Happiness Is...

Happiness is a long weekend.

A long weekend spent....

With a visit from one so dear to your heart that her very presence is like opening a window

 Eating "not-bad" tuna sandwiches with "not bad" pickles...

A finished scarf

Happiness is...

Going for a cocoa/coffee date with your little girl

A trip to the Thrift store resulting in this many books:

An old favorite...

And a new.

Happiness is...

An evening heart to heart with a sister while making chocolate cake from scratch,

and eating that cake until Monday

The stillness of the house all to yourself

Time to think

Happiness is...

Cream  of Broccoli in the sunshine 

Story time with Opa

Hugs and the smell of Oma's perfume.

Happiness is another heart to heart with a new friend 

Echoing many of the same thoughts.

Babies in the playroom

Indian Food and more chocolate cake...

Not wanting the evening to end...

and having a sweet girl in red jammies call you "pretty"

Happiness is an extra day of rest and play

Sleeping in cuddles with your baby boy, 

oh so carelessly strewn across your pillow with that fuzzy hair

A trip to a petting zoo ...

enjoying the smell of the animals,

The softness of wool

The warmth of a pony's back

Happiness is...

Balloons in bright colors perfect for dancing with

A box of 64 crayola crayons and a new coloring book. 

Processing feelings while building an etch-a-sketch city

The optimism of a sundress and sandals

The optimism of glass of mango juice almost Half Full

Yes, happiness is in the right now of remembering

all the special bits and pieces of a Family Holiday, 

A weekend well lived.

How was your weekend?

Everybody's Working for the Weekend

I feel that I have hit upon a universal truth, one of those things that sounds like a scripted line from a movie, where it comes out of your mouth and after you've said it, you think "Yeah, that IS how it is; I nailed it."
Tell me if you agree:

Moving into a new house is the best; moving out of an old one is the worst.

(to expound):

Barring some unforeseen nightmare in a new home, moving into a new house can be one of the most thrilling and exciting things.

But it's the leaving of the old house that can be so so hard, full of work and a little drudgery. 

If you are like me, it takes an awful lot to deter from the joy and excitement of finding new homes for things and making little corners of a new place feel like home. 

We moved into our last home that we built the very first DAY it was possibly liveable. The water was turned on the evening before we moved in and the railing was put around the gaping hole down to the basement where the stairs were going. We had to contend with uninstalled cupboards in the middle of the kitchen floor, rooms without doors or finished closets and a bathroom filled with extra tile, bags of grout sand, and a stand alone toilet....pretty. But I was still giddy to be setting up my nest in this construction  zone.


Our more recent move was MUCH easier, as we just showed up, unpacked, (did a little painting) and sat back and said, "we're here". It's been so much fun!
But there's still the old house to finish and get sold and that's a bit of dicey position to be in. God has a funny way of having things turn out, and as it would happen, the house is in sale limbo already (let's describe it as "betrothed") to someone very close to me. Honestly I am OVERJOYED to be finishing and sprucing the old girl up for my lovely "N." It makes all the work that went into this old place feel worth it, because it's going to someone (s) I love, to be home for them.
Talk about win-win.... except now we need to get to work.

(Also a Universal Truth):     All good things call for elbow grease.

So, we spent this last weekend with the "wee Winkelets" at their Oma and Opa's and Kevin and I worked on our own version of a DIY home show, finishing all the things on the house that never got done while we lived there.

(FINALLY the unfinished walls have baseboards.)

sigh

Anyway, I did so much "dapping" and caulking that my fingertips were worn to a shiny nub by Saturday night, and let me tell you there is no amount of 80's tunes or bags of Nibs than can make that job less tedious.

But at least I look wickedly hard-core with my gun here :)

Kevin and I have joked in the past that if we were any Sitcom family, we would be Tim and Jill Taylor from "Home Improvement"
A-B-S-O-L-U-T-E-L-Y.  
(some of you are even reading this and thinking, "Oh my gosh, they SO are.")

Now, Kevin is not always as ill-fated as "Tim the Tool Man Taylor".  He's actually amazing with what he can figure out and fix around the house, but this weekend did include wolf-like noises made over a torn apart hardwood floor with boards that ended up being a fourteenth-of-a-flipping-inch too large, a saw that wouldn't work and a nail gun that went kaputs....

But in the end we triumphed over at little less than half the long list of things that need to be done and we only made a couple rude remarks to the Primer  and how much we hated it and how much we hate priming walls....
honestly, all that work and then the walls look waaaaaaaay worse than they did before! (arrrgh)

 We spent our Sunday recovering and eating the last of Oma's Christmas baking, holding a  baby niece, and eating broccoli in front of the t.v. to make up for all the junk food we consumed overnight on Friday.....

How was your weekend?

