Amy J. Bennett

My scripture this week is Matthew 1:18-25

18This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. 19Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.

20But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus,because he will save his people from their sins."

22All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23"The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"—which means, "God with us."

24When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. 25But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.

I’m in such the Christmas spirit this year and now that Thanksgiving is over, I have no reason not to be.  But let us never forget what Christmas is for!

So how about you? To participate, simply post a verse, a set of verses or even just a reference to a verse that means something to you now or maybe even in the past.  Explain why it’s important or don’t. It’s up to you.  Go now and post and then come back. Post your name and then a direct link to you blog entry. If you don’t have a blog, feel free to leave yours in the comments. Here is the code for the graphic above.

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Today turned out to be pretty busy.  It started off well as Scott let me go back to sleep after I had gotten up with the girls around 7:30.  When I got up around 9:30, Scott went out to start on the icicle lights–which he ended up not doing because too many strands needed replaced.  I worked on getting the girls and myself ready and just hung out…the calm before the storm I guess. 

We had SIL and S come over and go out for lunch to Taco Bell with us.  Then we headed to the store to get some birthday presents.  Remember that birthday party I didn’t really want to go to last weekend?  Well, the previous one was thrown by the grandparents I didn’t really know but this one was thrown by the girls’ parents who is Scott’s cousin and his girlfriend.  SIL and myself had planned to take S and Emma ice skating today but felt the necessity to go to the party..it’s family and they came to ours kind of thing.  It was a roller skating party and I guess it was close enough to ice skating because Emma made the final pick to go to the party. 

We had fun and Emma actually did really well.  Lexi tried for about 15 minutes and then gave up on it.  I think she was frustrated her little wheels were so big and I guess she didn’t feel safe that tall because she kept saying they were too big even after I tried 3 different sizes on her.  And yes, I got out there too.  I haven’t roller skated in years and years and after a few times around, I picked it back up.  I really could have done it a lot longer than I did.  As you can see in the picture, Lexi ended up walking around the rink while I skated. Scott says she was insistent on going with me and there was no way I could carry her, so I let her walk.  There weren’t many people out and things are very relaxed at that rink.

We headed out after about 2 hours and then headed over to Scott’s parents.  Today is MIL’s birthday and although she is still getting over a respiratory infection, we took her out to dinner.  FIL is really sick with some stomach thing so he didn’t go.  We didn’t stay at the house afterwards either.  We came home and I started working on my Sunday School lesson and Scott crashed in the recliner.

Heather ended up coming over with my fabric for the dining room and we worked on what I wanted for the rod and finial. Who knew that was going to be so hard?  We still didn’t decide on anything and it’s still a possibility Scott might make something custom for me.  Oh the woes of knowing too much about choices and being picky.

So I’ve been pretty busy since this morning.  My eyes are heavy and I’m headed to bed…

Grey’s was sort of insane last night.  Or at least the end was.  And we’ll start with that.  I guess everyone kind of expected that to happen but kind of shocking to watch.  Didn’t Seth Green do a great job though?  I really like him.

Let’s see, what else to comment on?

I liked Izzie’s opening scene and her fighting with Christina over Hahn’s watch.  But I sort of agree with Christina…Izzie’s in over her head.  Yeah, she’s better with the patients but is she really a heart surgeon?

Lexie and Ava in the gallery?  That was a little awkward.  How come Lexie is so mad though?  Did she not believe him when he said he wanted nothing more than anything physical?  Poor girl had it coming.  She was warned.  And where did Ava come from?  I thought she left for good when she left her shirt last time.  Maybe I got the wrong impression.

Same thing with Meredith I suppose.  Except she said she wouldn’t commit and now Derek is looking elsewhere and she’s getting her toes stepped on.  Speaking of, I think I like that new nurse.  I of course want Mer/Der together but if anyone would replace her temporarily she’s decent.

George was not much more than a prop last night.  Can’t recall anything significant he did.

Mer and the ambulance scene was tragic of course.  I liked how Stan saved Ray’s life right before he died.  He’s right though, he’ll have some kind of story to tell.

Bailey and her husband…the last married couple left is definitely on the rocks and I really hope they pull through. 

That’s the time I got up this morning.  Like, actually got myself out of bed.  My alarm went off at 4:30 and I gave myself 9 extra minutes.  We were off within 15 minutes to the mall.  I was having a hard time between two doorbuster Christmas trees.  One was at JCPenney’s and the other Sears.  JCP opened at 4 and Sears at 5.  I figured the JCP tree would be gone but stopped by just in case because I actually preferred that one.  And sure enough, there were 3 left after mine.

So then we had an hour to burn until Staples – our big hit of the day – opened.  So we went to Belk.  Heather got a camcorder and I got the girls some winter coats and two Christmas outfits. 

Our one issue happened there.  Two people in front of us in line was insisting on using their Belk card.  Their card system apparently went down and the woman had to be on the phone for about 10 minutes.  Finally we overhear the amount is only for, get this…$5.  The lady FINALLY hands the woman cash.  Yeah.  That wasn’t fun at 5:30am. 

Over to Staples we headed with only minutes to spare.  The parking lot was full.  The line was wrapped around the building.  That’s what that picture is above.  Way across the parking lot is the door.  The line is down the front of the building and out the back of the parking lot where I was standing.  It was 40 degrees and windy and COLD.  But we got in and got everything we wanted!  My big score was my 500GB external hard drive for $79 after rebates.

But we stood in line for an hour and a half!  Thankfully we had some really nice people in line and had some good conversation and we were able to go in and out of line a few times to change our minds about a few things.

After that, we splurged at Chick fil a and then stopped at Target where I scored a GREAT rug and picture for the kitchen and then to Best Buy where Heather got a 32" tv.

We headed home then.  I was starting to fall apart.  Saying things like "What time is it?" while holding out a price tag for Heather to read really meaning to say, "How much does this cost?"

We came home to find Scott had all the Christmas stuff down and he had a bunch of stuff already in place.  We unloaded everything and then made three more stops.  First to Walgreens for blow up yard things.  Lowe’s where we couldn’t find a microwave for Heather so our last stop was Home Depot where Heather bought her microwave. 

It was a big day and we were so tired by the end.  I managed to stay up until about 2:30 in the middle of putting up bubble lights on the tree and crashed for 2 hours.  Heather just called and she’s still up.  I guess she’ll really crash for tonight.

All in all, I had a GREAT time shopping with Heather.  Just shopping period.  I even managed to mark one person off my Christmas list ;).

I had a great time today.  The food was awesome, the nap was great, most of it was just fantabulous.  But let me just say I had my fill with family today.  Well, to be fair to most of my family, I have had my fill of about 4 people today.  And that’s all I’m going to say about that.

Tomorrow is starting early.  Possibly as early as 5am.  Which, yeah, I usually don’t DO 5am but I’m really in the mood to DO Black Friday and there are some things I would really like to pick up at Best Buy and Staples.  And I’m still trying to talk Scott into going to get a prelit tree at Sears at 5am tomorrow because I really, really don’t want to string the lights on my current tree again tomorrow.   But I doubt that’s going to happen.  Heather is spending the night tonight and she sounded game for anything so we might just make it an event and do it the old-school way and run through three stores by 6:30am.