So loving this moment of pure love, joy, peace and happiness. A boy and his chickens.
Our chicks are growing fast- nearly 6 weeks now, feathers all coming in so we let them venture in our outdoor portable coop for some play time since the sun was shining warmly and there was no wind this morning. Of course our son couldn't resist sitting inside the coop as well.
There was much cuddling, talking, watching, laughing and picture taking going on.
Our daughter has taken particularly to one sweet little hen who is content sitting on the kids laps, snuggling into their jackets- so she named her Sweet Pea. Fitting for her personality. Unlike the other chickens who stayed in a group, or wandered around to peck the ground, she kept going to our son and climbing into his lap watching the other chicks from his knee or our daughter would pull her out of the coop and let her sit with her in the chair as the chick would tuck her head into our daughters jacket, content to just be close.
Yesterday we felt many blessings on this holiday. Blessed to be able to talk on the phone to out of town family. Blessed to be able to spend the afternoon with the kids Aunt and Uncle and sweet baby girl. Blessed to see pictures of family and friends having a glorious day amongst those they love.
Blessed most of all for a wonderful day of family time. Cherished as hubbie worked on projects with our son and our daughter and I hung out and I got to see her work her art magic.
The last few years we have done very small as presents go, we want the kids to reflect that Christmas is not about the gifts they receive. We had fun choosing a few special items we knew they would love. A lego set and Science kits, art supplies, a book bag and book and hand held microscopes from grandparents.
A wonderful simple, Christmas together.
First the boys worked on legos, then on his new Science kit.
Awesome water color sets- thank you Grame and Grandpa!
Already working art magic with the new watercolors....
And lastly, enjoying the newest member of our family- Our son's new Parakeet, 'Perry'.
May this holiday have found you joyous in the time celebrating Christ's birth with family and friends.
We've had fun searching out some amazing Christmas music. I think the favorites are of the Piano Guys, Lindsey Sterling and Pentatonix.
This Christmas Eve brings us spending time just the four of us enjoying a Christmas movie, some songs, piano music our son's been working on then tomorrow on Christmas Day venturing to my husband's sisters home to spend some time with their family.
We are missing our San Diego family as well as family who have passed this year and are not with us any longer.
Feeling blessed knowing that the kids Grandpa and Aunt, hubbie's Dad and Sister are in Heaven this Christmas even though no longer with us here.
We will cherish and remember the wonderful memories made with them.
From nearly sun rise to sun set we've worked countless hours outside. What an awesome feeling after a long days work to see this enormous pile of weeds and cleared out yard space. To gaze into the 'barn' (garage) at the animal pens all clean, lined nicely...happiness in my heart. Of course not only work was done- but fun was had...a little chicken on a leash walking around the yard. Some laughs over a certain boy wondering why his hoe was not pulling weeds...oopps it happened to be turned around. Breaks for water, breaks for lunch. Watching the sun set from the roof top and deeming it days end...heading inside for showers, dinner, relaxing and bed. Our son saying that after church tomorrow we should work again..because it was fun.
Yes, work can be fun, joyous, bring much happiness, satisfaction. Pride in working your land, caring for your animals. So tomorrow, we have the privilege of doing it all again.
Living this beautiful life together.
The pile of weeds pulled...
Work in progress on clearing..
So blessed in this life with these experiences, sharing them with family.
A little late with Christmas being next week. We haven't done a big tree in a very, very long time...our son told us yesterday its because "Sadie would eat it, and Rusty would pee it". Sadie being our very large 85lb Swissy that eats yes even wood and our little pup Rusty who pee's on every tree and bush outside. So, yes, we have table tree's. We usually get small living tree's but this year our son opted for something different...to have an 'Arizona Christmas'. So a cactus it was! We listened to Christmas music and the kids decorated their small tree's. A family dinner and movie on hubbies last day off before returning to work that eve.
Simplicity...a few ornaments, one strand of lights. Happiness.
