Laurel Elisabeth Stevens

A good day to be "home" schooling: It's gorgeous out. Let's clean up the breakfast dishes, have Elisabeth read me a story and do a quick phonics lesson, a few tangrams, then grab a picnic lunch and water and a blanket (okay, this part took a little longer) and get out the door. Drive to Jones State Forest and go on a beautiful nature walk. For me the day was perfect. Blue sky, birds singing, sound of cars only faintly in the distance, wind in the trees. Cute kids walking along the trail. I was surprised by all the stubborn roots that kept tripping up little Henry. He was pretty tired out after a few hundred yards down the trail, and asking for lunch at 10:30 and to be carried. But every time there was a little foot bridge he would walk. Of course I didn't get any pictures of those because I was afraid he'd fall off or in (some were just boardwalks to help manage drainage but one was a really cool pipe bridge with a 15 foot drop and no sides of any consequence....

Henry loves to dance. It didn't take long --he had a good teacher and example in Elisabeth. His favorite CD right now is "Yiyi Kih"--aka Lion King (yeah, I have the soundtrack from the 90s but they've never seen the movie). Favorite past time these days: "Pay pay chains Mama, pay pay chains, Fwe Fwe. . ." (Play trains with Mama, or Elisabeth. or anyone . . .). He's getting better at playing by himself though too. His new interest has prompted Elisabeth to become interested as well so we just rolled up the rug and let them leave a track set up all the time. Two nights ago I was putting Henry to bed and as I put him in his crib he said, "Kiss Mama." So I kissed him, and then he said, "Kiss Hen Hen." How could I refuse? This went back and forth for a good long while.

I happened to find an old kilt of mine, purchased in London by my mom. She had been saving it for Elisabeth to wear and I found it just in time. Elisabeth loved wearing it and looked so cute.

Henry seems to be working on perfecting temper tantrums. This morning I had to take him upstairs to change his diaper (stinky) and he did not want to leave his toy cars. I let him bring one, but that didn't seem to help. He was in a rage, 26? pounds pushing away from Mommy as I tried to carry him upstairs. That didn't help my mood as I was trying to clean his dirty bottom. I gave him a quick spank to the bare bottom in an attempt to get him to hold still (do you really want to picture what we're dealing with here?). This usually makes him mad and then he realizes he must hold still, but this morning, as Henry is perfecting his tantrums, he kept the writhing going. So close to completely losing my cool, I began mentally rehearsing why I'm cut out for this job. That didn't get me far. So I began to sing "Jesus loves me." It went sort of like this: Jesus loves HENRY this I know, For the Bible tells me so. Little ones to him belong, They are weak!! ...

DSC_0010 , originally uploaded by j_lstevens . Christmas Eve. After attending the service at Christ the King we headed to my parents' house. The kids had dinner and then we put them to bed (with mixed success). Then the rest of us enjoyed a feast prepared by Mom. We tried not to make it too late a night, as some of Santa's helpers had work to do. Not at our house though. Elisabeth's favorite gift was a china doll that I had received as a gift years ago (nearly 30 years ago?) so that wasn't too tough. Henry was thrilled with his truck and soccer ball, as well as a garage from Uncle Andy that John had put together ahead of time. No wrap rage from this family. We should savour this year, as the kids were quite content and didn't rush from one gift to another. Henry actually seemed bothered by us calling him back to open gifts. He had enough to play with already.

Can you pose like a monkey? (Timothy and Elisabeth at the zoo). Henry loves his kiddy car. He has holes in the toes of his shoes because of how he rides. Zoo friends. Charlotte, Henry, Sarah, Mom and I were there too, but no pictures of us. Oh, and some animals. But mostly it was really cold (for us) and cloudy, and Henry was miserable. I remember standing in front of the flamingos while Timothy and Elisabeth argued over who would stand in a certain spot (must've been really special) and Charlotte wandered around and Henry cried. It was Mom's (Grandmere's) first time in a while and she was underwelmed by the experience. I, however, was quite glad she was there to help out, as I really only held Henry the whole time. It was quite a workout. There was one high point though. Henry loves the fish and takes after his sister in his delight in them. He runs in to the aquarium, screaming and saying, "Ish, ish." Maybe we should've stayed in there the who...

I sat down to the computer on Christmas Eve to write some reflections, but after catching up on reading a few blogs it was suddenly time to get ready for church . . . and then Christmas was upon us. We had spent so much time and thought leading up to this day and suddenly it was here. We went to my parents and Josh and Sarah's church for Christmas Eve service. We filled a whole row and left one seat empty--Josh, Timothy, Sarah, Elisabeth, me (Laurel), John, Mom, Dad, and Nathaniel. Henry and Charlotte were in the nursery. Two years ago we also filled up a whole row, with no empty seats: Timothy in the nursery, Charlotte on Sarah's lap, and Tim and Kristen. The service was ripe with reminders of the sorrow that has occurred since we were there last, and the joy and peace that sustain us. "No more let sins and sorrows grow, nor thorns infest the ground. He comes to make his blessings flow far as the curse is found . . ." and "Hail the heaven born prince of peace . ...