to market to market...

i will get to posting some pics of the fabulous christmas week with my folks soon. promise. just couldn't resist posting these pics from the market. for some reason every visitor we have had has taken a pic of me at the exact same market buying meat. my chicken lady has got to be loving this publicity! don't i look like i mean business in these? especially the one with my tongue sticking out!

lynn and ted's visit

mike's visit

mom and dad's visit (yes weston rides his bike in the market:)

speaking of chicken... i tried this amazing african chicken stew recipe tonight. yumm! you can find it here: http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/african_chicken_peanut_stew/

merry christmas

the sweetness of our christmas with my parents still lingers around here in our home, despite the sting of saying another goodbye. realizing goodbyes do not get easier with time contrary to what some may say. as i have meditated on the incarnation this week, i have been really blessed by the old hymn, "down from His glory." i marvel at the fact that our King left His home (heaven of all places) to take on flesh and dwell among us. to give us hope. to give us life.


Down from His Glory


Down from His glory, ever living story,
My God and Savior came, and Jesus was His name.
Born in a manger to His own a stranger,
A man of sorrows tears and agony

(Chorus)
Oh how I love Him! How I adore Him!
My breath, my sunshine, my all in all!
The great Creator became my Savior,
And all God's fullness dwelleth in Him!

What condescension, bringing us redemption,
That in the dead of night, not one faint hope in sight,
God gracious, tender laid aside His splendor,
Stooping to woo, to win, to save my soul!

Without reluctance, flesh and blood His substance,
He took the form of man, revealed the hidden plan;
O glorious myst'ry sacrifice of Calv'ry!
And now I know He is the great "I AM"!

we had an amazing week together. so precious. so fun. tons more pictures to come. what a gift to have christmas with my pa and ma. love them so much.

she's back...

my favorite neighbor is back (she's been in her home-town the past 6 months), and with her all the goodies she regularly delivers.

i know y'all are probably munching away at all kinds of christmas goodies...peanut brittle, fudge....but have you indulged in spicy chicken feet lately??

cookie monster

made christmas cookies with w yesterday. had to take a brief intermission to feed adds. when i came back he was conked out. all that baking wore him out i guess. all i had to do to get him up though, was mention that i wasn't sure who would get to lick the beaters... it took a couple minutes, but he came to and had an insatiable appetite for cookie dough. and then he did all the hard work of frosting all the cookies.

sleeping beauty

had one of those sweet moments the other day gazing at my little darling as she slept. pondering who she is and who she will become. realized she was covered up in blankets lovingly made by my mama, grandma wiemer, and my great grandmother. thought to myself, "wow, what a legacy of beautiful women she's covered up in!" the boundary lines have fallen for you, my little sweetheart, in pleasant places. you have a beautiful inheritance!

animals everywhere

i find stuff like this all over the house... all the time. polar bears in the frying pan. dinosaurs in random drawers. penguins under my pillow. w is obsessed with animals right now. he hunts for them, he has birthday parties with them and best of all; when he wakes up in the morning, the first thing he says is, "you know what kind of animal i am today?" in the past week he has been a siberian tiger, a bengal tiger, a horse, and my personal favorite- a water rat.

river town

i just finished a great book. a really great book. in fact, for a week i could not put it down. kev is  relieved whenever i finish a good book because he says he finally gets his wife back:). i think the reason i liked it so much is because it is about someone else's journey living cross culturally and i could relate to him so much. if you're interested, check out "river town," by peter hessler. funny, poignant, interesting. here is an excerpt i read the other night:

"i never changed my chinese name, but i sensed the ease with which my chinese identity became distinct from my american self. eventually i came to think of myself as two people, ho wei and peter hessler. ho wei wasn't really a person until my second year in fuling, but as time passed i realized that he was becoming most of my identity: apart from my students, colleagues, and other foreigners, everybody strictly knew me as ho wei, and they knew me strictly in chinese. ho wei was completely different from my american self: he was friendlier, he was eager to talk with anybody, and he took great pleasure in even the most inane conversations. in a simple way he was funny; by saying a few words in the local dialect he could be endlessly entertaining to the people in fuling. also ho wei was stupid which is what i liked most about him. he spoke with an accent, he had lousy grammar; and he laughed at the simple mistakes he made. people were comfortable with someone that stupid, and they found it easy to talk with ho wei, even though they often  had to say things twice or write new words in his notebook. ho wei always carried his notebook in his pocket, using it to study the new words, as well as to jot down notes from conversations. and when ho wei returned home, he left the notebook on the desk of peter hessler, who typed everything into his computer."

crazy. busy. fun. weekend.

this weekend was awesome. we are thoroughly exhausted now, but it was awesome. had lots of fun friends in town and hosted some really special events. saturday we did a treasure hunt at the park for the kiddos. they had to find 8 "coins" all of which were clues to the coming Messiah. here is the map.

kev became "detective klause" and you should have heard the ooo's and ahhh's from the onlookers when he busted out the treasure map.

the kids did great. spent a couple hours wandering around the park. trying to find all 8 bridges and all the hidden treasure.

everywhere we went we had an audience. had to hand it to kev. he kept his wits about him. hat, headlamp, sunglasses and all.

at the end the kids got treasure bags. full of candy, stickers, party horns- you know better than gold.

so thankful for the community weston has here. so thankful for the community we have here.

soccer finale

w had his last day of soccer until spring on saturday. addy and i went along this time to watch.

it was so so cute and funny and entertaining.

