I'm posting my TEN ON TEN today from under an overwhelming to-do list.
It's that time of year again and I'm already feeling like all I'm doing is trying to catch-up. Awesome. Trying to enjoy the season (I really do love it!) while trying to get everything done that needs to be done (not a wrapped present under my tree yet!). So this Ten on Ten seems uninspired and unfinished. Phoebe came home from school with a big ole headache and the evening kind of fell apart from there.
Sigh.
I'm linking up HERE where you can find all the other participants. Maybe they'll provide me with a little holiday cheer today.
My kids were in their very first "Christmas Program" at church on Sunday night. Oh sure, they've practiced and sung Christmas carols for preschool and such, but this was the first time they practiced for several months getting ready to sing at our church Christmas Party. The kind where you drive around listening to the same Christmas carols every day for months until they are burned into your brain. Or at least until you find yourself singing "Polar Puppy" while cleaning the bathroom when your at home by yourself.
I know Eli enjoyed it, although he's always a little awkward and stiff on stage. He gets that from his mama. He'll do anything to spend time with his two church buddies, though.
This was Phoebe's cup of tea! She loves to sing and she loves to be on stage. Not to say that she didn't have her "space out" moments, too, where she stopped singing and just stared off in to the distance. I'm just glad she didn't pick her nose or anything.
But there was one song, in particular, that Phoebe l-o-v-e-d. It started because the first time we were driving to school and I heard it on the CD, I told her it was one of my all time favorite Christmas songs.
Growing up, my mom had the Oak Ridge Boys Christmas cassette (yep, it was a tape!), CHRISTMAS AGAIN. It was my favorite. I knew and loved every song and I just wasn't in the Christmas spirit unless I had heard that tape. I still love it. I know that makes me even worse than a nerd, but I love that group of Christmas carols. Brad cannot believe he didn't know this about me before we got married because it might have been a deal breaker. I personally think that anyone's whose favorite Christmas song is anything by Kenny G doesn't have a leg to stand on.
If I had to pick a favorite off that album, I'd have to say it was the song "New Kid In Town". Not sure why I loved that one most because they are all special to me, but I did. And that was the song the kids were going to sing in the Christmas program.
Phoebe was so excited she learned all the words pretty quickly and sang it loud every time it played. When it came time to practice it for the first time at rehearsal, she belted it out with such feeling and preciousness and sincerity that the director gave her a solo.
Sitting in the chapel, watching my baby girl sing her heart out to a song that is filled with such loaded memories was very moving. She's not the greatest singer, but she's mine and my love for her filled me all up and seemed to spill out all over while she sang. It was one of those "Mary Moments". Those moments we have as moms that feel bigger and weighty with the emotion they carry. The times when we "treasure up all these things and ponder them in our hearts" like Mary did after the birth of her Christ-son. Because even though Jesus was a heavenly being who changed everything, his mom was just a mom trying to figure the whole thing out like the rest of us.
I'm posting our youtube video here. She was singing kind of loudly because they children had been told they wouldn't be miked and she wanted to make sure everyone heard her! :) Feel free to not watch the video, too. I posted mostly for family.
I took several photos of the family after the performance. My parents and Aunt Amy had come in for the show, but someone had their eyes closed in every single photo. And not the same one each time! But I did get a few of my children and their buddies.
And this one good one of just the two of them. Don't be fooled by the good photo. It was taken after multiple bad ones, several threats, and at least one bribe.
I'm including the youtube video of the Oak Ridge Boys singing that song, too. Just for fun. It's my little Christmas gift to you.
We spent Thanksgiving with my parents and family this year. Three weeks ago. And I took 597 photos. I know the exact number because I completely filled up my memory card. It's taken me this long to go through and edit them all!
And there still aren't that many good ones. We planned matching Thanksgiving outfits. The weather was cloudy and with optimal conditions for outside photos. The conditions were favorable in so many ways, but still one really great one. I guess that's what happens when most of your subjects are under three. I admire real photographers more than you can imagine.
This is what you get when you tell a two-year-old to get "cheek to cheek" with his older cousin.
And this is what you get when the two bigger boys are doing their very best to humor you.
These next few photos are called "Boys Eating Oranges". They aren't amazing, but the subjects sure are cute!
Isaac helping his daddy make Pico de Gallo. My brother is a whiz at pico because his fine motor skills are pretty amazing. He can chop all the ingredients so finely and evenly. I know he appreciated the help, too. :)
The girls' photo shoot went a bit better.
Or maybe not. Hee Hee.
More photos of Thanksgiving Day. Mimi crafting with Lincoln and Phoebe.
Carrie and Sarah
It's just not Thanksgiving without a sword fight.
