Christmas 2017

Somewhere there is a picture of what actually went on here that Friday night. My friend with eight children under the age of 12 asked if she could come over and we could dip chocolates.

Sure why not?

At one point we had a whole bunch of little helpers around this table...gotta find the pics.

We used a bit over 6# of chocolate, my friend had made the oreo truffle and buckeye fillings before she got here because y'know, a mom with eight kids really has nothing else to do.

Saturday was a day for family gatherings....pinata, too much food..

A craft version of Chopped, we only got to round #1.

I gave them each 3 large coffee filters, scotch tape and a scissors.

They didn't want me to take pictures of their finished craft.

This is an idea I want to re-visit with a bit more pre-planning.

Christmas Eve was on Sunday, so in the afternoon, we opened most of our gifts.

Shekinah still loves Peppa Pig.

Faith got two pair of footwear that she didn't need :)

Zeke has been curious about the M'bira

Hope paid for part of her "new artillery" (a Canon)

Joe got a Steeler's blanket

Christmas Day with all the kids home. Thought I'd better take pictures because it probably won't happen again for a few years.

We didn't do the Thanksgiving version.

I made the food for this meal.

We've been eating egg rolls and potstickers for either Christmas or Christmas Eve for the past several years and they all (well all except Parker) seem to love it.

Parker ate rice...he'll learn- his daddy did.

Hudson dear, could have been satisfied with wrapping paper.

It was a good Christmas, I love having everyone home.

I think back to last Christmas...

Hudson was only --well, on his way.

Ben still hadn't asked Jana to marry him.

I wonder what this next year holds.

In all the hustle of family gatherings, chocolate dipping, Christmas programs,Christmas caroling, egg roll wrapping, shopping and flu season I think,

 it is best if you tell the story of Christ's birth and the reason he needed to come to earth, way before Christmas day. It should be a year-round conversation because the gift of Christ doesn't stop on Christmas Day, it was just  one part of the Salvation Plan.

I Did It Again!

I planned too much for the month of December. (Look at how much Hudson has grown!)

It seemed like such a good idea- since the health insurance deductible was almost met...

and I needed a colonoscopy and hubby needed  knee surgery (torn meniscus)...

Why not add two teens wisdom teeth in the middle of all that too!?

Yup, sounds great! I mean there were a few open days.

Well, three out of the four procedures are finished and healing well.

Joe's wisdom teeth are on schedule for Thursday morning, that is if he manages to stay well until then. He seems to be brewing a cold and is determined to delete sleep out of his schedule.

I did at least one thing right this month, according to Shekinah.

We also had two school Christmas programs to attend and we chose to attend the one --twice!

Simply because we enjoyed it so much.

"Sqooze" in a travel group get-together. Funny how the kids change their looks every year, but the adults look about the same...that or I need my annual eye exam (don't think I'm gonna schedule that yet too!)

Yes Hudson, I still need to make Christmas cookies! I did manage a hat while waiting around in doctor's offices.  I did get the egg rolls and dumplings made for Christmas dinner.

Who needs cookies?

I was very relived- he was too. He used the crutches for balance for 1-1/2 days and had very little pain, no nausea from his anesthesia. It really was an answer to prayer.

I do have a bored husband in the house tho'. I had to send him out on errands to give him something to do.

QOTD: Shekinah singing "Mary did you know, that your baby boy would someday grow up taller? Did you know...?"  (Maybe she should stick to whistling ...actually I enjoy her singing)

The Quarter Jar

A few months ago I was quite frustrated with my children. It seemed I needed to spell out every chore that needed to be done. And when I gave a chore, they made sure they did that specific thing and NO EXTRA. How on earth were they going to ever have their own home if they needed some one to tell them to keep after their own mess.

I know, I know, there are all those fancy chore charts and we did have those for awhile, but I think I'm the one with the ADD . I can remember to check up on people for just so long, then I get side-tracked. 

So- since my goal in teaching my children is to someday be productive citizens. People who will follow God's laws and other laws, because they want to, not because someone is watching over them and making sure they obey them. I also hope to have responsible children who will be appreciated by their future husbands or wives for their thoughtfulness and ability to notice when the trash needs emptied. I know two of ours are married and I'm hoping their wives didn't need to do too much training.

