Christmas 2012

We have had a lovely celebration these past two days.  It began Monday evening when we went to church with Grandma and Grandpa for Christmas Eve.  Both boys dressed up for the occasion as a special gift for Grandma.  Mommy was also pretty thrilled with the results!

Adorable Little Men

We enjoyed the service with Grandma and Grandpa.  Then we had a picture taken because we were all so fancy.  Too bad we can't figure out how to all look at the camera at once.  ;-)

After the service, we headed to Grandma and Grandpa's place for dinner and presents.  It was so much fun!  The boys did really well.

The first thing they have to do is find the Tomten.  Throughout December, we receive emails from the Tomten with pictures attached.  In each picture the Tomten is hiding, and the boys love finding him.  The Tomten is super sneaky and sometimes even appears in the background of pictures with the boys in the foreground.  The ensuing conversation is always adorable.

"Luke, did you see the Tomten there?"

"No, Paul.  Did you see the Tomten there?"

Then on Christmas Eve when we arrive at Grandma and Grandpa's place, there he is!  The Tomten!

Paul holds the Tomten's hand for a picture.

Both dudes pose with the Tomten.

Luke holds his gift from the Tomten - a mini Tomten!

We enjoyed a lovely meal of homemade tamales and sopa torasca, thanks to the amazingness of Dave and Lynne's culinary abilities.  The boys enjoyed whole wheat pasta.  We don't feel the least bit sad that they don't want to partake of the Mexican feast...more for us!

Done with his dinner and ready for action.  He looks old to me in this picture.  It's probably the tie.

Spy Gear from Grandma and Grandpa - SUPER exciting!

Paul with his Spy Gear - Happy!

Luke made this nativity scene for Grandma.  I think she likes it!  ;-)

The LEGO set Luke has been talking about for six months.  He's so happy!

Paul and his new LEGO.  Cool, dude.

Grandma got TWO hugs because Mommy missed the first shot.  I don't think either participant minded reenacting the moment.  I love this picture.

And lest you think that the parental units weren't having any fun, this picture dispels that myth.  We are cracking up over a website that displays people's Pinterest fails.  I laugh at this because I KNOW that if I were to attempt something from Pinterest it would be an utter fail.

You can tell that Krista is feeling bad for these people.  I am laughing so hard that I almost can't breathe.

It was a lovely Christmas Eve.  We arrived home around 9:30 pm and folks, including parents, were in bed asleep by 10pm.  Dreamy.

The following morning, I woke up at a quarter to five.  Some folks might see this as bad, but I got my seven hours of sleep and woke up feeling great!  I also had plenty of quiet time to myself.  My BSF lesson asked me to find places in Scripture where God the Father is symbolized by "fire" and God the Son as "light."  Pretty perfect activity for Christmas morning.  My favorite was John 1:5.  "The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it."  It's such a lovely truth.

Paul was up first, coming out of his room around 7:15 am.  He was able to entertain himself for about a half hour with his new LEGO from the night before.  We were guarding Luke's sleep, but at one point Paul slipped past us and woke Luke up to show him something he had just built.  Luke didn't seem to mind.  They spent the next hour in the playroom with their gifts from Grandma and Grandpa while Erik and I leisurely drank another cup of coffee and enjoyed opening Christmas cards.  So civilized.

I've said it before, but I'll explain it again.  We achieve this level of sanity and leisure on Christmas morning in two ways.  Firstly, I seed the gift giving on Christmas Eve with things I know they will really love.  Three cheers to Grandma for teaming with me 100% in this effort.  Secondly, there aren't any presents under the tree when the boys come out in the morning.  I bring them out of our room when we are ready for them.  The boys don't know anything different, so they don't feel underprivileged or neglected in any way.  And all of this allows this next moment to happen, my favorite moment of our celebration.

Around 9am, the boys came in from the playroom, noticing the lovely chocolate cake in the center of the dining room table.  They took their seats, and we asked Luke to read Isaiah 9:2.  "The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned."  A brief conversation took place about what this verse means.  Who is the Great Light that has dawned?  Yes, it is Jesus.

Then we sang the last verse of "O, Come All Ye Faithful."

"Yea, Lord we greet Thee,

Born this happy morning.

Jesus, to Thee be all glory given.

Word of the Father

Now in flesh appearing.

O come let us adore Him."

