Magic

When you are a kid, the magic of Christmas is like nothing else. After the magic ended for me, sometime around age 9, I never felt that kind of anticipation, excitement, and nervous happiness again. It wasn't until 10 years later, on the day of my marriage, and then again, on the day of each of my children's birth, that I experienced that same magic. The bundled energy, the anticipation that goes hand in hand with the unknown. 

When you grow up, and even shortly after that Christmas magic dissapears, life starts to become mundane. Instead of seeing how magical the Christmas train is, that goes round and round the big tree at the mall, you only see the crowds, and the consumerism, and the rip off prices at the Santa line. I don't know why it happens. I don't know why we become bitter, and skeptical, and hurried, and jaded.  Even those of us with the best intentions, those of us who commit, year after year, to "be different" this holiday season. It seems to find even us. And the magic is just never the same.

The first Christmas we had a daughter, was when Katelyn was 11 months old. She didn't need anything of course. People joked about the wrapping paper, and the boxes, and that was truth of course.

She loved those things.

But, Kevin and I just couldn't hold back. We bought her things that were certainly light years beyond her. I am pretty sure half of her presents said "for ages 4 and up".

It was just so exciting to see Christmas through the eyes of a child again. Maybe we were living vicariously through her a bit, but I think we were just so excited to have that magic back.

The way her eyes light up at the tree. The way she dreamily looked at all of the decorations, and clapped when she heard jingle bells for the first time in her life.

The way she screamed for her santa picture.

No, don't scratch that. That was magical too. It just isn't Christmas without a screaming baby in Santa's lap.

Every year since having our first child, we have felt the magic in our home again.

Every year, we also feel the stress of financially supporting another Christmas. We say we will tone it down, every year. We have gotten better, but we never really tone it down.

The cookies, the decorations, the Christmas songs, and the lights. And of course, the magic of Christmas, through the eyes of our little ones. 

Of course, Christmas to us is so much more.  The time of year when we stop and really think about the birth of Christ in that lowly manger. The time of year when we hear songs about Christ on the radio, and we reflect on what that little baby came to earth to do. It truly is magical.

Today, we had a magical Christmas day.

We were surprised with a 4 pound box of See's candy from Muma and Papa. That was pure joy!

We were so happy as we dug our teeth into a taste of home.

 

It was like being back at home, walking through a Sees store. If you don't know about our relationship with See's, read here:

See's 

We then proceeded to load a magical train ride, out in Boone, Iowa. The land was covered in snowy white, it was cold, but not too cold. (23 is now, not that cold).

The mere fact we were riding a train was blowing Noah's mind.

We then experienced one of the most magical, jolly, lovely Christmas events I have ever been apart of.

Their was a Christmas story read, while we went along the tracks, watching the snow forest pass up by.  We passed by the North pole, and low and behold, we found Santa!  Then Santa came in, and all the kids cheered and he passed out bells!

The kids were then handed out hot cocoa and cookies, and then we all sang Christmas carols. It sounds hokey on paper, but it was a blast. Kevin, Jaime and I all said that we hope this is a memory our kids won't forget. It certainly is one that will stick with me until the end of my days.

Baker, Baker

This entry is not about my favorite Tori Amos song. Though, that song, and how it came to become my favorite Tori song, would make an interesting blog post on it's own merit. Another day, another time.

Today, my heart burst with pride. My 7 year old had a go at her first home-made goodie, all by herself.

It all started when we woke up and it was 3 degrees out.

I have been told that these temperatures are the kind that usually only come around in late January. The kind that signal winter is in the deep throes, and you have about 6 weeks left before the birdies start chirping again, and you yell "SPRING IS HERE!"

We are still 2 weeks away from winter even starting.

But it's all good, because we have an oven. And you know what that means.

Baking.

We did venture out in the arctic weather today, attended a knitting class, and saw a school performance of the Nutcracker. 

But when we got home, and my nose was frozen, I decided that running to the store for milk was just going to have to wait. I certainly had enough in the house for the family to survive on, at least for one night.

I had a hunkering for something warm.

Katelyn and I decided it was time to bust into the bakers basket (this is a magical basket full of all my baking supplies. Vanilla, and dark chocolate pieces, and brown sugar, and marshmallows, and Lord only knows what else. All I know is that when I pull out that basket, aromas come wafting out, and I am instantly sent to a magical land of munchkins, and 10 feet tall lollipops, and rivers of chocolate. ) 

I opened the fridge and found we had 1 egg. Kind of crucial.

I gave Katelyn a cookie recipe book, and told her to find a recipe that only used 1 egg. It started as my lazy way out of looking for the recipe myself, but resulted in one of the best cookies I have ever had.

For reals.

Katelyn really wanted to run with the recipe, so, against my initial inclinations,(their will be flour and sugar everywhere) I let her.

Hence the proud mommy moment.

She found the recipe, pulled all the ingredients, found we only had chocolate bars, not chips, and broke them herself.