Cheers.

The Friday Moment

Inspired by Soule Mama a moment from the week I want to savor and keep as I head into the weekend.

Happy weekending everyone!

making the boo boos better

Nicola over at Which Name wrote a post today about ice/heat packs she made for her kids and their boo boos. Aside from thinking this fabulous idea, it made me think about my kids and their intense love of band-aids. If my daughter stubs a toe.... it needs a band-aid.

I remember a friend of mine telling me her children always wanted band-aids when they were kids and she was more than happy to sticker them up as it seemed to make any problem better.
I also remember when I was a little girl and my dad would draw "a dolly" (a little face) on my band-aids when I had one on a finger so that I could have a little friend to talk to while wearing the band-aid. That always made me feel better.

Then it reminded me of one my proudest moments when I was working at  non-for-profit Daycare years ago before I was married and a mama.
I worked in a class of 16 children from ages 3-5; "The Rainbow Room" and I was the official band-aid giver of the class.

One of the little girls in the class, (we'll call her Jennifer) was a very troubled little girl who came from a very dysfunctional home situation. She was part of the daycare as an intervention from Child Welfare had demanded she be put in a program that would provide some good care and stability for the poor thing.
Despite our best efforts though, Jennifer was in and out of our facility as her mother would periodically disappear and Jenny was temporarily removed from her mother's care.
One day while Jenny was living at home and had been coming to the center, she arrived with some very troublesome burns on the palms of her hands. It's still disturbing and heartbreaking to me, so I will spare you the details of the story she told us about how her hands were burned but the wounds had been inflicted by the burners of an electric stove-top.

We called her social worker and I was given the job of administering first aid to those poor little hands.
Naturally Jenny was TERRIFIED of me touching them and tried to keep them balled up her sleeves.
With a lot of coaxing and reassuring I finally got to clean them with clean cotton and warm water and applied burn ointment with Q-tips. But when I tried to apply a gauze bandage she started shrieking and crying and tried to run away. Over the next few minutes I talked her down of her ledge so-to-speak and using all my powers of persuasion, I convinced her that the bandage could be the coolest thing ever. We could put some tape on the outside of it and decorate it however she wanted. It was a very sweet moment to watch her warm to this idea and then even become enthusiastic picking out markers and stickers (even a little glitter glue) to decorate the tape of her bandaged hands.

Most of all I was proud of how this little girl trusted me not to hurt her when a lot of other grown-ups in her life did. and I was moved by the childhood essence in her that still couldn't be squelched no matter how much she had been forced to grow up beyond her time.
Now I've been a mama myself for a few years now, and I am still humbled by the trust of my little's when they come to me with the total belief that I can fix any pain they have. There are miracles in a mother's kisses and hugs, there is something special and even a little fun in all the special attention of being lovingly tended to and of course there is  magic in a band-aid. (especially those ones covered in cartoons).

cheers.

My little Ava Grace after she fell and skinned both her knees when she was a babe. Double knee band-aids!

A walk in the woods

We've gotten a lot of snow as of late.

It's only fitting as I just  made a resolution to go outside more this winter, despite the cold.

Usually the extent of my outdoor excursions at this time of year consist of me running to my vehicle from the house and then from the vehicle into whatever warm building I am headed to. Mad dashes across parking lots, that's my winter sport.

But this weekend we finally got a reprieve from the terribly cold temperatures and I needed a reprieve from being holed up indoors. It was a glorious, sunny day and we have a stretch of wooded trails behind our new house that needed to be explored.
I decided to explore them....alone.

More than the fresh air, and even more than the exercise, I needed the chance to get away on my own and find something else for my mind to focus on, my eyes to look at and my heart to respond to. I needed to recharge my senses the way only nature can do.
I've had a lot on my plate.
With all the stress and transition of moving, and settling, struggles with my health and a very recent miscarriage I'm still grieving, let's just say God and I needed to have a chat.

I emptied my head and heart of everything that's been going on, cried a little and refocused by taking the time to listen to His replies. Sometimes our conversations can seem very one sided, but I think nature is one of His greatest tools to speaking to the deepest places in us. It's something we can all connect to so tangibly.

I won't lie and say I ended my stroll through beauty with any concrete answers, new revelations or enlightenment. It doesn't necessarily work that way. But I did pay attention to things other than my frustrations, other than my fears, doubts, worries and anxieties, and yes, I was blessed.

