Thanksgiving 2009

This year I am thankful for:

Being alive.
The End.
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This is one of those years that is just totally working me over. I feel like a ripe, juicy apple that went into the dryer and came out a craisin.

As with all tough times in life, the things that don't matter have just...fallen away. My list of gratitudes has been pared down to the basics:

I am thankful for a warm place to shelter my babies and for being able to put food in their tummies.

I am thankful for my parents. I've been feeling their unconditional love hitting me in waves across the miles. Time and again this year I've been so grateful for their help just when I need it most, in ways little and big. My day-to-day rollercoaster of emotional survival has caused all the irrelevancies of life just fall away. Some days I feel like the only people in this world who are by my side are the Savior and my parents.

And that has reminded me lately of another time 20 years ago when I felt the same way. I never thought I would get through that year and some nights I would be curled into a ball, crying my eyes out in bed, hoping life would be okay--and yet there was a strange combination of darkness and light in my heart. I think that if you hold fast to the Savior during the dark times, there is a corresponding light which comes to comfort. Sometimes peaceful and glowing, sometimes burning and bittersweet.

Because my parents helped me fight and claw my way out of that year, I emerged a different and better girl. I think I will have another phoenix-from-the-fire ending this time around, too. No matter how hopeless the outlook that defining year 20 years ago, I felt the rock-steady foundation of my parents' presence. And twenty years later I feel the same.

I am thankful to be a parent, myself, and be able to give that foundation to my own children.

I am thankful for healthy children.

I am thankful for my beater van which keeps on running and has no car payment.

I am thankful for my faith in a Savior whose presence I feel, like that other dark time, almost tangibly. Sometimes I feel Him in the room with me, just there to love me even though I am failing miserably at being brave and strong and good. Or even just nice.

And I have been crying as I write this. My eyes are puffy and red. And so I guess I'm not a craisin after all--more a huge pomegranate.

A Christ-Centered Christmas--Gearing Up!

Greg Olsen, Angels of Christmas

This season, I felt I was starting my Christmas planning WAY in advance. Since the day after Halloween, I have been racking my brain for advent calendar ideas. (I've been listening to Christmas music and sneaking in holiday decor since the week before Halloween, but we try not to discuss that.) We do have a garland-type "Christmas Activity Advent" up and ready to go, a new one that I began last year and which I will feature in a day or two, but I have been wanting to create another, more calendar-oriented advent.

And so it was that The Great Advent Hunt has lasted most of November: I have been searching high and low for a little chipboard drawer thing that I could get crafty with, cover with paper and cute sparkly numbers, and hide little treats in. I could not find those drawers ANYwhere. It is now officially Too Late. So I'm giving up the dream and hoping I'll remember next year that (grrrrr) if you're going to craft a Christmas Creation, begin in August.

Here is the inspiration:

It's listed in this etsy shop

This version is also delightful, found at cut.color.create., a blog I like to stalk from time to time when I want to be a crafty voyeur.

found here.

I also like this advent by the-one-and-the-only Ali Edwards.

found here.

I really should have started my search in September if I was going to let the crafty magic fly.

I think I'll just stick to what I do best: Holiday Baking. After all, You can't eat chipboard drawers, right? The true talent lies in the art of delicious carb-creations. (I'll just keep telling myself that.)

After giving that detailed history of The Great Advent Hunt '09, we now finally come to the "Christ-Centered Christmas" from the title of this post.

The other day I came across this darling little advent you can print right off the internet here at The Friend. Cuter than anything my crafty magic could produce. (Be sure to scroll halfway down the page to find it).

Here is a sample of what you will find. So cute. And simple!

I have planned a simple, easy, fun Christmas this year--(mainly because we can't afford presents, but I am calling it "simple and fun,")--a relaxed month of mostly doing projects with my kids that create cozy Christmas memories.


And...
[Stay tuned for A Christ-Centered Christmas, beginning December 1st. I will feature an easy activity and scripture to do with your family each day of December.

I am so excited to do this with my family; it would be fun for other blog moms to do it with me and share our experiences.]

In the Spirit of Thanksgiving

This is a bright, sparkly video. I love the optimism. I love the simplicity of their words. And I love watching how everyone's beauty is so different and real.

Happy Thanksgiving this week!

I am thankful for my children.

"Shelves in the closet, happy thought indeed."

At LAST.

One year ago, the girls moved in to the playroom, which did not have closets--it was just a big room over the garage. A few months ago, Mike started to build the closets. Then stopped {ran out of funds}. Then started. Then stopped {no funds again}. Then started. Then stopped {you get the picture}.

This week, the closets are finished.

And I am a little more sane.
{only a little}

***The first person to correctly guess which movie I'm quoting in my post title--without google's help--will receive a Good Mail surprise from me.***

Friday Funny: "I'm on your side, I'm just trying to help you have good taste."

Quotables which have become classics:
"If we had an extra room, you could put all your things in it."

"Everybody thinks they have good taste and a sense of humor, but they couldn't possibly all have good taste."

"I find tinsel distracting."

