Christmas Story

I wrote this last year for Christmas. I read over it, and while I might do it a little differently now, I decided to keep it...for now. Maybe I'll start revising it a little every year or something, to see how my writing style and perspective changes...dang...that's a good idea...why do I always have those late at night...

"So, There Was This Teenage Girl" by Kendra Logan, December 2009

So, there was this teenage girl.

She was a good Christian. She was kind and gentle and loved God (she was probably really fun, too, because all real Christians are! XD). She was also a virgin, and her name was Mary.

(Fun Fact #1: "virgin" in the Greek can sometimes just mean "young girl", but in this case, it means, you know, an actual virgin ;D)

Mary was engaged to this great guy named Joseph, who was also a good Christian. He was pretty awesome actually. Really fun, caring, Christian, even brave. They were pretty excited about getting married.

But then God just had to throw a curve ball.

One night, an angel suddenly appears to Mary. *freak out* And the angel said, "Do not be afraid" first.

(Fun Fact #2: We don't know much about angels, but we know one thing for darn sure: they are scary. Every time someone sees an angel, they're panicking so much the angel has to calm them down. Haha, I can see the angels getting impatient now, "*rolls eyes* GOOD GRIEF, WOULD YOU GET A HOLD OF YOURSELF? Oh, I mean DO NOT BE AFRAID.")

So, back to Mary and the angel. The angel says, "God is so proud of you! You're doing great!"

...

...thanks...

Guess what? You are pregnant."

*blink*

O.O

Imagine how Mary must have felt. I know I would have been absolutely panicking. I mean, I wouldn't have doubted it or anything--if an Angel of the Lord says you're pregnant, you're pregnant--but I would have been really scared. And I wonder if Mary was afraid she had done something wrong, you know? I mean, I would have been like, "OH MY GOSH, is there something I've...er...missed..."

The angel went on.

"You are to name the child Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end."

>insert awkward silence<>insert awkward, ANNOYED silence<

Joseph: "Okay...well, you see, my wife is pregnant, and the baby is expected any day now. Isn't there anything you can do?"

The innkeeper directs Mary and Joseph to the stable.

I'm not even gonna go into what Mary must have been thinking at this point. But anyway, Mary and Joseph head on over to the stable and try to get as comfortable as they can.

(Fun fact #4: most of you probably already know this, but back in the day, stables weren't little barns like we have now. They were usually caves!)

So, Mary goes into labor, and now we will graciously switch over to what is happening with the shepherds.

Now, let's get something straight about shepherds. They weren't really considered important. They were kind of like today's garbage men. You need 'em, you'd miss 'em if they were gone, but it's not exactly what every kids dreams of becoming or anything. For the shepherds to be the first ones God had told (aside from the baby's parents) was definitely ironic to say the least.

That's another thing I love about God: he's got a great sense of humor.

And here comes the part we all know. Say it with me now ;)

"And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, 'Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.'"

Then tons more angels joined them and sang praises to God!

So, with that, the shepherds decided to go and see what the angels had been talking about. And they went into Bethlehem and found the stable, and WHOA! There *is* a little baby here, just like the angels said! (Shocker, right? ;D)

I can only imagine what Mary was thinking now. I'm sure she was overjoyed with Jesus, and I really don't think she minded having random shepherd guys show up at her "doorstep". I do think she might have been a little frightened, though. I mean, having your first child is supposed to be MONUMENTAL already, so imagine the huge burden it would be to have the SON OF GOD. The random shepherds showing up was probably a whole 'nother level of eye-opening to Mary. She was holding the Son of God in her arms, only a few hours old, and already he was drawing people to himself.

It’s a beautiful story, is it not? It has everything a good story should: love, adventure, realism, excitement, irony, and even a little baby. But not just any little baby.

The baby that grew up and saved my life.

But that's another story ;)

~Kendra

Christmas Dollhouse 2010!

Maybe you remember from last year, the Logan tradition of Christmas Dollhouse? Well, here are pictures from this year :D

{.captions on the bottom.}

I have a lot of people...

Lizzy's house in progress...

Momma's house in progress...

My house in progress...

Lizzy's finished house...

Momma's living room...

My finished house...

My parents' room..

My little girl's room...

My living room...

My kitchen...

The Parade! :D

We made muffins. And then pretended they were dollhouse cakes :D

Cake on my kitchen table...hehe :D

My parents enjoying their cake...

My family on Christmas Day!

