Tea Party

Monday holiday tea party. The girls decked out in their fanciest necklaces.  Pudgy hands gently clutching delicate tea cups.  Fancy napkins.  Mini sandwiches with the crusts cut off--peanut butter and jelly ones and salmon with cream cheese.  Hot chocolate with marshmallows for dipping.  Giggles.  Sisters being sisters. Moments like these are for keeping.

Weekly church foibles

We were late to church this morning.  Embarrassingly so.  Cheeks McGoo was having none of the whole sit nicely and be quiet thing, so Dear Husband and I took turns standing with her in the entryway.  Catholics call this part of the church the narthex. Crazy word, huh? Fortunately, there are lots of families at the church we attend and so there are usually a bunch of stray parents and kids hanging out in the entryway. 

I stayed in the church with Bee for the second half of the Mass. I saw my Husband and Cheeks at the end of the very long line going up to communion.  Cheeks looked particularly animated.  I shrunk down in my seat and watched warily.

Cheeks had decided that all the people in line for communion looked much like a line of people waiting for a bus.  (She has a particular affinity for buses.)  "Bus! Bus! Bus!" she called.  My husband whispered to her, "We're not getting on a bus, but communion is kind of like a bus to God."  Well, that did it.  For the rest of the Mass Miss Cheeks was calling out for the bus, her bus, any bus so that we could please get on board.  Yep, we're that family.

We told the priest after church and he laughed and laughed.  Heaven help us.

Snow!

No real accumulation today, but big fat flakes drifted by my window all afternoon. At one point I thought I might just stop working and curl up by the window with a cup of tea in had, but decided that perhaps wouldn't go over so well with the boss.

I did make hot chocolate though.  And tonight I am going to dream of a future snow day at home with the girls. 

Following yonder star

This weekend we celebrated Epiphany.  Miss Bee was so excited to sing "We Three Kings" at church this morning and follow along in her eponymous book.

We had pumpkin soup for dinner and Irish brown bread and I baked an almond galette for a special dessert.

While dear husband finished the soup, the girls made paper crowns in honor of those intrepid kings.  I was feeling very domestic and happily sat with them as they decorated their crowns with minimal squabbling.

Dinner was less successful. Both the girls wanted to wear their crowns while they ate.  Miss Bee's crown was too small for her head, and so she ate with one hand on her head and the other clutching her soup spoon.  Cheeks' crown was too big, and it kept slipping down over her eyes and falling off, which caused a considerable amount of drama.

Cheeks refused to nap this afternoon and so was overtired at dinner. She refused the soup, ignored the bread, and pretty much just ate grapes.   We put her to bed before dessert.  Miss Bee, on the other hand, had seconds of everything.

Despite this evening's mixed success, I hope 2012 can be a year where we bring faith home to the girls.  Whether it's celebrating a feast day, praying as a family, or just encouraging kindness, I hope that this year we can walk alongside those three wise men.

How I spent my vacation

I discovered that my local library now has downloadable ebooks that work with the Kindle app.  For me, this is the equivalent of putting a steady supply of drugs next to an addict.  I have been in ebook heaven this past month.

When I first got an iPad, I didn't think that I would use it much for reading, but I wrong.  It's just the right size to prop up in bed and you can read it one handed on the metro.  Now that Cheeks is going to school with her sister, we don't have to haul stroller downtown in the morning.  I really miss the extra time with my littlest one, but I am also a bit giddy to have a hands-free commute.

So--a few good books to download and a few you can skip:

Religion--

"An Unquenchable Thirst" by Mary Johnson: a biography of Johnson's time spent as a nun in Mother Teresa's order.  Boy, does she ever tell all.  It's a brave book.

"In the Land of Invisible Women" by Qanta Ahmed: I wanted to know more about what it was like to live as a western woman in Saudi Arabia, and Ahmed's narrative of her time as a Muslim doctor in the Kingdom was an interesting read.

Fiction--

"Winter Sea" by Susanna Kearsley:  I devoured this book.  Loved it.  Loved the fact that it was a curl up, dive in, flat out escape novel.  I enjoyed it so much I went right ahead and read "The Rose Garden," also by Kearsley immediately afterward.  It was also very good.

"Blue Nights" by Joan Didion:  I don't want to like Didion's narrative style, but I can't help myself, I do.  If you read "The Year of Magical Thinking,"  it's just like that, and just as good.

"The Story Sisters" by Alice Hoffman:  One crazy sister, one good sister, much angst.  Three stars?

"The Lace Reader" by Brunonia Barry:  Set in Salem, but not your traditional witch tale--the protagonist uses lace to read the future. A wee bit too much drama for me to recommend this one.

"The Buddha in the Attic" by Julie Otsuka:  This book was written entirely in plural voice.  It was lyrical for the first half of the book, but became annoying by the end.  We do not recommend.

"The Scottish Prisoner" by Diana Gabaldon:  More Jamie for those of use who love the Outlander series.  And more Jamie is never a bad thing.

Non Fiction--

"In Siberia" by Colin Thubron:  Reads just how one might expect a travel novel on Siberia to go: lots of trains, cold weather, communist references, and vodka.

"Medium Raw" by Anthony Bourdain:  I'm not the biggest fan of his travel shows, but, despite his potty mouth, Bourdain is a good writer, and a true good food devotee. 

WWII--

"Where the Birds Never Sing" by Jack Sacco: Partially about the liberation of Dachau, but mostly about an American GI's experience in WWII.

"The Heavens are Empty" by Avrom Ben David-Val:  All about the lost Jewish town of Trochenbrod, destroyed in WWII by the Nazis. Not as compelling as "The Lost" by Daniel Mendelsohn.  (This book makes you sad, whereas Medelsohn utterly and completely breaks your heart and makes you resolve to be a better person.)

"Lost in Shangri-La" by Mitchell Zuckoff:  Just change one letter of the author's name and oh my goodness you are in trouble! This book is an amazing true adventure set in the wilds of Papua New Guinea.  It's not as good as the book "Unbroken" but definitely worth a read if you like narrative non-fiction.

New Years Resolution

Go to bed earlier. 

This one really might be overly ambitious, folks.

Wishing you a sweet 2012

My much labored over Buche du Noel from Christmas Eve with "12 Days of Christmas" peperkakor cookies, sugar cookies, spritz cookies, with a set of french macarons thrown in for good measure.  Oh, and some chocolate fudge and chocolate covered vanilla cardamom cakes to finish everyone off.  Let's just say I find baking to be cheaper than therapy. 

I'm not particularly good at making or keeping resolutions.  Year before last I resolved to try 50 new recipes. I think I made it somewhere into the high thirties before I stopped keeping track.  Another year I resolved to learn to bake bread, and succeeded at that, much to my family's great happiness.  I also once decided to read 50 books within a year, which was less of a resolution and more of a pleasure.

I haven't decided what I will resolve to do this year, but 2012 brings a lot of excitement all on its own: I am looking forward to meeting two new nieces/nephews before winter is done.  In the spring, we are heading off on a long-anticipated Disney cruise.  In the summer, I'll switch to a new position at work. Bee will start kindergarten in the fall. This boggles my mind.  And in December, Dear Husband and I will be married a full decade.

I'm looking forward to this year's adventures, praying for strength to meet the challenges, and am optimistic that, if nothing else, there is a very high likelihood that Cheeks will be potty-trained before the year is done.  Praise the Lord!

Wishing you all a very happy New Year.