cake celebration for e

bungaree speak: bellies

j: so, mom are you pregnant yet?
b: not that I know of, j.
j: (gently pats up and down my belly) nope, you aren't pregnant yet, your belly has to be like a big mountain when you are pregnant.

Hazelnut Hill

We are blessed to live in a place in the world that takes great pride in its local treasures. one such delight are the hazelnuts, or filberts as some will know them. At our house we call them hazelnuts and get them from hazelnut hill, an excellent, local, home grown, fun place for an outing with the whole family. Corvallis Oregon has great treasures....this is one of our favourites during the Christmas season....we love giving these because whoever we give them to beg us for more in all their complements they shower on the flavour and sweetness of the nuts.

Not only can you get nuts, you can get them in all their forms...my favorite are the hazelnuts in dark chocolate, oh and the hazelnut toffee....oh, and they also have blueberries in dark chocolate and raspberries. Seriously...ya gotta try them, remember Hazelnut Hill.

they have a coffee shop as well....or hot chocolate shop (depending on your age and caffeine tolerance!)

the jesse tree

creation (God)

Tree of good and evil (Adam and Eve and the fall of man)

I made the jesse tree ornaments, (I finished most of them...the rest I will do a little late) and we decided we wanted to hang them on our regular tree. I love the symbolism of each ornament and the boys really were able to sit through the selected readings really well. The jesse tree is intended to guide you through 25 days towards a deeper understanding of all that took place leading up to the birth of Christ through the old testament. B and I learned so much as well, we loved doing this this year, and look forward to doing it every year as a tradition of the true meaning of Christmas with our little bungarees.

lamb (passover and exodus of the Israelites),burning bush (Moses, God's Leadership), field of stars (Abraham's promise of descendants), the first king(the beginning of a kingdom), clay water pitcher (Gideon, an unlikely hero)

Ram (the offering of Isaac), Tablets of Torah (God giving the Commandments to his people), ladder ( assurance of the promise to Jacob), shepherd's crook ( David the Shepard of the people), trumpet ( Joshua and the fall of Jericho)


here are the different sites that have the ornaments and the meanings behind them:

The Jesse Tree: Celebration of Advent
Advent: Jesse Tree
The Remembering Tree: Using the Jesse Tree to prepare for Christs' Birth
Ornaments for Jesse Tree Patterns (PDF)

knitting my little heart out

a's unfinished scarf, and a half completed dishcloth for grandma marble

a warm winter cowl for mom, I am now working on my third. I made one for mom, (shhh, I think it is still on it's way!!) one for B's sis e, and I am currently working on one for me.

I can finally disclose what I have been working on...I didn't want to let anyone get glimpses before they opened their gifts! :)

the building up until Christmas was tiring on my slim fingers, but filled with joy. I knit, knit, knit like crazy for gifts for our family. It is so fun to knit and think about the person while you are knitting their item. I have knit scarves, and cowls this year mostly and the usual knitter's fave granny dishcloths as well. We tried to do Christmas as homemade as we could, and as local as possible. It was so much less hectic, and way more enjoyable.

What did you get to make for your loved ones this christmas season?

baby girl

On the 24th of December, Christmas eve the first baby girl in our family was born. Not to me, but to my little brother and his wife. So far there were three boys and no girls, not anymore.

Stats:
Name: Grace
weight: 7 lbs. 6 oz.
length: 19 1/2 inches


all photos stolen from the Jackson's blog since I haven't been able to get up to Washington to witness the delight in first person. (thanks ross and angel for sharing!!!)

bungaree speak: losing heart

tonight I was praying over my boys before they went to sleep.

b: Dear God, I pray that you would bless my little boys, that they would grow up loving and serving you with all their hearts, amen.
j: amen.
o: I don't have a heart mamma.
j: everyone has a heart o!
o: you don't have one too j.

bungaree sing: twelve days of christmas

The boys love this song, LOVE it. J and O will ask me to sing it over and over. Today j volunteered to sing it for oliver (it is a little tiny book with the pictures) I guess something stuck from all the singing, but seriously it is HARD to get them straight! :)

when is enough too much?

We are now getting around 10 a day!! Seriously crazy chickens. I may have to start selling them soon, or giving them away. For now I am holding onto them since for so long we were begging the chickens to lay and...well...nothing. Now even though we are in full fledged production mode I am hoarding. Silly.

what we woke up to: fresh powder