Merry Christmas

We wish you a Merry Christmas!

We have had a lovely day. It was a small and quiet gathering. Due to my lingering illness I couldn't gather the energy to do much. Thanks for all the help from my sister, mom and my grandmother and dear husband we pulled off a nice Christmas celebration.

Grammy and the chidren gave us a presentation of the Christmas story - J has brought humor to us this season. He keeps saying "Mary and Moses" instead of "Mary and Joseph" when he sees Nativity scenes. He insisted loudly that he wanted to be Moses this morning but was pleased to instead be Gabriel and deliver the message to Mary. It was a delightful reminder of CHRISTmas this morning. The children were exceptionally happy with their gifts and were truly thankful as they expressed their gratitude to each gift giver.

We even crammed in a fast game of Monopoly this afternoon. Though unfortunately we discovered this afternoon that the dishwasher is not draining so Aaron has been battling with it. Not our Christmas wish, but these things do happen at inconvenient times.

I did get my jammies on shortly after 4 and tucked myself under blankets. I believe I will be off to the doctor in the morning - it seems to be the 2nd bout with bronchitis in less than 6 weeks so we need to do something much different. I am also scaling back our life and creating more home time for my rest and healing (not to mention the home management, unpacking, schooling, baby preparations, etc). Sometimes life forces decisions that must be made for the good of all.

A Father's Job

I love my job.  No, not the one I get paid for.  (ok, that one's fun too)

No, I'm talking about the one where I get to teach the kids that life is difficult.  But to keep on keepin' on.

By buying them scooters.

(stick with me here...)

Yes, I did.  boise.craigslist.com listing...the guy had 2 used ones at a price I just couldn't pass up.

15mph, electric, and an absolute hoot and a hollar.  (Janey's translation: "potential kid dismembering death traps")

Now how, do you rightly ask, could I possibly be in my right mind by saying "this teaches the kids that life is hard." 

I'm getting to that.  Be patient.  (that's another thing I get to teach my kids. Patience.)

So we bought those two electric mini bikes.  (and helmets)  And 15mph is pretty fast.  But it's not, generally speaking, life threatening.  (see the aforementioned helmets)

But it - very likely - hurts.  Skinned knees.  Bonked noggins.  Wipeout/rolls along the ground. 

Now while Janey maintains that my job is to try to maim the kids and her job is to keep me from maiming them too severely I look at it differently.  Life skins you up sometimes.  Tosses you higglety-pigglety and skids you along for a while.  It hurts.  Knocks the wind out of you.  Gives you some bruises and blood.

Does that mean you give up?  Absolutly not.  If we had horses,  I could draw the appropriate "if the horse bucks you off..." analogy...but we don't have horses.  (let me repeat that...we *don't* have horses.)  But we now have these.

So, you see, in my own fatherly way I'm grooming these kids to ride life to the fullest, deal with the inevitable crash and burn, and keep going.

It was hard.  But sometimes love must be tough.

Warning: Sleepwalking boys are dangerous!

Well, potentially.

So C (being 7) is working on "waking up to go potty".  Sometimes it works.  Sometimes not.

Sometimes it works half-way.

Like last night.  About 11pm, he goes tripping past my door.  Walking purposely.  Quickly.  

"Uh...son?  Are you ok?"

Mumbled reply.

Now I'm all cozy warm in bed.  Really don't want to get up.  Maybe he just needed a stuffed animal that's downstairs.  Yeah.  That's it.

Or not.

Wait.  Listen.  Wait...nothing.

I finally peel myself out of bed to go check on him.  And not a second too soon.  

He's standing in the living room. 

Eyes 3/4 closed.

Facing straight into the coat closet.

Jammie bottoms around his ankles.

"WHOA boy...!" sez I.  I steer him quickly back into the bathroom and get him seated.  Check back at the potential zone 'o danger.  No moisture.  Whew.  

That was close.

Our new addition...

drum roll please.......

I had my ultrasound and midwife check up today!

First news: the ultrasound this time confirmed that MY due date was more accurate (rather than what the little wheel says), looks like May 20th. So that means that we were trying to ultrasound too soon and the diagnostics/measurements couldn't really be done. We will ultrasound again next month.

Second news:
But we did get the BIG news that we are having a GIRL! Another little daughter and we are excited!!!

Another Step Forward and Misc

Hello!

I have been checking other blogs and thinking "why aren't there new updates? I want to know what is going on !?!?"

Then I realized that maybe I should update my own little space with some snippets, even though they seem trivial.

Okay, I have the sunroom mostly arranged and the boxes unpacked. It is the most "peaceful" room in the house in that chaos isn't the majority of the space.

