In celebratation of the Sanctity of Human Life, above are pictures of my two little miracles from God, Linnea and Laurel, on their original birthdays. Also, here is a video link to a very moving song “I’m Holding a Miracle.” Praise God! They are miracles indeed!
About six months ago we learned that Linnea’s close friend Sam would be moving far, far away to Montana. She was devastated. A week or so later, our good friends Bob and Kate received their adoption referral for two girls who are now ages 1 and 6. Linnea was elated that God was giving her a new friend, a very special little girl from Ethiopia who is exactly her age.
Kate gave us a picture of Lila Selam (and baby sister Ella Furtuna). We looked at it often as we prayed for the girls. Months passed, and Bob and Kate weathered many heartbreaking delays in the adoption process. Finally, just after Thanksgiving, they headed off to Ethiopia to get their girls!
This weekend Linnea and Lila finally had their first official playdate: sledding and later warming up with hot chocolate and more playing at the Hutchinsons’ home. The sledding conditions weren’t great since a little warm spell on Friday left everything coated in glaze ice. It was nearly impossible to get back up the hill, and the dads had quite a hard time dragging the kids to the top. Even so, the girls had a lot of fun together. Communication issues didn’t seem to be a barrier for their play time. Lila, who speaks a little English, kept saying, “I love you, Linnea.” What a sweet beginning to their friendship!
This year’s Christmas card photo was taken in November on a scenic old railroad bridge over the Dungeoness River in Sequim, Washington. Gramma Martin was riding in the rental car with us and told us we ought to stop and check out the bridge. Heavy rains earlier that week made the Dungeoness River rush rapidly below the bridge. It was a beautiful spot, especially with the fall foliage. Here are some other favorite shots from the bridge.
Every day this month, my youngest has asked at least once, sometimes more frequently, “Is it Christmas, Mommy?” I keep saying over and over, “Not yet! It’s Advent.”
For some reason, my answer isn’t getting through to her 3-year-old brain.
This afternoon I wrapped all of my gifts for the girls and my hubby while the girls were playing in their rooms. When my youngest came downstairs, I told her to look under the tree. She noticed the gifts but didn’t seem too excited. Then I explained that all the gifts in the red wrapping paper with gold stars belonged to her. Her eyes bugged out and she put the most shocked expression on her face. “For me! What did you put in them?” As if I would tell her!
I explained that the gifts would be a surprise that she would unwrap on Christmas Day. She started jumping up and down with the child-like Christmas excitement you’d expect from a 3-year-old.
Later the girls wrapped a gift for their daddy. They almost used all the Scotch tape in the process. When he arrived home from work, my 6-year-old met him at the door reporting excitedly that she had wrapped a present for him and it was waiting under the tree. Not to be out-done in the reporting, my 3-year-old said, “Yes, Daddy! We wrapped you a present! It’s pajamas!”
As you can imagine, big sister was pretty upset with little sister for ruining the surprise. Tears were shed. But I’m sure they both will be telling this story over and over again for Christmases to come; someday it will be funny to them.
One week until Christmas, and everything is feeling quite festive here. We’ve set aside the school books for now and are focusing on reading our Christmas favorites and doing ornament crafts. Michael even helped the girls build a ginger bread house a couple nights ago!
Snow globes are Laurel’s Christmas favorite this year, along with candy canes. She just can’t get enough candy canes!
Linnea’s Christmas favorites are my homemade hot rolls and the Nutcracker. Actually both girls are quite fond of anything related to the Nutcracker. It all started last winter when Macy’s Department Store in Minneapolis had a special Christmas display of the Nutcracker. They make a pretty big deal out of their Christmas displays, and it certainly captured the girls’ imaginations. For the longest time, Laurel associated any trip to Minneapolis with the Nutcracker. Even in July, she’d ask if we were going to see the Nutcracker while downtown. It sounded so ridiculous but made perfect sense to her.
Last spring when we signed up with the homeschooling group, I saw that tickets were available for the “Swinging Nutcracker” at Orchestra Hall, so I had to buy them! On Dec. 5 the three of us girls attended the much-anticipated performance with a big homeschooler crowd. We sat in the second row, and the girls were awestruck by the ballerinas and the 95-piece symphony orchestra. It was a lovely production. It felt like it ended entirely too soon. (I’ve seen the full-length ballet twice, so this hour-long performance left me wanting more!) Afterward we met Michael for lunch at Macaroni Grill and then the girls each picked out a Nutcracker at Michael’s craft store.
The next morning we made a frigid trek to get the Christmas tree. It was a bitter cold and windy morning to be outside so long. The temperature was about 15, so we all layered on the snowpants and snow gear. We found a nice tree rather quickly and loaded back onto the tractor-drawn wagon to return to the warm-up area.
