Occasionally, I will have my camera sitting on the dining room table. It’s a dangerous spot, so I don’t leave it there often. But, tonight, I was sitting there, with Gus next to me eating a snack, my camera in between us. He loves to touch the buttons and feel the different textures. He pressed down on the shutter and click! He cheered. So, I let him do it again and again, moving the camera a bit to try to capture him.

We worked a bit on potty training tonight. We’re in no rush, but when he’s interested, he can go sit for awhile. I sit with him and we have great conversation. Over and over I heard “Mama, I funny. I funny, mama.”

Lena’s turn to do the Advent calendar tonight.

Day 5. She’s 5. For 3 more days!

After the kids went to bed, I needed to get out of the house. Aaron has been working some odd hours, but our lovely babysitter came to my rescue. And off I went.

It was even colder today. We got a dusting of snow last night and it was around 20 degrees when I went out. I wanted to walk from one end of downtown to the other, but I only made it so far before my hands were too cold to even really press the shutter. I don’t usually drink hot beverages, but I needed something.

Hello, lovely little coffee shop. With a barista who believes that whipped cream and sprinkles can’t be beat.

I don’t like hot chocolate. But this… this was really good.

Oh, and the reason why I came downtown… to see all the Christmas lights!

Reed: “Mama, when the thermometer is low like this, what is it like outside? Cold? Hot? Sunny?”
Me: “Since you drew it, can you tell me what you think it means?”
Reed: “It means it’s cold. The sun turned off.”

It feels like the sun turned off. Normally, I’d lament that it’s not even winter yet, but I learned today that there is both astronomical winter and meteorological winter. So, even though it’s not astronomical winter yet, I can rest assured that meteorologically, it is winter. Something like that. Have I lost you yet?

I did convince my kids to play outside for a little bit today.

They didn’t last long, especially since they didn’t want to bundle up.

My friend Rosemary shared some images on Facebook where she created a custom bokeh (blurry background). I had seen this before, but I never bothered to try it until I saw Rosemary’s, which were really cool. Here’s the tutorial. 

I had seen hearts, which is what Rosemary did, but I wanted to try a star. Specifically a Moravian star, which is what I always associate with Christmas.

Complete fail. They look like creepy little hands reaching out of the darkness.

I do have a heart hole punch, so I tried that, and it was much easier.

I decided to try the star again, and I had a bit more success this time. Some look like stars, some look like dragon flies. That’s cool.

Of course, we did our Advent calendar again tonight, and the kids drew pictures again. But, I didn’t photograph them. However, here’s one of Reed opening the envelope.