Ordinary Time

One of our favorite read-aloud books is The Return of the Twelves by Pauline Clark.  It is about a young boy who happens to find the set of small wooden soldiers which turn out to have been owned by the Bronte children.  Of course, there is much more to the story than that, but I don't want to ruin it for you.  It's a great opening to learning about a famous family as well, because the Bronte children did have a set of soldiers which they wrote stories about. Why I am bringing this up?  Well, if you're like me, you suddenly realized that the gift-giving season is bearing down hard upon us and are starting to panic think about what your plan is.  I make a lot of the gifts I give my children, but there is a fine balance to be achieved between budget and the realities of time.  Since I have been trolling the internet these days searching for interesting ideas, I thought I would share one of my past ideas with you.   I made these for B. about 11 years a...

I try to practice hospitality.  I have discovered that as my family has grown, it has become both easier and more difficult to do this.  It is easier, because I don't spend quite so much time over-thinking it.  When I had fewer children and a bit more time, I would plan things to death.  Inviting someone over for dinner became an event.  One that took a lot of energy and time and wasn't something I wanted to do all the time.  As we grew in numbers, this level of planning became impossible if I still wanted to invite people over, so I had to relax a bit.  Instead of planning a special meal, I just make more of what we are having.  Instead of fussing over elaborate centerpieces and decorations, we pull up another chair (or two or three) to the table and hope that someone has been recently crumbed.  It's not as fancy, but more relaxing and doable. But as my family has grown, it has also become more difficult to be hospitable if only because of...

First, here is everyone at work busily carving pumpkins... either for themselves or for smaller people. G. (purple) and L. (pink) enjoyed playing in the pumpkin goo with spoons, but didn't really want to touch it with their hands. In general, my children need very little encouragement to dress in a costume.  Here is what they chose for Beggar's Night.  (My friend's term, which I really like and have decided to use.)  First the group who dressed up.  (A. and B. stayed home with me and helped to pass out ~600 pieces of candy... we get a lot of foot traffic in our neighborhood.) Some were distracted by things going on around them. L. as Tigger and G. as Pooh L. is showing she has a tail. G. K. as a fireman (with hose which was wielded as a weapon most of the night) D. as Gimli the Dwarf from The Lord of the Rings.  He caused the most confusion with 'viking' and "Hagrid' being the most popular guesses. TM as Robin Hood And P. as an equestrienne (h...

Today is TM's 9th birthday.  We celebrated last night.  Of course, as my children tend to do, he chose a birthday dessert which did not lend itself to candles.  A. and P. did the honors. Here is the birthday dessert TM choose.  Owl cupcakes.  He and A. wanted to make them and had a grand time decorating them yesterday.  Aren't they cute?  (The eyes are oreo halves.) G. waiting for her dessert Presents came after cake.  Here he is opening a gift from A. Laughing at a card from Grammy and Grandpa More and more people helped with the presents as the evening went on.  He loved all his gifts. L. and G. looking a bit worse for wear at the end of the evening. So, happy birthday, my son.  I love you very much.  I can't believe you are 9 years old. We have both come a long, long way from where we began.  It has been a wondrous journey. _________________ Go over and check out 4 Kids or More where I have been in...

We have heard the news the we have an official log-in date:  Oct. 24, 2011.  This is a big hurdle and now we settle in and wait.  It would be wonderful to hear that we have our Letter of Acceptance by Christmas.  This would put us on a timeline to travel around March.  Of course, I wouldn't complain if it all happened sooner, but I've learned to expect things to take longer, so we're back to not really knowing.  (If you're confused by all these terms, here's my adoption lingo explanation .) As excited as I am to be making this progress, I wouldn't be completely truthful if I didn't also share the anxiety I'm having as a result.  The anxiety isn't about what you would expect, either.  I know there will be challenges ahead as we integrate H. into our family.  I know there will be moments that aren't easy; moments where I wonder what we've done. But there will also be moments of joy and wonder as well.  That isn't the source of my anxiety...

I, who have no love for math, spent two hours last night calculating how big the pyramids would all be using a 30 meters to 1 centimeter scale.  And not only did I figure out the dimensions, I then cut them out of paper.  Why would a supposedly sane person do this, you ask?  Well, I am scheduled to teach the younger group of our history co-op this morning and we're all about hands-on learning.  What better way to get a sense of scale than to lay out a section of the Nile River valley on my third floor and place the pyramids where they would be found? Did you know that at this scale the Great Pyramid is 4.9 cm tall, the Statue of Liberty is 3 cm, a person is the size of a grain of salt, and the Nile River is 8 FEET wide?  I did the math over and over, but it's true.  And somewhat unbelievable.  Since we can't take a field trip to Egypt, we can at least get a sense of the immense size of the place.  And at this scale, we really can only lay out a ...

I have a newly discovered poem.  At least it's new to me, but it is not new by any stretch of the imagination.  It is the poem Aurora Leigh by Elizabeth Barrett Browning.  I came across a snippet of it when I was preparing for the chapter of Isaiah we were working on and was immediately smitten.  Here is the bit I first read: "Earth's crammed with heaven, And every common bush afire with God; And only he who sees, takes off his shoes; The rest sit round it and pluck black berries, And daub their natural faces unaware." Don't you love it?  We were looking at Isaiah 6:3 where Isaiah is in God's throne room and the seraphim are saying, "Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory."  The poem came into the discussion with the idea of the whole earth being full of God's glory.  I love the image of earth being crammed full of heaven... if only we have eyes to see it.  (Which also fits in quite well with Isaiah 6...