Advent Reading

Well, our school books have now been packed away in the attic until next year! The Christmas book basket has been brought down to the living room & I would like to share with you...

Elianna's daily reader for December will be Santa's Favorite Story
I must say the illustrations in this book are charming!

One Wintry Night by Ruth Bell GrahamWill be our daily read aloud.
We shall be dipping in & out of the book basket to supplement our reading each day.

The Very First Christmas

The First Christmas

We have had this for years - I think it was the first Christmas book I bought when Elianna was a tiny baby

The Night Before Christmas by Clement Clarke Moore; illustrated by Tasha Tudor

Mary did you know?

Favorite Christmas Carols

The Cobweb Curtain

The Wild Christmas Reindeer by Jan Brett

Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett

The Twelve Days of Christmas, Board Book by Jan Brett

Christmas with Anne and Other Holiday Stories by L.M. Montgomery

My First Story of Christmas

The Tailor of Gloucester (The World of Beatrix Potter) by Beatrix Potter

Jesus' Christmas Party

Bright Christmas: An Angel Remembers

Country Angel Christmas by Tomie dePaola

Merry the Lamb Finds Baby Jesus

This is the Star by Joyce Dunbar

The Legend of the Candy Cane

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson

The Tale of Three Trees

Of Snowmen, Sausage Rolls, Stollen & Sewing

The snow came down even heavier today & was much enjoyed by my girls.
Aided by Daddy, they made a tiny snowman named Luke.





Daddy picked the Holly berries for his eyes & buttons : )



Two very proud girls!



Here you see him sporting a bow tie!



At this point the girls came in & had a warming lunch - home made potato & leek soup & warm apple juice. Quiet time was abandoned in honor of this special day & whilst Rosie came to help in the kitchen, Elianna went outside to play with her snowman. Her you can see 'Princess Leah' that she made to keep Luke company ; )



Rosie & I busied ourselves in the kitchen, baking our usual 'Saturday Loaves'. We also made some Sausage Rolls to freeze ahead, ready for Christmas & a loaf of seasonal Stollen as a special treat for tomorrow's breakfast.

A tired & cold Elianna joined us for our weekly 'Pizza & movie night' & disaster struck - down came the rain - cold & bitter.
Luke & Leah were offered protection:



But, we had to face the fact that rain does not bode well for those of snow origin...

My poor, poor girl. Her heart truly broken. My girls are always tucked up in their beds by 7pm - tonight, Rosie went alone & Elianna & I cosied up on my bed - she with her spinning, I with my knitting. We chatted & cried &, eventually, laughed.
Then I remembered the wee surprise I had tucked away as a Christmas gift Girls' Best Book of Knitting, Sewing, and Embroidery by Virginie Desmoulins



This is a lovely little book that I would encourage you to take a look at, if you have daughters who are interested in crafting.
I made my excuses & nipped off to retrieve the book from its hiding place. Oh, you should have seen the smiles & the curiosity when I presented the book to my daughter!
The cover of the book actually has a cardboard Dolly that you 'pop out' of the cover - & lots of lovely ideas inside the book for making clothes for her, along with many other wonderful embroidery, knitting & sewing projects.

At 9pm a very tired, but much more peaceful Elianna went to bed, taking with her the new book. As i kissed her goodnight, she asked to have the lamp left on, so she could browse the book for a while before she went to sleep. It is so wonderful to connect with my child over a shared hobby. I love the times we knit, spin, sew & craft together.

It is good for the soul.

Goodnight & wishing you sweet, creative dreams : )

Our Advent Book Basket

For those thinking ahead to advent, I thought I would share the books we have in our advent book basket.
I would love to hear of the books & stories you share with your children at this time of year, so please do leave a comment to let me know.

The Very First Christmas

great Christmas read aloud

The First Christmas

We have had this for years - I think it was the first Christmas book I bought when Elianna was a tiny baby

The Night Before Christmas by Clement Clarke Moore; illustrated by Tasha Tudor

If you know Tasha Tudor, you know this will be stunning!

One Wintry Night by Ruth Bell Graham

another great read aloud

Mary did you know?

Lyrics to the beautiful song - comes with a CD

Favorite Christmas Carols

A gorgeous book, with favorite carols.

The Cobweb Curtain

oh, I love this lovely re-telling of the legend! Do take a look at Dawn's wonderful blog for ideas on how to enjoy this story with your own children.

The Wild Christmas Reindeer by Jan Brett

Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett

The Twelve Days of Christmas, Board Book by Jan Brett

beautifuly illustrated by Jan Brett

Christmas with Anne and Other Holiday Stories by L.M. Montgomery

For fans of Green Gables!

