This Farm girl learned a new skill

A couple of times a week, I walk past it. I stare at it, and try to figure it out. I ask myself, "Can I do that"? It's the Log splitter. Last week I decided to try. It didn't look too hard. So, I rolled it out of the garage, put gas in it, and tried to figure out how to start it. Once I started, I didn't want to stop. It really was fun!

I split this little stack, and moved it up to the porch. 

 Then this one..

 And this one...

 Then this one. Sweet Man informed though, 

that the middle of the driveway might not be the best place for it. ;-)

 So I rolled the splitter over 'here' and split some more. All in all it took me about 4 days to split a couple of months worth of wood. The neatest thing about this? When the Log splitter is going you can't hear a thing. Every once in a while one of the princesses would come out to tattle on the other one. Some one wasn't sharing like they should, or finishing their school papers. I would just wave and mouth "Merry Christmas". :-) It was about the most peaceful 4 days I have had in a long time!

I was so proud of my new skill, I even took a day to go over and split some of Dad's wood. Although, I am realizing just where all the muscles are in my body, for they are all pretty sore right now. ;-)

Christmas Traditions

A couple of weeks ago, out our Women's Christmas luncheon for the church, the question came up about traditions. We were to share what Christmas traditions we had as a family. I just sat back and listened, not only to get some really good ideas, but for the life of me I couldn't remember what we did...LOL. Never fear, the kids will remind you if you forget. ;-)

Seeing the Christmas lights is a big one. We try to hit several light shows during the month of December.

Apparently we always take our kids to the mall to eat at the picnic place, and enjoy the Christmas decorations. This is a really big deal since we only go to the mall once a year. 

 So last week, we took our annual mall trip. We were very fortunate to be able to add seeing a play to it too! Our print shop printed the programs for "The littlest Angel", and we had complimentary tickets!!

 The girls were thrilled, and so were the parents. ;-) It was such a cute little play, and definitely added to the magic of the evening.

 Of course another tradition is baking. We do a lot of baking. I ran out of oven space this year, so we improvised and used the wood stove too. ;-) It worked beautifully.

 We also make a paper chain to count down the days till Christmas morning. Every day, one little princess, gets to tear off a link and proclaim how many more days they have to wait for that super anticipated morning. 

 Some more baking. Princess #1 found this recipe for us, and it is quite yummy. You bake up some homemade chocolate wafer cookies. Sandwich two together with vanilla icing in the middle, and then roll in crushed candy canes. It was a little bit time consuming, but the girls loved it!

 This is the product of a full day of all that baking, and a couple weeks worth of crocheting while the girls would read to me.

One of the girls favorite traditions happens on Christmas Eve. We pull out the sleeper sofa, and they all "camp out" by the wood stove and Christmas tree. I tuck them in all nice and tight, and Sweet Man reads the Christmas story to them, from the Bible. His Dad always read it to him growing up, and he is keeping that tradition alive with reading it to his girls. It is a very lovely time. We put out some cookies and milk on the counter, for us parents to eat. The girls giggle all the while doing it, wondering which one of us will eat the most. Haven't they learned yet? Of course it will be ME!! I LOVE cookies! ;-)

The next morning, Christmas morning, I will be up bright and early fixing a Christmas breakfast for not only us to enjoy, but my parents as well. This year we will have a special treat. My Sweet Aunt will be joining us for breakfast too!

What about you? Do you guys have any fun traditions that you would like to share? Don't you just love how this time of year brings about so many neat activities?

Christmas decorating

Sunday morning I woke up feeling very much in the Christmas spirit. I did a little Christmas party for the 1st and 2nd grade Sunday School class, which was so much fun. I only had two students though...and they were Princess #2 and#3. What fun that was to hang out with just the two of them and celebrate.

When we came home I was excited to see that out of the four channels we get on our TV, two of them were playing Christmas movies!!! :-) 

After watching several people decorate their houses for the Season, on TV, I decided I wanted to do a little more decorating on our own home. I needed to take a hike though. I asked if anyone wanted to join me, and was secretly a little excited when they all chose to stay inside. ;-) I just love being in the woods alone. I have seriously thought about taking up hunting, just for the fact that I could sit and stare at the scenery for hours on end, and still call it being productive. ;-)

I came home with a bag full of fresh evergreen trimmings. So many trees to choose from. Of course it helps that I planted 800 pine trees the first year we lived here. Oh does that bring back memories. Memories of Sweet Little Princess #1 riding in a baby carrier on my back, mid November, while I dug and plopped trees down all over this place. Oh yeah, back to my original thought....

 I scrounged up as many containers that I could find.

 I made a couple of these...

 and these...

 Oh, and one of these too.

I just love this time of year. :-)

Brunch with buddies :-)

Last week we had the pleasure of spending the day with our good buddies. Both families have been so busy with so many activities, that we haven't been able to visit as much as we would like. The kids remind us moms of this frequently. So, we set a day to visit to our hearts content. We started off at their house for a delicious brunch, and so many cups of coffee that I lost count. ;-) Now, anytime you get this bunch of kids together, they are going to get creative. But I was not prepared for the question that my oldest came running down the stairs to ask. "Mom, can I sit on the roof?"....."What? Are you serious?"...She was. Her buddy has a window that looks out onto the flat porch roof. He has a little camp chair that he can sit in to take in the most magnificent view. What was a mom to say? "Sure"....I did go up to help them out, and make sure they knew to  not get near the edge. I would have taken a picture, but my cup of coffee was waiting for me back down by the fire. ;-)

We came home for a quick dinner, and then were off for more adventures. Sweet Man had three college exams the next day, so I was looking for somewhere to go, to give him a nice quiet evening at home to study. Four ladies can make a lot of noise ya know. The library was having a family craft day, so we "kidnapped" our buddies and took them with us. Trying to make up for lost time of not visiting. ;-)

They made cute little Christmas trees out of ice cream cones, and LOTS of frosting.

