goodbye, 2008; hello, 2009

This has been a really blessed year for us. I look back and I see God's heart toward us-- His heart to heal, deliver, and bless-- so clearly. Certainly, I would be lying if I said that every day was rosy and fun (!), but I can say with absolute sincerity that God's grace has been more than sufficient.

I ushered in the year 2008 in a pediatric intensive care unit. I remember praying that this was not a sign of things to come.

It wasn't.

Without doubt, Aubrey's health and vitality and the lack of medical intervention she has needed is an amazing testimony our family has from this year. But in addition, we have seen God provide in so many other ways.

I began the year very much at my wits' end as a mom, feeling uncertain and unequal to the task; God has given me new joy in my day-to-day life. Daniel and I were both feeling unable to meet the demands on our time and energies; God has stretched us both and taught us a great deal about working together as a team to accomplish more than we can individually. We wanted our house to be a place of great hospitality; God has brought us a girl in need of a family, allowed us to remodel our kitchen, given us a rag-tag bunch of Steeler fans who join us frequently for games and kielbasa, and more. I prayed that our family would be able to serve and reach out together; God gave us chances to do so.

Not every year ends so much better than it began. To be honest, the year 2007 didn't work that way for us. Still, as the days are woven together into months and years, I am able to see the fingerprints of God in it all. And what joy there is in getting a momentary glimpse-- an eternal picture-- of how He is working.

At the conclusion of this year, I am very grateful. Grateful for His goodness and faithfulness. And grateful for a new year to serve Him and love Him and watch Him move!

A quick weekend review::

:: I have had far more coffee these past few days than I would like to admit. This is not just because I've been tired, but mostly because when life gets busy, I really like pausing for a few minutes with a hot cup of joe in hand. Mmmm...

:: Our snow is completely gone. Our garbage pail was almost gone, too, having blown far from its intended location in today's windstorm.

:: I spent the whole day with relatives. So, so fun.

:: Aubrey doesn't sleep enough. She's also very loud (thank you, Jackie, for keeping her during the ceremony Saturday evening so that we could all actually hear the vows!). And she's very much an incredible miracle and blessing.

:: My kids are darlings. They have done so well with minimal sleep and very crazy meals (or lack thereof) these past few days. I am so proud of them.

:: I could listen to the music played/sang at the wedding ceremony over and over and over and over again. It really was that good.

:: Somehow, I've managed to not fall dreadfully behind on laundry this weekend. Part of me thinks there must be a tote bag or backpack stuffed with dirty clothes from some quick change that took place in some remote location that I've forgotten about, but I really don't think so. Wow!

:: Daniel is a great dad and the most gracious husband. I love him.

:: Carina was a beautiful bride. Her day was so special and I was so glad to be a part of it.

the most wonderful day of the year!

Christmas Eve celebrations began with hosting family and friends for our traditional dinner of Mexican Meatball Soup and Tortillas. We had two big tables, each set for 12 people. We ran out of soup before anyone got seconds (even though I quadrupled the recipe to supposedly serve 40 people!), but fortunately only Josh nobody seemed to mind too much. The time shared together was the best part anyway.

I left the house rather quickly following the 4pm meal in order to be at the church for a 5:30p choir rehearsal. Daddy manned the home, dressing all 4 kids and cleaning up from the meal. Fortunately, he had lots of help from Mom and 3 friends (Tanda, Ken, and Gary). Bravo, Daddy!




After the Candlelight Service (which was as beautiful and special as always), we continued our yearly tradition of coming home to get into pj's, eating cookies, drinking homemade eggnog (believe me when I say the real thing is nothing like the gross stuff sold in stores), and reading a lovely rendition of the Christmas story. Then the kids distributed the $5 gifts they purchased for one another in their own little exchange.













Thanks to simplicity, I was in bed at a record early 11p this year,. Wow! Not having to assemble toys or anything really cuts down on prep time. It was really nice!
Christmas morning dawned at 6:15a, which is the fairly typical Rise & Shine time around our house (dictated by the kids as always, of course). We dove right into stockings, which were our primary gift to the kids.






After a breakfast of baked oatmeal (with craisins and walnuts and cinnamon, yum!) and assorted fruit, we got right into unwrapping gifts. We even did a video chat with Daniel's family so that we could exchange gifts "together." Very cool!










