Top Ten Adult Reads of 2018

I’m not sure how I did it, but I read 109 books last year. 5 of those were picture books that snuck into the list and 24 of them were chapter books that I read with my 6-year-old, which means that I read 80 books for me and me alone. When I look back on them, it feels like a year of self-indulgence and luxury. There’s nothing like a good stack of books to make you feel like you’re traveling the world, meeting some of the most amazing (and maybe also some of the worst) people you’ve ever met.

Out of my 80 “adult reads” last year, there were ten that rose to the top as my favorites - and one extra that I added list because - well - it’s Jane Austen and she can’t be left out. Here are my favorites from 2018 - in no particular order.

The Snow Child - This was the last book I read in 2018, and I’m SO glad I snuck it in in the last week. I had thought about waiting until there was snow on the ground, but it came so highly recommended that I just couldn’t wait to open it. Once I started reading, I couldn’t put it down. This book pulled at my heart in so many directions, and it’s a book I will read over and over again. It’s a magical fairy tale that will break your heart and full you with so much joy all at the same time. If you need a good book this winter, this should be at the top of your list.

Where the Crawdads Sing - I highly recommend the Audio version of this one. It was simply incredible. It made me think a lot about my own family roots, it made me miss the south, and the ending left me stunned. It’s a fantastic story of survival and of beating the odds. I was crushed when it was over.

I’ll Be Your Blue Sky - This was one of my favorite summer reads in 2018. It’s light-hearted and beautifully written. I had not ever read Loved Walked in or Belong to Me, so the characters were unknown to me. I love the way the story lines of two different women are interwoven to tell an intricate and beautiful story of finding oneself. I loved it so much that I read the first book written (Loved Walked In) and was sorely disappointed. I’ll Be Your Blue Sky stands alone - and far above - the other two books with the same characters.

The Light We Lost - This book captivated me from the first page. I fell in love with the characters, got angry at the characters, and really felt every emotion they were going through. It's a beautiful portrayal of love, temptation, despair, and how life may not always be as black and white as we might think. Although I disagreed with the actions of the main character, Lucy, I always FELT why she did what she did. Relationships are so complicated - love is so complicated - and this book really lifts that up in a beautifully written way. 

The Broken Girls - I’m not usually a fan of thrillers, but this one was exceptional. It was creepy without being too over the top. This is another one that’s worth an Audible credit - I really enjoyed hearing the story told to me as opposed to reading the words on the page. It was suspenseful, entertaining, and a story well told.

Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine - I bought this book on a whim back in June when I was heading to a wedding and thought I might have a few extra hours of quiet. I tried to start it that very same day, but found it boring and whiney. I’ve told you before how I’m not afraid to put down mediocre books - and how, if the reviews are really really good, I’m also not afraid to pick them up and try again. I’m so glad I picked this one back up in the Fall, because I found it to be brilliant. It’s a book of character development, so read it when you’re ready to really dig into the characters - not when you’re wanting something full of action. It made me feel all the emotions, which is the true sign of a great book. I feel like Eleanor is a good friend, and because of that I’m pretty sure I’ll read this one over and over again.

An American Marriage - And now we’ve come to the books that had me coming undone at the seams. This one was so hard for me on an emotional level. It brings up contemporary issues of race, which always makes me angry at the world we live in and also a tiny bit uncomfortable (as it should). It’s not simply about race though - it also brings up topics of love and fidelity - and is just gut-wrenching on so many levels. But you guys … it’s SO SO good. If you didn’t read it in 2018, make 2019 the year you do.

Brown Girl Dreaming - I’ve had this on my TBR pile since it came out in 2016, and finally got to it this year. It’s a memoir written as poetry and is quite possibly one of the best pieces of creative writing I’ve read in a long time. It’s a quick read, and it’s one I’ll add to our school repertoire in a few years.

Dreamland Burning - Another book that made me think a lot about race relations, my southern roots, and just how far away we are as a society from where we should be. This one has a historical component to it, which I really enjoyed.

All We Ever Wanted - This is Emily Giffin’s best novel, by far. I’ve always been a Giffin fan, but her books usually fall in my beach bag and get devoured in a matter of hours, without much real deep thought. This book is so different. It’s incredibly thought-provoking, and brings up so many issues that I wanted to dig into with a group of friends.

