Saturday was the annual Smith Family Christmas in Young Harris, Ga – the one Sunday every year when I get to visit with my Smith cousins.  Zollie and I met in Gaffney – not our original plan, but I had given him bad directions, so he missed the Earl exit.  And he got in my car and we headed to Lavonia to meet Sherri – after we were talking and drove right past the exit, and had to turn around.  Sher got in our car, and we only missed one turn on the way to Sharp Memorial United Methodist Church, so we got to drive right straight through Helen.  The day was wonderful.  I got this picture of as much of the group as I could while we were praying before we ate.

As always, we finished up the day making various family group pictures, and I loved the way this one of Aunt Nita with the members of her family that could be there turned out.  Such a special day.  And then we headed home, and ran into crazy snow until we got out of the mountains.  Then it was serious rain, sometimes mixed with snow, until we all got to our respective homes.  But we all arrived home safe and sound, and it was, as always,just such a special time to be together.

Adam was actually supposed to move into the new Language Immersion School in Rock Hill at the first of the year, but the building wasn’t finished.  The move is now due to happen over the Christmas holidays.  I had not seen the sign in front of the school until I was in Rock Hill this week.  It’s a beautiful facility, and is right behind Sullivan Middle, where Charlie goes.

This week when June and Mason were here they helped us decorate our Christmas tree.  I was trying to get a picture of that, but obviously pushed some serious zoom on my camera, and got this picture of June Bug instead :-).  I thought it was cute, anyway.

Tonight was Char’s band concert – the first one we’ve ever been to – and we thought they did such a great job.  Alas, we could not see one square inch of Charlie while he was on the stage playing, but I did get this picture of him as he was standing up to leave the stage when the 7th grade band had finished playing.

And this one of him after the concert was over. We were so proud!

Yesterday when we finished our staff Christmas lunch at church I ran out to McGill’s to cast my vote for Clara’s gingerbread house in the contest.  It is so cute – so were all the others but I definitely thought hers was the most creative!

Yesterday Clover hosted the day-long mid-season robotics competition, and I had promised Lindee long ago that I would help work the concession stand.  Here is Mallory getting a bottle of water to get her through the afternoon. 🙂

Mal and one of her good, good friends, Shayla, after they finished their final preliminary competition and were waiting for the alliance selections. Their team ended up being the grand champions of the entire event, winning the award of excellence. We were proud, for sure.

Yesterday was the big festival at our church.  I wasn’t able to be there, so Friday night on our way home from the craft show we stopped by to look at the tables that were decorated.  There were some that had not been set up yet, but the ones that were just were amazing.  That’s McKenzie, Liz, & Charlotte in the background looking at the tables.  I loved this angel themed one.

And this beautiful one by Linda Abernathy, who was in charge of the entire event, was so pretty. You could just look and look and keep seeing different things, which was true of all the tables. Beautiful.

Yesterday when I picked June and Mason after school, they helped me make the icing and frost a red velvet cake I’d made earlier in the day.  June loves baking, and she said that it was the first time she’d ever made homemade icing, so both were excited.  Here they are showing off their finished product, and feasting on the leftovers 🙂

We got a couple of group pictures after the concert Tuesday – this one of Mallory and her family:

And this one of all our crew, except for Jackson, who was taking the picture: