I haven’t forgotten that I said I was going to write a series on a home management binder.

However, I have found several great blog series online already, so it seems silly to write my own when there are already lots available.

Also, I am not looking this time at making an actual binder, but wanting it to be a paperless, digital version. I have not yet seen a mom-version, a home-version of digital organization setups.

So, I am still in the research phase myself and not ready to write on it yet. But when I do, it will be a how-to set up a paperless, digital version of a home management binder.

Moreover, this blog will be moved over to a new domain and a new name in a couple weeks! I chose the name Healer’s Geste (and had a hard time finding the name!) to complement my husband’s blog, which was Ranger’s Tale, both of which fit for the domain pelennorfields. Matt shut down his blog a couple years ago, and mine is the only thing on this domain. Instead of keeping it going, it seems better to get a domain that is the name of my blog, and Healer’s Geste only makes sense in the Tolkien context. So, a new name and a new domain are upcoming.

My goal will be to have a series on a digital home management “binder” be one of the first series on the new blog.

Also, while we’re taking care of blogkeeping topics, I intend to host a book club on Ideas Have Consequences beginning in March. So, if you’d like to participate, you have a month to prepare. :)

Pretty

My January decorating effort:

Happy

Matt finished the trim in the living and entry way!

I love the way it turned out.

Now the last step is just touching up the paint job.

Funny

We had some friends over who had a little baby, so I had pulled out our Bumbo. The next day, Knox had a blast with it. Apparently, he did not read the instructions, which clearly forbid putting it on a raised surface. It’s not safe, baby.

Yes, he’s pulling off his socks and getting comfortable.

However, I don’t think the instructions said anything about putting it on one’s head.

Real

Knox thought the cornstarch should be decanted into a glass jar.

I’m glad Matt got our Oreck back online! It made short work of the mess.

Food is so daily. So relentless.

Mealtimes call us to stop, sit, and reflect. We might try to ignore or reject the call, but we will be more likely to flourish if we listen.

Food is an anchor. Mealtimes ground us, define us. You are what you eat. You are a part of those with whom you eat.

Convenience foods may wind their siren calling, promising more time for productivity or recreation, but providing food for yourself and your people is the ultimate productivity, a marvelous opportunity for re-creation (taking one thing and making it into another, taking many things and creating a harmony, taking one thing — food — and with it growing something entirely different — a person).

There really is nothing quite like food, like cooking, like meals. Perhaps that is why it is used so often not only as metaphor in the Bible, but as reality. Food is social, not merely nutritional. In our world of so many, many specific and particular and peculiar diets, we can easily miss that valuable social aspect of food. Providing food for another is love. