Holiday traditions and the Rise of Christmas

Family traditions are what make holidays memorable, I think. Little things only your family does or perhaps common things done in a unique way. Or even just a routine you follow year after year.

Traditions solidify the family bonds and create life-long memories and something to look forward to each year.

I never planned to have specific holiday traditions, really didn't give it a lot of thought. But luckily for me, they happened anyway.

I'd like to share two of our Christmas traditions. The first happened by accident, but I'd like to suggest it to anyone with a small child because it is an absolutely blast.

Each year around Christmas, I take a picture of Brady with a little chair he got when he was born. It happened by accident the first two years and when I realized what I had done, I kept it up. Now he has a blast showing how big and strong he is, flinging that chair around.

I present The Nine Christmases of Brady:

You could do this with a stuffed animal or toy and it could be on the child's birthday or some other special day. It's just a neat way to keep track of time and how big they are getting.

The second tradition came purely from Brady's imagination and "why not" attitude toward life. It is this attitude that led to the stick house we built and The Invention Party. Nothing gives me greater joy than when Brady has one of his big ideas I can say "yes" to.

Awhile back after reading a book that involved Christmas, he said, "I want to celebrate the day before the day before Christmas and I want to call it The Rise of Christmas." Now, when he said "Rise of Christmas" his voice changed and had a sort of grandiose hum to it.

"Okay," I said. "Why not."

So we sat down one night and wrote a list of what things we should do on The Rise of Christmas. Here they are: 

We had all of these guys going at once!

• We decided Elvis (aka my husband in his Elvis mask) should make an appearance. And oh boy, he did. He wore a long leather trench coat and had us in stitches before he "left the building."
• We turned on every Christmas decoration we had to lots of lights and music. 
• We drank hot cocoa.
• We watched The Grinch and Rudolph. 
• We opened 1 present. 
• We read about the birth of Jesus from the Bible. 
• We drew a picture in Brady's memory book that he made. 
• And an impromptu part of the night was a little "show" Brady put on for me with a couple of pillows. 

Yum, I liked this part of The Rise of Christmas a lot!

Do you have any unique traditions in your family? If so, I'd love to hear about them.

I hope your holiday was joyous and I wish you all the best in the New Year! 

Small Town Tuesday: Christmas tree in the middle of Main Street

This is my bi-weekly installment of Small Town Tuesday. Here in the boonies life is just a little bit different and I enjoy sharing slices of our unique lifestyle. If you have a small-town story please send me a message at vash_ii@yahoo.com or on Facebook.

One of our town's traditions that I just love is the Christmas tree. Lots of places have a city tree with an official lighting and all that.

But up until now I had never seen one IN the street, as in, smack dab in the middle.

Sure enough, city workers take out a few bricks at the end of Main Street each year and plunk that tree right in. They use a boom truck with a guy in a bucket to help stand it up. Brady gets a kick out of that.

It happens to be at the turn-around corner so you have to be careful to turn wide this time of year. As far as I know, no one has ever whacked into the tree.

It's just about the most festive thing. I love it.

Like a lot of bloggers, I won't be back for another week. So Merry Christmas!

We're celebrating our Christmas in our little town like usual with smoked turkey, smoked pork loin, salads and corn, potatoes and pies.

We got a foot of snow Saturday night, so I'm guessing we'll have some of the white stuff left. It's beautiful out there. New for this year is the holiday Brady invented, called "The Rise of Christmas" which takes place on the day before the day before Christmas. More on that in another post.

What are your plans for Christmas?

The day they put it up.

I'm amazed how they just stick it in the road!

It really looks beautiful at night.

Truth Chasers Club: Child Evangelism Fellowship

This post is purely out of my own desire to share a free program Brady and I have enjoyed. I thought others might benefit from it as well.

It's called Truth Chasers Club and we heard about it from our pastor's family.

I love that it is specifically for kids. I think ministering to children about God and Jesus is so very important. My kiddo also participates in the Good News Club here in town, also at our church, which is another ministry by this group.