There's something about winter and it's landscape that particularly spoke to me and the state I've been in. Underneath all those cold layers is joy just waiting to spring up and little bits of the promise of life show up under all that weight if we just pay attention.
 Later tucked into my Bible, I found this poem that so aptly fit the whole experience:

All Beautiful the March of Days

Frances Whitmarsh Wile (1878-1939)

 

All beautiful the march of days, as 

seasons come and go;

The hand that shaped the rose hath

wrought the crystal of the snow;

Hath sent the hoary frost of heaven.

the flowing waters sealed,

And laid a silent lovelness on hill

and wood and field

O'er white expanses sparkling pure

the radiant morns unfold;

The solemn splendors of the night

burn brighter than the cold;

Life mounts in every throbbing vein,

love deepens round the hearth,

and clearer sounds the angel hymn,

"Good will to men on earth"

O thou from Whose unfathomed 

law the year in beauty flows,

Thyself the vision passing by in

crystal and in rose.

Day unto day doth utter speech, and 

night to night proclaim,

In ever changing words of light, the

wonder of Thy Name.

Migraine Musings.

Today I felt like an egg.
At one point I felt like an egg boiled hard from the inside out and then plunged into cold water only to be rolled over and over until it's shell is crushed into a tiny mosaic of broken pieces.
At another point I was an egg with it's delicate shell being thrust at the hard edge of a cast iron frying pan before being cracked open and my insides spewed out.
At one point I even felt like how an egg must feel when it gets chucked at car going 50 km an hour.

It's tough being an egg.

All my life I have suffered from acute migraines, and yes I know that's not something I want to own as an edict over my life that I shall forever BE a sufferer, but it seems to be the thorn in my flesh God chooses not to remove and so instead we shoulder up and we learn.

It all started at the age of 7 or 8 when I would awaken in the dead of night feeling like my head was splitting open and I would stumble down the hallway to my parent's door and in sobbing tears tell them I hurt.
My dad would sit with me as I lay on the cold tiles of the bathroom floor in the dark until finally the pain and nausea would send me over the edge (literally) of the porcelain bowl and finally, shaking and cold, I would begin to revive.
Of course my parents were bewildered by this and I saw different doctors and optometrists which only led to dead ends and the suggestion that maybe I was highly excitable or maybe I had allergies to different foods.
This meant I wasn't allowed to have root beer for a while as there was a correlation between me, migraines and birthday parties and special outings where root beer was my beverage of choice.

Suddenly one day at the age of 11, they went away and I hardly noticed because I had more important things to focus on, namely the effects of puberty, starting Junior High and listening to Hanson.

One afternoon when I was seventeen and sitting alone in the basement watching television with no rootbeer in sight, I suddenly lost vision in my left eye.
I blinked, and blinked again and tried not to panic. I made my way upstairs to the living room where my parents were sitting and by then half my vision in my right eye was gone too. Amazingly calm, I blurted out "Uh... I can't see anything in my eyes... I think something is wrong".
My mother sprang into action and within minutes we were on our way down to the emergency department. All I kept thinking about was that scene from Little House on the Prairie when Mary wakes up blind and starts screaming "Pa! I can't see! I can't see!" (that still sends shivers down my spine.)
I don't remember much of the rest of that visit to the hospital. At one point I guess I passed out on the bathroom floor while we were waiting to be seen by a doctor. My mom came in and found me there and pulled the emergency cord and all these nurses and doctors came rushing in, put me on a stretcher and stuck me with an IV. I almost wish I remembered it, it all sounds so very ER and dramatic.

I was diagnosed as having suffered an acute 5 migraine ( I guess they rate migraines similiarly to tornadoes or earthquakes) with aura (which is a fancy way of saying I went temporarily blind). They told me to start keeping a journal for the next time it happened and sent me out the doors with some Tylenol Threes.

Fast Forward the rest of my coming of age years, I never suffered another attack like that until my daughter was  almost one and I was driving home from the grocery store twenty minutes from my house. I got home and told Kevin I couldn't see out of my left eye and had driven home using only the right. I felt no pain but wondered if I was having a migraine like the one I'd been through 6 years before. I decided to lay down on the bed and within ten minutes I couldn't see out of either eye, save the top corner of my right, and curiously I had no feeling in my left arm or the whole right side of my face.
This time it was my husband who was trying not to panic as he packed me into the car and there was no wait in the emergency as they ushered us in and put me on an iv drip.
This time they told us, the headaches were back and along with the aura, I was now sufffering symptoms of a stroke. I was advised to stop using any kind of oral contraceptives (as these can increase your risk of stroke 300 fold) and given a referral to a specialist in the city.... for 4 months later.

In those four months I began suffering the migraines more and more. I ended up in the emergency department repeatedly when the trial medications I was given didn't work. On our one and only attempt at having a romantic weekend getaway, we ended up in the Banff regional hospital, me puking my guts out on an IV for 5 hours.

I saw the specialist and tried the new medications she prescribed. I went to the big fancy hospital and underwent the fancy head scan tests, everything came back with a clean report which we were so thankful for, but we weren't any step closer to figuring things out.