At this point I was prepared to allow the boys to move on to the cake, but they were both totally up for more singing.  Rousing renditions of "Joy to the World" and "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" came next, and more than a few times, I had tears in my eyes listening to the happy voices of my boys singing praises to Jesus on Christmas morning.  I can't make them want to do this.  I can't force joy into their hearts.  Only the Lord can soften them and give them the desire to sing more songs to Him before the cake and before the presents.  I am a thankful mom.

After the singing, we cut the cake and opened the World Vision catalogs to pick gifts for Jesus.  The Bible makes it pretty clear how we can give gifts to Jesus.  "And the King will answer them, 'Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these, you did it to me.' " (Matthew 25:40).  Here are the boys picking their gifts.  Also, a favorite moment for this mom.

Luke picked a bicycle for a girl after reading that a bicycle can provide safety for a girl who might otherwise drop out of school due to fear of being assaulted or kidnapped on her way there.  I love that my boy has reached the point where he sees himself as part of the solution, rather than feeling scared himself.

Paul picked Bibles for children in their own language, a perfect gift from one who is just beginning to read his own Bible.  Erik picked training, tools, and seeds for subsistence farmers.  I picked $600 worth of warm clothing (for $50, people).  We added 5 ducks to the deal because we all like ducks. :-)

And then I brought out the boys' gifts.  We continued the tradition of three gifts for each boy, corresponding to their hearts, souls, and minds.  The heart gift is a toy.  The soul gift has something to do with their spiritual development.  The mind gift is educational.

Both boys received puzzles as their educational gift.  Luke's was of the space shuttle.

 The gift that was extra special this year was the arrival of Star Wars LEGO at our house.  Our boys have not seen the movies yet.  There's time for that later.  But they have been wearing Star Wars jammies for a few years now.  Erik and I decided it was time to introduce the opportunity to build something absolutely awesome.

A side note:  We have been pretty strict about the boys not seeing the movies yet.  We have our reasons.  Luke is ultra sensitive and would have nightmares for months.  Also, if we bring them Star Wars now in all it's 1977 cinematic glory, when they are older, they will clamor for something cooler.  There is NOTHING cooler, people.  We will wait until they can actually comprehend the plot and not just long for special effects and crowd-pleasing characters.

All of this nay-saying has led the boys to believe that not only does their dad not like Star Wars, but their dad probably doesn't even know anything about Star Wars.  I have SO enjoyed watching the boys marvel at Erik's revelation of even a little bit of his Star Wars knowledge.  Adorable.

King of the Funny Faces checks out his Star Wars LEGO...

...and decides that it ROCKS!

Luke headed to the playroom to build, but Paul and Daddy built together in the living room.

 My mom joined us for a very lazy brunch around 12:30pm.  Pancakes, scrambled eggs, and bacon.  Lovely.  She had given the boys their new pajamas the night before and then gifted them with a tub of generic, ultra-useful LEGO bricks along with a cool idea book.  Yes, we like LEGO here.

He's so cute.

We ended our day with a lovely time at Uncle Bob and Aunt Cindy's home.  Again, the boys did quite well.  My personal favorite moment was when Aunt Cindy brilliantly asked Paul to help pass out the gifts.  As he delivered each gift he said, "Here's a present for you.  Merry Christmas!"  I'm not kidding.  It was beyond adorable.  I forgot my camera, but Uncle Bob took lots of pictures.  Perhaps I can con him out of a few and get them posted here eventually.

Catching Up

December has been full so far, but in light of recent tragic events, I need to blog about the joys of life for myself and perhaps for others.  Sometimes the little things get us through when the big things threaten to overwhelm and paralyze us.  With that in mind, the Bangsund Update.

December began with our family visit to Schneider's Tree Farm, located on SE 172nd off Foster.  Yes, this is a commercial.  Owned by Don Schneider, this place is a kid's dream come true.  Check this out:

Don spends all summer spending hundreds of dollars at garage sales so that he can do this each December.  And my boys love it.  We pick our tree, and then they pick a toy.

Two out of three isn't bad.  ;-)

So many choices!  Paul ended up with a really cool fire engine that was actually in the overflow shed.

 Luke's choice has a very sweet story behind it.  With all these options at hand, Luke spied a plastic sandwich baggie full of Nerf darts.  He was instantly sold because we have lost three of the four that came with the two blasters we own.  Don, the proprietor and adorable grandpa figure, noticed Luke's pick and had to tell him that those weren't actually available.  They were for Don to give out to kids who chose Nerf items and needed darts.  Luke kept it together, but I could tell he was disappointment. He and the Daddy-Man redoubled their search efforts, while Don disappeared into his house.  He arrived back on the scene with this:

 It's an air hockey game that totally works and is totally awesome.  Luke was sold instantly.  The boys are playing the 2-player version here, but we also tried our hand at the 4-player version later that night.  Pretty great family entertainment.