We were really blessed to have two guests with us Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Our good friend Gary bunked out on the futon and joined me in photo-taking during the gift-giving:


Ken is a sophmore from China who needed a place to stay during the holidays. We met him Tuesday afternoon when he arrived at our house and are really, really enjoying him! He is a sweet guy who is extremely helpful with the children. In this photo, he is seen helping Bronwyn put on the Cinderella slippers she received as a gift from her great-grandparents in Texas:



I have lots more pictures from our afternoon at my parents', but I will save those for another day. Right now, I have to get back to preparing for my sister's big day tomorrow!!!!

Our sweet tree

We had a lot of fun getting our tree and decorating it this year . So even though it all took place about a week ago, I thought I would share a few pictures anyway.

Bronwyn loved being outdoors in the snow in spite of the single digit (!) temperatures


Aunt Mills with her two two-year-old nephews, Jameson and Jackson


The traditional snapshot with "our tree" before it was cut down


Aubrey slept through the entire outing and only woke up when it was all over (I think she was rather confused as to what all the commotion was about!)

Our tree stood bare for two days before decorated it. After such a wait, the kids were all the more excited to finally get the lights on and hang their ornaments!

I unwrapped the ornaments and then we called the kids in. They were so psyched. Look at Jack's eyes!

Intent on the job at hand.


How can you not love chubby toddler hands???


After we finished, the kids were still so excited that I couldn't get them to stop long enough to change the camera settings, which is why this shot is so blurry. As you can see, Aubrey in particular was desperate to get down and continue checking out the tree!
(She has, by the way, been great with the tree and gifts underneath it. A couple simple No's have done the trick. I am soooo thankful!)


We've been doing a whole lot of this every day: staring at the tree. The kids love to talk about their favorite ornaments, especially with friends who stop in. It's really fun to watch them take ownership. These traditions are very quickly becoming their own!

Simple

This year, finances and time have required simpler holiday activities and traditions. I am really feeling so blessed by this, as I was feeling kind of tired and rather undone after not living in our house (and without ready access to our things) much of the fall.

To be honest, I very seriously contemplated skipping the Christmas tree entirely, but Daniel and the kids looked quite disappointed by such a suggestion. Instead, we got a significantly smaller tree (only 6', as opposed to the 8+' we've been getting) in an effort to put less strain on both our budget ($5 is $5 after all!) and our backs.

Now I'm wondering why we ever got such big trees in the past. This little thing is incredibly sweet and I am in love with it.

I've only baked Christmas cookies twice so far. (I also threw together a batch of cookies for a very fun cookie exchange, but they were simply triple peanut butter cookies that I don't know I can refer to as Christmas cookies since they are not a traditional recipe around this home.) Due to the limited baking, I have had to somewhat ration our indulgences this year, making a breakfast of gingerbread boys and milk an extremely celebratory occasion.

I'm wondering why I've not realized before how much more fun eating cookies is when they are carefully portioned.

I have kept gifts straightforward and inexpensive for the second year in a row. One simple present per child. Consequently, my shopping and wrapping were done in record time this year, even without being in our house until last week. And, yes, we're still doing stockings for the kids, but not for Daniel and I. Wouldn't you know, Daniel seems incredibly relieved to not have to fill my stocking?!

Why haven't we kept things so understated and focused before? I am loving this.

Truthfully, I know it may very well be appropriate in years to come to buy the huge tree that little eyes can stare up at in wonder. I also know that I will once again be dying to make all the fun cookie recipes I haven't found time to make this year. But for now, I am enjoying the quietness and simplicity of a focused celebration. We might be skipping certain things and going light on others, but we have had more time than ever before for reading books aloud, sipping hot cocoa and laughing, listening to holiday music, sharing family devotions, snuggling on the couch under blankets, and talking.

