the week before Christmas

I vote for moving Christmas to the end of January.

I have good arguments for it. If we accept the fact that Jesus was not really born on December 25th (and we should: no shepherd worth his flock would be out in the fields in December weather in Bethlehem) then we are free to set a date of our choosing. So I vote for the end of January.

The economic arguments are stacked in favor of this. Online shopping gets a full four more weeks of keyboard clicking, in a month where, at least in the northern hemisphere, you do not want to be outside. An extended shopping period! A boon, no? (Let's ignore the credit card debt that would follow. The extended shopping period would boost the economy, create jobs, raise wages. Ergo: eventually credit card debt would go away. If I say it often enough, it will be true.)

But I'm not pushing economics. I'm pushing sanity. The pre-Christmas period is now too short. Whether you cook, bake, sing, do crafts, plays, dances associated with the holidays -- there's too little time for even a fraction of it. And then boom! December 26 comes and it's all over and what you have before you is a three month spell of winter. (If Christmas came on January 25th, you'd have short February and then voila! Spring! Well, just around the corner.)

I write this because I was thinking this morning how quickly these weeks have gone by. And how the weekend is going to bring family members together and that's great, but there are not enough hours in the day to do all that you'd love to do with said family members. (My second proposal would be to give everyone a week off following January 25, to indulge us in family time, friend time, free time.)

Of course, some would object. Christmas, you'll argue, is for Christians who comprise just 31% of the world's population. I'm amenable to changing the name of the holiday to embrace all the peoples of the world. We could just borrow from the French and call it Noel, which actually is on loan from the Latin world natalis -- meaning "of birth." A celebration of birth. How lovely is that!

For now, we have what we have: December 24th and 25th. They come in just four days. That'a an insanely short period of time!



Time... Holiday time... Christmas time... Why do I need time? My dinner menu lists were made long ago, as were the grocery lists. The brioche has been ordered (Madame at the bakery asks over the phone -- Is that you Nina? You want us to bake you a brioche? Yes please... I'll bake my own another time...). The presents are wrapped, ribboned, tagged. Cards mailed, house cleaned.

Time... Retired as I am, I especially love these days before the holiday. To make that steamy frothy cup of cafe creme and munch on a delicious biscotti send to us for Christmas... To finish reading my book so that I can get to the one I meant for this week -- a holiday story from a beloved mystery series. To listen to more music, to stare at the magnificence of the petite tree. To spend even more hours with my daughters. To watch treasured Christmas films together and read out loud from their own Christmas memory books, written some 25 or 30 years ago. Time to take in how beautiful the farmhouse looks, especially with the lights outside and one single delicious candle burning inside. Time for all that.


For now, breakfast. In the sun room, though without sunshine.






Afternoon: I pick up Snowdrop.

On my way to her school, I stop for my CSA two pound bag of winter spinach. This takes me by the lesser lake. It strikes me how dramatically everything changes in a place that lives by four seasons. Snowdrop and I would hunt for shade here in the summer months. Now, one day short of winter, there's a thick layer of ice on the lake...






It's cold today. Our high yesterday was 45F (7C). Today the high will be 25F (-4C). The little girl resists wearing any coat or jacket in the car, but yesterday I scored a success by getting her into something that I (deliberately misleadingly) called a hoodie. I bring it with me to school and offer it to her. She accepts it. Phew! It really feels cold today.

And yet, when we leave the car to go to the farmhouse (you gotta walk a bit), she feels the tug of the great outdoors.





I nudge her inside. She's not really dressed for this. But as we go in, she asks to put on her "farmhouse pink mitts" and her "farmhouse cap" and her "farmhouse boots" and out she goes again! Okay, this will surely be short lived. It really is cold!





She is intoxicated with the pleasure of being outside.  Let me bring my babies out for a walk! 

We do that.

Her laughter now is so contagious that we surely must look foolish as we romp around the front yard. Two laughing hyenas. Pretending to be airplanes.






We collect spent flowers, twigs and cones for a picnic with her babes.






And now she wants to bring it all inside. All fine, except that I watch my carefully cleaned for the holidays floors take on the litter of dried debris. But who would mind? Snowdrop, despite a napless day, has been utterly joyous.






Time to take things down a notch. We play inside.






For Snowdrop, Christmas is still made up of strung together stories, books and memories. She looks at my potted Norfolk Island Pine and asks -- is this your Christmas tree?  Well she might wonder. Last year and the year before, I used it as such. Does she remember?


Evening. The feeling of too little time eases a bit. Maybe we're too hell bent on wanting more of what we already have. Time. I remember Christmas in the years when I had two little ones in tow. I was a law student. Final exams took up the first two weeks of December. I had four meals to plan and execute (eve dinner, day breakfast, day lunch, day dinner). Tree, purchase, trimming, house decorating, school events, teacher presents, in-law presents, and of course, daughter presents! Purchased after endless trips to stores (can you imagine -- no online shopping!).

