Category Archives: Books

The Stocking Formula

I do think I’m making all this sound a lot grander then it actually is.  It’s just that I’ve been filling children’s stockings for 16 years now and in that time I’ve gotten a feel for what works for our family and what doesn’t.  As I noticed a certain pattern emerging over the time, I found that just being able to mentally plug in something to fit each category really simplified things for me, so that I don’t feel like I’m starting from scratch with five empty stockings each year.

Now in our household the stockings are ostensibly filled by Santa Claus, though at the moment no one is in a very Santa place; fickle, jaded little creatures.  I jest!  I jest!  Really either way is fine.  And we only started doing the Santa thing at all at their request.  But that’s the context that this tradition was born of.  The stocking gifts tend to be the only ones we wrap in paper.  It seemed unlikely that Santa would use the gift bags obviously made by me, therefore…  Plus there is something undeniably more exciting about tearing the wrapping off a package compared to opening a bag.  And since all other gifts, at all other points in the year are wrapped in play silks or fabric bags, that little bit of paper is an extra special treat.

Each child’s stocking gifts are wrapped in a specific color, every year without fail; one child’s in silver, another in gold, green, red, blue.  That way, even if everyone dumps the contents on the floor and it all gets mixed up, everyone knows without a doubt which gifts belong to whom.  Also, as you will see below, sometimes not all of the stocking contents actually fit in the stocking.  Which seems counterintuitive, I know.  But you will understand better in a moment.  In that case the ill-fitting gift is placed under the stocking and again the color-coded wrapping saves on confusion.  Also, it’s just a sweet little detail!

On to the formula: candy canes, gum, a deck of cards, art or craft supplies, a beautiful book and an optional practical item (as needed).

Candy Canes- I know of two companies that make big, beautiful, old-fashioned candy canes- worthy of pride of place, hanging out over the stocking’s edge- without the use of corn syrup or artificial dyes.  Hammond’s “Natural” line of candy canes come in a wide variety of flavors and Giambri’s (a little smaller and more moderately priced) come in both traditional mint and lemon.  Both companies still make other candy canes with more questionable ingredients, so be extra careful to purchase from their “all-natural” lines.  Yes, they are still sticks of pure sugar, but it’s Christmas.

For tiny ones we substitute fruit leather.  For tiny-tiny ones fresh fruit.

Gum- B-Fresh Gum.  A very rare treat.  This one is sugar free, corn free, gluten free, etc. Has no artificial ingredients or preservatives and is actually a source of water soluble calcium and b-12.

Same substitutions as above for wee folks.

A Deck of Card- Our family plays a lot of card games, usually over meals.  Cards lead a rough existence here!  In the event that we feel that enough have survived the year we make a substitution here.  I think that happened once.  Most often it’s just a deck of cheap regular old playing cards as they suit our needs just fine.  Occasionally someone will get another sort of card game entirely, such as Skip-Bo, Uno, or Quiddler (one of our all-time favorite games!).

Art or Craft- This can be anything from a pack of window crayons to a ball of yarn to a set of woodworking files depending on the age and interests of the child.  This is one area where the size and shape of an object might not conform to stocking dimensions.  So while one child’s colored pencils might fit and another’s carving knife is just fine, the third’s lap loom might need to rest below the stocking.  I prefer to get them something from each category, and from that whatever really suits the child, rather than just something that will fit.

A Beautiful Book- Not just any book, but a truly special one, chosen with great care that hopefully really speaks to the child and meets them where they are at.  There are few greater gifts.  I have a personal rule that I only buy them books that are either not available through our interlibrary loan system or which I know they will read many, many times over.  Board books and many novels fit nicely in most stockings, but picture books or say a beautifully illustrated, hardbound collection of poetry, do not.  So this another area where some of the books may be in stockings and some may not, since I want to give everyone a book no matter what phase they are in.

Miscellaneous (optional)- Some years there might be a little something else, usually something practical. This year for example, everyone is getting a small wooden comb because they all keep borrowing Mairi’s which is now broken and in need of replacing!

