Merry, merry one and all!

The tree is trimmed…well it is trimmed and trimmed again each day by the kiddos.  🙂 They add new lights, decorations, take off some and play with them all over the house…and are spreading the holiday spirit along the way.  🙂

It has been a beautiful Season: days filled with advent activities, nights filled with story books embellishing the Season.  We usually end each day with a rendition of the 12 days of Christmas…bum, bum, bum, bum…  {I sang it one night at the first of the month, and it has become their fav…fun for me as my siblings and i took on my mom & aunt buffie’s tradition of singing and acting out the song for the past 25 years or so…!}

In the spirit of things, here are the kiddos’ favorite songs of the 2010 season:

the builder: Angels We Have Heard on High…he particularly enjoys belting the Glorias in the chorus, & Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer, {5 years, loves kindergarten at Soldier Hollow Charter School, enjoys learning and teaching his younger siblings, was our decorating decorator this year…we even have lights on our coffee table, loves to build and invent with anything he can find in the recycle bin and some masking tape…heaven forbid we actually recycle any cardboard boxes!}

the dancer: I wanna Hippopotamus for Christmas & The 12 Days of Christmas, {4 years, favorite pastimes include painting and dancing, she and I have enjoyed special time while the builder is at school and the explorer is taking an afternoon nap: we’ve read and painted much, basked in the sun and talked of our warm Summer sun…she is anxious for the snow to melt so she can go swimming again, she is a flask full of questions if you’ll let her ask.}

the explorer: Jingle Bell Rock, mostly I think because Jingle Bells is the one familiar song he remembers from last year, and the rock one has groove to it…he does love to groove {2 1/2 years, an independent lil’ soul, desperately trying to keep up with his older siblings, adores music, getting into mischief…how he finds all the emergency pulls that the older two never saw…has the best manners of the 3 and is good to listen as we explain, and then respond, “Oh, I see…”}

Meanwhile, I’ve been contemplating the year 2010, have thought much about the events and milestones of the year, and honestly, I feel like it has been a breather-of-a-year.  Not without challenges,  but without the over abundance of milestones compared to the past 5 years of our marriage.

I’m grateful for a Heavenly Father who knows how much we can handle.  Knowing that He is ever aware and realizing it was okay to decrease the speed for a moment, I have tried to slow down even more this past year.  Trying more than ever to redefine our goals and priorities as a family and to find new ways to live providently and with self-reliance, we’ve given up much to simplify and meet these goals.

And yet, I know that as our breather-of-a-year ends, the next will no doubt be one of new challenges and milestones…and plenty of action is already in cue.

Best wishes and blessing to you and your loved ones as you reflect on 2010 and prepare for 2011.  May your holiday season and the coming year be filled with the of joy, hope, and peace that our Savior has shared and still offers to all those who seek.

luv from our home to yours,

the designer, moi, the builder, the dancer, & the explorer