First, pour yourself a smooth, sweet cup of cocoa.

And gather up your favorite cat…….while I share with you, dear friend, some of our weekend happenings, namely; decking the halls with boughs of holly, and decorating the “O Christmas Tree”.

This morning, I awoke to the sound of my two youngest children arguing loudly over a cat.  I was heavy with sleep as reached for the clock to look at the time.  It was 6:47am.  Caleb would need to leave for school in half an hour.  I rolled slowly out of bed, and thankfully found the boys already dressed for the day.  I served them peanut butter toast, passed out lunch money, made a cup of coffee, and after the busses came and left, I sat and looked at all the pictures we took this weekend………..

These are busy days for all of us.  Some of us Moms are working on less than ideal energy.  What a blessing it is to be tired yet still determined to love and nurture our families.

On Saturday, between a wrestling practice and a Christmas Ball, Rich and I had a small window of time to get our Christmas tree.  We were determined to cut it down ourselves this year so we bundled up in our coats and asked the children who wanted to go with us?  Out of seven children, we had two who were excited about going with us to get the tree; Seth (5) and Sarah (4).  So off we went.

It was raining.

The tree farm was busy despite the rain.  There were a line of cars with people tying up their trees.  We couldn’t help getting excited about finding just the right tree.

It is simply amazing that we’ve been in love over the last 20 Christmases…..

We walked briskly along the rows of trees and it didn’t take long to chose one.

Just right.

“Not only green when summer’s here,
But also when ’tis cold and drear.”

While Daddy cut down the tree, Seth and Sarah ran around laughing and having a wonderful time as only 4 and 5 year olds can do.

Happily wet and muddy, our dear darling Seth.  A cute note about the matching mittens; I dug through the mitten box and found two that didn’t match, yet more importantly were for the left and right hands.  When we got to the truck and buckled up, Seth leaned forward with the matching black mitten (which he had discovered in the truck) and said, “Mom, you’re blind.  The matching mitten is right here.”

Seth, ready to be a help, climbed up on the truck to pull the tree up with his Dad.

Then, even though I was right there ready, he insisted on jumping back down all by himself, thanks anyway Mom!

Christmas mud.

They wanted to get out while Rich returned the saw, but did you see that mud?  We made them get back in.

We left the tree farm with candy canes.  A few miles down the road Sarah spit hers out in my empty coffee cup, spitting and clearing her throat so much I became amused.  Apparently she doesn’t like candy canes.  (She doesn’t like toothpaste, either).

Points if you can name the title of my current read!

We returned home.  Rich and Ethan set up our beautiful (but very wet) tree, and then Rich and I had to quickly get ready for our date.  Grace left with a friend to go to school for the Madrigal Feaste, Jacob babysat the children for us, and we left the house for the evening.

And it came to pass that we decorated the tree 24 hours later, (last night).

Jacob turned on some Holiday tunes, while Emily made a Santa craft with Sarah and Seth.  The children are to glue a cotton ball on his beard each day until Christmas, when his beard will by then be fluffy and white with cotton…….they loved it (thank you, Em!)

It was a flurry of chaotic activity to get the tree decorated and all too soon not soon enough, it was completed.

We followed the excitement up with early bedtime for the younger children and crashing in front of the Andy Griffith show for the rest of us. I went to bed at 9 and was asleep very shortly afterwards, thankful for another day.

******

keep calm and jingle on

xoxo