A Birthday, Minnie's First Snow and Four Years of Marriage!

You haven't heard from me in awhile. Please excuse my absence! It's been a busy few weeks! Here's just an overview of a few items of interest:

• Darin had his birthday last Thursday and we had a great celebration together! Among other things, I brought him breakfast in bed and gave him Season 3 of NBC's The Office on DVD. Needless to say, he was really happy about all of that.
  

Bobblehead Dwight joined Darin for breakfast:

• Here's another bit of late-breaking news: I'm going to a have my first "White Thanksgiving". This is rather strange for this Texas girl.
  

I must say that with the arrival of this snow, some concerns of mine have been relieved: ever since we got the puppy, I've been slightly apprehensive about how she would do in the snow. Mostly I wanted to be sure I wouldn't have problems getting her to do "her job" outside in the winter weather. Housebreaking is hard enough without throwing snow into the mix. And I am happy to say that Minnie has taken to the winter wonderland quite beautifully:

• And I can't part without sharing my joy that tomorrow Darin and I celebrate our fourth wedding anniversary! And how fitting that it lands on Thanksgiving Day!

I hope you take joy in celebrating tomorrow and reflecting on the things that God has blessed you with in the past year!

Our Houseguests

Last night Darin and I had the opportunity to host three little boys (two from India and one from the Philippines) who are touring members of the Children of the World Choir. We had a lot of fun together even though they weren't with us for long!

Our church had hoped to have them sing in our misison conference this spring but it didn't fit in their schedule. They were, however, passing through last night and needed a host homes so on Tuesday afternoon our church pulled together a few families to take them. Darin and I were privileged to be one of them!

Darin just loaded them all up in his truck to take them back to their tour bus, so I decided to spend a few minutes looking up their website. I found their program and ministry to be quite interesting... you might too! You can learn about them here: Children of the World.

Here's a few pictures from our time together last night:

The "Big Hair" Ball

I think that one of the reasons Darin and I enjoy working with the high schoolers from our church so much is that they very well may be the only people who are willing to humor us by participating in our crazy party ideas! Our most recent hare-brained party scheme? Last night's Grace Student Ministry "Big Hair Ball".

Yup, the name of the game was to out "do" one another with crazy hair. I thought I'd share pictures of the creative hair ideas they came up with just in case you're feeling the need for a change in hairstyle and needed some inspiration... Enjoy!

Girls just wanna have fun:

You didn't think they boys were going to let the girls have all the fun did you?

Perhaps Darin and I could start our own salon...

Any ideas/suggestions for a theme for the next party at the Stevenson's are welcome! Your "two cents" worth is invited.