In an effort to encourage this wonderful behavior of "helpfulness without prompting" (I wish I had a catchier name for it) I made a quarter jar. I went to the bank for a roll of quarters. I think it costs $10 and I shook those shiny quarters in front of their noses saying "one of these will be yours every time you do a job without being prompted."

I needed to add a few rules. The quarters were not for doing someone else's job. They were not to be claimed for regularly scheduled jobs like dishes and clearing the table after meals.

They had to be claimed immediately after the job was done, so I could notice and check....none of this claiming $2 at bedtime.

I did my best not to assign the extra jobs unless people were practically tripping over it and ignoring it.It was interesting who made the most money. Some people thought they were too elite to stoop to doing jobs for a quarter, but we merrily ignored them. 

It took about 2 months to use up the quarters and I decided not to replenish the jar right away.

I wasn't sure I had accomplished anything, anyway.

Then about two months after the experiment I suddenly noticed that Hope and Faith had started taking turns washing the dishes..get this...

WITHOUT MY INSTRUCTIONS and

WITHOUT ARGUMENT!

That realization was worth more than $10.

(our dishwasher has been on the blink for about 3 months and I asked hubby to not replace it yet)

I just finished up this girl's five-year-Post-Placement report.

Sunday I got this note from her even before she tasted the soup.

She has taken up crocheting...you can't really see too well, but the hook is  inserted in 

a block of styrofoam and she tucks it under her arm.

So far she has just made a long chain, but give her time...she's only seven.

This bunch (me included) got hungry for real french fries the other day.

Then I made some on Sunday evening, but those potatoes didn't "chip" well.

Gotta find someone that hasn't chilled their potatoes- don't the grocery stores know better?

QOTD: The joys of language: after a civics lesson, one of my children asked, "what's the difference between persecute and prosecute... Isn't one of them an immoral woman? O wait that's...pros...!"

Thanksgiving Dinner- cont'

Zeke made rolls...

and decided they couldn't just be plain blobs of dough.

I must confess I helped him figure out how to do the kaiser knot, but he did most of them.

Somewhere along the line this little Mennonite girl showed up in my kitchen.

Shekinah made three-layered jello. We of course added whipped topping before we ate it.

Daddy got up at 3-something AM and put the turkey in the oven.

Stuffed it with onion, apples and some lemon thingy.

He even de-boned it before church!

Oh and he made the gravy.

Zeke played some upbeat tunes to keep everyone moving. 

Ben mixed up dressing/filling whatever you call it- under supervision.

Shekinah did a pickle dish.

Faith added the blueberries to her fruit salad

Hope's chocolate cookies beside the cheese cake.

BTW the cheese cake was this one and was better than last year's.

Demetrius brought mashed potatoes and I missed getting a picture! He said he did make them on his own--mostly--he had to keep shooing Glenda away. He said she was like a fly!

Grandma and Grandpa came too and we had a grand dinner.

Notes for next year: We could use about 8lbs of potatoes for a meal, we had enough but no left-overs.

Parker even tasted "dead bird"  in order to get some jello.

After everyone went home--grandpa and I went to Toy's R Us to do some shopping.

I'm not telling what we bought- but it was a big box.

What am I thankful for?

Family

Easy-going older kids

who added great daughter-in-laws,

healthy and cute (I am NOT biased) grandsons,

My parents who could come and enjoy the day.

A day without  "fits".

(We have come a loong way.)

School starts again on Tuesday.

I found a pattern to make crib sheets out of double bed sheets.

And So It Begins

Thanksgiving prep and Christmas shopping.

This year we decided to continue our new tradition of having the men and the younger girls in charge of Thanksgiving dinner. I put Hope in charge of the menu so we will at least have some vegetables. We have the "who gets the oven tonite" problem, but I think we figured that out.  Joe started with his cheesecake last night and Ezekiel will be able to make the rolls tonight and dad gets it at 3AM on T-day.  My job is to stay available for questions, but stay low-profile on the comment/advice section. If you see me on Friday I might not have a tongue anymore!

Checking his "cookbook". He is primed to be "happy for a long time" when he gets his new phone in  eight days. The nine-month-old one just does do it anymore.

