Happy New Year!

Koreans celebrate the new year based on the cycles of the moon, just as they do in China and many other Asian countries. It is a three day holiday, and is used by many to return to their hometowns to visit family. To celebrate, we dressed Tyson in his hanbok. It is a traditional Korean children's outfit that they wear on celebration days, including Lunar New Year. Tyson's was a gift from his foster parents.

In other Korean news, there have been a lot of  unintended consequences of the changes that the South Korean government has made in the last few years to their adoption policies. One that affected us directly was the increased age at which the adopted children are given permission to leave the country. A decade ago or less, Korean children were coming home to their families when they were 5-months-old. Tyson was 19-months-old when we brought him home in December 2012. Today these kids are close to 2-years-old when they come home.

But one of the most heart-breaking results of the new laws is that many more newborns are being abandoned. Scot and I have been following stories about a box that a pastor in Seoul created, where a mother may secretly, but safely, drop off her unwanted baby without being questioned or seen. I learned today that a documentary has been made about Pastor Lee and the "dropbox" that has saved the lives of  more than 200 infants last year along. Follow this link to see a trailer for the documentary. 

Holiday Sing-Along

Each year before the winter break, Riley's music teacher at school invites the families to a holiday sing-a-long. This year, the first grade sang for about 25 minutes. All the kids sing every song, but two or three different kids come up to the mics for each song to "lead" the group. I don't know if it was coincidence or not that Riley was chosen to lead the same song that she played in her piano recital.

Tyson's Preschool Party

Tyson's preschool class had a fun holiday party. The kids sang Jingle Bells and The Reindeer Pokey (a twist on The Hokey Pokey). Tyson and I made a Christmas tree mobile together. He gave me a couple of gifts that he has been making in class, and we ate some treats. It was fun to see him in that setting, and let him show off a little.

Tyson doesn't always get along well with other kids. He's can be a bit of a my-way-or-the-highway kind of guy. But this little red-head, who is about 9 months older, is his best friend, and they always play together wonderfully. We love that kid!

2013 Nativity

Riley is a typical oldest sister in many ways...at least typical in my experience, and Scot's. She and her brothers worked on this "play" all afternoon, and were excited to perform it for us on a Sunday evening.

Riley's Christmas Recital

Riley starting taking piano lessons from our neighbor in September. She has been doing well, and her teacher tells me often that she loves Riley's enthusiasm. So do we!

Christmas Train

I can't speak for the kids, but my favorite part of getting out the Christmas decorations each year is setting up my Dad's Christmas train. I have fond memories of setting it up with him in my childhood home, so when he passed away a few years ago, it was the only thing of his that I wanted to keep.  I'm glad I'm able to pass this tradition and some fun memories along to my own kids.

Riley's Thanksgiving Program

Riley and her classmates put on a fun Thanksgiving program, complete with songs, history, and plenty of holiday-related puns.

July 4th

The plan was for Scot's parents to join us for a long weekend, beginning July 4th. But his sister's plan to visit them in Albuquerque the following week was moved up, so we flip-flopped the plan at the last minute and drove down to Albuquerque instead. The kids had a great time with their cousins, some of whom they haven't seen in years.

One benefit to this adjustment was the fireworks. Because of fire restrictions, our town had cancelled their fireworks show. But Albuquerque went ahead with theirs, so we were able to enjoy them there.

Happy Winter Solstice

In honor of Winter Solstice and the longest night of the year, we had a candlelight dinner tonight. The food wasn't fancy, but the candles were a huge hit. Tyson exclaimed "buffday!" as soon as they were lit, and mentioned it several times during dinner. After everyone was done eating and we were ready to blow the candles out, I decided to go along with the unintentional birthday connection. We put a candle in front of each kid, sang "happy birthday, dear Jesus," and then we each blew out our candle. 

I knew the kids were enjoying it, and midway through dinner I had the thought that we should do this again next year. Asher's comment a moment later sealed the deal: "Mom, this dinner with candles makes me happy."

Christmas Advents

Last year I started a picture book advent with Riley and Asher. Each night between Thanksgiving and Christmas night I would read a Christmas book to them. A couple of the books I already had, considerate gifts received over the years from family members. I purchased a couple more that season, but mostly we checked books out from the library. I think the kids enjoyed our book countdown as much as I did.

Since last Christmas I've purchased a few of last year's favorites, just in case I couldn't get them this year. The kids have loved it just as much this year, and it's usually Tyson who pops up right after bedtime prayers and reminds me, "book, book!"

