Christian Photographers Community

Merry Christmas everyone. May we all remember the true meaning of Christmas and I pray you all have a Happy and Prosperous New Year.

Don

Merry Christmas.  We had heavy rain all during the night but that seems to be over now.  We do not have a white Christmas.

We expect our son to be here about noon and we will have our Christmas Dinner a little later.  The last we heard he is planning on being here for a couple of days.  I will likely take our daughter back to her apartment tomorrow. 

The house looks very festive.  My wife really got into the spirit of the season this year. 

Hope everyone has a wonderful Merry Christmas.

It is the day celebrated by many Christians as the day of our Lord's birth.  The Word of our Lord doesn't teach that we should observe the day, but that we should be thankful at all times for His coming.  Oh how thankful we should indeed be!  Think of it!  The holy Son of God humbled Himself to come into this world of sin in order to give Himself on our behalf - in order, by His suffering and death, to make atonement for our sins.  The words of J. S. Bach were, "Oh blessed Jesu, how hast Thou offended, that such a doom on Thee has now descended?  Of what misdeed hast Thou to make confession?  Of what transgression?"  Oh let us everlastingly be absolutely given to thankfulness for His coming, and let us be entirely given to serving Him all the days of our lives!

"Bless the Lord, oh my soul, and all that is within me.  Bless His holy Name!"  "He gave Himself, the Just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God."

Imagine this scenario.

It is your birthday. 

There will be a huge party with close friends and mere acquaintances invited.  The house is brightly decorated.  A festive meal is prepared. 

The guests arrive loaded down with gifts - which they exchange with each other and give nothing to you.

Strange kind of birthday celebration?  And yet that is exactly how the greatest Birthday of all time is celebrated!

Merry Christmas!  Candlelight Christmas Eve Service was very touching last evening.  So nice to see our little church filled! 

Marge, Ivalou and I saw 'Blind Side' yesterday.  I recommend the movie highly.  I would like to see it again.  Then we went to Bob Evans to eat but they were closed already.  So we went to O'Charley's and ate.  Great Christmas Eve! 

Today is a huge Christmas Dinner at Ivalou's.  Not sure who all will be there.  Just pray that everyone will be at least for an hour or so. 

It is 48°  and raining.  Better for the travelers.  Not ice and snow!  Praying for safe travels for everyone! 

Hope this Christmas is as special as all of you are!

Merry Christmas everyone.  May you all have a peaceful New Year

Merry Christmas all.   We give thanks for all the wonderful artists who have put beautiful Christmas cards in here.  Don and I went to a packed church at 2 PM yesterday and with the special hearing aids, again, he heard every word.  We are so thankful.  Some of the children had to work so we gathered finally close to 6 PM and ate, opened those presents and the time just flew.  Some are with family today and some are in the mountains.  We sure feel immediately lonesome whenever they leave but truly are so thankful that all are within driving distance and they all want to come together.  It is frozen outdoors so we stayed in all day - he is in the basement making small wooden gifts and I did put in an hour on sewing.  One hour on knitting and just getting things organized.   

Bonesy:  I looked up the tiny town of Solway, Minn. and see that it is south of Red Lakes. One Christmas - I stayed all alone in a hotel at Rochester, New York - but a family did invite me to attend their Catholic mass with them and I did enjoy the company.  They were kind enough to care - I was working. 

Al:  Your message of Christmas is timeless and needs to be mentioned over and over.  Thank you.  Praying for you and Marbeth and wishing you good health. 

Safe travels to all. 

Quote from: Jeanne Lee on December 25, 2009, 10:27:55 AM
Imagine this scenario.

It is your birthday.  

There will be a huge party with close friends and mere acquaintances invited.  The house is brightly decorated.  A festive meal is prepared.  

The guests arrive loaded down with gifts - which they exchange with each other and give nothing to you.

Strange kind of birthday celebration?  And yet that is exactly how the greatest Birthday of all time is celebrated!

It is kind of strange....The true joy of this holiday(meaning-holy day) is Christ Jesus our Lord...

Quote from: Al Moak on December 25, 2009, 09:52:10 AM
It is the day celebrated by many Christians as the day of our Lord's birth.  The Word of our Lord doesn't teach that we should observe the day, but that we should be thankful at all times for His coming.  Oh how thankful we should indeed be!  Think of it!  The holy Son of God humbled Himself to come into this world of sin in order to give Himself on our behalf - in order, by His suffering and death, to make atonement for our sins.  The words of J. S. Bach were, "Oh blessed Jesu, how hast Thou offended, that such a doom on Thee has now descended?  Of what misdeed hast Thou to make confession?  Of what transgression?"  Oh let us everlastingly be absolutely given to thankfulness for His coming, and let us be entirely given to serving Him all the days of our lives!

"Bless the Lord, oh my soul, and all that is within me.  Bless His holy Name!"  "He gave Himself, the Just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God."

Amen and Amen!!!

Wonderful beautiful cards to all sent!!!

