Haiti

I found this picture while browsing through photos of the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti. It broke my heart to see this poor father's face as he's carrying his child who was killed in the disaster. My heart aches for the survivors and all that they are going through right now. A lot of people lost loved ones and all that they have in this world, and I am so grateful for all the people who are doing what they can to help. I was reading an article about all the celebrities that are donating and trying to raise money for the relief effort and a lot of the people that commented on it were saying that there are a lot of people suffering here in America too, and that they are going to help them before they would be sending money over there. I don't think people realize that even before this earthquake, the people over there had nothing. And now they have less than that. The only way they can survive and move on is with our help. Even the most poverty stricken family here in America has more than most of the people over there, simply because they live here. We are so blessed to live in this country, we have much to be thankful for, and I hope we can remember that when life gets hard. I was thinking about the big earthquake that is going to hit someday here, and realized that even if it is of a larger magnitude, we still wouldn't suffer the devastation that they are experiencing in Haiti. I am not doing this post to make people depressed, I just wanted to express the thoughts that have been going through my head since last week and I finally got a moment to do it. So, hug your families a little tighter, there are many people in Haiti that lost theirs last week.

Christmas 2009

After we got the tree up. It is so small in our house with the high ceilings

We went to the lights at Layton Park. Taylor loved it, Celeste was a little cold.

Christmas morning. They were both in a relatively good mood. It was nice.

Justin's present from my mom and dad, they spoiled us.

We had a lot of fun this Christmas with our two kids. Taylor really enjoyed opening his toys and I think he will actually remember Christmas when it comes around again. He was still scared of Santa, I have high hopes for when he's 4. Celeste was okay with him, but she didn't really know what was going on. We spent Christmas Eve with Justin's family. Justin's mom does a great job with a beautiful program every year that helps us to think of the true meaning of Christmas. Christmas morning, we actually slept in until 7:30, which was pretty nice. Both kids were actually happy to be opening presents. After that, we headed over to Justin's mom's again for a little while before going down to my parent's for the remainder of the day. The kids got some great stuff from everyone and so did Justin and I, actually. It really was a nice Christmas and of course it all went too fast, as it will next Christmas. It always does.