A Note on doll stockings:

This one is kind of the wild card.  Many, many moons ago, on an adorable impulse, the older boys and I sewed a set of stockings for their beloved Waldorf dolls and the doll stockings became something of a family tradition.

Some ides for filling doll stockings:

  • shoes, hats or any other doll accessories
  • small crystals or gemstones
  • little gnomes or smaller dolls to act as the dolls’ dolls
  • a small wooden or needle felted animal, a little teddy bear
  • a tiny house plant
  • a little edible treat (you would be amazed at how giving most dolls can be, they almost always are willing to share with their keepers!)
  • dolly dress-ups: doll sized fairy wings, a wee gnome hat, a cape, etc

While I used to lean towards the fancier things on this list, these days it tends to be something very simple, like a crystal or bit of food.

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Books, celebrations and festivals, Food, Holidays, Kids, Mothering
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red and green

“Birthday traditions will not of their own accord become simpler, rather the reverse, and it is not difficult to imagine that traditions generated with enthusiasm can, in certain circumstances, become a burden.” ~ The Birthday Book: Celebrations for Everyone

The holiday season leads right into the birthday season in this house, with three birthdays in January, one in February, one in March and a break in April before our final child birthday in May.  Currently, I’m reading about birthdays while planning food for the Solstice and knitting for Christmas.  The knitting bit is a warm surprise for a certain little someone, with my current favorite everyday yarn, in the rich, festive ‘Hollyberry’.

A hand-made doll for her child (this was the only gift mentioned), a house decorated with greenery, odd bits of roots and foraged slices of wood mixed with white fairy lights, with plans for a day spent dancing, singing and eating nourishing foods.  This is the description of a Christmas celebration that I remember reading many years ago that has stuck with me.  As far as I’m concerned, it sounds just right.  Our own celebrations have become too complicated.  It’s time to scale back.  Mostly I want to reassess how we handle gifts.  We’ve always tried to keep things fun, but moderate.  In recent years we took up the “something they want, something they need, something to wear and something to read” concept, to which I tacked on art supplies as we always seem to be ready to replenish by this time of year.  It sounds fairly simple.  But with five children that’s 25 gifts!  Without taking into account a few odds and ends in stockings, not to mention gifts for any of our other loved ones or the gifts and planning required for our big double birthday celebration just 11 days after Christmas.  Even so, it might not be so bad if I didn’t have such high standards for the items I’m willing to purchase.  If I was willing to buy just anything…even if it’s likely to break…or potentially toxic…or from a sweatshop…or crass…or too much money…etc….it might not be such trouble.  But that’s not something I’m willing to compromise on.  As things are, it’s too much time, too much money, too much stress and much too much time spent on the computer shopping for me.   I’ve had a late season epiphany (erm, private little hissy fit? It’s a fine line.) and announced that each child would be getting one present under the tree.  They were all like, “ok” and went right back to what they were doing….I mentioned it would mean more time to be together and that I wouldn’t feel so strained and someone said that would be a much better gift.  Right.  And all this time Steve and I have been fretting about expectations and precedents having been set.  Eye opening.

It’s not quite as little as it seems as everyone will have a nice full stocking (have I ever shared my stocking formula here?  Would you like me to?) and there will be Christmas Eve pajamas of course.  And they all like to give gifts to each other.  So really it becomes quite a lot, without even taking extended family into consideration, and I wonder why I’ve fussed about it for all this time?

I’m also reading The Princess and the Goblin.  Firstly because I’m not yet too old for a good fairy story and secondly to see what hands would be best to set it into next.

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Books, celebrations and festivals, Holidays, Kids, Life, WIP, Yarn Crafts
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bits and pieces

The older boys are studying Emily Dickinson just now.  I ordered a great heap of books from the library, including The Gorgeous Nothings (ack, that title! sublime), which is a collection of Emily’s “envelope poems”.   It’s just beautiful and such an intimate little glimpse, it kind of makes me giddy.

I’ve been working on Iain’s quilt whenever he’s out of the house.  It’s absolutely exhausting.  How pathetic that I find something a simple as sewing exhausting!  It’s not exactly something one thinks of as strenuous.  But there you have it.  Exhausting, but satisfying.