We also got...a Christmas tree!

Look whose at the door, dear.  It's our Christmas tree!

We spent the rest of the day decorating, un-decorating, and re-decorating our tree.  Okay.  I can explain.  The first set of lights that we put on blinked, and we didn't have any extra bulbs to get it to stop blinking.  I don't like blinking lights.  So I went to the store and bought new lights, the LED kind that are fancy and whatnot.  Erik put them on the tree, and I didn't like them either.  Finally, I went down into the dungeon we call our seasonal storage room and found the actual Christmas tree lights hiding in a box that hadn't yet made its appearance upstairs.  I promise, I only made my husband put lights on the tree three times.  And yes, we have started a conversation about a pre-lit artificial tree.  ;-)

Here are some of the cutie pics taken once the lights were correct.

Paul decorating.  I love Christmas light shots.  Sorry for the blur.

Luke decorates.

Blinded by the flash, Five Year Old Paul poses by Two Year Old Paul.  Where does the time go, people?

Luke peeking around the tree at me.

Both boys peeking around the tree at me...looking a little like a two-headed monster, but mostly just cute.

In completely unrelated news, Erik and I are at the cabin for the weekend.  It has been delightful to spend time together watching movies and playing video games.  Yep.  That's what we do.  We also have enjoyed cooking together and watching it snow.  Super low maintenance weekend.  We even brought some Christmas along with us.

Cabin Christmas Tree - This little tree has been with me since college.  It's seen better days, but it does the trick here.

This beautiful box of light was a gift from my neighbor a few years ago.  I take it with me everywhere I go in December.  ;-)

The full effect

We have also had some snow.  This is the view of the deck this afternoon.

We will head home tomorrow, rested and ready to hug our boys.  I believe that no matter how crazy they make me this week, I will be so very thankful to be with them.  Every moment with the people God has given us is a gift from Him.

First Advent Blog Post!

It's that time again!  I'm posting to Simply Radical Christmas for the season of Advent.  If I have stories that are not Advent related, I will tell them here.  We will see how many posts make it to publish.  Last year I didn't have any!  Oops!

Viking Ships, Video Chats, and Other Thanksgiving Joys

Happy Thanksgiving, Everyone!  I know it was yesterday, but we continue to give thanks today.  In fact, I have a rather severe chest cold, which meant that I am not participating in Black Friday this year.  I'm SO thankful for the excuse to stay in my jammies all day, blogging and watching football.  It's cheaper this way, too.  :-)

There are a few fun stories from this week.  The boys have been learning about the Vikings in history.  On Monday they spent time coloring pictures of Viking longships.  I confess that I started the Christmas music on Monday also.  My chest cold had started and I needed the pick me up.  At least that's the excuse I'm using.  The results were the multi-cultural experience of listening to Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass while coloring pictures of ancient Viking sailing vessels.  Educational fusion, people.  It's the latest thing.  Okay.  I made it up, but it sounds good, doesn't it? I made a video, but it won't upload.  Perhaps I'll post it on You Tube and share the link...

In addition to the picture of the Viking longship, Luke also made a cut-out paper version.  It turned out pretty well.  Luke was especially excited to learn that the Vikings sometimes used gold to cover the scary dragon heads on the bow of their boats.  A bright yellow colored pencil took care of that business.  Check out the results.

A boy and his boat

The boat's permanent home on Luke's dresser

 On Tuesday, the boys were able to do a video chat with Grandma.  She read to them and showed them the cacti in her Palm Desert garden.  They had a blast.

Chatting with Grandma

 Thanksgiving was a great day here.  We started with the creation of the traditional Bangsund Thanksgiving Tree, a process that begins with the cutting up and crumpling of MANY brown paper grocery bags.

This guy likes to cut and crumple stuff.

As does this guy.

 Once the tree begins to take shape, the leaves begin to appear.  Luke finished his first.  You can't see it in the picture, but this leaf says, "I'm thankful for my brother" in super sweet seven-year-old handwriting.  It also includes a stick figure drawing of Paul.

Nothing sweeter

 And I'm pretty sure you can clearly see that this leaf says, "Paul is thankful for Super Mario 64."  Yes, it's a video game.  And yes, he's holding a bowl of Chex Mix.  I love Thanksgiving.