Thirty years from now, our grandkids will tell a smarter, more capable Siri to do it all and then they'll still bemoan how there is just not enough time. Perhaps those words -- not enough time -- are just a short cut for admitting that things are going well and life can be so good and can we just continue like this for a while, a long while longer?

cornflower blue

I bring my daily morning animal report to Ed: I think Apple is hiding her eggs. Also, I searched the whole barn but found no kittens.
They're gone?
They're gone.

We'll never know what brings them here and what drives them away. Are they somewhere in the fields to the north of us?





We don't know.

Do you notice the wisps of blue in the sky this morning? Within a few hours, the clouds disperse. We're in for a lovely day -- perhaps the last of the days when we climb above freezing.

(Breakfast)






It's a perfect day for Ed and I to play disc golf, under skies that turn a beautiful cornflower blue.

Playing disc golf... we do it on the sly, creating our own goal points, as the real ones have been removed. (The course is closed for the winter.) Why would a park close for winter? Why wouldn't you encourage people to come out and play, especially on the occasional warm day?






Soon after, I head out to pick up Snowdrop.

The girl isn't napping today. This means that I have to proceed cautiously: she may be up for a lot, or she may be more fragile.

But those cornflower blue skies help: I tell her that we can go out to her school playground for a while. She rallies.






And she stays upbeat...





... all the rest of the day.

I don't intend Ocean to be a record of her life, and yet it feels incomplete not to mention two strong, and I mean really strong currents in my time with Snowdrop these days: first of all, she loves (and I mean really loves) when (in the car, because I refuse to take it outside the car) I tell her a (made up on the spot) story about this penguin family, which in some ways resembles her family, but in many ways has anxiety producing adventures that Snowdrop would not immediately think of as her own. (For example: a baby seal wonders to the penguin household on a stormy day ... what now???).

Secondly, she, herself, has become the consummate story teller.

Snowdrop knows how to hold her audience. She uses anything and everything in her knowledge base to enrich her stories, and when she is on a roll, you are spellbound! If she ever becomes a standup comic, do remember -- it started at age two.


I'll add just a few small details of our play together today. Here she is, working with a toy that you may think is rather conventional: you dress the kid. Yawn! Girlie stuff. But in fact, two months ago, she couldn't have done it. Too, the options are a bit funky, with unconventional garb and accoutrements.






I was late for everything thereafter because I could not get Snowdrop away from this new exploration of the creative and unusual.











It seems to me that at Snowdrop's age, allowing her to grow confident in manipulating her world is possibly the most important skill that I can support. And I know, too, that her creativity knows no bounds. Throw in her verbal strengths and she is a person you'll easily be able to hire for your next geeky invention project! (I'm only the grandma... but this is what I see.)


We're leaving the farmhouse. I'm about to drive her home. She begs to put on farmhouse clothes that I keep as a backup, especially for outdoor play. She is bubbling with excitement: mommy will be so surprised to see me like this! She will open the door and she will be so surprised!






We drive a bit and I note how gorgeous the post-sunset sky is. The plumes of cloud left by airplanes only add to the beauty of the evening. I stop the car and direct her attention to it.
She asks --  Is that a rocket? Did a rocket go by?





And then, as we resume our journey  -- please, grandma, can you tell me the penguin story now?

tidying up

A wagging finger follows me all morning long: what's this pile all about? -- asks the voice behind it. Wag, wag, wag, right in the direction of my small, very small kitchen stack of papers and magazines.
Papers and magazines. Where should they go?
Just saying. Surfaces, brimming with stuff!

All this because I nudged Ed to clear the mud room bench of his own piles in anticipation of the holidays. And when I set a deadline and only half the bench was cleared, I dumped the rest out on the porch.

But that wagging finger... and this? by the little TV? Wag, wag, wag... -- it leads me to now attack piles of stuff that I had once believed were essential to my existence. out goes everything!

The farmhouse grows tidier by the minute.

It's a morning for finishing up clearing and cleaning. And ribboning and tagging. And when all that is done, I get really ambitious! I paint the rooms.

(Caught in the act!)






I should correct that: I do not paint every wall in each and every room. But remember when some two years ago I touched up smudges and cracks and crevices with what turned out to be very glossy paint (even as our walls are matte)? Well, I have been meaning to correct these garish splashes of shine. Today, I finally did it. The smile of success!






All this of course after a morning visit with the kittens in the barn (still four, still hungry, still eager to eat what I give them) and after eating breakfast with Ed. Let's just showcase the breakfast flowers.  Ed himself looks too discombobulated to be included in the photo.





And in the afternoon, I pick up Snowdrop.

It's a bit of a special day, as her mom cuts out in the late afternoon to join us at the Olbrich Gardens. There, a room has been dedicated to a toy train set up, where two electric trains scoot this way and that, amidst poinsettas and other potted flowers.






Perhaps as exciting for Snowdrop are the rooms just across the hall, where she can explore the permanent collection of tropical plants.











When we leave, we are treated to a glorious sunset just across the lake.






Late into the evening, I linger at Snowdrop's home for a while...






It's festive, she's festive and so very delighted to have us both there.






A snuggle with mommy is always in the offering!






Toward the end of the evening, she shows off her newest delight at home: a few dance steps on the arm rest of an old chair.





It's not possible not to be charmed by her antics.