The plan for it was very simple, uniform, and symmetrical.  And following that plan I very rapidly depleted my fabric stores.  Which is when I switched to using every little scrap in anyway I could.  I’ve since moved on to quilting it completely at random.  There is no method to the madness.  I have absolutely no idea how it’s going to turn out.  After all this work it could be completely hideous.  Or not.  It’s a mystery.  The whole of it is deep winter; frost covered trees, glittering stars set in the deepest of dark blues, snow and owls like the one that haunts our compost pile when the snow lays thick all about.

After what was frankly a terrible morning, full of strife and family discord, I was in for extensive blood work (again) tonight.  It was kind of a monstrous affair with 14 vials needing to be filled and them not being able to find a vein (seriously, the technician kissed my arm in relief when after much jabbing she finally found one she could use on the second side).  As I sat in the waiting room knitting, a little girl went in for her tests, and I listened to her cry thinking how glad I was that I was the one in for testing this time and not one of my children.  A smiling older woman struck up a conversation with me.  That on it’s own was so pleasant and friendly in a room full of disgruntled looking people staring at their phones.  The arthritis in her hands made it so that she can no longer knit.  It was her father’s birthday as well as mine, though her father had long since passed.  She had four children of her own, though she had lost a grown son to cancer 6 months prior.  And here our conversation was cut short.

I came home woozy and shaking with both arms bruised, but keenly feeling my blessings.  I called and wished my father a happy birthday this morning.  I worked a bit on knitting little gifts, something that feels so connected to the very essence of who I am.  I’ve hugged each of my children today, many, many times for some and no one has prodded them with needles or anything else.  Back at home the children bustled about, making dinner so that I could rest and concentrate on caring for the little one who was missing me.  She kept laying her whole self on top of me and snuggling in tight.  It’s been a very good day.

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Books, Life, sewing, WIP
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delicate lace

That’s the name of the paint color that we are oh, so slowly covering most of our first floor in.  I like to think that I’m above being influenced by the names of colors.  Surely I can’t be swayed by something so superficial?  The wildly disproportionate number of colors we’ve used with textile related names seems to indicate otherwise!Every morning two pajama clad little girls hide in my curtains giggling.

I never shared Seraphina’s toddler blanket, though it’s been done for six months or so now.  I meant to get very official photos of it laid out to block or hung up in the sunshine or most especially, me carrying her all bundled up in it.  But of course I never did any of that.  All I have are a few pictures that happen to include her shawl.  Including the two that I just happened to snap while admiring it one day.

Usually I’m not the least bit conceited about my knitting projects.  I enjoy making them and I enjoy using them, but I don’t think that makes me anything special exactly.  I’m just so tickled by this particular knit, completely smitten really, that I feel as though perhaps just a bit of it’s glory is reflected back on me and sometimes when I look at it, I confess that I may be just a wee bit pleased with myself.  

It’s huge.  I made the large version.  I used an adult sized sleeping bag, unzipped, to block it and the blanket stretched to it’s full width and length.

It was worked in soft and squishy Bare Stroll Fingering Sock Yarn. The undyed yarn is a beautiful warm cream color and using it meant that I could make a mostly merino blanket for a very reasonable price.

Her shawl- for a shawl it truly is, knit in the traditional Shetland Hap Shawl style, is much beloved.  She always sleeps under it.  She’s carried down from her naps wrapped in her creamy woolen cocoon.  It’s understood that she’s not really awake and ready to join in life again until she’s willing to shed her shawl.  Mairi is rather jealous and has asked me to make her one.  I can’t blame her really.  I dream of having one of my own as well.

I’m now reading Why Can’t I Get Better?  all the way through and it’s fabulous.  I highly recommend it to anyone suffering from chronic illness.

 

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baby things, Books, Kids, Life, snapshots, Yarn Crafts
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comfort knitting

More simple baby knits in soul soothing baby colors.  As mindless as mindless can be.  And even so I noticed a mistake in my first row of ribbing.  Ribbing for goodness sake!  Can you imagine?  And I also decided I was too beat to care enough to fix it.

