Advent Fair/St. Nicholas Party

Our church has a couple of kid-Christmas events that they thankfully place back-to-back. First is the Advent Fair, where they have many activities for young children to prepare their hearts for Advent. Young children do this with crafts and games, of course!

No Matthew did not shrink. He was missing when the picture was taken. The little guy is my friend from Omaha's son. They came to visit us last weekend, which was fun.


The 2nd event was the St. Nicholas Party. Think "Dinner with Santa" and you will have a pretty good idea. More crafts and a kid friendly dinner. My friend and I were spoiled, because after the party we ran to the store while Ken took the kids home and grilled us chicken and steak!

It is SNOW good!

First the good news. I found the missing Christmas presents! I bought several presents online and needed to hide them. I did such a great job, I couldn't find them. I think something similar happened with Carolyn's doll last year. This is the thanks I get for shopping early (and having a poor memory for detail). I cleaned out (well - started to) the storage room and found the doll quilts I am making for the girls. They have been mostly done since this summer, but then went missing this fall. They were found under some other fabric. - Are you really surprised? The box of missing online presents were just on top of the shelving unit in my closet. I just didn't look high enough. I am totally reverent when I say PRAISE GOD. One of the online gifts was bought online because I have never seen it in stores and will be a total hit for Joel on Christmas morning. I was stressed out, because I didn't know what I was going to replace it with and because it was a glaring reminder of my inability to keep my ducks in a row!! I am very pleased that they were found.

Also here are a few "first snow" pictures. Matthew didn't think it was enough snow to leave his project. (He was making a Power Point presentation of his Minute to Win-It experiment. Not to get totally off the subject, but they were learning about statistics etc. and so he had to get 50+ 6th and 7th graders to try to bounce a ball into a cup on their head in less then a minute. Initially the teacher wanted 89 subjects, but I guess he came to his senses. It was a challenge since Matthew doesn't know that many kids. Luckily he was able to get a bunch from church and scouts. I wish I had taken pictures, because it was a fun project. For the record, I did not think that when I thought he had to find 89 subjects.)

Back to the first snow. I still have fond memories of playing in the snow and coming in for hot chocolate. Joel and Carolyn were Anna's heroes, because her boot fell off in the back yard. Carolyn had Joel run to get me, while she kept Anna's foot warm. It was very sweet. Perhaps I am a slacker mom, but I am glad she is big enough to play with them outside while I watch from inside. I did buy snow pants this year, however, and we already have spent bonding time outside together clearing the foot of compacted snow that the plows left at the bottom of our driveway. We have a fire hydrant at the end of our drive, so I really am working hard to not let the snow build up there!

New Advent Tradition

I will admit that I have been an Advent slacker in the past. We have done a bit here and there, but haven't done as much as I would like. Today we invited one of our Faith and Friendship members (who also is our Adult Faith Formation staff member) to share Advent ideas. She did a great job with adult and child ideas.

My family is going to start doing a Jesse Tree this year and we are going to make a paper chain that will be full of our good deeds. We will then decorate our Christmas tree with the chain.

Joel made the first contribution to the chain by writing a letter. I suggested his Grandma who lives in Texas in the winter, since she won't be luck and get to see him at Christmas. Here is what he came up with. (I did suggest the picture of baby Jesus, but he did the rest (I guess I also helped with the spelling of "would"). I especially like that he labeled the people.)


Another thing that brings me Christmas cheer is this video link (click Hallelujah below) that my sister-in-law sent me. It is a Flash Mob where they sang this beautiful song in the middle of a food court. I especially love the chorus of PEACE ON EARTH.
Hallelujah

Let me explain

Before you decide that I am completely photo-obsessed, I need to tell you why I have more professional photos of my children just one month after the last set.

My friend Susan took our pictures last fall and we LOVED them! This year, I asked her about scheduling another photo-shoot, but it looked like we weren't going to work it out due to time-conflicts. Therefore, in October, the kids had a day off of school, so I took them to Target. (Those photos were posted here earlier.)

Well, a week later, my friend Susan asked if I would like to exchange services, she would take photos and I would take her curtain, cut it in two and hem both sides, so she could put it on two sides of a window. Well golly - I would do that for her for free, so of course I took her up on the deal. We did a quick photo-shoot after picking Matthew up from school. Here are a handful of the photos that resulted. By the end, my patience was gone (because outdoor photo-shoots are a challenge), but of course soon, all I will have are happy photos - because my memory is shot ;)

It's about time.