Next is the kitchen, I believe that I have unpacked all of the kitchen boxes and that I have 98% of it put away. There are lots of homeless things that are landing in the kitchen that don't belong there, so it is still chaotic and I avoid it. However I do have all of my cooking equipment accessible and I can cook - if only the homeless clutter would leave the counters and congregate somewhere else less crucial. And I have everything nicely arranged the shelves aren't bulging. I feel good about the purging that I did.

The garden - I feel like I am running out of time on my garden prep. I still have about 30 minutes of weed whacking to do - but it is COLD! Then I have my newspapers to lay out and then cover over with the leaves. I am hoping that I will get out there tomorrow morning and tackle it. Then it is ready for the snow and will be bedded down to work into the soil.

Okay the more enjoyable of all this is some baby prep. I snatched up some Black Friday on-line sales and free shipping and got some good deals on maternity clothes and cloth diapers. In fact I even feel motivated to try my hand at sewing some diapers. I am a bit selfish in that I like to do all this baby stuff myself - call it quality control but really I just thoroughly ENJOY it and love to delve into it!

We do have our ultrasound on Monday and are excitedly waiting to get peeks at the baby and know who this little person is. Then I can get some flannel fabric to make up for this special person. I have been feeling baby Backer off and on the past month. The off days have honestly made me very nervous and prayerful. But I am feeling more confidence with more movements.

We had our homeschool co-op class today. I am amazed at how much I have enjoyed prepping for the class and seeing it all come together. The wonderful part is how many other moms are helping and that I can stand back and watch during the class. I am looking forward to next semester and what we will plan for those classes. On Saturday our homeschool group will have our Christmas party - I love these families and the privilege of spending time with such great families. It will be a very fun time!

And on Friday Aaron and I get to have another adult night out. Monday we got to attend the KOTH couples dinner. And on Friday we will go to his company Christmas party - it will be nice to go out together and get to know more people.
Stay warm and smile!
=-) Janey

Life is delightful!

More info than you wanted to know...but here's some selected bits of an email exchange between the wife and I.

From:Janey

I don't want to shock you..... with my new hobby!

GP298 Redworm Composting System (includes 1,000 live worms) . . . . . . . . . . . . .1 Kit . . . . . . . . . NEW!! 39.55

...Redworms can consume ½ their body weight in organic matter a day, converting it to  castings which are higher in plant available nutrients than traditional composts or manures. Plant directly in castings, mix with soils, or make tea for watering . Castings increase water retention, plant growth and production.

Redworms can reduce feed costs for your flock of chickens/ pets/fishing bait. Redworms are composting worms that live in organic matter, eating and reproducing. Each mature redworm can lay 1 cocoon per week. In three weeks 1-5 baby redworms emerge, maturing in 60-90 days. The population increases exponentially as they match the feed available to them (making redworms a viable feed option for chickens- being 80% protein).

The system contains:

1000 redworms (~1 lb.)


****************************

That's right baby.  We're WORM RANCHERS now!!

This is awesome!

Think of it...sitting around the campfire. Worm-range songs... "oh give me a home...where the worms cast in loam...where the coffee grounds are 'et all day..."

Worm roundups.  Worm drives.

"Yee ha!  Get along little slimey!"  

"Uh-oh...the horse just stepped in... there goes ol' bessy.."

Wonder how hard it'll be to brand those puppies...

Etiquette conundrum

A couple interesting bits from the last few days (months..)

Saturday I was sitting with the kids, eating dinner.  The 8 year old daughter rips one.  (for the more delicate among you, she "passed flattice"  But to be perfectly accurate there was really nothing delicate about this particular flattice.)

Silence.

Dad: "What do you say?"

I look over at here with the patented arched-daddy-eyebrow.

Silence....wait...wait...she knows what to say, why isn't she saying it?  

I start to get a little annoyed.

"Daughter?!"

"Dad...I had FOOD in my mouth?!  I was waiting to finish chewing!"

Oh.  Of course.

Note to Miss Manners: If you pass gas with a bite of food mid-chew...what to do?

********************

C (age 7) :  "How long did that take?  An hour and a half!"

J (age 5.  Condescending tone.) :  "No....it was only 90 minutes".

Dad (age 35) "?!!?"

********************

G: (looking at her new 3-d human anatomy book from Nana Ruth)

"Dad ~ Look!  Look!  A bladder! "

"Umm...dad, what's a sphincter?"

(ok, I thought it was funny)

********************

Standard bedtime rule with the boys - no talking, no noises, or there are consequences.

Last night I gave the standard admonition.  "Lay still and lay quiet.  Goodnight."

Less than 30 seconds later "Bang! Bang!"

I walk back in.  "Son!"

"Dad, I didn't do anything!"

"Uhh...I just heard you shoot your capgun?!"

"It was an accident!"