~Kendra

13 Things and a Semi-Guest writer

I hate thinking up names for those blog posts, don't you? Gah. Anyway, my writing style will be hugely different from the awesome female writer you're used to reading from. I'm Kendra's friend from Utah that you may have heard of multiple times, named Jordan. Kendra's currently SWAMPED with Homework, so asked me to make a blog post. The post may be somewhat below your standards for the blog though, so just bear with me. :D

Also: I was in a rather odd mood when I wrote this. You'll see. Keep reading.

13 THINGS

1Rudolph the Red-nosed reindeer. Aside from him having a biological lightbulb built into his nasal passages, he's (obviously) a reindeer, so gets to pull Santa's sleigh. YAY!

Dasher: His name sounds like a razor product built specifically for the holidays. "Buy the new Gilette Dasher for just $12.99 at your nearest Walmart and get the shave your wife can appreciate on Christmas Eve! Only at Walmart!"

Prancer: There's a ballerina reindeer, apparently. Prancer, his name reminds me of a sword for some reason. o_O

Dancer: I do ballroom dance, and I know Kendra does hip-hop, so we can both kinda relate to this Reindeer's name. Maybe he does latin or standard while he's flying? *shrugs* Something to think about.

5 Vixen: Okay, seriously, anyone getting twilight vibes here? Vixen makes me think of vampires. Also, vice is the opposite of virtue, so makes for an interesting name of a pet of a beloved fat jolly guy that sneaks into your house and eats your food.

Donald: Aha! So apparently the duck has a second job to sneak into the north pole and dress up as a reindeer every so often. Apparently he does quite the job, since Walt Disney never noticed him sneaking off of the pages and walking away.

Cupid: Honestly there are just too many lame jokes I could make about Cupid. Why name a Reindeer after one though? I mean, really, he already has his own holiday. Going after the inspiration of Donald, he apparently slips away and metamorphs into some sort of fairy tale 4 year old with a bow that makes people fall in love.

At this point, I googled the song lyrics and realized there isn't one named Donald. *facepalm*

Comet: Best name here, in my opinion. If I were Santa, I would've named the reindeer after the places where he gets more cookies.

#OTHER REINDEER NAMES

Being a frequent user of twitter, pardon me if I let some hashtags sneak into the post. >_>

Snowball: Wouldn't that be a fitting name? He could have a huge annual snowball fight with the penguins when the visit whichever pole they inhabit. I mean, the scientists can use the company and maybe some more fun.

10 Jolly: If you can have one named Prancer and another named Dancer, why not a mindset? Jolly should go around as a backup and make positive on all the most nefarious situations.

Food: Santa's favorite snarky little Reindeer, he usually hangs out with his cousin, Jerald McGreggor and cooks things like hot chocolate in the kitchen with dear old Mrs. Claus.

Timothy: That dear little boy in that classic tale actually walked all the way to Santa Claus's summer house in the Bahamas after a hobo burnt his crutch. Jerald McGreggor and dear Timothy are planning revenge on said hobo.

13 Jerald McGreggor, Food's cousin, often times is the most left out of the backup-reindeer team. After Rudolph joined the team, Santa said he didn't want to put another spot on ther already over-crowded sleigh. Jerald stayed back in the kitchen and poured the hot cocoa when Food told him so and spent the rest of the time concocting odd plans with Timothy to get back at that hobo.

Yeah, it was random, it was odd, but hopefully I made someone laugh. Enjoy Christmas and remember the story of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, being born in a manger. Spread the holiday cheer and remember Kendra's swamped position and maybe send her some chocolate. :D

-Jordan, Kendra's odd friend from Utah.

Christmas Movies

Hello again! Tomorrow Cassidy and I see "Voyage of the Dawn Treader!" If you've already seen it, don't spoil anything :P

17 Christmas Movies*
1. White Christmas
2. Miracle on 34th Street
3. It's a Wonderful Life
4. Home Alone
5. The Santa Clause
6. Elf
7. A Christmas Story
8. A Christmas Carol
9. I'll Be Home For Christmas
10. Jack Frost
11. Jingle All the Way
12. The Nightmare Before Christmas
13. The Polar Express
14. Unaccompanied Minors
15. Beauty and the Beast: Enchanted Christmas
16. Christmas With the Kranks
17. Deck the Halls

*Note: Just because we listed these, doesn't mean we think they're great XD

~Kendra

Jingle Bells

Cassidy is here :D She's spending two nights with me and we're gonna go see the third Narnia movie, "Voyage of the Dawn Treader." :D We're excited. And she's going to help me think of 18 Somethings to do for the Christmas Countdown.