I drive home listening to grand seasonal music, smiling all the way.

farmette Sunday

Before farmhouse cleaning, before breakfast, before Ed is fully awake, I make my way to the barn. The cheepers are all over me, nudging each other to get as close as possible. It's a miracle that I don't tumble over them. Stay back, cheepers! I don't have anything for you! (Yet.)

Finally, I spot them.





One kitty. Another kitty.





And another. Four in all. The mom, as always, is nowhere to be seen.





I feed them. I feed the cheepers. I check for mice in the basement. It's one of those moments when farmette life really feels like farm life.

Yet it is all a bit of a mystery for us. We have one chicken who lays eggs. The others? Eh, not so much. The cats come and go. The mice? We trap some, the others outsmart us. And still, it all sort of comes together in the end. We manage. The animals seem content.

Cleaning and house scrubbing comes next. And finally, close to noon, there's breakfast.






For the afternoon, Ed found an "outdoor seminar" for us at the Arboretum. It's about conifers (trees that grow cones and have needle-like leaves).

Sure, it's an excuse to take a walk in the Arboretum. But too, Ed and I like learning about all the plants and animals that thrive around us.

I'll never mix up a white pine and a red pine again.





Nor will I look at a juniper berry without remembering that cedars are actually junipers in disguise.





And that fir needles are flat and friendly (their tips dont prick) while pines have needles that roll in your fingers.





I had seen a short news clip about how the next generation of kids is losing its close connection to nature. Children these days know fewer names of birds, trees and flowers.

If I want to be any kind of grandma, it is the one who keeps that connection to nature alive for my grandkids. Snowdrop already knows names of some trees and many flowers. She and I share a secret love of chestnuts and she keeps one in her jacket pocket and I keep its partner in mine.

Kids keep you on your toes. You learn so that they can learn from you.

And that is such a good thing.

(If you're looking for Sunday dinner pics -- no, not today. Holidays and social commitments make for an unusual Sunday for us all.)

Saturday in gentle sunshine

I come downstairs to fix breakfast. I glance out the kitchen window. This is so routine for me! I like to see how the light falls on the barn and sheep shed, especially on a day like this one, where the sun, though not intense, throws the kindest tones on our landscape!

But what's this?






Ed! Ed!! Come down quickly! The kitties are back!

He is instantly awake, downstairs, ready. We're prepared, we have kittie stuff!.

Do they remember? We come with food!






On Thanksgiving, there were five. Today, we count four. Plus mom, though mom is always out and about, hunting, hunting...

Four. Ed sets out bowls for five. They lick them clean, of course.






This is such a tough season for them. One seems to have drippy eyes. Four. Will they stay? Will they be gone soon?






We return to our beloved little farmhouse...






... for breakfast. In the sunshine.






Cheepers on alert. I think it's because they sense the kitties' presence.






In the afternoon, we go to Brooklyn. Not the New York one, the one next to us, with the Ice Age trail cutting through it.






It's a beautiful day to be out in Brooklyn, Wisconsin.






Yes, we still need to wear blaze orange. Guns, dogs -- we hear them. What are you hunting? -- Ed asks one guy getting out of a truck just next to us. Oh, rabbits, pheasant. That kind of stuff -- the hunter answers.

Well, at least they point their rifles low to the ground for that.






At the farmette, we tiptoe back to the barn. Will they be gone? Will we see them again?

They're here. Huddled. Watching us. No longer totally afraid.





There will always be more questions than we're able to answer. We can only hope that all is well. A little food, a little water. Perhaps it's enough. For now.

At the farmhouse, I resume holiday preparations. Menu planning. Ribboning packages. To the sound of music. In the light of the setting sun.

Friday

Early, oh so early. Why not sleep in? I'm retired. Sleeping in is what you do when you're retired.

Too much to do. Clock still set to Europe. Ed is restless. All good reasons to be wide awake.

Breakfast. Unusual, because Ed says -- okay, I'll eat something more than just a bowl of fruit. And, too, it's all early. He has work, I have stuff to do.






Food shopping. I go to my favorite grocery store and ask: can I reserve a bunch of endive for Christmas? I got a very quizzical look on that one, but hey, I want to braise endive and the availability of this beloved (by me) veggie is typically sketchy.

Afternoon: time to pick up Snowdrop. I enter the classroom. Everywhere there are little tykes sleeping and there's Snowdrop, parading up and down the room in bare feet, a little bit at loose ends.  Another no nap day for her. She must be so tired. Snowdrop is a girl who needs lots of sleep to keep those sails billowing forward.

Well, okay. We will keep to a tame schedule. 

(No coat again. By choice. Hey, it's 31F! -- just a tiny bit below freezing!)





At the farmhouse now. We have left school but now we are playing school. Her babies are the students. I think I am, in her mind, that too. This is music class. Snowdrop has a nice, strong voice!






Yes she does!






And a good bang, with her entire soul into it.






As always, the holidays just sort of creep up on us. Quickly, magically.






I think about this as Snowdrop leaves, the restaurant up the highway delivers sushi and Ed comes back from a day at work. The day is aglow. Preholiday, December, Friday at the farmette aglow.