When the blurry ones capture the moment, you gotta go with it. 

This post has been linked to Wordless Wednesday over at 5 Minutes for Mom.

Today, during a brief a morning snuggle, I pulled Eden close and hugged her tight.

And she replied,

“Thanks Mom.  You fill me up with love, all the way up my body and into my brain where all my memories are.”

(Melt.)

If my kids know anything at all, it’s that they are loved.    They are loved in the happy times, in the episodes of overwhelming thoughtfulness, but also amidst the trials, the disobedience, the discipline.  My girl has told me many a time:  “I know you love me, you just don’t like my behaviour.”   Communicating that is so important.   And truth be told, she hears it a lot because, well… she’s disciplined a lot.  She knows I do it out of love. 

My 11 year old still climbs up into my lap, limbs sprawling all over the place, to snuggle in and tell me he loves me.  I hope it never ends. 

Remember this? 

Yeah, I know. 

I think I’ll pull out my copy and read it to the kids today.  We’ll see if I can get through without crying. 

If you haven’t told your kids today that you love them, please do it.  

Those words will fill them up, all the way up to their memories.

This will be my third year with a ‘word.’    It sounds funny to say it like that, but there it is, my WORD. 

Sure, there are things I want to achieve this year — more like the standard resolutions — but the word thing has really worked for me over the past two years, so I’m going to stick with it. 

I always have a lot of things going on in this head of mine, so the beauty of a word is that it’s easy, small enough to remember yet broad enough to be applicable to many aspects of my life. 

This year, I want to simplify my schedule,

simplify my record keeping,

simplify my belongings,

simplify my menu,

simplify my work,

simplify my overall objectives in life. 

It’s a good word for me.

My husband and I are both feeling intensely optimistic about twentytwelve.    It’s going to be a great year.  If I simplify where I can, I will minimize some of the peripheral distractions in order to move forward more resolutely, 

with what really matters.

Happy New Year to all!

This post has been linked to The Lettered Cottage.    (This little word of mine.  I’m gonna let it shine.) 

¹ A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.  ² The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him— the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of might, the Spirit of the knowledge and fear of the LORD— ³and he will delight in the fear of the LORD.

He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes, or decide by what he hears with his ears; ⁴ but with righteousness he will judge the needy, with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth.  He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth;  with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked.  ⁵ Righteousness will be his belt and faithfulness the sash around his waist.  ⁶ The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling^[a] together;  and a little child will lead them.  ⁷ The cow will feed with the bear, their young will lie down together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox.   ⁸ The infant will play near the cobra’s den, and the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest.
⁹ They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain, for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the LORD
   as the waters cover the sea.

 ¹⁰ In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his resting place will be glorious.      – Isaiah 11:  1-10

I hope that as you read this,your heart is smiling. 

And I hope that right now, where you sit,

your belly is full,

that you are sheltered from the wind,

that there are people who love you

and will  love you no matter what.

Above all, my hope is in the Saviour that was born in a humble manger.

It is my prayer that you appreciate the gifts of our Father,

that you welcome Him in – really get to know Him,

and are as amazed by his grace and glory as continually as I am.

It is my hope that you are as just as content as can be. 

With buckets of love and abundant blessings for 2012,

~T.  xo

I saw this picture on Pinterest and started to drool. 

Yes indeedy.

So when I attended a friend’s Christmas party a couple weeks ago, I knew I had to make it.    It was easy and delicious and I will definitely be making it again and again.  I followed the recipe found here, but added chopped green onion (because I love it so).

It was a big hit at the party and several people have asked me for the recipe, so it’s a sure keeper! 

(Thank you Steph.)

Now to test out other combos that keep popping into my mind:

 -olives and goat cheese?

-chicken and mushroom?

-BBQ chicken?

-a pizza version?

-shrimp and seafood sauce?

-artichoke and asiago?

-cream cheese and crab?

-a caprese salad version (mmmm… my long time favourite salad with tomato, basil and fresh bocconcini) 

- or a sweet apples and cinnamon version? 

- or chocolate and banana? 

Holy Schmoly, this is going to be fun! 

