Gratitude Sunday

An opportunity to think about and share our gratitude for the little things in life!  Laurel at Alphabet Salad provides the link-up every week.  Less long-winded folks than I am list out short bullet points of thankfulness, so don't feel like you have to write novelettes like I do in order to participate!  Just have fun counting your blessings, however many you like, in whatever way makes you happy!  Today's Mr. Linky can be found here.





Soooo...  What am I grateful for this last Sunday of January?

I am grateful for:

*  Little girls who love tea parties.  

Cathy and Anna actually threw this tea party (pictured below) in their room last week.  They're very responsible young ladies and have a working tea cart in their room and it pleases me no end that they know how to organize, prepare, and clean up after themselves like they do!  And leave deviled eggs and scones for the rest of us!

Photo not borrowed with permission --
mainly because Matt has a million
readers and I have about six...

*  This guy...

 Matt Walsh, his blog in general, and, in particular,
this article about my vocation in life. Not because I feel any need to justify being a Stay At Home Mother, mind you, but because it's immensely satisfying to see someone so perfectly articulate the beauty and importance of my job.  And because Matt has a huge readership and really ticks off the feminist left.  If you haven't read this or any of his other posts on SAHMs or life in general, run over and see what you think.  I love this guy.  He's an amazing writer -- with a lot of good things to say.

*  Getting the roller skates together with the key. 

While trying to organize the deepest darkest  recesses of the garage this past week, we unearthed a box of VHS tapes from when our big kids were little kids, and it seems many of the movies are classics our youngest kiddos haven't seen. How could we let that happen?  I feel like a neglectful parent!  As the years have slipped by, we've kept up with buying the new classics Pixars and the like, but never just never got around to replacing the old classics with DVDs.  To make matters worse, through all the moves in the last few years, we've just never been able to manage both a working VHS player and VHS tapes together in one place.  (Yeah, well... it's been a little crazy,,,)  But, Huzzah!  Finally, somehow we've managed it.  We have a player that actually works with all the TV components -- and now we have the tapes, too!  Pass the popcorn, kids!  We are snuggling into a late January phase of couch potato-ness.

*  No football today!   

My baby brother used to be able to
sing falsetto and sound exactly like
Snow White.  Hilarious!

Not that I don't enjoy football, especially when our team is winning.  But, like I just mentioned, we've been indulging in old movies this past week.  Binging, actually.  Digging into the old collection, we've watched a bunch of the old Ollie and Stanley movies, Cinderella, Anastasia, Sleeping Beauty, The Sandlot, Stuart Little, and The Boys Next Door.  And, right now -- in the absence of Sunday afternoon football -- we're watching Snow White.  What a simple pleasure! No competition, no stress, nobody knocking anyone else down...   Just an evil witch trying to kill her stepdaughter. Good wholesome fun for the whole family! Riiight... And back to football next week --- and the Broncos murdering the Seahawks. (Figuratively.  We hope,)

*  Children who aren't afraid to be silly

Doesn't matter where they are, doesn't matter whether or not someone has a camera in their hand, these youngins of ours have no inhibitions  They really really do not care what anyone else thinks -- and are very, very silly.

  Kevin and Michelle

Ninjas.
(Apparently.)

William and ice cream
with swag

Gabe and movie star glasses

Cathy and Michelle, curling hair -- you can see who was having
more fun with this...

Cathy with Anna's Christmas gift:
5 gallons of whipping cream

Dominic, Mchelle, Cathy -- mugging in kitchen

Kevin and pool cue

Dominic and face -- from upstairs balcony

William and silly string -- pointed at Mommy
(Not so much silly -- as dangerous pointed this way!)

 

* And then there's this...

While I was scrolling around looking for silly pictures, I ran into some of the random recordings we made over Christmas time.  Some are just plain old silliness (more of the above), some are straight-up singing of Christmas Carols (The kids gave a concert on Christmas day), but some show how singing erupts sometimes in the middle of silliness -- or silliness erupts in the middle of singing....  Talking  and singing...  and singing and talking... and walking and singing...  and singing and walking and talking and being silly, while occasionally breathing, sleeping and eating... and singing.

There are a lot of other videos the children would consider better quality, I'm sure.  But I
like this one.  It shows how a song is born here when the children are all together -- something
I am so grateful for: that they love being together, that they love singing together, and that the two
things are spontaneous and joyful.  I'm a gratefully blessed Momma.