I'm saving this leaf forever because it cracks me up.  :-)

Our tree continued to collect leaves over the course of the day, but my favorite addition was the bird's nest in the crook of the lowest left limb.  In January of last year, my friend Betsy gave me a jar with some pretty slips of paper and a pen for recording and keeping answered prayers.  The slips of paper in the nest are all the prayers I remembered to record the answers to from our little lives.  Many shared God's provision for homeschooling, Roots, and BSF, some showed His comfort given in difficult circumstances, and one shared the Lord's hand over Erik's job, protecting him from layoff this past January.

"Praise be to you, Lord,
    the God of our father Israel,
    from everlasting to everlasting.
¹¹ Yours, Lord, is the greatness and the power
    and the glory and the majesty and the splendor,
    for everything in heaven and earth is yours.
Yours, Lord, is the kingdom;
    you are exalted as head over all.
¹² Wealth and honor come from you;
    you are the ruler of all things.
In your hands are strength and power
    to exalt and give strength to all.
¹³ Now, our God, we give you thanks,
    and praise your glorious name."

1 Chronicles 29:10-13 

Our lives are filled with answered prayers nestling in the branches of our Thanksgiving tree.  We are grateful.

 Here we are ready to eat our Thanksgiving meal together.  We used paper plates because I found these turkey plates in my bin of fall decorations.  Love it.

Yum!

I took this because both boys had turkey and cranberries on their plates.  After the click, I saw Paul's face.  LOVE IT!

 Later in the day, we Skyped with my sister in New York.  It was crazy.  Imagine my boys plus Nikki's boys (Joe, almost 6, and Rory, 3) all in the same room and able to see themselves on screens.  Oh. My. Goodness.  All four boys spent most of the time interrupting each other and the parents.  It's not really about the conversation, is it?  It's about Joe sharing his passion for trains and Paul joining in while Rory runs around in the background and Luke makes faces at himself.

Three-fourths of the Lansing Fam with the Bangsunds teeny tiny in the corner.  :-)

We finished our day by heading to the Willseas for dessert eating, game playing, hymn singing and hard laughing.  It was awesomely awesome.  We were there until just after 9pm and the boys were absolutely stellar.  No arguments.  No fussing.  No whining.  Paul did not want to leave at the end, but other than that, he did great.  What a huge blessing!  The boys really love these people, and I can pretty confidently say that these people love them.  At one point, the 8-year-old girl led our boys and the 3-year-old boy through the dining room wearing animal hats.  She is clearly a very capable zoo keeper.  Meanwhile the adults played games, including a new favorite called Suspend, sang hymns, and enjoyed great fellowship.  I shared with John and Holly as our evening drew to a close that this is one of the only houses on the planet where we are able to extend our evening like this.  Our friendship with them is simply one of Jesus' sweetest gifts to our family.

Today we continue to be thankful for all we have.  We awoke to a rather cold house because the furnace had stopped working sometime in the night.  It was about 62 degrees in the back half of the house.  BRRR!  This turn of events made me crazy thankful for my warmest sweater and the fact that we are not homeless, out in the cold and the elements.  We have all stayed bundled all day, and Matt, our personal heating and cooling expert from Petra Heating and Air Conditioning, is coming by in about an hour.  Pretty awesome.

Deep Sea Chase - A Shadow Puppet Play

If you read this blog regularly, you know that I am a BIG fan of Kiwi Crate.  It's a company that puts together everything we need to do a really fun craft including the directions.  Then they send it to us in a shoebox.  A new one each month.  I love it.  Before I go any further, if this sounds like a dream come true to you, you can get $10 off your first order by clicking here.  (Plus I get a $10 off coupon as well!)  Anyway...the most recent Kiwi Crate provided the opportunity for the boys to make shadow puppets.  SO much fun!

This all happened last week.  The boys made their puppets and then they put on a show for us. It was precious.  Here are some pictures.

Luke told me what to write.  Pretty cute.

The ticket takers outside "The Theatre"

Before the show, taking off their hats to show that they are no longer The Ticket Takers. Now they are The Actors.

It's a shark!

Watch out, little fish!

The puppets after the show

The boys share the fun with Daddy after the show.

For the record, Deep Sea Chase lasted about twenty minutes and mostly involved the shark chasing and eating all the other characters, including Paul himself who stood up to cast his shadow on the wall.  It was awesome.  We love Kiwi Crate.