Bonus - Pride & Prejudice - I am so ashamed that in 38 years of living, I had never read any Jane Austen. At the start of last year, I promised myself I’d get through at least two classics and this was one I chose. It was a slower read for me, because of the old English that it’s written in, but I really enjoyed it. I found myself really identifying with the characters and dreaming of what life may have been like. When I finished it, I watched the 1995 BBC production of it (hello Colin Firth!) and it made me appreciate the book even more. I’ve decided 2019 will be the year I read the rest of her stuff - because - well, why not?!

So there you have it. My favorite “adult reads” of 2018. What were your favorite books last year? What’s currently on your nightstand?

Some Thoughts on Spring in New England

When a person loses the ability to take pleasure in the mundane - in the cigarette on the stoop or the gingersnap in the bath - she has probably put herself in unnecessary danger. ... One must be prepared to fight for one’s Simple pleasures and to defend them against elegance and erudition and all manner of glamorous enticements. ~Rules Of Civility

I’m just gonna be real for a second. Spring in New England sucks. It's not the deep dark days of Winter that get me down in New England. At least not this year. This year, I found those early Winter days to be magical - the early darkness of days, the forced slowness and calm, the limited sunlight. I knew it doesn't last forever, that the light returns, and that Spring DOES show up. But the six weeks between we set our clocks back and Memorial Day ... that's the real struggle. We are in the hardest six weeks of life for me here. It's the time when we think Spring should be here. We should be able to go outside in something other than snowsuits and boots. We might still need hats, mittens, and coats - but we shouldn't have to be getting all suited up just to go on a walk. The sun might feel warm, but the wind tells a different story. Instead of seeing flowers and new birth, we look outside and see a sea of white. It almost always snows in March ... and the last few years it's snowed the first week of April as well.

Meanwhile back in Georgia, people are packing away the heavy coats (if they ever got them out at all), are spending long days full of sunshine and playing outside, and are maybe even planting Spring gardens. They are cutting fresh flowers for their centerpieces and getting ready for the start of farmer's markets. 

But I embarked on a journey to embrace the seasons this year ... and to find the beauty in it all. What I'm learning is that my way of embracing these terrible early Spring days is by hibernating. It's my time to just be still inside my house. I ignore the world around me as much as possible. It's the time of year when I regularly say no when people invite me to hang out. I know that better days are coming, but right now ... I just can't bear to do anything except hibernate in my own hole and pretend the world outside me doesn't exist.

It's my time to practice my bread making. It's my time to use up the contents of my freezers (yes ... there are multiple.) To clean the house from top to bottom. To rearrange furniture. To read books. To pray. To write. It's now, more than any other time of the year, that I just long to be alone. Now is the time that I'm doing all I can to take pleasure in the simple - in the mundane - in the quiet.

I know that soon, the snow will melt. The sun will shine it's warm rays and the wind won't be quite as crisp. I know the flowers will bloom and we'll be out of the house more often than not. Come summer, our days will be full of fun. Full of friends. Full of sunshine and picnics and beaches.  

There is a season for everything ... this is my season for being still. 

Staying Out of the Grocery Store

I have a whopping goal for February: to buy no groceries except milk, eggs, yeast (because we are completely out) and the occasional cheese. We gave up the grocery store for Lent last year, and it seems that February is as good a time as any to start being diligent about eating out of the freezer.

This was my goal for January - but sales on fresh fruit, baby carrots, and spinach did me in. And then we ran out of pasta. And then we ran out of flour. And then I didn't have Worcestershire sauce. Or Soy Sauce. And then I saw rotisserie chickens at Costco - while I was there to pick up cheese. I guess there are worse things to splurge on ... but I'm REALLY trying to stick to our commitment to eat locally and seasonally. I promise the berries I bought were not local. Nor was the spinach. So January was a fail. We'll try again this month.

This should be easy for me. Our freezers are STOCKED with food. And we still have a bi-weekly Winter CSA pickup that includes some storage crops, dairy, and meat. It's not that we really NEED groceries. It's just that I get an idea in my head to make something for dinner, and then I don't have an ingredient, so I end up at the grocery store - where things are on sale - and I end up buying food that we don't really need (but we'll eat) and spending money that I could spend on something else later down the road. Anyone else have this problem?

