Christmas in Review

Parent/In-Law Gifts - Always hard, right? Which is one of the reasons I'm passing on these ideas. See, I'm nice like that. I went to a class in September(?) on good inexpensive Christmas gifts taught by the lovely and talented Heidi (currently the mother with the most children in our ward, soon to be tied by me). One of the things she talked about is making a Memory Lane game, an idea she found in Family Fun magazine. I knew I had to do it, and had all kinds of great plans for getting it done right away. But since this is me we're talking about, I didn't start until 3 days before Christmas. It made it more difficult since while the article has lots of great putting-it-together tips, the pictures aren't that great of the actual board, and there aren't many suggested questions. I changed up the game a little bit and created three question categories, and am more than happy to share those. This is how our game turned out:




We played this Christmas Day with some of the family and had a great time.

For my in-laws, I stole an idea my sis-in-law has done for my parents the past two years and made a grandkids book through mypublisher.com. I put it together with a page of pictures and a page of questions/answers for each of their grandkids. It wasn't finished in time to be delivered before Christmas, but it arrived a couple days ago, we gave it to them today, and it was a hit.

For the Kids - This year my focus was all about not buying crap. Things that the kids would be bored of playing with three days after Christmas, or that would just be more "stuff" hanging around to deal with and store. I did a lot of online shopping (yay amazon) and found things that I feel fit each of them and would help strengthen their creativity and talents. They were all happy with their gifts, so I guess it worked.

Family Games - We got some great new family games for Christmas this year. By far the favorite is Blokus. We've also played Banangrams several times, tried out Baffle Gab last night during our New Year's Eve fun, and still have a couple others to try out (Hyper Dash and Perquackey).

My late New Year's Eve is quickly catching up with me so I'm going to end this and try to finish up my next post.

Random December-ness

We have a tradition that started last year - checking out a bunch of Christmas books from the library and keeping them under the tree with the Christmas books we own to read throughout the Christmas season. I keep trying to brainwash the kids into how much fun it would be to wake up Christmas morning and just find books as gifts, but I haven't quite sold them on it yet. If they only knew all the wonderful choices Santa has had to choose from for each of them!

(I took a picture but with all the Christmas rush haven't taken it off the camera. So just imagine for now. Maybe someday I'll post it.)

I was pulling out the materials we needed to make more felt ornaments this year and found 3 books in a 4 book set that I bought last year for a certain little girl. She got one for Christmas and I forgot about the rest. Oops. Would be fun to travel in time back a year and find out why they were hiding in there.

Love the whole online shopping thing. How parents did it before, I don't know. So nice to research, read reviews, compare prices, then with a few clicks your order is on its way. One thing has me scratching my head, though. Amazon, or people that sell on amazon, change their prices really frequently. Sometimes a little, sometimes a lot. There is a book sitting in the "buy later" section of my shopping cart that drops by a penny or two every day. One of these days it will be free, and then I will buy it. Something else was $19.99 when I added it to my cart. A few days later it was $39.99. Then it partially dropped down again. It's an addiction now, so I have to pull up my cart just to see how the price has changed. One day it was $85! Supply and demand maybe? Who knows, but wow.

Back to late presents, though. I finished the quilt that I gave to my sister and brother-in-law for Christmas last year - hooray! It turned out just as amazing and beautiful as I knew it would. I thought I had quite a bit done, but it took me sewing while watching most of the first four Harry Potter movies to finish it up.

(Again, I have a picture waiting on the camera.)

Jamie was gone for almost 20 days in a row (came home for one night, not even 24 hours) starting the early morning after Thanksgiving. It was mostly for training back in Massachusetts, but then off working. The song "I'll Be Home For Christmas" became a lot more meaningful because we really missed having him around. Since he got home he's been cooking like crazy, always a bonus.

Anyway, back to finishing up those final few Christmas surprises!

