one thousand gifts

almost one year ago, a dear friend and i undertook the challenge set forth by author Ann Voskamp to count 1,000 gifts in the year 2012.

it was a dare...to write down at least three things each day that we were grateful for...to stop and notice the little things that make life so very lovely...a call to stop sleeping through life, to wake up and really smell the roses.

there were days i forgot to write...
and other days when i absolutely could not stop myself at just three things.

just like any year, 2012 presented some tough stuff...

but even in all that, there was grace abundant.

as i share a few of my favorite Christmas pics, i'm reflecting on all the good of this year.

and as i re-read through the journal pages scrawled with one thousand things that made my heart happy these past 365 days, i'll share some of the best ones with you.

#11 - getting my hopes up

#62 - a cousin!

#65 - a new group of kiddos to love...7 weeks to do something joyful!

#97 - Peach's loose strand of hair...its very own gold

#116 - rejoicing over big accomplishments for our little daycare friend who is learning to use the potty

#128 - a treasure trove of dirty, unwanted, craftable jewels!

#190 - combing my great-grandmother's hair while praying for her and knowing that i'm just returning the favor

#235 - the pain of being away from my girls...it truly is a gift

#238 - the way Peach crouches down beside the book drawer, carefully choosing a treasure to open

#309 - a 10-month old baby who still wakes during the night...some babies don't wake up.  so, tired as i am, i'll choose joy when i hear her whimpers in the middle of the night.

#343 - the wisdom i gain with each new ear infection...

#347 - long sleeves in the morning giving way to short-sleeved afternoons

#408 - teaching students outside on a perfectly still, blue day

#414 - J's servant heart and the sparkly clean windows on our house

#459 - how my girls miss their day care family when they've been away for a while - what a gift that they have an extension of goodness and care in their lives

#489 - grocery cash in my wallet and renewed focus to pay off our school loans

#501 - Tulip crying the whole way home...it is good to have a child who knows, loves and misses the comfort of home and her crib

#568 - memories of Costa Rica brought on by a student who visited there and brought back my favorite snack :)

#580 - Peach's sweet voice reading, "and then the mother said, 'this is a wonderful picnic and the baby plays in the sun and it is actually a wonderful day."

#599 - "bumpin' up and down in my little red wagon"

#612 - watching Tulip practice her mommy skills - it does take a lifetime to learn, doesn't it?

#650 - little purple flowers hugging brick walls

#677 - santa socks in july

#701 - the possibility of a baby??!?!

#717 - late night crafting with my momma

#722 - cloth diapers on the line

#805 - early, silent mornings in the Word

#811 - being so exhausted...growing a person is tough work :)

#820 - wild sister giggles coming from the bath tub

#822 - the answer to 3 years of prayers...a NEPHEW!

#851 - pumpkins

#902 - the way Tulip says "woosie" when she wants to play ring around the rosie

#910 - cutting down our own christmas tree...a lumberjack husband!

#915 - Tulip potty trained all on her own...UNBELIEVABLE

#924 - setting up the manger with Peach

#942 - a snowman kind of day

#962 - J's commitment to our family

#970 - middle of the night snuggles and an opportunity to speak Jesus' peace over a bad dream

#973 - the way Tulip says, "momma..." and then rambles a whole bunch of things i can't understand :)

#985 - a pile of things to do over Christmas break and the fact that I get a Christmas break

#999 - a reminder to study my girls

#1,000 - one year jam-packed with treasures

twinkle

twinkle, twinkle little elf, sitting there upon your shelf...

we jumped on the elf on the shelf bandwagon and goodness sakes! have we been having fun!

our elf, "twinkle" arrived on december first and brought this fabulous advent calendar (made my my super-crafty aunt)

every day, we look for miss twinkle and check to see what she brought us from the north pole in our count-down calendar

on day one - the girls found these santa ring pops - sugar for breakfast?  why not?

one day we woke to find twinkle helping herself to some raisin bran.  another day she had dug through the junk drawer and found our expo marker.....uh oh!

and who knew that elves can spell?

what's an elf to do when there is only one A in the set of blocks?  

good thing Twinkle is resourceful and found the construction paper  to remedy such a situation. ;)

i was not as thorough with my picture taking as i would have liked

i forgot to take a photo on the days she was hiding in the tree, wrote a note on the deck door with window markers, hung from the fan in Tulip's room and wore a Peach's sock on her head.

goofy little elf....

we had our little family Christmas just tonight.

the girls opened three gifts from us after we talked about how Jesus was given three gifts by the wise men.  they each also had a gift for each other and Peach had gifts for momma and daddy.

afterwards, we sprinkled magic reindeer food on the front lawn, set out cookies and milk for Santa and read some stories about Jesus, the greatest gift of all.

now the peanuts are snug in bed and Santa has tucked a special treat for each of them under the tree and filled their stockings.

we're sending Twinkle back to the North Pole until next year, when the magic will start all over again. :)

well hello there....

got to see our littlest family member on saturday....

all 12 ounces of him or her

be still my heart :)

seeing this bouncing babe has sent me into a semi-panic about how we are going to fit another person in our cozy little home.

the nesting has officially begun

rearranging and reorganizing...

making room for more love - what could be better?

hello there, little one :) we couldn't be happier that you are on your way.

welcome to the north pole

we almost didn't do this...

for a lot of reasons.

first of all, i'm tired.

and so is j.

he's teaching full time and coaching so his days are loooong.

i'm teaching part-time and growing a baby all while literally running after littles.