So I'm going to rely on you my dear readers, to keep me accountable. Is anyone really out there reading this anyway?? I figure I'll check in at the end of every week and share what we've eaten and how we're being creative with what we have. It'll be a delayed CSA Adventures so to speak ... you'll see how we're using our CSA goods after they've been stored, instead of fresh off the garden. It'll be fun, right?? Heck, maybe we'll even create a few new recipes!

So who's ready for some freezer-inspired fun?

Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash.

Snow Day Maple Candy

When we made the decision to stay in Massachusetts instead of moving back to Georgia, we agreed that we had to do something to embrace the change of seasons. By now ya'll know winter is the hardest for me - it's cold ... snowy ... and it consists of bundling and unbundling small children any time you have to go outside. But I'm committed to this place ... and so this Winter I've been committed to appreciating the season that we're in, and finding the good things. After all ... There is a season for everything, right? (Cue the music...)

One of the ways we've embraced Winter this year is by making a list of all the snow-day activities we want to do. Then when there's snow on the ground, we can bundle ourselves up and make some fun out of it. After all - my kids adore the snow - and I just can't imagine their little lives without it anymore. So one day this week, when we were surprised by a couple of inches of snow, we decided to take a cue from Ma and Pa in our Little House in the Big Woods book and try our hand at making Maple Candy.

As you can see here, I poured way too much maple syrup in our pie pan of snow, so then we rushed outside to add more snow, thinking that would help it solidify; but all it really did was turn it into a big pie plan of mush. We ended up with something that resembled maple snow cream ... but we did end up with a few pieces of soft taffy at the bottom. Next time I'll use less syrup and boil it a bit longer so it hardens a little more. Regardless, it was delicious, and we made a happy Winter memory - so all in all, I'd say it was a big win.

Chicken and Dumplings

 “They are great in soup,” she said. “But I don’t really like soup,” I confessed to my best friend, who is convinced that soup is THE greatest thing to eat during the winter months. “It’s like drinking your food .... and I’m just not okay with that. I mean, I like to eat it maybe once a month ... but not once a week - and definitely not several times a week!”

We were talking about how to use the parsnips I have in my fridge from my CSA share. They keep piling up - like my beets - because I just can’t figure out how to get my family to eat them. And THEN ... then she said something brilliant.

”What if you add dumplings to it? Then it’s a little more hearty.” 

Spoken like a true Southerner. I just love her. And since that moment I have been dreaming about how to turn leftover chicken into chicken soup with dumplings.

I am pleased to say that I nailed this one on the first try. That doesn’t always happen, but after I took the first couple of bites I proclaimed to my family, “Man I love when something works.” And work it did.  

This is a perfect recipe for a lazy day at home (if you need to make broth) or you can make it a quick weeknight recipe by using chicken broth you already have (which is what I did). It’s cold and rainy today and this was a perfect rainy Sunday afternoon lunch.

Ingredients: 

For the soup:
2-3 cups leftover chicken
2-3 carrots, chopped (1-2 cups)
1 parsnip, chopped (1/2 cup)
1 onion  (1/2 cup)
1 cup chopped celery (I used frozen) 
2 cloves garlic
2 tbsp butter
8 cups chicken broth  
salt and pepper to taste
1 tsp Herbs de provence (you can also use a blend of thyme, rosemary, and whatever else you like)

For the dumplings:
1 1/3 cup flour
2 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
2/3 cup milk
1 tbsp butter (melted)
Pinch of herbs (I used Herbs de Provence) 

Directions:

Melt butter in a large dutch oven or soup pan. Add parsnips, carrots, onion and celery. Cook 5-7 minutes or until they smell amazing. Add a pinch of salt, garlic, and the herbs. Mix well and cook 1-2 minutes longer. Add chicken and broth. Bring to a boil and season with salt and pepper to taste. Turn down the heat and let it simmer for 15 minutes or so. While you wait, mix your dumpling ingredients, taking care not to overmix. You want it just barely incorporated. 

When your veggies are mostly tender, drop spoonfuls of the dumpling batter into the soup. When all the batter is in the pot, cover your pot and turn the heat to low. Let it cook for 15-18 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out of the dumplings clean.

