::Lady Almina and the Real Downton Abbey::

If you are a Downton Abbey fan, this is a fun read. It's a biography of the real lady of the estate, which was actually called "Highclere Castle." The writers of the show drew a fair bit of inspiration from Lady Almina's life. The fact that I found the most intriguing is that it was her husband, Lord Carnarvon, who funded Howard Carter in the excavations of Tutankhamun's tomb in Egypt. It's a thrill when things I've studied and enjoyed come together like that.

::That reflects it::

I need lists and calendars to put my life in order. I really don't know what I would do without these things. My life-organizer of choice is an over-sized fridge calendar from Costco that just happens to be covered in quotes meant to inspire. In the three years that I've daily glimpsed my life up on the fridge, I've never once stopped to read a quote. Until yesterday.

"There are two ways of spreading light; to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it." ~Edith Wharton

I do not know how Edith meant her words to be understood. Likely, she was meditating on the power to affect change through either action or emulation.

Standing there, squinting at her words, a greater message got through to a tired, sluggish woman whose been growing restless again: I'm no candle. He is. What have I been doing to reflect Him lately?

My reflective qualities have been dulled from various and sundry lesser choices that have been made over time. Lately, I haven't been quite as comfortable with my tarnished, dusty sheen. But, God knows, polishing up is lots of work. Lots of replacing and relinquishing. A worthwhile endeavour though. What good is a dust-darkened mirror in a world that is dark enough as it is. 

::Cheddar & Chorizo Soup::

ade a meal to embrace the cold weather. It's hot, spicy and full of fat.

 :Paula Deen's Cheddar Soup::

I substituted chorizo sausage for her pimentos. And I served it in homemade bread bowls. I baked the bread into round loaves the size of small soup bowls, than cut away the top and hollowed out the middle.

::Eleven Years::

n our eleventh anniversary, we did what we do best. We hung out with our kids on the snow. Sleds full of firewood, chocolate chip muffins and kids, we tromped and skied through the woods. Sipped hot chocolate around a warm fire, and watched snow flakes fall against the backdrop of sleeping oaks.

::Skiing on golf balls::

Home from our annual Tremblant ski trip. I really love my family. I really do not love dirty hot tubs, or skiing on golf balls. Still worth it though.

::2012 in Photos::

I took fewer photos this year. I'm one child richer-- and busier. And I'm teaching an extra boy at home. More time spent living than capturing it through a lens. That said, here are my favourites, month-by-month:

This photo belongs here, because it's our first family photo in which a sixth little person is included. (Hidden though she may be-- rules are rules.) She's so inextricably a part of 2012, and so irrevocable ingrained on our hearts.

Last year's photos

::2011 in Photos::

::Ornaments 2012::

Salt Dough Animals. I saw a Noah's Ark version in a Martha Stewart magazine years ago, and it stuck. I never did hunt down cookie cutters like hers, but found these instead:

HOW TO: Canadian Critters Salted Dough Ornaments

1. Prepare a batch of Salt Dough.
2. Cut out your animals using cookie cutters and insert small eye-hooks at the of each animal. I found mine at Home Depot, but you can always make hooks using wire.
3. Bake for 4 hours at 200 degrees. Yes, I know it takes forever, but it's worth it.
4. Once cooled, they will be good and hard. Trace your animals onto pretty paper. I used green scrapbook paper. Cut out their outlines, and Mod Podge them onto the backs of the cookies. I did this to hide the brown spots on the side of the cookie that was face-down on the tray. But it also means your ornament looks pretty on the tree even if it gets trued around.
5. Once dry, draw details onto the non-paper side of each animal.
6. It is important to spray varnish the first coat or the ink will bleed. It may still bleed a little. The next coat can be brush-on varnish.
7. Next, I snipped all but 1 cm off the ends of red-tipped sewing needles. Use whatever colour you like, I just found the red to be very festive. These pins can now be pushed into the dough as embellishments. If they don't go in easily, pre-punch a hole using a thumbtack and then apply a dot of crazy glue to the hole before putting in the pin.
8. Last, feed ribbon or twine through the loop and tie.

Six Canadian animals for the tree:

::Decade-old insight::

At the age of fourteen, in a sea of lost, anxious teens trying to establish a place for themselves in the pack, I found Chantal. Friendships come in all shapes and sizes. Some are borne from a violent collision of circumstance. Some through grudging admission. Some through persistent effort. Ours was simply borne when two girls, who were more comfortable in a pair than in a mob found each other at the right time and the right place.

As is usually the case in the present, and with a little teen narcissism thrown into the mix, we took each other completely for granted at the time. But, a dose of decade-old hindsight has lead me to conclude that Chantal, in many ways, saved me from myself back then.

I was a wildly passionate girl, prone to following the paths of my emotion to the most complicated ends, until I was good and snared. But this girl kept me grounded. Her honesty and unapologetic integrity of self was invaluable to me, because I didn't feel at all comfortable with who I was. So, in the face of my repeated misadventures, followed by deep self-pity, she did not say what she thought I wanted to hear. She did not say that I was a victim, ill treated by some heartless jerk. No. What she said was; "Well, that was stupid, what did you expect?" And what was so brilliant about her was that she didn't necessarily say this in words. She had a way of saying nothing at all, but her eyes would twinkle with suppressed rebuke. And the message would be received.