Or a friendly day of football.
That ends in a dog pile.
Photos at the park. Thank Heavens for nice weather!
Once Thanksgiving was "officially" over, all the kiddos donned their holiday best.
So we decided to have a little mini photo shoot. You can imagine how that went.
Most of these just make me laugh.
Even though my photos weren't as amazing as I'd wanted them to be, they will help us remember the Thanksgiving of 2012. Because that's the cool thing. My photos may not be beautiful, but the memories are.
I got out of the habit posting my "What's Cooking Wednesday" during November since I was posting 30 Days of Thankful. It worked out (sort of) because I didn't bake as much during the month of November. But I had one recipe that I was *dying* to share.
Let me give you a little back story. Brad's birthday is in November and he loves German Chocolate Cake. It was the groom's cake at our wedding...well, without the traditional coconut-pecan icing because I think it's ugly so we had a coconut-pecan filling with dark chocolate icing. So much prettier. But I digress. I don't like it very much and it's not the easiest cake to make, either. Actually the cake part is no trouble, but the icing is a pain because it's cooked. Cook it too long and it's too runny. Cook it not long enough and it's runny. You have to cook it just right to make it stick and you know how bad I am at the precision part of baking so my icing always runs off the cake. Highly frustrating for a cake I don't care much for. But because it's Brad's birthday, I always feel like I should make him one for his birthday.
Then I found a recipe for a German Chocolate Pound Cake and I felt it was easy enough that I probably couldn't screw it up. And my Aunt Anna offered to make Brad his own German Chocolate Cake (from scratch!) at Thanksgiving so I was off the hook.
Yippee!
The cake was a hit...both with Brad and our Huddle students. I thought it needed sharing because maybe there's some other baking-challenged woman out there who needs to make a German Chocolate Cake for someone special in her life. This is you answer, my friends!
German Chocolate Pound Cake
1 box German Chocolate cake mix (I don't remember what brand I used. I don't think it matters.)
1 tub coconut pecan icing
4 eggs
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 1/3 cup water
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a mixing bowl, beat together all the ingredients except the icing. Beat for 2 minutes. Stir in icing. Pour into a greased and floured bundt cake pan (I used Baker's Joy). Bake for 1 hour. (Mine probably took a little longer because my oven cooks slow. I probably just baked it until my cake tester came out clean.) Cool in pan 10 minutes. Invert onto serving platter and wait at least 10 more minutes, but I let mine cool completely.
Even though I feel very old and way past all that "baby" stuff, my friends keep having babies. Because of that, I've made a couple of baby quilts in the last few weeks.
One for a baby boy...
And what is more "boy" than cowboys?
And one for a girl...
In beautiful shades of vintage pink and blue.
And I have to admit, it's still kind of fun to think about a baby all swaddled up in them. The whole world should a blanket of its own.
I am thankful for my children's teachers. All of them. Every year, preschool and elementary, we have been blessed by women who care and give and work exceptionally hard to make sure my children are successful...whether it's at reading or math or sharing their toys. These women have gone above and beyond what's expected of them and I am so grateful that my children were surrounded by love even when they were not at home.
Day 30:
I am thankful for my Lord. All this month, I've been looking at my life and the ways I've been blessed. It seemed only fitting, on this last day, to give praise to the One who orchestrated it. And my life is blessed. Charmed, you might say. For those looking in from the outside, I may seem to have it all together. My faith and life might seem trite and gilded. But we are all broken and sick and shattered. At times (too many it seems) I'm holding onto my faith by a too-thin thread and my belief in an all-loving God is hazy at best. But deep down, way down deep under all the ugly, hidden, damaged, dark places in my soul is light I cannot ignore or deny. My God is a God of love and redemption and peace and hope and grace. I am so very, very grateful for that in ways I cannot even begin to articulate.
Happy 30 Day of Thankful. Thanks for sharing in this with me.
I am thankful for old friends. Those friends who knew who you were and remind when you've forgotten. Those friends that you haven't seen in so very long, and yet you start right back up where you left off. Those friends who hold a special, dear place in your heart and in your memory. The girl friends you can't wait to spend a weekend with. The only ones you'll stay up till 2:00am for just to keep talking. The young couple friends who can remember what it was like before kids with you. The ones who would skip Sunday School class to hang out. The friends who know the real you and change you for the better.
Day 28:
I am thankful for my "new" friends. The friends who've only known me as a wife and a mom and a cancer-survivor. The friends who know my children well and love them. The friends who know how crazy controlling I am and just laugh it off. The friends I miss so much now that my life is so super busy we have to schedule Girls Night Out three months in advance. The friends that make my life in Amarillo a happy place.