In the lessons we receive from Truth Chasers, there is a story section and Bible passages which I read to Brady and then an activity/quiz section. Each time we go through one, it leads to wonderfully deep discussions between kiddo and I, which is awesome.

Another cool part is you get a personal note back each time you complete a section. According to our pastor's oldest daughter, Brady's sitter, who volunteered with the group at their headquarters, these are called "huggy notes" and she wrote some herself.

She said she also worked in the mail room, graded papers, added new kids' information to the computer, put new lessons together and prayed over any requests that came in from a child. 

My boy will also earn certificates and awards, and eventually his own Bible. He's very goal-oriented so loves that part.

Here's what their site has to say: 

"The Truth Chasers Club^® is an exciting Bible correspondence club designed to disciple children and adults. God has allowed us to reach over 499,000 Truth Chasers since February of 1999! Hundreds of completed lessons are received in the mail daily!   Dedicated volunteers come from all over the nation to help make a difference in children’s lives through the ministry of the Truth Chasers Club."

And:

• Learn amazing facts about the one true living God!
  
• Learn how much God loves and cares for you.
  
• Enjoy stories and activities just for your age.
  
• Get a response every time you send in a lesson.
  
• Earn certificates and awards.
  
• It’s free!
  
  

  

  A recent lesson we received.

  

  The lesson's activity section.

  
  

  

  Brady's official card.

  
  
  

  

  Our sitter provided this photo of the student gallery at Truth Chasers headquarters. These are letters and pictures sent by the kids doing the lessons.

   

   

Refrigerator pickled carrots & growing carrots

Gardening has made me love carrots.

It's true. I was wishy washy on them before. Eh, they're okay, crunch, crunch, but I lacked motivation to eat them. But now that I have discovered how easy they are to grow, I love them!

Along with okra, I deem them Easiest Garden Veggie I Have Tried So Far. Both okra and carrots survived extreme heat, drought and hail. Carrots even withstand cold. I didn't harvest these guys until mid-November (I kind of forgot about them and they did fine!). You don't have to baby these two veggies at all and they provide produce that lasts a long time.

Look how many there were! And that was after harvesting two batches before.

Hahaha! This guy cracked me up. We named him Patrick because he resembles a certain sponge's sidekick. We kept him on the counter like this until he withered away.

Their seeds are so tiny, it's amazing how big they get. I've roasted them, steamed and honeyed them, put them in soup and eaten them raw, Brady's favorite method.

It was time to pickle. We've pickled green tomatoes and okra as well and it's an awesome way to preserve veggies.

I used this recipe to the letter. We like our pickled stuff to be sweet, with just white vinegar and not too many spices. This recipe was perfect and I doubled it. The doubled recipe made 8 jars and they are delicious and tender-crisp. We eat them with every meal of the day.

 

Co-schooling: Toilet paper roll mummy craft

If your kiddos attend public school, I highly recommend volunteering in their classroom if you can.

It's not something I ever thought about doing before my son started school. But now I know I will do it every year. Not just provide a snack or plates for a party, but being there in person.

I know it's difficult if you work outside the home like I do, but I just treat it like a vacation day. I put it on my calendar and take that day off.

I have to admit, the reason I decided to do it was because both at the beginning of 1st grade and 2nd grade, at the parent information night, NO ONE had signed up to lead a craft or game on holidays. All the snacks were taken. All the drinks and cups and plates. But not one name for a craft or game.

Shoot, I thought. I could do that.

I LOVE it. Last year, I led the Valentine's Day heart shaped pipe cleaner glasses. This year it was toilet paper roll mummies for Halloween.

