Country Chronicles: Christmas at the Ranch

Posted on December 27, 2012 by melissafed

I don’t know if there is a more magical time at Christmas than when your children are 6 and 4. We’ve had the most wonderful season. December was full of adventure, memory making and entirely too much sugar. A few of the highlights?

We begin to get ready for Jesus’s Birthday December 1st. We set the countdown calender, wrap 24 books (one for each night of advent) and even (the first saturday of the month) grab our tree with some of the dear friends.

Other highlights of the month were:

Nightly stories under the tree:

Ninja bread men…

Christmas pagents…

Epic sledding (O beat everyone, all the time. He is so fast we had to get him a helmet and goggles. He thinks they make him go faster so, double win).

Cousin sleepover/girls night out:

Christmas was good at our cabin in the wood.

Country Chronicles: These days…

Posted on November 24, 2012 by melissafed

Oh Hi! Where have you been? I know…I know…It is me that has been MIA, right mom? Sister? Today is the day I return your calls. SORRY.

*RIGHT NOW: I’ve been working a bit too much this week. So this morning the kids and I are cuddled up in blankets, books, and now they are watching “Frosty the Snowman”. The perfect Saturday morning. I have missed them this week and I am excited to have them all to myself this weekend. *BEST RECENT INVENTION: O has hung a rope from the loft and is swinging on it…non-stop. He got blisters and so now he wears green gardening gloves and camo water shoes…nothing else. I made him put a t-shirt on for a photo the other day though. I’m not sure that anything else in the history of our home has gotten more use than this rope swing, this last week. *The BEST thing in my kitchen lately has been this salmon marinade. I make a lot and then I marinade the salmon, broil it till it flakes off a fork. Then I make a simple salad, throw the salmon on it and add the dressing (unused marinade). Joel eats absurd amounts…did you catch that? JOEL EATS ABSURD AMOUNTS (translation? make this salad…your ~~carnivore~~ man will like it).

*I’ve started Christmas preparations over here. A touch of decorating (much more to come) and started to do some planning. A few traditions we do?

Our advent calendar is ‘event based’. That is, we put in something special to do each day. I was so excited to find these printable event ideas as sometimes it takes me days to think of all 24 events. This gives me a nice start to which I can add our personalized things (like the Living Nativity!!!).

I am also wrapping Christmas books today. We had exactly the right number in the Christmas decorations box so now we will wrap them up so that the kids can open a new one each night in December (idea stolen from pinterest…of course).

* We are of the strong belief that we don’t have nearly enough celebrations, festivals, holidays. So we started a new one last weekend. “Ranch-o-versary” celebrates when we moved up into the woods two years ago. All who currently or have ever lived in our basement suite were invited…and we expect them to be here for it every year until we are all dead. We are a little skinny on the traditions so far, but fondue with the Switchback family seemed to work out pretty well.

* Speaking of the Ranch…look what the boys have been working on! A rink. We need a bit more snow and for the temperature to drop a little before we can start flooding, but hope to have it up and ready to roll for the Aylard arrival home from Uganda!

Anyways…how has your week been? Best adventures? How are you spending this glorious Saturday???

Building Bridges

Posted on November 3, 2012 by melissafed

You are the peninsula stretching out into island and I can feel you quake. The ground beneath your feet is already shifting, the tectonic plates of independence they just won’t stand still. I can feel you moving away and I, mother, I will build that bridge.

On these days when even I would prefer to set you adrift, I will reach across the greatest divide and draw you in. Draw you close. We’ve given this advice. Parents of teenagers, they say “What do we do? They push us so hard?!” and we say, keep building bridges, chances are good they don’t like themselves much, at this moment either. So love them anyways. Teach them what grace means. Show them what love is. PUSH BACK. Build that bridge.
And so tonight I am thankful I am home….though there are other places I could/should be. Tonight we do extra story time and wrestles and bike riding. Tonight we figure out how to build our very first bridge.
And Boy? Just so you know… I will keep building no matter how many times you throw those grenades. This mamma love has no gaps for you to find.

LET THE WILD RUMPUS START!