This post has been linked to Edie’s  Party of Christmas Appetizers.  If you don’t read Edie’s blog, you need to.  

And that’s all I have to say about that. 

I appreciate the snow and the smiles it puts on the faces of my children.  Need I say more? 

I am grateful for our blinds that were installed yesterday.  We removed our old unrepairable shutters over a month ago for repairs and painting of window casings, and have been living in a fish in a bowl ever since.  Aren’t they purdy?

I am grateful for our homeschooling week.  It may have been one of the best weeks ever.  Happy children, eager to learn, eager to create, and working through their errors patiently and productively = happy Teacher-Mama.

Caleb even asked me before bed last night, “I know tomorrow’s Saturday, but could you please prepare some extra math for me to do?”    Um. YES!  Who am I to squelch any desire to learn? 

I am grateful for the life of my Grampie and the love he had with Grammie.  It was difficult being 2000 km away from his funeral this week, but I am so very thankful for the man he was, the abundant fruit he displayed, and for the knowledge that he is dancing at the feet of his Father… which is exactly where he wanted to be all along. 

Forever and ever,

Amen.

The kids are doing remarkably well with our homeschooling this week, enjoying the new curriculum, jumping into their work early and without my prompting, working through problems (and even corrections)  — calmly and patiently.  I’m sure David is tired of hearing me talk about how terrific this week has been, but it’s been GREAT!   The icing on the cake, however, was the snow that came yesterday.  It started at about 8:00 am…

…and it continued all day.

 It was a snow day here in our county, but considering the time we took off this fall, we opted to work through the day anyway.  Before hitting the books, we did a bit of last minute yard clean up by removing the pile of gravel from the driveway.  Our front walkway was completed the previous day (nice timing!), and the gravel had to be moved in order to use the snowblower.  The kids were great about getting down to business outside (moving gravel is HARD WORK), and equally good about their school work. 

After lunch, of course, they were back outside. 

David took the afternoon off to watch the kids while I worked, but I did manage to snap a couple photos of them in the yard.   This makes me thankful for the father my kids have.   

I must say I am grateful for the seasons.  I look forward to throwing open the windows on the first sunny spring day, and I look forward to the crispness of winter, drinking apple cider and hunkering down by the fire with books on the day of the first snow.

And that’s exactly what we did. 

And it’s exactly 1 month to my favourite day of the year!  Happy Winter to All!

My last post (4 weeks ago!) was a sudden drop off from my involvement in the 31 Days series that I very quickly decided to jump into, so it’s no surprise that things have been completely upside down and inside out around here lately.  We’re slowly working our way through our renovations, our Community Christmas dinner planning meetings have picked up, I’m working on fundraising for a Mission to Uganda in 2012, and I’ve got clients out the wazoo.  I try to schedule them appropriately, but sometimes a bottle neck is unavoidable.  

Do you ever feel that there are times when you’re just doing the bare minimum to get by?  That’s where I am now with so many things in my life.  Our meal situation lately has been less than ideal.  The laundry is piling up.  My bedroom has become a household dumping ground rather than the peaceful sanctuary it’s supposed to be.  I’m not spending the time I should with the boys’ school work.  I’m taking the easy road with my Junior Church lessons.  I’m just treading water, trying to get through the long list of things to do.  

Fact is, I’m far too busy and I don’t like it. 

But what can I do about it? 

Well, for starters, I can pray.  Pray for patience and calm and for help in getting me step by step through this mountain I’ve created. 

Secondly, I can pick away at things, bit by bit.  I’ve been painting our new powder room since last week.  It’s something that should take an afternoon, but I don’t HAVE an afternoon.  So instead, I’ve spent 5 days in there, doing little bits with the 20 minutes here and 30 minutes there that I manage to find.  Still, I’m only at the first coat.  It’s not ideal, but it is what it is…  my reality.  Bit by teensy tiny bit is the only way things are able to get done around here. 

I can continue to get up early.  My internal alarm clock has been successfully adjusted to spring me out of bed between 5:30 and 6:00 am each day, and what a difference it makes in the rest of my day!  I get a bit of time to myself to enjoy a coffee and work or read or blog (ha!) before the troops march down the stairs at 7:00.  It’s glorious and I need to keep it up. 

