Happy new year!

I. Am. Tired.

We went to a “party” last night. It consisted of three families, getting together. Six adults, twenty one children. Seven adults, I suppose, since one of those children has reached age eighteen, I think. There was hayrides and food and games and we managed to stay up until midnight, and then 1am, and finally left just before 2am. I hadn’t seen 2am in a long, long time. I don’t think any of my children had ever seen it. All six made it, meltdown free except for a moment with Charlotte that had nothing to do with tired, and had a great time. It’s now 11:36am and Eden, Charlotte, and Ruby are awake. The other three still sleep. Pierce is still in the same position as when I put him in his bed after we got home last night: flat on his back, in his jeans and button down. He hasn’t moved. He’s never slept this late in his life. Some strange part of me is hoping he sleeps until noon… just because.

We were serenaded on the way to the party by Charlotte, singing “Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego” over and over at the top of her lungs. The girl has learned to yell. Why she chooses to yell the names of these three characters, recently learned about in Sunday School, remains a mystery. There was no other story, no other words. Just major excitement at the names.

The van was strangely quiet on the way home.

Experiencing a new year is odd when you watch it through the eyes of a child. Sterling and Ruby have been answering “What month is it? What year is it? What’s the date?” all year long. They’d mastered 2013. Now, to learn another. The littlest ones don’t know what it all means – but the abundance of sweets and sparkling juice made for a fabulous evening for them.

All this, followed by pumpkin pie for breakfast. Turns out, when you put the Christmas pies in the basement refrigerator they get forgotten. Ruby’s comment: “I didn’t know we could have dessert first, and THEN protein…” Someone has heard my cry for eating protein at mealtimes.

Pierce didn’t make noon. 11:51. Liberty got up just after noon. No one has heard from Sterling yet…

Christmas

Early yesterday morning, before anyone had emerged from bedrooms, there was a crash.

The tree that had been standing tall for over a week fell over. No one was in the room, it had never threatened tipping before, but there we were, drenched gifts and broken ornaments strewn across the living room.

I headed for the kitchen to make Blaine’s gift. Without a clue what else to get for him, I decided to try my hand at the very Dutch pastry banket, or butter letter. Not being a stitch Dutch myself, I had yet to try making it, but my completely-Dutch husband grew up with it, loves it, and has hinted many times that I ought to make him some. After a thorough search of my city’s grocery stores, I found one that carries almond paste, and we were in business.

The filling melted out of the dough EVERYWHERE. Every single one I made leaked. My dear husband assures me this is relatively normal, but after the tree, an imperfect gift for my husband was not what I’d hoped for. Frustrating. From his consumption of his gift, I’m thinking Blaine’s less than bothered.

While the butter letter baked, I had one of my girls mix up the pumpkin pie. The oven sat hot and empty for over an hour before I found the pumpkin pie batter in the mixing bowl, pie crusts sitting empty, oven sitting empty. There went my target time for dinner. We didn’t eat anything beyond fruit for the first time yesterday until 1:15 pm. It wasn’t the meal I’d planned. Our big meal was supposed to be a late lunch. It was supper. We didn’t open gifts until 3:00.

We ended up eating three hours after I’d planned. Charlotte dropped and broke her brand new ornament. Several of the dolls made by dear friends for my girls took a bath in Christmas tree water. Pierce peed on his new truck. Ruby decided to take the paints out of her new paint by number and Pierce opened the lavender and painted the floor, Ruby’s new skirt, the couch, and the paint by number package. I found out said paint washes off of wood floors and leather couches and skirts well when wet. Charlotte’s new sock has a small seam in a place where a seam ought not be from the scissors she used to open the package. The Christmas tree was down and out of the house before supper when it threatened to fall again after we cleaned it all up and straightened it once. The kids loved their Lincoln Logs, played heartily, picked them up and filled an entire five gallon bucket with them before bed, and Pierce helped them out by dumping them with a crash during devotions.

Sitting back last night, exhausted by the day and reminiscing on years past, I couldn’t help but think. Things were not like this growing up for me. It was just my sister and I, life was organized and quiet. Traditions were upheld. Yelling over the noise never happened. I remember exactly zero toppled Christmas trees. We took the tree down when we wanted to, not when it forced us to. We always opened gifts in the morning. The living room didn’t look like a hurricane had hit after gifts were opened.

Was that better? What am I complaining about? It was less stressful, to be sure. Things were more organized. There wasn’t chaos. It was quiet.

My kids weren’t complaining. My husband wasn’t complaining. It was me. It was my picture of the ideal way to celebrate Christmas that was being skewed.

Jesus was born in a barn, my friends. He left a perfect world to become man, to dwell among us, to save us from our sins. He humbled himself from God to baby. A not-talking, not-walking, helpless infant laid in a hard, stinky, dirty manger, a baby sent to save. And I’m complaining that there’s chaos in my house, that things aren’t happening when I wanted them to, how I wanted them – on a day that we celebrate Him.

Humbling.

Thanksgiving 2013

Mom and Dad are gone. It’s the moment I dread from the moment I know they are coming. We hadn’t seen them since June, and now Thanksgiving is over and my house is quiet again – and the mess that it is is all from us and my not having really cleaned in four days. Hello, Laundry.