We've also started an activity countdown this year. We kicked it off on December first by going to our local high school's community winter celebration. We started the party with photos with Santa. Then each club had a booth set up with activities for the kids. They decorated cookies, did a bean bag toss, each won a cupcake at the cake walk, made Rudolph crafts, stockings, and snowman necklaces.

Since then we've had a Christmas-related activity each day. Sometimes it's a simple game or an art project. We've watched The Muppet's Christmas Carol and the First Presidency Christmas Devotional. We've baked together and delivered gifts to friends and neighbors, and driven around to see Christmas lights in nearby neighborhoods. We had cinnamon rolls and hot chocolate for dinner last week, and are going to try making egg nog soon. 

Unfortunately, I've had to rearrange the schedule to skip activities that require snow, as we've only had one storm since the beginning of the month, and even that was melted quite a bit by the time Riley was home from morning kindergarten. This Sunday we'll be doing some Christmas caroling via FaceTime. If you'd like a call, send me your email address and a time range that would work for you and we'll try to make it happen.

This is definitely a tradition that I would like to continue. Next year I would like to focus more activities on serving others. I've realized that's it's also a great opportunity to learn about Christmas traditions in other cultures, and other winter holidays as well. St. Nicholas Day is December 6th, so the night before we read a book about the legend of St. Nicholas. The next morning the kids woke up to find chocolate coins in their shoes. Next year I'd love for us to learn more about the festival of lights together, and maybe have tamales for dinner one night, in honor of Riley and Asher's Mexican heritage.

What about you? Have you done anything this year that you hope might become a tradition?

Kindergarten Thanksgiving Program

Riley and her kindergarten class shared the "real" story of the first Thanksgiving.

July 4th

We managed to have a fun and relaxed fourth of July. I love it when I can use both those adjectives to describe a holiday! We went to a parade downtown, where the kids were more excited by the cheap candy than the cool old cars, the live rock band playing "I'm A Believer" on a landscaping company's trailer, the police motorcycles, or even the two giant Percheron draft horses with red and blue manes and hooves. Riley almost redeemed herself when she pointed out a preschool friend who was the "Westward Expansion" float. At least she was paying attention.

We came home in time for Scot to get a rack of ribs in the smoker and for me to start the homemade triple berry frozen yogurt.

At 2:00 we joined the neighbors for a bike parade. We are lucky enough to have a Denver policeman living on the street, so he led the parade in his patrol car. That was likely Asher's favorite part of the day.

Ash was definitely the smallest kid in the parade, but he did a great job of keeping up with the group. In the picture above you can see him between the two kids in the front of the pack, just pushing away on his scooter.

Dinner was awesome! We ate ribs, my variation of my Grandma's potato salad, glass block jello, rolls, and peppermint lemonade. After cleaning up we watched a pit barbecue competition on TV before breaking out the frozen yogurt.

Because of the high fire danger, our town and all those around us had cancelled their fireworks displays. Instead we watched televised fireworks from D.C. and New York, and still managed to have the kids in bed around 8:45.

Father's Day

I got a card on Father's day with this picture. I thought it was pretty cool, but even cooler once I realized it was my own kids. Thanks - fatherhood has been the best adventure of my life.

She Says....

Soon after Thanksgiving last year, Riley was talking about Santa constantly. After hearing her bring Santa up again, Scot asked her what the most important thing about Christmas is. She quickly responded, "We celebrate Jesus's adoption. Er, birth."

One of the valentines Riley received from a school friend was a paper heart attached to a glow stick. The message on the paper was: "You make my heart glow." Riley must have thought it was extremely clever because I overheard her saying it to herself a couple of times that afternoon. The next day she made a cute collage at preschool and wrote Mom *heart* Dad on it. When she handed it to me after school she told me, 'You make me glow my heart out."

After preschool one day: "You wanna know what I said to Tyler (a boy in preschool)? I said, 'My dad can beat your dad up.'" Tyler has older siblings, so I suspect/hope that he's the one that started this conversation.

Easter

Easter was fun, with a few egg hunts. Our block has an egg hunt each year and the younger kids get a head-start (they close the street down and eggs are hidden in the front yards of about 20 houses). Shana and Steve were visiting, so they helped hide eggs in our yard for another hunt. We like doing the Easter bunny type stuff on Saturday so that we can focus on the resurrection on Sunday. We teach 4 and 5 year olds at church, so on Sunday we had a lesson about what Easter is really about. But probably confusing to them, we gave them an egg with candy and a little Jesus cutout to remind them of Him coming out of the tomb (the egg).