The recipe called for placing the cheesecake in a pan of hot water...he hopes to avoid a cracked cheesecake this year.

I stayed out of the kitchen and repaired a quilt...apparently quilts make good mouse-house building material.

Gotta add this story. My parents have a cabin in the mountains and after deer hunting season they winterize the place and usually don't re-open till spring. They leave some supplies like extra bedding in the cabin. One spring when they opened the one blanket they discovered that one industrious mouse had nibbled all the knots out of the tied comforter. Thankfully that mouse thought the string and not the fabric was good bedding material....so mom re-tied the comforter and gave it a good washing and it was ready to use again. 

This is in the fridge this morning...it does have cracks. He will need to do some research for next year, though he says he is DONE making cheese cakes.

The Winner!

Well that was a record! 1178 views on my blog. I realize that the word "giveaway" attracts many lookers--not sure how many readers.

I had about 50 people give me a ten-word description of their lives right now. I wish I could get to know all of you.   I typed up the names from the three different places--FB comments, blog comments and g-mail messages

 and had my night owl pick a name out of the dish

And this was the name he picked!

Wanita Zimmerman her ten words were  "sleep, eat, baby boy, laundry, girls, homeschooling, cleaning, excitement over Thanksgiving"

I will catch up with you and you can read your book while you hold your baby.

I have one more to give to someone personally who I know is having a difficult time with life right now. Unfortunately, it will be hard to pick just one person.

Thanks so much for playing along. If you missed the drawing, I think she has a few more blogs scheduled to do give aways this week. Actually go to here and  check the schedule.

 Or you can just go to Amazon and buy the book. OR you can contact Dorcas Smucker  31148 Substation Dr, Harrisburg, OR  97446  The books are $12 plus $2 postage.

Book Giveaway!!

A new book from Dorcas Smucker? Why yes, I'd like to review it. I'm not quite finished yet but so far it has not disappointed .

Now if you are into murder, intrigue, car chases, or other wild scenes this is not the book for you. But if you are into stories from real life in a busy house with teens, a family business, a husband who is a minister with a sprinkling of a ninety-some-year-old grandpa this is the book for you.  Each chapter is a short story that you can read while you drink that cup of tea, rock the baby, or after everyone has hiked off to bed and the house is quiet. She has an enviable knack for observation, and putting regular daily living into a readable story. I rarely can remember the funny stuff my kids say when I finally sit down at my keyboard.  She is open and honest about her experiences as a minister's wife, living with SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder), and growing older.

In the chapter entitled The Minister's Wife  she quotes this conversation:

"Are you looking forward to the conference?" my sister asked.
"I guess so," I said.  "Except that nobody intimidates me like a Mennonite minister's wife."
"But!" she sputtered. "Your're a Mennonite minister's wife!"
"Not really," I said, and then whispered, "I'm actually just pretending."

She makes me laugh at some of the absurdities of our "plain" life.  Don't be worried though, she explains things so that all her audience can identify with her stories.
There is a limit of what she can explain and I heartily agree with her decision in the chapter Telling Your Own Story where she talks about the new fad of "Amish" romance novels.

If you're part of the culture, you instinctively understand the subtleties that are almost impossible to explain to someone outside of it. 
    This year, just a few days before Halloween, I received yet another request to help an author who wants to write a novel about conservative Mennonites. She wants to make sure she's authentic with the details, she said.
     Perhaps I was too harsh in my refusal, as she seemed more serious and scholarly than most, and I applauded her desire to not be offensive. But I couldn't bring myself to help her, not only because of all the details the defy explaining, but because I have come to believe that the story you tell best is your own.
    Back when Margaret and I were young, the Amish and Mennonites--sister denominations under the Anabaptist roof-- were an obscure subculture that few Americans had herd of and even fewer admired. It wasn't unusual to be harassed and mocked.
     Then, for reasons I will never understand, Anabaptist became cool. Bizarre TV shows featured the producers' visions of Amish and Mennonite life, giving an entire generation of watchers a completely distorted picture. Or so I am told. I don't watch TV.
     An avalanche of novels featuring the Amish but written almost entirely by the "Englisch" poured out of  Christian publishing houses. "Bonnet fiction," the industry called them. They range from well-structured but subtly "off" to simply horrifying, with boxy Photo-shopped  kapps on blond girls with eyeliner on the front covers.
     Struggling authors saw a potential bonanza, and too many of them somehow found me, hoping that I would be that genuine source who could lend the stamp of authenticity to their hopeful story of young Lizzie pinning on her kapp, enjoying her Rumspringa without getting shunned, and falling in love with the handsome English neighbor, leading to a crisis of soul to be solved by following her heart in a very suburban- American way.
      Always, these manuscripts were all wrong, from the opening, "Ach, such a beautiful day it is, " to the individualistic American approach to decisions. The characters followed certain rules and flouted others but always made the choice all wrong in vague ways that I couldn't put into words.
     "But I found a glossary on the Internet, " one author said, "and it said that 'ach' means 'oh'."
     "But it's always negative," I said. "Ach, the pigs are out again,"not "Ach, it's a beautiful day."

