Happy Christmas!

While we are winding down our first Christmas Day in Australia, we wanted to take the opportunity to wish you and yours (especially those of you who are just now starting your Christmas Day) a Happy Christmas, as Australians like to say. We are having a wonderful Christmas season, full of new discoveries and traditions.

We have spent Christmas Day for the last decade with both sets of parents and other extended family, and knew we would miss them dearly. Fortunately, we have found the celebration of Christmas to be different enough here (in terms of climate and traditions) that we did much better than we could have hoped. We enjoyed a Christmas Eve BBQ at the church, a festive and informally celebratory Christmas Eve service, 2 Christmas morning services for Rick, a Christmas dinner gathering (which included yummy salads, fruits and hot and cold meats) with close friends, Christmas crackers (a cardboard tube wrapped with Christmas paper that pops when opened and contains little gifts), the wearing of Christmas crowns during dinner, Christmas pudding and a game of street cricket afterwards.

May God's richest blessings shine on you and yours,

Anne, Rick, Erin, Claire and Lachlan

Our gingerbread houses (Australian house with veranda on the left)

Joseph, Mary and Baby Jesus on Christmas Eve

All but one of us wearing our Christmas crowns

Our first game of street cricket!