Christmas Joy

Christmas is always a time filled with family, fun and reflection.  Despite how different this year has been for us, Christmas was a time of family, fun and reflection.  All the usual family players were around, plus Uncle Peter, Grandpa and Auntie Leslie.  Jonah was allowed two back-to-back day passes and was able to be home for Christmas and out with us again the following day.  

Having Jonah home was elixir for my soul.  He laughed, he played and we imagined life with him home.  It was different, but it was good.  When the day ended, and Simon had to take Jonah back to RIC, I wondered aloud if we could just keep him home and pretend everything was ok.  Childish I know, but the familiarity of all being home together was just too hard to resist.

This year, the brokenness of the world was front and center in our family, which makes the gift of Christmas all the more sweet.  God sent His son as a baby to heal the brokenness in the world.  The healing is not yet full realized, but there is a path to hope now as a result of Christ entering into the brokenness, and this year, in our house, that hope shone bright.

The day after Christmas we all went to see Seussical the Musical.  Mum usually takes just the older kids to a play in December, but this year Julia was old enough to join.  The combination of Jonah's new needs and Julia being Julia made it seem a wise decision to have extra adults, so we all tagged.

With our crazy schedule, it's been hard to get to church, but we were able to attend Christmas service together.

When Jonah gets a Wii for Christmas, everyone wins.

The Goodalls you see - Christmas 2015

The Goodalls you know - Christmas 2015

Julia loves her Christmas crown.  Honestly, she loves any crown or any excuse she can come upon to have people take her picture.

Jonah & mummy - a Christmas queen and and her prince.

Growing up, I lived in Germany for a few years.  While we were there, my family purchased an authentic Erzgebirge Pyramid that I was always fascinated by.  Mum gave me one for Christmas this year to help fascinate a new generation.  It was a big success and what I hope will be an heirloom holiday decoration. 

Since both Jonah and Grandpa are bald, they shared a hat this year, although clearly Jonah was doing the borrowing, since he didn't see much action in Desert Storm.

We snuck a great girls day into the holiday mix.  Who doesn't love a Christmas-time pedicure?

Anna loved her polish change, but did wonder why she didn't get a full pedicure.

Care to guess who's who?  Julia is of course all pink, mummy was blue, Auntie Leslie went burgundy and Anna has a nice pink with a purple sparkle overlay.

To end our girls day, we got home drinks and fancy chocolates at Anna Shea, which Anna is always partial to by name alone.