catching up... finally

2 full weeks have passed since I last posted. I had lost the blogging bug and the computer bug and have been trying to spend less and less time at the computer and unfortunately, that means less blogging, but I'm dedicated to keeping up again...

We have been super busy as everyone has in the month of December. On the 12th of December we went to the Big City Bread and worked at the market selling crafts that the kids and their friends had made. Each year we raise money this way to buy an animal through the Heiffer Foundation. It's a really cool way for the kids to give back. This year we had a ton of really nice ornaments and some woven potholders and some hand cut buttons. The kids ended up raising a little over $200 and Beatrice and Daisy rocked at keeping up the table while the rest of the kids ran around the market only occasionally to stop in and help them out. The adults just got to hang out, drink coffee, and try to stay warm because it was freakin' cold out there.

This is the very cool pencil tree that Jenny brought to hang the ornaments onThis is a pic of our table.Here we have a few of the kids shopping at our table. It was a fun night, but the weather was super cold and we ended up not being able to stay until the market closed that night - even with the irish whiskey circulating through our blood with coffee and hot tea. It was one of those nights when getting home into the heat was the place to be!

We also made homemade Marshmallows this year. We have never done that before. I found the recipe in a holiday magazine and we thought we would give it a try. We made them to serve at our solstice dinner we had, but then when it got time for hot chocolate, we forgot about them. Figures, right?! No one actually had hot chocolate because I forgot to offer it with all the food and sweets and wine. They were really sweet being made of nothing but sugar. I think somewhere along the way I might try to make them again without corn syrup and use agave nectar instead. I've been substituting it more and more in my cooking where a recipe calls for sugar and it is not as sweet as sugar, so maybe they would be better. It was fun to make them and it was super fun when we realized we had actually successfully made our own marshmallows!

Lastly for this post in the catch up... We had a very small dinner party to celebrate the winter solstice. We usually have a pretty big get together with a house full of adults and kids, but this year when we were going over the list of who to invite, we realized it was just too many kids to have in our home this year, so we whittled it down and only had our closest friends and their children over. (I apologize now to anyone not invited it wasn't because we don't love you all we just needed it to be smaller this year.) By doing this, we were able to all gather at the table together and I actually got to hang out with everyone. When we have a big get together there is always someone who needs something or something needs to be done and I seldom get to visit with our friends, so it was a treat to keep it small this year. Jason and I made a giant pork roast on the grill, collards (from our garden), and potatoes (from our local farmers market). Everyone else brought foods that went along with that so that we had a full on dinner meal rather than potluck style food and it was awesome!

Here is Sarah the amazon and Sarah the pixie laughing. Best Friends and Soul mates! (India made the scarf I have on - must brag on her.)

Always gathering in the kitchen waiting, waiting, waiting for the food to be ready to eat and a feast it was!

Yummy wineand lots of it, good food, conversation and being able to see everyone's faces - priceless (this could be a credit card commercial) The kids are missing because they scarfed down their food and rushed out to get back to playing. The adults busted out Catch Phrase (thanks to Holly for bringing that) and coupled with the wine we had laughs that make the belly hurt.

India made us a cake (decorated it by herself - she has been taking cake decorating classes and she does a very good job.)

It's a solstice tradition in our home to make ornaments for our trees. I buy little wooden ornaments and plenty of paint and everyone gets to paint an ornament. The kids did it too, but I was being slack with the camera. We adults, well most of us, waited patiently for the kids to get done so we could get down to the business of painting. We even got Kris in on the painting this year. This is the most fun of all for me. I love getting together with friends and being creative.

getting ready

In the words of India and Kalib... FINALLY. We got our tree and decorated. We aren't quite done, we still have a few things to put up, but we are getting there.

We've also been working on making ornaments for the craft market we are doing tonight. We made three different kinds of ornaments. The kids made wire angels and beaded ornanaments with meme's help and the 4 of us made paper mache stars that we put glitter all over. (They are my favorite.) Here's everybody getting ready to start gluing glitter! Talk about a mess!

Lastly, our humble tree. We decided to get a tree that would grow with us this year. We are hopefully going to leave it in the pot for a couple of years, so this year it is wonderfully small. As we were going through and picking from the many ornaments we have, we decided to only put our special ornaments on - the ones we bought for each year or made for each year. I'm happy to say that for the last five years we have made our special ornaments. We laid them all out according to year and I just think that is sooo cool. I didn't realize that until last year. The last few years we have bought wooden ornaments and painted them and you can see comparing them that the kids are getting better and better at painting them. Jason and I have ornaments dating back to 1994 when I bought my very first Christmas tree. The only year we don't have on is 1997. I think that is really cool. We have always picked one up along the way, but I guess I never really thought about it being a tradition that we do. It was really neat to pull each ornament out of the box and remember where it came from and what we were doing when we bought or made them.

james and the giant peach

Yesterday we went to the Classic Center to see James and The Giant Peach. It was awesome! We sat 5 rows from the stage. It was a hearing impaired production, so 2 of the performers were deaf and they signed their parts, in fact, everyone signed their parts while they were talking and the 2 deaf people had someone speaking their parts, but they did the acting. We learned all kinds of sign language simply by watching them. It became a game Kalib and I played to show each other signs we had seen and put together with what they were saying. The production was super funny. The theatre was full of kids and they were all laughing so loud and sitting on the edge of their seats to see what happened next. This is what I love about theatre. Everything is completely in the moment and it is all so simple. There are not huge explosions with special effects very often and you have to pay attention or you might miss something. There are no 5 second clips and then a new angle it is all right there happening in front of you. To me, it is like a good book coming to life right in front of you as you are reading it. I just love it! Thanks meme for taking us to see it! Today we are going to the Oconee Civic Center to see How the Grinch Stole Christmas Ballet. Should be quite fun! Two theatre productions in one week. What a great week!