A Friday ritual. A single photo - no
words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special,
extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If
you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the
comments for all to find and see.
What yesterday looked like...A day in the life of us....Hubbie had an extra few days off this week, Sunday and Monday leading into his normal Tuesday, Wednesday off. He had testing for a new job position he is going for that will provide better benefits, better pay and a better future for all of us. So he left super early. Plans to wake up when he did and get an early start on my work did not pan out, tired from staying up late with him made me not want to rise...instead I slept in till 7am. Two of our pups who sleep with me didn't complain a bit. I never set an alarm. The kids don't have to be up at a certain time. If we happen to get a late start, everything else begins late..chores, school. We go with the flow. But the flow seems to go 'around' the same time every day none the less.
Some coffee after feeding the pups I take 15 minutes for myself to catch up on a few favorite blogs, check my personal emails and finish a full cup before diving into work. I'm a stay at home mom, a work at home mom and a home schooling mom. I work full time, work I get paid for I mean. So this means really trying to manage my time well to make sure everything in the home gets done and our kids get taken care of amongst getting all my 'paid' hours in. Most days the to-do list doesn't get done and that's okay. Lately the kids have switched places, usually it used to be our son who rose early and our daughter who slept in, now its the other way around. 7:15 our daughter comes out and grabs a blanket and curls up on the couch with a good book or a tv show. By 8am our son gets out of bed. Our daughter makes herself breakfast and I help our son with his. They eat, play, relax while I go and do a short work out and grab a shower. They then get dressed while I work on dishes or if I didn't get much work done I'll take a few extra minutes to finish up on that before the day begins.
Chores are next...a quick room cleaning, beds are made, laundry is picked up, the bathroom is cleaned...then off to do animals. Some days I help or if there are too many dishes calling my name I head off to the kitchen. If I wasn't outside I go out to take a quick check to see if there is anything else that needs to be done with my help- cleaning the ducks pools.
After chores its our morning structured learning time. Some days we go on field trips, some days the morning is already pre planned from the day before, other times there is no plan and we sit down to make the plan then do it. From learning about the Flood of 1913 last week, today we looked into Dams. We watched a video on you tube below: and then made a river and our own dam in our yard, the kids attempting to let water through slowly but not flood or knock the dam over - PBS Kids Build a Dam
Building Dams
After our adventure outdoors, we came inside to read some of the Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol then had independent study time. Our son worked on some math then did a dino worksheet to match up bones, working as a 'paleontologist'. Our daughter researched voice actors and how to become a voice actor and did some reading. While they did independent study I finished up a few work projects online. During the day I update two different company websites doing data entry and research, and in the evenings and weekends I'm on-call for a home care company.
A break for lunch and the afternoon brought our daughter working on her art, she's been into colored pencils, also researching online art instructional video's. She shared this one with us she thought was neat:
A few of her recent drawings...
While she spent time on her art our son and I ventured outdoors in the backyard for some play time- bringing his swords, we ran around chasing each other, hiding behind tree's, sword fighting, laughing a lot in the sun. Sister came out for about a whole 2 minutes, ran a few laps then went back inside deeming it too windy for outdoor play! It was windy, but it was also sunny and decently warm!
I finished up some computer work after our play while he watched his new favorite show 'River Monsters' and our daughter continued on her art work. Every few minutes he'd pause the show to come tell me about what river they were on, what fish they were after...I'd ask him where the river was and he with the help of his sister would locate it on our wall map.
Finishing work, several days of requesting a 'shorter cut' I finally assisted my daughter with a hair cutting..
Hubbie came home right before dinner, dinner was made, a few friends stopped by to say hello and pick up their new guinea pig baby then we watched a family Christmas movie, 'Snow' and off to bed for the kids...Hubbie and I stayed up a bit longer to catch another episode of 'Alaska the Last Frontier' then we headed to bed too, tired from the day.
A normal day in the life of us...extraordinary moments spent together, cherishing every one of them.
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