Holiday Fun

I love Christmas! I revel in the festivities and the lights and the anticipation as much as the kids do, and I delight in the simple and abundant joy that fills the season. We have had plenty of fun in the past couple of weeks.

First, Nana came to visit for a couple of days. "Nana Claus," as we began calling her, filled the tree with presents while Hannah was at school and Ben and Becca were napping. The kids loved having an early Christmas celebration and excitedly unwrapped the special gifts Nana brought for them. Additionally, Nana Claus filled the kids (and us!) with candy and other treats. But, most importantly, she filled our house with love and fun while she visited, and we felt sad to see her leave.

Then, on Monday, Ben had his preschool Christmas field trip to the carousel downtown. Siblings could attend, which greatly pleased Hannah, since her vacation began after school on Friday. We have not ridden the carousel since ballet ended last spring, and I have missed it! Becca's initial wariness of the ride this time surprised me and made me realize that I need to take them more often.

I love seeing their happy faces as they enjoy the ride.

Finally, tonight, we took our first drive of the season to see a lovely lights display at our county fairgrounds.

The display has thousands of lights, and for a few dollars, we drove through the fairgrounds to admire them.

Because we have watched A Charlie Brown Christmas so many times this year, the kids loved the Peanuts display.

But, their favorite part is always the light tunnel, which flashes and changes colors as the cars drive through.

I don't know which I enjoy more - seeing the lights or hearing my kids' excited squeals as we drive past. Fortunately, my parents love the display, too, which gives us a good excuse to go again in a few days when my parents come to visit.

And, really, I think that is why I love Christmas so much. It is a season filled with beauty and joy and abounding with good excuses for merriment and celebration and generosity and fun. In what better way could we celebrate the birthday of the Giver of "every good and perfect gift" than to allow our hearts and our lives to overflow with thankfulness and uncontainable joy? Merry Christmas! It truly is "the most wonderful time of the year."

Dabbling in the Domestic Arts

As part of the holiday celebrations at Hannah's school, the students are learning about gift giving. Each student has a "heart partner" for social studies (the school pairs kindergarteners with first graders), and the kids have to make gifts for their heart partners only using items they already have at home. Well, I had several sheets of red felt left over from making Hannah's lobster costume for Halloween, so we decided to sew a heart pillow for her heart partner.

At first, I did not think that Hannah could handle sewing at her age, but then I remembered Little House on the Prairie and imagined that Laura Ingalls was already sewing quite a bit by the age of six. So, we decided to tackle the project together.

First, I cut out two hearts from the red felt, and, since I had no stuffing in the house, we cut tiny strips of felt to use for the heart's filling. I pinned the whole project together, threaded the needle, and then showed Hannah how to do a simple running stitch - up and down through both layers of fabric. As I suspected, she needed quite a bit of help and her stitches followed a somewhat crooked path along the edge of the fabric, but overall she did a great job.

At first, I alternated with her, sewing a little when she needed a break. By the end, though, she sewed for a good length of time without my help, and when she got tired, I pushed the needle through the correct spot, and she pulled the thread out on the other side. Finally, as we neared completion, she excitedly took the heart and decided to finish all by herself. She really impressed me with her ability and determination, and she got to experience the satisfaction of completing a difficult project.

In attempting this project, I expected that Hannah might get excited about sewing and creating useful items, but I did not anticipate the effect it would have on the other children. Ben and Becca remained glued to our sides as Hannah and I worked, eagerly watching each tiny stitch. I explained to Hannah, to help her understand how to sew, that she should do the running stitch in the same way that she would work the laces through her lacing cards. As a result, the lacing cards have become a new favorite toy in our house. Ben and Becca spent the morning working on this:

"Look!" they exclaimed again and again, "I'm sewing a stop sign pillow! I'm making a stuffed orange!" They enthusiastically practiced, hoping that they, too, would be able to sew someday.

Little did I know, when taking on this school project for Hannah, that it would become a practical lesson in domestic arts, a chance for fine motor development, and an inspiration for all three kids to learn a new skill! Now, if only I could teach them to repair their own clothes... I guess I have to wait a few more years for that!

O Christmas Tree

On Saturday, we made our annual trek to a local Christmas tree farm to cut our Christmas tree. Josh and I have done this together since we were engaged, and our children make this tradition even more fun! A few years ago, we found a new farm after the old nursery stopped allowing people to cut their own trees, and although this farm is a bit farther away from our house, the trees have remained fresh and beautiful much longer. My family always had an artificial tree, so I take extra delight in the festive fragrance of fresh evergreen that fills my home each Christmas season.