Here's what it does for me: 

• Shows my kiddo in a tangible way I think what he does at school is important. 
• Shows his teacher I'm committed and involved and that I support her (helps when I expect  her to support me back). 
• Allows me to know his classmates and them to know me. 
• Makes me step outside of my comfort zone and do something new. 
• Extra time with my kiddo! 
• Makes the teacher and I part of the same team in a very real way. This team mentality is important on both ends. 
• I get to see his classroom environment. My kiddo's class did a "brain break" to the Dinosaur Stomp and to Book Chicka Boom. It was absolutely freaking hilarious!  
• I get an idea of what his teacher has to do day in and day out, and it makes me appreciate her more. 
• A day off of work! Bonus!

I got the idea for the toilet paper roll mummy from this site, but I changed it up quite a bit. For one, the self-stick gauze was WAY too expensive to provide for 18 kids plus they're older and better able to handle regular gauze. Plus I felt it needed more variety.

Materials:

• Several rolls of 2-inch gauze, the cheapie kind, cut in strips long enough to wrap several times around a toilet paper roll.
• One toilet paper roll per student. 
• Assorted googly eyes. I chose ones in different colors and sizes from Dollar Tree so the kids could mix it up. 
• Tape of some kind. I used gauze tape actually. 
• Construction paper circles cut to fit the bottom of the tp roll. 
• Construction paper mouths, pre-cut, or the kids could cut them.
• Construction paper arms, pre-cut, or the kids could cut them. 
• Glue. 
• Candy.

Steps:

1. Tape the circle on the bottom, tape well so candy doesn't fall through. 
2. Tape one end of the gauze at the bottom. 
3. Wrap gauze around to the top, overlapping it some each time around. 
4. Tape gauze at the top. 
5. Glue on eyes, arms and mouths. 
6. Fill with candy. 

We all had a blast! I loved going around and helping and encouraging individual kids. It's amazing when 18 pairs of eyes are on you. And when I pulled out the container of eyes - BAM! - I was swarmed by kids! Wowza!

The best part though was seeing how each kid put their unique touch on their mummy. Take a look.

My kiddo's cyclops with his favorite color, orange.

Hahahaha! Sad cyclops! This kid was so proud of it!

Hugging mummies! Girls made these, of course :)

Look, this girl had her purple-armed mummy put its hand on its hip.

Green eye and arm on one side, blue eye and arm on other side. Color-coordinated mummy. Oh, there's the hand-on-hip mummy in the background, hahahaha. I loved that.

These best buddies made theirs exactly the same!

That back one is the happiest, most colorful mummy I've ever seen.

Small town Tuesday: Brady's letter to our town cop

This is my weekly installment of Small Town Tuesday. If you have a small-town story (with pictures is even better! ) please send me a message at vash_ii@yahoo.com or on Facebook.

Even in our little town we have crime. It breaks my heart. I wish we could be immune, but of course we are not.

A couple weeks back someone cut the cables on one of our vehicles and stole the battery. It couldn't have gotten them more than $10 and it cost us $70 to repair and replace.

This really seemed to get to Brady. He was immediately fired up, ran and got his scooter and said we needed to go "look for suspects" in the 30-degree weather. So we rode/walked around town - it doesn't take long, ha! - and looked at people we saw.

If we knew them, Brady was certain they were not a suspect. Or if they were a "little old lady" he was just certain they couldn't be involved.

When we were done, he ran in the house, grabbed a pencil and paper and wrote our town cop a note which we mailed a couple days later. Here's a picture of page 2:

I love that he knows our town cop by name and feels so comfortable communicating with him. The next day we saw the guy up town, across the street, and Brady hollers out: "Hi! I sent you a letter. There's a criminal in town!" The affable officer smiled and said, "Okay!"

I also love that Brady feels so strongly at 8 in his ability to affect change. I hope that quality stays with him as he grows up.

It's unlikely the culprit will ever be found. But at the very least it served as a learning experience for my boy.

Fels-Naptha laundry bar review, giveaway & poison ivy home remedy?

Disclosure: I was given this product for free to try and review. There was no monetary compensation involved and all opinions are 100 percent my own. 

