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  Christmas Travels Part 1  
posted by sara

OK- I’m finally sitting down to talk about our great Christmas travels. At least the first leg...

 

Family Christmas Part 1:Flora

 

The Cancer

Don’t you appreciate things so much more when you almost don’t get them? We appreciated our Tolbert Family Christmas Day in Flora so much this year because for a minute there we thought we might miss it.

I haven’t mentioned this before, but the cancer Nathan’s mom had surgery for while we were in China has returned more aggressively. She started chemo the week before Christmas and her immune system is very low. Those of you who have walked beside someone going through chemo know the general pattern- Cathy will have chemo, then feel super yucky for a week, then feel tired for a week, then begin to feel normal for a week just in time for the next zapping. Aaron happened to get a really high fever a couple of days before Tolbert Family Christmas Day in Flora (teething induced? the mystery continues…) Our doctor was convinced it was a virus and highly recommended we postpone our travel plans both for Aaron’s sake and Cathy’s. We were bummed, but understood. I realized all kinds of things happen to throw kinks in peoples Christmas plans. Luckily Aaron continued to get better and the family made a mutual decision to resume our plans as scheduled.

 

Pioneer Christmas

Every year we have a Christmas theme and this was one of the best years yet! Our theme was Little House in the Big Woods. The family made butter, homemade ice cream, and had foods from the Little House on the Prairie cookbook. Some of the gifts were pioneer themed (beef jerky, homemade apple jelly, my Anne of Green Gables cookbook) and were wrapped in brown paper.

I’d like to acknowledge my sisters-in-law who helped out with kitchen stuff and baby stuff as duty called. It was tricky that Grandma wasn’t really supposed to be too close to the babies and Jenn and Sara jumped in and did what needed to be done.

Speaking of Grandma, I know she has been through so much the last month but any woman going though cancer treatments who can effectively do the “worm” to get a group of charades players to guess the word break dancer is in a category by herself.

Though our trip to Flora was short, the girls hopped in the car and managed a visit to the Mennonite grocery store and an Amish family business (no heat, no lights, no electricity in the store!) The women in Nathan’s family are very serious about their bargain hunting, budgeting, and couponing but my favorite part was seeing the horse and buggy we passed along the way.

1. stockings 2. the whole family 3. Aaron opening presents 4. Aaron hanging out in Jonah's new sleeping bag 5. Grandpa and Grandma prepare to read the Christmas story 6. Jonah shows off his new cape and Grandma shows off her beautiful new scarf

 
Jan 14, 2009
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Nathan Tolbert, Sara Tolbert. This page created by Nathan Tolbert