Wishing For Pine Needles

Valentine-ing

 

How did you spend your Valentine's Day?  (Hope it was a happy one!)

A New Year

For me, the new year came during some knitting and baby snuggling.  Hmmm.....all good signs for a peaceful 2012.

Wishing you and yours the most wonderful of New Years!

Our Twelve Days of Christmas.....Catch Up!

These twelve days of Christmas have been so full....so full that I've forgotten to post about them!  We'd like to share just a bit of our merry-making....phew!

Happy Christmas Eve To You!

Our Twelve Days of Christmas.....It's Not OUR Birthday!

A friend recently shared a very true statement with me.

Christmas is not OUR birthday!  This profound little thought has become a family theme for us this year.  We are pondering the advent conspiracy movement and re-evaluating what this season means to us.  While we love the traditions and the warmth of Christmas, we have made a concerted effort to make it a less complicated and more meaningful holiday.

This "Our Twelve Days of Christmas" series I've been blogging about has highlighted some of the fun things we do as a family, and having fun together is most definitely a goal for us all during this magical time of year.  And because there is so much to choose from, we have to pick what we like best.

But fun and important are not the one and the same, and while we enjoy participating in festivities and traditions we also know that they are not really all that important.  Does it really matter if we sit on Santa's lap every year?  Or bake the same dozen kinds of cookies?  No!  It doesn't!

What is important is that we acknowledge that Jesus is Lord, and that He was sent into this world, fully God and fully man, into the form of a sweet, newborn baby.  It is HIS birthday!  And this is our true gift.

So as we enjoy this special season, we have taken a step back to make it a little less harried, a little less expensive, and a little less the-same-old-thing. 

You see, this leaves us more energy to focus on the Christ child, and this my friends, brings the most complete and real joy there could ever be.

 

Our Twelve Days of Christmas....Sleepover!

Today was spent recovering from our annual sleepover by the Christmas tree.  There was even a time today, albeit brief, that all four children were napping at the same time.  It's true, I tell you!

Sleeping over all cozied up in the family room has become one of our very favorite Christmas traditions, and last night was the perfect night.  Yesterday was the last day of school for this year, there were no practices or lessons to wake up for this morning, and Christmas is in the air all around us!

I'm so thankful for these sweet and cozy times, the memories we are making, and the ones that have already been made.  Isn't Christmastime just the best?

8 more days!

the Holiday

 

Hoping your Thanksgiving holiday was a happy one!

 

 

(and that your week is off to a good start!)

Hurray for Fall....and Pumpkin Milkshakes!

 

I love Fall because of.....

-warm drinks
-so many colors
-marshmallows
-bonfires
-sweaters
-caramel and apples, together or not
-hayrides
-baking
-chilly mornings
-nestling in
-and pumpkin milkshakes!

Pumpkin Milkshakes

2 cups vanilla ice cream
1 cup milk
2/3 cup canned pumpkin
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
whipped cream and extra pumpkin pie spice for topping

Combine first 5 ingredients in a blender; process until smooth.  Pour into glasses and top with whipped cream and sprinkle pumpkin pie spice if desired.  Serves 4 approximately.

(from Cooking Light, adapted by me)

What do you love about Fall?

 

 

 

Fall Farm Love

Loving Fall here!  How about you?

(Linking up with The Prairie Homestead on 10/3/11...check this cool blog out!)

Truly, the End of Summer

Around here summer seems to be officially wrapping up.  Fall, right on schedule, somehow knew that Labor day came and went and then settled in quite comfortably with a week of rain and chill.  (We hope she doesn't forget about those cool, crisp, sunny, apple-orchard days that we long for so badly!)

Labor Day this year brought us in these parts one sweltering day of 101° and another of a brisk 65°. (What are we supposed to do with that, except for to alternate swimming and ice cream with sweaters and socks?)

We celebrated a birthday with a special grandma who came to see us.....

and finished it off with an "indoor picnic" with lots of grandmas and grandpas all at one big table.

This new season marks the beginning of more changes for us here, mainly with the birth of one new little baby coming up very soon.  While we are excited beyond words to meet this little one, I am also enjoying where we are right now, because it will never be exactly this way again.

What does the start of this new season mean to you this year?

 

Back to School.....(already!)

Does anyone else feel like this summer has flown by faster than the last three summers combined?

Here, we are officially back to school!

Back to early bedtimes.....and early mornings.....

Back to packing lunches.....everyday.....

Back to homework......

Back to a routine!

Back to a school we all adore.....

and teachers we love dearly.

Back to friends who are more like a second family.

Back to learning....

about math, spelling, and grammar......

reading, writing, and geography.....

God and country.

Back to being another year older....

and another year wiser.

Back to knowing that by the end of this year,

my two baby girls will be 10 and 7 years old.

And wondering how on earth that happened.

(Hoping your school years are off to a great start!)