My Awesome Siblings

Last night my family put up our Christmas tree!! (okay, my brother put it up and then sparadically it got decorated lol) The front room is now littlered tastefully with Christmas knicknacks and just makes everything more Christmassy!! :) so happy! Now if we could only get rid of those few remaining pumpkins and gourds sitting on each end of the mantle... lol

I've been meaning for a while to post some pix of my awesome family!!

This is my younger (I can no longer say "little" :( and be truthful!!) brother Joseph and his first deer!!! I was SO proud of him!! And happy too! I've got a freezer full of venison to cook all winter! lol

These are my little sisters Bethie (who just turned 9 this week!!) and Hannah (who is ten). Hannah's the one in curlers! lol As you can tell, this was a lazy day at home! Hannah usually runs around the house in an ancient, worn out, and really whacky skirt on, and Bethie's gonna pass her up in height any day now :(

This is my best friend and room mate Heidi on her 13th birthday (just 10 days before my 18th!!) We gave daddy a hard time by reminding him that he had two milestone bdays that month :) (mom would normally groan from somewhere in the background lol) Apparently us being so old makes them old as well lol.

This is my perky little (at this blessed point in time he still is my "little" brother!!) brother Nathan, who is also the youngest!! Isn't he just hysterically adorable?!

So these are my awesome siblings!! Now, this may not be my mindset every moment of the day (lol) but it always is in the long run!! They are such a blessing when I just stop to think about it-- even in the little things! Joseph put up the tree and strung the lights last night, and only last week he just randomly suprised my dad at hanging some drywall he (my dad) had been meaning to get around to for heaven knows how long! lol He'd never done it before and did an AMAZING job! (he and dad both said there was a small gap, but to my untrained eye, they could've fooled me!) And just look at that deer!

Then last night after the frontroom was all decked out, I made everyone hot chocolate and they plopped down and popped in a Christmas movie. I went to go back to my room (which is in the basement) and lost traction on the first step with my houseshoes and ended up falling down the stairs (owie!!) Heidi, Hannah, and Bethie were at my side, crowding me out on the steps within seconds, bombarding me with "Are you okay?" "What'd you hurt?" "Did you slip?" (Nooo!! lol) "Did you hurt anything?" "Are you alright?" "Need help?" It struck me how sweet it was that they all came rushing to make sure I was okay. :)

And then little Nathan... omysoul is that little buddy a bundle of energy!!!!! Yesterday I was juicing apples for breakfast and he (being the only one up and at the table at that point) begged me to let him put a few apples in the shooty thing and push them down. So I let him. :) It was super cute how excited he got over putting three apples in and juicing them! As everyone else came to the table, he let them know how HE made apple juice with Katie. It was so precious. He begged me to get him up this morning so we could do it again, and I planned on it, but I got up too late and was doing my devotions when he wanted to this morning, so he did it with mommy. He told me later, "Me and momma made juice!" Mom had already told me (she told me they had added a few carrots, despite his plea not to, and then he was pleasently suprised when it was really yummy lol) "I heard!" I told him. "I heard you added a special ingredient this morning and it was really yummy!" "Yeah!" He said, but there was no more left, so he added, "We can make you some later." It was so precious!

As "big sister", who is often "in charge", I need to remember these precious moments and focus on the special and promising talent with and belonging to my siblings whenever they start to argue or rough house or tattle and I begin to feel agrivated and lose my meek and quiet spirit and joy in the LORD.

I challenge you, dear sisters, to do the same thing this week! Every time you begin to feel aggrivated and are tempted to be greived with your siblings, pause and thank God for them and then ask Him to show you something good about them you can focuse on and even praise them for! Remember, even though "all those brothers and sisters'' can drive you crazy, there are girls out there who would do almost anything to just have ONE.

Our siblings are blessings- gifts!- from God!!!!

What are you thankful for about your siblings today?