A Carol to my King

On Friday at 11:30 I was driving to my daughter's school to read to her class when I heard the terrible news from Connecticut on the radio. I had to take a good while to cry and pray in my car parked in front of the school before I could compose myself and go inside. Like you, my heart is broken for those precious babies and their families.

 I've struggled all weekend to find peace and honestly, it comes and goes. I've held my own babies close, and hugged them until they've begged me off and wriggled away. I knew that before my girls were to head back to school today, I would have to talk to them about what happened so they wouldn't hear it from someone at school and have to face that knowledge alone. and I wanted so much to get to a good place myself so I could speak to them of comfort and peace and God's love and help them really believe it. The last thing I wanted was to take from them their happy, secure, beautiful outlook on this world.

On Sunday I attended sacrament meeting at our church praying for healing, personally and of course for those impacted directly.  It was our Christmas program, and we sang and spoke of Jesus Christ, of his birth and his life. A soloist sang "What Child is This?" and with teary eyes, my thoughts turned to another carol, the Coventry Carol, which tells of the countless children who died at the order of king Herod shortly after the birth of Christ. The joyous birth of the long-awaited Prince of Peace had come to pass, so soon to be followed by horrific tragedy.

Certainly God could prevent such events. Certainly He must weep to see such suffering among his children. He did, after all, send his Son to deliver us, to bring peace and comfort. But deliverance from the physical captivity and pain and trials and losses of this life is not always the kind of deliverance the Savior gives. Often it is the deeper, more profound and endlessly more meaningful gift of peace amid trial, of comfort in sorrow, of a surety that he is perfectly aware of us in the midst of our suffering because he has borne it himself. And the promise that through him, all will be well.

With those thoughts in mind, and with prayerful hearts, Caleb and I told Malan and Jane last night about what had happened. It was hard. Lots of questions were asked and answered. We told them there were loved ones waiting to hug and hold those sweet children on the other side, that for sure Jesus was there to meet them and that they will be safe and happy until they are with their families again. Then we kissed them and told them we loved them and sent them off to sleep. I don't want to have to have a talk like that again, ever. But their tender, innocent hearts understood and rather than fear and confusion, I believe seeds of empathy and compassion were planted.

Like you, I am still processing. I still find myself in tears throughout the day as thoughts of the terrors of Friday come into mind. But this morning I sent my two oldest babies back to school with hugs and smiles. I feel at peace that they will be safe, and that, like one insightful blogger mentioned this morning, angels (likely dear loved ones who have passed on) watch over our sweet children. That I am sure angels were with those children in their last moments, comforting and calming them and taking them quickly on to a much more beautiful place. And I know that through Jesus Christ, all will be well.

Hugs and prayers to all of you at this hard time, from our family.

Airplane

Wow, such a busy time of year, right? So good though. I love this season, I love the excitement, and it's even better watching my girls be excited about it all. But times like these I get to feeling like my poor kids just follow me around from task to task. I find myself thinking "Kay, this month is crazy, but then we'll settle down and get back into a good routine for the kids." And though I know how important it is, it can be so hard for me to stop trying to get the next thing done and just PLAY with them. I really want to do better. I hope I can find a way to minimize all the busy-ness and less important STUFF. I'm taking suggestions, if you've found a way.

Today, for a little bit, we played airplane, and it was pretty great. My legs hurt though.
 I guess maybe I'm out of shape. (Okay, for sure I am.)

This last picture tugs my heart a good deal. Self, this is what it's all about.

We Live Here

The last of our Christmas cards just rolled out of my printer. I love sending Christmas cards, and I love receiving them.

But now I remember why I haven't sent out a Christmas card for the last two years. It's because when I take on a creative project, this happens:

1. box of fabric scraps used for malan's santa suit school project 2. tipped over electric pencil sharpener 3. stack of christmas library books 4. what remains of the box the girls cut apart to make a cardboard island 5. pink heart cookie cutter that didn't get back in the bin after we pulled out the christmas cookie cutters 6. doll broken leg cast 7. funnel, most recently used as a megaphone by emme 8. dancing muki that just got new batteries (yay. i think muki is about to get "lost") 9. alphabet blocks used to entertain emme for a minute 10. malan's "maniac magee" 11. jane's school work from yesterday 12. the vacuum cord-in case someone stops by it will look like i have intentions 13. jane's snack pouch 14. olivia's most recent treasure map 15. christmas cards laid out for envelope stuffing

This is the floor of my office. And don't kid yourself by thinking the rest of my house doesn't look just like this right now. A few children ago I think this state of things would have made me want to absolutely pull my hair out. But today during nap time, instead of cleaning, I made this little sign to go in my entry instead:

Hee hee. It'll last longer than a clean house, and I think I'm going to need it for the next 20 years. I would LOVE my house to be all put together and clean and perfectly decorated. So I try to keep things somewhat organized, and I browse Pinterest for new rugs, and drool over fabrics for our window seat cushion, and save my pennies. And it is coming together. Oh so sloooowwlly. But in the meantime, there are pirate cousins to play with and dress ups to wear and snack times to be had. . .

