Christmas Card 2022
This picture was taken in what will become our forever home in Strawberry Park. In September, Jeremy and his dad, Scott (and often Jeremiah) strapped on their work belts, put on their Carhartts, and in their free time went to work framing our house. The goal was to get the floor on before the snow, but then they started framing walls and adding trusses and a roof and whoops, it’s now December and plumbers are coming next week.
Hi, have you met us? We’re the MacGrays.
You may have noticed Isabella is missing from the family Christmas card picture this year (I’ve added a recent photo below for your viewing pleasure) and that’s because in August she moved to Seattle to start her life as an adult. She text not too long ago to say that “like, it just like, hit me that I’m like, an adult. I have three jobs and like, I can’t even afford to like, buy my boyfriend a birthday present because of rent and food and it’s just like, crazy.”
NO, I’LL TELL YOU WHAT’S CRAZY, ISABELLA. YOUR USE OF THE WORD “LIKE,” THAT’S WHAT.
Isabella, hard core adulting.
Olivia went to her first middle school dance and sang in her school choir concert. You may be wondering how a girl who cannot speak sang in a choir concert. Well, I will tell you how. She walked on stage in her pink skirt and turtleneck alongside her aide, Mariah and smiled and pointed and almost cried and waved her arms and then a handful of times, stuck her neck up and proudly sang a note. It was the sweetest rendition of “For Good” from Wicked I’ve ever heard, I’m telling you what.
Jeremiah got baptized in May (big smile) after which he led us in communion with tortilla chips because Qdoba catered the after party. For his next adventure he has decided to join Civil Air Patrol which is a program I don’t fully understand. Something about being a junior Air Force person where maybe he’ll earn his pilots license but maybe not because they also teach about science and integrity and have to run a mile and keep their hair cut short. Is it half Boy Scouts half military training? I guess we will find out.
Ellie is in the fourth grade and if you ask her what she wants to be when she grows up she’ll say “a baker.” When you ask her what she wants to do as a baker she says “put food on a menu and run the restaurant” and so I told her it sounded like what she really wanted to be was a restauranteur. At this she smiled and said “well that’s good because my parents own restaurants they can give me!” Eleanor has not learned how to earn her own way yet.
I couldn’t fit my update on our actual Christmas card so this is *exclusive online content* (wink). My update is I learned about affliction this year, but this is a Christmas card and you are supposed to be upbeat so I will also add that, more powerfully, I learned about Christ’s peace in affliction this year. It’s been a hard year. It’s been the best year. It’s been a year of…
I’m just kidding. I was just seeing how many times I could use the word “year.”
When our home is finished we hope to have each of you over. Maybe by then we will train our French Bulldogs to not jump up and bark at people like crazies when they come over. It’s unlikely, but Christmas miracles do happen.