After Tyson realized what was in the eggs, he stopped looking and just wanted to open them all and eat the candy. The kid has a sixth sense for chocolate. When he hears Scot unwrapping something in the kitchen or can smell the faintest whiff of chocolate, he comes running. He has chased Scot to see what he's got, and insists that he open his mouth to see what it is.

Each kid has had an Easter bunny ears photo taken. Tyson's turn.

Little kids are funny Easter egg hunters, since half of the attempts to pick up an egg result in them dumping out their basket.

Here's Tyson trying to get at a peanut butter egg.

Christmas Day

Christmas day was fun. Since it was Sunday, we still had church, but it wasn't until 10:45. I sang in the choir and we had a really good program. Our choir is about 12 men and 18 women. There was one men only song (O Come, O Come, Emmanuel in 4-part harmony) that was really fun to sing and even gave me goose bumps. I also accompanied O Little Town of Bethlehem for the choir, and O Holy Night for our choir director, who is a world class opera singer and the chair of the theater and opera department at CSU (or something like that - he really knows what he's doing).

Becca found some more Geo Trax on craigslist, so we spent 45 minutes setting them all up Christmas Eve for the kids to see in the morning. There really is an obscene amount of tracks. But after tearing them down and setting them up later in the basement, it was gratifying to hear Asher giddily say, "you the best builder EVER, daddy!" over and over. The second time, I made a second level of bridge above another bridge, so I guess that's pretty awesome to them.

This is a view of what the kids first saw when they woke up. I don't understand the part about 'stockings hung', since once there's stuff in it, you really don't want to risk hanging them, for fear of falling or stretching the stocking. The boys got Tonka dump trucks and Riley got some Disney Barbie princesses (2 of them, and we reserved like 5 more in a closet for birthdays and stuff).

The kids have been playing dress up and being superheroes lately, so Becca found this place that makes capes (you know what they say about superheroes and capes in the Incredibles though) and masks with your choice of letters, shapes and colors.

It took no convincing to get SuperRiley to try hers on.

It took about half a day of convincing to get SuperAsher to don his disguise.

Since we were leaving for Korea the next day, we didn't do anything super fancy for dinner like years past (prime rib, crab, etc.). We had Becca's family tradition of Christmas lasagna, salad, and bread sticks. That afternoon, we took down the Christmas tree and decorations, finished packing for Korea, and headed down to Denver for the night before our flight.

Albuquerque Nativity

We headed to Albuquerque to see my parents the week before Christmas since we were headed to Korea the week after. We really didn't have anything planned, so we mostly hung out with family, relaxed (calm before the storm), and ate (I always overeat because I try to fill all the familiar cravings I have from growing up). We did go to the aquarium one day because our kids love fish. Riley and Asher loved playing with their cousins and were sad to go home. My youngest sister was there and always is a big fan of her nieces and nephews. She organized a short nativity with the 5 kids 4 and under. It was actually really cute. Asher was not happy at all to be a wise man, but Riley called the role of Mary in perpetuity.

Riley was a good bride, as you can see in these pictures. I'll add captions of what I think transpired during this couple in love. Mary: "I'm so happy! I'm married!". Joseph: "What did I get myself into?"

Mary: "Isn't my dress just so pretty?"

Mary: "Oh my gosh! Did my husband just fart in the reception line?" Yep, that's marriage.

A Christmas To Remember

I find myself enjoying Christmas-time more each year, as my kids’ understanding and enthusiasm grows. I love this season, but every year it seems like it goes by too fast. Part of the reason for that this year is that, in addition to all the holiday festivities, we’re busy making arrangements to bring Tyson home.

But when I look back, I want to remember this time of year for more than just the excitement of bringing Tyson home. This is the first year that Asher has really gotten excited about Christmas. He’s the one that reminds us every evening to turn on the Christmas lights. Riley has been involved in making and shopping for gifts for family members and friends, and has been very excited about the giving aspect of Christmas. They each have a favorite Christmas song. When “Let It Snow” came on the radio last week, Asher told me it was his favorite song, and every time he’s heard it since then he declares, “dis my favewit song” or “I wuv dis song.” Riley loves “Angels We Have Heard On High” for the alleluias.

We have three “kid-friendly” nativities that are all set up side-by-side on a sofa table. The kids have been playing with those nativities more than just about any toy in the house. Not surprisingly, Riley is very particular about how each nativity is set up, and is careful not to get the pieces mixed up with each other. On the other hand, I often hear Asher orchestrating battles between the camels and the donkeys. One morning Mary and a palm tree were even caught up in the fray.

