happy new year!

welcome, 2013!

i've been having a bit of an issue with uploading photos to the blog, so i haven't been posting much, because it's just not as fun. i do think it's time for an update, though. 

december passed by rather quickly. we enjoyed the season of advent as much as possible. originally, i was going to do a special activity every day. i ended up doing it a bit differently. a friend told me about truth in the tinsel, a daily advent devotional for kids, so i decided to do that with love. it's an ebook and each day has a scripture reading, devotion, and instructions for making an ornament. i modified some of the crafts for love's abilities and to use materials that we had on hand. we certainly didn't do all 24 days, and we did more at the beginning of the month than the end, but it was a great way to observe advent, and something that we can do in future years as well. 

instead of scheduling an activity for every day, i made a list of things we wanted to do together and we went through the list for what worked on whatever day. we didn't get to everything on the list, and i'm okay with that. here is what we did get to:

- visit the train display at our local mall
- make homemade "gingerbread" play dough
- make salt dough ornaments
- drive around and look at christmas lights
- watch a christmas movie and eat homemade pizza (we watched the polar express)
- send christmas mail to grandparents
- visit the local botanical gardens
- read new christmas book ("room for a little one" from my sister)
- get christmas books from the library
- color in christmas coloring book

we also enjoyed observing advent by lighting our way of light wreath each day and moving the wooden mary a little closer to bethlehem each day. love learned "away in a manger" with motions as we sang it each day after devotions.

the four of us were home together for christmas, and then we traveled to visit family last weekend.

unfortunately, the flu struck our home just before christmas. jobot came down with it the friday before christmas, it hit love on saturday, and jeremy and i got it on sunday. christmas eve found me crawling into bed with a fever and chills, huddled under piles of blankets and snuggling close to jeremy to get warm. it was a bummer. thankfully, we all felt pretty good on christmas morning. we opened our stockings, had a nice little gift exchange, ate some cinnamon rolls, and headed to church. some friends came over in the afternoon and we had christmas dinner and played games. it was a good day.

we went light on the gifts this year, which was the usual for us. jeremy and i decided to get a few things that we needed. they weren't surprises, but i wrapped them up anyway. we got ourselves a nice pair of scissors, a food scale, and i got a pair of tennis shoes and jeremy got some new slippers. we gave jobot a pair of booties for his cold little toes, and we gave both kids a set of wooden blocks. love was given a water bottle and...the big gift which several family members went in on together...a wooden dollhouse, doll family, and furniture! i really think this has been as much fun for me as it has been for her. jeremy did well with my stocking...vanilla almond tea, which i have really been enjoying, a beautiful new mug, and a bar of lavender soap. all things that add a little luxury to life. the best gift was that jobot finally started sleeping through the night, starting on christmas night. it is amazing to sleep all the way through the night again!

of course, more than enjoying the gifts and the family time, we basked in the reality that God is with us. we recently came across a prayer by max lucado, which we have found very fitting for this time. here is an exerpt from the prayer:

"Jesus, the world sure seems dark. i have a good eye for silver linings, but they seem dimmer lately.
your world seems a bit darker this Christmas. 
but, you were born in the dark, right? you came at night. the shepherds were nightshift workers. the wise men followed a star. your first cries were heard in the shadows. to see your face, mary and joseph needed a candle flame. it was dark.
dark with herod's jealousy. dark with roman oppression. dark with poverty. dark with violence.
oh, Lord Jesus, you entered the dark world of your day. won't you enter ours? we are weary of bloodshed. we, like the wise men, are looking for a star. we, like the shepherds, are kneeling at a manger.  
this christmas, we ask you, heal us, help us, be born anew in us."


and to continue the prayer as we enter this new year...may the light of the world shine brightly even through the darkness of our lives. may the hope of Jesus be born in us as we walk on this earth, and may Jesus be invited and faithfully enter into our lives.

happy new year!

polar express day

we've been trying our best over here to enjoy the christmas season...sitting by the tree, enjoying the lights, reading christmas books, doing advent devotions, listening to christmas music...

yesterday was a special polar express day at our house. in the morning, we read the polar express book. in the afternoon, love and i worked through a preschool pack that i had printed off and prepared. there were polar express themed puzzles, coloring sheets, matching cards, etc...

then...after jobot was in bed, we had a special movie night with love. we ate our homemade pizza while we watched the movie, then had hot chocolate, just like the kids on the polar express. love was so into the movie - we had to keep reminding her to eat her dinner. she loved it, and we loved just watching her joy. when we got to the part of the movie where santa gives the boy a bell, i pulled out a jingle bell for love. her eyes lit up and she was so excited.

i find so much joy in making things special for our family, and i'm really enjoying that she is at an age where she can appreciate special, fun things. our polar express day made a great memory, and just might be a tradition that continues every year at our house.