That’s it! You’re done! Chicken and dumplings as good as my Grandma used to make!

Note:  We store the leftovers separately so the dumplings don’t get mushy or fall apart. The soup will freeze well, but the dumplings won’t - but who ends up with leftover dumplings anyway?!

Celebrating Candlemas

Today marks the midway point between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox.  You guys ... that means we're halfway through Winter!!! When doing some lesson planning last week, I discovered that there's a real name for this celebratory day - Candlemas! It's mostly celebrated in Europe, but let me tell you ... I'm a huge fan and am determined to make it an annual celebration in this New England household. Although the end of Winter is misleading here in Massachusetts and we tend to have snow into the Spring, this day helps me remember that Summer WILL come - no matter how cold and snowy it might be today.

But there's an even more special thing about today ... it's the 40th day of Christmas. I know ... I know ... it's technically Epiphany and not Christmas anymore, but there's something significant about this 40 day mark. 40 days after Jesus was born, Mary & Joseph took him to the temple, where they met Simeon. Simeon had been promised that he would not die before he met the Lord's Messiah. He had waited his entire life for this day ... and upon the presentation of Jesus he knew without a doubt that this baby was the Messiah the world had been promised. 

Now, Lord you let your servant go in peace: your word has been fulfilled. My own eyes have seen the salvation which you have prepared in the sight of every people; a light to reveal you to the nations and the glory of your people Israel. ~Luke 2: 29-32

There's something so significant to me that we celebrate this Feast of Simeon right smack dab in the middle of Winter. Right when we are all waiting for the light to return. Right when we think we can't press on any further in these dark, cold days of winter ... we are reminded that the Light has come. That more light is on its way. That God has fulfilled ... and continues to fulfill ... his promises to us.

I mean ... how can we NOT celebrate a day like today?! When I discovered all these wonderful things about this 2nd day of February, I decided we'd make today a special day. Here's what we're up to today:

Morning Light - this is what I call our Morning Time together. This is the start of our homeschool day together and usually includes a reading from the Bible, singing our monthly hymn, talking about the weather, the calendar, and the season we are in, poetry readings, and usually a picture book of some kind. Today we lit candles all around us, learned about how people celebrate Candlemas in Europe, read the Presentation of Jesus at the Temple in Luke 2, watched a video of the Song of Simeon (which, by the way, gave me chills and brought tears to my eyes), talked about what we're waiting for (Me - Warmth! A - Gramma to come visit! E - someone to give us new kittens), and then I had them cozy up under blankets by the fire while I told them the fairy tale of the Snowdrop.

Art - We then moved to the kitchen counter, armed ourselves with paper and oil pastels, to create a piece of art that represented how we heard the story. I love doing this with the girls - especially with stories that have very few pictures - because it really encourages them to think about what they've read and be creative about what they imagine. After we finished our pictures and talked about what we drew, I showed them illustrations from a Kindle version of the story.

Crepes - One of the traditional ways people celebrate Candlemas is by eating crepes or pancakes - the round shape symbolizes the long days of sunshine that are up ahead; so we'll be including crepes in our dinner plan for the evening. We'll have breakfast for dinner with savory crepes full of eggs and bacon and sweet crepes full of jelly or Nutella. We love any excuse for crepes - and it's been a while since we've made them, so the girls are quite excited for tonight's dinner. And of course we'll eat by candlelight - because today is the day we celebrate light after all!!

Singing - For a week now I've had the Song of Simeon from my Lutheran youth days in my head but I've been unable to find music for it anywhere. Today a good friend came to my rescue and send me a picture of what I had been singing - and I'm so excited to share it with my girls tonight after dinner. I dearly miss good Lutheran liturgy, so I love being able to incorporate it into our family life as much as possible.

Nature Journal - Later this afternoon we'll grab our nature journals and add an entry about Snowdrops. They aren't sprouting here yet - it's still a little early for that - but it's fun to anticipate their arrival. We're hopeful that there are some in our yard ... and if not, they'll be the first bulbs we plant in the Fall!