I’m just barely reading Anne of the Island from the Anne of Green Gables series.  I picked it up at random in the bathroom one day.  Are other people’s houses like this?  We have books everywhere, but they seem to kind of funnel here.  Especially in the upstairs one where Galen thinks he’s being clever and sly by hiding out in there to read after lights out time.  Once a week or so, usually over Sunday dinner, I’ll mention that I counted, say, 11 books in there earlier and as there aren’t 11 people in this house that can read, it seems like maybe some of them could be returned to shelves?  I don’t even know who was responsible for the appearance of this one, but no one has complained about it going missing yet.  I could be reading any one of my more serious books, but I’m so tired that I wouldn’t remember a bit of them anyway and so the balm of good, old, reliable, steadfast Anne with an “E” it is.

Wee Miss Seraphina Violet Juliette, usually the very picture of glowing, roly-poly, rose cheeked health, who never gets any more than a touch of what may be going around, has developed the worst case of croup that I’ve ever borne witness to, resulting in several scary, sleepless nights for the both of us.  Thankfully it has just about run its course.  It’s been such a relief to hear her singing to herself again, even if her voice is still just barely more than a little squeak.  Things seem to be improving, but it’s been another very long week, in a streak of long weeks.

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baby things, Books, Kids, Life, Mothering, WIP, Yarn Crafts
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white sands and grey sands

     This post is all interrelated, but only from my perspective.  It’s all curled around and into itself like that shell.  I could try to explain it, but I don’t think it would make much of a difference to you.

Do you know that song?  We used to sing it as a round in the family folk chorus we attended years ago.  I often found myself humming it or singing softly to myself as I worked on this little dress, while sitting on a beach back in June.  That Rabbit Heather Tweed yarn with it’s little flecks of rich brown and delicate beige reminds me so much of the sand on the shores of a particular pristine kettle pond, one of my very favorite spots in the world.  It’s peaceful there.  This entire dress was knit while we were away, but I only recently worked in the ends and added the button.  I thought it was so of that place that I needed to work some part of it in somehow.  I brought home a little pouch of trinkets that I thought might work: small shells, smooth pebbles.  This sea snail shell seemed to make the best button.

Reading, reading, reading; thinking and researching and reading some more.  I’m reading Why Can’t I Get Better: Solving the Mystery of Lyme and Chronic Disease in bits and pieces, whatever sections seem most relevant.

     Healing Lyme: Natural Healing and Prevention of Lyme Borreliosis and Its Coinfections by Stephen Buhner came highly recommended to me, and is rather heavy as you might imagine.  It’s a very valuable resource, full to the brim with important information.  Yet, I’ve been struggling to get through it.  In the beginning it was because vision problems were causing me difficulties, but also because it was freaking me out and I could only assimilate the info in small doses.  Even so it still made me feel like there were ticks all over me and tiny worms corkscrewing themselves into my eyeballs and brain.  I’m towards the end now, where I thought I would feel hopeful and I suppose I do to a degree, but the protocol is vast and over-whelming, so there is that as well.

Then there is Out of the Woods: Healing Lyme Disease for Mind, Body and Spirit, also difficult for me to read, but for entirely different reasons.  While the other books come from a more technical place, this one is mostly a memoir.  One that I can relate to so intimately.  For most of the book she is struggling- desperate and suffering.  When she describes how she feels physically it conjures up such a strong and acute sense memories for me of the way that I felt or the way I still feel.  All the same it is inspiring and very much worth reading.

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baby things, Books, EDS / POTS, Kids, Life, Mama Care, Yarn Crafts
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moss and sky

I’m almost finished with Mairi Rose’s birthday dress.  Is it wrong that I already have her birthday sweater for next year (technically the year after since it will be 5 days into 2017) picked out?  Is it wrong that the same can be said for four out of my five children?

I’m using up the last of the yarn my friend gave me to make Seraphina a little pullover.  It has a crazy big collar.  I’m in the midst of something of a collar obsession, but this is the first time that I’m actually acting on it.  The yarn is the mossiest of moss colors!  When she wears it I believe we will be at risk of losing her in the woods.

