"This is Dorrie. She is a witch. A little witch. Her hat is always crooked and her socks never match."
For Character Day at school Savannah chose to dress up as one of our favorite literary characters: Dorrie the Witch. My mom has almost all the Dorrie books written by Patricia Coombs and every time we stay with my parents we read them all over and over and over again.
(It's always nice to get more use out of Halloween costumes!)
Unlike the government, when we put a freeze on our spending, we put a FREEZE on our spending. Unless it's for an absolute necessity (tithing, mortgage, cars, or food), there is NO money going out! One of our previous expenses that we have deemed unnecessary right now is Xander's hair cut. But because we don't want him turning into Cousin It at some point, David decided to cut his hair like he does Noah's. So now I have two baldie boys. I was worried that Xander wouldn't like it but it turns out I was wrong. He loves his new look and every day when he looks in the mirror he says, "Mom, I'm still bald!"
The germs have been working overtime at our house these days. It started a couple weeks ago with Xander waking up at the crack of dawn with a painful earache. I took him right in to the doctor because I don't mess around with ears. Although he ended up not having an ear infection (thank goodness), he did have strep throat! You would never have known it, though, because the kid had never once mentioned to me that his throat was bothering him. The colds and sore throats and coughs have continued to plague all of us; no one in the family has been spared. Savannah woke up around two last night and after an hour of listening to her cough, I stumbled out of bed and applied the inexplicable but miraculous method of rubbing Vicks Vapor rub on her feet and covering them with socks. Works like a charm every time! Within 5 minutes there was no more coughing. But the one who has been hit the hardest is our poor little Noah. He has been sick for over a week and just by looking at him a person can tell that he just doesn't feel good. I always know when the medicine has worn off because he comes up to me, gives me his sad puppy dog eyes, and says, "Mommy, I sick." He then proceeds to tell everyone in the house that he is sick; he even told my dad all about it on the phone one afternoon. Just too cute though I do wish he'd get better one of these days.
For Keepers this month the girls headed off to an art studio to do some watercoloring. One of the moms of our group has a family member that is an artist and has an art studio right in her home. She taught the girls about mixing colors and adding texture to watercolor paintings. 
My little artist.
Another fun Keepers meeting!
We had planned on spending Christmas in Baltimore but, due to some unforeseen events, we were blessed to be able to go to Cincinnati instead. We spent 10 days there celebrating the birth of our Savior, ringing in 2010, and soaking up quality time with our family.
Uncle Bryan had recently returned from Mexico so the kids were able to spend A LOT of time hanging on him...I mean, hanging out with him. All the kids LOVE their Uncle Bryan!
Bryan is showing off his inner Jackson 5.
We played a lot of games, Sorry and War being the favorites.
We had our tasty traditional Christmas Eve dinner, read stories, sang songs, listened to Grandpa tell the story of the birth of our Savior, opened Christmas Eve jammies, left food for the reindeer and Santa, and eagerly looked forward to a visit from Santa.
Santa did not disappoint this year. Xander got more Star Wars guys plus a tank to carry them around in...
Savannah got the American Girl doll, Felicity...
and Noah got more choo-choos.
Yes, we had a wonderful visit. Other fun things we did included The Children's Museum, Chuck E. Cheese, the movie "Princess and the Frog" (which I found very mediocre) and "Sherlock Holmes", which I had not wanted to see but ending up LOVING! We watched some great football games, read lots of books, laughed a lot, and enjoyed just being together.
One of the great things about this visit was spending time with my grandma. My Grandma Schaeffer spent Christmas with us giving my kids a wonderful opportunity to get to know their great-grandma. 
This Christmas reminded me that even when we are going through challenges and trials in our lives, Heavenly Father continues to bless us. This Christmas was such a blessing to our family and I am so grateful that we got to spend this time with my family.
