9th day of Christmas - celebrations of winter.

The kindness of the day - Give the gift of water.  Three times in 2015 our well went out and numerous other times. The longest was in Oct/Nov for a month.  Hauling water is hard, washing dishes camp style, laundry at family's homes, showers at the gym, family and friends will sure make you humble.  Family offered us showers and laundry where water costs and friends offered tanks of water in the land where water is gold for home, crops and animals. We have a lot of giving back to do. So we offer others the same today to other farm folks and we were glad in the gift of friendship in return.

9th day of Christmas - Nine ladies dancing representing the fruits of the Holy Spirit - Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness and Self-control.

Here it is the Eve of Epiphany. Growing up it was always a big day of family and friends partying on "little Christmas" ...the day the Wise Men came with gifts to baby Jesus.  My mother would always give us a shiny new penny, my dad would make giant German pancakes and later play the spoons for us or the mouth harp, and us kids had been practicing a skit or our musical instruments since Christmas for a quick family performance. Just an all around fun day. 
So here we are now with kids in their jammies and fun awaiting us tomorrow. A little crafting, playing a rowdy game of match or two and movies.

Time for evening prayers- we do ask God, out loud to bless our family, friends, land and animals. I have been in the habit of this since my parents taught me as a child. One night I simply rolled over and went to sleep when Dude said, "wait, what about the God blessings....?"  It was nice to see it meant as much to him as it did me.

Crafts

Each week I get my fix of crafting in some way or the other. This week, when meeting up with other farm girls, I taught some younger friends how to make pompoms.  We made lots. They piled up and we got very excited with each new ones me made. I loved that they experimented with different yarns that Sunny, one of the farm girls, donated to their cause...making pompoms.  Friend, Frankie tied them in the girls hair and we had a blast all morning.

Yesterday we gathered some of the pompoms and made our January wreath. There is snow everywhere and has been for at least two, maybe, three weeks.  Our theme during our crafting was obviously snow. My friend Alley graciously lent me her kids for the afternoon. We made snowflakes, lots of them, sock snowmen and wreaths.  The music from Frozen was playing in the background and we all sang loudly to the part we knew.

The wreaths were easy.  The forms were from the Dollar Store. We covered them with left over cotton batting from quilts made last year. It was cut into about 3 inch strips covering the wreath and hot gluing along the way. The pompoms we made during the week, ribbon from Christmas leftovers, and ornaments...and of course, glitter. The kids got very creative.

We ended the day watching a movie and sipping on root beer floats.  

All in all a very fun day.

8th Day of Christmas and the New Year.

Promise is what each new year brings...hopes...dreams and of course, a bit of uncertainty.   We wrote out our goals for the new year last night. We folded it up, label it , "Don't open until 12/31/2016" and taped it to the top of the kitchen chalkboard.  We have many dreams and goals this year to stay on track and not get caught up in a quick -- ohhh , let's get that ---when we have a new roof that needs to go on. Two things to remember ...we cut up our credit cards and we do all the work ourselves.  In this day and age it is almost the unthinkable but we are going for it. 

Today we woke up to a very cold morning.  The goats were shivering and calling out to come share some warmth, the light had gone out in the chicken coop (I was afraid to check on the chicks but they are hardy and all alive and well ), and fire was long gone from the wood stove. The day was sunny but the snow still remains high on the ground. We are happy the forecast predicts warmer weather.  We need a bit of a thaw.

Not a whole lot going on here today.  Seed catalogs have begun to arrive and we dream of gardens to be planted in the spring.  We did some planning.  Here we have to find what does well and plant,  that , plus we compost and work the hell out of this hard and barren land.  It is nice that we also trade with others so we don't have to grow EVERYTHING. For example, my mom can't grow mint and I have garlic but she has the best sage and oregano, so we trade.  Also, someone at work grows raspberries but actually she is the only one in her family who eats them, so every year 2 gallons show up on my desk. They make the BEST jam. It is always exciting to dream of new crops.

The rest of the day is sewing. This year's goal, for me at least, is finish many of this half started projects I have in the sewing room or get rid of them.  The room is beginning to look like an episode of Hoarders.

Happy New Year to each of you and pray each of  you have a healthy and peaceful year.