Decorating Candles - I had great intentions to make candles today, but I never got my act together to buy wicks, so instead, we may decorate some tapered candles from Trader Joes that I have stashed in a drawer. Honestly - whether or not we get to this project is yet to be determined ... it just depends on how well my girls can get along the rest of the day. At the moment, things aren't looking so promising ;-)

Planning Seeds - This is more my activity than one that I'll share with anyone else - but hey, every Mom needs some self-care, right?! It's the time of year when we start to plant seeds for our Spring and Summer garden. Although our garden will be very small this year, as our yard is mostly shade, I do want a few plants to tend and nurture throughout the harvest months. I pulled my box of seeds out and can't wait to buy some potting soil this weekend and get our little babies under the grow lights.

It's such a joyful day ... Spring is on it's way! We've made it halfway through Winter! The days are getting longer! The light is drawing near! Before we know it we'll be playing on the beach all day! And until then, we'll remember the story of the Snowdrop. And find strength to hope for the summer we know will arrive.

It was bitingly cold, and the days that followed didn't bring a sunbeam. It was weather to freeze such a delicate little flower to bits. But there was more strength in it than even it realized. That strength was in its happy faith that summer must come, and this had been imparted by its own deep desire and confirmed by the warm sunlight. And so with patient hope it stood there in its white dress, in the white snow, bowing its head when the snowflakes fell thick and heavy or while the icy winds swept over it.

January Book List

Winter is really the best time to read. The days are shorter and SO much colder, so it's so much easier to cozy up by the fire with a good blanket and book. Although we do a good share of reading in the Summer, we have lovingly dubbed Winter to be the "reading season." And let's be real ... most of my reading these days consists of children's books - either to my kids or in preparation for future homeschooling years. We probably read 10-15 books a day most days ... and while I'll save our favorite picture books from January for another post, I thought it would be fun to see a stack of what chapter books we're digging into this month.

The Vanderbeekers of 141st Street - One of the juvenile fiction books I read this month, it's such a cute story about a family in New York City who is on the verge of losing their apartment right at Christmas-time. The five siblings have eleven days to save their lease, and they come up with such clever, sweet ways to show their landlord just how much they love living there. It's a beautiful illustration of how we never know what is going on in someone's life, how sadness can be permeating if we keep walls up, and how simple acts of kindness and love can change a life. It's one that I'll pick back up come December as a bedtime read-aloud for A.

The Secret of Nightingale Wood - This is another one I found in the children's library, but it reads like a true classic. I found myself forgetting that I was an adult and falling into the storyline as if I was a 12-year-old girl. It covers some tough mental illness topics, and isn't one I'll be reading my children any time soon, but it's definitely one I'll come back to in several years when the girls are much older. Set in England in 1919, it is a fictional story of a mother who is mentally ill after the death of her son, and the struggles that the 12-year-old daughter goes through in trying to help. It raises issues surrounding depression and suicide and I think it could be a good conversation starter for talking about how we take ownership of our own health and choosing health providers that listen to us and our family members. As a reader, I loved every word of it and would recommend it to any teenager or adult. 

The Hideaway - This was my guilty pleasure book of the month - aka a great beach read or sit by the fire with a cup of tea read. It's set in the South, and I'm a sucker for good novels about people in the South. It takes me home and reminds me of my own family growing up. The story made me happy - as any good beach read should - and it reminded me how the older people in our lives all have stories that we've never heard. 

The Heart's Invisible Furies - This was my Book of the Month book for August. I started it back in August and put it down out of sheer boredom in September. But when I saw it won the award of Book of the Year from Book of the Month for 2017, I decided it was worth picking back up and pressing onward. I'm so glad I did ... it ended up being a beautifully written, thought-provoking novel about the coming of age as a homosexual in Catholic Ireland. While it didn't move me the same way A Man Called Ove did, it ends on a happy note and was well worth reading to the end. Not a BOTM member? Try it out ... I'm finding that I love every single book they send me and not a one is one I would have picked up from the library on my own.

Back Bay - I picked up Harvard Yard at a Library book sale in the fall and decided I couldn't read it until I read the first book in the series. It was nothing special, but I'm glad I read it. I learned a lot about the geographical history of Boston and a few fun tidbits about Paul Revere. It was a fun, quick read, and I'll definitely pick up Harvard Yard in the next month or so!