We took photos this morning, after ignoring cameras for the entire visit. Good grief. Everyone scrambled to get dressed before Grandpa and Grandma left. It would appear that stripes are the choice for shirt of the day.

Today, we’re back to school. Blaine’s back to work. I’m three loads of laundry deep and have four more left. Supper tonight: Turkey Pot Pie. It’s 56 degrees outside and as soon as the babies wake up from naps, we’re headed outside to play for a bit. This somber mood is killing me.

Random thoughts from a moment in my pie-making procrastination.

Judging from the activity level coming from my abdomen, the baby agrees with me that lime Jell-o is definitely on the list of favorite foods.

If Skittles hadn’t changed their green from lime to green apple, I bet baby would agree that those are also fantastic. Sadly, we’ll never know.

My parents are coming tomorrow for the weekend. The excitement in my house is amazing. We haven’t seen them since early June.

Charlotte colored with pencil on the coffee table. She was instructed to clean it off. Half an hour of half-hearted scrubbing, she had it clean. She told Liberty afterwards she would never, ever, ever do that again. The words of sweet success.

Brady (the dog) tried to go home with the delivery truck driver yesterday. He was unimpressed.

The two kittens found a new home. I’ve never missed anything less.

Pierce had his first potty-accident free day on Monday since we started potty training mid-June. Not one to lead anyone on, he was sure to poop in his zipper pj’s, without a diaper, first thing Tuesday morning. Glad we’re clear on that accident free day not being a new habit or anything.

I’ve scrubbed my house above and beyond it’s regular maintenance three times this week in preparation for my parents’ visit. I’m starting to think I should wait until about noon tomorrow, and send the kids with Blaine somewhere until Grandma and Grandpa get here. This repetitive cleaning business is for the birds.

We took the week off of school this week. I’m amazed at how much more I can accomplish when I’m not devoting 5-7 hours each day to schoolwork with the kids. The deep freezer got defrosted and cleaned out this week, my friends. I cannot remember the last time I did that.

I found two beef roasts, a chicken we grew/butchered a year and a half ago, a pound of ground deer meat, and 10 pounds of cranberries I didn’t know were in there. So glad I had just stocked up on 8 more packages of cranberries on sale for Thanksgiving days earlier.

I cut a bunch of fabric off of the couch we just replaced. The look on Liberty’s face when I told her I’d make her something and she could know she’s wearing the couch was priceless. It has to be something like wearing the drapes on Sound of Music. Who knew embarrassing your children could provide such entertainment? Ruby didn’t see the irony of wearing the couch though. She just started making plans for whatever it was I might make.

I asked the kids what they’d like for Christmas. The list consisted of boards and nails for Sterling, a planner calendar with note-taking space for Liberty, socks and maybe a cute silver ring for Eden, and chapstick and a bag of the little “cutie” oranges for Ruby. Charlotte and Pierce don’t have a clue. Entitlement attitude, meet my children. Or rather, don’t. I kind of like them like this. A lot.

Holiday surprise.

They must think that without coffee, we’re incapacitated.

I wonder where they got that idea.

Christmas monkeys.

I sewed 17 sock monkeys in the last month and a half. Ten of them were for my kids and their cousins who were here for Christmas.

Fun stuff.

Christmas numbers.

There are 17 people in my house this Christmas. All family, crowded together under one little roof. Ten little people, all having the time of their lives and making memories that will last a lifetime. Seventeen people, one bathroom, 51 meals a day to prepare, and more games played than I can count.

One Christmas trampoline, gifted early, being well broken in by 20 little legs (and a few adult ones too). Two black dogs, unsure about being friends, tolerating one another and joining forces when it’s time to tree the cat. One Christmas tree, decorated in tinsel in the name of making it less homely, now decorating seventeen people with it’s tinsel. One baby boy, unsure of the level of noise in his home, raising his level of crabby to an all time high. One little girl, bossing around the dogs in her big girl voice, fully expecting to be obeyed and becoming indignant when she’s not. The same little girl, asking numerous times if the visiting dog is a dog or a cat. Our cat shares the same name. The visiting dog is the size of a cat far larger than any I would consider safe and welcome in my home. And she can bark. It’s so confusing.

What a wonderful life.

Once in a while, I’m amazed that things can go so well.

I’ve always shopped ahead. My kitchen typically busts at the seams with food, and skipping shopping for a week or two means the only thing we really run out of the gets desperate is milk and fruit. It’s worked well for me, and I don’t meal plan but cook out of the cabinets. I’ve tried meal planning, and think if I was consistent it would be fabulous but the fact that it took time each week/month to do means it fell by the wayside.

Yesterday, though, when I had 18 hours notice that Thanksgiving was just us at our house because our friends we’d planned to spend the day with were all sick, I’d never been so glad for my overstocked kitchen.

We had turkey, sweet potato casserole, mashed potatoes & gravy, cauliflower, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie and cherry pie without a trip to the grocery store. In all fairness, I was planning to supply the turkey anyway, but it had come out of the freezer from a previous purchase too.

Next time I grumble at the amount of food on my food shelf, and how buying ahead creates bursting cupboards, I’m going to remember this. It was a pretty cool moment. Once in a blue moon I feel all organized and prepared.

Now, back to my regularly chaotic life. You know, that one that has us cancelling all school lessons planned for the day except math so that we can clean the house that contains more dirt from my garden-tunneling child than I care to admit.