View from the Prairie Box

My husband is the best daddy ever and this photo captures the fun he and Livia experience together. He tickles her to no end. I love these crazy people.

We’ve opened a public group on Flickr for those who are interested:

Today I’ve realized it really is December. As in, Day Two, we’re committed to the month here and this train ain’t stopping for nobody. Time to get that tree lit and decorated. Time to finalize birthday plans(!). Time to make a list and check it twice, that kind of thing. And yet, there are still lovely reminders of Thanksgiving lingering in my home, including this beautiful arrangement from my second mom. Every year I forget that Karen will drop by some November evening with a gorgeous vase full of seasonal flowers, and every year I’m blessed by the beauty. I’m going to enjoy my Thanksgiving bouquet as long as it lasts. Thank you, Karen!

Bloggers new to the December Photo Project are arriving all the time and our numbers seem to be growing each time I check this site. Very cool! It’s inspiring to stop by your blogs and check out your photos. At the same time, it takes a bit of time to collate names and websites and then add them to the sidebar. So bear with us. We’ll get all the names and links straightened out within a few days.

If your link to the right is broken, drop a comment on this post.

To join the DPP, sign up here.

Grab the DPP badge from Flickr here.

Check back to learn more about a Flickr Group. I’ll explore our options later in the day.

**For now, if you want to sign up using your Flickr site, simply leave the URL and I’ll add that link to the sidebar. Several folks have done this and it works just fine in lieu of a blog. (If anyone know how to easily, handily, simply invite the masses to a Flickr Group, do tell. If it involves typing in one-point-one million email addresses, then there’s no way I’m doing it this year. )

Wahoo, the December Photo Project is underway! Just look at the group that’s gathered for the DPP—I’m impressed! (The DPP blogroll is currently being updated… If you don’t see your name, be patient and check back tomorrow.) I can’t wait to do some serious blog surfing and enjoy December through your eyes. I look forward to traditional and non-traditional pics, and lots of baby shots (thank you, Haley, for Kate’s eel impersonation). Make sure to encourage one another by stopping by a new blog and leaving a comment or two.

Checking the birdbath in our garden has become a new daily ritual for me. Did it rain last night? Is the water frozen? Is there snow in the bowl? Forget an outdoor thermometer or a rain gauge—I’ve got a birdbath! The birds haven’t figured out that it’s for them so I might as well use it for my own purposes… as in, December Photo Project, Photo #1.

Questions regarding DPP:

1. “Does it have to be a picture you took on THAT day?”
2. “Do we just post them to our own blogs?”
3. “I am not really a very good photographer, and I don’t know how to use the camera very effectively. Still, I am tempted. But wary. Do I really want/need to add this to my December???!!!! :) On the other hand, one doesn’t need to blog if one doesn’t want to, since one is posting pictures every day.”

Hmmm.

Answers:

1. [Big smile]
2. The general idea is that you allow others to see the month of December through your eyes—and that you challenge yourself to:
   1. Post every day through December 25 and
   2. Use your camera on a regular basis

   So nope, you don’t have to take a photo every day necessarily. I do (except that time I was in the hospital…) take pics every day, but that’s just the way I like to do it. And yes, you do post it to your own blog. I’ve had blog-less friends in the past who simply posted them to the Flickr group site (TBA).

3. I definitely think you should join up! This is a very lightweight and fun blog project with guidelines, not rules. Most folks I know don’t end up with 25 posts by the end. No guilt though. Just fun.

The December Photo Project is back for the fourth year!

Come one, come all. Grab your cameras and join me in a photography challenge for the first 25 days of December. Snap a picture each day and show the world what you’re looking at! Drop a comment on the Prairie Box or email me privately, and we’ll list your blog under a December Photo Project heading off to the right once December rolls around.

The excitement begins December 1. Join us! (And stayed tuned for more info about a Flickr Pool… We might use the same one from last year or perhaps I’ll create a new one.)

On Mondays, dance days, I try to keep you down and low-key as long as possible in the afternoon. Today you watch a Sesame Street video while silently sucking your fingers beside me. I try to sleep and feel like I could drift away into hours of rest.

Half an hour before class I rouse you from your dream-watching, enticing you to full awake status with brand new dance tights and a long-sleeved black leotard. You are alert almost immediately and jump eagerly on my bed while I attempt to catch your active toes in the sleeves of white. You pause only momentarily to point your toes—dancers know how to do that after all—then lose all focus with your giddy excitement. The tights are up, the leotard squeezed into and the hunt begins for your ballet slippers. We run to the kitchen for a quick snack of chips and juice, dinner will have to wait until after the oddly meal-timed class is over. You spill the small bowl, I envision cheese powder all over your outfit and give a warning to be careful. Hair pulled up into a bun on the top of your head, bright pink clip in place. You slip on your sneakers, take one last gulp of juice and out the door we go. Without ballet slippers. Once I’ve run back in to get them, we’re on our way across the street and down the block to the old brick building at 8th & D Streets. You bend to the sidewalk and pick up a wrinkled leaf, spotted with caterpillar eggs. It is my treasure to hold and save while you’re at dance. Before we even walk in I know we’ll be greeted by tired moms waiting on the stairs, young toddlers with sticky faces climbing and playing and grabbing legs. We greet our friends, you telling me how much you LOVE Pete and Elsie, and I pull up your tights one final time.

The door opens. You walk in with the others, ready for class to begin. I give one final admonition to be a “good girl” and you nodded with affirmation, as though you never would consider behaving otherwise.

In less than 45 minutes you’ll be at my side again, walking home hand in hand, my adorable ballerina girl. I love you now and forever.

(This is my snapshot of Livia at age 4.)

Me: And you were reading your Bible this morning because why?

Liv: I want Winnie to stop biting me.

Me: How was reading the Bible going to solve that issue?

Livia: God gonna speak to that dog.

****************************************

The conversation above came after Jeremy found Liv in bed reading her little pink Bible. She had gotten sick in the night and this morning I told her to stay in bed until I had brought her a drink. While I was downstairs, Liv was reading her Bible to figure out right and wrong. She said that the next time Winnie is sick, Livia will read the Bible to her—apparently to teach the wee dog that biting is wrong. My favorite line, though, is “God gonna speak to that dog.” Love. it.

I realize that I’ve been burning the candle at both ends recently, running back and forth between various responsibilities without much pause for reflection or rejuvenation. I was beginning to treat every activity as an obligation… not a great way to live and definitely not a way to enjoy life! On the heels of the realization comes some small stomach virus that has Liv laid up in bed and me kept at home on a sunny and cold Friday. And you know what? I’m thoroughly enjoying the day. My calendar is cleared, we’ve got groceries in the cupboards, and I have an excuse to go slow.

Most enjoyable of all was thirty minutes of reading Little House in the Big Woods to my daughter. Livia laughed at the story of Pa playing Mad Dog with his daughters, and urged me to keep reading the chapter on Christmas. I love connecting her to a series of books that has brought me so much pleasure over the years.

Livia, with great enthusiasm: Why the moon didn’t eat his lunch?

[grand pause] 

Jeremy & Rebecca: I don’t know. Why?

Livia: You supposed to laugh!

Jeremy: You have to finish the joke first!

Liv, still with great enthusiasm: Oh… Why the moon didn’t eat his lunch?

Jeremy & Rebecca: I don’t know. Why?

Liv: Because he a FULL MOON!

[great laughter]

Thanks, Pastor Keith, for teaching our daughter about humor. She learns more than Bible verses when she goes to AWANA.