Getting There

A dreary day, saved by Samuel Whiskers.

This winter that is not continues. It rained cats and dogs all night last night - and I live in Canada! Amy is sick with the flu (again!) and was up fussing. Maybe the sound of the storm bothered her, too. I hardly got any sleep. This morning it was still dark, rainy and incredibly dreary.

I naturally slept in too late and was behind schedule. I somewhat grumpily rushed through breakfast and had just enough time to get a quick shower before we started our homeschool lessons (I try to start at the same time each morning). But just I was sprinting for the shower, hoping that this was not going to be One of Those mornings, Jasper tugged on my sleeve and showed me a book he had picked out: The Tale of Samuel Whiskers, by Beatrix Potter. "Can you please read this book to me, Mom?" he asked politely with a smile. My heart flooded with warmth and happiness. How could I refuse? Sometimes it's better to forget about the schedule.

As he often does, this little guy reminded me to slow down and enjoy the moment, and not be so serious! He listened intently to the whole story - he has an amazing attention span for a 3 year old. It's a funny story. After it was done I carried on the rest of the day's activities with a different attitude. And you know what? I notice that when I make an effort to slow down more, and concentrate on each task before me, instead of trying to do many things at once, I actually get more done.

The rain continued all day. The common behind our house is entirely flooded. Really not a good day to play outside. The children weren't quite as chipper as usual, being cooped up inside. So I decided that after lunch, it was necessary to make chocolate cupcakes with sprinkles. That makes sense, right?

I had a helper in the kitchen, as usual...

I am happy to say these cupcakes (topped with ganache rather than icing) were ridiculously good. Maybe some time I'll share the recipe!

There was still a few meltdowns and tense moments today, and naps were taken...but all in all I think this day was much better than it could have been. :)

A zippered pouch.

A little while ago, my husband bought Jasper a collection of little plastic horses from the dollar store. He loves those horses! But they have been scattered all over the house for weeks now. I decided to do something about it. I had a bit of fabric (that was generously given to me) with cowboys and horses on it, and I had seen this tutorial a while ago - so I gave it a go.

I was a little bit nervous when I read in the tutorial that I needed to use a zipper foot - because I had never done that before, and in fact had no idea what my machine's zipper foot looked like. I figured it out though! And this little bag was quite easy and quick to sew up. Of course, if you look closely you will see that none of the seams are quite straight and the lining is all bunchy...no problem though. I'm pleased with myself, since it's the first time I sewed a zipper into anything.

Jasper was quite thrilled with it, which warmed my heart! I love making things for children.

Hit by the flu.

I guess it's that time of year. A few weeks ago Kira came down with the flu. Then last week, Chris got sick...he got it the worst of all of us, and had to take a day off work to just sleep. Jasper was very sick last weekend too. A few days ago Owen started with the fever and cough and sore throat, and today I find my throat is sore and scratchy, and I feel weak and dizzy...humph. I thought I was going to fight it off, but I guess not. Perhaps it has something to do with getting only about 5 hours of (broken) sleep the last couple of nights.

Amazingly, Amy has not gotten sick...surprising considering the number of kisses she gets on a daily basis!

Last weekend when I was walking quickly into the grocery store an elderly gentlemen took one look at me, made a gesture moving his hands towards the ground and said (with a smile) "Slow down! Slow down!" I didn't respond; it sort of stunned me for a moment, but once I was in the store I got it and started giggling. I must have looked silly speed walking into the store so seriously. I resvoled anew to stop rushing around and start taking on my daily tasks at a gentler pace.

This sickness has certainly forced me to maintain that resolution. The way this flu bug has picked us off one at a time, and then lingered...we have had sickness in the house for weeks now and it's still going. We haven't gone anywhere (other than me to the grocery store and Chris to work), and our homeschool activities have been put on hold...we've all just been basically hibernating here, reading, relaxing, playing video games, making paper snowflakes...actually it's been rather nice, fevers and runny noses aside.

