check this out

here is a little cultural lesson about papakura new zealand. click here check this out. thanks a lot mr. read for this link.

tongan youth retreat

cultural dances, singing, food, and lots of new friends. we had a great weekend and some new and interesting experiences. cail made lots of friends and averie was the most popular with her blue eyes and chubby cheeks!!! glad to be home but off again to go camping with the harkness fam. more pictures later! enjoy these.

day at the park

do keep in mind this is dec. for all of you who are accustom to cold snowy days in dec this may be a shock. it is to us that's for sure, but we are loving it.

play house

here we are playing in the house mommy made us. she says she never knew banana boxes could be so much fun!!!!

who is santa anyway???

check out my friend's sew funky blog. her family celebrates st. nicholas day and i think it is a great idea. maybe a good trend for those of us who have little ones!!!! it helps us to remember why we really celebrate christmas. let me know what you think.

dinner @ the bowlin's

see if you can guess what we had for dinner???





after dinner we went to get the mail and found thanksgiving cards from grandma martin and auntie ali!!! this is cail reading her card. she loves cards. she tried to take mine the other day and claim it as her own. mamaw and papaw sent a princess card for her birthday and she carries it around everywhere.

josh's trip part 2

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

josh's trip part 1

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

this may take a while to load but it's fun!!!

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

carols in the park

sounds fun eh!!!

well, let me tell you, it was HOT. i'm still trying to get the hang of a summer christmas. we sang snowy cold christmas songs while sweating, sitting on the green grass at the park and squinting into the hot sun!!! then i had to go get a coffee because when the sun went down the breeze picked up and it was cold. cail's lips were turning blue and i had goosebumps, but of course little averie was still sweating. she takes after daddy in the body temp department!!!! by the time we were ready to go home the crowd had multiplied to near a thousand people, the music was still going and sounding great, and the temp had dropped so it felt a bit more like the christmas season.

cail got to paint an angel christmas ornament, eat a fruit kabob, dance to the hip hop dance group, and we are one more step into the christmas swing!!! oh, and she got to go up on stage with edgar when he did the opening greeting. she looked a little intimidated by all the people, and didn't have to say anything but she sure looked cute (that's her mama's opinion anyway). to bad daddy had to work, we sang extra loud so he could here us all the way at youth group!!!!

more weird and wacky stories from our summer christmas experience later. ta-ta