Thank you!

Thank you to everyone who purchased advent calendar drop-ins from me! I sold 120 sets and raised over $700 towards our pledge for Home of Hope India. I was a busy bee cutting paper and assembling the sets for several weeks in November! I am glad they are all shipped out and delivered, and I hope everyone enjoys sharing the story of Christmas with their little ones this year.

As for us, we stuck with our little bags from last year as our "advent calendar." I dropped two gold coins and the little scroll in each bag. I also purchased some small Christmas ornaments that look like miniature presents from a craft store and dropped them in to a few of the bags to let the kids know that on that day they have a small present to open. For their gifts during advent I purchased a few Christmas books (like the Grinch Stole Christmas, Berenstein Bears and the Joy of Giving, and so on). So, on a few lucky days when they open their bags they will have a little gift to open!

Happy Holidays!

Children’s Advent Calendar Drop-ins For Sale!!!

Last year I broke down the story of Christ’s birth into 25 short, simple readings to drop into each of day of Sydney’s Advent calendar. After reading each day’s sentence we would glue it to a piece of construction paper and assemble the story of Christmas over the course of Advent. By Christmas Eve we had the entire story pasted together and we could read it together. She and I both enjoyed it and I thought other parents who would like to make sure the story of Christ is an important part of their Christmas season might also like to use our little story.

Because Brett and I have pledged a contribution to help build a new orphanage for the young girls from Home of Hope India, I decided to make and sell my “Children’s Advent Calendar Drop-ins” for $5 each to raise money for our pledge. I hope you will consider buying them for your loved ones this Christmas! The price includes:

• 25 short daily readings recounting the story of Christ’s birth with a short prayer for each Sunday in Advent.
• 25 ribbons to tie each reading into a little scroll to easily fit into the pocket of an advent calendar.
• A small book of colorful paper in which the children can glue their daily readings and create their own “Story of Christmas.”
  

All money raised from the sale of these Drop-ins will go to help purchase a “stepping stone” to build a new orphanage for the young girls living Hyderabad, India through a charity called Home of Hope India. Right now these girls are sleeping on concrete floors at night and they have nowhere to play, so they really need our help!
http://www.homeofhopeindia.org/
http://www.100stepstohome.com/

This is a great and inexpensive gift to give for children, grandchildren, godchildren, nieces and nephews over the Thanksgiving holidays. It is written in language most appropriate for younger children (toddlers through age 10).

If you don’t have an advent calendar, there are SO many ways to make one creatively, or you can buy one at places like Land of Nod, Pottery Barn Kids, etc.

Last year, we bought small, inexpensive Christmas gift bags and wrote a number on each bag from 1-25 and hung them around our breakfast nook. Inside each bag was a small piece of candy and our daily reading. (The little chocolate “gold” coins you can buy are a great sparkly filler to accompany the scrolls.) You can also buy miniature stockings for very little money and hang them on a rope with clothes pins.

Here are some photos of creative do-it-yourself advent calendars if you need some inspiration:

If you would like to order Drop-ins for your loved ones, please email or call me to tell me how many and send a check for $5 each to:

Claire Burkhart
7545 McCrimmon Parkway
Cary, NC 27519

I will have them all completed before Thanksgiving, so please place your orders early in November. Please add $1 for shipping if you are not in Cary or Wilmington (where I can deliver or you can pick them up).

Remember that all money from these Drop-ins will go to build an orphanage for young girls in India!

Thanks!

Happy Birthday to me

Brett made me an awesome birthday dinner on Thursday. All week he had been asking me what I wanted for my birthday dinner. Since it was a weeknight and we have kids, it made the answer very simple:

"Not a restaurant because that's more work for me to bring food for Pierce and keep the kids happy while we wait for our food. Not some fancy complicated meal that you have to cook and I have to watch the kids by myself all night then sit by myself while you do dishes. Nothing that I have to cook myself."

That left me with one option: something that requires no cooking and no dishes... A French-style meal of just cheese, bread, salad and wine. Perfect!

