7 Quick Takes: 9 November

1.

In case any of you (none?) are desperate for a potty training update, despite me scaling way back in this area due to 3rdSister I having a virus last weekend, she is enthusiastically counting to ten and, um, performing when I sit her on the toilet, as well as asking to come to the toilet after she has done something in her pants. To me, this is progress enough at the moment!

2.

Christmas Cake in progress

Christmas time, Mistletoe and Wine...well not quite, but I've certainly been preparing this month. I've bought shiny purple paper to wrap the books we read, one a day, during Advent. I've started writing Christmas cards. I've made a Christmas cake! (which admittedly, needs sticking back together with marmalade. Yes, I wept, and have had to make a sumptuous carrot cake this morning to feel better.) Last night the 3Sisters took it upon themselves to snuggle on a duvet with hot chocolate watching a Christmas episode of the Simpsons. So lovely to get a glimpse of what's to come! (And if anyone thinks I'm insane doing things this far in advance, remember I'm hormonally challenged, and I also like to get stuff done so I can 'cruise' through the holidays the Flylady way.....)

3.

I'm also using the advent of Advent to re-focus on my prayer life, which dwindled when I was sick for a couple of months. I always take the 6am slot to sit with tea and toast and read scripture. I'm now trying to re-introduce a morning prayer time, using Angela Ashwin's Woven into Prayer collection, accompanied by my Prayer Journal (which I last filled in on 8 August!) I truly feel it sets me up for the day, and I benefit from the discipline.

4.

I have to say, however, that today all 3Sisters were up at 6am today, two of them writing Christmas cards (don't say a word!) and chattering around me and sometimes to me. I was clearly sat in the computer corner, reading aloud from a book, sitting with God - and you know, it is lovely to have a reminder of how prayer and life aren't separate, but I would have liked things to be a little more still. I reminded 1st and 2ndSister about how we visited the Wesley rectory in Epworth a few years ago, and recounted how Susanna Wesley used to put a teatowel over her head to signal her time in prayer. "Can you think of a way I could signal to you children that I am praying?" I asked. Well, apparently it would be a good idea to wear my dressing gown, or put the fish tank on my head. This may require some thought. 

5.

Yesterday I attended the first of three sessions with half of our new Pastoral Visiting Team. This is a new thing set up by our priest, and although it coincides with me becoming a Lay Minister in pastoral care, I've been very much taking a back seat due to illness, and what with having a baby in a few months, I'm kind of along with everyone else for the ride. I didn't learn a lot in terms of the material, but it was good to revise it and spend some time getting to know the new team. It feels very strange returning to work after more than two months away - it was great, and inspiring, and getting back to feed the girls snacks, remind about piano practice, supervise homework on the computer, get 2ndSister ready for dancing, make dinner and bath 1st and 3rdSister was not the rest I needed afterwards, but that's life!

6.

Further potty training update - while writing this, 3rdSister came up and told me she needed  the toilet. And went! There is hope...

7.

Something a little gratuitous, because I'm otherwise uninspired. 1stSister finished the book of The Hobbit recently and wants to see the film which comes out shortly before Christmas (something we'll allow unless it's a 15 Certificate)....we got to see the 3D trailer at the cinema recently and it all looks well worth it - especially   the dwarf Thorin Oakenshield, who I really should marry as he's around the same height as me, and looks almost as lovely as the actor who plays him did as Guy of Gisborne in the BBC Robin Hood series. When looking for a picture to try and convey this, I stumbled across a blogger who is even more obsessed with Richard Armitage as Thorin than I am - can you believe it!

* with thanks to Jen Fulwiler @ ConversionDiary.com for hosting - head over there now and read a whole load of other Quick Takes!