Men in Tights

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Every now and then Laurianna becomes fascinated again with ballet, ballerinas, etc...and will spend the day in her pink leotard dancing to music all day. She's never had a lesson of any kind, but has a book on ballet that she loves to look at. I caught her in the living room the other morning reading the book again.


McKenna decided to join in the fun too, so she quickly dressed up in another leotard.


Which left Zachary. Without a dress.


Try as we may, convincing him that boys don't wear dresses...not working so well. Fortunately he's young and we still have time. But with two older sisters trying to look like a fairytale princess, it's not easy. After seeing the girls dressed up as ballerinas he started crying and wanted a dress too. Sigh. Rick happened to look through the ballet book and found some male dancers wearing whatever it is that male ballet dancers wear and showed it to Zachary. It's a little easier when you have pictures to back up your proclamations. :)




A tshirt and a pair of tights later...not the ideal get up, but to Rick it's better than a dress...Zachary was able to help spot his sisters in their dance positions. We have our own little troupe in the making.

Decorating the Tree

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Tonight we finished decorating our tree. Last night we took the family on an outing to "find" our tree...hidden in a corner in our basement, hauled it upstairs, and in 10 minutes flat had the sucker put together. It truly doesn't get much better. Light a pine-scented candle and no one is the wiser.





This year was a little more fun decorating with the kids. Yes, they are still grabbing at every single ornament they can find (I did get smart last year and packed them away by degree of breakability - score 1 for me). The bottom half of the tree is theirs to freely decorate (a.k.a lump ornaments together, stack one on top of the other) and the top is mine to tastefully finish. So please only look from the middle up if you desire to view the "grown-up" version of the tree.




In past years I've tried telling the kids about some of the ornaments that are being put up. Daddy gave this one to me before we were married. One of Mommy's friends from high school gave me these. Mommy made this when she was 10 and it used to hang on Oma and Opa's tree. In years past it's all fallen on deaf ears. They truly could have cared less. But tonight they were actually interested in seeing which ones were "theirs" - Laurianna's baby ornament, McKenna's special ornament when she asked Jesus into her heart, the ornament Rick and I painted on our honeymoon.




And then it hit me. Someday, our kids are going to take their ornaments with them to their own houses to share them with their children. So strange. I could hold onto them (the ornaments, that is) forever (the kids too!!)...but what fun would that be? Someday our tree will be "ours" again and it will just be Rick and I decorating it, but I'm sure we'll miss the cluttered chunks of ornaments adorning the tree. Or miss finding ornaments that little hands have pulled off the tree and hidden under the couch. But in the years to come, as we continue the tradition of decorating together as a family, the kids will start remembering the stories behind each of the ornaments and it will be fun to continue sharing with them. Even more fun will be in sharing in the traditions that they carry on in their families and be a part of the new ones that make their family special.

Eight Random Things...

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Christin posted 8 random things about herself and I KNOW she meant to "tag" me, but apparently the tag got lost in cyberspace somewhere. So, I am picking up the proverbial slack and posting my own to share.

In no particular order:

1. I have been known to work under the hood of a car. I am a closet mechanic. *grins* Rather than paying an astronomical amount for a new part for my old car, I would scrounge around local junkyards for a used alternator (or other car part) and replace it myself. And I don't know exactly HOW I did it - but it worked, so that's all that's important, I suppose.

2. I do not like beef (as in steak) on a salad. I can do a taco salad, but steak on a salad literally makes me sick to my stomach. Go figure. I love steak. Love salads, but never the two shall meet.

3. I met Corrie Ten Boom. Granted, I was only one, but I met her. My mom was one of her secretaries and when we went to Holland to visit my mom's family, we also went to visit her. So, therein is my "claim to fame." That, and I was Sara Groves RA - went to college with her, had many classes with her, served on the college Activities Board with her - amazingly talented woman she is.

4. I hate running. Not an overall extensive exercise fan. Played sports all through high school and did great, but really hated to overexert myself in general for any other reason. I suppose that's called laziness. :) I hated it so much that I managed to get an exemption from college PE that involved having to run a mile (yes, you read that correctly). How's that for laziness? Pitiful, but true.

5. I bought my wedding dress only a few weeks after I met my husband. And I was smart enough not to tell him until after we were engaged. :) No sense in scaring the man off too soon, right?

6. I will not leave my house without makeup. I'm serious. It happened once (I'm not sure exactly how) and it was a very difficult thing for me. I have always been very self conscious about that, so no makeup, no leaving the house. Getting married and having to wake up without makeup on was a hard thought...but I have survived, and my husband doesn't seem overly concerned about it. He's only run screaming from the room in terror once...

7. I get motion sickness, and also sea sickness. Unfortunately I discovered the latter while on a date with someone (not Rick, shhhh). Nice date, huh? We were supposed to be deep sea fishing and he ended up watching me lose my stomach contents from the previous week over the side of the boat. Such a memorable day.

8. I am a HUGE fan of board games. Unfortunately for me, my husband views them as "bored" games. Not so much of a fan is he. I am rather competitive and will play when given the opportunity. Don't like to lose. And I really dislike bingo....because there is no possible way to strategize and win - you just sit and wait. And I don't sit and wait very well. Hard to believe I know.

So, there you have it. 8 random things about me. Perhaps you knew some of them...perhaps not. But now, I will tag a few people to play along...Crystal - are you reading this? Let's hear 8 things about you....and hmmm...Davene - are you up for it? :)

Traditions....

