On Monday, 12/11, some parents from our parent group hosted a Christmas shop for the students. It’s a room filled with items that were donated or bought for the students to purchase for family members and loved ones for a small (very small) price. This is some thing that the students look forward to and it’s a fun event to help with. Since we had finished the program on Friday night, we had decided to use the music class time for the Christmas shop. A few older ladies from our church came to help wrap the gifts for the students, and it was a great opportunity for them to interact with the students and to help stream line the wrapping process! We were given quite a few nice items for students to pick out, but kindergartners and first graders are the funniest group to watch shop! One little boy bought his dad a whole handful of cute tiny erasers! I tried to convince him that his dad might want something else, but he replied, “oh no! My dad will like these, and he will be happy to share with me!” So, the hopefully the parents remember that the gift giving is studen-led! It was a fun morning! Somehow when it’s time to take down and put everything away there are less people, but I think that’s a universal problem! 😀 I was thankful that our kids had the opportunity to think about others, to spend their money on something for someone else, interact with some older folks who wrapped their presents, and enjoy the morning.
On Tuesday God gave me the gift of “no school”! I was probably more excited than the kids that we had a snow day. We had some snow fall on Monday night, and more snow was expected for Tuesday about mid morning. Originally I had made plans to have a mom friend, Hannah, and her young children over for the morning to play and visit with Emma and I. She sent me a text saying that she wouldn’t be able to come to our house as her husband had taken her vehicle to work. However, did we want to come and play at their house? The boys were very excited to play at someone else’s house, and Hannah has a bit of a hill in their backyard. The boys gathered up their snow gear, snow boards, and sleds, and we went visting! The roads were fine or at least in my opinion, and since my kids are early risers we were at their house before 8:30am. It worked out to be a fun morning for all of us. I had a great morning visiting with Hannah, the kids played outside for several hours, we had lunch at 10:30, and we were home by 11:30! Hannah has younger children than I do, so the boys did a great job of playing nicely and helping the little ones with outside gear. I wanted to leave before nap time arrived, as I remember that being a very important part of my day as a mom with young kids! By the time we arrived home, it was snowing again. I think the boys spent most of the day outside except for needing food. They built a fort, made a snowboard jump off of the picnic table, shot targets, and got along far better outside than they would’ve inside the house! It was a day for fun, memories, and rest. I soaked it all up!
Wednesday was Roger’s day off. Originally I had made plans to spend the day with Allison doing some shopping and enjoying each other’s company. However Emma’s class was having their preschool program on Wednesday, and I didn’t want to miss that! And it worked out because Roger could also come to the program. Travis also started his speech lessons on Wednesday. We are hoping that this will help him with reading and other school subjects. He works so hard at school, but his success levels are low. He will have speech lessons twice a week for the next several months to see if this will help with school success.
Also on Wednesday there was a meeting scheduled for after school for parents, teachers, and the school board. It was more of an informational meeting and to see how the parent group could help the teachers, etc. Originally I had planned to go as these types of things are important to me. But then I realized that I didn’t want to use up time on the day that Roger had off, and time that the kids were out of school, to attend a meeting. At some point in time I’ve come to realize that not everything can fit in my day! After we had picked up Emma from school at 11:30, I had gone home to make a meal for one of the teachers at the school. They’ve had a few changes in their family, and I wanted to be a blessing to them. I also made three coffee cakes for hot lunch on Friday. I figured out that if people don’t realize that we are invested in the school and that this school is important to us, then they aren’t paying attention! So I skipped the meeting as I went home with my boys. It was a good choice for today.
On Thursday Emma and I finished up the grocery shopping for hot lunch, and we spent most of the day at home. We read books, wrapped presents using lots of tape, made cookies, did laundry, and then before we picked up the boys we went visiting. Emma and I went to visit Mrs. Welch. She enjoys it when we visit (as do most older folks), and it has been a while since we visited. It always feels like I’ve just visited people, but as I look at the calendar I realize that more time has passed than what it feels like! We enjoyed our visit with her, and Emma gave her the gift we had made for her. Emma loves to give gifts to people, but I have to watch what she is giving. She’s given away used candles, broken pencils, her brothers stuff, and other miscellaneous items! I now inspect her “gifts” before she wraps them or gives them to people!
Friday was chapel and hot lunch day. No matter how organized I try to be, Friday morning is always just a little bit crazy...okay, generally, a lot crazy! For some reason getting everyone out the door on Friday, putting stuff for hot lunch in the truck, and all the other morning routines as challenging on Friday. Now that we are fourteen weeks into the school year, and a new calendar year is right around the corner, I’ve decided that I need to make some changes! I’m working on how I can make Friday morning be a little more relaxed, and I’ve had a few ideas. I just need to implement them!
Roger worked on Saturday, and the kids had Christmas program practice for the church program in the afternoon. We worked around the house in the morning, and the boys wanted to go ice skating in the afternoon. I wasn’t sure that we would be able to fit that in with the program practice, but they brought their skates just in case. Sure enough by the time we finished practice, it was almost dark outside. The boys were disappointed but we don’t have lights at the pond!
Sunday morning dawned bright and beautiful, and the boys were anxious to go ice skating. We had already had plans to go to the pastor’s house for lunch after church, and I knew we wouldn’t be coming home between services. So Roger took the boys down to the pond to play ice hockey. It was pretty chilly this morning at about four degrees, but the boys still skated for about 1.5 hours. When they came home they had rosy cheeks and cold toes! We had Christmas program practice during the Sunday school hour, and the practice went much better than it did on Saturday!
The children did their Christmas program during the worship hour, and many new faces came to church. It was a blessing to see all the folks that came out for the program. Kids are cute! Emma had been a sheep for Saturday’s practice, but on Sunday we needed another angel. Emma became the angel, except during the program she still acted like a sheep! She sat on the ground with the sheep, followed the sheep to see baby Jesus, and yawned about every three minutes...I guess she was tired! The program went well, and all the grandparents loved it, and the Gospel was presented. So we have many reasons to rejoice!
We went to the pastor’s house for lunch and enjoyed a good afternoon of fellowship. The boys played outside all afternoon, and we laughed and talked about many things. The afternoon passed by quickly! It was encouraging to go to their house, enjoy someone else’s cooking, and have sweet fellowship. The Lord provided a refreshing afternoon to start off our week.
A dear lady from church sent us home with some extra groceries and a beautiful quilt. And another dear lady found a nice jacket for one of our boys. I love how God provides for the little details in our lives even the ones that we don’t ask for!
We are less than a week away from Christmas! This week is full of parties for the kids at school, wrapping gifts, making cookies, Christmas caroling, and lots of other exciting things and ...sugar! Emma has asked me every morning since we put up the tree if we are opening presents today! I finally told her that we couldn’t open them without Aunt Jen. Then I realized that Aunt Jen will be here three days before Christmas so Emma still won’t be able to open the gifts!! Roger and I made the decision to not give our children gifts this year...I know, craziness! We just feel like we already collected and gather a lot of stuff with five children, and I can’t think of anything that they all “need”. Instead we put the money towards a family outing, and we plan to do something fun together over Christmas break. I’m definitely not opposed to giving gifts, and it’s something that I love to do! But this year we are having the kids draw names for each other, and we are doing something together as a family. I’m looking forward to seeing how it works out!
God is so good to us. We are blessed beyond measure, and I am thankful that we have this special season of Christmas. We wish you all a very merry Christmas!
No comments:
Post a Comment