Road Post Encore

(Written 1/3/10)

I hate to keep using the phrase “on the road again,” but the fact is, there is quite literally a ribbon of highway strumming and humming under our wheels and sending its vibrations right up into my spine. This time, those wheels are pointed southwest.

Both ways on our journey, we’ve passed through the snow-blanketed Shenandoah Valley of western Virginia -- the most scenes part of our journey. HIghway 81 cuts through rolling hills sprinkled with farm houses, silos, and cattle grazing patiently through the snow. We don’t have time to stop, but signs along the road tempt us with their announcements of Civil War Battlefields, presidential birthplaces and libraries, and natural caverns. Argh. We must return. Either that or UVA in Charlottesville could make the Professor an offer.

(Also. We passed within scant miles of Polyface Farm, which you’ll know by name if you’ve ever had the pleasure of reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma. I could almost smell that purely organic chicken manure.)

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Here are some of the ways we’ve been passing the time as we lap up the miles: Reading. Listening to Adventures in Odyssey and an audiobook of The Goose Girl. Watching movies after dark. Drawing. Cross-stitching. Snacking. Singing. Sneaking bits of dark chocolate from the private parental stash in the glove compartment. Playing “Categories,” in which someone chooses a category and we name its members in turn until someone draws a blank or contributes a repeat (try this with everything from African Animals to British Monarchs to Star Wars Characters).

We’re using the return journey to visit relatives and friends along the way, which, as it turns out, is oodles more fun than a night in the Super 8 Motel.

Oh, and foodwise? Giant improvement since Christmas Day. After an evening on the Tennessee-Virginia border eating fast food at possibly the nation’s most unalluring mall, I swore off the grease. Hooray for options like Chipotle and Panera Bread (and occasionally a Whole Foods) and a GPS Navigator on my phone for hunting them down!

A Photo Assignment Poem

Something old
Something new
Something gold
Something blue

Something hollow
Something full
Something shiny
Something dull

Something moving
Something stuck
Something yummy
Something yuck

Something cold
Something hot
Something funny
Something not!

To flesh out the staycation we're having this week at my parents' house with the various aunts and uncles (i.e. my siblings and their spice), each couple is in charge of planning one group activity and one theme dinner. Yesterday we did Kristen and Allen's activities: making steamed dumplings and then completing the above photo scavenger hunt around the house in teams. Then we all brought our cameras, uploaded our photos to one computer, and projected them on the big TV while everyone guessed what line of the poem the featured picture portrayed. Some serious silliness ensued. Feel free to borrow my sister's creative labors for your own family Game Night!

Today we're doing a Yankee Swap and then playing Wits and Wagers, which our family brought. I think a Spain Night is on the dinner menu. An icy wind is howling out there, but if we can find any snow tomorrow, we're headed for the sledding slopes! Have to do something for these snow-deprived children of mine.

On the road againl

[Note: We are actually in southern Virginia right now, but I wrote the following last night. It failed to post because our internet connection was -- well -- shoddy.]

Friends, we are in Memphis, Tennessee, hunkered down at the Doubletree (thank you, Priceline Hotels!) after Day One of Interminable Driving.

Guess what? Turns out it's actually a really shoddy idea to take a road trip on Christmas Day, that is if you actually want to eat hot food for one of your meals.

We found the only restaurant on God's green earth, I mean Memphis, that was open, and it was a stinky, smoky, sports bar, and they kicked my kids out for being under 21. And as it turns out, it's also a shoddy idea to mess with me when I'm experiencing low blood sugar. I might bite your head off. Then you might offer us takeout food and I might cry while waiting for my food because I feel GUILTY AS SIN for biting your head off, and then I might leave you a very generous tip.

The Professor took the kids down to the indoor pool, after they managed to smear ketchup on the bedding and spill tea on the bedside phone and the bottom of his laptop. Good times, good times.

Ah, road travel!

What I'll Remember ...

The fire is quietly crackling behind me ... in the fireplace, that is.

The tears that brimmed, as they always do, during the final scene of It's a Wonderful Life still feel salty on my cheekbones.

Most of the suitcases have been carried to the car in anticipation of tomorrow's long drive.

Here's what I want to remember about today:

- Our gift time, and in particular the kids' enjoyment of each other's handmade gifts. Ian was genuinely excited about the tie-dye socks, and the girls were tickled pink by the embroidery kits. They'll be stitching away the miles tomorrow.

- Our discussion, over coffee cake and omelets, of what it means to bring gifts to Jesus today -- how to give Him our hearts, first thing every morning.