I was surprised to learn the Purex Fels-Naptha Laundry Bar & Stain Remover has been around since 1894. I'd never heard of it! 

So when I received one to review I asked my Mom if she had heard of it. Her immediate response was: "That's what we used to put on poison ivy."

What?

I checked it out and sure enough, it's here on Wikipedia and I also found this blog entry. I know all too well the agony of a poison ivy outbreak, so you can bet I will keep this on hand! When I have a poison ivy rash, I'll do ANYTHING to make it go away. If I am unfortunate enough to get the opportunity to try out this home remedy, I will let you know how it goes. 

In the meantime, I used it for its intended purpose as a stain remover:  

"Purex Fels-Naptha is a laundry bar that works overtime to remove your toughest stains. Whether it is dirt, grease, or ring-around-the-collar, a bar of Purex Fels-Naptha can clean up the mess."

If you want to know more or get updates, you can "like" Purex brand on Facebook.

We found this blanket in a car we bought and it was too cute to trash, so I thought I'd try to get the stains (bottom right corner) out. 

I hate to throw stuff away if it's still useable.

To use the bar, you get the laundry wet and rub it on.

You can also shave some off and put it in your load of laundry. 

Here are my before and after photos. I think it did a great job of removing the stain and I would certainly use it again. It can flake a bit, so I keep it in a little container in between uses and the smell is a little strong when putting it on, but not bad.

 

I'm also holding my first-ever giveaway, which will run through Dec. 8! Purex gave me 3 coupons for FREE bars of Fels-Naptha. I kept the entry process is short and sweet and I'll mail the coupons to the winners! Good luck and thanks for stopping by!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Quick - like canned - chicken noodle soup

One of my favorite quick light snacks is my own homemade chicken noodle soup.

I've been playing around with it for awhile, trying it different ways and I have come up with one now that tastes a lot like the canned version you get at the store!

This was out of necessity when hubby was sick and desperately wanted chicken noodle soup but I had none.

So here's how it goes:

Quick chicken noodle soup

2-1/2 cups water
2 chicken bullion cubes (I crush mine first)
1-1/4 cup mixed vegetables (frozen or canned)
1/2 cup mini pasta

* You could probably add a little canned chicken or a few herbs too.

Throw it all in a pot and boil until the pasta is done, about 10 minutes.

These are the only ingredients.

My aunt sends these adorable alphabet noodles from California!

Plain old frozen mixed veggies.

The end result. Mmmmm.

Small town Tuesday: unexpected birthday guests

This is my weekly installment of Small Town Tuesday. If you have a small-town story (with pictures is even better! ) please send me a message at vash_ii@yahoo.com or on Facebook.  

We recently had a little party for Brady's 8th birthday. We invited family, his 2nd grade classmates and some other friends outside of his grade.

But we ended up with a few unexpected guests in a way I imagine wouldn't happen often in a larger city.

Birthday party chaos!

We had the party in a building we have up town. We use it for storage, family get-togethers and parties. It's very close to our house, so the day before the party Brady and I were hauling plates, cups, toys, cookies, drinks etc. from our house up to the building.

"What are you guys doing?" came a voice from down Main Street.

There were four girls. I knew one of them. She used to be in Brady's class but had moved to a city 30 miles away. I guess she was in town visiting cousins.

Brady knew most of them and some still went to his school. They ranged in age from 8 up to early teens. They all looked similar, hence my idea they're sisters and cousins.

They  hung out there the whole time we went back and forth, back and forth, carrying supplies.

At the end, one of the girls said, "Can we come to the party?"

I couldn't see any reason why not, so I said, "Sure." I thought they might forget or their parents would say no, but even if they did come, we had plenty to share.

To my surprise, all four girls showed up to the party. I have no idea if their parents knew they came. They ate food and drank pop and played with all the other kids and just in general had a great time.

It worried me a little that they were unsupervised, but we all kept an eye on them. They were the last to leave.

It made for a fun party and Brady was quite happy to have them there. Another unusual little slice of life in our tiny town.