After arriving at the farm (which we located much more easily this year with the help of our GPS), we parked near the Douglas firs and began searching for the perfect tree to bring home with us.

Some years, we struggle to find a tree we all love, but this year, we ended up choosing the first tree we saw. We dutifully looked around at other trees, but ultimately, we returned to the first tree that caught our eye.

Of course, we had to have a family photo in front of the tree! First, facing the sun (oops):

And then, with the sun behind the tree - much better!

After all of the required pictures, Josh began cutting down the tree.

This year, he did not even need my help. The tree had some bare space near the trunk at the bottom, which helped, as did the lack of snow on the ground this time. In past years, we have unwittingly timed our tree-cutting with the biggest early snowfall of the season, which makes for lovely pictures, but less than ideal cutting and driving conditions!

Hannah and Ben "helped" Josh drag the tree back to the car, and then I assisted in squeezing the 8-foot Douglas fir into our minivan.

We tied down the back door of the van, paid for our tree, loaded the kids into two separate cars, and began our journey home. We had to stop once on the way home to retie the back so the tree would not fall out while we were driving, but we made good time and got the tree set up before dinner.

We had a wonderful day together as a family, and we hope to decorate the tree soon as well. Finding four working strands of lights has proved to be a more daunting and time-consuming task than getting our tree! But, with Josh on the job, we should have a lovely, decorated tree by this weekend. Only 16 more days until Christmas!

Expectantly Waiting

Wikipedia defines Advent as "a season observed in many Western Christian churches, a time of expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of the Nativity of Jesus at Christmas." Although we kicked off our Christmas season with a train ride on the Polar Express, we desire our kids to focus mostly on the real reason for our celebration - Jesus' birth. So, as I pondered getting an Advent calendar to help us count down the days until Christmas, I wanted to make sure that they would be expectantly waiting for Jesus, and not presents or Santa. Unfortunately, nearly everything I found was either extremely expensive or poorly made.

Then, yesterday, a friend of mine posted a link to the Advent calendar she created for her family. I instantly loved the idea and decided to make a version of my own for our family this Christmas. Fortunately, I already had a lot of coordinating paper, so I did it almost completely with supplies I had on hand. I only had to purchase double-sided tape and some clothespins.

I began by cutting out 25 four-inch squares of solid colors and 25 three-inch squares of decorative paper. I happened to have paper with leaves on it, but anything festive will do. After laying out the solid-colored papers in the order I desired, I arranged the smaller papers on top of the larger ones. Then, I cut out 25 one-inch squares of various colors, wrote the numbers 1-25 on them, and added one to each set of squares. Using double-sided tape, I put each design together to create a pretty, numbered square - one for each day of Advent.

Then, I typed out 25 different verses, and centered them on 3.5-inch squares in Photoshop. I used Photoshop because I have many decorative fonts available in it, but any word processing program will work as long as the verses fit on the back of the fancy squares already designed. 3.5 inches worked well for me. Then, I printed the verses out on nice cardstock and affixed them, in order, to the back of each numbered square.

I used most of the same verses as my friend, but I did change a couple of them. These are the verses I used for each day:

1. In the sixth month, God sent an angel to Nazareth . . .The angel went to Mary and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.” (Luke 1:26,28)
2. The angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God. You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus . . .” (Luke 1:30,31)
3. “He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord will give him the throne of his Father David, and he will reign forever; his kingdom will never end.” (Luke 1:32,33)
4. The angel said, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.” (Luke 1:35)
5. “For nothing is impossible with God,” said the angel. “I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered.”May it be as you have said.” (Luke 1:37.38)
6. An angel appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife . . .She will give birth to a son, and you are to name him Jesus because he will save his people from their sins.” (Matthew 1:20,21)
7. All of this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Mary will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” which means, ”God with us.” (Matthew 1:22,23)
8. When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. (Matthew 1:24)
9. In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken . . . So Joseph also went up from Nazareth to Bethlehem the town of David. (Luke 2:4)
10. Joseph went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. (Luke 2:5)
11. While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger because there was no room in the inn. (Luke 2:6,7)
12. And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. (Luke 2:8,9)
13. But the angel said to them, ”Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people.” (Luke 2:10)
14. “Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. . . You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger,” said the angel. (Luke 2:11,12)
15. Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests.” (Luke 2:13,14)
16. When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.” (Luke 2:15)
17. So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. (Luke 2:17)
18. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. (Luke 2:17,18)
19. Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God . . . (Luke 2:19,20)
20. After Jesus was born in Bethlehem, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born King of the Jews? We saw his star and have come to worship him.” (Matthew 2:1,2)
21. They went on their way, and the star they had seen in the east went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. (Matthew 2:9)
22. When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. . .and presented him with gifts of gold, incense, and myrrh. (Matthew 2:10,11)
23. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)
24. Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. (1 Timothy 1:15)
25. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. (Isaiah 9:6)