Then one Sunday, at church, the Pastor gave a call for prayer for any one with a request that they had always neglected to ask for in prayer.
I don't often bring requests forward, it's a downfall on my part, and has nothing to do with my faith over seeing God actually heal me, (well maybe it does a little, I guess I'll have to soul search that one a little more) but really I had never asked for prayer because of this flawed idea that I had so many other things to be thankful for, I should just keep my burden to myself and be thankful for what I had. No use in complaining when other people had REAL problems.

Well, I asked for prayer, received it and felt like I was healed. In fact another few years went by with absolutely no trace of the headaches. I stopped being afraid to leave the house, I stopped needing to carry medication on my person at all times, I stopped being afraid to drive (as much, but that's another skeleton for another closet for another day). It was great and I give all praise and glory to God for that reprieve.

But following our family's vacation to Hawaii just over a year ago, I was hit with the worst headache yet. I suffered the full extent of my symptoms and didn't catch it in time to take my medication. It lasted almost 3 times as long as the usual attacks and took me almost a week to recover. (there may have been some jet lag in there too).
Since then I've had migraines off and on, I take medication for them when I catch them which is during the 20 minutes I have from the start of the aura till it dissolves and my sight returns along with searing pain. The medication reduces me to a limp dishrag so it has it's pros and cons and I really hate putting something so drastic in my body in the first place.
I've done tons of research on the whole topic, but the problem is, there isn't a ton of research done on migraines. They are like individual thumbprints unique and hideous to the sufferer. There are different methods of dealing with them ranging from acupuncture to fruit juice and of course there's still prayer.

I've taken my burden back to Jesus many times in the last year and asked him not only to take it away, but for answers. All I hear from him back is the answer "no, not now". Not an angry "NO" but the still,gentle, patient "no." of a Father who's worth trusting.

I'm going to continue being proactive about the whole thing. Keeping a migraine diary is something I haven't been disciplined about but the major community out there of people like me claim it is THE ONLY WAY to find the triggers and manage the migraines as naturally as possible.
Really the medication is something I'd love to get off. I'm not on a preventative at this point because even though my doctor prescribed one, I'm really not gung ho to start a regimen of hard drugs. (and believe me these steroids mean business).

If anyone knows of some research I haven't seen I'm willing to look into it, but I also don't want to start throwing myself at miracle cures and I don't have the money to start new product. Like I said I'm trusting that God knows what he's doing and with diligent note taking and making over my healthy living habits, I really think things will go a long way.

In the mean time and that being said, keep me in your prayers,
Sincerely,
Humpty Dumpty

The Goodness of Post

"Here's the mail it never fails

Makes me wanna wag my tail

When it comes I wanna wail

MAAAIIIIILLLLL!!!!!!!!!"

(yes, we've been known to watch a little "Blues Clues" now and then)

My amazing friend Keri sent me the coziest package in the mail from the exotic mountain reaches of B.C. and I think I squealed at higher decibles with each item that came out of the box.

The Stash.

Organic Kama Soap :kamasoap.com, which Jackson took a bite out of the instant I unwrapped it, but he was fine cause it's made of the most wonderful ingredients.... in fact he's probably healthier now for ingesting it.

Home Grown Honey from some Kimberly locals: moodybee.com. Even the jar makes my heart sing!

Homemade Crackers from Keri I believe she shared the recipe on her blog a while back here on her blog

VERY DELICIOUS COFFEE!!! osonegrocoffee.com
My whole kitchen smells like this now; I open the bag just to sniff it and have considered opening it and just waving it around all parts of the house so that my whole living space will smell like delicious coffee....just a thought.

Herbal soak and Epsom salts from Purcell Organics: purcellorganics.com I had the most lovely bath in my new bathtubs with this stuff, and even though I had to shower a bit afterwords on account of being covered in little herby bits, it was wonderful. Like soaking in a big cup of tea. :)

A back issue of Country Living Magazine ( my favorite) and the UK version to boot!

My friend Keri's business: A Clean Alternative. cleanalternative.ca

(this is a very typical picture taken at our house: Me looking devastatingly chic (lol) and my children doing something random at my feet.)

And here's my personal favorite; Keri made this apron for me and it's tres' fabulous! I believe it to be upcycled from a former night dress in lovely rose print and a vintage table cloth. It's so just the right thing for me who is particularly falling in love with aprons these days.
And falling in love with retrieving the mail wouldn't you say?
Much love back to you Keri, stay tuned for what get's mailed your way!

Cheers.
P.s. Check out these websites, honestly this stuff is all gorgeois!

A New Year....

A new year, a new chalkboard a new wall to hang it on and some new resolutions so here we go....

Let's see how we do.

