Conor's 17th

Happy Birthday, Conor.  I hope you like it!

Frosted Sugar Cutout Cookies.

Frosted Sugar Cutout Cookies...the finished product. Clare, Theresa, Noelle, Natalie, Regina and I worked on it this morning. I accidentally added twice the amount of butter to the frosting recipe but ohhhh, is it good.

  I was too busy supervising and refereeing to take any pictures of the decorating, but here's a slightly wider shot of the proceedings.

Sock Babies

I found this craft idea and couldn't resist - making a Baby Jesus out of a sock.  You can read more about the tradition here.

As an added bonus, all the socks were matched from the sock-matcher basket while we were looking for stray white socks to use for the craft!

Gaude! Gaude!

It's Gaudete Sunday!  That means the third Sunday of Advent, and it's time to rejoice!  The Catholic Church uses the color violet - not purple - for the first, second and fourth Sundays, the color symbolizing penitential seasons, and rose (not pink) for third Sunday.  Rose is a "brightening" of the color purple - oops, violet - and symbolic of joy as our Savior's birth draws ever nearer.

This year we decided to put our tree up on the first Sunday of Advent, but not to decorate it with anything but white lights until Christmas Eve.  However, this proved too drab.  My son Brian had the idea to decorate it as an Advent Tree, using only purple violet decorations, and adding rose on the third Sunday.

I am happy to say that it has turned out beautifully, in our opinion anyway.  It's simple, to be sure, but we are very happy with it and I think it will be our tradition from now on.

Violet only, the first two weeks of Advent.

Today we added rose ribbons and ornaments.  I also had the idea to display the cards we received on the tree.

We will most likely keep it like this, and add white ornaments on Christmas.  This year we are also doing another tree up in the rec room, and that one will have the family ornaments we've amassed throughout the years.  Or maybe we'll strip this one on Christmas Day and redecorate it.  I don't know yet.

 Orna-Man!

Snapshots of December

We were quite surprised to have Saint Nicholas drop by on his feast day...

Saint Nicholas with Conor, Clare & Theresa

Our television is on a ledge in the corner, and the twins seem to think the closer they can get to VeggieTales, the better...

Natalie, Noelle & Archibald Asparagus

The aftermath of a very messy sock battle...Mom won, of course.

9/10 of our family has been ravaged by the stomach flu for the past two weeks. This has been a common sight in our house recently:

Theresa, Noelle & Natalie passed out on the floor

As soon as we felt a little better (and the rain stopped) Daddy and the healthy ones went to get our tree. They picked a real beauty...Conor & Clare

And had a delightful time decorating it...Noelle

Theresa & Brian

Clare

And every day since then, the twins have been steadily un-decorating every inch they can reach. It's kind of like a reverse Pin The Tail on the Donkey - whatever they can grab is fair game. There's a sparkly silver disco ball just out of their reach, and they are so cute jumping for it, in an annoyingly mischievous kind of way. They haven't gotten it yet...they do know how to drag a stool over, so I imagine it's only a matter of time until they put two and two together. This is what the tree looks like now (and how I suspect it will look from now on).

Christmas Stockings & Gift Traditions

Kim over at The Mommy Machine posted about her traditions regarding Christmas Stockings. So I'm going to share mine, and invite you to comment about your own. Or better yet, make your own post and link to mine so we can share!


One year I also made stockings for all of us.










Mine aren't as personalized as hers, but they have a white pocket on the front with the child's monogram on it (in a family of 10 this can be useful since they were all from the same fabric). I haven't done the twins' yet, because my sewing machine broke and it's not high on my priority list. I actually like Kim's mom applique' idea. It would be so cool to add items slowly as their interests change.

I know this is corny, but I use the Christmas stockings to resupply the kids with toiletries - toothbrush, deodorant, dental floss, lip balm, hand lotion. I also include a movie, dvd or cd of interest, maybe a small toy for the younger ones, their favorite gum or candy, and some money tucked into the pocket. The ones who hang out at Dunkin Donuts received gift cards for there. My handyman son received a roll of duct tape. My hikers one year received patches from the longest hike they'd completed that year. Maybe something they need, like a pair of gloves or a travel umbrella. One year my little girl, who'd recently had her ears pierced, received a pair of earrings.














Oh - each year I also put in one Christmas tree ornament for everybody . It doesn't have to be expensive. Some years everybody gets an individually selected one, but other years it's a set. This year everybody got a jingle bell from Target.


Last year it was a packaged set of tiny wooden presents with a monogram sticker on each one. The year before was a set of Rudolph&Friends ornaments. My oldest, a nonconformist, got Herbie the Dentist. My tallest son got the Bumble. My tool-lovin' son got Yukon Cornelius, etc. I've used plastic stars, or miniature stockings personalized with names & the year. The kids love opening the ornament box every year and reminiscing. When they move away and have their own trees, they can take their ornaments with them (this sounds good in theory, but will probably break my heart).

In recent years, one of the treats I've tried to include is candy from another country. One year I ordered eccentric candy bars from Australia that aren't distributed in the states. My kids are STILL talking about that year. There are whole bunch of candies with really weird names that sound totally quaint to Americans. Get a load of these:

Curly-Wurly
Killer Pythons
Cherry Ripe
Wine Gums
Violet Crumble
Tim-Tams
Milk Bottles
Freddo Frogs
Magical Elves
Dairy Milk Bars

Violet Crumble is amazing. So is Nestle's Peppermint Crisp - unlike anything I ever tasted. I ordered fifty bucks of candy this year (I couldn't stop myself), to stuff stockings and also to set out for company. It's a great conversation piece as well. I get them from Simply Australian but there are surely others. I just stick with what I know. The lady there, Jan, was so terrific to work with that first year, and I'm loyal - I believe in rewarding good customer service.

Now onto Christmas gifts. When we had fewer than 4 children, they used to get a boatload of presents, large & small, and the distribution had to be kind of equal. But the present pileup got to be overwhelming in our small house (not to mention the mounting cost), and you all know that the kids don't even remember what they got after a few weeks.

A dear friend suggested that the kids should only get 3 presents because that's what Jesus received, so we did that for a while, but after another kid or two, the accumulation and cost were still substantial. Even when we tried to make one of the gifts spiritual in nature, it still felt like the focus was on the presents more than anything else.

So a couple years ago, we took the plunge and cut it down to one present per child. GASP! Talk about pressure! When they only get one present, it has to be a good one. Of course, they still get presents from others outside the house, but on Christmas morning they get one present from us in addition to their stockings.

NEXT YEAR, though the kids don't know it yet, we're thinking that we won't get them any gifts at all. I know, I know, we probably all say this every year, but this time I'm sincere. We're going to put money away all year, and at the beginning of Advent next year we're going to give each of them $100. They will have to think of something good to do with the money for somebody in need. We're big supporters of Food for the Poor and they have an amazing gift catalog, but it doesn't have to be anything overseas. Maybe they can provide 5 Christmas dinners to people in our town. Maybe they can buy warm coats and mittens for kids. Maybe they'll participate in Toys for Tots. We're going to try to offer ways for them to help other people in our town or abroad, and my prayer is that after the howls of protest die down, they'll come up with ways on their own that we didn't even think of.

But I'll still try to stuff their stockings with something amazing. Otherwise I might die of guilt.