Posted on October 29, 2012 by melissafed

: The invitation for the party that never was (last year…)

I had a favorite book as a child. One of the clearest memories I have of kindergarten is my teacher, Ms. Davidson reading “WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE”. I was transfixed, mesmorized, I LOVED it. Two years ago when I bought it for my kids it had the same effect on them. They asked for it near every day for six months. The memorized near all of it. Last year I planned a Wild Rumpus party for them, but then, my little boy was in the hospital for his birthday and I was too exhausted by the time we got home to think of doing anything like that. I just wanted to rock my babies in a sterile bubble so that they wouldn’t get sick ever again. A year later and I have recovered enough to let them play with other little ~~germs~~ children.

On account of the fact that I combine their birthdays AND I didn’t get to host a party last year, I felt more than entitled to get a little carried away. And so ensued the ROYAL RUMPUS. My daughter is a bit more into princesses than wild things so I ensured there was plenty of royal fun as well as wild boys. It worked out great.

A walk through our party. The entrance sign:

The decorations:

The goody bags:

Gummy contributed most of the amazing decorations, but our favorite parts were the boat for Max in which he sailed off through night and day. THANKS AGAIN MOMMY!:

Our little wild princess…

Party people sailing off

And the Max and Princess cut outs, also compliments of my momma:

We watched a movie (that E acted out…my favorite part):

Showed their TERRIBLE CLAWS…

We made masks and crowns:

And had such a fun WiLD RUMPUS:

I just hope the kids had as much fun at the party as we had putting it together! Thanks again for all your help everybody!!!

Resources we used for our Royal Rumpus:

Most posters/invitations EVERYTHING here to print! I downloaded the font here so that we could add our own details for the invites and goody bag labels.

Activity book/crown for goody bags from Harper Colins

Max paper doll for goody bag. From Toy-a-Day.

Bernard Paper Doll for goody bag. From Toy-a-day.

We showed this version of the story by Sendak. We found it in a discount bin for $3! Amazing I know.

More fun ideas here…if you want to get even more carried away then us!

Country Chronicles: What I Want to Remember of September 2012

Posted on October 4, 2012 by melissafed

We played hide and seek with the moon tonight. We chased him all the way home and E shouted “surprise” to him whenever we found him. The clouds hid him sometimes and at other moments he covered himself completely with the mountains. Still we chased.

The two point buck ran in front of us for a while. We climbed Sun Valley road and he ran before us, the moon seemed just steps in front of the deer. For a moment we thought he might be able to leap right over it.
Hey diddle, diddle.

And these fantastically ordinary mamma moments are the ones I seek to create. To savour and remember. So…with that…the things I can’t forget, am so grateful for… about September 2012.

717) How our girl shouts “SURPRISE” every time we come around any corner ever.

718) Little girl, pirate swords, dress too short, patent leather boots 😉

718) This week we launched the research study I am co-coordinating. You can read about it here. It is going to be fun.

719) Launched a new church service last week. I really loved it.

720) Worlds. Best. Bird. Nest. The cutest birds ever.

721) Construction projects. The skating rink to be is in the background…the wood fired hot tub, made from a giant dumpster is burning some days. Yes. There is no doubt that Switchback Ranch is fast becoming a hick paradise. And I am in love with it.

722) The most glorious September days…Walks and talks.

723) His quiet dignity…

724) Her exuberance, zest for life…

Jesus. Thanks.

Linking with my friend Emily who launched her book this week! YAY EMILY!

Celebrating with you!

Marriage: Knotted

Posted on September 18, 2012 by melissafed

We weren’t finished yet, you or I, when we said those vows. You stood there, green before the crowd and I beside you quivering like a leaf in the breeze. We thought we knew what love was, but we didn’t.

And in this unfinished state, we grow up into love. We grow into each other and around each other and we are two tree trunks wrapping our bark right into the flesh. Sometimes we fight the pressure to bend or be shaped and yet most of the time, we do, ever so slightly, shift to the right or to the left. You grow up into me and I into you, grafted together producing a new varietal. I wonder…is it the sort of tree that will feed you? The children? This church? Our own souls? Can you (can they) gain sustenance by the way we mold into one another?

