Happy New Year

Our holiday week...


Christmas gifts



Family



Birthday...Ni turned three (do you like the hillbilly with the half eaten cake look?)


And much needed rest

It has been a wonderful and exhausting week, with Ni being sick for the majority of it...you wouldn't know from the photos though!

Solstice

Happy Winter Solstice to my northern friends (and summer solstice to my southern friends...that means you Moeder Kip). I can't help but wonder how it all works in the southern hemisphere, with Christmas in the summer...up here in the north advent is about turning inward with the short days and lack of light....how is it approached down under? I've even been to Australia for Christmas but was a much younger me and wasn't observing such things back then.

I love that the winter solstice and advent is about turning inward and this presents a perfect oppourtunity for making Christmas gifts


Today I'm spending the day crafting with the family..making these ridiculously easy bath scrubs, (if you are choosing to use salt instead of sugar, please know that the cheapest place to get epsom salts is at animal feed stores) and painting....



..... I am not one of those mums that can handle the mess with alot of crafting (I know I'm not alone on this), so this is a rare special treat, this also worked out to be a nice calm acitvity that both my feverish children quietly (can you imagine?) enjoyed.

Enjoy your solstice, wherever you may be.

Lovely Winter Music

One of the Mum's at our No's school played the harp for the Advent Spiral Celebration, she has a lovely voice.




Since playing Advent Spiral has become the activity of choice for "Ni". This Mum has become her "idol". She can listen to this CD all day long, she pretends to play the harp with my guitar......This woman is pretty much "Ni's" Hannah Montana.....

Maybe she's the waldorf equivalent:)

Snow Day!

Good times...



for kids...



and parents

Sinterklaas Dag

Being a gal of Dutch heritage I like to keep the dutch traditions going for my little people. Last night was Sinterklaas Avond (St Nicholas Birthday Evening), and the children polished their Klompen (dutch wooden shoes) and left treats for Sinterklaas' white horse. We have been listening to Sinterklaas Liedjes (songs) for weeks now, (even HNH is singing them in pigeon dutch).





Sinterklaas is the the dutch version of St. Nicolas. He lives in Spain (no one seems to know why) and comes by steamboat with his white horse and helper Zwarte Piet.

If you were a good little boy or girl, you would get funny dutch treats in your shoe, like pepernooten and drop (these would only be considered a treat to people with dutch blood in their veins, normal people think they are weird..hehe)

If you weren't a good little boy or girl..there are lots of rumours of what happens....Zwarte Piet would put you in a bag and take you back to Spain....and make you into candy!!!!!!!!!!!??????

It is a big time holiday in the Netherlands, and it is not just for kids, adults give gifts of poetry or whatnot meant to embarrass the recipient!!!

Nice culture hey? I don't include all the traditions and would like to keep to the sweetness of it like this mum.

What are some of your family traditions, they certainly can't be more embarrassing than mine!

Advent?

Being raised Catholic I can vaguely remember the words Advent and Lent being dropped at significant holiday times. The only thing I knew for sure was that chocolate was involved with both, eating and abstaining, but I could never remember which was which....anyway here we are in the second week of Advent and I am thrilled to be rediscovering it thanks to "No's" school and their annual Advent Spiral celebration.

First week celebrates the Mineral Kingdom
Second week celebrates the Plant Kingdom
Third week celebrates the Animal Kingdom
Fourth week celebrates ...the Child of Light, or Human Kingdom



The Advent Spiral really affected NoNi, they made their own, dimmed the lights and walked the spiral in the light of the full moon, and well.... my heart swelled.



Lighting the "candles" (Martha at the centre of it all, hehehe)