Best of wishes for all you in the new year and good luck with your resolutions too!
(care to share what they are?)

cheers.

Under the Weather.

Every few years every family I know seems to have a flu Christmas.
You know the ones where everybody throws up and has fevers and eats crackers and ginger ale instead of turkey?

That seems to be on the roster for the Winkels this year. We've been healthy since 2007 so I guess we're due.

Kevin came home sick yesterday afternoon much to my surprise and climbed straight into bed. The kids and I carried on with our day until 5:00 I could barely swallow for the sore throat I had.
We all headed to bed early, but were awakened in the middle of the night by a feverish baby who had the runs and a dry hacking cough.
Mama was chilled and aching all over, so Daddy manfully dealt with the diaper and we got the poor little tyke back down to sleep.
Fast forward to 5:45 am and both kids were on either side of me in the bed in only half their jammies crying while Kevin got dressed to go to the school to make plans for the substitute teacher who'd fill in for him (remember this my friends who think being a teacher is a cushy ride);
Ava Grace was moaning, "I can't swallow!!!!! I hurt...EVERYWHERE!"
Then she added, " Please let's pray to Jesus, we need his help!"

Indeed.

We prayed, He helped and we got through  today. We made it out to the doctors office and were given a prescription for penicillin that we really don't need and probably won't take.
We ate Chicken Noodle soup, watched Thomas the Tank Engine and I Cross Stitched.
We all napped.

I'm thinking we probably should've gotten our flu shots this year and right about now we'd have the energy to be stuffing the last boxes. We'd be making our lists and checking them twice.
Ah well, there's something cozy about all the cuddling on the couch we've been doing and there's something to be said for starting the holidays early and wearing pajamas all day... and man, that chicken soup was good.

Here's to looking on the bright side and wishing everyone else health for the holidays!

Dark, Small, Moments.

I know this time of year calls for blog posts about cheerful crafts and delicious baked goods, but tonight it is for my selfish catharsis and a look into the dark, small moments of this mother's heart....

Four years ago, Ava Grace was a tiny baby of five months when she came down with a rather intense gastrointestinal infection. We were in the hospital for several days and on one particular night in the pediatrics ward I had one of those clear moments of thought that stands out and sticks with you long after the initial illumination has dimmed.

I sat in the green vinyl rocking chair in our hospital room at about 2. A.M. rocking the body of my listless, lethargic baby, listening to the sound of the nurses sneakers squeaking up and down the quiet hallways.

Even though I know God's presence was with me throughout that whole situation, I still felt so helpless and overwhelmed as very young, very frightened and still very new-to-the-job mother, knowing there was nothing I could do to fix the suffering of my baby girl.

I remember thinking of a campfire song we learned as kids; the one about going on the bearhunt and coming to different obstacles. The lyrics say, "Can't go over it. Can't go under it. Can't go around it-- Have to go through it."

I was struck with how blessed I was to only be given a very small taste of what some parents must feel in having to deal with children who are really ill and really do require so much more assistance and treatment than we did then.
My heart and arms began to physically ache with my empathy and I began to weep for all the mothers (some I know) to whom visits to the hospital, are a more arduous and regular occurrence.

The gratitude I felt then has never really left me, and I can honestly say that the health of my family is something I don't take for granted.

But of course from time to time you hit a stride of life and health concerns fade into the further recesses of your mind and the topics of school lunches and bedtime routines become more of a focus.

Well, today was another hellish visit to the hospital (with my son this time), and once again I found myself at the mercy of medical intervention to give us answers concerning his health and once again I was reminded of the parents who are subjected to medical tests and therapies far greater in scale.

My little son Jackson has never had great digestion.
From the day we brought him home from the hospital he kicked and screamed for hours on end with a bloated tummy and painful gas.
It was awful.
Finally we figured out to rid his diet of lactose and that helped a great deal, but for the last six months his digestion has again been up and down. (mostly down).

I have two courses of action to take, one with a naturopathic doctor to see what they will prescribe and what dietary changes they can recommend,
But in the meantime of waiting on that, I have a very sick little boy on my hands who is getting increasingly picky with what he will eat and the list of foods that set his stomach off is getting longer and longer.

Finally on Sunday we took him in to the hospital to make sure he wasn't dehydrated and that anything emergent or sinister could be ruled out.
They agreed he didn't appear to have a virus, but they ordered a full bill of tests to rule out everything from parasites to intolerances.

This was what I had been dreading the most.

I had heard the shrieks of small children having blood work come from the little bedded room across the hall from the main lab. Kevin handed me the requisition form and I shuddered, I cried, I held my boy and prayed for another way out, then I sucked it up, collected samples of his poo the following day and drove to the hospital before I could back out.