And still, even now, ever more, it is my job to put my own roots down deeper to find my joy in the Living Water beneath this ground. Both of us, unfurling branches towards the Sun, feeding ourselves on Pure Light. Suddenly, we are moving in the same direction as we grow out from the shadows. Somehow easier, when we are growing the same direction. We almost soften…though we both know, only the God of the trees could bend either of our hearts.

And you. How you grow each year, a ring around the sun, and where I thought I knew each notch, each scar, you prove me wrong and you somehow produce a fruit I’ve never seen. After all this time, I still don’t know you. It is the joy and the curse…this tree bears both.

And in the growing sap will bleed. And in the pruning whole branches will fall, rot. We trust the one who tosses them into the fire.

And still.

For you, I will seek to provide shade to rest in. Food to sustain you. And perhaps? I might even bend some days. But only for you. And only by His Grace.

Aching for marriage these days…Yours & mine. You can read some of my other posts about marriage below…I hope they encourage you to keep on keepin’ on. Or to start right. Either way…

The sexiest thing on earth…

The best love stories..

How to keep going the same direction

He made all this for us to play with…

Posted on September 11, 2012 by melissafed

Swiss Family Feddersen in our orange amphibious vehicle, rolling over the tree stumps and broken up trails. We emerge into the open where the whole of the valley opens up to us in glorious and generous splendor. We see the smoke from the forest fire, burning up the end of summer heat. Our dog is running ahead of us, on the prowl for anything that threatens, he protecting us while the children yell for him when he slips from view, protecting him in return. The sun is setting through the trees, fall light casting long shadows and she says what my heart is crying:

“Oh mamma…I think God is playing with us in this night”. I ask her to repeat it because she is three and could she have possibly have really just said that? A smile plays across her lips as she curls into my side, her pirate sword raised high, her hair wild in the winds. And she says it again “God…he made this for us to play with. He is playing with us”. My eyes well with tears and again I wonder how much I’ve missed? How many evenings have I blustered and rushed and missed the God of the universe in her heart? In mine? Longing to bring peace where there has been strife? Whisper love over all the bumps in our family life. How many times have I let the annoyances, that seem so frequent, rule in our household when I could submit to a much more gentle truth?

The truth that gratitude in the moment, for the moment turns ordinary moments into extraordinary ones. That there is beauty to be found even in the most difficult of days. That God, wants to play with us, wants to be our joy, wants us to relish this extravagant world he gave us, wants to speak to us, love on us. Wants all of our worship, all of our praise.

Praising today for:

712) Cousin Love

713) Church Love

714) Home…Sunsets

715) Harvest…bringing it in green…temperature is dropping fast

716) That slow poke moon last week…

Linking with:

The Wellspring & A Holy Experience (you should REALLY follow her today…so amazing) and Emily Wierenga.

Five Minute Friday: Graceful

Posted on September 8, 2012 by melissafed

Her hair smells like energy and wildness and faith. She wraps herself around me demanding, always, all of me. She can’t deal with my distraction or lack of passion or dormancy. This girl? She is going to call me out. She is going to ask me hard questions, she is going to live life in fullness. She is going to want me in the midst of it with her. She reads me like a book this one…when I am irritated, when I am happy, what she needs to do to sway me either way. She is teaching me to be real…she won’t let me get away with mediocrity. She has no time for my self loathing…she picks it up, wears it as her very own cloak. I must find a way to toss that aside.

Toss it aside and put on Grace, be defined by it. Be wholly dwelling in it. A woman who walks in it, who draws it from others, helps them to feel it, find it, believe it. For you E…I would learn it for you.

I am going to need every ounce I can claim. You and me? There are adventures to be had. Excited to be the mamma that leads you where I know you are being called to go. Even if it scares me to the utter end of myself…you truly are your daddys girl. And of all the hidden dreams in this here heart…my greatest is for you to be a grace dweller. Easy on yourself…easy on the world…Fearless….GRACEFUL.