When I wasn't busy making stupid choices, and she wasn't busy watching me do it, we had So. Much. Fun. And I mean good, old-fashioned drug-free, alcohol-free fun. We used to sit up on the highest step of the huge cathedral by my house and watch people walk by. We'd walk for hours, from one end of center town to the next. We would ride on the handlebars of the neighborhood boys bikes and laugh with heads thrown back. We would make our way up to the old train tracks and watch the sun set over the river. Sometimes we'd jump in. . .  Scratch that. Sometimes I'd jump in. She'd stay dry. And safe. Like I said, my stupidity was a spectator sport she observed.

We soon became extensions of each others' families-- as though an unspoken joint-custody arrangement had been imposed. Every weekend was a sleepover. We just alternated houses. I stopped trying to win over Duke, the temperamental dashound, and resigned myself to his less-than-friendly greetings-- barks, snarls and growls. (Usually mellowing into grudging acceptance as the night wore on.) I ate many, many spaghetti meals at the dinner table. And we could have picked our way across the rocks of the Britannia piers with our eyes shut.

As for my noisy, always bustling household, she learned that it was customary to be bear-hugged at the door, and jumped on by hyped-up little boys, and mandatory to speak about one's feelings, no matter how uncomfortable. We knew every crack in the pavement of my neighborhood. We loved to make studies of people. As we'd walk, we'd observe every detail around us and muse aloud about them. I think the practice of really taking a good look at the world around us is gift we've taken with us into adulthood.

And so, you see, those four years, that can be so painful for so many kids, were, for us, years of security, adventure and wonder. We looked at the unembellished world and saw possibility. Every day Chantal and I would choose to shed the high school veil of introspection and self-indulgence, and head out into the world looking outside of ourselves to the people beyond. Looking and hoping for people to interact with, whose lives we could enter into, even if for just one night. And I think it made us the richest teenagers around. We were a pair of story collectors.

Thank you for that, Chanty. Thank you for helping me get through the late 90's without self-destructing. Thank you for helping me love outwards. And for helping me learn to be thrilled by the mere possibility of each new day.

::Nativity Angels::

Stunning little winged creatures.

::Caelah's Prelude to 10::

Almost ten. A Piano Recital Party was one way to celebrate.

 Tonight she'll be watching the Nutcracker ballet with Oma. And Sunday she'll turn ten with angels wings affixed to her back as she recites her lines in the nativity play. Lots of celebrating. Lots to celebrate.

::Red & Green & Sparkly::

::Tree Day 2012::

Our favourite tree farm just keeps getting bigger and better.

::Praying John 17::

Take one minute to flip to John 17. If you don't have a Bible handy just click here.  Jesus prayed this passage to his Father about us. Us. His treasure. His longed-for ones. Us. Offered back to God by a thanks-filled Son. Jesus really loves us. But, he recognized us for what we were. Gifts-given.

I found myself praying these verses with intensity. A mother for her children.

I am praying for them. For the children you've given me, because they are yours. Every child I've ever called "mine" is yours, and I am blessed by the gift of them. And one day you'll bring me to you. Out of the world I'll be taken, but they will remain. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, as your adoptive daughter, that they may be a part of this family, even as I am.  

While I've been with them, I have raised them in your name, which you have given me. I have guarded and protected their reckless little bodies, but especially their reckless hearts, and I pray that not one of them will be lost. Put your joy deep in them. Keep them coming back to the deep well of it.  

I have given them your word. Poured over over it with them to unlock a glimpse of you. Waited to see an eagerness for you. The world will hate and ridicule them because they are not of the world-- outsiders, just like like their mom. I'm not asking you to bring them to you yet-- not until you're ready.  But, please keep them out of his hands-- the liar who steals and kills joy, hope and life itself. They don't belong to him. They're yours. 

Clean them with the truth of your scriptures. Even if it hurts them. Make them ready to meet you.  You asked me to accept pain for your sake. Out there in the struggling, messy, wounded world. I did. I will. And I'm sending my kids out there too. I won't hide them away. I'll send them out. For you.  

In the time I have left here with them, for their sake, help me slough off clingy sins and fears and other baggage that muddies the glory you could be shining through me for them to see. Clean me up so my kids can see you in me. I'm just their mom, but you are so much better. You are Truth.

::Night Fairy::

e spend a lot of time in the car. And that much time in a confined space does funny things to the kids. They find all sorts of creative ways to poke and prod and make each other yowl until I nearly steer off the road. So, audiobooks. I just keep them coming. This latest one was a surprise. I thought it would be decidedly girly, and cause my boys to protest. The silence in the backseat(s) suggested utter enchantment.

Which was confirmed when the last chapter came to a close and I heard a sigh drift up and over quiet heads. Five minutes later, another sigh.
Sigh.
Gabriel: "I just can't stop thinking about that book."
"You want to fly don't you?" I guessed. Because that's what I'd been thinking myself as we heard about our fairy-friend's adventures on the back of a hummingbird.
"Yeah. On a bat. That would be so fun."

::Homemade Soft Pretzels::

 "Soft Pretzels" from Canadian Living

::A Robot. Not a Cellphone::

Elijah made this costume all by himself. I am so impressed with my creative boy. (I tried to convince him to keep the arrow on his "pressure gauge" set to red, as he tends to blow a gasket more often than I'd like. He didn't laugh.) After all the hard work he put in, Lij did not appreciate being mistaken for a cellphone. But any ruffled feathers were smoothed out each time his costume was awarded a verbal "best-of-the-night."