Merry Christmas

The children stood trembling with excitement by our bed this morning at 5:50 a.m.

We go from being in technology overload,

to retro,


to complete bliss, all in just one quick glance around the room.

Of course Big Kid #1 is napping in the other room, completely worn out from all the excitement and/or food. I hope you've had a wonderful Christmas.

My List

In a season where people often ask, "What's on your list?" I'd like to share my list of a different sort, things I'm thankful for this holiday season. Here goes...in no particular order

1. Time off (yay!)
2. gift buying, card sending completed a whole week early (first time ever)
3. tons of help from my husband :) #2 would otherwise not exist
4. my chickens started laying eggs again! their second winter they don't lay unless you trick them with a light to extend their daylight hours (thanks again to the hubby and daughters who rigged the light for me)
5. a babysitter that puts me totally at ease and fills the house with smells of Christmas baking and who has a mellowing effect on the kids (jaw drops open here)
6. my busiest and most successful Christmas knitting season ever (and I thought quitting the farmers market would be my downfall)
7. happy dogs
8. happy kids
9. happy marriage
10. the chance to bake way more than I need to, just because
11. an old friend hopefully moving back to town (fingers crossed!)
12. my ideal job, without it #1 wouldn't be possible either
13. friends
14. creativity. the kind that prompts my son to make a punching bag out of pillows with his friend, and my daughter to write a book so intriguing that her tablemates at school snatch it during free reading time
15. my other daughter's two front teeth
16. hope for the future. for changes coming, for hearts softening, reality hitting. for eyes lifting and a life that continually moves forward.

She thinks she's Ina Garten

I'm not a cooking show freak, nor do I think I'm Martha Stewart, but I have always liked to bake, and Christmastime provides a great incentive to do so and a great excuse to give the goods away. Of course I like to eat what I make but there's something about the baking and giving away, baking and giving away that makes it more fun somehow.

I love to watch Ina Garten cook on her show the Barefoot Contessa which may sound crazy to some of you but for those of you who like her, then you know what I'm talking about. She makes everything look so big and yummy and simple and good that she has me hooked. If it hadn't been for having mono two years ago I probably would have never known about her. There's a silver lining in every cloud.

So in honor of Ina I decided to make these little jam thumbprints from a recipe in this month's Country Living Magazine and they're a new family favorite. Whoever wrote that recipe is a genius becuase they've come out perfect every time.

And the peppermint bark is an absolute must. I can't get enough of it. So simple, so good,

and then Ina showed me this:

simple, easy, happy, Merry Christmas.

They sled on....

Then it snowed

Just in time for Christmas and more snow than I've seen in all my 17 years living here. I thought the blizzard we had last March was atypical for central VA and I was right, but this on top of it? In the same year? Very, very strange and it's still coming down. We may have 18" when it's all said and done and there are some people in this house who are beside themselves.

As a child I wouldn't have known what to do with myself. But as an adult I know my job when it snows consists of layering tons of clothing on 3 kids and then peeling it all off as they come in one by one, watching the ice balls fly through the house as I do. I am on snow patrol, snow cleanup, the one to corral the wet winter gear in front of the fire. I'm the hot chocolate maker extraordinaire, and all around feeder and cleaner upper. Pretty much like every day now that I think of it. But I whine.




I'll admit I love watching the action, the dog as she bounds and leaps through the white stuff so deep it's up to her chest in most places, the kids as they walk and fall and run and fall and slide and fall, and how they're big enough now to pull each other on their sleds.

Have no doubt about Sunny, she loves it too.

Do not feel sorry, or have pity.

I can assure you,

She's in heaven.





And in a little bit, when she's done playing with her children, she'll go curl up on her heated bed, in her cozy cedar-filled house, and take a long snooze until they come back out.

But for now, we are stocked and ready, the fire is mellow and warm, the snow clothes are gathered around it warming and drying and everyone is getting ready for round two, and three, and four and....

And a little of this

A little tree decorated this year with bits of the vintage button collection, a head start on the gift wrapping,

simple wreaths,

and the letters I have yet to mail,

the old ladder from the dairy barn providing another spot to hang a wreath,

and the simple nativity, positioned differently every day by the children.

A subtle and understated Christmas is what we're creating, definitely one of our own making. The collection of reminders growing each year, slowly and in stark contrast to what I find just past the doorstep.

What Christmas looks like

On any given day you'll find half-eaten gingerbread houses, stripy tights curled up on the rug,

gift bags for teachers waiting to be filled and lined up in a row,

the tree standing, looking the best it can in an unfinished office as we slowly expand into our new space. We like how the lights look in the big window as we come up the drive, and think we've found the right place for it.

There are the rocks Allie gathered on an impromptu expedition outside yesterday after days and weeks full of too much rain,

just below the grumpy cat, pretending to be miserable though we know otherwise.

The ever-important knitting bag and Legos, both of which figure prominently in the house and can usually be found here, in front of the fire.

Homework, always, homework.

Some jewelry making after a long hiatus,

and bags of clothes lined up and ready to be given away, if I don't put them here it could be months before I take them in.

In short, we are lived in, comfortable, expanding into new space, messy, real, spread out, together, sick, well, hungry, tired, ordinary and content, all waiting, excited and very much enjoying the season.

Coming around

I'm working again, filling those surprise post-Christmas orders for bunnies and hats and the like, and the remaining orders that had a post-Christmas deadline. But all the while I have that nagging little thought in the back of my mind about the sweater I'm going to make for myself. Yes, it's that time of year where I want to knit for myself and I plan a project, buy the yarn, start knitting, change projects mid-stream, get distracted by new ideas for the shop, decide I can use the yarn I bought for myself to generate revenue and never end up knitting that original sweater. For my knitting friends who see me cycle through this phase every year, you're welcome to tune me out for a while.

But I'm going to give it a go again, despite my past inability to produce an end result and I've dug out an old pattern to try. Well, I say try, but I'm changing the pattern quite a bit. Don't laugh, Pam. It's so cute and free, you can check it out here on Ravelry. I'm going to make it long-sleeved instead of 3-quartered, with raglan shoulder seams and instead of making it short and trapeze-shaped in the bodice I'm going to make it longer, past my hips and more fitted to the body. I know, a complete overhaul. To back up a few paces, if you're a knitter and not familiar with Ravelry, you should give it a look--you can get completely lost there.

So the next step is to scout out some yarn, of the non-itchy variety because that collar comes up close to the neck and I'm planning on wearing the heck out of this thing (famous last words). If it ends up becoming something else I promise not to complain.

Meanwhile, for the record, the three of us who were in the woods the other day have poison ivy. I know, it's dormant, there are no leaves in sight, but those boys were cutting the vines and handling them and I swear then all they have to do is look at me with it on their skin and I've got it too. Luckily they don't have much of a reaction and what they do have is gone in a day or two, but I'm quite allergic, and minimal as it is on me right now, I'll be itching for a couple of weeks.

On a last note, it's almost time to say goodbye to the stockings and all of the Christmas decorations. According to Kevin it's bad luck to keep them up past New Year's Day and as much as I don't like to see them go, it's a good way for me to get a handle on the clutter.