...right, Cass? XD

...15 minutes later...

"Daddy? Can you help us think of 18 Christmas things to do for my blog?"

"Songs."

"...thank you."

Christmas Songs (our favorites are in green):
1. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
2. What Child Is This?
3. Joy to the World
4. Angels We Have Heard on High
5. O Come O Come Emmanuel (Casting Crowns instrumental version)
6. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (courtesy of Lizzy)
7. We Three Kings
8. Carol of the Bells (this is actually a Celtic Woman version)
9. Winder Wonderland (Lizzy again) (Cassidy: "Wonderland is one word." Me: "..right.")
10. O Holy Night
11. Holy Emmanuel (can't find a Youtube video for it :-/)
12. Bethlehem Town
13. In the Bleak Midwinter (-_- can't find this one either)
14. In Like a Lion (Always Winter Never Christmas)
15. Do You Here What I Here?
16. Jesus Light of the World
17. Jingle Bells
18. We Wish You a Merry Christmas

:D There you go.

~Kendra

19 Days...

You're driving down the road. It's dark and cold outside, the trees are bare and you can feel the chill through the windows. Headlights. Streetlights. Shadows. Charcoal clouds. Uphill. Downhill. Around the corner--

Bam. Christmas lights.

1. The tasteful...
2.
3. The not-so-much...
4.
5. Your next door neighbors...

6. 7. The traditional...

8. The abstract...

9. The townhouses...
10.
11. The monuments...
12.
13. The fresh...

14. The tacky...

15. The themed...

16.
17. The unique...

18. The bright...19. The Kendra's Room XD
~Kendra

Vrolijk Kerstfeest!

*wince*

Sorry. You know why. And if you don't, NEVER MIND! I DID NOTHING WRONG. >.> :D

*clears throat*

The Christmas Countdown will begin after these short messages.

Pictures From Disney:

Minnie!

Pooh and Piglet, in case you didn't know ;)

The Osborn Family Light Show or something. It was pretty amazing. The whole Disney street's worth of buildings were like this.

Splash Mountain...got a little more soaked than planned!

Peter Pan! Not the best picture, sorry. It's hard to take pictures when you're so into watching everything! (Lizzy took most of these, btw, and my dad took some. I didn't take ANY XD)

Aladdin and Jasmine!!!!!!!!!! Pictures cannot even capture this.

Cinderella's Castle (Daddy: "Why is it called Cinderella's castle? Isn't it the Prince's?" Me: "...the Prince doesn't do the decorating.")

Cinderella's Castle at night!

Lizzy finally got her picture with Chip and Dale, her favorite :)

Me and Belle--finally! She looks pretty much like Belle in this picture, but overall, she was actually the least accurate in appearance and personality. I was disappointed XD

Waiting in line for the African Safari! This is the only picture from Animal Kingdom that's uploaded so far, but Lizzy has more to come, so maybe I'll post some more later.

The pool at our resort.