The warm-up area at Z’s Trees (http://www.Zstrees.com) offers free hot apple cider and free peanuts in the shell. Laurel was so hungry and excited that she popped a whole peanut — shell and all — into her mouth and started chewing. I don’t know how long she’d been chewing it when I noticed the puzzled look in her eyes and figured out what was going on in that little mouth of hers. She didn’t need too much prompting to spit the mess out and eat one of the nuts I had cracked for her. Linnea right away made the connection with her new Nutcracker at home and stashed some peanuts to bring home and crack.
Once we recovered from the cold and got the tree home, decorating was a hoot. Both girls totally got in on the action. This was a first for Laurel because last year she was completed distracted by playing with a calculator and somehow missed most of the tree decorating!
After the tree, we set up the nativity, and then Linnea and Laurel spent all their free time playing with it. You can’t imagine all the unconventional visitors baby Jesus has had! Princesses, snowmen, you name it. And all of them evidently have to take naps during their visit. One evening I noticed all the people in the nativity set (plus unconventional visitors) lying down and covered up with little tissue paper blankets. I should have taken a picture! It was priceless.
Tonight while I finished stuffing Christmas letters into envelopes, we watched the “Celtic Woman Christmas” DVD. The girls love the Celtic Women http://www.celticwoman.com/. Laurel watches a few songs and then dashes off to her room to grab a big, fancy dress-up gown of her own. She dances around the living room and tries to sing all the songs at the top of her lungs. Linnea, meanwhile, is fascinated with the violinist on Celtic Woman. She pretends to hold a violin and bow and fiddles along to the music. She sings, too.
This Sunday Linnea will be singing as a choir member in the Christmas production at our church. It is a children’s musical called “A Christmas Carol,” a modern version with some slight similarities to the classic production by Dickens. She is most excited because last night at practice she got to stand next to her newest friend, Lila Selam. Lila is 6 and is from Ethiopia. Lila and her little sister Ella Furtuna were adopted by our close friends Bob and Kate. What a memorable Christmas this will be for their family! You can follow their story at http://romans815.wordpress.com.
We’ve got about 4 inches of snow right now, and the weatherman just said there’s a blizzard warning. We’re supposed to get 8 inches by noon tomorrow, and more after that. The high is 20, so there’s almost no doubt we’ll have a white Christmas! My favorite kind!
Enjoy getting ready for Christmas with those you love!
Linnea is 6! Her party was a “fairy tea” with four of her little friends and her little sister. I served flower sandwiches, apple and pear slices, forest fairy trail mix, graham crackers iced with Pixie Dust, shortbread cookies, cranberry white chocolate scones with clotted cream, raspberry cups, chocolate cupcakes with buttercream frosting and raspberry sherbert floats. I also served ginger peach tea, cinnamon plum tea, and lots of apple juice! All the girls looked so lovely, and they had fun decorating picture frames with ribbon and flowers. We read a book about creating fairy houses, and we played with tea sets and felt boards. It was a lot of fun! Many thanks to my dear cousin Rachel for all her help with the party preparations and the party crowd!
Our family just played a new board game tonight that’s perfect for family fun at Christmas! It’s called “To Bethlehem” and it’s for ages 4 to 104. A couple families from our homeschool group spoke highly of it, so I ordered it and we all played (including 3-year-old Laurel). We had a great time making our way to Bethlehem with 5 sheckels in hand. You can order the game online from Family Man Ministries at http://www.familymanweb.com/ .
Our family just returned from a week-long, pre-Thanksgiving trip to Washington State to spend time enjoying God’s creation, as well as visiting relatives in the Port Angeles-Sequim area. Getting there involves almost every mode of transportation imaginable: airplane, subway train, rental car and ferry boat (and sometimes a shuttle bus, but not this time, thankfully). The girls did amazingly well despite the rigorous travel day and the two-hour difference in time.
One special highlight was re-visiting Sol Duc Falls, where Michael and I got engaged in 1995. Although we’ve made more than half a dozen trips to Washington since then, this was our first trip back to that exact spot, and it was all the more sweeter to have the girls there with us. They loved searching for fairy homes in the rainforest as we hiked 0.8 miles to the falls.
Here are some photos from the journey. Praise be to God for His glorious creation!
VOTE FOR SLUSHIES: Earlier this month we held a dinner election. Each of us nominated our favorite candidates for dinner in the positions of main entree, side dish, fruit, vegetable, drink and dessert. Pictured are the girls campaigning for slushies and hoping to secure their daddy’s vote. The winners were: BBQ chicken, salad, carrots, watermelon, apple pie, and slushies of course! I wish I could say I came up with this idea, but actually it was an assignment for Linnea’s current events class.
Starlight Writer 
