I had the book by this title saved for many years until my girls were old enough to read it.  Alas the time has come and my copy has long since been loaned out to who knows where. I was so pleased to find an e-text of the original and thought I would share here.

I have been on Shutterfly today ordering prints of the last month’s sightseeing trips.  Thought you might like a glimpse of the Colorado countryside too.

   First stop Thanksgiving week was the Manitou Cliff Dwellings. Here are the little boys climbing on same.

Alannah and her cousin.  Am guessing the handrailings were added some time after the Indians.

Next stop was Royal Gorge Bridge.  Its a BIIIIIIIG ole gap in the ground. I am so sorry I missed seeing my children suspended over it. Not ; ) 

here is another view. You can walk across or ride the trolley.  My clan being who they are, did both. <g>

Today is the first Sunday in Advent. No grand plans here alas. Just baby prep – preparing for the flesh and blood baby due in 2 wks and the Holy Babe due right after.  I confess to being a slacker otherwise. We set up the tree, actually a couple trees, yesterday. Allen hung lights outside. Appropriately enough the star lights. This week we hope to make some St Nick icons and some easy candy to share with friends. We will read some books. We will light the candles tonight. It is all I havein me so, like the Widow’s Mite, I have to believe it is enough. This is not to say all my dear friends who are graced with more energy this particular advent are misguided. There is a season to everything and this just happens to be a quiet one at the ranch due to circumstances.

If it is a quiet season at your house as well you might want to visit Elizabeth’s blog today and remember some special women who will not be celebrating in big or small ways with their families this Christmas. Or visit Fuller Farms and lift up a prayer for a special family who are grateful to have each other this year as they move through cancer treatment. You might decide that it is perfectly alright to kick back, heat the cocoa, and just BE this year.

While we may not have hit all the wonderful crafts this time around, we will be doing this one thing – the Christkindl tradition. We will draw names tonight to learn who it is that will be in our special care this advent season and then will spend the next few weeks thinking of ways to bless them.

I found another lovely blog this week  – A Virtuous Woman. She posted very eloquently about serving our husbands, including one of the most compelling exerpts I have seen from Edith Schaeffer. Lost in the hooha that is generally stirred up when one begins to discuss wifely submission, Ephesians, and ‘headship’ is the idea that we serve less because of Ephesians and more because of Matt 25:35. It is not our husbands who call us to serve, it is Jesus who says, "When I was hungry, you gave me to eat…"

Anyway, I encourage you to consider her post. It’s not about rules, but about the softening of hearts that occurs when we serve as He did – without grumbling or murmuring. (I am working on that part….)  Its not about ‘why must I’ but about ‘why shouldn’t I’. And moreover, about what incredible good comes to us by laying down our lives for another.

I haven’t sung the "We just got a letter" song all week. Apparently, I can blather on and on for quite some time before it hits me that noone is blathering back. Once it hit me I got a bit paranoid and told Allen, who suggested that perhaps noone was GETTING my mail.  Could it be?  Yes indeed. Although we have incoming mail set up there was a glitch with outgoing.  This means alllllll those notes sent this week went into cyberspace and not into your boxes dear friends! And since I can’t send out I couldn’t tell you I couldn’t send out.

We have a call in to tech support so hopefully the problem will be solved right quick. Meantime please excuse the silence on this end of the inbox. : /   

….without them what would pregnant moms do??  Alannah really pulled off Thanksgiving for us this year. She is becoming a proficient cook and did the pumpkin pies herself – complete with the homemade crust.  Then set the table and generally provided an extra set of hands. For this I was exceedingly thankful!

Moira and Allen went on the second season hunt last week.  We just got the pics uploaded and she was too funny to pass up blogging about. Here she is in the Colorado wilderness first thing in the morning…

And here she is a bit later in the day…

  She outlasted the adults though and hiked like a trooper with no complaints. Her Daddy was very proud of her! There were no elk in sight this time but, as expected, she had a very good time just being outside in mountains.

There was an interesting study about the effects of divorce on children spotlighted in our local paper today.  I found the author’s link here. The study contradicts commonly held contemporary assumptions about "good" divorces.  It also challenges people in "low conflict" relationships to work harder at maintaining and improving them vs moving on with the idea that children will not be impacted negatively.

There is an excellent post at   Three Plus Two about traditions – Thanksgiving and in general.  I have been thinking similar thoughts for weeks now. I was blessed to have extended family very involved in my life growing up. However my mother and grandmother both worked outside the home and while there was lots of love, there was rarely an abundance of time.

My grandmother was truly a expert seamstress, knitter, and cook. She could knit intricate photographic images into sweaters, lovely cables, and mittens that fit perfectly. She sewed my prom dress and our family christening gown. She made meals that kept our table full of guests – though she eagerly employed all those new mixes and boxes.  She was also a child of the depression – the era and the disease. Her father died when she was very young and her own mother was less than stable. She grew up with an appreciation for "new" "modern" and "convenience".  She saw no need for passing on the valuable skills she possessed. They were unnecessary in the new dept. store world she embraced. So I watched. I deeply desired her skills. But, in the end, I left home with just fleeting bits and pieces of information and have spent the past two decades attempting to assemble them into a functional whole.

Like Angel, I am so grateful that our children are with us all day every day. Though my skills come nowhere close to Gram’s I do try to be sure that what I know, they know. Hopefully they will leave home a little further down this road and will continue to travel until we recover the skills lost to more than a generation now.

What can you do?  Do you bake, sew, crochet, cut hair, grow gardens, paint, stitch quilts, write books, make music, take pictures? As the host of an HGTV show said earlier this week, "Everyone is an artist!"  That means you too. and someone would dearly love to know how you do it.

Our Aidan became a boy scout in October. We were blessed to join a large homeschool troop locally. My dear friend and neighbor Mary has been able to carpool to mtgs on the nights Allen has been gone so it has been working out well. He is absolutely beside himself with pleasure. He memorized his Bobcat badge requirements and got his first award already.  And did you catch that white bead on his necklace? That would be for ‘best behavior’.  Yep – my kid! ; D 

On Saturday they went on their first field trip. Here he is with some of the other boys and the firemen from the station they visited. (A is third from right) Kieran went along for the ride but was less impressed. I asked him if he had fun and he said frankly, "Um not so really". Apparently there was no demo of the uniform or sliding down ladders involved. Darn.