Christmas Giveaway! - Winners!

Merry Christmas!!!

Our three winners of the Limited Edition Ethiopia Flag ornaments are:

Out of 17 Comments...

#16  "Cindy"

#11  "Dave And Katie"

#13 "Kaylen N."

Congratulations!  I'll be emailing you to get your mailing info shortly.

Christmas Giveaway!

Merry Christmas!

Our Christmas season officially kicked off this last Saturday.  Our church does a ladies Christmas Luncheon every year where we have a wonderful time of fellowship, food, music and of course a timely message.  I usually lead the worship/caroling and this year, for the first time, my oldest daughter joined me singing harmonies.  She did her mama proud!

Photo Credit: Erin W. (thank you Seester!)

This year's theme was Prince of Peace:

For unto us a Child is born,

Unto us a Son is given;

And the government will be upon His shoulder.

And His name will be called

Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God,

Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Of the increase of His government and peace

There will be no end,

Upon the throne of David and over His kindgom,

To order it and establish it with judgement and justice

From that time forward, even forever.

The Lord of hosts will perform this.

Isaiah 9:6-7  

Oh, how I LOVE this promise!  Fulfilling scriptural prophecy, the Son arrived some 2,000 years ago, walked this earth without sin, was crucified for my sins and yours, laid in the tomb for three days, was resurrected to life and ascended into heaven with the promise to return for His beloved Bride.

"The Lord of hosts will perform this."  

I trust He will!  I anxiously peacefully await that day when He returns and we are gathered together with Him in the air! (Rapture practice anyone? Throw your hands in the air and jump as high as you can!)

"And if I go and prepare a place for you,

I will come again and receive you to Myself;

that where I am, there you may be also."

John 14:3

The Giveaway

The last post I shared my most treasured Christmas memories from childhood - my beloved Santa.  Now that I'm all grown up and walking with Jesus through this life, we're making new memories.  One of my favorite memories from recent years is two Christmases ago when we shared with our kids that we would be adopting.  You can see the video here on this post.

So, for today's giveaway, here's what ya need to do to win (at least one of the 4 of the following must be done to qualify):

1.)  Comment on this post telling me your most treasured Christmas memory.
2.)  Purchase one of the original ornaments from yesterday's post and leave a comment telling me which color/pattern you'd like and email me with your mailing address talesoftherogi at gmail dot com.
3.)  Sponsor a piece of our adoption puzzle at AdoptTogether.org/Talesoftherogi and leave a comment back here on this blog post for your entry to be counted.
4.)  Simply make a donation toward our adoption expenses at AdoptTogether.org/Talesoftherogi and leave a comment back here on this blog post for your entry to be counted.

*Be sure to comment for each thing you do so that all your entries are counted*

**All purchases, sponsorship, donations can be made at AdoptTogether.org/talesoftherogi using 

Paypal or a credit card ~~Thanks!**

Next Friday, December 14th, I will use a random number generator to choose 3 winners.  Winners will win one of 3 of these "Limited Edition" Ethiopia Christmas ornaments.

Christmas Memories, and a Sneak-Peek

Merry Christmas!

I do love this time of year.  One of my fondest memories of Christmastime as a kid, was Santa coming to my house on Christmas Eve.  My sister and I would sit on his lap and tell him our Christmas wishes.

Christmas Eve 1975

I'm not sure what my sister was wishing for here ;-)

He'd then let us reach into his big velvety red bag and pick out our first gift - usually an ornament that we'd hang on the tree right then - and give us each a giant candy cane.

Ole Santa would wish us a peaceful night's sleep and assure us he wouldn't come back until we were indeed asleep.  I happen to have that old Santa suit.  It belonged to my grandpa who passed away when I was in college.

Christmas 1975
Clockwise from left: Me (3), Grandpa Burgess, my cousin Laurie (3), and my sister Erin (18 mos)

I figured out that Santa was my grandpa when I was in second grade.  Late fall that year, my grandpa had a heart attack and ended up having triple bypass heart surgery.  Santa still came that year, but he was different. I KNEW Santa and this guy in my house was NOT him!  As I sat on his lap (very suspicious, mind you), I leaned back and saw the back of his neck.  I saw a hairline under the white hair and put some clues together.  Santa's stand-in was my DAD!  That year Grandpa wasn't well enough to do his Santa shtick, but we had a few more Christmas Eve's with the "real" Santa after he was well.

I sure do love my Santa!

All in the name of Christmas memories, Friday we'll be doing our very first giveaway.  Last year my sister and I made up a bunch of these ornaments for a fundraiser and this week I've already sold 4 just from a quick post on our adoption agency's yahoo group page.

Over on our Active Adoption Fundraisers page you can see all the possible colors and patterns.  I've been busy making these Christmas ornaments to continue fundraising for our adoption and decided to make an extra-special one for this giveaway.  Here's a hint at what it'll kinda look like:

So, be sure to come back Friday to see the ornaments and enter for your chance to win one of three
"limited edition" Ethiopia Christmas ornaments.

See you then!