"MOONBOOTS"

First of all I want to say THANK YOU to all of you that have commented on my first blogpost. I am enjoying this and love reading the many comments. My son, Russ, also wants to thank you. His hope is that each of his spoken word poems that he writes and performs can touch each and every person in some way. That people can take something from them and use it in their lives!

Many of us are having to put our snowboots on these days as winter weather spreads around the nation. This year just might bring a White Christmas to people who never ever wish for one. My wish every single Christmas is for a White Christmas. Last year we had lots of snow ahead of Christmas then had a few warmer days that melted all the snow by Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Then within a few days afterwards we had lots of snow back on the ground. It doesn't really matter after the fact, I love snow in the air and on the ground for Christmas! This year (cross my fingers) it looks like we're definitely going to have a White Christmas. We have had two snowstorms go through just this week. Not counting the inches of snow we have had prior to this week. In this part of Illinois, we have broke a record for the most snow in December. It is not supposed to warm up in the next few days and we have LOTS of snow on the ground, plus we are supposed to get more snow between now and Christmas. Snow on the ground with all the Christmas decorating makes the decorating glisten and gives everything a look of warmth and comfort.

I am attaching my webshots link of pictures of our home during this Christmas Season. Remember I'm new here and my son isn't home to help me figure out how to post a link on the side column for my Christmas pictures like many of you have. So here they are as a link within my post. Enjoy! Just a little background, this year we have had to adjust to a house that isn't as decorated as we are used to due to a flood in September and we lost most all of our decorations. We always knew that we had angels looking over us -- but in this case as we were able to move back in after being out for nearly a month, as we started to recover from the devastating losses, we found one corner of our crawlspace that had not flooded and the bins that were in that corner were some of my very favorite Christmas decorations and all of our Hallmark ornaments that we have collected over the past 30 years with lots of memories entwined. Finding those bins of memories not destroyed in anyway is why we Believe! Also, some very dear "friends" from the Country Sampler forum got together and sent me a prim tree and others sent some decorations for that tree and around our home. I have every single piece that was sent me from those dear "friends" scattered somewhere within our home spreading their love throughout our home this year. There have been many times in our lives when I have been convinced that we have Angels sitting on our shoulders and I am constantly reminded of that. This experience has just solidified those thoughts. Angels exist in our lives on a daily basis! My very favorite song is "Angels Among Us." I wonder why?

We were devastated when we were told by the restoration company that Ryan's village would have to go in the dumpster along with many other treasures. (Pictures of his village are included in our webshots albums.) But with help of some very dear friends, one evening we spent hours carrying up the water drenched boxes, piece by piece from the basement and then removing each and everyone of them from their boxes and disinfecting them and then we let them sit in our garage on tables to dryout for a few weeks. We were bound and determined we were going to give it our all not to loose these irreplaceable memories also. Then came the joyous occassion (at least we had hoped it would be joyous) to plug them in to see if they would come to life again. Each and everyone of them have lights and sounds and it wouldn't be the same without them working, low and behold everything works! All the lights light and the the carols are being sung! We did have to replace a few pieces, for example the town square tree -- that could not be saved. But after all we were able to re-enact our "Forever Christmas Eve" scene once again. We have been building our Christmas village scene for over 15 years for our severely disabled 25 year old son. We have collected the pieces for him over the years. He loves watching all the lights and listening to all the sounds! Beautiful sounds of Christmas!

http://community.webshots.com/user/primitivewishes

Now getting back to the "Moonboots" title of this post -- no I did not make a mistake and title it "Moonboots" instead of snowboots. At the bottom of this post is a video of another spoken word poem that that my son wrote and is performing. This is a light hearted one and I hope all of you enjoy it! Sorry, Deb, you've already seen this one!

Just remember to strap on your "Moonboots" today and each and everyday!

Country Girl Wishes to each and everyone of you!

With love, Bev