Christmas Caroling at Shriners Hospital

My sister Tiffany...

This last Wednesday night we went Christmas Caroling at the Shriners Hospital in Sacramento with my family and their young men and women from their ward. It was a wonderful experience. It was great to get together as a family and do something of service during this Christmas season. However, what made it very personal was that my sister Tiffany has been a Shriners patient since she was an infant. As many of you know my twin sisters Tiffany and Nicole were adopted into our family when they were babies....officially at 2 years of age. It's a very long WONDERFUL story and if you would like to know the whole story let me know and I will tell you. But for sake of this not being a book of a post...my sisters were born to a biological mother who had little to no prenatal care and had abused many substances while pregnant. Needless to say we are very lucky to have these beautiful healthy girls in our lives. Both however, have lasting affects of what this women has done.

Tiffany being a patient of Shriners, is due to her uneven in length legs and being born with her hip sockets never forming. She has had many surgeries at Shriners free of charge which is very appreciated and thought of as a huge blessing!! Tiffany is one of my Hero's!! She has endured so much pain in her young life.

So my family wanted to show how appreciative we were of Shriners by caroling to their patients. As I looked at the kids and their families watch us sing to them, I couldn't help but feel emotions felt when Tiffany was there....and knowing a lot of these kids have it way worse off then Tiffany did....and on top of that they are going to spend their Christmas in a hospital. I hope all of us really count our blessings this holiday season! There are so many who have hardships and trials above and beyond our own.

Now....any of you who know the Petersen's know that it is always a party when we get together...this wasn't any acception. Here are some fun pictures I was able to take.


Here is my Andalyn Belle playing with the stuffed animals that they had under their Christmas tree in the lobby of the hospital.


Here is our "double trouble" Andalyn and Montana hugging the elf's that were pulling Santa's sleigh in the lobby.


Ryan and his "Drama" as Andalyn would say.


Ryan and his "Drampa"


Ryan and his Uncle Logan....who is getting his mission call any day now!!!


Ryan and my Aunt Jean....it was so good to see you there!!

Dave and I after the caroling was over. We may have to make this a family tradition....Service always brings more happiness to this time of year!!