- Driving around this afternoon with Ian, just the two of us, looking for some homeless folks who might like some bags of homemade cookies. Before we left, he said to me, "I don't really want to go, because I just want to stay home, but I know I SHOULD." Yup. Welcome to life. Thirty minutes later, after a surprisingly difficult quest, we were both giddy and cheering out loud upon delivering our last bag. THAT is the best gift I could give him today.

[Related digression: On vacation, I read four books. The best one, one of those you finish and want to buttonhole every hapless individual within fifty yards and shove it into their hands, was Same Kind of Different As Me. Here. I'm shoving it into your hands now. Read it, preferably with your Puffs with Aloe (TM) nearby, and see if you're the same afterward.]

- Eating tamales and chocolate cake with Aunt Kristen, Uncle Allen, and Adopted Aunt Acacia tonight. O the yumminess of homemade guacamole! O the legacy of terrible garlic breath!

My goodness, I can't end this post by talking about garlic breath. How about this instead? In the next couple days, while we are driving driving driving and I am whining to the Professor about the state of my tailbone and saying "Is that kind?" at regular intervals toward the back seat, I hope all of you are spending lots of time sitting on the floor in your pajamas, playing with the wee folk and letting your list of Stuff to Be Done recede far, far behind you. Enjoy the moment, whatever it is for you, and be blessed.

xoxo,

me

Homemade Gifts

Unlike everywhere else in the blogosphere, I haven't really done any Christmas-related posts around here, and that's for two reasons:

1. The Mexico trip and graduation sort of obscured everything else.

2. We have a complex relationship with the holiday. One that brings us to think and pray things through every year.

In the interest of being straightforward, I'll try to explain it like this. We don't do certain things that are commonly accepted as Christmas traditions in our culture. For example, our family doesn't have a tree, since the Professor and I have issues with the pagan origins of that tradition. We don't do Santa either (although my four year old is a Santa fan, and that is something that falls squarely into the category of Not Worth Making an Issue About as far as I'm concerned. Childhood is the time for childish things. We grow. We move on. We discover silver hairs, far sooner than we would like). We try to fend off the predatory vultures of commercialism that love to hover at this time of year (don't we all!).

Let me be clear: I have no problem with what YOU do or what is important to YOU. Really! Life's too short for legalism of any kind. In fact, I'm only sharing where we are in our journey since it seemed sort of glaring NOT to address it. Shall we consider the issue addressed?

Here's what we DO do.

We do family traditions, taking advantage of the many ideas and opportunities for making special memories together (gosh, that sounded so sappy I just can't bring myself to reread what I just wrote).

We do send out cards and eagerly check the mail every day for those hand-addressed missives from relatives and friends. Thanks, guys!

We do gifts, among ourselves and some relatives.

We do look for ways to reach out to people around us.

We do listen to, and sing, carols. Not so much "Santa Baby" (ew!) as "Hark the Herald Angels" or perhaps my favorite, "O Holy Night." (What's yours?)

And of course, we do Jesus. (Always.)

For our family, we do a combination of bought and made gifts. This year, Ian is making learn-to-embroider kits for his sisters. He'll decorate mini canvas totes with fabric markers, and then fill them with goodies as inspired by maya*made here.

He has been wanting to make a wildlife album for a while, as place to collect his photos of various animals we run across. So I'm giving him a blank album, a pile of photos, and some cards made in Photoshop:

Some time in the next two days, I need to help the girls tie-dye socks for him without his knowledge. Good luck, self!

The Little Engine that Could Windsurf

... in which our hero, the fearless Professor, decides to teach himself windsurfing among the waves of the dynamic Gulf of Mexico. Being the self-sacrificing sort, he provides free entertainment for the resort guests lounging on the beach. I love that man. He's just noble noble noble.

OK. I'm on the board. Now I just hafta grab that sail like so ...

Or not.

I am of courage undaunted! Back onto the board I go!

I want my Mommy.

Maybe I need a little lesson? Señor?

Aha!
Now I get it!
Yeeeeehaw!
OH yeah!
I AM WINDSURFER! HEAR ME ROAR!

We are back

Back to home sweet home. The trip exceeded our expectations. Not to say everything was 100% perfect, but certainly close enough for every person in the family to have a fantastic time. The kids were all in mourning about leaving the friends they made, which is something I didn't foresee happening. Here's what we discovered: in December, Mexican resorts are chock full of Canadians! Seriously, it's like the entire continent just tilts a bit like the sinking Titanic and spills some frostbitten refugees into the much warmer southern lands.

We made friends with one super nice family from Calgary with FIVE kids. Just like my family of origin. Guess how long they were staying? Fifteen days! What happened to camping in the rain? I wondered (knowing that's just what my dad would say).

More later.