She followed the recipe and prepared the cookies, and aside from the mixing (she turned the mixer on high, and guess what happened? Flour everywhere) she made the cookies completely on her own.

And dang, if they weren't the best cookie I have ever tasted.

I don't know what she did, maybe it was the love?

I don't mind if either of my girls grow up hating the kitchen. I don't want them to do something, just because I love it, or because I think they will love it too. I want them to explore things on their own, and find things that they love to do. Watching the pride on Katelyn's face, as she served her family the cookies, made me so happy and warm inside. When you are little, you need triumphs and victories.

Today, my little baker baker was victorious!

I'm dreaming of a white......

I'm dreaming of a white, Thanksgiving.

I think my fall scarecrow looks cute full of snow. Poor old scarecrow has never been covered like that before! He is probably thinking, isn't it November? Oh yes scarecrow, but we aren't in HB anymore!

This go around, we were not prepared, and had no idea snow was coming, until the day of.  We didn't have our shovel or our salt purchased. Whoops.

It was really exciting though, because my dad is in town visiting, and we didn't think we would see any of this white stuff during his trip. It wasn't in the forecast until it was upon us, it seemed.

My favorite part about snow so far, has been the magic it brings for the kids.

I remember, being a little girl, and going to a cabin in Wrightwood. I remember staying up late at night, sitting in the top bunk and looking out the little window by my bed. I would hope and pray to see snow fall. I would go to sleep, eager and anxious to wake up to a world of white.

Seeing the joy it brought to the girls last night was magical for me.

I let them stay up late and watch out the window as the snow came down, and the streets started to change colors. I don't know how long this magic will last, but for the time being, it is pretty special.

I wish I could have been inside their heads last night, so I could have seen their dreams!

Emma woke up at the butt crack of dawn, literally. She came bounding into our room asking if she could go outside and eat the snow. As many of you might remember, she had taken a vow back in California, to only eat snow all winter. She was anxious to get started.

I wasn't thrilled at going out in the snow in the dark, so I told her we could go out at 7am.

And we did.

Our version of sledding.

The way Noah does snow eating. Inside.

We are about to go take a walk to the library in the snow. Wish me luck!

Having fun with nature

This week we had a great week at school. I am making progress with getting ourselves into a routine, and am still awaiting approval for a move into a new school district so the kids can attend homeschool classes two days a week in the West Des Moines school district. They are the only district that offers classes exclusively for homeschoolers. BUT, we did join a homeschool group, and jumped on the purchases of a ton of shows, orchestra, and ballets, all at the Des Moines Civic center. They offer a series called The Applesauce Series, and it is for schools, and homeschoolers, and the tickets are $1 each. How can you beat that? I bought tickets from now until next May, and we have a line up of really fun Friday field trips, and we will get to experience a little class and culture.  Sounds good to me!  Yesterday, we made our first trip into Downtown Des Moines, and I managed to NOT get lost, or end up on a 1 way street going the wrong way. 

Yay me.

We toured the State Historical Museum, and it was full of great stuff (way bigger than I thought it would be), and most of it coinciding with what we are learning in History. Pretty cool. And, it was free. So we will definetely be going back. We also joined an art class, that was only $5 through the homeschool group, and we are going to sign the kids up for a homeschool PE/Music/Art class at the local YMCA. The Y is really big out here, and I am very impressed by what they offer. They have year round indoor swimming, classes for the little tykes, of course a gym, and free childcare for mama (should I ever decide that I want to actually excercise) and classes for the kids. Plus, the location close to us offers this cool homeschool class. So I am pretty excited. And it is all done on a sliding scale, and no one is going to pay much more than $50 for the WHOLE FAMILY. And that includes free childcare. Score!

That brings us to today.

It was a beautiful day, and we wanted to take advantage of the nice weather. We have been here 3 weeks, and haven't seen anything that would be considered "severe", and yet, I already recognize that a sunny day, with a temp of 52 degrees, warrants going outside and running around.

We also decided that we needed to do a craft.

That's the nice thing about having girls. Sometimes, a craft just strikes you.

Must. Craft. Now.

And Noah doesn't have a lot of options yet, so he is kind of obligated to go along with our whims.

I didn't feel like loading them all up to head out to a store, so we decided that we would take a nature walk, and use what we had in our craft bins.

If you are a mama of littles, I highly recommend stocking up on craft supplies. A little here, a little there. Spools of ribbon, feathers, googly eyes, colored cotton balls, raffia, string, glitter, fabric, felt, pipe cleaners (a lot of this can be found in the dollar bins at target, or at the Dollar tree). If you see something on sale at Micheals, or Hobby Lobby, pick it up. Throw it in your art bin, because I guaruntee, you will use it at some point.  There is nothing better than letting your little's "go nuts" in the art bin, creating things and using their fun little imaginations.

In California, we often went on nature walks, especially in the fall, trying to find fallen leaves. Because we lived by the beach, there was not a ton to choose from, though many areas in Southern California do have big beautiful trees.  We have seen a ton of leaves here, but we decided to go with the pine cone instead.

