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Merry Christmas!

What a wonderful Christmas celebration we have had at the Harper Hullabaloo! It has been a whirlwind for the last two days....but so worth it! It all began Thursday night when we attended the Christmas Eve service at church. We then came home and the kids put on their new pajamas and set out milk and cookies for Santa! The stockings were hung by the chimney with care in hopes that St. Nicolas soon would be there!

And St. Nick showed up in a big way! Or as Beckett put it, "Santa brought the bomb this year!" (Basically, he brought them each the one thing that they had asked for!) B and H came in our room at 4:30 am on Christmas morning, ready to go check and see what Santa had brought, but we were able to hold them off until 5:30. (old mom and dad needed their sleep!) By 10:00 we were at Sean's mom and dad's house eating breakfast and sharing gifts with family and by 1:00 we were on the road to B-wood to visit with my mom and dad. Granbob got tickets for himself, Sean and Beckett to go see the Titans play on Christmas night against the Chargers. They had a blast! It was a LONG day, but a very good one! I'll post more pics and tell a little more about our Christmas in a day or so, but just wanted to share this cutie pic of the kiddos! Hope you all had a blessed Christmas!

Emmanuel~God With Us!

A Reminder

Just last night, Sean and I were talking about Will and the "what ifs" and the "whys". What if Will was still in Ethiopia? What if his birth father had not relinquished him for adoption? What would have happened to him? Why us? Why did God choose our family for Will? So many questions that we will never fully understand. Yet we are so unbelievably thankful for this opportunity to be involved in His plan for our family and for the orphans!

It was brought to my attention this morning that our amazing agency, All God's Children International, has a new video on their website about being the voice for the voiceless. There are so many children with no family, no hope for a future and they need us to speak for them. Maybe God is speaking to your family about adoption. Maybe you can help by providing funds for orphan care. Maybe you or your family could serve the children by going on a mission trip. If God is speaking to you in some way, I encourage you to join Him! You will be blessed!

We are so thankful that we obeyed the call and that Will is a part of our family. It has been six months and it is hard to remember life without him! But I was reminded this morning. Reminded of how far he has come in the 8 months that we have "known" him. At 1:19 in the video, you can see Will's referral picture. I almost didn't recognize him even though I stared at that picture for weeks! He was so tiny and under-nourished; a result of the extreme poverty that so many of the families face in Ethiopia. Let us not forget the voiceless. My prayer is that even though we are home with Will and that he is thriving, that we will not forget what we saw. That we will continue to be a voice for the voiceless and speak to others about how we can all help. Deuteronomy 4:9 says, "Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them slip from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their children after them." That is my prayer.

(If you would like to watch the video, you can mute the play-list at the bottom of the page. You can also see Sean and the top of Will's little head toward the end of the video when Kristi is meeting LL for the first time. We had just met Will right before she met LL and we were able to share that special time with them!)

Happy Birthday Jesus

Last week was a busy one! Both Beckett and Helen were involved in Christmas programs with their classes. On Wednesday, Granbob, Grankaki and Auntie Mame came to watch Beckett in his Christmas play with his enrichment class. They performed a play that their assistant teacher had written and Beckett did so well! This was his first play with memorized lines and he was great! There were also several songs in the performance as well. We then went to his classroom and he showed us all of his drawings from this semester that were displayed on the walls. He has learned a lot about drawing! I was SO impressed! Anyway, the sad part about Wednesday is that I left home without my camera and video camera! How did that happen? I don't know, maybe brain over-load!?! I was so upset, but I knew that some of our friends in the class would take a few pics of Beckett. One friend is going to give me a copy of the video she made....so I felt much better after that. However, I have no pics of Beckett in his play to share on my blog. He wore blue jeans and a red shirt. He played himself and spoke about wondering what gift he could give Jesus. It was precious!

Now, please do not think that I have a favorite child since the next pics are all about Helen. Let's just say, I learned a lesson on Wednesday and the first thing that I packed for Thursday's program was the camera! I also have a good friend who takes much better pictures than me, and she sent me several great pics from Helen's performance. Helen was a sheep in her Mother's Day Out presentation of The Nativity. So sweet. All of the boys and girls did such a wonderful job and we were all so proud! Here is a picture of the whole group as they took a bow! Helen is on the front row, looking right in our direction with a huge smile!

Helen with her friend, Wyatt the donkey and a shepherd.

Another picture of the whole group!

Helen did not want a speaking part in the play, so she was given the part of a sheep. However, she was able to give a step-by-step account of each moment of the play and she knew everyone's lines. They had been practicing for over a month, and we ALL knew every word to every song as well as exactly what to expect when we went to the performance! Now, she was too shy to have a speaking part in the play, but at the end, they each took the microphone and told their name and what part they played. She was quite confident and sounded great!

Just a close up of our little sheep. (who has chapped lips, by the way!)

Helen and her cheering section! My mom, dad and aunt were there. Sean's mom and dad were there, and of course her brothers and her mom and dad! We were all so proud of Helen and Beckett too! And might I add, that we were proud of Will, who was quiet and very observant during both of their programs! :)

On Friday, we went to Chattanooga to celebrate Ty and Marley's birthdays! Ty turned four and Marley turned 2 within 3 days of each other, so they celebrated together! Kathy made the cutest cakes for each of them. Here is Marley with her mermaid cake.

And four year old Ty with his shark cake!

