Friday, January 1, 2010

Happy New Year & Our Family Tradition

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Happy New Year 2010 from our home to yours!!

We hosted a fun, family friendly New Years celebration last night. We had 19 people (kids and adults) enjoying a taco bar, sledding, games, an ice cream sundae bar, tattoo stand and so much more! :) What fun!!

For today, we have a simple family New Years Day tradition. I'll bring out markers and paper, and then each family member draws two pictures. The first picture is a note reflecting on things for which we want to say "Thank You" to God. For example, here is my picture from 2002...
That year, I was thankful for John, my two boys (the girls weren't born yet), Harbor Clubs (a ministry at Church), the opportunity to serve in Africa, and growing as a disciple of Jesus.

Here's a fun example from my son Jake (shared with his permission). Jake is now 15, but here's his Thank You for 2002.... :)


Or here is Benj's from last year...


For our New Years Day tradition, after we share our "Thank You" page, we take a new piece of paper. On this paper, we write out/draw specific prayer requests for the coming year. For example, this is Benj's paper for 2009....

It is always so fun to see what the kids come up! It's also a blessing for me and John to put our requests on paper, and then watch how God works over the year! When I pulled out John's paper this year (I keep them all in a special New Years tub) ~ I gasped out loud. God answered every single item on his list (and they were big prayers!).

For my New Years Day prayers last year, I had written "opportunities to share Jesus with others". (I just love Him so ~ and want to tell everyone I can!) I had no idea at that time that God would open a door for me to lead a Bible Study of 80 women on Monday nights (and less than a month later, no less)!

God is so faithful, isn't He?! :)

I can't wait for our special tradition to get started today !! I've pulled out the paper and markers, but John just said first I can sneak off to the bookstore for a bit with my Bible, while the kids are still waking up after their late night. Woo Hoo!!

What about for you?? Do you have a special New Years tradition?? Share with us please!! I'd love to hear from you! :)

Happy New Year! May 2010 be a year filled with much joy, peace, health, and God's richest blessings!

5 comments:

jj said...

Hi Cinday,

I did your Snow Day Shuffle two weeks ago when we got a foot of snow. Now I'm going to do this tradition of yours today. It's January 2, but I think we can still begin a New Year's tradition.

Thanks for sharing.

JJ

Michelle said...

What a great tradition. My husband and I usually discuss our vacation plans and things we would like to do to the house within that year.

Wylie @ Shout A Joyful Noise! said...

Wow! Yes, He IS FAITHFUL!!! PTL!!!
Wylie

Anonymous said...

Happy New Year to you and your family! What a wonderful new year's tradition, too. Sounds like a fun party!

Jessie said...

What a fun tradition! During the holiday's I often cover the whole table in parchment paper (the big roll) and let everyone go to town. If something brillian develops I cut it out and glue it in a journal belonging to each of my kids.

I love the specific nature of yours though. I can incoporate that too!


Love it!

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