In many ways, it really is true that simple is best.

family room plans (aka dreams)

These are sample photos of the larger items I have picked out for the family room. It all feels so real now that I've got pictures of all the fabrics. I have to keep reminding myself that patience is a virtue!

this is the indoor/outdoor runner I will soon buy for the mudroom/laundry room
(I can't wait forever on this because we're currently tracking all sorts of mud in every time we take a step-- and it's also on sale right now, making it a more urgent purchase)


this is the area rug for the new family room

this is the couch I have picked out for the family room
(yay for couches with machine washable slipcovers!)


this is the small area rug I want in the kitchen


this is the fabric I've chosen for window treatments


this is the style window treatment I'm thinking of copying
(err... having someone else copy-- I can't sew)

Our new family room

Our new family room-- which was a pre-existing space that required tons of work to refinish!-- is still sitting pretty empty. Last night I was "playing" in there, the result of which was furniture layouts defined by rows of shoes and boots that I confiscated from the new mudroom/laundry room. Daniel helped me put down masking tape today so that it no longer looks so... unprofessional.

Here are some pictures of the empty space, none of which do a very good job at capturing the openness or the view (what can I say? I certainly never claim to be a photographer!) :

the masking tape marks the placement of the corner sofa I have picked out


this shot shows the new door to the deck (the old one was where the refrigerator now is)


the masking tape marks where the old built-in cupboards will be rebuilt


looking down the 8' wall that partially separates the laundry room/entrance from the family room (the mound of jackets is because Daniel hasn't had a chance yet to put together the coat hooks on the wall)


these storage shelves were a "bonus" that Bill built for me... eventually I plan on having nice matching baskets on each shelf

This sure is fun stuff!

We are slowly but surely making the kitchen our own. It still feels like stepping into a different house when I walk through the dining room doorway, but eventually I'll figure out that it's mine.

Tonight I baked cookies. That helped. I got to play with my new oven: so cool! Even washing dishes afterwards was really fun because I got to do the job using my new sink and faucet.

I'm still playing around with where to put everything, of course. And the random decorations sitting all over are because I haven't felt like arranging things since I'm planning on decorating for Christmas tomorrow morning.

looking in through the dining room doorway


my awesome oven


my baking hutch and lovely plate rack

Pictures of the family room and mudroom/laundry room will be forthcoming.

In the meantime, here's a little video of Gabriel in his very first Christmas concert ever. This event took place 9 days ago. I think he really enjoyed himself.

Home for the holidays

We all slept in our very own beds last night.

Well, all of us, that is, except Bronwyn, who joined Gabriel in his bed sometime during the night hours, preferring the closeness and companionship of her big brother (who all of his own iniative just so happens to keep an extra pillow on his bed for nighttime visitors) to the space and solitude of her own mattress.

Still nursing a cold, I went to bed early after getting all four kids to bed and unpacking their suitcases. Daniel stayed awake several more hours (he's like the Energizer bunny these days, I kid you not), painting trim in the new mudroom/laundry room, hooking up the washer and dryer, moving tools out of our dining and living rooms, and utilizing the shop-vac on every surface in the kitchen-family room. I woke to a house that was considerably more pulled together and starting to feel like home again.

I also woke to a pounding headache and achy sinuses, but that's another story.

With the house looking more like our own, it only felt right to set about making it ready for Christmas. And so we bundled into hats and mittens, boots and scarves, and tromped over snow-crusted field to pick out a Christmas tree. I wanted something smaller this year, something simpler and easier and cozier. We quickly settled on a nicely rounded, 6.5' tree that looks perfectly quaint in our big dining room with 9' ceilings.

I love it and can't wait to decorate it this evening.

Yes, the tree is in the dining room again. Our family room space is not quite ready to be inhabited, though it sure is warm and sunny and tempting. There is additional painting to complete, a cable to be run (a long ways from its current location in our current family room), built-in cabinets salvaged from the space prior to demolition that need to be sanded and painted and re-built, an area rug to be picked out and bought, and furniture to be purchased. We have known for a while that the room will not be done instantaneously-- after all, we don't live in a Pottery Barn catalog-- but instead something that we keep chipping away at little by little. And really, it's a fun process, if one that occasionally challenges our my patience.

We're home, in a house that is bigger and more functional and even lovelier.

Home for the holidays!

Aubrey

Aubrey saw our local family doctor on Monday and then she had her 15 month cardiology appointment today. She is doing great. We are so thankful!