peach has been getting up in the night to go potty - which is good.  she's waking up dry.  but one of us is up with her, helping her through the fog of sleepiness and back to bed.

tulip had an ear infection that i treated with a home-made concoction.  i'm proud to say it worked, but it took a while and for the past couple weeks, she's been up multiple times during the night, needing momma or daddy to rock and soothe her back to sleep.

needless to say, when i look in the mirror, my reflection is one that sighs, "there's not much i wouldn't trade right now for a nap."

on top of that, a fellow 7th grade teacher at my building passed away last weekend and i've been clinging to God by my fingernails all week for words to explain something that i don't understand to the hundred and twenty five 13-year-olds that i teach every day

despite all that...j and i agree that these opportunities to really love our kids will only be here for a short time

some day, i'll sleep again and the bags under my eyes will disapper (hopefully?!??!)

some day, the endless trail of toys strewn about the house will cease

some day, we will have all the time in the world to pursue our own interests.

but today, for a brief moment, we have the opportunity to make some magic with our kids.

so, ignoring our exhaustion, we pulled together our second annual north pole party....

thursday night i was excited as i got the house ready.

friday i got the gut-wrenching news about what happened in Connecticut.

what?!

how?!

i almost turned tail again.

all i could think was...how can we (a bunch of teachers and their kids) get together and whoop it up when families on the east coast were hurting so desperately?

that could have been us....our school...my classroom...our students

but the house was clean and looking very polar.

and peach was bouncing from room to room chattering about santa and sleighs and bells and reindeer.

sometimes we're tired...

other times we're sad...

and those are real, valid feelings.

however, at the end of the day, all we can do is pour out all the good we can into this world.

and hope that it is enough for these kids that are in our care.

so, our friends showed up in jammies...

and we all made Santa's nice list :)

we ate yumm-o cookies

and drank ice-cold milk

we mixed up some magic reindeer food...

wrote letters to Santa and J read the story of Old St. Nick by flashlight

as the littles laid on the floor and watched J project the images of reindeer onto the ceiling in our dark basement, i was so glad that we did it.

i don't say all this to make us seem like more than we are.

we're human and just like all parents, sometimes we give in to the exhaustion, cut story time short, put them to bed early and just veg on the couch....

sometimes, even though we've got a kitchen full of nutritious food, we make them mac-n-cheese because we know that no one will complain about that...

sometimes we yell.

we are not perfect.

even though i'm still left with lots of "why" after the past week,

i know that i have little opportunities, like this one, to make the world better.  to love my kids and the others in my life extra special.  so that when the sad and the bad comes (as it surely will), they will have a foundation of goodness to stand on.

i've heard that it takes 10 positives to outweigh one negative.  maybe glittery oats and sprinkles on cookies are a lot more important than we give ourselves credit for.

maybe these jobs of being parents, grandparents, friends, aunts, uncles, teachers, day care providers,...although they seem monotonous and mundane....maybe they are the biggest, most important jobs.

maybe sweeping cocoa from every corner or my kitchen is one little thing that adds up to all the other little things to outweigh the one really big bad thing.

the house was a disaster after everyone left, but as i washed dishes,  picked up the remnants of a pillow fight, put toys back in their homes and prayed for families i'll never know, my heart was happy to have the blessing of cleaning up after a bunch of energetic little munchkins.  

may i never, ever take that privilege for granted.

i've got monday staring me in the face.

last monday i groped for words to explain to my students that a really good man's heart just stopped working while he was out shoveling snow.  i explained, with tears streaming down my face, that the room just downstairs, will now be occupied by a new teacher.  that was tough.

one week later, i've got to figure out how to convince them that, despite what happened in Newtown, our school is still a good place to be.  i've got to try my best to make them feel safe and make learning exciting - to help them see that education is a gift. 

this is tough stuff.  and college didn't prepare me for it.

but, i've got a bucket of candy canes and a whole weeks' worth of little opportunities to do a lot of good.

Lord, let it be enough.

what we've been up to

this Christmas season has been more fun than any i can remember...including the days back when i believed in the magic of this time of year.

i feel like we've hardly taken a breath.

but it has been good, fun, family time.

the memory-makin' kind.

here are some pics of what we've been up to....

diggin' through our snowman kit

eating snow by the spoonfuls...

entering coloring contests...

playing peek-a-boo...

having snowball fights with only the protection of a single window pane...

crafting up interesting projects to give away...

wrapping while listening to Christmas music...

ho-ho-ho-ing while wearing little clips tucked sweetly away in advent calendars...

and going for rides to look at lights while munching popcorn...

the magic has seeped its way right back into my heart.

and at the end of the day, when j and i fall exhausted onto the couch, we're both thinking the same thing....

"what did we ever do to deserve all this?"

my favorite....

i took this photo the other day while my petunias had their noses pressed up against the cold window pane, waiting for j to throw another shovel-full of snow at their faces.

their little squeals...

the way my little looked up at her sister...

the way my big girl smiled down at the girl that is quickly becoming her best friend...

the sound of both their voices chanting, "more!"

 it was enough to make me tear up.

what a wonderful time of year....

sparkly

today, we woke up to this...

which led to this...

and, finally, when daddy got carried away....

this:

my momma always said - "first comes the laughing, then comes the crying."  :)

the meteorologists are predicting something ferocious and blizzard-like for tomorrow - i've got enough food in the house to feed the whole neighborhood and three Christmas movies.

bring on the snow!  i can't wait!