We are solidly into woolens season now.  My Sweet Wild Violet is outgrowing most of her bonnets, placing a collection of sweet toddler hats on my must-knit list.  I’m secretly pleased to have such an excuse.  Little bonnets are one of my very favorite things to knit!

I just started reading Kim John Payne’s latest book.  I actually bought it for myself.  I very rarely buy myself books, preferring to avail myself of our local library system.  But I felt certain that I would want to revisit this one often, delving deeper with each return.

Steve brought home a crate of clemetines yesterday.  The house smells like Christmas.  I’m starting to get serious about making plans for the coming holiday/birthday season.  What about you?

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baby things, Books, Gardens, Kids, WIP, Yarn Crafts
6 Replies

32/52, 33/52, 34/52

Some how there were very few pictures of Galen the last several weeks?  It happens that way sometimes, where one child isn’t represented for a while.  At other times there will be a ridiculous surplus of photos of that very same child (see the post below!).

Some highlights: A tree fort in progress, late season sheering, a first tooth lost, berry picking in her new favorite hat, the joy of a new play space, and a tiny girl who continues to climb into or onto everything she can find.

Mastitis is the ailment of the week.  It’s just been a constant barrage since the beginning of June. I’m starting to have serious concerns about the abilities of my immune system.

I’ve been watching talks given by Shefali Tsabary on YouTube.  There is great strength there.  I plan on checking our library for her books.

I wanted to thank all of the people who have commented on this post.  I was truly touched by your observations and kind words.  These days, for the most part, there are only a few people who comment regularly here.  Sometimes I feel like I’m mostly just talking out loud to myself.  It was nice to be reminded that there are other people out there, busy people like me, who don’t always have the time or the desire to make their presence known, but who none the less, are still appreciative of this space.

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52, Books, building, Kids, Life, photography, snapshots
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Yarn Along

Yesterday Seraphina said “yarn” for the first time, over and over again, while sweetly sitting and playing by herself with a lovely basketful.  I don’t know that I’ve ever been more proud or pleased.  I called everyone from all over the house to come and hear her.

I’ve made a decent dent in Iain’s birthday sweater (above), though I confess to neglecting it a bit this week as I seem to have developed a crush on Galen’s birthday sweater, which has left me rather preoccupied.

I’ve been reading Nelson Mandela’s Conversations with Myself, partially to see if it’s a good summer reading option for the older boys.  I’m enjoying it, but I think that without at least some background and a general feel for the course of events, it might be hard to follow.  The entire book consists of snippets of conversations and correspondence, none of which is presented chronologically.  Which isn’t a criticism.  It works for me, I just don’t think it’s the best option as an introduction to Mandela’s life.  I think I’ll try Long Walk to Freedom.  I’ve not read it before.

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Books, Homeschooling, Kids, WIP, Yarn Crafts
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raw

(except for yarn)

I just finished reading The Good Life Lab: Radical Experiments in Hands-On Living.  It was fine, I guess.  I never really got into it.  A childless couple who are into conceptual art and electronics, living in the dessert and essentially homesteading.  It’s wonderful that there are so many ways for people to step to the side of consumer culture and take more control and responsibility for their own lives.  They just came at it from a very different angle, most of which doesn’t really apply to my life or really appeal to me either.  I think it’s very unlikely that I’m going to be doing a lot of prickly pear cacti wildcrafting in the mountains of New England!

“The chains of the body are often wings to the spirit.” ~Nelson Mandela

I’m still working on that blanket.  Approximately, 49,840 stitches so far (I don’t know what my thing is with knitting math lately).  It’s been something of an obsession for me.  A great many of those stitches, especially in the beginning, where knit laying down with eyes closed.  Many times I would pick it up as a distraction, to try to knit through pain, both physical and emotional.  It’s been kind of a life line for me.  If I can just keep knitting this blanket, full of the past and making way for the future, just maybe everything will be ok.

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Books, Life, WIP, Yarn Crafts
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