Harwell Holidays

We have officially entered into the holiday season! I've always had a rule for myself that I wouldn't start playing Christmas music until the day after Thanksgiving, but I feel like I must confess publicly that I started way before this year! Harry Connick Jr. is my all time favorite Christmas crooner... and his records were absolutely begging me to play them about three weeks ago. So I gave in! And I think it's safe to say that they improved my quality of life and even gave lift to my ability to pull off my first ever Thanksgiving dinner!

Andrew and I were so blessed to host both of our parents and my sister for Thanksgiving this year. I am finding more and more that hosting is one of the top things that bring me joy.


This is the whole crew at dinner minus Mom who was taking the picture


Me and my sister, Allie posing with the set-up


Me giving Dad the picture of their new house I painted for him for his birthday


On Friday, the gals entered into the mayhem of Christmas shoppers in Montgomery. It was great to get most of my shopping done... but I have forgotten how draining extensive shopping can be. Before I moved to Auburn, the girls in my family would always start at 7:00 in the morning and shop until midnight in Nashville! I have no idea how we did it... but I'm not sure I want to do that ever again.

The treat we got after our shopping trip this Friday was seeing my two favorite children: Madelyn and Brooks! I stole this picture from Leslie's blog because it's probably the best picture of them I've seen!


Other highlights of this past month (sorry we've been skimpy on the posts!) were traveling to Orlando for a regional staff conference with Crusade. The conference itself was wonderful and it was great to reconnect with other staff, especially those that I joined with. However, if anyone ever asked for a good way to torture me I might tell them to place me in a room where I get to see Disney World everyday but can never go. That's exactly what happened.... almost Dante's Inferno-esque. It was terrible to wake up and look at Epcot out my window and know that we couldn't afford to go nor had the time. So we decided to do some Disneying for free... went to Downtown Disney, Disney Boardwalk, some Disney hotels with Christmas decorations... and even got to ride the monorail late one night with Chris and Anne Marie. It was pretty cool that we got to sit in the very front, but it was also kind of anti-climatic riding around in one big circle and only seeing the castle from a distance, not to mention it smelt like beef and cheese as Buddy the Elf would put it. But it was still fun... and if any of you know me well, you know that Toy Story is the best of best of movies on my list and I got a picture with Buzz Lightyear, so I guess it was all worth it.


The last thing to mention is that... we bought a house!! We are so blessed! It's actually a pre-sale of a house in construction in a new neighborhood in Auburn. After months of frustration, we could tell the Lord's hand was on this place. It is perfect for us and perfect for our ministry. We will be able to move in late February! I will post pictures of the process. Thanks for all of your prayers and all of your love. Andrew and I are so thankful for our family and friends. We hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving celebrating the Lord's goodness in our lives!