I put some winter and Christmas books into a thrifted basket...I rather like how it looks. (Once the holidays are over, these books will go away until next year.)

My Christmas shopping is done too, which helps me to feel relaxed--although I haven't made any headway on the quilt. I thought I would just try to do the top and give that to Jasper on Christmas morning, but alas! When I went to press the very first seam with the iron, the fabric wrinkled and melted. I guess some of the scraps I had received were polyester. I am not sure if it's a good idea, but I have decided to proceed, and just keep the iron on low...wish me luck. :)

Today we woke up to the very first snow fall--it's the first time the snow has stayed on the ground, anyway. As I was looking out of the window at the lovely snow-covered branches I saw two "V" formations of Canada geese flying due south. I guess winter is truly here...and like every year, now is the time to put on some slippers and spend some quiet, restful time in the house. I'm going to be shutting down our Etsy shop for a holiday break in a few days, too, and I'm looking forward to that.

I do hope though, that we'll be free of this flu bug before Christmas arrives! Has anyone else been hit by the flu?

December already!

I can't believe it is December already!

I remembered at bedtime last night that I needed to get out and tie up the little Advent bags I made last year...it didn't seem real to me that the end of November had come so fast.

(I put something special in one bag each night leading up to Christmas.)

It also doesn't look like the holiday season outside--we had so much rain lately, that yesterday we had quite an impressive flood out behind our house. And so far we have had only an extremely light dusting of snow which didn't last.

But, the calendar does say December 1st. Yikes!

You know, a little while ago I was in the dollar store (buying some Christmas tins to use for giving baked goods to Kira's friends). It was very busy, and I couldn't get over the feeling of almost panic that I sensed there. The feeling that I sense in every store this time of year. Everyone is frantically trying (or so it seems to me) to buy everything they need before it's too late. It is a very unpleasant feeling in the air. I would like to say that I am beyond all that holiday anxiety, but it wouldn't be true. I admit, I feel anxious right now too. I may not buy very many things, but there are so many things I would like to make for Christmas and I know I will get little of it done. It just seems that there are too many things going on in my life--all good things, but still. Sometimes I feel like I have more blessings than I can take!

(Actually, I have been considering lately giving up blogging. I love it, but I just have so much to do, and I seem to be having a harder and harder time, since the baby was born, to find time for it. I haven't made any decisions yet, just thinking about it.)

It's strange, that this time of year, when the darkness and cold should be forcing us to slow down and hibernate, we instead pick up the pace, rush around buying things, baking things, making things. Even for someone like me who is trying to keep our holidays low key--I am not even exchanging gifts with the extended family, and we will only be attending one party this year--I still have a lot to do. I can't tell you about the projects I want to do, of course, for those children of mine who can read.

I will say though, the quilt I am making for Jasper is simply NOT coming along at all. Day after day I try to find time to work on it, but it doesn't happen...but somehow the kids manage to spend time in my work room even if I don't, and mess it up to the point where I'm going to have to clean it for half an hour before I will be able to do anything. *sigh*

It doesn't help that Amy just cut another tooth. I am just not getting enough sleep. My energy levels are not what they should be, despite all the vitamins I take and the water I drink. I know all the moms out there understand, so I won't complain any more. :)

One project I hope I'll have time for is making some festive garlands to decorate up the house--I'd like to use some fabric scraps I have to make a yo-yo garland or two, like this one I saw here:

I feel so lucky that earlier this year, a friend gave me a big stack of Christmas fabric squares, among other fabric. I know I will be using up these bits for years to come!

Of course, December also means baking. I have a list of things I want to make: Chocolate covered pretzels, like we make every year, candy cane bark, date squares, truffles, sugar cookies, and cherry shortbread. Nothing in the list is too complicated, I should be able to manage it all.

