Walk Thru Bethlehem 2009

My first born with his first born. It was 10:45 on Thursday night. 900 people through the city.

The LaFollette's after working in the city with Brother Chuck. Chuck made a comment about Miami and Evan turned and gave him a dirty look and made a noise at him. We all laughed. Go Penn State. He's a Penn State boy.

Evan Joseph after playing Baby Jesus. Is he making an Elvis look? Hmmmm...

Kisses for Papa.

Both boys go straight for Dean's beard. Too funny.

The 3 wise men.

Kelly, Aaron and Evan playing "Mary, Joseph, and Baby Jesus" during Walk thru Bethlehem 2009"

Our kids having a major role in Bethlehem.

Mike and Rita Woodard as the Inn Keepers

The Brown Family, Kelly, Austin, Conner and Emma in the Jewish Home.

Don Walker the Elder for the city.

Jenn Owens and Ashley Gallops our fruit sellers

Nathan Gallops the guard at the fruit stand.

David Ross as the fish seller. "Stinky"

Scott Whitaker as our tax collector.

Aaron, Evan, Kelly's mama Vanda Borges and Me. Vanda had just gotten home from the United Arab Imerants. She's working over there teaching English as a second language for 2 years. She was helping some of the girls put their head dresses on properly so that they would stay. She knew how they do it over seas so it was fun for her to help out.

Aaron, Kelly, Evan and Grandma Vanda. Evan had fun looking at the animals.

Kelly and her mama. Vanda surprised them at their new home. Kelly didn't know she was coming home. How fun. Aaron opened their front door and there was a lady wrapped up in a Burke and there was a squeal from the living room and BIG tears. Kelly was so happy. Vanda got to be here for her baptism last weekend too. What a joy!

Our friendly, spitting camel. : ) Evan loved him.

Evan checking out the camel.

What a beautiful baby boy. His Granny loves him so much.








We had an exhausting weekend but we couldn't be any happier. We put over 7180 people through the city in the four days. God held off the rain and we only had one night of cold weather. I can't tell you how smooth the nights went. We had to have had enough guides because there really wasn't any late nights. Dave Gallops did a great job running the city. Dean got to take Kevin Gentzler through the city with his pastor and youth pastor. They are debating on whether to do Bethlehem up where they are. Dean was thrilled to be able to guide them through the city and answer any questions they had. I was going to work all four days but I got a migraine on Sunday and it lasted the entire week. On Friday night when we got to Church I asked Dean to give me a shot. That shot just about sent me to the hospital. I got so sick I can't even begin to explain it. My whole body stiffened up. Scared me to death. Praising God for Eric Erickson. He was able to get someone to cover most of my shifts. Thanks just doesn't seem like enough. But by Sunday I was able to finally make it into the city to work and I got to do something new this year. I worked the metal booth. So I closed the city on Sunday and had a great time. God truly blessed Kings Avenue with a great group of workers. Everyone really went out of their way to make this a wonderful experience. I'm so excited we get to do this every year. What a great way to give back to the community.

I volunteered to make some soup for the workers at Bethlehem. So on Thursday I made my famous Potato, ham, corn chowder. I made 4 gallons of it. There were 5 different soups. Mine was the largest pot and the rest were in crock pots and regular soup pans. Well, at the end of the night mine was gone and literally there were two people trying to scrape out the rest of it and everyone else's crock pots were still half full. So Friday night I made another 4 gallon pan of my mushroom broccoli chowder. When I walked in with my pan people were following me saying that's the pan that had the potato soup so they know what was in there was going to be great. Jim Niblett put out all of the leftover soups and my huge pan and once again my soup was completely gone. Scraped clean. So I didn't work on Saturday due to my headache so when I came in on Sunday with a box with throw away pans people were following me wanting what I made. Well, when they found out they were desserts they were really disappointed until they tasted them and then they were asking for more of what I had brought. So I guess I'm still the reigning cook at Kings. : ) Or at least the soup queen and Scott Whitaker calls me the dessert queen. So.... I am smilin' and braggin' a little in this post.