The Best Hardy Party Ever!!

It is the Christmas season and with it comes many parties with family and friends. Last Sunday we had the "Hardy Party". We look forward to it every year. My grandchildren love to get together with their great uncles and aunts and cousins. It is an evening filled with food, laughter, discussion and fun.

This year as every year the relatives brought Christmas gifts for the kids. Uncle Martin handed out the gifts from he and Aunt Dot. It was a tin shaped like a Christmas cookie with a card attached. Everett opened the cookie tin to find a Christmas cookie with M & Ms in it. His eyes got very big and he said, "A Christmas cookie, thank you so much!". While he was exclaiming such thanks for the Christmas cookie, the other kids had opened their card first to find a $35.00 gift card to Target. Everett had to be instructed to open the card where he found the same thing.

Then Aunt Peggy handed out the gift from she and Uncle Dave. The boys were very excited to receive a swiss army knife each. Once again leave it to Everett to exclaim, "Wow! a killing machine!". We were all laughing except for Addy who was busy looking in the little purse she had received to find small little gifts inside. She was opening each one to see that she was receiving make-up and lipsticks. She could hardly sit still. All of the sudden she jumped up, raised both arms and exclaimed, "This is the best Hardy Party ever!". This too brought much laughter from everyone.

I was thinking about the party later and thought, 'yes this was the best Hardy party ever!'. It was not because of the gifts or the company but it was because of the lesson I learned from Everett. When he was looking at one solitary Christmas cookie, he displayed a grateful heart. His eyes never said anything but 'thank you'. It seems my grandchildren are always challenging me. Do I have a grateful heart when all I receive is a cookie?

God makes His will clear concerning our heart in all situations. "give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." 1 Thessalonians 5:18 This was demonstrated at the Hardy Party. It is the memory I will treasure from this year's celebration with the Hardys and hopefully one I will learn from. Thank you Everett. Thank you God for evidence of your Spirit to be made known through a 9 year old.

The Tooth Fairy Forgets!

On Thursday of last week, Tristan, my 7 year old grandson, lost his front tooth. He was excited about it. I received a picture from his mom on my phone of his toothless smile. Another great event in the life of a child growing up.

Thursday was also the day of the Christmas tea. My daughter came during the evening, sat at my table and we enjoyed the night together. At the end of the evening, there is always the clean up. I am in charge so I am usually cleaning up for over an hour after the event has ended. This year my daughter stayed to help me. We were in my office at around 10:00 p.m. when her husband sent her a text very concerned because she hadn't let him know she was staying. The result was that she went home and then sat and explained to him how she got caught up in helping and forgot to call.

On Friday morning, Tristan came in to his mother and said, "the tooth fairy didn't bring me the money for my tooth." My daughter's response was, "Well you see it was like this. The tooth fairy was at a party last night and stayed too late. She came straight home and talked with her husband so she forgot." As Tristan was just looking at her she added, "My tooth fairy never forgot."

Tristan's response was priceless. He said, "That's because your tooth fairy was a christian!"

Don't you just love that! I do because there is a relationship in his mind with a christian and integrity and follow through. Isn't that the way we are to live our lives as followers of Christ? We need to follow through on things and mean what we say. Thank you Tristan for the reminder!!