As Good As True - This is a brand new book that I got on my Kindle for free thanks to the Amazon First feature of Amazon Prime. A Historical Fiction book set in the 1950s, it tells the story of a Syrian woman who tries to stand up against her husband and daughter by letting a black mailman deliver their mail. There's quite a bit of domestic violence and abuse in it, so it could be a trigger for anyone who has stories of domestic violence and abuse in their life. I found it hard to read large chunks at once, but it's an incredible story of what life might be like for a minority in our society - not only in the 1950s, but also today.

River Runs Deep - I saw this on the endcap in the Children's Library a week ago and just had to grab it. It was good ... but not great. It did have some great nuggets of history that I had never heard before ... did you know that long ago there was a Doctor who turned a cave into a hospital in an attempt to cure tuberculosis? And that same cave served as a hideout for runaway slaves, who were aided by the slaves owned by the Doctor? I'm now so intrigued by Mammoth Cave, and am having the hardest time finding any adult material on it. If you know of a good book or two that tells the story of Stephen Bishop or Mammoth Cave, send it my way!

Peaceful Parent, Happy Kids - I'm trying to read at least one book each month that has something to do with parenting or marriage. I come from a family where one parent was a yeller and I sometimes find myself falling down that road - particularly in times of stress or unrest. This book has been incredibly helpful in understanding how the brains of children work and how my actions and reactions help influence their emotions and actions far into the future. It not only gives helpful insights to what our children may need from us as parents, but also gives real steps that we can take to help shift our parenting from one of power and control to one of coaching and empowerment. It may be the best parenting book I've read in a long time (but truth be told ... I don't read a ton of parenting books.) She has another book out called Peaceful Parent, Happy Siblings that will definitely be in my pile later this year. I need all the tips in helping my girls stop fighting and be friends for life!

Winnie-the-Pooh - Would you believe I had never read the original Winnie-the-Pooh? I read this to sweet A at bedtime and it became a great way for us to wind down after the day and just have some one-on-one cuddle time. Being the first chapter book we've read at bedtime, it started a new daily ritual for us, and for that I'm so thankful. For those of you who haven't read it, this is the first collection of Winnie-the-Pooh stories. We meet Christopher Robin, Pooh, Piglet, Owl, Rabbit, Eeyore, and Kanga & Roo come along somewhere in the middle of the book. Written as if though the author is speaking to Christopher Robin, it has a unique writing voice that is lost in most modern children's books, and is the perfect bedtime story.

Little House in the Big Woods - These were some of my favorite books growing up - does anyone else remember watching the TV show with Michael Landon as Pa? I found the complete set of books at a thrift store some time last year and have been anxiously waiting the moment when my kids were old enough to appreciate them.  When we finished Winnie-the-Pooh and A asked for another chapter book for bedtime, this was the one I chose. When she saw we only had a few chapters left, she said, Oh Mama! Does that mean we get to read the next one soon? I love sharing some of my favorite books from childhood with her - and I'm finding that this one is really the perfect book to read together in the dark days of Winter. It's reminding me that there's beauty in simplicity, and just how lucky we are to have the things we have. It's opened up great conversation about what life used to be like and we've been able to talk about the similarities and differences between our life today and their life so many years ago.

So that's what I've been reading this month. What about you??

Embracing Winter at the Beach

I am not a Winter person. I can remember the first time I saw “real” snow. I was a sophomore at Valpo, and I walked from my apartment to my class at a turtle’s pace as I stared at the snowflakes falling on my mittens. They were beautiful. I had heard no snowflake was ever the same, but being from Georgia, my experiences with snow were rare, and mostly from inside the warmth of my house.

After that first big snow experience, though, I was over it. I hated having to bundle up every single day and hike across campus in snow boots. Three years at Valpo and three more at Akron Law and I was so totally done with snow. I moved back south as fast as I could - where I loved the occasional winter snowfall. Because it was unusual. It was beautiful. It was extraordinary.

And then we moved to Massachusetts. D knew winter would be hardest for me. He knew my thoughts about snow. And we knew Massachusetts sees a lot of it. But I'm a firm believer that weather shouldn't be your primary reason for moving - or not moving - to a certain place.