They led us into the little room used for torturing small children with needles and instructed me to swaddle him in a heavy sheet and pin him to the little bed. Two nurses then proceeded to unsuccessfully  poke him with three different needles in both arms to draw TEN vials of blood for testing.

I lay next to him helping pin him to the bed whispering into his ears and praying softly while he screamed loud enough to shatter glass. After 5 minutes of this ordeal, even I caved and my prayers started falling on his red face along with my tears.

The look of distrust in his eyes is what destroyed me the most.
And made me think the longest.

As well as this post being about parenting sick children, it's about the ways in which I realized God parents us.
We are sick and in need of treatments we often don't understand. God's heart breaks for his hurting children too, and all he can do is rock us in his the vinyl rocking chair or pin us down when we struggle.

When my hands stopped shaking a good hour later, I held my boy and kissed him so many times I thought my lips might fall off. I cried some more, thanking God that he made me a parent of these precious children but that he is also a parent to me.

Hopefully within days, these tests will give me some more answers, unfortunately they don't give the answers I seek the most in the dark, still moments of my heart.
A fallen world is the only answer available for why some children are sick and why some parents must go this hard road, and that answer can seem desperately thin at times.

If you are one of the parents I know who has no course but "through" illness with your child, know that my prayers REALLY are with you. Those of you I know and follow your stories, I can only say you inspire me and encourage me in the way you bravely, selflessly and even joyfully take on this journeys full throttle.

For tonight I will linger longer at the bedside of each of my sleeping children and take the heaviness of this day to my knees before I lay my head down, but letting these words fall here lets them lift too.

I am blessed and of that I am so very aware.

Whew, What a Whirlwind Winkel Weekend!*

There's nothing quite like the feeling of being exhausted after your days of rest. 
I mean the deep, bone exhaustion of days piled up on top of one another till their like a mountain strapped on the back of a  bike going up hill and I am straining on the pedals with scrawny stick legs.... and probably wearing a ridiculous bike helmet all the while.

(Must make flashbacks of gawky childhood years stop....)

Friday night we headed out to the glittering metropolis of Camrose ( a farm town of about 15, 000) to do our monthly grocery shopping. I wanted to get to the one grocery store that has been able to supply our needs for our celebration of Dutch Christmas (Sinterklaas) in the past. Alas, this year there was no Chocoladhagel, papernoten or stroop waffels to be found.

There wasn't even any appelstroop.

So, after filling the cart with 250.00 of dry goods etc, (and getting a free turkey) we headed over to the local mall for a meeting with St. Nick himself.

Allow me to insert a note here about Santa Clause and his place in our family.

Remember that kid, Ian, I mentioned a week ago, who's  practically a fixture in our home? Well, last year,  he cornered Ava Grace on the stairs and told her all about the workings of this Father Christmas and how he would bring her WHATEVER  and AS MUCH as she wanted for Christmas.
I could see her eyes growing and a light lit within them. Such a thing had never  even entered her head as possible! ANY TOYS she wanted! AND HE WOULD BRING THEM IF SHE BUT ASKED.

This surely must be the meaning of not just Christmas, but life altogether. 

Fortunately this parent swooped in and educated her small daughter, that this gift giving saint is a fun part, but not the true meaning  of Christmas and that he only gives one gift that must always be under  $15.00.

:)

On with the story.....

Santa of course has remained a celebrity in Ava Grace's eyes and ranks somewhere  below Jesus and above her teacher Ms Whalen.

Where her patient mother falls on this list depends on the day....

Waiting in the lineup to Santa's styrofoam village, she made everyone laugh with the sincere clasping of her hands and her excited gushing, "Oh mama! He's here! He's really here! I can see him! and I'm going to meet him and talk to him  (insert squealing noise here)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

She was almost like me at a Hanson concert. :)

(I laughed at how she approached him like a king on a throne. It cracked me up.)

 Bless her, when Santa asked what she wanted for Christmas she told him straight out and said "My mom checked it, that one's not too spensive. " (that's my girl.) Then She added, "and Jackson just wants a fire truck cause he's a boy."

 Jackson, despite his dapper attire, did not make it into any photo ops other than this attempt with Father Christmas. He took one look at the kindly old man and began shrieking like sharp pointy things were being thrust at him. I was disappointed  because I had put him in a bow tie and everything.

                                                                  We are not amused

I'll pick up the pace now...

Saturday we hosted the inlaws for brunch and then the faithful  pair of them helped Kev load up half of our worldly possessions into two vehicles and trucked it to our new house.

Later that same day, there was very loud Boney M Christmas music ringing through our halls as I scrubbed and scoured my whole house in a pair of rolled up jeans, Ancient Missions trip T shirt and a jaunty bandanna tied about my head while the kidlets went swimming with Dad.

