The Burgess Family Blog

I'm not big on New Year's resolutions.  I have this thing about not committing to something unless I'm pretty positive that I can follow through on it.  And in that case, any time of year is a good time for working on something. But there is something special about the fresh start of a new year.  This week a co-worker led us in an office coffee cup clinking toast saying goodbye to the year because wow, it's been quite a year! I've been thinking about it, and I was actually more excited to say goodbye to 2014.  2015 has had some interesting twists and turns for sure, but I'm thankful for growth I've seen in myself and others, and the friendships that get strengthened through the good and bad. Luke and I are still getting on our feet after leaving SROM two years ago this past fall.  We have had our ups and downs in figuring out what's next for us, but 2015 was mostly "up"-- if not financially, at least relationally. Hopefully 2016 leads t...

 I've blogged more times in December than any other month in 2015! Wanted to share some Christmas photos with you.  There will be more-- this was only Christmas round 1.  We still have round 2 to go, when we visit with my mom and sister on New Years weekend! When we went to Luke's Granddad's funeral the week before Xmas, we were able to leave our younger two kids with my mom here, and then we left the older two kids with Luke's parents in Kansas!  Luke and I enjoyed about 36 hours kid-free and we consider this the best Xmas gift!  We finished  (okay, started and finished!) our Christmas shopping, saw the new Star Wars movie (it was great), and had dinner out at Dickie's BBQ (that was great too!). Then we got our younger two kids back and had a few days with just them, before Luke's parents came out for Christmas Eve and brought our older 2 kids back to us in time for the Christmas Eve church service.  Here are some photos:  silly k...

I'm getting more blog posts in this month.  A lot has been happening!  Journey by photos: Rosa gets to help me at work a lot.  I love my job!  Here she is helping me decorate one of the Xmas trees at the church.   This is our church sanctuary this year.  Isn't it nice!  All the available room is opened up for Xmas Eve!  After so much decorating at church, we still had to decorate our own house.  Here's Winter making some sort of list.  This is my child, for sure!  We make our own pizza while we decorate our tree.  The kids love this special "just us" tradition!  Get those decorations on there... Christmas cutie! Ta-da!  Pearl of course dressed up for the occasion ;) Time to eat the pizza and drink some bubbly juice More decorating and horsing around! Even the cat loves Christmastime!  We also had some kids' programs to attend this month.  Here's Je...

Tonight we worked on our Christmas cards.  It's a chore, but I never want to complain about sending out 50 or so cards at Christmas because when we were support-raising in ministry, we used to send nearly 200 letters every other month!  But also, it's a blessing to send Christmas cards because it's a blessing to have friends :) I also read THIS today  about friendship at Christmastime.  It's a good little article , I hope you'll read it and be encouraged.  And it reminds me of one of my favorite Christmas songs, which I'll share with you here: Merry Christmas! 

Things can change so much in a short time.  This photo is from only 3 years ago.  But much has changed.  I'm not just talking about how much kids grow in such a short time.  Granddad Joe is no longer with us.  And Grandma's Alzheimer's has changed her a lot since this photo was taken too.  It's somewhat surreal to look at this photo now and think how different things are this Christmas from Christmastime just three short years ago. My (Kit's) own grandparents passed away a while ago already; one set before I even knew Luke, and the other set a few years ago when the kids were very little.  I was not real close to them, relationally or geographically.  I knew soon upon meeting Luke's that his extended family would become mine in a way as well.  And now one is gone. We knew this time would come, but it's always hard to say goodbye.  Luke grew up playing on his grandparents' farm and being mentored by his Granddad.  These relati...