Last week while waiting in my van, I quick-snapped this photo of Mimi; the way she was carrying her backpack just cracked me up. I knew instantly she's been watching how I carry my purse.

Also last week, my friend Michelle had a craft night and I was way too tired to do anything but sit on her famous chaise and make a list. My head is clattering with holiday miscellany: baking I want to do, baking projects with kids I want to do, my craft ideas, crafts with kids, ways to infuse this next month with a daily dose of spirituality, traditions I want to make sure to perpetuate, menus, scheduling...I did a Brain Drain and felt much more in control. And I do love a good list. This is just a dumping session; the real lists will be categorized and prioritized. I can't wait for holiday baking! Let the sprinkles fly!

Here are a few cozy corners I've been working on.
Above is the entry table.

Here is the balcony.
I need to acquire some photography skillz, obviously.

I've been adding Christmas touches here and there for a week and it's just about done, on the inside, that is (ahem, Mike...anytime...) I really want to get the outside lights up on my entry arch and turn them on, just to annoy Kate, who is bah-humbugging all over my bliss. Every time I open facebook, she has added a new snarky comment directed at us jolly pre-season folks in Who-ville. So.....

...Happy Festivus, Kate! xoxo

Up All Night

All day long today I held this sick little baby while he cried and fussed and squirmed.

Every night before I go to bed, I sneak into his room and change him into a fresh diaper so he doesn't wake up soaked to the skin. When I open his bedroom door, I am hit with a wave of baby smell--so strong, I suppose, because he's been in his room, freshly bathed, with the door shut for hours.

I love the little sleepy sounds he makes as I change him. I love that my mommy-shushing and nonsense talk comforts him back to sleep. I love to rub his warm little round tummy as I zip his jammies up.

But last night his tummy was burning hot. I could feel immediately that he wasn't warm and cozy--he was burning up. And so began a long night--a very long night--of him tossing and turning and being awake, deliriously trying to play with toys and the tv remote.

Today was more of the same. And when Jack is sick, he doesn't have the courtesy to be snuggly and just lay quietly in my arms; he is restless and disquiet. So I don't even get to sit and rock a sick baby--I wrangle one.

And after 24 hours, I'm exhausted. And poor Baby is, too. For a little guy riddled with ear infection, he's been a good little boy and so brave.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Deck Me.

{Secret Note to Self: This post shall take no longer than 10 minutes to write. No more 90-min long posting! You will be finished by 11:30pm or you will run 15 extra punishment minutes tomorrow morning. In the cold.}

Below is the non-secret portion of today's post.

As of three days ago, I have begun decking the halls. It is a compulsion for me to begin the minute after Halloween is over.

I admit that as I answered doors to trick-or-treaters (a grand total of 3--story to follow in a coming post), the Christmas storage bins were waiting in the wings--brought up from the basement but hidden behind a closed door.

I have been secretly listening to Christmas music since the first chill in the air. I have been grinning-and-bearing my way through Halloween and will now reward myself with lights and glitter and garland and (cue the Sesame Street Grover Voice).....sprinkles!
Sweetie Jack was given a candy cane to keep him satisfied and subdued while Mimi & I dove into the frenzy. This was Mantle Decor, Day 1. I've been dreaming up a white & silver mantle, so I started with a huge silver frame and added a white feather boa. The frame has been in my basement Frame Stash for who-knows-how-long (that is an interchangeable term for "approximately how long I've been married"). The boa was from Mimi's chicken halloween costume 3 years ago.

While impatiently waiting for a socially acceptable time to Deck the Halls, I've been avariciously reading The Nester. She opened my eyes to shopping the house and using what you have to decorate, so I've been looking at all my stashes with new appreciation.

Below: I added lights and a few jars filled with white snowball-y looking ornaments. This is all stuff I had from my Endless Christmas Bins.

Mimi has been waiting all year to decorate this little white tree. Well, actually not. As my fingers were typing that sentence my subconscious self remembered the day in June I found Mimi & the cilantro-partner-in-crime decorating the tree with all my blown glass candy ornaments. *&$#@!%!! Seriously. With an fair amount of broken glass on the cement floor.

But she got a second chance and did a good job. {I am now 8 minutes past my deadline. Crap. Why can't I be a fast writer?}

I'm pretty sure she's got visions of sugarplums already.

Here is the mantle about halfway into the process.

The candy cane sugar rush did not deter Jack from going to bed. Here is the little mama about to take him upstairs. Isabelle loves to put him to bed, snuggle him in, arrange his blankies just so around his face, pet his feathers and say goodnight to him.


A day later, I added the mirror--also from the basement. Everything is just kind of thrown up there, but it sparkles so I like it. I'm going to do a fun candy theme on the upstairs mantle where the kids congregate, and I'm not sure about the mantle in my room. I'm just glad we are here in this house to see another Christmas, so I'm having fun making it cozy. We've got a tenuous grip on life with even more tenuous finances. I plan to drown my sorrows in sprinkles.

{20 minutes past the deadline...I'm going to be so sore tomorrow from punishment minutes.}

***Edited to add: Post finished at 11:55pm. Dangit.