Like last year, I made a little birdie to celebrate my little sister’s son’s first Christmas. I’ve made several of these so far but this is the first time I’ve made one for a boy. It was fun to use a different palette of colors! We’re so glad you’re in our family, Baby Gabe!
Well, no baby in sight so today I took everything out of all our kitchen cupboards/drawer and pantry, washed them inside and out, tossed/gave away stuff we don’t need/use any more, threw out outdated spices, reorganized, and generally gave myself a nice, clean, lovely kitchen. The last time I did a deep clean (and especially reorganize) of our kitchen like this was just after Nik and I got married so it was about time, I suppose!
Once I was finished with all of that, Nik swept and mopped and now, the kitchen is great!
So, I can cross off, “deep clean and reorganize kitchen,” from the “Before the Baby Comes” list and hopefully, this baby will be here soon!
Although unintentional, we ended up with a bit of a theme for our mothers’ presents – protection from heat!
For my mom’s morning tea, a mug rug!
And for Nik’s mom’s hands’ protection, some potholders!
This year, I made a Christmas decoration or ornament for each of my siblings’ families.
For Eric and Meggan, Noah, Selah, Jonas, Ezra, and Violet, a green tree garland:
trees in a tree!
For Jon and Leah, Kaitlyn, and Maria, a patchwork star with “Merry Christmas” in many languages, appropriate, I think, for their life right now.
For the pet-loving Chris, Katie, Addie, and Alex, a “Polaroid” ornament!
And for Rachel and Drew, Grace, Clara, and Gabe, a felt “ogee” ornament:
If you want to make it two-toned like I did, you have to sew two squares of felt together, mark the lines, and then sew on either side of each line before cutting, like this:
Sounds complicated but it’s really not!
Merry Christmas to all our family and friends!
We love you!
Love,
Nik, Laura, Ellie and Baby B2
Joy to the world! The Lord is come;
Let earth receive her King;
Let every heart prepare him room,
And heaven and nature sing,
And heaven and nature sing,
And heaven, and heaven, and nature sing!
Just in time for Christmas…
Ellie is cutting her two-year molars!
And so we not only are anticipating a new baby, but we have a grumpy, slobbery, hand-chewing, not sleeping toddler on our hands.
I knew those molars were going to come in someday and I did say at one point, “It would be nice to have all of Ellie’s teething over with before B2 comes,” but I didn’t really expect Ellie to take me at my word.
So, pray that this teething gets over with quickly!!
Today, I spent most of the day cleaning our upstairs. I even swept/dusted the stairs on my way down. Keep in mind we don’t use the upstairs – at all – in our daily lives. My sewing room is up there but for practical, daily life, we don’t use it.
Nik says I’m nesting. I asked him if it was nesting if I’ve been planning to do this for weeks. Namely, I’ve been planning to start deep cleaning the house about now (39 weeks), figuring either I’ll get a lot of cleaning done or the baby will come sooner or both.
Pretty good plan right? And it’s so nice to know that all the clutter is gone from upstairs, everything is dusted, the floors are swept, everything is in its place, and there’s clean sheets on the guest room bed. I even folded up the ironing board and unplugged and covered my sewing machine.
Now if only I could say all of that was true for the main part of our house, which is where we actually live! Maybe I should have started down here and moved upstairs once the downstairs was done but at least I know that the upstairs will stay clean. 🙂
I guess you can say I’m nesting. Just waiting for B2!
We’ve taken almost every important set of milestone pictures in Sherwood Gardens so we didn’t want B2 to miss out!
And so, I present to you, “Laura was very pregnant (38 weeks pregnant to be exact) with B2 so she, Nik, and Ellie took some fun pictures to remember this moment forever.”
(And thanks so much to our friend Stephen for taking the pictures for us!)
Ellie fits just about perfectly under my belly! 🙂
And a few just for fun:
I’m not quite going to hit 2011’s mark of books read (almost 150) but I’m going to come close (almost 125!). I track my reading on Goodreads. So if we’re not friends there, you should join me!