Unnecessary Conclusion Clarification: Disney was amazing.
~~~~~~~~~~~
The Christmas Countdown begins NOW!

Guess what, folks? ONLY 20 DAYS TIL CHRISTMAS! Dude, how'd it come on that fast??? It honestly feels like six months ago I was doing this Countdown thing. The next 20 days are sure to go by all too fast. We all know the solution to that, though, right?

Carpe diem, of course.

How to Say "Merry Christmas" in 20 Different Languages!

1. Italian: Buon Natale!
2. Mandarin (Chinese): Kung His Hsin Nien Bing Chu Shen Tan!
3. Croatian: Sretan Bozic!
4. Farsi (the Persian language): Cristmas-e-shoma mobarak bashad!
5. Dutch: Vrolijk Kerstfeest!
6. Filipino: Maligayang Pasko!
7. French: Joyeux Noël!
8. Elvish (not sure how there's an elvish word for "Christmas," but whatever XD): Isusarad 'elir!
9. Greek: Kala Christouyenna!
10. Faroese (spoken around Denmark): Gledhilig jol og eydnurikt nyggjar!
11. Portuguese: Feliz Natal!
12. German: Fröhliche Weihnachten!
13. Russian: Pozdravlyenie s Rozjdyestvom i s Novym Godom!
14. Maori (the Polynesian people of New Zealand: Meri Kirihimete!
15. Spanish: Feliz Navidad!
16. Iraqi: Idah Saidan Wa Sanah Jadidah!
17. Gaelic: Nollaig chridheil agus Bliadhna mhath ùr!
18. Irish: Nollaig Shona Dhuit!
19. Breton (a Celtic language spoken in Brittany): Nedeleg laouen na bloavezh mat!
20. Danish: Glædelig Jul!

~Kendra

Female Cows and New Pajamas

So. Today has been good and bad at the same time.

Bad:
- I slept horrible
- I've been cold all day
- I think I may really be getting sick :(

Good:
- Church was good (I loved all the songs we sang!)
- I got some great journaling done
- We had Christmas with Matt and Katie's family, WooT!

We went straight to their house after youth group (since all of us except Katie were already together). We got pizza :D Then presents.

Lizzy shops for Katie, I shop for Matt. It just works better that way :) Katie was thrilled with her presents (a soft blanket she'd been wanting and this awesome Bath & Body Works peppermint soap).

Matt was actually really glad about his kite and reaction ball, too! :O I was really glad and kinda relieved. I don't know if you remembered, but he showed me this car he wanted me to get him for Christmas, but when I went to get it, it turned out to be a slot car -.- So, I ended up having to get him a kite. He actually *loved* it!! He said he'd been *wanting* a kite, and Matt's not one to make up crud like that.

I got REALLY AWESOME, REALLY FUZZY PAJAMAS!!! YAY!!! I love y'all!!!

So, because I didn't really feel like much, I mostly sat and watched Matt play Modern Warfare 2. I usually like to watch that kind of stuff. Today, I was too fuzzy to really take it all in, so I just made do with pestering Matt with irritating questions:

"What makes that gun an uzi?"

"You do realize that a 'heifer' is actually a female cow, right?"

"How do you tell who's on your team?"

"Can you shoot holes in that water tower?"

His answers:

1. "It's the kind of gunnnnnnnn, Kendra."

Me: "I KNOW THAT. What MAKES IT AN UZI??"

Him: "It shoots faster than the other ones. But there are actually guns that look just like it that shoot faster."

...WHAT THE HECK.

2. *laughs* "No, I didn't know that..."

3. "There are big green letters above them. Jeez."

4. *ignored me*

So that was my day. Mostly good, kinda cruddy because I feel sick, though :( But, not bad. Also, the fact that school starts back tomorrow kinda puts a damper on things.

Oh well.

Tomorrow, look for "Things About Playing Video Games With Guys".

~Kendra

Boxing Day

It's the day after Christmas, AKA "Boxing Day (Canada)" as my calender so aptly puts it ;) I know this day is supposed to be a huge let down, and it usually is for me, but this year it's not. After three years in a row of cruddy Christmases that I ruined by trying too hard, this Christmas was basically perfect. I didn't regret anything, and nothing could have made it better. Everything was, well, perfect. I'm really glad I've been blogging throughout the season so I can commemorate it.

Today we went to my aunt's house, and did presents and Christmas with them. My aunt made lasagna, and, as some of you know, I don't like lasagna. It's not a taste thing, it's a texture thing. I hate ground beef. I know that's weird. I can hear you saying, "But it's in spaghetti!" Yes, well, I don't eat spaghetti with meat in it, which, in case you were wondering, is one of the quickest ways to get yourself considered a vegetarian. (I am not.) And then you say, "Don't you eat meat on tacos?" The answer that is, well, yeah, but it's different because A: it's softer and not as disgustingly coarse and B: the sauciness helps.

But that's really not the point of this. The point is, I hate lasagna. But when we sat down at the table, I mentally crossed my arms and said, "Kendra, today is the day you like lasagna."

And I ate it. Two servings.

The texture was occasionally gag-o-licious, but the taste was really good. I can actually say that I think I'll eventually LIKE lasagna, and for now I can at least say I can eat it. So, today was pretty productive. Some weird stuff happened on the car ride back, but that's not for right now, LOL.

I know I've been promising pictures from my new camera, but we (okay, I) haven't gotten around to attempting to upload them yet. I think I might still have a few more snow pictures though, so there they are:

Lizzy and Katie making snow angels :)
KatieMe :DAt the Open House. Left to right: Daniel (the guy who always brings out the worst in me), Caleb (a kid from church), and me.Playing LotR Risk. THAT was fun.And, that's my post for the day. I hope you're continuing to have a happy Christmas season! The Christmas blog header and background are coming down the 31st, so if anyone wants to suggest backgrounds, go for it. No promises on taking the suggestions, though XD I can be picky.

MERRY DAY-AFTER-CHRISTMAS! ;)

~Kendra