A Photo to Cherish

I have very few photos from my childhood and many of the ones remaining haven't been taken care of properly.  I have recently started scanning all my old photographs, those from my childhood up to Noah's and Eiley's early years.  You can see the damage forty years has done to this photo.  There is tape on it and several places where the image has peeled off.  I'm happy to be scanning the photos in the hopes that they will last a lot longer in digital form, but there is something magical about having an old photograph to hold in your hand.  This is the earliest photo I have of me with my dad.  I love to see us looking so young and happy. 

I love you so much Dad!  Happy Birthday!

Goodbye to 2012

We had a very quiet home-based holiday season this year. No traveling, no guests, and Joe was home for 2 1/2 weeks thanks to his first teacher's winter break.  It was different, and it was lovely.

My children wanted to have a Christmas party so I tried to find a way to engage them with their friends without an emphasis on more gifts and cookies.  Happily our homeschool group decided to come together to provide gifts for a family in need.  The family we were matched with is a single mother parenting her five children, ages 10 years to 10 months including a special needs 3 year old.  The mother doesn't work and doesn't speak English.  Each family in our group bought gifts from the provided wish list and we hosted a party at our house for the children to wrap all the gifts.   After the visiting, wrapping and eating lots of cookies several of us delivered the gifts to the family.  Her children were lovely.  As we were putting the gifts under their tree, her 10 year old boy thanked us and said 'I'm sorry we didn't buy gifts to give to you also' to which Elio replied 'You can next time'.  :)

Our plans for an evening bonfire with friends on the Winter Solstice were cancelled due to freezing temperatures and a high wind advisory.  We stayed home and opened a few gifts from relatives, as this was our 'Christmas Eve' with Noah and Eiley, but we didn't do anything solstice-y.

The next morning we celebrated Christmas Morning, Take I. 

my favorite Christmas photo of three of my kids

In the afternoon, Noah and Elio built a fire in a small metal bucket to roast marshmallows.

Christmas was spent at home as a family of four.  Here are the photos of opening gifts on Christmas Eve...

Armand opening card with 25 dollar bills to buy plants for his garden.

 

 ...and Christmas Morning. 

 

We spent New Year's Eve at home also, though not fully by choice.  On the 29th Armand came down with the flu, and Elio followed suit on the 31st. 

 I didn't mean to photograph Armand crying. I was lying between the boys on the bed and when I turned to take Armand's picture, he started crying.  I took his temperature after this and it read 105.3.  They are both mostly recovered and (knock on wood) no one else has gotten it.