He is Risen Indeed!!

While the Easter Bunny did NOT pay a visit to our house this year, we did have a delicious Easter Lamb.

Kathy
Project 366 - Day 83

We don’t like to rush through Christmas here, nor do we hurry along the close to the holiday season.

An Advent train - Daniel counts the boxes.

But at some point you have to put things away.

You must say goodbye to red bows, ribbons and Advent Calendars. Christmas dishes, mugs and even lights.

I have a Christmas notebook that I bought at Barnes and Noble several years ago. I use it to record decorations, recipes, gift ideas, and more. I have a section where the contents of all of our Christmas bins are detailed. For example, Bin 3 has Christmas party supplies, a small poinsettia plant (obviously not real) and an angel (also not real). I love having everything all organized. I can find what I’m looking for by flipping to the decorating section in my Christmas notebook and then tracking down the appropriate bin.

If only the rest of my house were so well ordered.

Sarah waves goodbye to Christmas.

Our Christmas tree, however, remains in its place of honor. Every morning, first thing, Tim comes down and turns on the Christmas lights. “It brings me joy,” he says.

How can I deny him holiday joy? It turns out the only reason, in years past, we used to pack up all of our Christmas adornments in a timely fashion is because we had a real tree. There weren’t enough needles to hold up the ornaments and the lights.

With a fake tree, we might still be celebrating Christmas in March. Anyone ever heard of a St. Patrick’s Day Tree?

I checked the official blog records (aka our archives) and it looks like we didn’t pack up the tree until January 20th last year. I’m obviously rushing things this year.

Just don’t call me Mrs. Grinch!

Kathy
Project 366 - Day 12

Don’t tell the children - we aren’t going to fully begin school until Monday.

Shhhh!

We’ve been doing a little math here and some reading there, but nothing serious. It’s not completely my fault. Oh, I wanted to get back on track, waking up early and hitting those books with a jam-packed schedule, but the house has been full of children ever since New Year’s Day.

And I’m not talking about the five who live here.

Let’s see, New Year’s Day we had a party. The evening came to an end much too soon so we begged to have the five P. children over for the night. They stayed until mid morning Wednesday when I returned them to their (very cheerful and refreshed looking) mother. I couldn’t just ‘drop and run,’ I had to stay for a little visit. Just being polite, you understand. There went the morning and lunch time.

In the afternoon another friend called to see if she could come over for coffee and computer work (two of my favorite things). I somehow managed to end my exciting school planning session and welcome her crew of kiddos.

No school.

Today we had MORE visitors. Some dear friends are home from serving in Africa for a year. The parents had a meeting today and the two boys needed a place to go.

Joshua and the boys played an incredibly LONG game of Axis and Allies.

You see how we suffer, forced to sleep in every morning and then visit with friends all day.

Kids galore and no school, it’s a difficult life.

Of course, Monday is going to hit everyone pretty hard. This late night blogger is going to feel it the most, I’m afraid. I have a LOT to do before then.

1. Christmas cards to finish (don’t worry, I’ve started calling them Happy New Year cards).
2. Pictures to upload for our 2007 Family Newsletter (the one I’m pointing everyone to on our New Year’s cards)
3. A school schedule to plan.
4. Chore charts to type up
5. Some curriculum to order
6. A new blogging plan (one that actually allows me to get some sleep) to discover.

And that’s not including the general laundry, house cleaning, and meal prep that requires constant attention.

Fire up the French Press and pass the coffee beans!

How about your family? When does your school (home or otherwise) resume? Did your children go back to school Wednesday? Anyone else easing into school a little slowly? Do you think a true night owl can get to bed early enough to wake up before 8 am on a regular basis? What time does your homeschool begin?

It’s much too rainy and gray here in WA, let’s move this game to Lake Michigan. Um, you boys are a little over-dressed for the beach!

Gotta love that Photoshop!

Kathy
Project 366 - Day 3

One of the great things about having a large family and many generous relatives, is that Christmas gift-opening lasts practically forever. We’ve been concentrating on out-of-town relatives today, since people start to wonder by the end of the Christmas week (when you don’t mention their gift) if there was some kind of a mishap in shipping.

The problem is that many of our relatives are the careful, send-packages-early sort — the kind that make the temporally-challenged rest of us seem very slapdash and irresponsible. Their gifts were delivered much earlier in the month and so were at the bottom of the pile, covered up by Johnny-come-lately gifts purchased locally late in the day on the 24th. Now that we’ve worked our way down, the tops of these packages accuse us reproachfully, and so we rushed to open them.

Gifts from Thailand and Norway, brought together with Daniel’s unique touch.

So many have been so generous to us, I feel rather shamefaced, especially when I think of less privileged people around the world. Then again, when I consider how these gifts reflect the love that is lavished upon us, I’m less embarrassed by the splendor, but rather I’m challenged to think of ways that we can splash that splendid love on others.

Now that Sarah knows her reindeer name (Prancer), it is killing her to wait to open a few last presents.

It is a glorious season, and our hearts are full of gratitude and thankfulness to the One who has made all this love and delight possible — our Lord, Jesus Christ.

Tim
Project 365 — Day 362

We stretch celebrations out as long as possible in our house. Birthdays can last a week or two or even longer if you are careful. We’re certainly not done with Christmas yet. There are many presents still under the tree and others that haven’t arrived yet. We open presents S*L*O*W*L*Y around here.

We do, however, try to start thank you notesright away.

With a large family (each of whom buy for every member) we end up with an impressive collection of gifts. Since we also take time to focus on each person as they open their presents and stop after a bit to PLAY with the new toys, present opening takes a LONG time. I love gifts and surprises so I encourage everyone to savor the experience.

Unfortunately, all of this savoring and celebrating means I am quite behind on my Christmas cards. At what point to they become Happy New Year cards? I’m in the “I’s” but that still leaves a LOT of people left on our address list. Also, I have to finish the 2007 Christmas newsletter. In our Christmas cards, I’ve been directing people here to the blog. This would normally be great, but it would be nice if I had something for them to actually see. I have the newsletter part written. It’s not very witty or clever but it does a decent job or summarizing our year. I’m in the process of adding pictures. I made it through April this afternoon.

My goals for the weekend - edit and complete the newsletter and finish another (large) chunk of Christmas cards.

What about you? Are you taking Christmas decorations down this week? Starting homeschool back up? Dancing with your beloved under the twinkling Christmas lights? Did you finish your Christmas/holiday cards? Do share!

Kathy
Project 365 - Day 361