Holiday Cheer and Glad Tide(ings) Preview

The holidays are not easy on me.

My anxiety rises every time I go shopping. The extra lights, extra people, extra noise. I hate it more than anything. That would be my boggart for sure- the malls at Christmas, the traffic around malls, and maybe even a crowd of adults with glazed eyes asking for the things they want.

How am I going to get through this?

Internet shopping, extra coffee, and some extra patience with myself.

Back at home I am working with a lot of laundry issues and changes. Here's my latest project:

Indoor clothes lines. $12 on Amazon and it mounts to the wall. It is also supposed to be retractable, but that part doesn't work well. No mind, since it will just stay extended. Not as much sag as we thought it would have either, but I cannot hang jeans or towels on it. It isn't heavy duty enough for that. Tomorrow I will post how we dry those heavier items and the math behind why we have started this new change.

With the success we have had not running the dryer this last month, I think we will seriously look into an outdoor line for next Spring.

I am also working on the cookbook and holiday photos and keeping the kids entertained. The usual stuff keeps me busy and distracted and joyful.

Today, December 2nd

Today my girls are outside picking rose hips for tea they are making.

Isaac is playing with his toy cars.

Chili is bubbling on the woodstove.

Chad and Grampa are cutting and stacking firewood.

I am planning out the Christmas blog series of how I am going to emotionally survive the holiday season. Lily told the pastor at Children Time, in front of the whole congregation, that all she wants for Christmas is a Midwife kit and for her mama to be happy because Mama is always sad at Christmas.

Whoa, hearing that hurt my heart. 

Time for a change, y'all.

This year we are also paring down activities and changing things up a little bit. We are hand-making quite a lot of the gifts this year, we are hand-making ornaments, hand-painting wrapping paper, decorating the tree just us without company, and we are going to stay home more.

Staying home also means more reading time, more dancing time, more art, and more home cooking our meals. I am really looking forward to weather cancellations, snowed in days, and hot tea.

As I was planning out what to write this week and next, I also looked at archived blog posts. It is amazing to see how much our family has changed and how slow this change has happened. Last night I hug my laundry on indoor lines. Even as recently as last year I was proclaiming the high praise of the electric dryer and saying that hang drying clothes was NEVER going to happen at our house.

Change happens. When it is real change, it is gentle and slow. So that is how we will change our traditions here too.

Happy Monday!

What We Already Are

When I became a mother for the first time, no one said to me, "Hey, that's nice, but you are not a mother yet, maybe someday." No, I was a mother because I was doing it.

Today I was reflecting on something that I noticed with the amazing group of women that surround and support me and how they treat my daughter, who is often with me when I see them. They take her seriously as an artist. She won't someday be an artist maybe. She IS. She is because she is doing it. She is because she loves it. She is because it makes her happy and she cannot imagine a life without making art. She is 9 and she doesn't have to wait to grow up  to be something. She is.

Holly is a dancer. She works hard to learn more and practise her skills, but she goes to the studio, trains, and at the end of the year will perform on stage. She doesn't have to wait to think she will someday be something. She IS. She is 5.

Isaac? He loves trains and toys and running and painting. Right now he is loving just being with us and doing what we do. Soon enough he will share with us what he loves and we will nurture it. 

Nurturing a child is the critical point here. If we tell them, That's nice, but it doesn't mean anything significant. Move along. How will they ever really believe that they could ever be anything? I suffer that now, not sure if I can call myself a writer or a poet even though I do both and have even been published! Maybe it is because I don't really feel all grown up and so much importance was placed on being grown up before one could really be anything at all.

Holly wants to be a pilot too and a construction worker. She already builds things. She LOVES aircraft of all kind. You will never catch me doubting what any of my children are capable of. Not ever. Watch them fly!

The kids are also farmers, right by our side doing work that they love, hard work. They earn the credit for this work that most just dismiss the value of because of their age alone. That is so problematic. Children can and want to do meaningful work and my children do.

I will continue to be their biggest fan, encourage them to dream and see possibilities with every turn. I will carefully tend their imagination and help turn their dreams into reality. That is how we homeschool and how we parent. It goes beyond that though, it doesn't stop at my children. More and more, I have found myself cheering on and encouraging others, children and adults, to believe in their own possibilities. Who says that it is too late? Seriously? Who? If you want to do it, give it a try. Progress measured in inches is still progress.

What do you want to be when you grow up? Can you take the step and call yourself that now?

Dirty Wild Rice Dressing

Recipe for Dirty Rice Dressing

2 cups of wild rice

6 cups of broth (I like lamb or chicken, either works)

1 cup of water

1/2 cup of butter (1 stick)

1 lb of ground sausage (I used Traditional Bratworst, but I also like Green Onion in this recipe)

1 celery stick diced

1 onion diced

1 red bell pepper diced 

This is what was in the seasoning packet that our customers purchased at Prairieland Herbs:
3 T of seasoning salt (Swamp Fire is what I used, slap yo' mama works too)

1 T of Alebepo pepper

1 T of dried shallot

1 bay leaf

Bring the broth and water to a boil. Add the seasoning packet/mix and stir. Add the wild rice and stir in. Let simmer on low until the water/broth level is at the top of the rice (this takes 40 minutes to an hour). Turn off the heat and cover. Let rest while browning the sausage in the butter. I know that seems like a lot of butter, but the recipe provides 12 cups of rice, trust me on the butter! 

When the sausage is browned and ready, add it to the rice. Then add the diced vegetables. You will be adding them raw. I like the crunch and texture they add to the mixture and they will cook in the heat of the rice. Some folks I know caramelize the onion with the meat, but it isn't needed. The veggies are also where you can play a little. Like carrots? Dice some up and add them. Shallots? Go for it. Mushrooms. Yum.

Since I usually make this for a large gathering or samples, I then move the mix to a crockpot and keep on low/warm while serving. The rice just gets better and better.

One more tip- more than one person commented at our sample event about the amount of broth in ratio to the rice. Wild rice is not the same as minute white rice. The extra broth really is needed. The mix we use is a combination of 6-7 different wild rices, but the flavour is AMAZING.