It was a busy week with another birthday party earlier in the week, some shopping, doctor's appointments, basketball practice (Sean had to lead practice because the coaches were out of town) and Sean's work Christmas dinner, but we made it through and had a great time! We enjoyed a relaxing Sunday at home and now we are ready for another busy, yet fun week!

Merry Christmas!

A Visit With The Big Guy!

What a busy weekend! I won't bore you with all of the details, but we did work in a visit with Mr. Claus himself on Saturday evening. We have always gone to see Santa at the Christmas party held by Sean's company. They always do a nice job with the party and it is very family oriented. This year was no different. We started out with a visit with Santa. Beckett and Helen each told him one thing that they wanted and they are a little concerned that they didn't tell him anything to bring for Will. I think we will have to check and see if we can send him an email with that info! :) Anway, although there were no smiles from Will, at least he didn't totally freak out as I imagined that he might! Love this sweet picture!
The other big hi-light of the Christmas party this year was karaoke! Yes, Beckett and Helen sang their first karaoke song in public! They loved it, and if they hadn't waited until the end of the party to get up their nerve to do it, I'm sure they would have done a lot more! They sang "Jingle Bells"! I love how Helen is looking at the screen with Beckett as if she is "reading" the words to the song!

Here they are as they were getting ready to sing. This DJ LOVES his job. He was very helpful and good with the kids!
Here is Will getting in on the Jingle Bells action! He stood on the dance floor and bounced up and down while they sang. If you would like to hear a little bit of their performance, check out Beckett's blog, The Slam to see a video clip! Too cute!
It was a fun evening! The rest of the weekend involved a trip to KY to deliver Christmas gifts for kids, some shopping, church with our friends at OAA worship center in Madisonville and our Growth Group Christmas party last night! This week is busy with birthday parties, basketball practice, family coming in town for Beckett's Christmas play on Wednesday and Helen's nativity program on Thursday! It is going to be a busy one!

I hope you all have a wonderful week! No matter how busy it gets, lets remember the reason why we are celebrating this season! I know that we will all enjoy the lights and decorations, the gifts that we give and receive and the family gatherings. But let's not allow the real reason to be pushed to the sidelines of our experience! Praise God that we have HOPE because of the gift of His son, Jesus!

Merry Christmas!

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas!

We basically lost about a week after Thanksgiving. Helen was sick with the flu and then I ended up getting a small dose of what she had. Mine only lasted 24 hours, but it was not fun. So we had some catching up to do! Friday night we went to pick out our Christmas tree and decided to decorate it on Saturday. When we woke up on Saturday morning, it was snowing! It was so beautiful! We ate breakfast, bundled up and hurried outside because we knew it wouldn't last for long! My first picture is a close-up of the first snowman of the season. Don't you love the banana mouth, carrot nose and tootsie roll eyes? Sean, Beckett and Helen hooked up with our neighbors Matt and Carson to build this beauty! We also got in a little sledding. I had Will so bundled up that he could barely move. He didn't stay out for long since he has had a yucky cough and nose the last few days. But I didn't want him to miss his first snow!
I set him down in the snow to see what he would do and just like everything (he is so laid back) he just took it all in. He didn't get excited or freaked out, he just sat there in the snow and checked it out!

Here is a picture of the gang with their beautiful leaning snowman! Check out how Sean is having to hold it up! They ended up getting some wood to prop him up because he was leaning so bad that he almost fell down! (By the way, I just love Carson's rosy cheeks!) Too cute!

Carson's cousin and Helen's buddy, Carlie, stopped by for a few moments to play in the snow with everyone!

Last night after I got the lights put on the tree, we got out all of the ornaments. This is a picture of the first ornament that we hung last night! I love it! I ordered it from this sweet Tennessee family who is adopting a little boy from Ethiopia. They are selling these ornaments to help raise funds for their adoption and I just had to have one for Will's first Christmas with us! Love it!

On the back of the ornament it has Matthew 18:5~"Whoever welcomes a little child like this in my name welcomes me." Check out their blog, if you are interested in purchasing one and helping this family bring home their newest family member! So I had to take a picture of Will with his ornament on the tree, but he just wasn't feeling it. First of all, he is the droolingest child I have ever known! (Is droolingest a word?) He soaks 4 or 5 bibs a day and I guess I had just gotten tired of putting bibs on him because his shirt is totally wet in this picture! And I think it also has some leftover supper on it. But wet t-shirt and all, he is still adorable! :)

Here is Helen getting ready to hang our Mother/Daughter ornament.

Beckett getting in on the ornament action!

And the finished product. I think it turned out quite lovely!

The Flu is NO FUN!

Well, we had a wonderful Thanksgiving with family in North Carolina, UNTIL we woke up on Saturday morning and Helen was sick. She managed to travel well as we returned home, but it went down-hill from there. She has been quite sick with fever and vomiting. I took her to the doctor and they confirmed that she has the flu. We are praying that everyone else stays well, but we do have lots of coughs, sniffles and runny noses in our home! Helen is beginning to feel much better and her spirits were lifted 100% when she received a delivery from the florist today. Mamaw sent Helen some balloons and a coke which was such a special surprise and treat! Thanks, Mamaw, for being such a wonderful great-grandmother and blessing Helen in such a sweet way!

I'm off to wipe another nose and find another surface area to clean with a Clorox wipe! :)