What next???

Around 2 yesterday, we were just thinking about  starting to make our Christmas dinner. We had finished all the shopping and we feeling quite pleased with ourselves and had plans...yes, we had so many plans to make the evening so nice. All of our resident cooks had all the fixings to make their "special" dish. We were prepared!
Boom! My first thought was a small plane had crashed. We live under the path for Bush Intl.. Airport. We all ran outside to see blue flashes of light and then there was another loud BOOM and more flashes of  very blue lights.  My second thought was we were having an Alien Invasion! Needless to say, all electricity was out  by then. We had all the neighbors join us in the cul du sac in all sorts of strange garb. We looked like scruffians of some sort. The wind had come in from the North and we had all grabbed whatever we could to stay warm and check out the Alien ship landing or whatever it was.
We all felt like Professionals after surviving Hurricane Ike last year so we were all actually quite brave. Neighbors all get together in the Cul du sac when strange things happen. It usually seems to be at the young couple's house across the block however. This time it was also. A tree had fallen on the lines and taken out the transformers for our whole sub division- minus a house or two. We saw some lights but maybe it was just a generator powered Christmas tree.
Well, Plan B.
Mark and Mercy went out to scrounge around  FM1960 for firewood for sale so we could survive the night. The temperature was dropping even more and it was going to freeze. Then we rounded up our candles and had to think about Christmas dinner- hoping some place would still be open to buy  dinner. Mark went into a big discourse on Pine trees and how useless they are and how they should all be cut down within 4oo feet of any houses and power lines. HELP! After Carbon Dioxide being declared a toxic poison (pathogen) in the news the other day, we could almost hear the local trees gasping for breath. I might turn into an unofficial tree hugger just to comfort the local trees. It was all a Scrooge ski by Mark..
Anyway, after the excitement of a street full of fire trucks and strange looking men (definitely not aliens)  in colored and very weird  suits, we did have a fun evening. We had  Domino's pizza around the fire and played Taboo. Selena (8 yrs.) surprised us all with an answer we older and more educated (chuckle chuckle) all couldn't get. WHIZ kid that she is, she is also   homeschooled ( I wanted to mention).  Then everyone suddenly wanted Selena on their team.
Just as we finished having our party, opening up a few gifts, and enjoying eggnog, the lights finally came on. A roar went up around the neighborhood. Lights came on, just in time to turn them off and head to bed.
We didn't however. Missionaries that we are, we stuck a DVD into the player and took a visual trip to Ecuador and watched End of the Spear.......a beautiful movie with a powerful message about love and forgiveness at the end.
After all this, we had such a memorable evening,

Later,Mercy let us in on her  morning prayer. She had prayed for something special to happen so we would all be a lot closer for Christmas. Well, I guess I better keep her home today so she can't share that little tidbit of info with all of our neighbors. Ho ho ho.. Being world traveling missionaries, we have had so much experience in adapting. To us, we just refigure and still have fun. Isn't it a beautiful strength to be able to just see God's hand in everything? We may be poor in the eyes of the world.....but oh so rich in so many ways that really count! Merry Christmas!