CHRISTmas

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A New President

I read this article, and felt so strongly about it that I wanted to post it here for all to read.....

America Chooses Obama
By Roxanne Wieman

Well, here we are on the other side. A watershed moment. An historic election. And we, the American people, have made our choice.
Barack Obama will be the 44th President of the United States, and the nation’s first black president. And in elections across the country, Democrats won their seats in the Senate. When Obama takes office in January, he will do so with a Democratic majority in both houses of Congress.

“The American people have spoken, and spoken clearly,” McCain told his supporters in Arizona after the results came in.
But what about you?
Those of you who took our RELEVANT poll yesterday favored McCain: 47 percent of you voted for the Arizona Senator and 33 percent of you for Obama. So, are you disappointed? Will you hang your heads today? Do you fear for our nation’s future? I’m not so sure.
So many of us—members of the widely contested “young evangelical voters”—were divided about this election. Not just as a group, but even in our own hearts. I know which candidate I chose, but it wasn’t an easy decision. And, to be honest, I didn’t really care who won. I agreed with both. I disagreed with both.

What I’m wondering now is where do we go from here?
While the electoral vote and popular vote strongly favored Obama, our country is still largely divided. This was a hard-fought, personal and passionate race. There are wounds on both sides. Can Obama and the Democratic congress heal those wounds? Can we help?

Yes and yes.
Obama ran as a unifier. He condemned our party divisions and championed cooperation across party lines. Many of the Democrats who won seats in the Senate ran with similar platforms. If Obama and the Congress majority maintain that position and “reach across the aisle” in the years to come, that will certainly go a long way in healing our wounds and unifying our country. Karl Rove has already expressed his own wish that the Republicans would do the same, "I hope we will support [Obama] when we agree with him, persuade him when we think his mind is open, and oppose him when we think he is wrong.

"Whether unity happens in Washington or not, the question still returns to us: what can we do to help? As Francis Schaeffer so famously put it, “How shall we then live?” Now that the election is over and Obama and the Democrats have so clearly won, how shall we then live? I believe that we, the young Christian voters, can uniquely answer this question. I believe, in fact, that this is the very question we are so primed to answer. Because this election and its profound life issues has galvanized us to true action.
Yes, we voted. But it’s more than that. Through this election, we’ve become aware of the major social issues of our day. And now we want to do something about them. We recognize an election will not change everything. We do not rest our hopes for change on a political party or candidate. We vote, we hope, but we don’t stop there. Tomorrow and the next day and the next and in January when Obama takes office, we get up and we continue our sojourn to follow Jesus. We live our votes for life, for justice, for peace, for equality.

We comfort our friend who tells us she’s considering abortion. Then we gently tell her why we believe life in the womb is precious. We help her find alternative options … and we stick by her side all through the pregnancy and birth and after. She is not a statistic or a faceless evil to us.

We love beyond racial, gender and sexual lines. We reject stereotypes. We embrace individuals. We work for reconciliation.

We do not talk about “that side of town,” we live there and work there and mentor there. We are a part of educational reform, and ESL, and rehabilitation.

We recycle. We reduce our imprint. We consciously make our purchases, recognizing the global implications. We strive to “live simply that others may simply live” (Ghandi).

We personally pray for our soldiers in Iraq, for the citizens of Iraq, for our leaders who are making tough decisions that affect millions of lives. We really do pray, and we believe our prayers matter.

We continue to work hard in the jobs God has given us, saving our money and stewarding our resources. We tithe. We donate. We volunteer.

We continually challenge each other to deepen our understanding of whole life ethics and Jesus’ call to follow Him.

I believe this is who we are. I believe this is who you are. I believe we can be the change we’ve voted for—no matter who we voted for.

3 boys....

Jack-5 years old. Collin-2 1/2 years old, Tristan-2 weeks old

Introducing.....

Tristan John Saeger was born 2 weeks early on Tuesday, September 23rd at 7:42am, weighing 8.0 lbs., and measuring 20 inches. What a perfect addition to our family :)

Big brothers Jack and Collin meet their new brother.

And finally at home, sleeping in the cradle....

Backyard bubble fun

31 weeks.

First pair of googles

Bring on the summer fun and the splish-splashin' :)

My favorite lil' Americans

4th of July before eating a pancake breakfast at the fire station :)

Opening Valentine's from each other...

Happy Valentine's Day 2008!

Grateful

I am starting to create my next mini book. I'm entitling it: {grateful}
Some sections I'm planning on including, pictures or not:

faith
family
friends
my job
seasons
scrapbooking

I'm working with the KI Memories line "Grateful" which I love, because it incorporates seasonal trees all in color.

Completed Advent calendar layout

I'm so glad I recorded our list of advent calendar activites this year..... perfect and easy to scrapbook them afterwards.
The list of our activites are listed on the far right page, with a December stamp for some interest:

Christmas Advent Calendar layout

Made my layout title last night using chipboard letter, some clear nativity stamps and sparkle modge podge. Using red, lime green and a tad bit of light blue for my layout's colors. To answer some of your questions, I won't be scrapbooking all the Christmas pictures. Just the advent calendar pictures with a list on the layout of each day's Christmas related activity or treat.

Fun at the Park.

Enjoying seeing things differently, thanks to the photo-a-day challenge.

Sometimes.....

.....joyful pictures need no explaining. And that's what 's so great about scrapbooking.....because you can journal as much or as little as you want, and pictures like these I may just scrapbook with no journaling at all. Because a child's joy is perfect in itself :)My next layout I'll be working on is an advent calender layout...I have some cute pictures of the boys opening their advent calenders, and I wrote down each day's activities leading up to Christmas. I'm thinking non-traditional colors, or less traditional green and red hues for the layout.

Picture a Day for a Year

I'm going to be doing something new this year in addition to my scrapbook pages. I'm taking one picture day for a year, at which time I'll put them all together somehow. The daily pictures will be anything from my family, to something I find while out and about, to something artsy to something simple, inspiring, and/or beautiful. I think it'll be pretty cool at the end of the year to see our "everyday life" through a picture a day. Thoughts?

The Christmas 2007 Alphabet Albums

The 2007 Christmas albums turned out great this year! I printed a lot of pictures this year, so in addition to the photos in the albums, I put the other pictures together-adhered back to back-and attached them together with a binder ring after using my crop-a-dile. I also rounded the corners of the pictures after they had been attached to each other to give it a more "finished" look.
The album cover was a silver embossed image...

I used kraft paper for the pages, and used the Autumn Leaves clear stamps for the letters, and a set from Stampin Up for the letter's definition...
I really liked how the black stamped images looked against the kraft paper. I'll definitely be using this combination again on another layout or project.





The albums are so fun to do--a great way to look back through time-even a year-of our family's lives. It's fun picking out the pictures, and seeing the sisters and moms receive them. I just hope they are continuing to enjoy receiving them as Christmas presents each year!

Happy 2008!

Happy 2008 !

Enjoying our New Year's Day with family and friends.