Christmas, Hinkypunk style

 According to Sean, you are never too young to begin baking!  Sean introduced Ephraim to the joys of flour while baking saffron bullar this December.

 With saffron rolls baked, Santa Lucia Day could arrive.  We were serenaded by some very bassy voices early in the morning. It was sweet of the boys to get everything together to give us this early morning treat from Sweden.

     As Christmas drew near, packages began arriving.  Sylvia thought the most exciting things were the boxes.  She spent many an hour hopping around the house in this one.  You can hide in it, nap in it, read in it, watch a movie in it... the options are simply endless with such a box!

     Ephraim got dressed in his first pink outfit during the subzero Christmas weather.  A leftover from his older sister's baby days,  he was not complaining about being cold in this down filled snowsuit.  We have had many a good stroller walks this week with him snug and pink.

    After a ham dinner on Christmas Eve, we sat in the living room and listened to the kids play trios.   Sylvia had been working all month on several Christmas sons to play with her brothers.  It was really satisfying as a parent to hear them playing together.  Ephraim is fated to play the cello in about 8 years so we can have a full quartet.

     Then came the Nativity Story.  Asher as Joseph, Sean as the donkey, and Sylvia as Mary.  The donkey could use some kneepads for an early Christmas gift next year.

 Ephraim didn't complain about lying in a doll cradle to play the baby Jesus.

   With a knock on the door... a guest from the North Pole arrived.  It seems he couldn't find his beard, so he wrapped some toilet paper around his chin instead.  It made for many laughs, as he handed out packages of pajamas.

The stockings were hung, and Santa returned to set out the loot....

Ephraim thought chewing on the wrapping paper was the best part of Christmas morning.

Sylvia was excited to have a My Little Pony calender, candy  and a butterfly blanket made by Grandma Chiddix.

      Asher was relieved to have a new set of viola strings.  We are all relieved as well.  He is competing in a concerto competition next week, and was highly stressed about his old strings sounding bad.  Now we can all enjoy the pleasant sound of music without muted cursing every two measures.

    Mattias was thrilled to have some new headphones from his siblings.. and a My Little Pony - Rarity from a girl at school.   It seems a girl in their high school orchestra knows my boys are Bronies. (Bronies are teenage boys who think My Little Ponys are cool.)
        Mattias keeps his pony by his computer.  If you are a computer geek you will know about "rubber duck debugging".  (You can even look it up on Wikipedia.)   Anyways, Mattias uses his stuffed Pony instead of a rubber duck while programming.

      I suspect Asher may be the target of this generous girls attentions.  His pony, Twilight Sparkle, was gigantic!  Sylvia thought it was great that her brothers got ponies for Christmas.  She can borrow them to play with. This girl knows how to impress the whole family. :)

      Noel is the only person who owns a camera currently. ( I jammed the lens of the general-family camera earlier this fall.)  In order to use one of her cameras,  we have to swear a blood oath not to take pictures of her.  I just want everyone to know that she does still exist, and is prettier than ever with long beautiful hair and a charming smile.  She is like Ephraim, when she smiles the whole area around her lights up.  (Too bad we don't have a picture of that, eh Noel!?)

     It was a very fun Christmas.  The days since have been spent playing games,  and eating too much fudge.  The boys have been making competing fudge recipes.  ( I am currently a fan of Mattias's Cooks Illustrated recipe.)   The boys have seen the Hobbit movie twice with different friends, and they beat me at chess daily.

   I have loved having Sean home with his vacation days this break!  He makes everything better.  It has been a wonderful Christmas season.  We are blessed with health, a warm home, and amusing children.   I look forward to the next year and the adventures we will have.

Circus World, and beyond

   When Sean's parents came to visit earlier this month,  I purchased a family pass that would get us into all 11 Wisconsin Historical sites for a year. Now I am determined to see them all!  (Unfortunately for the kids, they are part of my evil plan to expand their horizons and have new adventures.)

 With a complaining crew of only 4/5's of the kids (Ephraim though it was a brilliant plan), we set off for a day trip to Baraboo, Wisconsin (about an hour north of us) to see what Circus World was all about.   Basically, it is a large area that the Ringling Brothers used as their wintering-over home starting in the 1800's, and has now been turned into a museum for tourists and school field-trips.

 They had a beautiful collection of the old circus wagons and carts.  It is amazing to think that these were hand carved, and then driven about in all sorts of weather.

 We wandered around a big warehouse, exploring all the different styles.

It was a cold day, and we were freezing.  Half my time was spent trying to keep Ephraim wrapped up in a blanket. You really don't get a sense of the freezing temperatures (the warehouse was unheated) in these pictures.

We took this picture with my mom in mind. It was the original wagon used in Buffalo Bill's Wild West show. 

 In another building they had all the costumes used for the circus.  I'm not sure if we were supposed to try them on... but there were no signs saying otherwise.  Sylvia and Asher looked stunning in their hats.

 Ephraim wasn't sure about this fashion show, but I thought he made an adorable circus baby.

 It was a beautiful autumn day, just very cold.  The trees all along the river (which runs through the complex) were in full color.

 We chose the last weekend they were open this season.  Thus, we didn't get to see all the live circus shows and animal acts.  We did get to see one magician show, but it was about on the level of Asher's card tricks that he learns from youtube.  Nevertheless, the kids found fun activities on their own.  They had fun on the playground and on this old fashioned merry go round.

 We had the place almost to ourselves.  Sometimes it made me think of a desereted carnival set that you would see in a movie, with some sort of chase scene.  Below are the McMullin movie stars.

