God is great

God is great, beer is good... people are crazy.

- Billy Currington

I love that song.

Here are some snapshots of our Christmas...

Adventurous Addie, Adelaide "bakes" at a homeschooling club, Christmas shepherd's pie, new books, Christmas fruit tree inspired by IowaGirlEats, and a minion cake I made for my nephew's first birthday that I was especially proud of.

Merry Christmas!

I hope your Christmas Octave is going splendidly. We had a laid-back, family-oriented Christmas, as we had hoped. It was nice to have my mother stay with us, not only so I could spend time with her, but because it is great to have company for Addie at home. Plus, we got go on a date and watch the new Star Wars. Have you seen it? We LOVED it. We are now planning to visit Fatima for New Year's Eve and a much-needed vacation in January. That I am REALLY looking forward to. I can hardly sleep at night.

"A little child is born for us today;

little and yet called the mighty God, alleluia."

(From today's morning prayer)

Home-schooling and Over-schooling

I have an article up at Catholic Stand about education... as complex as that might be:

http://www.catholicstand.com/homeschooling-and-over-schooling/

I hope you enjoy it. This is one of the things I most think about recently.

The sound of little feet

I was driving across the bridge to Lisbon when "Remember When" by Alan Jackson came on the online radio I was listening to. It's one of my favorite songs ever. I started crying and was worried about not seeing and swerving into the river. It gets me every time.

One of my favorite lines is "remember when... the sound of little feet was the music we danced to week to week". When I hear Addie's running around the house... because she never walks, she runs... I sometimes think of this line and get a little nostalgic. For the time I'll have to remember that sound.

I also love the line "Remember when thirty seemed so old, Now lookn' back it's just a steppin' stone, To where we are, Where we've been, Said we'd do it all again". Whenever I think of my wedding or the life my husband and I are building... well, this line describes it.

Finally, I got teary-eyed in the car thinking about a friend I have who just had a prematurely-born baby. She was so worried about having kids and having to give up her lifestyle of travel, eating out, etc. that I thought of her with this line: "new were born. life was changed, disassembled, rearranged." With Addie, that's exactly how I felt. Everything was disassembled, only to be rearranged again. It's hard. But it's a million times better.

Christmas decorations

We have been enjoying our Christmas decorations this Advent. Last year I didn't put up a tree or listen to any Christmas music... I was that overwhelmed with baby/work/trying to do everything. (because I loove Christmas)

This year we got our act together and put up our tree on the first Sunday of Advent. We've been really enjoying having dinner with just Christmas tree lights and candles lit. And my husband doesn't mind listening to Christmas music non-stop since November and the the Nutcracker CD playing a million times. I got myself a winner. ;)