they warm up. and then have a water break. they do a drill. and then have a water break. they have a meltdown and then have a water break. they attempt a game and then have a water break. lots of water breaks. i have wondered why kev brings so many snacks along. now i know.

kev is such a good daddy. really he is amazing.

farewell saturday morning soccer. until next season.

ouch

adelynn just cut her 1st tooth!

thankful

we had our fall frontier feast tonight. having a big thanksgiving party with local friends on saturday, but wanted to do something special today too. so we traveled to massachusetts and became samoset, miles standish, puritan woman, and oceanus hopkins.

we ate chicken, dried fruit, nuts, and corn (and of course mashed potatoes and gravy b/c it's just not thanksgiving without mashed potatoes and gravy).

we read a puritan prayer and talked about how much the native people helped the pilgrims.

halfway through dinner w remembered that miles standish had a mustache (in his pilgrim book he has a mustache) so i had to paint one on him.

so much to be thankful for.

boys will be boys

weston colored me this cute picture today...

and then informed me that they are poisonous dart frogs.

happy thanksgiving

madeline

we did five in a row again last week for preschool. this time we read madeline and learned a little about france (mostly we just ate yummy things).

crepes on monday (like the french flag?).

date at a "french cafe" on wednesday. w was a bit skeptical about dipping bread in his cocoa and drinking it out of a bowl, but discovered that he really liked it.

made cheese on friday. yep, that's right we made cheese. i learned that 400 types of cheese are made in france and i am quite certain that they are all better than the cheese we made.

did some sorting- smallest to biggest (madeline was the smallest of 12 girls). got these rods at a garage sale last summer for 50 cents btw. love them. use them all the time.

and put madeline on the map.

now.... onto pilgrims and indians and our fall frontier feast tomorrow!

the old jammies

these are weston's mcqueen jammies. he likes his mcqueen jammies. really likes his mcqueen jammies. as you can see, they are a bit outgrown. the other day he informed me that he will only wear his mcqueen jammies until he is 5 and then he will give them to addy to wear!

i love sundays

we've kind of purposed to make sundays restful around here. worshipping with friends in the morning and spending the rest of the day together. just the 4 of us. i love it. i look forward to it. this afternoon was awesome. addy was a champ and napped for 2 hours. kev got caught up on college football. west and i snuggled in a cozy blanket and he looked at books while i mindlessly read my latest "ladies detective agency" book. then we went for a walk together.

and discovered a new dirt pit

and went home in time for dinner and a movie. rack shack and benny. yeah, i love sundays

memories

found this picture the other day and laughed just as much as i laugh every time i see this pic. sunriver family vacation 1997. sweet sweet memories of those trips to oregon as a teenager. especially love the expression on my darling little brothers face!

growing up

so, i am one of those people who is notorious for running late. always scurrying around at the last minute, trying to get out the door. this was the case on monday as i was getting addy and i ready to go to w's class. i asked him to go into the other room and find something quiet to do. after about 30 minutes of showering, feeding, blow-drying, i realized there had not been a peep from the other room. panic began to set in as i briefly imagined all the things that could have been going on in the other room with my normally very loud and active boy, but when i ventured into the living room, this is what i found:

he had gone into the kitchen, gotten himself a snack, and was quietly sitting on the couch reading a book. amazing. my little guy is getting so grown up!

necessity is the mother of invention

i've been wanting to do a turkey project with w this month, but have been perplexed about where to buy feathers. i was on my way to w's class the other day and i passed one of these shops that i have passed hundreds of times.

you can't see it well in the picture but inside i spotted big feather duster. i had an epiphany... feathers. turkey. that's it.

so we bought it, went home, and got busy.

not bad, ey? it's not michael's, but it'll do. the only downfall is that w has been using what's left of the duster for a hockey stick and my living room is covered in chicken feathers.

my latest goal

-learn how to cook with tofu.

any suggestions?

bath-time

i was feeding addy the other night and i overheard this conversation between weston and kev:

(weston's in the bath... fyi- he loves his bath)

kev: "west- 5 more minutes and you need to get out."

w: "it's ten minutes on my watch!"

thanksgiving alphabet

this month we are doing a "thankful alphabet." everyday we do a letter and every letter w tells me something he is thankful for. i helped him with A. kev bought a huge bag of apples (30 cents a pound btw) and we made applesauce together so A was for applesauce:

for B i let w try to figure out how to sound something out, so i said "B buh buh B." W said, "B is for bubby, like amelia's bubby! i am thankful for wyatt." so there you have it... B is for wyatt:).

"oh give thanks to the Lord for He is good." Psalm 118:1

addy- our preschool fan club

something to ponder

"it is  mysterious dance of love in the christian community as we lay down our rights and our demands and seek to outdo one another not in what we can get but in what we can give." -john piper

look-a-likes

w at 3.5 months

addy at 3.5 months

the swagger-wagon

when we were in oregon last summer our dear friends, the sherrells:

introduced us to the swagger wagon commercials. (they have one by the way:). kev and i seriously spent at least an hour at my folks' watching swagger wagon commercials on you tube (you can watch our fav here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ql-N3F1FhW4). we laughed SO much b/c it is totally the season of life we are in and most of our friends have MINI VANS now. never thought i'd say that. admittedly, i occasionally dream of owning a real swagger wagon myself... but for now, THIS is what we call our "swagger wagon":

let me tell you, it can haul a mean load of groceries, 3 kiddos (when we want to bring a pal along), and whatever stuff we happen to come by. i've even put w's bike on top. the challenge is getting all the "stuff" we come home with up 5 flights of stairs. no garage entry for this swagger wagon.