Christmas!

    I hope that you had an amazing Christmas, I know that I sure did! The first thing that we did was open our presents from Santa. I got a Flip camcorder. Justin got a metal detector, Ryan got a firehouse, Abigail got a doll nursery, and Tyson got a ................DOG! We were all very excited about that one except for my dad, he is the reason that we haven't had a dog for so long, but we hope that he'll learn to love Gracie (that's our dogs name) as much as we do. By the way, Gracie is a blue heeler-border collie mix. She is very smart, very cute, and very nice. Everyone got basically the same thing in their stockings: socks, underwear, a mini box of cereal, and candy! After that we ate our boxes of cereal for breakfast. Next we opened all of the rest of our presents. Some of my presents were: tennis balls, clothes, lots of books, a thing that you can knit stuff with, yarn to knit stuff with, and some jewelry. Soon after that my grandpa and step-grandma Annabelle came over. We spent some time with them and then had a Christmas dinner of ham, potatoes, rolls,etc. They left to go pick up my aunt Darlene from the airport, and we went and played wally-ball with our friends the Hardy's. We beat them by the way. We then went home and waited for my aunt and grandparents to get back from the airport. They got here, and we ate dessert. After spending a little more time with them, they went home and we went to bed. I had a lot of fun!

I'm Not Dreaming of a White Christmas, I'm Having One!

 Here in Lubbock, Texas, snow is a rare occasion, but today, we woke up to more snow than I have ever seen! In some places it was above my knees! We went out and played in it with our friends the Hardy's. It was pretty fun, but the wind and ice blowing was awful! The snow wasn't very good packing snow as it is. It was still pretty fun though. We made snow angels, threw some snowballs, and started to make a snow fort. After about twenty minutes though, we went inside. I must say though, I think that I would have had more fun if I had a coat on! Ryan didn't last very long before he started crying, but when my mom asked him if he liked snow, he managed a "Yes" through his tears. I'm not sure how well Abigail liked playing in the snow, but she sure did like eating it! It is supposed to not melt today, and snow more tomorrow. We are all really excited!

 

Emily

 

Tyson

Justin

Ryan when we first came out.

Ryan after 15 minutes.

 

Abigail. Yummy!

The Cluff's and Hardy's in the snow!

I'm Not Magic! :(

Yesterday, Ryan was trying to turn off all of the lights in the house so that he could see the Christmas tree lights better. My mom and I needed a light to see by though, so we turned on a light whose light switch is kind of hidden. Ryan was a little upset and asked my mom how to turn it off. She replied, "You have to say, 'abracadabra, zippide-zoo, light turn off, choo choo!'" He did so and we discreetly flipped the switch. He was amazed. "Mom, I'm magic!" he delightedly said. He did this for at least five minutes. We got tired of flipping the switch, so we told him that he should probably stop before his magic ran out. He continued to believed us and stopped. Today, after church, he came down the hall saying, "Mom, I have sad news. I'm not magic." He was on the verge of tears. Apparently, he had said the magic words, but when Tyson tried to flip the switch, he saw. "There's a switch," he sadly informed us. He then went and showed us that the magic words didn't work, someone had to flip the switch. By this point, mom and I were feeling pretty guilty for tricking him, but then he really made us feel bad. "I'm not magic," he said crying, "I'm not even special." it took us quite a while to convince him that no one was magic, and that he was still incredibly special. I feel bad that we tricked him, but he had so much fun "magically" turning on the lights! 

Locks of Love

Yesterday I cut off literally a foot of my hair! My  hair used to be really long, all the way down my back. For the second time in my life, I cut off a huge amount and donated it to a foundation called Locks of Love. They take hair that someone has donated (there must be at least ten inches) and makes it into wigs for people whose hair has fallen out due to treatment for cancer. The last time that I donated, I cried after the haircut. I just didn't look like me without my long hair. The fact that the haircut itself looked bad on me didn't help. This time, I didn't cut off quite so much, and the hairstylist did a wonderful job! I'm still adjusting to having such short hair, but at least this time I like the way it looks. I am glad that I was able to donate my hair.

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!

On December 1, it snowed in Lubbock! I have Tennis first period in school. We are in off-season, so we were in the cafeteria working out. My coach looked outside and saw that the ground was covered in snow, and that it was still coming down hard. She went out to quickly take pictures, and we followed her and started to play in it. When she was done, she looked at us and told us that if we wanted we could stay out here and play in the snow for the rest of the period. We were ecstatic! For the next 45 minutes, we made mini snowmen, had snowball fights, and just enjoyed having enough snow to play in. We had so much fun! I was really glad that we got to do this, because about ten minutes after tennis ended, it stopped snowing. By the time we got home, there was no trace of the inch of snow that we played in earlier. I am very lucky to have such a nice coach!