Since we live in a pinterest era, coming up with a cute craft will never be hard again. In fact, there is so much to choose from, that you an often leave, feeling depressed and dissapointed in yourself for not turning your mason jars into beautiful vases, in time for dinner by 5pm. If only I hadn't run out of burlap. Dang it.

Or, maybe that's just me.

Today, we decided to go pinterest free, and just create. I love watching the kids run with an idea.

We started off with a nature walk.

 We got distracted with some leaves.

 

We took a walk around the campus, and found some great pinecones, but we also found quite a bit in our own backyard.

 We gathered them up.

 

And headed in. It was funny, because the kids felt hot outside. They were sweating by the time we came in. It was 54 degrees.

If you want to let the kids go nuts with a craft, it is sometimes a good idea to pull out certain items you want them to use. Katelyn and I had already discussed what we thought would be cute, so I had an idea of what to pull out. Of course, there are the days when I let them just rummage through all 5 huge bins of craft supplies. But today wasn't that day.

Start with supplies.

 Prepare all your pieces and parts, and try to explain to the kids where they will go. Sometimes, kids have their own ideas about that. And that's ok too.  (No, No, you are doing it all wrong. The eyes go at the top. You know. Where eyes go. Not by the feet. Oh, well. Now Thanksgiving is ruined.) Is that just me too?

 Let the mama do the hot gluing. Unless you want your 7 year old to start screaming, peeling at herself and saying she is on fire. That has never happened to me, by the way.

 Then, presto. Cute little turkeys. All unique, and colored with funny feathers because those were the only colors of felt I had. But they were made with love, and they cost $0 to make.

Happy crafting, mamas.

First snow

We had our first Iowa snow. It wasn't a crazy snow. Not the kind that sends the whole town to the same supermarket to stock up on food and wood and batteries (I have only "heard" of this snow. As far as I know, it is just a myth. But, the mere fact that friends, aquaintances, and strangers speak of this snow, I have to believe it really does exist.) It was a pretty, light dusting of snow. It was Veterans Day, so it was a day off anyways, which was great.  We had been waiting all morning for it to arrive, and finally we stopped looking out the window. It wasn't long after that, when our phones starting ringing from local friends. "Snowing!" Were the texts we got.  So we bundled up, and ran outside to watch the first flakes of the season come down. 

Our friend Ken came across the street from the school, to see the kids reactions. He gave everyone a lesson on trying to catch the snow.

Funny.

The kids ran around, and Emma asked if she could eat it, but as you can see, it was just a light dusting, so that will have to wait until next time. We did quite an accumulation atop Big Green, but I didn't really want her eating snow off my dirty car.

Emma is ready for any occasion.

Not sure. Thought it was cold.

Lasted about 5 minutes, caught some snowflakes in her hood, and went inside.

We all loved watching it come down, while we were snuggled under a blanket watching a movie. It was very pretty once it picked up.

Today we are enjoying weather in the 50's, and this weekend it will be in the 60's, but with expected thunder and lightning storms. This season thing is pretty fun.

Walk with us

For the time being, we are living in a house right across the street from our church and Grandview College. We are "wintering here" as we call it.
This house has had a bunch of firsts for us. Being from Southern California, we aren't used to having houses with covered porches (or mud rooms), and basements. Kevin was able to set up a woodworking shop in the basement, and we might put back up our archery range. We have been told that we will have lots of time this winter to spend inside, and be "homey".  And not the kind of homey you call your friends on the streets of East LA.

One of my favorite things since arriving, has been our close proximity to the church and school. We have enjoyed some yummy lunches in Jenson Hall with Professor Ken Jones. Kevin has had a chance to meet faculty and college students, and the kids and I have had lots of fun wandering around the neighborhood circle, which is basically just circling the college campus. It feels very protected and safe, and the walk is nothing less than beautiful. We had fun visiting Kevin at work on Friday, when we stopped in to say hello and the kids played in the nursery for a bit, while I did a quick recap for Kev, of our days events. We have very much enjoyed all the visitors who have stopped by to say hello to us in our new place. Lovely meals, and cards have made us feel so welcomed, and so loved.

It occurred to me yesterday, as we were raking up the leaves from our front tree, that all the beauty in these fall colors, would soon be gone.  Surely, icicles, and big luxurious snowflakes will soon fill our space with magic and wonder, but for now, I have such color to see when we take a walk. So before it is all gone, and that last leaf drops, take a walk with me and the kids while we walk to church across the street.

Starting at our driveway, we will cross the small street to the parking lot.

 

Then we cross the street.

Into the parking lot we go.

Continue through the campus.

Now, we prepare to cross another small street

And then we arrive. It takes about 3 minutes. We are loving our walks!

And the best is our walk home with daddy!

Here are some of the pretty trees we see, while we walk. The first five or so, are from our front yard.

 Our porch. I love fall colors.

Happy Fall! Tomorrow, we might get a snow dusting!