A feast for fairies

It rained much of Thanksgiving, but in the breaks of sunshine Elsa and my sister, Naomi, worked to make sure the local fairy population had enough shelter and food.

We hope they had a merry feast with their acorn cups.

Thanksgiving Leftovers

And here a few leftover photos that I liked too much to leave out but weren't part of a collection...

A somewhat futile attempt at a sister picture:

Beatrice with my sister:

Nora playing Blokus (her new favorite game) with Joel

Elsa waiting for the Thanksgiving guests to arrive (with a checklist to make sure all three of them come!):

For some reason we play the most hilarious games of Settlers of Catan with my family...

AWOL

Wow. The last time I posted Nora had just turned five and we were starting up our school year.  We've had a good school year so far, and I've been focusing on daily tasks of living and schooling and loving as best as I can, and that means that blogging has fallen by the wayside.  Not just blog posts, but I've also neglected returning emails and phone calls as my days sweep by (and if you are someone to whom I failed to respond, I promise it was not intentional!).  So I feel like I have been AWOL from most of the world outside the little realm I'm attempting to manage.  (Key word being attempting.)

I continue to focus my (new!) camera on bits of beauty in order to help my heart do the same thing, both of which are challenging for me when the tidiness of our cozy apartment is such a direct reflection of me being a Tired-Mommy-of-Littles and The Littles being so full of creative energy.  Both of which I know are beautiful things - but it so hard to feel that way in the middle of the afternoon when they're begging for another snack and I've just tripped over another pile of toys.

On my best days I try to focus on loving my family, helping the kids smile about their lunch vegetables, and not caring about whether their hair has been brushed this week or not.

Christian and Missionary Alliance

(The photos are from the CMA Southeastern Conference women's retreat in October at a camp-like center outside of Birmingham - and they give proof that we do have a teeny bit of fall color down here!)

It was a tiresome, arduous, emotional journey, but we have finally arrived and settled in our new church home.  I loved the Anglican church we attended last year but we knew it was not the best denominational fit for us long term.  Joel had agreed for my sake for us to worship there for the first year so we would have an immediate and steady church family as we adjusted to making a new home in Birmingham.  

We spent last summer visiting churches, meeting pastors, making lists of denominational distinctives, and praying.  It was a particularly difficult task because it made Joel and I confront head-on some of our theological differences.  Also, we weren't just looking for a local church home -- Joel is pursuing ordination and a full-time vocation in the church, so we were looking for a long-term fit.

We finally landed in the Christian and Missionary Alliance.  Honestly, even though we both believed it was where God was directing us, it felt more like a compromise for each of us rather than a perfect fit.  Over the past 6 months, however, God has given us confirmation after confirmation that we are in the best place we could be right now, and possibly for many years into the future.

For those who are not familiar with the CMA, I won't go into the details, but here is a link to their website.  Our local church is called Birmingham International Church.  There are over 20 different people groups that worship together in our building, and we love how prayerful and gracious our new church family is.

Tepee

A storm bought down several long limbs around our apartment.  They were soon tied together to construct a tepee just large enough for all sorts of adventures (including school :)  

Tabitha got in on the fun too, and we would find here napping in the tent even when we weren't out there.

It was also the perfect place for evening storytime.

Feeding the giraffes

We've loved our membership to the Birmingham Zoo (a gift from my family).  The girls saved up their money to feed the giraffes this fall.  I wondered if Nora would get a bit shy when we finally got there, but there were plenty of other people to watch ahead of us in line and both girls were pretty fearless by the time it was our turn.

The girls love to stop by the Red River Hogs whenever we are on that side of the zoo...

They think that the flapping ear tassels and tails are hilarious when the hogs waddle around.

The macaws are kept outside during the day and we got to see them get some snacks.

And Elsa makes sure that we always feed the flamingos - it's only 25 cents for a handful of food, and for her that's a great deal!

Elsa usually shares her quarter's worth of bird food with Nora, who prefers to let the beautiful birds eat off the railing instead of from her fingers.

And of course we always have to make a pit-stop at the reptile house.  Elsa loves the Komodo dragon so much that she has named him "Cod."  Though she is quick to correct me that he told her that his name was "Cod" because she can speak Lizard.

A few school photos

I loved Nora's "O" page in her Sing Spell Read and Write book - She made her name at the top with both upper and lower case letters, and the baby next to the psychedelic octopus is baby Oliver.

We had to stay home sick from one of our Classical Conversations school days, so a friend dropped off our science activity for us - dissecting crayfish!

Another highlight from last semester was our interview with our neighbor who is a zookeeper in the Birmingham Zoo's primate house!  We often do activities with another family of home-schoolers and they joined us for her visit.  The kids came ready with interview questions and our neighbor brought her insect collection and some bones she had found.

We've also had some fun art projects.  My friend found a great source of online, step-by-step art projects using various mediums (charcoal, watercolor, pencil, etc.) and copying different artistic styles (we've copied things like Monet's water lilies to ancient Egyptian art).

Since we are studying ancient history this year, we also tried to copy cave paintings.  It was a fun art experiment!  We crinkled up paper and then smoothed it out again to simulate the rough cave walls.  We talked about how we could make "paint" from natural items (but we just pretended and mashed up bits of watercolors in water), and used sticks, leaves, and whatever else the kids wanted to try to use to paint.  The kids got a big kick out of this project!