Finally, I hung string from my curtains in my dining room, and clipped the squares to it with clothespins.

Each day during Advent, we will turn over a square and read the verse.

The kids love it and began begging to do it as soon as they came downstairs this morning. And I am thrilled that they are expectantly waiting for Christ this season... even as they wait for presents as well!

A Christmas Surprise

Last year, we surprised the kids with a trip on the Polar Express. We paid a little extra to become members of the railroad in order to avoid the lottery and buy tickets in advance. This year we decided just to take our chances with the lottery. Then, in early November, we realized that we had forgotten all about the lottery and had missed our chance to purchase tickets. However, out of curiosity, Josh went online to read about it and discovered that we could still get seats on weeknights in early December. We excitedly bought the tickets for December first and began planning for the kids' surprise.

On Tuesday, I let Becca and Ben stay in their pajamas all day and then convinced them that they needed to change into clean pajamas to pick Hannah up at school. We drove through the pick-up line, and I told Hannah that today was "Jammie Day," and she could change into her pajamas as soon as she got home from school. Josh was supposed to come home at 4:00, but he got tied up on a phone call. "Uh, oh," I told the kids, "I was going to go get dinner after Daddy came home, but he's going to be late, so I'm going to have to bring you all in your jammies." I took them all through the drive-thru at McDonald's just as Josh came home from work. When we got back to the house, I called Josh on the cell phone to "convince" him to come drive around with us to look at Christmas lights. He finally agreed, and we began our drive to Cleveland for the train ride, pointing out lights along the highway as we drove. The kids began whining to use the bathroom about 10 minutes from the station, so we told them we were driving to a place where we knew there would be restrooms. As we pulled into the station, Hannah noticed the sign and started screaming in excitement, "It's the Polar Express! We're going on the Polar Express!"

We really enjoyed the train ride, just like last year. We got seats in the dome car this time, so we were a bit more comfortable, and the windows extended across the ceiling as well as the sides, which gave us a lovely view of the full moon as we rode. The kids snuggled up in their blankets in the beginning, while an elf read The Polar Express over the loudspeaker and we followed along in our copy of the book.

Once the train picked up a little speed, the elves brought around hot chocolate (at a much more drinkable temperature than last year) and delicious chocolate chip cookies.

Finally, we reached the "North Pole." The elves handed out paper towels for the kids to wipe the condensation off of the windows as the train slowly moved into the station, full of lights and actors dressed as elves and Christmas characters.

After about fifteen minutes, the train began moving back along the tracks towards the first station.

To help pass the time, the elves led Christmas carols, which Hannah enjoyed very much.

Santa also came around and gave each kid a souvenir sleigh bell to bring home, pausing to autograph our The Polar Express book as well.

Ben mostly just stared out the window, and Becca alternated between snuggling on my lap and bouncing off the walls!

We arrived at the station a little after 9:00pm, and began the long journey home. Becca slept, but Hannah and Ben somehow stayed awake for the whole car ride. Sleepily, the kids trudged up the steps into the house, where they saw our Polar Express train set, which Josh had put together in the living room while the kids and I were out getting dinner. After a few minutes of playing with the train, the kids finally crashed in their beds around midnight! Needless to say, Hannah slept in instead of going to school on Wednesday, but we all enjoyed having a wonderful surprise family outing to kick off our Christmas celebration this year.

Bones and Stones

For Thanksgiving this year, we traveled to visit my dad's family in Pittsburgh, PA. In contrast to our very rustic Thanksgiving last year, we stayed in a hotel with my parents, my brother, and his girlfriend, and we ate our meal in the comfort of my aunt and uncle's home, driving to my grandparent's house for dessert. We had a wonderful time visiting family, many of whom the kids have not seen in a couple of years.

