Bethlehem Revisited

So Saturday night we enjoyed our latest Christmas adventure. I guess every year the town of Waxahachie puts on what they call Bethlehem Revisited. I have never heard of it before but we decided to go this year and I am so glad we did - so worth the drive. They have set up this whole fake city enclosed in a city wall. Inside there are all these people in character, fully playing their roles. There are tax collectors, money changers, Roman soldiers, tons of different types of merchants, inn keepers, etc. Every half hour they have Mary and Joseph come through the city, with Mary riding the most adorable donkey. They talk withe inn keepers not just reading the Bible story but actually having conversations. They are eventually led to the stable where Jesus is born. They have 3 live camels that are really nice looking. Wise men accompanied by a group of people. Shepherds with sheep. All of them asking along the way how to find the Messiah. It was super impressive. We were there for at least an hour. It is free, too, though they accept donations. I so recommend going. They make flaxen and let you feel it, pick seeds out of cotton and let you feel that, have wool to feel and furs, herbs and oils to smell, scarves and turbans to try on, chickens for "sale", the tax collectors encourage you to pay your taxes and the soldiers praise Caesar. The only thing is that I would recommend eating before going to Waxahachie as restaurants are limited. But go, you won't be disappointed.

President Bush's New House?

Ryan loves to be part of current events. Or at least he loves to visit places where current events are happening. So when it came out where the Bush's are most likely moving in a few weeks he wanted to drive-by. After the temple we headed over - it is only about a mile from the Dallas Temple. It is just at the end of this little culdesac and it quite modest looking (although it is worth $2,000,000). Welcome to the neighborhood, W.!

The house next door where it is speculated the secret service will live.

Arlington Nativity Exhibit

Well, the next holiday adventure we had was this past Friday night. We took a date to the Arlington Stake Nativity Exhibit. It was quite interesting. They set up all the nativities in the classroooms and the theme for the year was angels, so each room had a scripture of a quote either from and angel or about an angel and then the room was decorated around that scripture. For example, there was the scripture where the angel tells Joseph to take Mary and Jesus into Egypt, so the room was decorated all Egyptian. Their displays were quite impressive and I always enjoy nativity exhibits. They had a choir singing in the chapel and if I were to guess I would say they were from perhaps a Southern Baptist Church. Anyway, it was well done and enjoyable.
After, we tried heading to Interlochen. We have never been before and the light display isn't really supposed to start until next weekend. But Ryan has heard horror stories about the crowds so we thought we would beat the rush and go early. Well, surprisingly only a handful of houses have their lights up already - but at least it wasn't crowded.

Trains

I am not sure who, but some amazing person put together this incredible list of all the holiday happenings in our area. I got this list the Sunday before Thanksgiving and the week after Thanksgiving I got out my calendar and marked all the dates of the things I wanted to do. Well we started out our holiday celebrating the Saturday after Thanksgiving by going to see the Trains at North Park with Ryan's parents and his sister. It only costs $5 for an adult and all the money goes to the Ronald McDonald House. It was totally worth it. Not only did they have tons of trains, many of which were BNSF (which we are obviously partial to), but the details of the surrounding landscapes and all the people around the trains were just amazing! I think probably our favorite was this school yard were the kids were playing and the swings moved and there were a bunch of kids playing tug-o-war and the rope moved back and forth, and there were just a ton of things going on and it was impressive. The whole thing was impressive. I think we probably spent an hour walking around looking at all the trains and such. They had San Francisco complete with Lombard street, Downtown Dallas, New York. It was just a lot of fun and I would recommend it!

Temple Workers

Ryan and I were set apart as Dallas Temple Workers at the end of September. Our first day as temple workers was the second Saturday in October (the first Saturday was conference) and so we have now been working there about two months. We work the Saturday mid-day shift (11:30-4:30) and although it basically takes up our entire Saturday we are really grateful for this experience. We have already done a little bit of everything and we have learned a ton. We are amazed at how much there is to learn. The temple is such an incredible place to spend your time and serve. This past Satruday was somewhat sad, though. We had to cancel at least two sessions and in at least three session there were only three patrons. We have enough temple workers to accomodate a large number of patrons but instead we are using our temple workers as patrons. We would love more people to come to the temple. I know it is hard if you have young children to get to the temple, and I obviously would not be available on Saturday's, but Wednesday mornings and pretty much any time Friday I would LOVE to watch children for anyone who wants to attend the temple! Even if you want to go on a Friday night date to the temple, I will watch your kids, let me know! I'm so grateful to be able to have this time in my life to serve in the temple!

Thanksgiving

When my oldest sister got married19.5 years ago a cycle was set up such that she switched off spending Christmas and Thanksgiving each year between our family and her in-laws (one with each family.) It was another 7 years before any of my other sisters got married, but when my next sister got married her husband's family didn't have a plan for holidays really established so they just went along with the same plan as my oldest sister, spending the same Christmas's and Thanksgiving's with us as she did. All 7 of us have kept the plan since then. None of the families we have married into had established plans already so there have never been any issues. Well, this year is an in-law Thanksgiving and my family's Christmas. So we were with Ryan's family for Thanksgiving in Grapevine.
Ryan and I started out the day with a run (I am not a runner and hate running, but we figured we needed to do something active if we were going to spend the day eating and sitting around.) After we'd gotten ourselves ready we loaded all the food I prepared the day before and headed to Grapevine. We had an enjoyable day. We ate (of course), played crouqet, went on a walk, watched some football, played some card games, looked through ads, and just spent time together. It was a good day and I was grateful for Ryan's great family and all their kindnesses to me.


Some of our pies: Top - apple pie made by Ryan's mom, center - pecan pie made by me (it was Ryan's aunt's recipe and it was amazing), bottom - pumpkin pie, from Central Market. I also made refrigerator cake (a family recipe created by my grandma - yum.)