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Tradition. I can't hear that word without my mind breaking into a rendition of said song from Fiddler on the Roof (you can sing along inside if you would like...). Since getting married and having children Rick and I have talked about so many different family traditions. Which ones we liked. Which ones we wanted to establish as a part of our family. Some of them are rather simple. Some of them more involved. But they all involve a yearly ritual of sorts in an attempt to pull our family together and establish a bond that just maybe our children might carry on into their own families.

Curious as to what our traditions are? We started out with grand ideas for some.

Tradition #1: Chopping the family Christmas tree. I had always had a live tree. No fake tree in our house. My mind quickly began to change on this point the year of the praying mantis'. Yes, bugs. And lest it sound too minor I will use the word...

infestation.

Fortunately now it is a fun story to tell. They did look so innocent and cute (at first). And I'm sure it was great fun to be one of those little bugs on the wall watching me chase each and every last one down from our cathedral ceilings with the vacuum cleaner hose. All ornaments off the tree. Yank the lights off. Haul the tree outside. Pesticides. Time outside to freeze. Should have taken care of the problem. But there were two nests. So back they came. My little mind began to toy with the idea of a plastic tree of sorts. Pre-lit. So this year our search for the family tree will be traipsing down to our basement to haul the box out of the corner and stick the branches into the trunk.

Tradition #2: Christmas breakfast and dinner. A special breakfast of some yummy French toast. Dinner must involve ham. And more sweet potatoes since we didn't get enough of them at Thanksgiving. And lots of other yummy food. But those are the necessary pieces. Oooo...and eggnog. I'd be shot if we didn't have that.

Tradition #3: Stay in pajamas all day Christmas day. This sounds great until Christmas falls on a Sunday and you can't exactly go to church Christmas day in your pj's. So you change, pretty up, and then lounge the rest of the day after church. This has become one of my favorite family traditions. We had some friends of ours that do this and we pulled it in as one of our own. I NEVER stay in my pajamas past 8ish. Can't stand not taking a shower. But surprisingly enough for Christmas pictures I'm looking not so pretty. And I'm ok with that. :)

Tradition #4: Molasses cookies and milk for Christmas Eve night. And we open ONE present (which is always the same...new pajamas...when do you think the kids will catch onto this one?) These are Grandma's molasses cookies. Can't miss these. Or having the kids look nice for pictures in the morning. :)

Tradition #5: Celebrating advent. This has been done differently each year. We've had an advent log and celebrated each day, and more recently used a wreath with a candle for each week. But we really enjoy this aspect of getting ready for Christmas. We try to do a devotional each night. Sing together. And just enjoy it together.

Tradition #6: Making some sort of cookie mess. Must involve sugar. Lots of sugar. Roll in it. Colorful sugar. Sprinkles. Any sugar will do. By the time Christmas has come we will have more cookies than we know truly know what to do with. But we will eat them.

Why do we try to establish traditions with our family? How do we envision our family in the future? With 4 kids...prospective spouses...numerous grandkids...it's all a little mind boggling. But mostly, I want our children to desire to be together. Spend time together. LOVE to be together with our family. And continue traditions in their own families as a means of developing relationships. Christmas is such an amazing time to establish traditions - it's a season that is ripe with options. But really, so is the rest of the year: Popcorn night Sundays, movie nights, game nights...I'm sure that we all have something we do together as a family during the year. I think most important to me ... in addition to developing close relationships within our family ... I want to draw our kids closer to Jesus. But that doesn't require a "tradition". That's truly our everyday life, isn't it?

So..what are your traditions? I'm just curious...and would love to hear what you all do as a family. So, please share - and I'll try to compile some of them into a future blog (and maybe add some more to our list of traditions!!).

Chocolate Cake for Everyone!

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Little boy Kaleb turned one on Saturday. Personally I'm having mixed emotions about the whole thing, but really can do little to change it right? :) Knowing that Kaleb is our last little one is bittersweet. I don't have any desire to go back to the baby stage, but as he outgrows clothes, everyday loses a little more of that "baby face" and just plain grows up, it's a little sad mixed in with sweet. Just a year ago he was a little thing - not quite 6 pounds. Such an amazing blessing to our family. Anticipated for many months. Desired with all our hearts. And safely delivered to our eager waiting arms...and all the additional little people arms too!

And now he's one. Look at this little face...

We were blessed to have Rick's parents visit from New York along with our niece Brianna. Maria (who was with us when Kaleb was born) and her daughter Cassie also were part of the bunch celebrating Kaleb's big day. The siblings were very excited about his presents (and he really loved the butterfly book which only later I discovered was on sale for a good reason: the first page is English and the rest is SPANISH!! sigh)...

ripping open a present

playing with a little wooden barn

Other than the cookie he so eagerly mauled the other night, this was his first cake. and chocolate. If I had to clean up a mess, might as well make it fun to see! There were some great cake pictures - the looks on his face in some of them deserve some great captions! Here is the cake before...

...a first grab

almost done....

Satisfied with chocolate!!!

Another quick family picture too!

Looking up to Daddy

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Kaleb loves music, as do all of our kids. It is so much fun to see him bopping or clapping to music that he hears. Rick was getting music ready for Sunday worship and had his guitar out and Kaleb was over investigating, so of course I had to take a few pictures. I just love the little look on his face as he looks at his Daddy.