But ya'll .... winter is SO hard for me here. Cold temperatures start sometime in October and run through May - sometimes even into June. Half the year you're wearing coats, hats, and gloves. The months of February-April are just brutal ... because just when you think Spring should be on its way, you get whacked with a Spring snowstorm and below freezing temperatures. You can't start a garden until June - you don't get to eat fresh tomatoes until August - and then it seems like Spring, Summer and Fall all roll into one very short season.

It feels like the deeply cold days of Winter began a few months early this year - temperatures have been cold since mid-November, with single digit highs the last couple of weeks. While it was amazing to have a White Christmas, I'd really love if the temperatures would stay above 20 degrees. Anything much colder than that and I feel like life is just impossible. Especially with kids.

Just yesterday I found myself falling into my depths of winter despair. We bundled up and went to the library - and it was near impossible to get home without crying. The bundling and unbundling of very small children any time you go anywhere makes you just want to stay home. But when you stay home, your kids go crazy - so you feel like you just have to get out of the house every once in a while. Life will be SO much easier when we no longer have to deal with carseats and they can keep their coats on ... but with girls as small as mine are, we still have a few years before that's possible.

But some time last year, I committed to truly embracing the seasons. All of them. Even Winter.

So with the temperature nearly at 30 yesterday, and a reminder in my head that one of the reasons we moved was so that I could go to the beach anytime I wanted, we went home and grabbed our snowsuits and headed to the beach. I've never seen snow on the beach before. It was mesmerizing to watch big pieces of ice flow in and out with the waves. I could have stayed there all day had I had a fire or a big cup of hot chocolate. Well - maybe not all day ... that might be pushing it ...

When we made the decision to move near the beach, I joked with a friend of mine that one way I would embrace Winter would be to head to the beach with my snow pants on. Yesterday, I stayed true to that promise. And I'm oh so glad I did. I'm already making plans to go back in the next couple of days after this monster storm hits.

I'm learning that the trick to embracing winter is to lean in to the warm and cozy things you can do inside, while being crazy enough to bundle up and go outside just often enough to enjoy the beauty of winter.

Beef Pot Pie

I don't know about ya'll, but these brutally cold New England temperatures are putting a total damper on my mood. I'm making up for it by cooking all the cold weather meals I can think of. I've never been a huge fan of beef stew, but we were treated to an amazing Vegetarian Pasteten on Christmas Day, and it made me want a good, rich, beef pot pie. I couldn't find a recipe that I liked, so I combined several different recipes to come up with this one. I'm not a huge pie fan, so I leave out the bottom crust and simply top it with one. 

If you - like us - are gearing up to be stuck inside tomorrow, make sure you have the supplies to make this. It's perfect for these insanely cold, dark winter nights ... and come tomorrow, you'll be so glad you can whip this one out and warm up!

Ingredients
1 pound beef tips, beef kebobs, steak tips, or any other beef you want to use.
1 cup wine
4 Tbsp butter, separated
2 Tbsp bacon grease (or olive oil or more butter)
1 onion, chopped
1/2 cup water or beef broth
1 tsp beef bouillon (if using water. I use Better than Bouillon because it's SO yummy)
2 tsp fresh garlic, minced
4 peppercorns
1 small bay leaf
1/2 tsp thyme
1/4 cup flour
1/2 tsp salt
3 Tbsp cornstarch
1/2 cup water
2-3 cups of roasted veggies (mushrooms, potatoes, carrots, winter squash, beets would all work well)
1 pie crust (I cheated and bought one at Trader Joe's)

Preparation
I roasted my vegetables the day before I made the pot pie and used potatoes, parsnips, carrots, and butternut squash. You can also do it the day of - you can put them in to roast at the same time you put your beef in to marinate.

Cut your beef into bite size pieces. Marinate in 1 cup of red wine for at least an hour. Mine marinated for about 4.

In a large pot, saute the onion in butter until tender. Remove the onion from the pot and set aside. Put bacon grease and remaining butter in your pot to melt.

Roll half of the meat in the flour to coat. Brown meat over medium-high heat in your pot. Once your meat is browned, add the remaining meat to your pot along with the wine and water/broth. Stir in the garlic, peppercorns, bay leaf, thyme, salt and onion. Bring the liquid to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer for 2 hours. If the sauce goes lower than the beef, add a little more water, broth, or wine in order to keep meat covered.