My First Story of Christmas

Given to my very own Rebekah Rose on her Christmas Eve dedication : )

The Tailor of Gloucester (The World of Beatrix Potter) by Beatrix Potter

A Christmas Classic!

Jesus' Christmas Party

My girls love the repetition of this book

Bright Christmas: An Angel Remembers

Just beautiful


Country Angel Christmas by Tomie dePaola

a great story for the littlies

Merry the Lamb Finds Baby Jesus

Another very old book from our collection


This is the Star by Joyce Dunbar

stunning illustrations, gentle, rhythmic narrative.

The Legend of the Candy Cane

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson

These are my three new books for this year : )

Young Children and Worship

I recently shared with you our new 'Quiet place'.

Today I would like to share with you how I plan to use it more fully.
I have been reading an inspiring book: Young Children and Worship
A key point of my family's journey into Waldorf home education has been the idea that children are very much children & not 'miniature adults' - This book, for me, resonates with that thought & develops the idea that children are very spiritual beings. The stories are not presented in a fashion of the parent (or teacher) teaching the key points of the Bible stories - "how many loaves & fish did the little boy give to Jesus?" etc etc but in a way that develops wonder & reflection & encourages a true relationship with our heavenly Father.
The first three 'lessons' are showing the children how to enter the 'worship place' in a respectful, calm & appropriate way, how to listen & talk with God. Then the lessons present different Bible stories & encourage reflection & worship.
The book has pages to photocopy in the back, to make figures & scenes for the storytelling. I am going to keep it much simpler than that & use odd Ostheimer animals that we already have (sheep & a wolf) & very simple, faceless wood conical figures for the people. This will keep preparation to a minimum & encourage the girls imaginations to really connect with each story.
We will begin this week with the first lesson - & our quiet place will be our place of worship. I hope that, by the time we have finished working through this book together, our quiet place will be a place were my girls feel drawn to - when they need to pull away from busyness, when they need to go & be peaceful. God is inside us - He is with us always. But often we need to follow the example of Jesus, get alone with God to hear that Still Small Voice.

A Quiet Place...

I had an idea to create a quiet place in our home. a place for quiet reading, a place to go & be with God when the rest of the house is too noisy; too distracting. A place I can go for my early morning Bible study & a place for me to go at quiet time, when the girls hunker down in their room (somewhere where i cannot be distracted by chores, or emails!)

Today, I created that place. It was very simple & the whole family is pleased with the result.
In our tiny spare room, I hung a canopy from the ceiling



on the floor is a small rug, a basket of seasonal books & a selection of Tasha Tudor books.





I have added some of my Bible study aids to the children's bookcase



Here is my own personal Bible study basket



Here is a reading bag I have put together for my 'school' study



My journal, You Are Your Child's First Teacher & Heaven on Earth: A Handbook for Parents of Young Children

My cosy chair



Ssshhhh!

Midsummer

Midsummer went well, despite the fact that I was recovering from a fall a few days earlier.

We had friends visit:



& the daddies got to work fixing some plumbing whilst the mummies put up the tent:



We camped, read A Midsummer Nights Dream, knitted, talked, looked for mice & snuggled up in our cosy beds. (Miss R is in her bed in the middle!)



We walked on walking day - E with her Rainbow's pack:







And Miss R with her snail buddy :)





And then, after reading our current read aloud & eating supper, the little people in our home were tucked up in bed by 6 O'clock.
And mummy settled down to some knitting :)

Taste of Summer

We have been making the most of the summer sun here in the last few days.
Our day today was filled with reading, talking about our faith in the Lord, tasting good food:









Being inspired:



Reading from our Bible & journaling about it.

Knitting:



Planning more knitting



Getting wet:





And more stories.

We are outdoors as much as possible when the sun shines, I like to sit in the shade of our magnolia tree. I get far too hot otherwise. We had a happy day....I hope you did too.

The Spring Book Basket

Thoughts of spring are upon us, as we begin our garden planting. We have a seasonal book basket & the books within change with each season.

Although not officially spring until March the 20th, I have just stored away our winter books & lifted out the spring time selection.

I thought it would be fun to share:

Spring Story (Brambly Hedge)

Pelle's New Suit

Spring

How a Seed Grows

A Seed Is Sleepy

The Dandelion Seed

The Jesus Garden: An Easter Legend

The Spring Rabbit

Toad by the Road: A Year in the Life of These Amazing Amphibians

Home for a Bunny

In our home, we are bookaholics!, so any recommendations you may have for springtime reading, please do leave a comment.