I realized that if I didn't get the kids to pose with their quilts soon, it would have to wait for spring. I finished the quilts a couple days before the new school year started, when Ken's sister (the great quilter) visited. I actually need to sit down with each quilt and make sure all the loose threads are trimmed, but I was pleased to meet my self-imposed deadline. The kids seemed pleased with their new bedding! (sorry the orientation is off, but I don't want to modify and re-upload



I can show you a few more photos of items I made for people. I haven't shipped them yet, but these people don't look at my blog, so I am safe to share!
I made this table runner for my sister's birthday. In fact I need to fix one seam and get it in the mail ASAP!
This quilt will be heading south in a few days to a friend's baby that is scheduled to join this world soon! Lucky baby! Blessings to her family as the wait these final few days and then welcome her!

This little thing started when I flubbed a few squares for the quilt above, but just couldn't throw them away. I had an "aha" moment and made a dolly quilt for the big sister of the baby-to-be mentioned above. I LOVE making quilts this size. Such quick gratification. Hopefully the big sis will love it as much as my girls love their little quilts.

Thanksgiving 2010

My folks came for Thanksgiving and we had a nice quiet celebration. They are easy guests to have and we love their visits.


Ken took off Wednesday, so we were able to get the house (mostly) clean that day and several of the dishes prepared. On Thanksgiving we finished cleaning just in the nick of time. I sent the kids out "go welcome Grandma and Grandpa" as I cleaned the last spot. Our garage is even clean - well not "eat off the floor" clean, but both cars fit in the garage and everything else has been organized to fit better for the winter.

I loved the lack of a schedule for the weekend and the hours that could just be filled with togetherness (of either the playful or cleaning variety :)

The kids (and Ken) did a lot of puzzling this weekend. Originally we brought the Wolf puzzle out because Joel needed an activity, but as soon as we opened the box we realized that it was a bit tough. The other kids and Ken jumped in to help and it was done in less than 24 hours.



I am thankful for:

MY FAMILY - immediate and extended! It was so nice to have so much time together without having to rush here and there this weekend. It was great that my parents could make the drive to share some time with us.

OUR JOBS - I am thankful that Ken and I can both work at jobs we find fulfilling and that pay the bills.

OUR HOME - despite a few warts (windows that will eventually need to be replaced and a few spots of siding in need of repair), we love our home and its location. I especially like that many of its usual "door closed" areas (laundry room and office) are now neat and organized.

OUR FRIENDS - Those far and near add meaning and joy to our lives.

OUR CHURCH - I am glad that we have found such an active and spiritually fulfilling place to belong. Especially one that adds so much to the category just above!

It's the Great Halloween Charlie Brown

We had a wonderful Halloween weekend. Ken's parents came to visit on Saturday, but you will just have to trust me about that because my camera is acting goofy, so when I went back to download more photos it started acting up. After all the Halloween festivities of the weekend, I wasn't wanting to figure it out tonight. It was great to see them and we were very glad that Ken's mom is recovering well from her knee replacement surgery. They will leave Friday for Texas, so we were happy they were able to come to on Saturday.

In our community, Trick or Treat was on Saturday this year. Here are my super heroes.

Although Matthew wasn't dressed as a traditional super hero, his actions were quiet heroic, as he went trick or treating for canned goods with the church Youth Ministry rather than trick or treating for candy. I was able to chaperon this event and it was FANTASTIC. This will be an annual tradition for me, as it was so delightful to witness 6-12 graders giving back to the community and having such a great time doing it and celebrating God. (>1400 items collected!)

Ken took the other kids trick or treating while we left a special "spell" book full of candy for our neighbors on the front porch! On Halloween day we went to my Faith and Friendship group's Halloween party. It was nice to gather with spouses and older children, who are usually at school when we meet.

My super-girl has a new super-skill - solving 24 piece puzzles by herself. I love when the kids hit this milestone. She probably would have done it sooner, but when I am sitting by her she always says, "help me Mama!" Since I was doing other things she did it herself (about 5 times :)