A Very Different Kind of Christmas..

Christmas at Boys and Girls Country is grand! 

The first event we had this year was Tour of Lights where all the cottages decorated for X-Mas according to a theme we each picked, We were then judged by guests who come to visit and see the lights and decorations. Since this is the last Christmas that all of our original cottages built in the seventies will still be standing as our new cottage rebuild has begun, we decided to throw it back to the decade of BGC's beginnings for our cottage theme. We used some of Mimi's vintage ornaments and had a good time dressing up in this retro theme. 

The next day the High Rollers came to BGC! And what fun it was!! 

The High Rollers are a group of motorcycle enthusiasts who collect toys all year to bring to the kids. They roll in all at once as the kids line the fences waiting for them. This year over 400 bikers rode in and it was too much fun to watch them! "Santa" even rode in on a Harley to deliver toys! 

Brianna won the High Rollers t-shirt design contest!! 

We had fun decorating inside the cottage for the season as well. 

The stocking were hung by the chimney with care...

Since we root for both the UGA and WHS bulldogs we thought it was fitting to have a red
and white Bulldog tree!! 

Our pretty little entry table all dressed up for the season. 

Our family tree with ornaments that are special to us all. 

Our Christ is peace at Christmas tree. 

Our Girlie Girl tree complete with Campbell's fave decoration, a light up pig!

We had a great time with all these parties and decorating this year. The first two weeks of December were crammed full of merriment so much so that when the girls, most of them at least, left on the 18th for their holiday off campus visits with family I had to remind myself that Christmas wasn't yet over. In fact, it was still almost a week away. 

I titled this blog, A Very Different Kind of Christmas, and it was for our family indeed.  Through various circumstances the members of my immediate family have all found ourselves going in very different directions this season. Coday and Laura were not financially able to come home for the holidays, Minda and Ellis were with the Purdie family this year and Cliff and I went home to Nola to see his family that we had not seen in close to a year. But this left Mom and Dad in Orange, child-less on Christmas Eve and Day. It was a kind of strange wonder to be without these loved ones I have delighted in being with for some thirty plus years of my life at this time of the year. 

But I think in some mysteriously wonderful way it was fitting, too. 

As I eluded to earlier not all of my girls went home for the holidays. All who stayed made the decision to do so themselves for various reasons I can scarcely imagine having to make at such a young age. Reasons like divorce, separation, abuse, addictions, and neglect have formed barriers in their precious hearts so deep, that this place, this campus, is now more of a home to them than any other place they could go home to, and so they chose to stay here to spend Christmas together. I am so thankful for our amazing single, Sarah, who was able to stay and be here with them in our absence. (Although, even though we were technically "off" I spent much of the time even away in Nola talking and counseling with the girls via text or email.) 

This Christmas was a reminder to me of what Christmas really is at its heart. Yes, there is, I believe, room for the decorations, the gifts and even for Santa, but at its core it is the story of hope found in the midst of all but hopeless circumstances. 

It is the new "family" that God has blessed my parents with in Orange who opened their homes up to them during this holiday; friends who have risen forth from the ashes like angels of mercy bringing with them healing and the recollection of true love and friendship on their humble wings. 

It is in the glint of Christmases past that I saw in ornaments hanging on the tree and the burst of sheer, joy and sadness interwoven so tightly, tugging at my heart strings that I laughed a bit with tears in my eyes at the thought those loved ones gone on.

It is in Campbell's timid hugs with family he has not seen for awhile, warming to true embraces of love and joy in his eyes at the sight of them. 

It is in the gift of a place like BGC that is a safe haven in the middle of the storm that can sometimes be family and in the love that bonds those willing to let it. 

It is in the gifts we received as a cottage 3 family from loved ones across the nation, who though they have never met our girls, love them all the same as an extension of us and the Father. 

Christmas is, after all, a certain nomadic couple literally writing the story with each step, finding solace in the comfort and kindness of strangers. It is the resting of weary bodies in the dirt and hay of a stable, and the groaning 'neath the weight of child birth in the moonlight. 

My mother wrote a beautiful text this weekend to us children that I now cherish on her recollections of this Christmas and ones in years past. In its final lines she recounts her daddy's words of wisdom to his children traveling home for the Holidays,

 "Christmas is when you get here," 

he always said, and so it was some 2000 years ago as well. 

Before that tiny cry pierced the darkness, it was just a night. 

 

But in that moment when the babe newly born was wrapped in Mary's loving arms, laid low in the manger, Christmas arrived. 

Home for the Holidays that first Christmas night

 meant the three of them there, the cattle nearby, and strangers bearing gifts.

Sounds familiar here on our little ranch, too. 

True Christmas arrives for different reasons in our hearts each year.

Sometimes as family comes home for the holidays, 

but  sometimes, special times,  it happens if you allow 

yourself to become home for others. 

I will leave you with more pics of our Christmas fun and as always prayer requests at the bottom.

Bug cheesing for a quick xmas photo op!

One of my fave new pics of Cliff and the girls with Santa. 

Campbell meeting Ellie the Elf  for the first time. 

Bug Kitty!

Neano reading to Bug.

Reading about Ellie with Daddy.

My greatest gifts this Christmas.  

Bug checking out daddy's hat at the Interlinc Xmas Party.

My little heart and his Christmas puppy. 

Its not the Polar Express but Bug sure enjoyed it! 

Cliff meets his new nephew, Ethan. 

Cliff and his little mini me niece, Gabby. 

Gabby and Bug bonding over a love for Peppa Pig and their iPads. 

Siblings or Cousins???

Leila and Thomas help me make Coday House Christmas Bars. 

Cliff and his mini me, Gabby. 

Daddy-O reading to Bug. 

Me literally contracting baby fever! 

HEAUX, HEAUX, HEAUX Barefoot Christmas in Nola! 

Bug Ninja Warrior resting in his new bouncy house. 

Bug in a box! 

The Harris/ Hurleston Cousins. Gabby almost 2, Campbell 31/2, Thomas 6, Leila 9 and Ethan 10 days.

Prayer Requests:

Pray for our girls who are still with family until after the new year. Pray for their safe return and for many happy moments with family while they are away.

Pray for the girls who are still here or who have returned that we will spend New Year's with in a few days. Pray for us to be a place of peace and comfort for them during this time away from family.

Pray for Cliff's family in Nola and VA and NM. 

Pray for my family in Orange and MS and CA. 

Pray for peace and healing in all our hearts.