Does anyone have a favourite truffle recipe they'd like to share? I think maybe when I get started on my baking, I'll make the truffles first...I could use a few myself. :)

By the way, for anyone who wants to spend some time reading with a big mug of tea...the Winter edition of Rhythym of the Home is up (our Etsy shop is a sponsor there). For those not familiar with it, it's a quarterly magazine for parents filled with lovely seasonal craft ideas, recipes, interviews, and articles about family life and celebrations. Just throwing that out there!

Leaf Pictures.

We still have quite a lot of leaves hanging around our neighbourhood (on the ground, anyway), so when I saw this post on making pictures from pressed leaves, I wanted to give it a try with the children.

Our results weren't quite as fabulous as the ones in the original post, but we had fun. Strange that although we have been doing crafts with autumn leaves for many years now, I had never thought of simply gluing pressed leaves together into a picture.

Kira made a bunny:

Owen made a monster:

And Jasper made what he called a leaf pile. And then, before I could take a picture of it, he added more glue. And more glue. And a hazelnut, it looks like. And then he added more glue, until the bottle was empty. He squeezed the last bit that was left onto his brother's picture, apparently.

It was fun not only to make the craft, but to go for a walk looking for different shapes of leaves. Next year I'll try this again, but maybe I'll supervise the glue usage a bit more carefully. :)

Has anyone else been doing anything fun with the last remaining autumn leaves?

What I've been up to.

Thank you sincerely to everyone who offered their encouraging comments on my lost post. Obviously I've been feeling a wee bit frazzled lately. A teething baby will throw off the schedule in just about any home, I suppose. And Chris has started a new job where he is away for long hours every day. Yet, I am learning to manage this new life with four children. I am learning to pace myself, to take time to recharge myself, and most importantly to engage the children in the work that needs to be done.

I decided to declare a no-school week this week--instead we are having a Life Skills Week. The time I would normally spend "doing school" with the children--about 2 hours per day, usually--I will dedicate to teaching the children how to help me more around the house. Today I worked with the boys for a while ensuring they knew how to put their own laundry away and tidy their room. Later today I will teach Kira how to do laundry. And the week will continue like that. I hope that this will be a good investment of time and that things will go at least a little bit smoother in the future.

Yesterday too, when I planted some garlic in the back yard which I had sprouted, I made sure Owen helped me. (I know, it's rather late to be planting garlic in Canada, but I had a whole bag full that was going to go bad before I could use it so I figured, might as well give it a shot! I put some cloves in a container with wet paper towel, and almost every clove sprouted within 24 hours.)

I pulled out the few straggly chamomile plants I had to make room for the garlic. There were a few blossoms on the chamomile, which strangely were the nicest and largest blossoms I've had so far. But there were only a few, not even enough for a good cup of tea, so out they came. I am sure the chamomile didn't grow very well because of the lack of sun in my back yard--for that same reason, I'm sure the garlic won't grow well either, but it's fun to experiment anyway.

I am going to try my best from now on to involve the children in my daily tasks. There is just no way I can comfortably manage our family business, take proper care of the home, cook all our food from scratch, tend to the baby, and facilitate the children's education besides, all by myself. I need to learn to delegate jobs, and ensure everyone in the house is resposible for their own messes.

But enough about that. I also wanted to mention a small sewing project I did for Halloween. Owen wanted to be Toad, who is character in the Super Mario universe who looks like a toadstool. I was rather proud of myself that I whipped up the right kind of hat at the last minute with some scrap fabric, although since I was making it about 5 pm on Halloween I had to glue on the red dots instead of sewing them by hand. Here is Amy modeling the hat:

In other news, I harvested my humble herb garden a little while ago, and some bunches of sage, lemon balm, rosemary and oregano have been drying on my clothes line in the back hall. It makes me so happy to see bunches of herbs drying! I'm not sure why, but it's just a happy sight. (No basil; my plant was huge, but it all withered away after a light frost we had one night. That's what I get for procrastinating.)

