...
Funny thing about Paws, she's really rather narcissistic...we catch her looking into the mirror all the time. We have the strangest but most awesome animals ever to say the least.

and of course...

myself:

I snapped this picture the last day of camp. My best friend Lauren and I were waiting for our families to come and pick us up and well...we were taking some pretty random pictures. haha

Hoping you're all having a lovely holiday!
blessings~

What's the Strangest Thing You've Ever Received in the Mail?

To say the least, I honestly never thought my answer to that question would be "a turkey" but it is!

Earlier last week, we received two large packages via our local post office from a food service company.

Now, I guess I should explain, we've never had a traditional Christmas or Thanksgiving meal.
We figure that instead of spending hours and hours on an elaborate meal that is going to be consumed in a mere matter of minutes, that we should instead spend that time together as a family doing things that we enjoy doing together. And so, only a few times have we had turkey on thanksgiving (usually only when we've won one from our local market, or had one given to us) and when we have either ham or turkey on Thanksgiving or Christmas we cook it the day before so that we don't have to spend a bunch of time in the kitchen the next day.
I guess another reason for our lack of the elaborate Christmas and Thanksgiving meal is that my mom and I, we're just not the most culinary inclined people...which is to say, we're really not that good of cooks.

But I like that, its how its always been for us and I'd rather be able to spend time doing things and having fun with my family then figuring out something to do on my own because everybody is rushing around preparing a meal or somesuchedness.

Now, our friends and family know thats how we are, and so, we were joyously surprised last week to have received a fully cooked and packaged smoked turkey and a platter of other yummies as our Christmas gift from some wonderful friends of ours! The thought is just so wonderful, and we are definitely going to enjoy it!

So a definite, exuberant thanks to Suzanne, Bruce, Laurence, and Caitlin!!!
Hope you guys have a wonderful Christmas, thanks for the gift!

Whats the most strange, or unexpected thing you've ever received in the mail?
Comment below or link up a post and let me know!

Christmas Break!

Its finally here!
Cue the sigh of relief.

Though I'll have to be continuing with Spanish over break so that I can have enough done by the end of the semester...but its still much less stress than usual!

Today I spent four hours at the mall wrapping presents.
For those of you who know me, the mall is not exactly my idea of a good time...in fact I've only actually bothered going into two stores; the Christian t-shirt store that used to be in the mall and Barnes & Nobel. But I've only ever bought one book from Barnes & Nobel.
Mainly because honestly, I can't afford to buy anything in the mall, and none of it really appeals to me. I don't like wearing Ambercrombie & Fitch or American Eagle, in fact I won't even buy their stuff from GoodWill...I just don't like that image, its not me...

My random mall rant aside, thats where I was for the majority of my day today.

Every year my mom goes to a womens retreat and they like to be able to give scholarships to women who wouldn't otherwise be able to attend, and so Barnes & Nobel provides the wrapping paper and the space and we wrap gifts bought anywhere in the store (as long as they've purchased something from the bookstore as well) and then we come in and volunteer to provide the wrapping service, and ask people for donations for the scholarships.
Its was the first time I think I've ever actually enjoyed myself at the mall.

Oh yes, and I don't like riding escalators...which is a long story...but I just don't like them...maybe sometime I'll tell all you peoples about it...

But on to other things for now.

I finished listening to the audio book of The Hunger Games a few days ago.
It. Was. Awesome.
While it might be a little violent for some people, the story itself was excellent.
I loved the Gregor the Overlander series and Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games didn't disappoint.
Definitely a 3.5 out of 5
I'm looking forward to getting the sequel Catching Fire from the library.

Now, today at Barnes & Nobel, it sure is a good thing I purposely left my money at home because there were definitely some tempting lovelies.

I have a thing for notebooks...and I absolutely LOVE these leather ones I saw today!

This one is by far my favorite, I would adore having this one.
Its a bit of a different size than I usually prefer but it is just so comfortable in my hands, when I'm writing, things have to feel just right and this is just beautiful.

There were some others I loved that they don't have on the web site because they were the last few in stock, on sale at the store, but I really liked this one too. I really like the flap, the tie and the size.

While the first is more of a hardcover style, and the second a thicker harder leather cure, this one is a wonderfully soft, supple notebook, absolutely delectable. (Yes...I love notebooks)

I'm debating whether or not I want to invest in one...because my current composition notebook is just about full...only a few more pages to go and thats not much!

hmmnnn....well much to contemplate there...maybe if I wish really hard for one for Christmas? haha

Hope you're all having a wonderful Christmas break! I know I'm looking forward to watching Christmas movies, camping out under the tree, making caramel corn and Christmas dinner at a friends house.

blessings~