And our messy, imperfect house works perfectly for those good things.

Outtakes

Here are a few outtakes from our family picture attempt:

Trying to get the kids to smile-

Emme begging for a break-

Binky break and an airplane overhead-

Deciding we're done with group shots after Emme scratches Jane on the face-

Some intense face-gazing. Nice. I think I was trying to be funny and I love that Caleb is like, "Ok. This is what we're doing." He is a good sport.

Katie did such a great job manning the camera, and we got some we really love (which will be forthcoming), but MAN, what a process. The only thing we've found that helps is serious bribery. How about you? Any secrets to taking a good family picture?

Tree Hunt

The day after Thanksgiving is the day for our annual Christmas tree hunt. One of my favorite days of the year! We coerced Katie and Joey into getting a live tree with us, and Juli also came along. I know we could save money by just investing in a fake tree to put up every year, but I just love this tradition so much.  I would love to have a Christmas tree farm of our own, wherever we end up.

After getting our tree home, we turned on the Christmas tunes and got 'er all lit up and purdy.

 'Tis the season! I hope it's a merry one for you.

Old tree hunts here and here.

Thanksgiving 2012

What a wonderful week! It made me so happy to have my girls home from school with me for almost a whole week, to have Caleb around a ridiculous amount (as far as residency goes) and to just spend serious amounts of time with family and good friends. Here are a handful of pictures from our Thanksgiving.

A couple of pilgrims, sharing a costume for their school celebrations. Olivia was pretty excited to let me dress her up, and then got super shy and embarrassed suddenly when her preschool friends saw her and had a really sad little meltdown. I think it's because she didn't know what a pilgrim was and she felt confused and out of place in a weird costume in front of her friends. She felt better when Aunt Katie read a book to the class about pilgrims and she recognized herself in the pictures. Oops. It was a moment for me. I feel like so many of my tough parenting moments could be avoided if I took a the time to prepare my kids a little better.

My sweet sister Juli joined us for Thanksgiving, along with Katie and Joey and our friends the Bates and the Woods. Juli is a chef by trade and I just felt all sorts of relaxed all day while preparing the meal because I could just ask her every time I had a question about anything. Juli also coached Malan through making the rolls, which were perfect, and Malan also helped with Caleb's banana cream pie. It all went so smoothly, and every dish brought by the other guests was lovely. It was just a happy day with great people.

I'm grateful for so much. Wonderful friends and family, freedom, love, health, and happiness top that list. Missed you, Pittsburgh friends and scattered family. Hope that all of you out there had a happy Thanksgiving week.

Pulling it Together

I spent last week poring over paint samples and painting and moving furniture and rifling through old boxes of thrifted picture frames, trying to quickly force my house into some sort of presentable state. This is because I was in charge of hosting book club this week and I wanted to fake like I'm all put together and stuff. Nothing like a deadline and a bunch of people you want to impress to get you to wrap up the projects you've been dragging your feet on. But probably you're more self-motivated than I am.

On the day of book club, Olivia and Emme gave their best efforts to following me around re-making messes I'd just cleaned up. Sweet little things.

 The kitchen help. I may have slapped his behind thirty times in passing, I was so happy to have him around more this week. (Audiology rotation=happy wife)  I know I'm a little (lot) crazy at times like these. So good game, Hon. Thanks for your hard work.

It was a bit of a frantic week, and we are seriously lacking in the clean laundry department, but pulling things together for a special occasion like this is the manna in the wilderness of my everyday mothering. It feeds my hungry, wandering, creative soul.

Book club recipes:

Chicken and white bean stew recipe here. This stew is so good you will cry culinary tears of joy. Another of my sister juli's creations. I use chicken breasts not thighs, add cooked potato chunks, use jar alfredo instead of refrigerated, and heat it through in a pot on the stove rather than in a crockpot because I rarely manage to plan that far ahead.

Strawberry salad recipe here

Apple cider float recipe here