Additionally, I must, must, MUST say ‘no’ more often.  I’ve actually been doing pretty well with it, but I have told myself that in the New Year (after the Community Christmas Dinner and our big New Year’s Eve party is behind us and once I have a few work projects marked off my list), I will reduce the number of simultaneous clients.   I have already told some that I can’t take anything new for 3 months, and I think that’s the way it’s going to have to be if I am to keep some of my sanity. 

For now, I will tread water.  But I won’t tread it in a crazed panic with arms flailing all over the place.   Everyone knows how unproductive that is.  

No, instead I will tread slowly, calmly and steadily, seeking the joy in the warmth of the water, ever with my eye on the shore.

I knew a while back that the month of October would be insane, and it is.  I called that one!  It was probably the worst timing ever for me to take on a little blog challenge, but I couldn’t resist.  I thought the topic would help me on my path of intention, and it really has.  

BUT…

It’s insane.  (Oh, sorry.  Did I say that already?)   

I thought that in light of all the hub-hub that’s swirling around me, I should take a moment to share a glimpse of my life right now. 

This is my living room/ dining room.  Yes, yes it is.

This is the sitting room off my kitchen.

This is my mud room/ home office area and soon to be powder room. 

This is my side yard. 

Plus, I have a pile of design work (about 6 concurrent projects) to boot.    

Oh and two little volunteer projects in which I am intensely involved.

School?  Yeah.  That too.  Only our schedule is reduced to about 1.4% until we get through this reno.  We will ramp up to 100% in November.  (I’m so glad we schooled all summer!)

The icing on the cake came yesterday, when we discovered we have to dig two giant holes outside (possibly a trench) to address a water leak from the main under our front lawn and lovely new retaining wall.  Ugh. 

Chaos, I tell ya!  

Day 22: 

It’s okay to slow down the blog posts on intention if the purpose of the slow-down is to be more intentional about the other things in my life.   (Clearly, there are some other things that require my attention right now.)

There.  I said it.  And it feels much better. 

So, I am skipping a few.  My main goal over the next couple weeks is to get through all of this household stuff so I can get my main floor back in order.  I’m good with that and I hope you are too. 

Catch ya on the flip side.  

This post has been linked to the 31 DAYS series.  You can start from the beginning here, and check out the other 31 Dayers here by visiting The Nester.

Part and parcel of getting a new chimney and fireplace involves stacking the wood to burn in it.  We had the first half of our wood delivered on Monday, and after getting them started (and establishing the ‘ends’), the kids were really able to pitch in and help get it stacked. 

We do not pay our children for their household tasks, as we believe pretty strongly that much of what needs to be done needs to be done simply because we are a team.  We do it because it needs to be done, not because there is a dollar figure attached.  However, once or twice a year, for unique tasks like this, the kids get a little something for their hard work. 

In this case, they know there is a cash reward.  They are working their buns off to work that pile down to nothing.  Caleb and Eden have always been pretty diligent workers, but this time, Gabe is right there alongside them… WITHOUT me having to suggest it.  The boys were out there for over an hour yesterday morning before I even knew what they were doing.  Good on them!

Day 17: 

Sometimes a little motivation goes a long, long way. 

This has me thinking about other areas of my life that could benefit from a motivation boost.  Should I be giving myself little rewards here and there for journeying along on my path of intention?   

Maybe I should treat myself to a little something for getting some of the tougher things done.   A contribution toward a trip away with my beloved?  A new handbag or a pair of shoes?  Something to keep me from procrastinating. 

But sometimes motivation comes simply in the joy my kids express when I make time amid the busyness to play a game.  

And sometimes motivation is the simple desire of getting things done.  (Ahem.  Laundry.)

But if I could tackle things with as much gusto as my kids used tackled that wood, I’d be laughing.  LAUGHING I tell you.

This post has been linked to the 31 DAYS series.  You can start from the beginning here, and check out the other 31 Dayers here by visiting The Nester.