Sunday morning we ran around like a lot of disorganized, well-dressed headless chickens and then threw ourselves into our van and trekked an hour down the highway for church. We only realized in the parking lot we had forgotten diapers.

Towards the end of the lovely service, I got one of my freakish migraines and lost vision in my left eye. I took my prescription medication which helps, but also reduces my vitality to that of a limp dishrag because of it's side effects.
( I will post more about these migraines and medications in a later post, because I've been doing much thinking/researching etc. on the whole thing lately).

This time around the medication also gave me wicked hot flashes so I rode home back down the highway with the air conditioning on on my side of the van, wearing only the camisole top I had on under my church attire. (my passenger window even fogged up, I was giving off so much heat, I kid you not.)

Sunday afternoon, I stayed home with Jackson while Kevin and Ava Grace went to a family Christmas Party hosted by his work. I followed Jackson around the basement wrapped in pair of sweatpants and a shawl blanket with a mug of tea, now freezing from having given off my year's worth of body heat in 2 hours. ( It's monday now, and I still can't seem to get warm.)

Ava Grace came home with a bunch of cheap plastic Dora the explorer toys (which I could rant about in another post, but wont here) which she was given from a VERY sketchy Santa Clause indeed.
Kevin was very quick to inform her that THIS man was NOT the REAL Santa  and only a strange man dressed up like him. This probably staved off a lot of trauma right around the time he pulled down his pants in a cheap gag to reveal his "plastic bum" shorts from a tacky joke shop.

I was rather speechless when she related this tale to me.

Indeed.

We ended our weekend with Chicken Alfredo, cuddles on the couch, and a couple games of crazy eights.
All is well that ends well I suppose.

Ah, the irony of a restful Monday.

And on it I am thankful for:

20-30

21. My In-laws. I really am blessed with their support and willingness to help and serve.

22. Naptimes for the whole family

23. Bowties on baby boys.

24. Half the House being packed and shipped

25. Fantastic teaching from God's Word that produces real change in me.

26. The volunteers in the church nursery and Sunday school who do such great things with my kids.

27. Friends who help me out short notice
28. Countdowns on the Calendar and things to celebrate.
29. Emmanuel. God. Is. With. Us

30.  A good night's rest.



*The Alliterations are for Keri.

Playing Hooky

Friday morning we were getting ready for school.
It looks a little like this:


...No mama, I want to wear this to School!!!!!


It's minus 20 you can't wear shorts

Where are your boots ? (what is it with us and Boots?)

I need to comb your hair

Can I have candy?


Jackson, No touch!

Mom did you pack me a snack?

Mostly

Can I have candy for snack?

Jackson, Mommy says Ta Ta!

Mama, where are my boots?

Jackson climb down from there!

and on and on it goes :)

Well, we were almost getting our "poop in a group" as my friend Al, so delicately puts it, and a familiar red van pulled into our driveway.
I had completely forgotten today was a scheduled day for me to babysit for my friend H.
Her son, Ian has been coming to my home on the days she teaches (as a sub) for the last 4 years, so he's a pretty solid fixture at our house, although lately he's been in Kindergarten and hasn't come over as much.

"Ave," I turned to her as H, and Ian came up the walkway, "do you want to go to school or stay home and play with Ian?"

It was not a difficult choice.
Ava LOVES Ian. As evidenced by this conversation over lunch:

Ava: "Ian, what are you going to be when you grow up."
Ian (no hesitation whatsoever) "A denturist."

 ( I should insert here, that Ian's dad is a denturist)
Ava: "Oh,,,,, I'm going to be a mama"
Ian: "Of course you are, everybody gets to be a mom or a dad. Someday you'll be a mom and I'll be a dad."
Ava: "Hey Ian, maybe someday you could be the dad, and I could be the mom together!"
Ian: "ya, that could be a good idea."

.....

So..... for the rest of the day when they weren't getting betrothed, our day looked pretty much like this:


Ian brought his apple crate full of wooden trains and tracks and we set up the sweetest train system of all time.  That's "Gold Thomas" on the tracks, he's all bling .

 Out to the backyard they went once we pried the screen door out of it's frozen tracks.

  We made gingerbread men, and angels and snowmen and trees and you name it; we made it.

 Of course they had to be decorated.

 This makes my teeth hurt just looking at them....

School Shmool... Staying Home Rules!

With it comes the thankfulness....

Today I felt pain and with it deep thankfulness

I was reminded of a story told by Corrie Ten Boom; when she was a child she asked her earthly father some very heavy questions and her Father's reply was apt. He told her that just as he would never ask her to carry a suitcase too heavy for her physically, our Heavenly father asks too that we place our burdens on Him and allow him to carry them for us.
It doesn't mean we don't feel them, but their weight is not on us.

