Blessed, I am

Christmas has come and gone. The tree is down and most of the decorations are packed

away. Now, if I could just get the girls to organize their bedrooms! We had a wonderful Christmas filled with family and love. We spent Christmas eve with William's family. Ashley, William's daughter, came too! It was nice. We enjoyed watching my little niece, Camdyn, open her presents. I finally made a successful prime rib dinner. Don't ask how I could mess it up. The kids all opened gifts and we had a wonderful time. My brother Robert came with his son Gavin to spend the night and enjoy Christmas morning with us. It is so much fun to have little kids around on Christmas. The kids and grown-ups all enjoyed the gifts. We had my family up on Christmas day. It was a ton of fun and my shoulders are still sore from playing our new Wii game. Yesterday, my brother Ken and his family arrived from Denver to visit for a few days. We all gathered at Sara's home and had a fun visit. We are going back down this evening. Tomorrow everyone is coming back to my home for dinner and the Bronco game. We have really had a wonderful Christmas. The girls are really starting to understand the real meaning. I am very proud of them. They are beginning to understand the world is so much bigger than them and they have an important role in being kind and giving. In our local newspaper was an article about an older, sick woman who was nearly being evicted from her hotel room and would have no where to stay after Christmas eve. Here is the link-

http://web.thedailycourier.com/eedition/index.html?py=2008&pm=12&pd=23&pb=0&pg=A6

The girls were looking over my shoulder and read the story. As they read about her ailments, and her autism was mentioned, they both got very upset. They are very protective of people with Austim. My nephew, Joshua, who is Camille's age, has autism and they get very upset when someone is unkind to him. The girls brought me the phone and asked if I would call the motel and see if anyone had helped her yet. I called and asked the question and when they heard me say, "no one has", they ran to get my purse. They asked if I would take them by the bank so they could get some money and pay for her to stay for a while. Camille said she was sure she had enough money to pay for a year. (not quite, but I didn't tell her that!) I looked at them and told them they needed to save for college. They were so sad. I then told them that I would pay for them. They were so excited. We quickly drove to the small and dirty little motel 6 where the woman made her home. Camille and Megan walked ahead of me. When we got to the front desk, Camille said we were here to pay for a week for the lady in the paper. It was a really sweet moment. The girls never thought about not doing something. I was grateful for that moment to be able to see my girls, not as fighting and sometimes impatient girls, but as kind and compassionate spirits. They were both very quiet on the drive home. As we pulled into our driveway, I looked at Camille who was very deep in thought. I asked her what she was thinking about. She just looked at our home and told me how grateful she was that she got to live in a warm home. When I asked them why they felt they needed to do something this time, for this woman, when we read so many sad stories, they replied that they were doing what Grandma Johnson would do if she had read the article. I am a lucky, lucky mom.