Remember my post on Unplugged Sunday? Well, we have been continuing this, and I must say it has been wonderful. I really enjoy having a day free from electronics. The house is so quiet and peaceful, and we have been doing some really fun activities in place of television and computer. My husband, for example, helped the children make their own board game. It's based on the video game MarioKart, which is ironic I know, but they have all been working hard on the game and it's such a joy to see the whole family work together on a project. (And fun to play together, as well).

Of course, with a seven month old girl around here, a lot of cuddling has been going on. Amy's older siblings all adore her and sometimes fights break out over who gets to cuddle with her! I guess there are worse things children could argue about. And I guess I understand. She's pretty darn cute.

(That's milkweek fluff on her shoulder--we had just gotten back from a walk!)

Life is full and good. :)

Book Review: Mrs. Sharp's Traditions.

Mrs. Sharp's Traditions: Reviving Victorian Family Celebrations of Comfort & Joy is a book originally published in 1990 by Sarah Ban Breathnach. Some might recognize her as the author of the bestseller, Simple Abundance: A Daybook of Comfort and Joy. Simple Abundance was written later--Mrs. Sharp's Traditions was her first book.

Writing in the voice of the fictional Victorian homemaker and mother of 12 Victoriana Sharp, Ms. Ban Breathnach takes the reader through the year month by month, and describes in detail the type of customs, crafts and celebrations that families in the late 1800s enjoyed. Short essays on the history of different holidays are included, as well as a special poem for each month. Delightful illustrations from the Victorian era decorate each page.

Although this book may catalogue the traditions of times past, it was written by a modern author with the goal of providing inspiration to modern families. And that is exactly what it does. Not only was this book a joy to read, it gave me many ideas for new traditions I would like to include in our own family holidays. The book also contains many lovely ideas for family traditions and rituals that are carried out all year round--for example, the author details how to plan a weekly Family Night, how to create calming bedtime rituals, and how to make outings in the country memorable for children.

Where holidays are concerned, the book deals with all the ones we are familiar with in North America (including Jewish holidays), as well as several European holidays we may not be familiar with, such as Michaelmas, All Soul's Day, and St. Lucia's Day. The changing of the seasons are also talked about--for example, she includes some nice ideas for making crafts with nature's bounty in the autumn.

This is a wonderful resource for families of young children who would like to add some new rituals and traditions into their life. I highly recommend Mrs. Sharp's Traditions to any mother who would like to make next year's seasonal changes and holidays a little more special and memorable for her children.

Just a little thing.

Our house has been so chilly the past few days...and I am loathe to turn on the electric heaters, because I know that once I do our utility bill will suddently skyrocket.

I worry about the children though, so I have been trying to make sure everyone is warmly dressed. I didn't have a hat for Amy--I had plenty of newborn hats, but none of them fit anymore. And I didn't really want to buy a hat. I thought of making a cute aviator style cap, with a ribbon tie, but I couldn't find any patterns that didn't look much too complicated for me.

The house was really quite cold yesterday afternoon, and I wanted a hat for her pronto! So I grabbed an old plum coloured work shirt of Chris's that had done that annoying thing that shirts do--become wide and short. I laid it out flat, cut out a rough hat shape (I didn't even bother to draw it first) and then sewed both sides together. It took me more time to find a chopstick to turn the end out than it did to make it, for real!

Amy seems to like it. Now I want to make more hats. It really struck me how easy it was for me to find a solution to the problem at hand (cold, bald baby head) using what I had, without spending a penny. I know I know, it's just a hat, it took zero skill, but a few years ago I wouldn't have even thought of doing that. I would have dragged the baby out to a department store and spent $5 or $10 on a little hat which might have looked fancier but wouldn't have been any more serviceable.

I am inspired. From now on, I will look at every cast-off T-shirt as potential baby garments. I can't wait to experiment!

Unplugged Sunday.