Here are my favorite fictional books of 2012
(with edited reviews from what I posted on Goodreads through the year).
The Chosen by Chaim Potok: Although I enjoyed it, it wasn’t until the last couple of chapters that my heart was moved to tears by the intense struggle/sacrifice that the father made and the hard decisions he had to make in raising his son. It was also interesting to read the (admittedly fictionalized) account of the varying reactions among the Jewish population in America towards the formation of Israel after WWII.
“One learns of the pain of others by suffering one’s own pain, he would say , by turning inside oneself, by finding one’s own soul. And it is important to know of pain, he said. It destroys our self-pride, our arrogance, our indifference towards others. It makes us aware of how frail and tiny we are and of how much we must depend on the Master of the Universe.”
The Chestnut King (100 Cupboards #3) by N.D. Wilson (and also Leepike Ridge): By far, my favorite of the 100 Cupboards series (of which I read all three this year), I think N.D. Wilson came into his own as a writer with this book. I cried some serious tears at the end, enough to make me a bit sad and introspective for most of the day. The evil in this book is very real and so is the redemption. And I especially loved Frank the Fat-Fairie’s words to Henry at the very end (can’t miss the Ruth reference there!).
The Mysterious Howling and The Hidden Gallery ( (The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place #1 and #2) by Maryrose Wood: I had a lot of fun with these books – lots of funny, subtle humor that kids probably won’t get. I think they would be fun to read aloud.
The Importance of Being Seven (44 Scotland Street #6) by Alexander McCall Smith: I missed Bertie so it was nice to read another in this series, this time focused mostly on him. Great fiction can make you reflect/think just as much as non-fiction (if not more) and this book indeed does that.
In the Company of Others (Father Tim #2) by Jan Karon: The message of God’s redemption, forgiveness, and mercy is amazingly strong in this book. I wish explicitly Christian fiction could be as well written as this book (as with all of Jan Karon books). I rarely come across Christian fiction that is so well-done that the faith aspect of the book feels natural and not thrown in to appeal to a specific audience. The “God” parts of the book are integral to the story but don’t feel fake or forced at all. I loved this book, cried at the end, and will be reading it again.
Death Comes To Pemberley by P.D. James: This was a totally satisfying read as a Jane Austen lover! As a disappointed reader of a few other Austen modern adaptations, I was skeptical that this one was going to be any good but it hit all the right Austen notes for me. I particularly loved finding references to a couple other of the Austen novels thrown in. I also found her sly criticism of the American system of judicial appeals pretty amusing.
I also enjoyed:
I mean what I say in the title because believe me, none of what I’m about to write would be true if we didn’t have the imminent arrival of a baby to motivate us.
We are completely finished with Christmas presents – not just purchased and/or made, but wrapped and delivered. I mailed my family’s presents in November. I was done wrapping all of our other presents over a week ago. We’ve now delivered them to family around here so that, in the event that B2 comes before Christmas, we don’t even have to worry about them.
(OK, actually, I just remembered that I have one present I still have to wrap for Ellie but if it doesn’t get wrapped in time, I don’t think she’ll notice.)
I don’t think I can even express how nice it is to have everything finished before late night Christmas Eve. I’m remembering Christmas 2009, when I undertook a really ambitious list of presents to sew and then really only managed to get them all sewn because we had four snow days just before Christmas. Four! When did I really think I was going to get them done?
We consciously started planning for Christmas extra early this year and we also consciously asked ourselves, “How can we bless our families and express our great love for them but still radically simplify our gift giving?” It made a huge difference.
And now, I’m just grateful for the peace and calm that I feel…
until of course I have a bit of a twinge of pain and then I think, “Was that a contraction? MAYBE!!?!?!?!?!” and then we’re off on a whole different topic! 🙂
I do want to remember this for next year though because who says that this can’t be our practice every year, even without a Christmas baby to motivate us?
Salmon and Souvlaki 