This week I got my Christmas shopping done.
Sometimes life gets a little hectic, and before I know it I have five projects hanging over my head. And the calendar keeps rolling on, and each day passes without anything getting crossed off my list, and the pressure in my chest builds. When I start to feel like I'm a few interruptions away from bursting into tears, it's time to set some things aside and make sure those projects get done.
That's what I did last week. I have a sweet husband who had the week off, so he filled the homeschool teacher role for a couple days. But aside from that, I cancelled school for the week, and I spent every spare minute crossing things off my list. I finished my Christmas shopping (except for a couple little straggler gifts). I sorted, edited, and uploaded all my 2024 photos (so far) for printing in January. I cleaned out my kids' rooms (no small task) in preparation for Christmas presents. And then I spent the weekend sending out emails, writing an overdue book review, writing a couple blog posts.
So here we are. I've been wanting to share our recent happenings on here before we are full-on into Christmas season. Despite what the weather did a couple weeks ago, it's still fall, and I don't want to let it slip by without chatting here.
Our Fall
Our post-election snowstorm.
Ever since 2020, I get very skittish in election years, and I've particularly avoided going out on Election Day. You just never know what is going to happen, and I'd rather be tucked away in my little mountain home to deal with the results on our own, for good or for ill. So I stayed up far too late on Election Day, went to bed with the slow dawning of relief spreading through my muscles, and when I woke the next morning with nary an election hiccup in sight, it felt like Christmas morning in more ways than one. Snow blanketed the ground, and we cheered the results and declared a snow day. I baked, we played Christmas music. It was lovely.
It turned into two lovely days, and then three, as the snow continued to fall, and our previously planned events were cancelled clear into Saturday. Finally on Saturday morning, with my husband and oldest out hunting, the younger kids and I could take it no more. We went roller skating, and had a grand time.
This fall we pinched our pennies a bit. Instead of a corn maze (which are quite expensive here) we went on a tour of a tea factory, and visited a fall bulb sale at our local gardens. Instead of a pumpkin patch, we visited our ranch friends, and they gifted us with pumpkins from their garden that are still gracing our house. Instead of picking produce, we went on an adventure in the mountains, and sat in the middle of a huge, secluded aspen grove while we read books and ate candy corn. Fall fun doesn't have to cost alot, does it? Spending time with people you love in the brisk air is what makes fall special.
Homeschooling is going really well, much more smoothly than the previous two years. As I've written before, I think when you hit a homeschool rough patch, the thing you really need to do is power through. Things do tend to improve if you give them time. Even though I have more to manage than ever before, I feel more up to the task as well. I would like to write about our curriculum choices for this year at some point, since we made a bunch of small changes and we are also managing work for our new homeschool co-op. We are taking a more "purist" approach to Charlotte Mason style history this year - my kids are reading so many good books, and it's really wonderful to see them connecting with what they're reading. I'm reading about half their books with them right now, and I myself am learning so much! A curriculum summary will be coming eventually, but for now all the books are my favorite change.
A Hobby Update
Every year around this time, I find myself wanting to learn how to crochet. I've tried learning to crochet before, but it's tricky! I will persist though. A Christmas ornament crochet pattern caught my eye on Etsy the other day. Even though I've gone shopping for the correctly colored yarn, I have not had time to attempt my project yet. Now that all my pre-Thanksgiving tasks are out of the way, perhaps this week I can give it a go. I hope to report success the next time I write an update.
Reading has been very touch-and-go since the summer. I have finally finished quite a few books, but can't seem to get my reading momentum going on any one book. I will have a reading update blog post coming in the next couple weeks, but I have a feeling my yearly totals are not going to be as impressive as previous years. One recent book quite likely will make my favorites list though - I just finished True Grit by Charles Portis a couple weeks ago, and I found it delightful. If you like spunky main characters, amusing first-person narration, and the Old West, it's a winner.
I haven't been baking nearly as much as I typically would in the fall, but I did make caramel pecan cinnamon rolls last week, and they were very tasty.
Derek and I have found several new shows that we are finding amusing. Our favorites are usually competition shows (think Survivor), and we found one called Anonymous. It's one of those social media game shows, which can often be annoying, but this one grew on us. We also have tried a show called The Snake, which is a one-day game show where contestants have to complete tasks while figuring out which player is secretly trying to sabotage them. And then we stumbled across Frogger - which is, well, a real-life Frogger. Similar to America Ninja Warrier, but sillier. We're saving that one to watch with the kids. One of these days I'll get Derek to finish watching Downton Abbey with me, but for now, competition shows are scratching the entertainment itch.
Gratitude
I told Derek a few weeks ago that this year has felt like a year of disappointments. I rattled off a list of things that have just not worked out the way we wished. We had to buy new appliances instead of taking a planned trip to see friends, we didn't have successful hunting seasons, and finances have been leaked away by scary trips to the emergency room.
What I really needed was a bit of sleep, because things always look worse when you're tired.
But in the last couple weeks, my heart has started to calm. God is gracious to us, and somewhere along the way that knowledge settled back on me, like the snow settled on the ground last week and made it sparkle. We are very blessed. All the things I was disappointed about are just life; but life is also full of gifts, isn't it? This is the time of year when we are reminded to open our eyes wider to see them fresh.
Remember when we all used to post thankful lists this time of year? I'm thankful for:
So many little gifts when you stop to think about it. I know this, I've been counting gifts for years, but sometimes life gets busy, and you forget how wonderful everything can be - God's common grace in showers every day. And of course, underneath it all is always that deeper gratefulness that comes with knowing my Savior calls me His own. If everything else falls apart, if every hope is disappointed, if everything is lost - that is something that can't be taken away.
Happy Thanksgiving season! Knowing me, I won't get around to writing another personal post before the day. So I hope you all are overwhelmed by gratitude to the Giver of all good gifts this year.
"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning." James 1:17
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