 They decorated these little trees too.

They also made these light bulb necklaces. It was a crafting palooza!

I just think these trees turned out so neat. I think they will look great on our kitchen counter. I am thinking about making a Christmas village with gingerbread houses, and these will add a nice touch.

 Or not! "Hey, who ate the decorations?"

How did Sweet Man's exams go? Well, he passed all three!!!!!!!!

He is just so amazing! :-)

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

The past couple of weeks have been so busy. But oh so fun! 

We had dinner with the dogs. ;-) 

 Were able to redeem some rewards for reading.

 Yes. We always get this excited over free pizza...LOL

 Visited the festival of lights...

 And was able to tell "Santa" what we wanted. Although he seemed a little nervous when Princess #1 said "another pony". This poor Santa didn't know that our girls knew the truth about Santa, so he tried to so hard to have her come up with something that she might actually get...LOL She settled for telling him to bring a toy horse. :-)

 We enjoyed the hot chocolate and cookies there too!

 We have been still trying to stay on track with our schooling....whenever the cat will let us. ;-)

 Lots of baking going on.

 And sewing. 

 And even some Christmas caroling! :-)

Last night our AHG troop visited a home for Alzheimer's patients. It was amazing to see that even though the patients  have forgotten so many things, most of them still knew the words to the Christmas songs. This time of year has always been accompanied by so much joy and wonder. It was so nice to get to see this group of girls share that excitement with others. Holidays with children are just so precious!

Some days are better than others....

Some days are wonderful. Everything works like it should, and goes as planned. I cherish those days, for they are normally followed by the "other" kind. The ones that you would rather not repeat...

I overslept and started the day behind schedule.

Couldn't get the fire to start. I hate being cold!

The pony stall flooded and required an early stall cleaning and laying down of new bedding. Yes...all of this was BEFORE breakfast. I am naturally a hungry girl ya know. I need food to accomplish such tasks.

Came inside to make breakfast. Phone rang and I completely forgot about the breakfast in the oven. It burnt. Who needs to eat anyway!

Fire wouldn't start.

During school time it appeared that one of my children woke up with the case of the clumsies. Knocked over everything possible. Cups of pencils. Organized stacks of papers..etc.

After all of the knocked over articles get picked up and put back into place, I settled myself down to accomplish the read aloud time, the teacher's manual said it was time for. This is of course was when one child decided she had to poop. Now you can't have read aloud time without ALL of the students, so we wait. And wait. We can hear her singing in the bathroom, so we know her return must be getting close. As soon as she settles back down in her chair, it seems that another child has developed the urge to poop. I seriously considered calling school off to have a holiday to honor fiber at this point. But we press on after everyone is a little more "comfortable" in their seats.

We finished our read aloud and were ready to tackle learning about the planets. Did you know that we only have eight now? I can't keep up with all of these "new" findings. During this time is when it seems that one of our dogs had developed a weak bladder and had to be let out and in numerous times, during the span of what leftover time we had for school. The other dog? She must have seen my frustration in how many times I had to get up to let the other one out, for she deemed the carpet the perfect place to do her business!!

Fire won't start.

It was time for lunch, and the only thing I could find were last night's leftovers. I remembered why I have so many. No one liked it! Who needs to eat anyway? ;-)

I decide to try super hard on dinner tonight, and go all out. Around twenty minutes before I had it all spread out on the table, Sweet Man calls and says he has to work over. :-( Fancy dinners are not as nice without a Sweet Man!

Fire won't start!

I decide to have the girls strip down to their birthday suit for a bath. I turn on the faucet....NOTHING! A dry well. I wipe the girls down the best I can, armed only with a dry rag. I paint a smile on my face and make a joke about the water. I do not feel like smiling or joking. But it's what we needed at that moment.

I drag myself to bed and call it a day. I make the declaration that I will not oversleep tomorrow....and I am getting a blow torch for that stinking fire! ;-)

Job training ;-)

Children love to pretend, and it is a great "tool" for them to actually learn and express themselves. One of our little activities at our house, which is much loved by the girls, is pretending to be a waitress. Whenever time, and my patience, allows, I will let one of the girls serve our food at a meal time. They like to make menus of the ingredients that I have made, put on an apron, grab a note pad and pencil, and proceed to take our "order". Of course there is only one thing we are allowed to order. ;-) I am not a short order cook. Don't have time for that.

If the waitress is lucky, we might even dig through our pockets for a tip. ;-)

Even though pretending is fun. Getting to do the "real" thing is super fun! A couple of weeks ago (yes I am behind on blogging) our local American Heritage Girls troop had a pancake breakfast. The girls got to play the part of hostess and waitress. They thoroughly enjoyed the day. Sweet Man and I thoroughly enjoyed the pancakes. ;-)

Aren't these the cutest little waitresses ever?!