See that "ach" thing is something I knew, but I'm not sure that I would have been able to pinpoint it.

OK, enough of quotes, what is the title? Glad you asked. It's called Fragrant Whiffs of Joy . And I have one to give away.

How shall I get you to enter the contest? I don't like to make things too simple, I need to make you work a little bit. Let's see, how about.... Yeah.

Leave a comment with  a ten word description of  what is going on in your life these days. I will do a drawing on Monday the 20th. Leave a message on my blog, on my FB page or a direct email to pufuquan@gmail.com  I will need a way to contact you if you are the winner so please identify yourself.

If you don't want to mess around with waiting on a free book you can just go straight to Amazon and buy it here for $15 the Kindle version is also available.
Or buy if directly from the author  Dorcas Smucker at 31148 Substation Drive, Harrisburg, OR 97446. Books are $12 each plus $2 postage. Checks or PayPal accepted.

Prayers and Guarding My Tongue

Just one short church service and a lot to ponder. Our Sunday school lesson was on prayer. Our teacher challenged us with a few things but this one stood out to me. George Mueller kept a diary of his prayers and their answers. Supposedly he recorded "a million-and-a-half"answered prayers. Of course the question that popped in my mind was "What was the half-answered prayer?" My mind didn't catch that there were 1,500,000 answered prayers. I guess I need more sleep.  But really, what about writing down all your prayer requests and recording their answers?

Then the sermon was about guarding your speech, all the stuff I already know about that,but find difficult to put in practice. I recently read a mom's advice about dealing with tough situations with angry children. She recommended a pause before you answer them. So much in life feels like you need to give an immediate response. "Don't make people wait." "Get a move on!" And then in the EMS world "Every second counts!"  But in answering taking a few seconds to take a breath before answering...no not the deep inhalation that happens before you blast someone! The breath that calms you down first.

So it sounds like my week ought to be plenty busy.

And just in case people actually read this and don't just look at the pictures, I am doing a blog book review introducing Dorcas Smucker's new book. It will include a give-away so check back tomorrow.

I was going to try to do a 100 word review of my week, but gave that up...I can't remember much of what happened this week. I'll check my camera pictures and see if I can tell.

Now I remember...Mon night we were invited to celebrate National Adoption month with Pressley-Ridge at Science Factory. The girls enjoyed it. It was not very full so you could check out each station without being pushed. 

Not the greatest picture, but she figured out how to wrap her hands around that rope and lift the bowling ball that was attached to the other end. I was impressed.

I was also impressed when we returned home to find the dishes washed.

Thanks Joe--well I had asked him if he please could.

Removed all the left-over wool fuzzies from a wool batting (quilt stuffing) catastrophe

and put the quilt in the frame to be re-quilted.

Parker got in some soccer practice, and learned that you need to have your shoes tight or they fly off when you kick! 

Hudson was very good for grandma, even took a bottle and ate baby food!

Met some friends that I previously only "met" on Facebook.

And found out that little someone was playing with my phone.

Ben and Jana were here for supper last night and "the boys" ended up playing "The Bean Game". Found out that I need to prep a bit more food if I want left-overs when I have six teens sitting at my table.---Well that was more than 100 words, but then I'm still working at talking less.