5 cool 31-day series: ADHD to wardrobe to husbands

Last month, several bloggers participated in a challenge to post for 31 days on a specific subject. The idea of doing that was too overwhelming for me, but I really enjoyed several that I came across during the month and wanted to share them.

I thought they all had interesting and practical ideas throughout their series. And here they are: 

1. Rochelle Barlow's Learning American Sign Language. This series stops at Day 16 but it was so interesting and so helpful that I had to share it!  

2. Creative Home Keeper's 31 days to a wardrobe you'll actually love. Victoria's posts inspired me to go through all of my clothes and purge and be intentional about what I wear.

3. Serving Joyfully's 31 days of loving my husband intentionally really helped me see my husband in a different light and change the way I respond to him. It was a great reminder of how my words and attitude can set the tone for our entire household.

4. Beth Cranford shared 31 days to find your ideal business. She has several interesting ideas for making money through self-employment. 

5. And Nerdy Mom had a great series on 31 days of ADHD. I just think in our world today you can't know enough about ADHD. If you aren't parenting a child diagnosed with this disorder it's likely you will have a family member or friend who experiences it themselves or with their child, or someone in your work place or school. I think it's worth learning more.

I can tell these gals put a ton of work into their posts. I am in awe of what they have accomplished and am inspired for my own blogging future. If you have a minute, go check them out!

The joy of reading & new teaching techniques

Brady had an "aha" reading moment the other day that tells me he will not give up on reading.

We purchased the book to the left, October Ogre - which incidentally is about a small town mystery - from the school. I read it to him at bed over several nights.

On the last night when I finished it, he sat back and said, "Awwww. It's over." He sounded so sad and I thought YES, yes kid, I know just what that feeling is like.

That let down at the end of a really great book. The feeling that propels you to pick up another, and another, and another.

Then he said, "Will you read it to me again from the beginning?" Of course! I told him then that someday he would be able to read great books like that to himself as well.

The next weekend we started something new. For 15 minutes, we sit side by side on the couch. He reads a book of his own and I read a book or magazine of mine. He told me, "You know that really was kind of fun."

Another tip comes from his reading teacher. Her and I keep in contact through email and, given his love of numbers and tangible expressions, she made a chart so he could see his progress as the year goes on. He LOVED that and it seemed to fuel his motivation to improve more.

If you have a reluctant reader, perhaps giving them a visual display of their progress in speed, accuracy, sight words, minutes read, reading level, whatever, just might help.

Stuffed bell peppers recipe

I have to say off the bat, I am so excited that all the peppers pictured here were from my garden! It just took me this long to post it!

This recipe is a slight variation of this Betty Crocker Stuffed Pepper recipe.

Stuffed peppers

4 large bell peppers (used 6 medium ones)
1 lb ground meat (I used venison)
1 cup cooked brown rice
1 clove garlic
2 cup spaghetti sauce
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
1/2 small onion, chopped
1 tsp salt
Black pepper to taste

Cut thin slice from stem end of each bell pepper to remove top. Remove seeds and membranes, rinse. If necessary, cut thin slice from bottom of each pepper so they stand up straight.

In large pot, add enough water to cover peppers. Heat to boiling, add peppers and cook about 2 minutes, drain.

Cook ground meat and onion in skillet over medium heat 8 to 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until browned, drain. Stir in rice, salt, garlic and 1 cup of the sauce. Cook until hot. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Stuff peppers with mixture. Stand them upright in un-greased 8-inch square glass baking dish. Pour remaining sauce over peppers. I also put any remaining meat/rice mixture all around the base of the peppers with some sauce on it.

Cover tightly with foil. Bake 10 minutes. Uncover and bake about 15 minutes longer or until peppers are tender, sprinkling with cheese the last 5 minutes until it melts. They tasted great.

The whole meal involved cucumbers, tomatoes and peppers from the garden, and venison my husband hunted. Somehow that made it taste even better!