Ooh, look who consented to make a guest appearance in honor of Christmas! Of course, she insisted on total artist control over the use of her image -- this is a self-portrait!
We hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and a new year full of love and joy!
We went to a candlelight service at our church on Christmas Eve. That Grace loved the singing and joined in, loudly. She had fun with the candles. It was beautiful -- a very peaceful interlude in the midst of all the activity of Christmas. 
We had a family Christmas party on the 20th. Instead of turkey or ham, we had Mexican food. That Grace helped mix the guacamole. 
Aunt Donna and Papa.
Our beautiful niece. 
A new baby. 
Two beautiful nieces and 2 babies! That Grace had a great time once she got used to everyone.
The past few weeks have been a whirl of activities. We've been shopping ...
eating ...
lots ....
cooking, of course...
pouring...
drinking tea...
and we spent a fun day with Aunt Donna and Uncle Craig, baking cookies ...
and rearranging furniture!
We went to the tree farm for our Christmas tree yesterday. It was getting dark when we got there, so these pictures aren't the greatest. That Grace really got into it this year. We just let her run wild.
She finally decided on a pretty but very prickly one. She helped Dad cut it down. 
Dad was tired after cutting down the tree, so he let That Grace load it on the top of the car. Good thing she's stronger than she looks!
I planned on posting updates while we were on vacation but, surprise!, there was no service at the top of the mountain, so this will just be a quick update. I don't think the picture above really needs a caption. It kind of speaks for itself!
Visiting with Aunt Donna (who is not a fan of the Pebbles 'do). She and Uncle Craig dog sat while we were gone, which we really appreciated!
Hmm, she's almost got it!
Eating a hearty breakfast in the mountains.
Apparently deciding her stomach was too full for any more food, That Grace decides to feed her feet!
Having fun on the way home -- before we got stuck on the interstate for 6 hours.
We went shopping with Caroline this morning. That Grace was very interested in the infrastructure of the store and spent a lot of time exploring it! After determining the racks were indeed sturdy enough to hold the clothes and didn't pose a safety hazard to innocent shoppers, she was satisfied. 
Tonight we went to a birthday party for a good friend of mine at her parents' house. Her oldest is a little younger than Caroline. Because she was the first grandchild, they let her decide what to call her grandparents. Apparently she ended up calling them what they called each other, so she calls her grandmother by her first name and her grandfather "honey." Now all of the grandchildren do the same. It's really cute to hear these almost-grown boys calling their granddad "honey."
That Grace was captivated by this doll chair and just had to sit in it. She was so intent on sitting in it that she willingly sat this close to my friend's husband. She had birthday cake again tonight. I thought, "Oh well, we're just going home and going to bed; what can happen?" Well, it's 12:28 a.m. and she's up playing babies with daddy. So much for that line of thinking! My friend's mother grew cherry tomatoes in her garden this year much like ours. That Grace saw them sitting out in a bowl and got very excited. She ended up eating four of them in a row. She wouldn't eat the little grape tomatoes on the vegetable platter; she wanted the home grown tomatoes. She turned out to be quite sociable tonight. She was a little clingy when we first got there but once she realized there was plenty of party food and lots of people willing to share, she was quite the social butterfly!