moses

after love's bible story the other morning...

daddy: "what was your story about today?"
love: "moses. he was scared of the bushes!"

advent preparations

i've been thinking ahead to christmas. well...advent, really. it seems like this is the first year when love will really be able to start to comprehend what christmas is all about. i really desire to take time to slow down this coming advent season. to share the story of jesus birth with love, and also soak it up once again for myself. to plan activities for advent that involve serving others, having fun, and basking in the hope that christ brought to this earth. i need that these days.

in thinking about the coming season, i am trying to find ways to share the coming of jesus with love in a way that she will be able to understand. she enjoys reading, so naturally, books seem like a wonderful way to accomplish this. i came across two books that i think would be very helpful, and if you are looking for a good christmas book to read with kids, check them out. someday i would like to own them and be able to read them every year during advent.

the first one, my favorite of the two, is song of the stars, a christmas story, by sally lloyd jones. we looked at this book at a bookstore recently and loved the way the story was told. jeremy said it gave him goosebumps. it is a beautiful book.

the second, room for a little one: a christmas tale, by martin waddell, has beautiful illustrations and a sweet story. i appreciate the phrase in the book, "a little one came for the world". yes, for the world he came.

by far, my favorite christmas book as a child, and still today, is the twenty-four days before christmas by madeline l'engle. i read it every year. in the book, the austin family does a special activity each day during advent. i know that a lot of people do this, but i have never done it. i think this will be the year that we will start this tradition with our little family. so, i have also been making a little advent list...so far, i have fourteen things on the list, and i will continue to add to it as we go along. by the beginning of advent, my list will be complete and we will be able to do something special each day. at some point, i will share our list on this blog.

we also have this way of light wreath that we will be using with advent devotions this year. i think it is such a meaningful way to lead up to christmas.

today was a little gloomy and a lot boring. after a dinner of pumpkin pancakes, we had a family dance party to christmas music. it lightened the mood around here and brought out some much needed giggles. the first dusting of snow drifted into our world tonight, and that calls for some snuggling time on the couch with my hubby.

leaves, leaves, and more leaves

we've been given the gift of a couple of days of unseasonably warm weather. and we have taken full advantage. yesterday we raked leaves, lots and lots of leaves. such satisfying work as the yard immediately looked amazingly better.

today there was a bit of sleeping in for this mama after a rough night with the littlest member of our family. after breakfast, we headed out for a walk and then trimmed the bushes in front of the house, put the sandbox in the garage for the winter, and loaded up the van for a trip to goodwill. i've been sorting and cleaning and organizing and decided it was time to get rid of a lot of things i've been holding on to "just in case". i've been feeling bogged down by things and stuff and am feeling good about getting rid of things.

we headed to a local furniture store where we had a $25 gift card that was good just for today. we didn't want any furniture and didn't want to spend more than the money our gift card was for...so we searched all the decorative things in the store and finally found a pillow with just the right colors for our living room. i've been wanting a colorful pillow to add some color to that room, so it was perfect. a $100 pillow on sale for $25, just right for our gift card...we had to pay 1 cent and then it was ours to take home. the sales guy asked if we wanted the $12 protection plan. really? for a free pillow? i don't think so. (and the whole time i was trying to comprehend a life of buying pillows so expensive that they need protection plans!). to top it all off, they had clowns, balloon animals, face painting, and snacks...all for free...so it was a good stop!

we went to costco and had samples and bought some eggs and maple syrup. when i opened the egg carton to check if the eggs were cracked, one of the eggs fell out and broke on the floor...so we ended up bringing home slightly less than two dozen eggs. jeremy broke another one after we got home, so i guess it is just a day of breaking eggs around here.

we got the car washed, redeemed a couple of free things at panera for a snack (lunch was the free snacks at the furniture place and the samples at costco!), and headed for home. i gave love a haircut and we cleaned up the house.

quite a productive day i would say.

the biggest news of the day is that jobot's first tooth popped through! he's growing up a little too fast.

extra hour

i used my extra hour on sunday to make a special breakfast for our family. we had a delicious and relaxed start to the day before we headed for church. 

halloween

our little lamb in a mama-made costume, and our little guy who dressed as his daddy.

she loved the sheep costume. especially her ears and little black nose. i loved that i made it for her.

handsome boys. our friend did an amazing job knitting jobot's little beard.

in the afternoon, we told love that later we were going to walk up to people's houses and say "trick-or-treat". and then...people would give us candy. a look of amazement and disbelief spread across her face followed by a huge grin. oh, the wonder of being a child. we had as much fun watching her trick-or-treat as she had trick-or-treating. oh, the joys of being parents.