Kids and Goals

I haven't been a New Year's goal person for very long. In the past I always figured that I shouldn't set a goal just because it is New Year's, that when I saw a need for change I should set the goal then. But a couple years ago I caught a bigger vision of the New Year's opportunity.

I was helping one of the kids prepare their Family Home Evening lesson the first Monday in January. We were looking for a good story about goals from the Friend magazine and happened upon this great goals chart. We printed one out for each member of the family, and that night everyone set goals for the year! The simplicity was fantastic to help the kids get the idea of goals. The topics helped us to think outside the box (although they are in boxes?) and set a good variety.

I remember one of Melanie's goals the best. She was 5 at the time and set the goal to be able to jump rope 10 jumps in a row. She had been practicing and could get a few in a row, and I knew if she could get to 10 she would quickly surpass that. The day after setting the goal, she practiced and practiced, DESPERATELY wanting to reach that goal. Within just a few days she had it, then went far beyond her goal, soon reaching 20, then 50, then 100! Later that month her kindergarten teacher told us she had never seen a kindergartener so good at jump roping. A simple goal, but a real lesson that if she could set a goal and work hard, she could achieve it. Definitely something good to learn at an early age!

I've given up on plenty of goals because of lack of planning, so likewise, if you want to help your children reach their goals, help them make a plan. Help them think about and define all the who, what, when, where, why, and how's. Help them get of vision of what they need to do to accomplish it so they will know what will be required of them. I'm grateful for my Wood Badge training and the goal setting experiences I've had through that so I can be a better mentor for my kids in this.

Since as homeschoolers we work on school goals a lot more hands-on than most, we got each of the kids a simple planner so we can keep track of monthly and weekly goals and keep a better record of all the great things we're learning. It's one of my New Year's goals to teach the kids to use those.

Last year I set a goal to make 2008 the year of decluttering. I got rid of a wonderful amount of unnecessary stuff and have been very pleased with my progress, but with so much more to do I plan on continuing that goal this year (Karen, still willing to check up on me?). My attitude change about 'stuff' has been the greatest result of all.

BTW, here's a list of questions to help think of New Year's goals.

P.S. While writing a portion of this we were watching a fun family movie called Hawmps! It's a kick and a half. "Don't mess 'em up so bad they won't hang good!" Reminiscent of some of the great old Disney comedies like The Apple Dumpling Gang and Hot Lead and Cold Feet. Watch it if you get the chance!

Happy Mother's Day

Just have to tell you all what a wonderful husband I have. This is what I got/am getting for Mother's Day.

Fertilizer - Yes, I asked for it. Husbands take note - even if it sounds like an odd gift, if your wife tells you what she wants, get it for her! I'm looking forward to a lovely lawn.

Brakes - Isn't that thoughtful? My van inspection is coming up so last Saturday he and his dad checked out the brakes. Yes some needed replacing, and when I got home he told me Happy Mother's Day, LOL. I'm glad he cares about our safety (oh yah, and that whole passing inspection thing).

A Clean Fridge - Our fridge has needed some cleaning out for quite some time, not just tossing old food, but a down and dirty cleaning. Earlier today Jamie tossed something nasty out and I mentioned that I've been meaning to tackle the fridge, and that it would be soooo wonderful if he did that. He did! And it looks great! Knowing I don't have to work myself up to dealing with all the nasties has me positively glowing inside.

Dinner - Jamie is making dinner for not only me, but he put out an invite to both our families to anyone who would like to come so the moms don't have to cook. Jamie is an excellent cook, but guys, even if you just throw a roast in the crock pot with some spices on top, buy some rolls and salad, that would be a great meal!

Mother's Day Card - Every year I get a handmade Mother's Day card with a poem written by Jamie. I look forward to this more than anything else, because I know he puts some time and thought into it. Not that they are anything fancy, dripping with romance and such, but they are all him. And I love that.

I love you, Jamie! Thanks for all the wonderful things you do not just on Mother's Day, but every day.

Happy Mother's Day!