So, Brett got 7 different cheeses from Southern Season and had the cheese monger arrange them from mildest to strongest. He also paired the cheeses with wine (red for the milder ones and white for the more pungent ones). And he sort of broke the rules by preparing escargots. But all he had to do was stuff the shells and heat them, so it wasn't too much cooking. And they were wonderful.

Dinner was awesome, but I was so stuffed after we (almost) finished all the cheeses that I was actually disappointed when he told me he had dessert! Wow!

Thanks for an awesome birthday dinner, Brett. It matched all my criteria - not in a restaurant, no cooking and (almost) no dishes.

Prayer of St. Francis

A good friend of mine recently posted this prayer on her blog and I really enjoyed reading it. So I'm copying it from her to share with my friends and family. Thanks, Gina! Gina recently went through the RCIA program to become Catholic (like I did years ago). She is an awesome example of a strong Christian and Catholic. Those converts always seem to make the best Catholics! :)

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace;
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon:
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope
where there is darkness, light
where there is sadness, joy
O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.
Amen.

Congratulations, Dad!

The reason we all went to Spain was to see my dad recieve an Doctor Honoris Causa from the University of Miguel Hernandez in Elche, Spain. This award is an extremely special honor bestowed upon someone who has made great contributions to his field of research and teaching. It was a great excuse to get all of my dad's family together, including his wife and her two daughters and granddaughter. We really enjoyed spending time with Knox, Julie, Gemma, Andy, baby Savannah, and Heidi!

Dad's ceremony was really nice. He got a fancy outfit, hat, ring, gloves and honorary degree. They even had a pianist play a marvelous jazz ensemble for him during the ceremony.

Thanks for inviting us, Dad! Great job!

And they're off!

Just the other day I looked at Pierce as he was chasing his sister around the living room and I realized what a big boy he was becoming. It was a nice day out, so I ran up to the attic, grabbed the tricycle and brought it down for him to try. It just seemed like he was ready for it. Well, his little feet didn't quite touch the pedals, but the look in his eyes let me know he was ready to go! He was so excited to ride it and once we got going you could tell how proud he was of himself. What a cutie! Sydney enjoyed taking her brother out for his first ride.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar visits Spain

Brett and I had the absolute pleasure of spending last week in Spain with my brother Ian and his wife Nathalie. We had a wonderful time visiting the cities of Madrid, Toledo, Campo de Criptana, Chinchilla de Monte Aragon and Alicante. One of the things Brett and I were most looking forward to in our trip were quality and uninterrupted meals with no dishes to do and no children to feed! So we ended up eating our way through Spain with enthusiasm and seemingly insatiable hunger! On many occasions I thought about that iconic children's story, The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. We were that caterpillar! Especially on Saturday as we feasted our way through Madrid on a five hour tapas bar crawl. Just as the caterpillar ate one piece of chocolate cake, one slice of swiss cheese, one slice of salami and so on until he had a major stomach ache, our meal went something like this:

One spanish ham and manchego croissant

One beer

One glass of port

One bowl of garlic shrimp

One bowl of breaded fried shrimp

One glass of wine

One plate of crispy fried pigs ear (mmm, cartilage)

One plate of olives

One glass of wine

One plate of stuffed mushrooms

One glass of sangria

One plate of spanish cheeses

One glass of wine

And One cone of gelatto!

And after that, we were finally full!

On Sunday we also had a green leaf sort of day to cleanse ourselves from the indulgences of Saturday night.

Eating tapas is such a fun and unique experience. The idea of a social and mobile meal that involves exercise and small portions is such a contrast to the American way of eating. Taking pleasure in food and making it the center of conversation during a five hour meal is really a cultural experience that you have to leave the US to enjoy. We ate each plate of food at a different bar and probably walked over a mile during the meal. We were in the good company of hundreds of thousands of other people (literally!) crowding the bars and streets of Madrid into the wee hours of Sunday morning.

There were many many more adventures to recount from our trip to Spain. I'll try to highlight a few of them on my blog as I find time in the next few days.