On Saturday, we decided to enjoy Pittsburgh a bit, so we headed across the city to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. What a wonderful museum! I knew they had a great dinosaur exhibit, but I never expected the kids to get so excited about the gems and minerals exhibit. All three kids were completely enthralled with the beautiful rocks and crystals.

Hannah thought they were beautiful and suggested that maybe she would rather be a geologist than an entomologist when she grows up. When we asked Becca about her favorite part of the museum later, she told us, "The rocks. They were pretty and shiny and sparkly and glowy in the dark..." She was adorable!

As I expected, the kids loved the dinosaur exhibit as well. The display had full skeletons of all of the dinosaurs most kids would readily recognize - apatosaurus, diplodocus, triceratops, stegosaurus, and of course, tyrannosaurus rex.

The museum also had many lesser known dinosaurs and another gallery dedicated to Ice Age animals, like mammoths and mastodons.

After viewing all of the wonderful skeletons, we arrived at a section geared entirely towards kids - "Bonehunter's Quarry." Many skeleton replicas lay buried in a waxy clay-like substance. Children first donned a pair of safety goggles and then used a chisel and a paintbrush to carefully excavate the bones. All three kids loved this part - especially Hannah! They definitely learned that uncovering dinosaur bones is a delicate and difficult job, requiring a lot of patience.

We spent the majority of our time in these two sections, but the museum had many more wonderful displays - North American and African animals, birds, Native Americans, Egypt, life in the Polar regions. We did walk through most of the exhibits, but by the end, the kids were tired and ready for lunch. We all had a great time and learned quite a bit, and I think if we go back, we will start on the top floor and work our way down so we can spend more time in some of the displays we missed or rushed through this time.

After a nice lunch, we returned to the hotel for a lazy afternoon. Becca took a nap while Hannah and Ben played with Grandma and PopPop in their hotel room. Well, they played for a little while until they both succumbed to their sleepiness and took a nice long nap on my parents' bed.


Aren't they sweet?

I love museums, and I think I will use this one as a starting point for a long unit on dinosaurs. I have a great book full of dinosaur-themed activities for Ben, and I just finished reading him Dinosaurs Before Dark last month. Now I just need find a way to work some geology into the unit, as well!

Learning "On the Go"

Between sick kids and Josh's MBA class, I have not spent much time doing "formal" school with the kids this month. However, we have spent a great deal of time learning.

I have discovered that Ben enjoys when I read the Magic Tree House books to him, since some of the words are still a little difficult for him to decipher on his own. Plus, he likes asking me constant questions while I read so he can understand the information better. After reading the first book in the series, I skipped ahead to Thanksgiving on Thursday, in order to coordinate with the season. Ben and Becca liked the story, but I think some of it may have been a little over their heads. Additionally, Ben practiced reading The Story of Thanksgiving by Nancy Skarmeas. This is an excellent, simple book that explains clearly why we celebrate Thanksgiving. I only had to help him with a few words, like "Pilgrims" and "Plymouth," the first time through, and he read it perfectly to his preschool class a few days later. I was very proud of him. He is blossoming as a reader, and though he does not read as avidly as Hannah, he definitely enjoys it.

For fun, we have watched our Charlie Brown Thanksgiving DVD multiple times this month as well. A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving mostly just makes the kids laugh, but The Mayflower Voyagers is wonderfully educational and has helped the kids understand what the Pilgrims faced in order to settle in the new world. The first time we watched it, they marveled loudly over the length of the journey and expressed sadness about how many of the original settlers died. Now, they impress me with the random facts about the Pilgrims that I often do not even remember from the film.

Through the busyness of this season, I have also discovered the educational value of waiting in the car for Hannah's school dismissal. Just while sitting in the car in the afternoons, Ben has learned how to count by tens and Becca has learned about rhyming words and that "ck" sounds like "k" and not "sk." I often spell a simple c-v-c word, and Becca tells me what it is, or I ask her how to spell a word and she spells it for me. She has become quite good at reading short vowel words and even surprised me today by telling me that "oo" sounds like "ew." I don't even know where she learned that one!

So, in this hectic time of year, I am squeezing education into the extra spaces of my day, by reading and talking and answering an abundance of questions. Looking back, though, I am encouraged to see that my kids are indeed learning, even if that learning does not always resemble "school."