Christmas-gift planning

I've been starting to think a lot about Christmas. I have lofty goals this year; I really want to make almost all of my gifts, and I haven't left myself much time to accomplish it (we have a lot of people on our list!). But I've always loved making gifts, and now with all this bloggy inspiration in front of me, it makes it even more compelling.

We went on a road trip recently, and it gave us plenty of car time to brainstorm gift ideas. Now I'm filling in the gaps, looking through craft books and blogs for inspiration.

A few things we'll be making this year:

a wreath of leaves, pinecones, and acorns
several recycled-material wallets
potholders from Soulemama's latest book
goldenrod salve
and....shhhh...can't tell the rest!

The Giving (Thanks) Tree

Found this idea somewhere in the blogsphere, and it felt just right for us. Growing up, we always had an Easter tree--a stick planted in a vase, to hold our blown eggs. I loved that tradition, and this reminded me of it. A Thanksgiving Tree. A place to hold our collective thoughts of gratitude when we come together tomorrow. Andi and I put up a few starter "leaves," and I'm hoping our guests will help us fill it before dinner.




I'm grateful for this place, as well. This chance to share with like-minded people. Thank you for reading, and commenting, and caring. Happy Thanksgiving.

Edited to add: Thanks for the comments! The tree is now full of so many thoughts. My 5-year-old niece particularly enjoyed it, and kept adding things: her own name "because I'm thankful for myself," other people, "babies," "cake," "friends," "love," and so many more. Reading everyone's contributions became our "grace" for the meal.

Gracing the table

This is how our dining room table looks this week. (Please ignore the wrinkles; we're talking real life here.) We've finally reached and maintained our goal of a clear table where we can easily sit to eat each night (it had become a terrible dumping ground in our first months of parenting). I've been having fun using my beloved vintage tablecloths again, and arranging seasonal centerpieces.

Once I'd put poems all over the house, I remembered this little pink book I'd started several years ago (there, between the salt and pepper shakers). It's a collection of graces. I was on such a roll with the poems, I got all inspired to revive this collection, too.

Andi and I have moved pretty far from our religious upbringings, and are working on defining our own beliefs in a way that we can share with our children. It's important to us both that we give thanks at meals, but without dogma attached. So we began this little collection of graces we like, drawn from a wide variety of sources and traditions: songs we learned when we were camp counselors; favorites from our childhood; children's books; a recent library request; anywhere we come across grateful words we find beautiful and meaningful. As with the poem cards, we're finding that having them right there on the table where we'll see them is helping us to remember old favorites and learn new ones.

Here's my favorite new discovery, by ee cummings, an old favorite:

"I thank you God for most this amazing day;
for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes."

Planning

Ok, so I've got the old, smashed, camera held together with rubber bands to tide me over until we figure out what to get next.

There's lots of planning going on around here lately.


Planning the menu for Thanksgiving. (We'll be hosting 10 for dinner.)

I'm a bit obsessive about my Thanksgiving planning. I like to do a big long prep list of everything that needs to be chopped for every recipe, and we spend the night before chopping and stowing away all the ingredients to make the next day's cooking easier. I'm behind on that this year. I just went shopping, and hadn't even finalized my recipes yet! I just know I'm going to have to run back out to the store. I hate being disorganized like that. But you do what you have to do, and in this first baby year, things just aren't going to be all Martha. (But my family will accuse me of it, anyway.)


Planning Christmas crafting.

These are the materials we've gathered to make a wreath for Andi's grandmother, who wants a new autumn wreath that she can store away and take out each year. So we're going for sturdy materials. We gathered the leaves while visiting our friend in Boston, where they still had some color, and then dipped them in beeswax to preserve them. Just hoping for a few free minutes to finish the project.


And I'm not even sure what I'm planning to do with these; I just love them!

We went to the Winter Fair at a local Waldorf school this weekend, and I couldn't resist these gorgeous things. The beeswax pinecone candles will be used on Thanksgiving. The wool felt and roving? I don't know, but I couldn't resist. Any ideas?

Dum ditty dum!

Your camera is nicer than mine. Because mine has already died a very untimely death. *!#*@ lens error! Back to the drawing board.

So, here's a story from 2 days ago...before it died.



This is where you'll find me most mornings: curled up on the couch, surrounded by a heap of children and books. On this particular morning, we'd already read a pile of books, had our snack, and moved on to projects in the studio. There was glitter confetti flying everywhere, and intense big-kid projects in danger of little-kid hands, so I returned to the couch with the "littles." I pulled out a favorite book--Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb by Al Perkins--and read it once. As I started it again, the two-year-old left and returned with "a drum so I can play it when you read." I added another for Lucy, and we were off on several more raucous readings.

"Hand, hand, fingers, thumb.
One thumb, one thumb drumming on a drum.
One hand, two hands drumming on a drum.
Dum ditty, dum ditty, dum dum dum!"

(Shall I go on? I could--I've got the whole thing just about memorized.)

Poems all over the house

Thank you so much for all the lovely comments yesterday! I've been so inspired by all of you; it's nice to have something to offer in return.

I've continued copying out poems whenever I have a moment. I began with selections from Catch Me and Kiss Me and Say it Again by Clyde and Wendy Watson. This is an absolute gem of a book; new nursery rhymes with great language and rhythms, reflecting a family's daily life. I first read about it in Under the Chinaberry Tree by Ann Ruethling and Patti Pitcher (another must-have book, in my opinion), and I knew I had to have it. I spent an unprecedented $10 to buy it on eBay, and I'm so glad I did! I've used it with infants and toddlers in my program, but this method is going to help me remember so many more with my own children (and, of course, with the others, too).

As I chose from this book, I found so many that were perfect for daily routines: washing hands, clipping fingernails, baking, dressing. The poems suggested new places to put them. So now they're all over my house:

In our office, where we change her downstairs (see them, tucked into the shelf off to the right? And by the way, how do you take photos of a window?):


("This little pig found a hole in the fence...")

In the kitchen:


("Clapcake, clapcake, butter and milk...")

In the bathroom:

("Sing a song of soapsuds, filling up the sink...")

I'm loving them already. And so does Lucy. This morning, she saw me shuffle the cards in the office to find a new one to read. Later in the morning, as she sat on her potty, I started reciting one of the poems I'd already memorized. She looked over her shoulder to the spot where I'd tucked the cards! A reader in the making.

Keep a poem in your pocket

I'm in the midst of a project.



I always supposed I'd have a stash of poetry in my head to share with my baby. I've collected tons of poetry books over the years, with a wealth of perfect choices. But when I want a little rhyme to share as, for example, I change her diaper, only a very few come to mind, over and over. I needed a reminder.

When I was in the sixth grade, my teacher posted short poems all around the room, wherever you'd pause: by the pencil sharpener, the sink, the water fountain. I still remember "As I was going down the stair/I met a man who wasn't there./He wasn't there again today./I wish that man would go away." which I memorized that year, just from seeing it so often.

I decided to adapt her idea to home. I'm copying out some of my most favorite little rhymes to display by her changing table, so we will memorize them by frequent exposure. I'm going for ease of use here, so I'm just using index cards, propped up so that I can quickly switch to a new one as needed.




"Keep a poem in your pocket." Or maybe on your changing table. "The little poem will sing to you."