Carol, Judy, Larry, Don and to Everyone!!! Peace and goodwill to all!!!

Thank you God-Thank you Jesus for this time and this season to remind us of your joy-love for all!!!

The day is over.  gifts exchanged, food eaten, weight gained, and all are tired.  What will we remember about this Christmas?  A gift? food? company? or will we remember the awe the shepherds felt when they saw the Christ?  Will we remember He is the I AM?  I pray we all do so.

What a wonderful Christmas spent with family and realizing the reason for the season.  Wonderful to look around the table of 23 and realize that we all will live in eternity with our Father in heaven.  What a great feeling. 

All the ones that had to travel back to Ohio because of jobs today (that's what happens when college kids work in retail) returned home safe and sound.  Jo, her husband, Steve, and Lydia stayed at Ivalou's.  I imagine they are putting up the Christmas decorations since Ivalou will be going to Ohio next week.  Then Ivalou had a blood draw January 4th so will be back home then. 

Since I didn't put up Christmas decorations, I am having a very leisure day today.  Just chilling out thinking about how blessed I am and how blessed my family is.  Thank you, God!

Hi everyone.  We are winding down our family get together today.  My son and I took my daughter back to her apartment after coffee this morning.  This is the first time he has seen where she lives.  It met a lot to her for him to be here this year and, of course, it met a lot to Pat and I to have them both here.  He will leave for home in the morning sometime. 

After we got back from downtown Atlanta (the traffic was really light--it was great) we went to the Texas Roadhouse for a good lunch.  We all enjoyed a very good meal. 

I have been trying to get my Christmas present present, a 23 inch monitor, set up and working with the second monitor.  It works with the Analog setup on both computers but when I set it up with the DVI (Digital) cable for the new monitor it doesn't want to recognize the older monitor.

We had a wonderful celebration yesterday highlighted by the visit in the late afternoon of our grandson and his wife and our great grandson. 

I feel like a giant sloth today!  I mean, I can't remember being so lazy for a whole day, in a very long time!  But I deserve to just do nothing occasionally, don't I?   Yep  

I cooked for two days, so was a little bit tired.  Plus taking Beth out for the day is really tough for me.  Of course, I did have help with her, but feel the responsibility for her care mostly rests on me.  She was able to stay until about 7:30 last night, then we had to pack up and head home ASAP.  We got her back to the home all right.  And she had a good day, so it was all worth it.

We had a great day with the kids and grandkids, and the one great grand.  We had a nice brunch about 11 in the morning; then the big meal of ham and turkey and all the extras about 6 in the evening.  We exchanged lots of gifts--it seemed to be a book Christmas this year!  And we did remember that we were celebrating Jesus' birthday, and to thank Him for His inexpressible gift of salvation, purchased by His own death on a cruel cross.  What a God!!  What a Savior!  What a plan!

Etta Sue, glad you had a great Christmas.  Larry, bless you, I know how much it must have meant for your son and daughter to both be at your house.  God is still in the miracle-working business!  Hope you get your computer problem solved, and I know you will!

Grandson Mark gave me an external hard drive for my computer, along with a promise of coming up to install it and do whatever is necessary.  He worries about my losing my photos.  Sweet guy, that Mark!  

I will probably wonder for days what happened to today!    But it felt good to just relax and read a good book.  So no apologies.  Ha.

Today has been a day of family togetherness, also. I'm in Georgia with my son and his family, and my son from England, and also his son, and his new little grandson whom he is seeing for the first time since his birth in September.

What a joy to see how well everyone got along, how freely the conversation flowed, and the genuine joy in being together.

Now, I'm looking forward to feeling better tomorrow and enjoying a relaxed day with our Lord and with the family together.

Love to all.

Ruth Ann

Hi everyone.  It is a beautiful morning here in Georgia.  We are having a combined service this morning at church.  The attendance is always down.  The choir is singing a very nice anthem today, a new one for us.  Our director is back from her trip to Germany with the Atlanta Symphony Chorus.  They sang with the Berlin Orchestra for the second year in a row.

Our son is still here but will leave for home this morning.  We have enjoyed having both of our children here and have had individual time with both of them as our daughter came out before Christmas and he has stayed a couple of days after.

It sounds like everyone has had a lovely Christmas.

I did get my new monitor all set up.  Windows 7 makes it very easy to use dual monitors.  I am going to have to get used to using such a large screen.

I will watch some football this afternoon and evening.

I just put away the last of grandmother's plates and  auntie's plates - all are as safe and snug as I could pack - barring an earthquake    And, yes - I have been through earthquakes in Colorado too although the ones in Seattle were bigger that what we have experienced here.  Don is making biscuits and gravy for breakfast this week and two neighbor couples are to be invited. 

I found some more of my kids on Facebook and got the chance tot alk some to my # 2 son, I have seen  him or heard from him in 17 years.

That's great, Marilyn!  Makes for an even more enjoyable and memorable Christmas, doesn't it?  

17 years is a long time.

Yep Jane it's a long time.

Time to start a new week!

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