Later, when her life circumstances carried Corrie down some very dark and trying roads her simple prayer became to ask God "Father, would you then, hold this also?"

His burden is easy and His yoke is light.

And so in the pain comes the thankfulness, like so many shafts of light coming through a dirtied window until all around is filled with a peaceful light that can't be touched but is deeply felt.

He is here too, and he will carry it.

10-20

Today, I am thankful for:


Love.

Contented children

The phone call you needed.

A simple peanut butter sandwhich

A tidied room

A God who hears and answers prayers

Simple gifts from a daughter at school.

Cold remedies for snotty babies

The washing machine contines... barely, but it continues....

Advent and a focus for my faith

Good to the Last Drop.

We may have found a solution to our drinking problem...

As you may know, I have been trying to root sugar out of the sneaky hiding places in our diet, some days we have more success than others, particularly in the beverage department.

Not only have I had a very hard time learning to enjoy coffee black, but the kids really like their juice.
I mean really really like their juice.


I joke that Jackson likes juice like some people like illegal substances... of all kinds.
He`s a bit of a junkie actually.

Now I`ve never been one to give the kids sugared drinks like punch or cool aid or soft drinks, but even the Pure Apple Juice from concentrate I get in frozen cans or the Orange Juice of the same type, need to be enjoyed in moderation (apparently no more than 4 ounces a day which is only 1/2 a cup).

The problem then becomes, what else to substitute for the juice?

This isn't really a problem per say, because the obvious answer is water.

My kids do drink a good amount of water. But water is not very exciting and so water is consumed at the breakfast, lunch and supper table in a grown up cup with a straw.... this is the only way that water is exciting enough for my kids to drink it.

But they do in fact drink it, so I am satisfied.

The real problem is Baby.

Baby doesn't just like juice, baby also really, really, likes his bottle.
But only when it doesn't have water in it.
Water in the bottle makes baby turn into the hulk

and we don't much enjoy hulk baby.

Why not milk in his bottle?  You may be wondering?

Milk is what most babies take in their bottle, but Baby is lactose intolerant and so he needs Soy milk which is dang expensive.

I have a post sitting in my drafts about our recent dive further into frugality which would make this post make perhaps even more sense than it does, and that post would tell you that in a moment of shock when I realized how much we were spending on both children's milk habits, I also researched and found out they were over consuming milk, by almost twice the amount they really needed.

It kind of works out like this:
Ava Grace is 4 so she needs no more than 16 ounces of milk a day.  (that's less than 3 cups)
That, in our house,  translates to two sippy cups a day.
One at Naptime and one at Bedtime.

Jackson is 18months so he needs only 16 -24 ounces max a day
which translates to two bottles a day.
One at Naptime, and one at bedtime

(and no, I don't put them to bed with their bottles or milk cups, it's part of our routine to have a cup with a cuddle before going to bed)

With Jackson we go with the lower amount, but there's still times in the day when he wants something in his bottle, most likely just for the comfort of having it.

My goodness I feel worn out with all that explaining! Isn't it kind of sad that as a mom I feel I need to do all this explaining for the things I do with my kids? Am I the only one?

Anyways, there you have it.... our drinking problems

Then I remembered that my sister-in-law's father (did you catch that?), who is from South Africa and drinks Rooibos tea like it's water, told us that this tea is actually given to babies where he is from, and that it has many good properties etc. etc.

I decided to go on a google hunt just to see what I could find about babies and rooibos and guess what,

There was a lot out there!
This site, had it pretty well summed up and I was excited that there may be something new for my little one's to drink and get something good out of it at the same time!

I learned that herbal teas (rooibos in particular) contained a healthy amount of antioxidants and was beneficial to kids in often calming upset stomachs (of which Jackson also frequently suffers). It is naturally decaffeinated and contains no hidden sweeteners.  Unlike Black Tea, it is not a diuretic and does not contain poly phenols t that interfere with the absorption of iron.

All around herbal teas are a safe satisfying drink to feed small tots like mine! And BONUS, if you brew them weakly they are still getting a pretty good dose of water!

I tried this for Jackson on Friday, by making a weak brew of All Natural Pomegranate Rooibos with a little splash of his soy milk. (roughly 6 ounces)

He was skeptical at first, but soon gave it a better try and the 6 ounces gave him enough to suckle away at over the period of the afternoon ( he still had 6 ounces of soy milk at afternoon naptime and a cup of water at lunch and supper, each)

I served the tea at first lukewarm temperature, and as it cooled over the course of time, he was less interested in it.
Late in the afternoon I decided to throw it back into a ceramic mug and give it 20 seconds in the microwave to make it slightly warm again.


So there, you have it.

Now if I could only find my tea cozy.....