Happy fall, Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Birthday Anna, happy Hannukah, Merry Christmas. Caught up. Phew.
It doesn't pay to try and truly talk about and recapture all the little events of the past several months, so instead, I'll give some highlights and thoughts.
Fall was lovely. Long, beautiful, bug-free...the kind of fall you dream about. This fall and winter I have realized that I do, indeed, love seasons. There is always something to anticipate, something to long for, some change on the horizon. I do not do well with monotony so I suppose I'm rather suited to Manitoban life. I remember in August Luke told me that winter was his favorite season and Samuel said he couldn't wait for snow. Now that winter is here, I would say that it's true, the boys do really love this season and I am too, more than I have in the past. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Back to fall.
This fall we started our homeschooling journey. And a journey it has been. After the first day both Luke and Sam were completely worn out and didn't even want me to read one more story to them, which is about the rarest thing I had ever heard. I realized that my expectations about what homeschooling kindergarten would look like would have to change, and I'm pleased to say that gradually, they have. I feel like we have gotten into a comfortable groove, of being sometimes very productive, sometimes more relaxed, and in the end, I think we are slowly achieving some of the goals we initially had, and also changing and modifying our goals. At the very least, I have become a lot more reflective on learning, educating, and what kind of things are indeed important to spend our time and energies on. Luke has done great, learning to read at a pretty basic level and actually enjoying it, doing some math and enjoying that, and maybe more importantly, becoming more and more curious about the world around him and learning to ask intriguing questions. And Samuel doesn't want to be too far behind. He has learned to write his name and will write it repeatedly on a piece of paper. Both Sam and Luke are more and more interested in drawing and colouring, and doing "crafts", which basically involves emptying the recycle bin and taping it all together, into boats, firetrucks, and other unrecognizable machinery. Sam is also our little puzzle man and will patiently work away at puzzles while I read with Luke, which has been beautiful to see. Other favorite homeschooling moments include memorizing and reflecting on new bible verses each week as a family, doing math in the great outdoors, spending many days at Fort Whyte Alive, spending time in our homeschooling group who have already become good friends to us and snuggling on the couch reading story upon story. It's not all roses though, and when Anna is crying and Sam needs attention and I'm trying to do something with Luke, I'm often tempted to rethink our decision, but for now we are feeling that the pros outweigh the cons and it's pretty special to get to spend so much time with my kids every day, exploring and learning together. I hope to do a more unit based approach in the New Year and am excited about the kinds of things that are in my head, let's just hope I can organize myself to actually do it! We also enrolled the boys in swimming, Luke took skating lessons and Samuel was involved in a kindergym program which they loved immensely. It's nice, after spending so much time being the teacher, to sit back and watch someone else connect with our boys and see them have such a good time.
And I must not forget our little lady. She is such a joy. My mom said, when I was pregnant with her, that we will have two boys and "a girl for dessert". Well, that's been pretty accurate, she gives some of the best hugs, is such a giggler, toddles around like she owns the place and is often asked for by the boys when they're playing, to be their "puppy" when they're playing dogs. It will be nice someday when there aren't so many toys to pick up and diapers to change, but these are the days we will reflect on fondly so I am choosing to enjoy them now. At least in theory. She turned one at the end of November and we had a lovely little family party with the cutest cake, made by my friend Julia, with modest help from me. Mostly I just sat around eating cake crumbs while I watched her slather on buttercream. A thoroughly enjoyable evening really.
And then there was advent, and Christmas, and all the fun and stress of that. We hosted Julio's side on the 18th, which was such a lovely time and not the stress that hosting can sometimes be, as everyone was so helpful in bringing food and cleaning up and I had prepared a lot of the food in advance, so it truly felt like a relaxing and enjoyable day. Our boys just adore their cousins, on both sides, so they were in cousin heaven and Anna was royally doted on by the girl cousins. The boys were both in our church's Christmas concert, and as a true Christmas miracle, both of them stood up and "performed". Luke threatened to not go on stage every time the concert was mentioned, so I was just happy as anything to see him sing and even do an action or two. And Samuel is nearly always willing and agreable to try new things and being on stage didn't phase him one bit. He has proudly recited his little line, "We are the shepherds who watch the sheep, tonight a holy watch we keep" which was incomprehensible on stage, to any willing ear since. We went on the Christmas Eve sleigh ride at Bird's Hill with a bunch of people from our church, which was fun in theory, as it wasn't too cold and the snow was falling gently as it should on Christmas Eve, but Anna was miserable so that made for a bit of a tough time. She refuses to wear her mitts and also doesn't like the cold. But good luck trying to reason with her. She's such a baby sometimes. :) We had a quiet Christmas day at our place and the boys played and we puzzled and wore slippers and jammies and didn't really do much of anything, which was exactly the Christmas present I like these past few years. We spent a lovely boxing day at my parents' place, with treasure-filled stockings, a yummy brunch, the traditional (for the past 4 years or so) Christmas pageant put on by my dear mother in which we're all actors, games, naps, a big dinner...the Christmas dream. It's funny though, somehow this Christmas just didn't hold the wonder or magic that I have experienced in the past. I am definitely guilty of having high expectations, in general, so maybe that was the culprit, always longing for the perfect experience, but maybe I'm simply growing older and realizing that a lot of the effort to make Christmas magical must come FROM me and not FOR me.
I think I'm caught up. If all goes well we will celebrate New Year's Eve with good friends tomorrow, unless Sam's fever and Anna's croupy cough keep us home, which could be fine as well. In any case, happy new year to all, may 2011 be magical, for you and from you.
