Best Christmas ever

Looking back over the past 2 weeks all I can say is I have been SOOOO blessed. Well really our family has been so blessed. Our church family has just surprised us--different groups of people took it upon themselves to decide to bless us!! I don't think the different groups of people were working together in any sort of way--all I can think is that God just put it on their hearts to offer to help us out.
We were given bunk beds, mattresses, sheets, comforters (this was an amazing blessing because the kids were sharing a small bed), oodles of kid clothes and toys, a new set of porch stairs!!!, installation of a new well box (which was nice because our current box kept shorting out which meant we'd lost water...), a new guitar for DH to play in the church band, tons of tools for him for Christmas, a new blender and cast iron pans for me!, knitted afghans, and someone brought a chain saw and chopped up our big tree that fell over into a TON of firewood so me and DH have been enjoying toasty date nights outside by the fire on our swing with some tea. Not to mention TONS of money and gift cards!!!
I am BLOWN away--this Christmas has to be one of the best. And not just because we got gifts but because I got to experience Christ's love in such an amazing way. It made me realize how powerful this kind of selfless love must be for non-Christians and this makes me want to give of myself freely a whole lot more. No, I am committed to become a follower of Christ that gives and loves freely.

new bunk beds!

These are the old rickety stairs we had been using--and yes there had been a couple falls hobbling down these things!!

These are our new wonderful stairs!! They even made a little lower rail for the kids! We still need to put a stain on it--but they are so wonderful--we love how the stairs are wider and there is even a little bit of a porch--what a blessing!