Kids’ Christmas Musical 2024

This morning was our annual kids’ Christmas musical at church, which is always such a great time! I sang on the worship team first,and we sang a few Christmas carols and worship songs. Then the kids took over the rest of the service and did a great job on their play!

Emerson had her very first solo this year (the first year she did a duet, and the second year she led the preschool choir), and she did such a great job! The whole fam was tearing up of course, bursting with pride and love for our sweet, gentle girl, and her precious little voice!

 

 

Addison stayed in the service with us today to watch the play, and although she was a little chatty and very wiggly, she enjoyed watching it, and did pretty well. She needed to hold Daddy’s phone though and take a few pics herself, after watching us do it so much.

I absolutely loved all the little buildings in the set decor this year, bu this adorable little chapel with stained-glass windows and twinkle lights was my favorite!

My sister has been directing and leading the kids Christmas musical every year for 10 years now, and does an amazing job every single year. This year though, she started working on it merely weeks after giving birth to baby number four, working on motions and songs during her maternity leave, and leading a special missions project on the night of her birthday. Her co-director and friend Renae shared all of these details in her thank-you speech at the end of the program, and not only was she crying, but so was Megan, and our whole family. We’re so proud of her and everything she does for her family and for the kids ministry at church, and especially the children’s play every year!

 

We tried a little “add me” feature on our Google photos to take a family pic afterwards, but Emmie must have moved slightly between photos, and so it gave her an extra arm 🤣 Oh well, still cute 🙂

We went out for a big family lunch all together at 4-Rivers to celebrate the end of the play, and had delicious BBQ, and I had yummy baby snuggles too.

And then I even got him to sleep, and he was just the cuddliest, snuggly-est little squish.

Jeff too Addison home for her nap after lunch, and Emmie and I ran some errands. We treated ourselves to a special coffee drink for her special day in the musical. I asked them to make one of their December specials but without the coffee, so I basically got her a very expensive chocolate milk, but she was so proud of that drink, and she loved it.

Even though it was cloudy, it was still so bright, and we took about 15 selfies, facing multiple angles, trying to get a decent picture, but all we got are these very squinty eyes. We were joking and being silly looking through them in the car, saying, “Not an eyeball in sight in any of these!”

We picked up our Walmart grocery order, and she helped me put away all the cold stuff, but we just left all the other stuff out on the counter. And apparently, Sheppy helped put the rest of the puzzle together last night, after we all went to sleep!

I’m obsessed with this puzzle, and the little houses. Kind of like the little houses in the musical set today. (I’ve actually got a cute house-related project in the works, but I can’t share it yet…)

After dropping off the groceries, we had a 30-minute quiet rest time together, and since Jeff and Addie were still napping, Emmie and I went out to Beall’s outlet to do some Christmas shopping. She’s a good little shopping buddy, and her and I found some good stuff.

It was time to wake up Jeff and Addie once Emmie and I got back, and we got everyone re-dressed and ready to go back out again. My Mama and Grandmommie gave me this beautiful poinsettia this morning for Christmas. We didn’t want Pennie to eat it though (don’t want her to ruin it, plus, it’s poisonous for her), so we set it up on the front porch, and it looks beautiful there!

We drove across town to drop Emerson off at Hanger 38 for the end-of-choir celebration party, with Aunt May-May, Uncle Bo, and all her other little kids choir friends. They had pizza, played arcade games, and did some bowling, and we found some ways to kill time while she was there.

First, we went to Goodwill to look through the books, and hit the kids’ book jackpot. not only did we find great books, but the girl rang them up for a song. I think these should have been almost $15 total, but we get them for less than $4, when they rang up for just 59 cents each!! What a steal! Especially for that beautiful hard-cover Puffin illustrated version of “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.”

We went to a little Chinese take-out place for dinner, but they had tables inside, so we actually just stayed there to eat our dinner. We made a quick run through Target, where we sneakily bought a couple of Christmas gifts for Addie we found on clearance. We picked up Emerson at the end of the party, and headed on back home.

When we pulled into the driveway, Addie said she had put on her pajamas, and we opened the back door to find her wearing her jacket like this, with the sleeves on her legs and the hood pulled up over her head. I literally laughed so hard I was doubled over, and Jeff was guffawing next to me. She is the goofiest, silliest little girl!

I wanted to flip through this new book when we got home, and wanted to show Emmie, so I thought I’d show it off here too. It is in perfect, pristine, brand-new condition (well, it appears to be missing a dust-jacket, per my research, but oh well), which would normally cost $30 per the original bar code on the back. And even the $3.99 sticker would have been an awesome price. But you guys – 59 cents?! Incredible! I love thrifting.

And it looks so cute on the side of my bookshelf, propped on top of my other Puffin illustrated classics collection!

Bedtime went really quickly and easily with Emmie since she was so sleepy, but y’all know Addie “wasn’t tired” and needed lots of extra “work” to get her to sleep. Today was an extremely busy day, and I’m worn out! It’s 10pm now anyways, so it’s definitely time to just sit down and rest, because it’ll be another busy week this week too…