Dec. 22nd thru 30th, 2012 : On Holiday

Dec. 22nd thru 30th, 2012 : On Holiday

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

We stopped our lessons are geared up for Christmas without any distractions!  I sewed 2 felt birds for Dh's Christmas gift--we always give each other one loving pair of birds to add to our Christmas tree each year, with the year on them to represent each Christmas together.  How wonderful that this years birds were homemade.  I have a very nice friend here in Indiana to thank for showing me how to make these cute birds (thank you, thank you!!).  I had such a good time making them that I also made ONE bird each for: my daughter, Giz, Grampy, and new family member-baby Norah. 

The other gift I made were Pauline's (Dh's Grandmother) "Ranger Cookies"--they are always so good that everyone tells Dh how good *HE* did (He is the Master Chef in our house, and therefor must be the baker behind the cookies) making them.  Since the family always rants about them at reunions, I made 2 batches and them bagged them up in ziplock bags, and them put them in Christmas bags for: D, C, G, J, and G&G.

Dd made 2 wonderful batches of cookies on her own....and then we forgot to bring them to the party!  You won't believe how sad we were to have to eat them ourselves!  She has finally conquered the whole process of baking now.  The only step that had been holding her back was the oven.   I had been putting the pans in and out for her; due to my fear that she would burn herself, but now she has even started doing that all by herself.  She did 3 batches of cookies on her own.

Christmas was a lovely day.  Dd rec'd a new AG doll: Caroline Abbott and her other gift--a really nice bow & arrow set (Dh had just bought 3 bales of hay for our garden; and Dd is borrowing those to use for her target.).

Giz & Grampy drove up from southern Indiana to open presents with us.  They brought their Black Lab (Kate), and our Black Lab/Great Dane (Sophie) had a ball playing with her all day.  They were going to spend the night; but we had already had one "blizzard" and another big snow was heading our way over night, so they headed back home after dinner.

On Dec. 29th was the family Christmas party in southern Indiana.  We packed up our gifts and got in the van.  We had received another 6-8 inches of snow and the world was so amazingly beautiful.  I really needed something to distract me from thinking about all the snow and ice on the roads; and due to 2 major snow storms in one week---we knew what we HAD to do----put in one of our favorite audio's : THE LONG WINTER by Laura Ingles Wilder (based on a truly epic winter in the US in 1888--during the time period we are studying right now with Core E).  We have listened to this audio a few winters in a row; and love it dearly.

The party was actually a lot of fun.  Dd got a Lava Lamp of all things!!!  She loved it; but boy, was that a surprise!  Who would have thought!  Giz handmade Dd a jean throw/quilt out of old jeans from her attic that belonged to Dd's father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and great uncle.  I almost cried!  How truly kind of her.  She made each of the grandchildren one of these mini-sized quilts with jean material from their father (or step-father) and then added in the older generation's jeans too.

After the party was over we headed to the farm to spend the night.  The farm was in all it's glory!!!  If you have ever seen the first Narnia movie--The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe then you can guess how beautiful the farm was.  (Yes, I know that is not the first book in the series; we have read or listened to them all, but it is the first movie that was remade a few years ago, and it was very popular and perhaps you've seen it?!)

We woke up on Sunday; and due to the snow, church was canceled.  So, we piled on our clothes and had a great day of it.  Dh had woke up very early and headed out for his last hunting of the year, and only managed to SHOT a hundred photo's!!!! Ha!!!  Dd and I got dressed and aimed our sights only on the snow!  Dh and Dd sledded up and down the long driveway over and over and over while I hiked through the woods with our dog, Sophie.  It didn't take me long to find deer tracks and I did what I LOVE to do....I followed them!  When we use to live at the farm, this is what I looked forward to every winter--following the deer trails and seeing where they go and how.  The highlight of my trail following was that I found the bedding down spot where 4 deer had been sleeping.  Imagine 4 really big oval crevasses where the snow had been removed, all this snow--except in 4 big spots, in the shape of a big deer!  How fun for me to find where they had been sleeping! (She photo below)

 We had a GREAT day.  We were really, really tempted to spend the night and have another snow day--but Dd was feeling VERY homesick and really wanted to go home.  We ate lunch, watched the Colts play a game with G&G, and then played in the snow until it got dark....then packed back up and headed home.  We didn't get home until about 9pm; which made a very long day!



We went to the farm---SNOW!

We have a very OLD cemetery on our property at the farm.  This little angle looked so pretty in the snow.  We have people that fought in the Civil War.

This picture above is one of the blinds we built!  Now it is filled in with snow!

The whole woods looked like this....so amazing!

This picture gives you a very good idea of the actual amount of snow that we had received.

Here is one of the four deer beds that I found when I followed the deer tracks around our woods.  They picked a lovely spot--this was a blind that we had built 2-3 years ago under a group of cedar trees!





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