At both appointments she came in around 17lbs 13oz (well... the cardiologist's scale said 8.08 kilograms and my quick conversion attempt confirms the family doctor's scale). This may sound like a weight loss if you saw this previous entry, except that the home healthcare nurse's scale always seems to come in higher than either doctor's office. I've no doubt that Aubrey has continued growing little by little, bit by bit. And eventually she'll be forward-facing in her car seat.

We talked more about the transesophagael echocrardiogram the cardiologists want to do and I got to have some questions answered and concerns put to rest. The cardiologist who specializes in echogradiograms wasn't in today so we will most likely speak with him on Monday morning and get it scheduled for sometime in January.

Overall, Aubrey just continues to do so well. This was our least eventful appointment yet and for that I am grateful. I've learned the hard way that you don't want your baby to be the "interesting" one!

Winter-y

It's been snowing almost nonstop since sometime during the night. Our world is covered in white. It is altogether very breathtaking, which is exactly why I'm glad I don't have to go out into it at all today.

You see, I'm battling a bit of a cold. It's not bad-- just a headache and a runny nose-- but enough that I have slept pretty badly the past two nights. My sinuses were starting to hurt this morning until a few minutes in a REALLY hot shower opened them up a bit. I forget how much I take breathing for granted until I can't.

Blankets, candles, and hot tea are in order. The kids are all down for naps (simultaneously, which is a big deal since it's only been recently that I can coax Aubrey to stay awake all through the morning) and my surroundings are rather tidy, so some nursing of this cold sounds like the best thing I could come up with doing this afternoon.

The latest::

:: We continue to enjoy our time here at Mom and Dad's while the work in our kitchen goes on. Danica arrived last night with her two (!!) boys. It's so fun to all be together.

:: This afternoon Daniel and I worked on a good bit of preliminary cleaning at our place, along with the help of a couple college girls. It's really super relieving to me to have all the tools out of my dining room, much of the dust downstairs wiped and vacuumed up, and my bathroom clean again. We are getting so close to having our place put back together and ready to be lived in, and I am super excited. The kitchen is looking amazing. Daniel pulled an all-nighter on Tuesday and painted until 6:30am Wednesday morning (cathedral ceilings aren't a quick paint job!). I am absolutely in love with the color now that there are two coats. The flooring is almost completely in as of today, too. I am really, really pleased with it.

:: Between 3 and 6pm (while I was out cleaning-- sorry, Mom!), Bronwyn got sick. She's thrown up a couple times and looked pretty green all evening. Poor girl.

I'm really hoping nobody else gets whatever it is that she has.

:: Tomorrow is the last Friday Program of the semester. The students will celebrate with a small $3 gift exchange in the morning and then the Christmas Concert is in the evening, both of which Gabriel is very excited about. Friday Program has been great for Gabriel. He's had opportunities to learn submission to authority, being kind to others, and letting preferences/offenses go. He's also had a whole lot of fun! I'm grateful for all these things.

:: I'm enjoying the holiday season a great deal. I'm very glad that this year I'd planned on doing things smaller, since decorating for the season and doing any baking isn't exactly happening yet! I'm learning, slowly but surely, to prioritize what's really important and let the rest fall as it may.

:: I apologize for how random and thrown-together all my posts have been these past few months. It's been a busy season for us and I'm afraid I don't seem to always find time to think, let alone write!

Our trip to Pittsburgh

We returned last night from our wonderful trip to Pittsburgh. It was such great fun to be able to visit with many, many friends and family without feeling like we were rushing or having to "pick and choose." I loved worshiping at both services, playing games after the kids went to bed with Daniel, Beth, and Mom & Dad Paladin, having a playdate for my kids with my friends' kids, going to a parade downtown, and more.

Here are a few photos from our time away, in no particular order:

Our friend Tim playing with Gabriel

Daniel, his brother Larry, and his nephew Malcolm watching the Pitt game



Mom Paladin entertaining Aubrey while we got hot chocolate downtown



dinner with some of the best friends in the world



Bronwyn and Jackson helping Grandma Rah-Rah sew up the turkey



Larry (Daniel's brother), Emily, Larry IV, and Malcolm on Thanksgiving Day



watching the Christmas Parade in downtown Pgh Saturday morning



getting a quick family snapshot before church on the 30th