I’m so happy that Christmas is on a Sunday this year. That we will have the opportunity, mid-morning to join with our church-family in singing praises to God and Christ, and to be reminded of the reason for this holiday.

Merry Christmas to all of you! We look forward to sharing photos of Christmas day, and photos of Tyson. They may be a little delayed, but I promise to get them up here. Don't forget to send me your email address, since we'll be making the blog private soon!

The Santa Conundrum

The dilemma about how much to tell my kids about Santa started years before I became a mother, or even a wife. I remember a college friend telling me that her parents never made Santa a part of their family's Christmas celebrations. The kids didn't receive any gifts from Santa, but they also weren't told that he wasn't real. They just didn't make a big deal out of it either way. As an adult, this friend told me that she thought her parents' approach was perfect, and she intended to do the same when she had kids.

Well this concept blew me away, but in a good way. I was impressed enough by the idea that I remembered it for years, and after Scot and I were married and discussing traditions that we wanted to carry on with our own family, I brought this up. When Scot was growing up, Santa only brought the contents of their stockings, as well as a small gift or two. According to Scot, his mom didn't want Santa to get the credit for the big stuff. So when I told him that I was leaning toward not pushing the concept of Santa, it wasn't a stretch for him.

Up until this year, it hasn't really been an issue. We've never told our kids that any of their gifts are from Santa. But Riley is old enough now to have picked up the idea that Santa brings toys to kids, even though we have never told her that. She had been mentioning him quite a bit in the last few weeks, but I felt strongly that some sort of action was needed when, in a prayer at bedtime, she thanked God for Santa.

Since that night I've been pondering how to address this. I really like the idea of just not making an issue of it at all, but I really don't like how obsessed she is becoming with Santa.

I remembered an article I read last year by Pastor Mark Driscoll in the Washington Post's On Faith column. He and his wife have taught their children that "Saint Nick was a wonderful man who loved and served Jesus faithfully. So, we gladly include him in our Christmas traditions to remind us of what it looks like for someone to live a life of devotion to Jesus as God." They have separated the truth from the folklore, in order to not demonize Santa. Love that!

I came across this blog post about a lesson that one mom did with her children about the similarities between Santa and Jesus Christ. "We talked about how Santa is actually a symbol for Jesus, and everything we love about Santa is really everything we love about Jesus." Awesome!

This is going to be the topic for our family night lesson next week, and I'll be using ideas from both of these articles.

What are your thoughts? I'm wondering if this is a topic that other people have strong opinions on, or if I'm just one of a crazy few. What is/was Santa's role in your family's Christmas traditions, and would you change anything if you were starting over?

Thanksgiving In A Bun

For the past several years, we've had Thanksgiving dinner with family, or made a big meal with friends. Becca wanted a low-key Thanksgiving as we get closer to our lives getting crazier (going to Korea, and bringing home Tyson, and something else that is potentially in the works). I think her idea was to go to a buffet. In any case, she didn't want to cook a full traditional Thanksgiving meal (although I usually end up cooking most of it with her). I took over and did my thing. Becca just had to make some stuffing and dessert. She took it one step further and made homemade buns.

On cooking shows (I'm a big fan of Food Network), they talk about 'de-constructed' dishes, where they take something typical and break it down into it's parts in some creative way. I heard a new term which I like better: 'remodeled'. So, here is our 'remodeled' Thanksgiving:

I brined and smoked a turkey in my smoker. I had smoked a turkey breast and whole chicken before, but never a 12 pound turkey. After 8 hours of low-and-slow apple and mequite smoke wafting around the turkey, the end result was spectacular. I even got a nice 1/4" smoke ring.

With that turkey, we made smoked turkey, Swiss cheese, stuffing, and cranberry sauce sandwiches on homemade buns with potato chips and French onion dip and jello (at Riley's request) on the side. I added some potato chips to my sandwich for some crunch, so it was a full Thanksgiving sandwich (sans sweet potatoes and green bean casserole, but I refuse to recognize green bean casserole as necessary, like a salad).

Becca made a pumpkin cinnamon pull-apart bread. It was like monkey bread, but the homemade dough was much better and the butter rum glaze put it over the top.

Riley's words summed it up, "This is like a meal come true." Amen. Smoked meat and sandwiches - I'm thankful, as is my stomach, for you.