December Begins

 We had our annual lighting ceremony on Monday night.

And by sewing madly in the late afternoon, I managed to finish 24 gift bags (20 of them were made in previous years) for our Christmas book advent.

We've been faithfully opening one a day, and I love, love, love how the kids still gather around and get excited over seeing what book is in what bag and then settle happily down near the fire for read aloud time.

This week we opened Dasher, Santa's Twin, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, and The Night Tree.  We're just reading The Best Christmas Pageant Ever a chapter at a time, so it's fun to double up and read a picture book and a chapter book.

We're also trucking along rather well with regular school.

We did add The Jesus Storybook Bible to our Morning Meeting.

We read The Big Wave, and we're almost through with The Master Puppeteer.

The Big Wave is the single best book about grieving I've ever read in my life!

The kids and I both kept dropping our jaws as page after page expressed wisdom that we want to remember forever.  

We think we might pull it out to read once a year from now on.

I surely do wish I'd discovered it years ago.

But what a blessing to discover it at any time!

The high schoolers and I are making good progress through our Japan history/geography notes.  We're also having so much fun with The Education of Little Tree!  The world seen through the eyes of a 5yo boy is hilarious!

We had snow this week!

I did not get out to play in it, and no one got any pictures, but my kids were out in it as long as it lasted--about 3 days.

Baymax raced through chores, breakfast, and school and was out the door by 9:45 am.  He took a ruler with him and measured the snow depth until it reached the requisite 3 inches I set as a minimum for sledding (in order to protect our hill from being too torn up).

The snowy roads caused the kids' church activity to change from caroling around the church neighborhood to dodgeball in the church gym.  

I, on the other hand, had to attend a primary presidency meeting that lasted 4 hours!

And then the primary presidency was changed!!

I'm still in it, in my same role, but everyone else changed, so we have to have another meeting as a new presidency in order to redo all of the work we already tried to get done.

Life is weird.

Wednesday was quiet and industrious.

Snacks and quiet activities while I read aloud

But the real, real fun was for Mister Man, who got to use his gift card present from Nature Angel for a trip to Barnes and Noble to choose any book he wanted!!

She was charmed by his delight and deep dive into a book wonderland.

Then on Thursday night, we had all 4 of our CAP kids in uniform for the first time together!

It was with real dismay that I realized I'd sewn Mister Man's and Beowulf's name tapes and CAP logos backwards! 🤦

Their blouses are back on my sewing table awaiting a free moment to rip out the first round of stitching and do it right this time.

I did the sewing for Little Princess the first time around, too.  And now she does her own sewing.

I'll need to be sure the boys do their own sewing in the future.

It was Nativity Puppets week for us!

We had the privilege of inviting our American Rhythm friends to join us, and a few of them were free to do so.

The show was every bit as magical as it ever has been!!!

If you look closely, you can see Ladybug's beads near the front.
This pic came from the Nativity Puppets' webpage.

Being invited to join the cast next year and learning about the commitment

When we got home, we ate and did what school we could, then we had a quiet afternoon.

We were going to put up our tree on Friday night, but Sir Walter Scott fell into bed sick as soon as he got home.  As of this writing on Sunday night, he's still sick, but we're hoping he'll feel well enough for us to do it tomorrow night!