 Mattias has his own idea of fun... Sylvia was not so sure if she agreed with him.

 After visiting Circus World and eating a picnic lunch, we drove to a nearby natural preserve that I had heard was a nice place to hike, Parfrey's Glen.   Ephraim's first ride in the backpack was a success.

 We found a little creek off to the side of the trail that beckoned to the kids.  I am amazed we did not go home with all children dripping wet.  They have gotten much better at leaping from rock to rock in their old ages.

 It was a very pretty area, I'd like to go back and see more of the trail sometime.

 Asher felt very tree-climby.  He tried almost every one we passed.  Here he is realizing that climbing this tree could end in impalement. Utilizing his brilliant self control, he moved on to the next tree.

He finally found a perfect candidate for his next climb.

 I turned my back for a few minutes, and when I looked again, Asher was about 30 feet in the air.  (I don't know if you can see him in the picture below). I told him to climb down, Sean had already started looking around for branches to use for splints on broken bones.  This is how parents get grey hair.

Sylvia also got in on the tree climbing action, but she stayed a little closer to the ground.

 Noel was great at helping Sylvia cross over the creek on the stones.  This is probably how we avoided going home with soaking children.

 Noel's main activity was "cleaning the creek".  This entailed using a long stick to clear leaves and muck from between the rocks so the stream ran clear and fast.  She got a 10 foot section cleared before we had to leave... only a mile or so left.

Two things I learned from this trip: first, putting almost boiling water in your thermos means your hot chocolate will still be too hot to drink 6 hours later.  Second, if you go to places late in the season, the elephants will have already migrated elsewhere.

  I hope to go back next summer and see what Circus World would be like at high season.  We will definitely go back and hike more of Parfrey's Glen.   It ended up as a fun day.  I'm glad my complaining crew did not mutiny and toss me out of the van.  I think we all have fun memories from the outing.

Grandparent McMullin's visit

   Sean's parents came out to Wisconsin this past month to see their latest grandchild.  Liz enjoyed holding Ephraim while Brad helped Sean do fix-it projects around the house.

 Ephraim was at the sweet stage of opening his mouth wide and planting a big slobbery kiss on people's cheeks while they were here.

      We took a day excursion to see a historical site in a town about 2 hours away, on the banks of the Mississippi River.  The historical site is an old home from the late 1800's, "Villa Louis". The estate has been restored to all its former Victorian grandeur. It was stunningly elegant, not at all what you would expect to find in a small mid-west town.   Unfortunately they do not allow indoor photography, so here is a photo of us all out on the steps - you will just have to imagine all the exquisite wallpaper and furniture.

 It was a neat tour.  Afterwards we went to the river for a sunset boat cruise on the Mississippi.  Here is Sylvia and Grandpa before we got on the boat.

  I didn't realize what the view would look like from the river. It was very pretty. Apparently this upper section of the river is the only portion left undeveloped.  The rest of the river banks south of Wisconsin are all covered with industrial factories and shipping docks. 

 The trees along the bluffs were just beginning to turn color.  I think it would an amazing tour to have taken 2 week later when the hills would be covered in fall colors.

 There was a covered portion of the boat we could ride in when it got too windy or cold.  Sylvia enjoyed covering up in a blanket and watching out the windows.  We were allowed to bring food onto the boat, and enjoyed a little snack.

 Sylvia's favorite part was resting along the window ledges at sunset, watching the beautiful light bounce off the ripples left behind the boat.  It was very peaceful.

 The next day was the start of General Conference weekend.  Here we have three generation of McMullin's dressed and ready to head off to the Saturday evening priesthood session at the church.

We greatly enjoyed their visit and hope to see them again next fall.  I'm sure we will have more fix-it projects lined up by then for Brad to help Sean with.

Sylvia at school - butter making

   Sylvia and I are reading through Little House in the Big Woods again.  This time is for school, to better understand how people would have lived at that time in history.  So, we are doing some fun activities as they come up.  This week we made butter and bread. 

     First we had to make a grater.  Sylvia is pounding holes in a can to make the bottom of it rough. Sylvia got to thinking afterwards, and realized that if you put a flashlight in the can, the pattern of holes would shine on the wall.  Now she wants to make a new can pattern in the shape of a butterfly.

 But, back to the butter making.  Once you have your grater,  you peel a carrot on it.  This is used to color the cream yellowish in the winter, when the cows aren't eating grass.   Yellow butter was considered prettier to place on your table.

(Unfortuantly I boiled the cream and carrot too long on the stove.  It over cooked, and was too hot to do anything with.  So, Syliva just made white butter. )

 We put the glob of butter from the shaken jar into candy molds.  This way Sylvia go little indivdual pats of butter, shaped like roses.

The next day we baked some bread to go along with the butter.  Sylvia had fun rolling out lots of different shapes.

 The final products were left to rise. After baking them, we served them for dinner, where the entire tray was polished off.   Everyone agrees that this is a very tasty way to study literature and history.

It is funny to note that I did this same activity with Mattias about 6 years ago.  Here are some pictures of Mattias doing the exact same activity in the fall of 2006

 Getting his can-grater ready...

 Grating the carrot to add to the cream for color...

And shaking, shaking, shaking the cream!

    I think it is funny that Sylvia was part of Mattias's 2nd grade butter making event, at age 4 months.  Little did she know that she would be shaking that cream herself in another 7 years.  I guess this means the next time I'll be doing this activity will be in the year 2020 with Ephraim.   Ephraim slept for most of Sylvia's butter making adventures this past week, so it will be all new material for him. :)  I love being a homeschool mom!