Has anyone seen the blog, Unplugged Sunday? It is a collaborative effort of multiple writers, all on the theme of "unplugging" from electronics and media for one day each week--Sunday.

Ever since I stumbled upon the blog a few months ago, I have been thinking about trying it with our family. I have, in the past, implemented entire weeks with no electronics, and I always loved doing this--I loved the peace and quiet, the time to do more crafts and even cleaning, the artwork the children produced. But unfortunately, I don't think my family would appreciate it very much if I regularly said "no tv this week." Rather to my chagrin, my children really enjoy video games and DVDs. I limit the amount they can play/watch, but I still often feel that they stare at a screen more often than is healthy. I also don't like the fights that video games often seem to produce among them.

So I thought one day a week without technology might be nice. I spoke to Chris about the idea, and he was immediately on board--a gesture which I really appreciated, since he enjoys online games himself! And so this Sunday was our first Unplugged Sunday.

So all day yesterday, the computer and the television were off limits. I even unplugged them so they wouldn't get "accidentally" turned on. Yes, there were a few minor grumbles, but overall we had a lovely family day. We had a relaxed pancake breakfast; lots of reading happened; we made a baking soda and vinegar volcano, much to the delight of all; the children played outside for hours; and perhaps most importantly, the house had a very quiet, peaceful feeling all day. I think Unplugged Sunday will become a regular tradition in our family. For future Sundays, I would like to plan more specific activities to do as a family, such as board game tournaments, nature walks, and holiday crafts.

If anyone else is intrigued by the idea of Unplugged Sundays, here is a list of posts for those just getting started. :)

Apple Picking.

I've been itching to take the children apple picking lately. Last year, we didn't go until mid-October and it was disappointing trying to find decent apples on the well-picked trees. But throughout September I have been hesitating because we've been having so much rain. Every day I keep thinking either that it will rain, or that it will be too wet from the rain we had the day before.

Then yesterday I was reading in Mrs. Sharp's Traditions (a lovely book about creating family traditions and memories, which I will review soon) a page on family outings. The author was talking about how important it is to sometimes surprise children with a spontaneous outing, and I thought to myself, enough worrying already, let's just go!

Chris was agreeable, since worrying about the weather is just not something he does (I could learn a few lessons from that man). So this morning we were off...and wouldn't you know, that the day was just about perfect! Cool but not cold, breezy, mostly sunny...it started to sprinkle just as we were heading towards the van for the return trip. And the orchard itself was quite dry.

The farm we went to is a bit of a drive away, but it's so nice there.

They have a hayloft absolutely stuffed with straw where the kids can play...

And a little shop selling caramel apples, muffins, sausages and of course, apple fritters.

The trees were very heavily laden--we certainly had no problem finding enough apples this year!

 
Amy slept soundly the whole time. Have I mentioned that she is a whole six months old already? She looks huge to me, sleeping there in the stroller...times goes too fast.

It was a beautiful day and a lovely outing. I'm so glad we went, and made some new memories, and I didn't listen to my silly fears about mud puddles. As a bonus, when we got to the farm we met another homeschooling family, also with four children, who were just leaving, and we chatted with them a few minutes. It's always fun to meet other homeschoolers.

I have to say, having our children home with us all the time provides such a great opportunity to beat the crowds and do outings like this when all the other kids are in school. We have been to this same farm before on the weekend and it was rather crazy...but today it was downright tranquil.

Next to the eating area there was a bin filled up with cut apple wood, which I assume was going to be used for somebody's wood stove or fireplace. As I passed by it, I got a sort of shivery feeling all over...I know, it sounds a bit melodramatic, but--that bin of firewood seemed to represent country life to me, and for an instant I pretended that I was in our own yard and that bin of firewood was for us. And I thought of how right that would feel, to be storing up fuel for the coming winter.

Living in the city, having only one vehicle and limited funds, I don't get out into the country nearly as often as I'd like. But each time I do, I am reminded that yes, that is the life that I want. Someday....