Once your meat is done, get it out of the pot with a slotted spoon and put it in a bowl. Go ahead and put your roasted veggies in the same bowl. Whisk cornstarch with warm water until dissolved, and pour into your pot. Mine thickened almost immediately, but you may need to cook it a few minutes until it's the consistency you like. If it's too thick, add some water. Remember it will thicken a little in the oven - so don't make it too thick! Taste the gravy and adjust salt/pepper as needed.

Pour gravy over your veggies and meat and mix well. Pour it into your pie pan - I usually use a cast iron skillet for pot pie. Top it with pie crust, making sure to cut some vents in the top before putting it in the oven.

Bake at 350 for 30-45 minutes or until brown on top and warm all the way through. Serve with a good red wine and you just might embrace that big snowstorm coming your way!

Diving in to Homeschooling

When we first decided to Homeschool, I had no idea what it would look like for us. When we did Homeschool Preschool, I bought a curriculum that I only sort of liked. I never loved it - it never felt like it had much flow to it - and I always felt disjointed and off base. I didn't decide to homeschool because of some deep educational philosophy - I decided to homeschool because it simply felt like that's what God was calling us to. I had read many books over the very early years of parenting, and traditional school just didn't seem to jive with the kind of parents we had been striving to be. I can't really put words around it in any other way - it was something that had been on my heart for years, and was a feeling I just couldn't shake. When I told a dear friend that, she said Then Crystal, I think you have to listen to that.

Now I understand how that argument can be challenging for some. I guess it's all too often that parents use "But God called me to it" as a reason for homeschooling - when really what they want is to keep their children from the world. There are too many cases of child abuse and neglected disguised as "God called me to." But I do believe God calls some of us to a life of homeschooling - and I had come to a place where I felt like I should really start listening.

I started questioning friends who homeschool on how they knew it was the right decision for them. As I heard their answers, I felt this deep gut truth ... that homeschool was the life God was calling us to. It probably helped that Kindergarten at our local public school costs $400/month in our new town - and that's $400 that we don't really have. So I informed my husband that I wanted to homeschool for Kindergarten and see how it went. He agreed that it was the right choice for now - and that we would reassess for First Grade.

And then we moved. And God gave me this amazing group of women who homeschool based on the educational philosophy of an old British lady named Charlotte Mason. I had never heard of Charlotte Mason until I met these ladies - but when they invited me to be part of their study group, I eagerly said "YES!" I was probably 5 pages into the book we were studying when I said to my husband, "I found it! These are all the reasons I want to homeschool! She put words around it all ... here it is!!! It's right here! This is what I've been feeling for so long!"

After a significant amount of reading, podcast-listening, and researching, we've decided that homeschooling based on Charlotte Mason's philosophies are the perfect fit for us as a family - not only for Kindergarten, but for the early years of education. Her educational philosophy meshes quite well with the pace of life we have tried to live for several years now, and it has been a breath of fresh air to find other homeschooling families with similar philosophies and lifestyles.

Charlotte Mason believed that formal lessons shouldn't start until a child was 6. The months of October - December consisted a lot of re-orienting ourselves to a new town and yet another new life, so it was easy for me to do "School Lite." A is just Kindergarten-age, and no formal schooling is required in the state of Massachusetts until first grade, so I embraced living into our transition. We used Five in a Row - and we all enjoyed it - but it never felt like enough for my  incredibly bright, extremely inquisitive 5 1/2 year old. 

Since A turns 6 in February, we decided to use the New Year as our launching date for formal lessons. I made book lists, requested books from libraries, ordered math and handwriting curriculum, and started to put a plan down on paper for a Charlotte Mason inspired Kindergarten Winter Term. D gave me some quiet time last weekend to get everything together, and A started getting really excited to "start real school."

With Day One in the books, I'm feeling so good about the direction we're taking. We had such a peaceful morning - who knew that was even possible?! We had tea together, we read books, asked questions, sang songs, talked about life, played with numbers, and began our introduction to cursive. A loved every minute of it - and I have to admit - so did I.

Stay tuned for more about why we chose Charlotte Mason and how we're structuring the rest of our "Kindergarten" year.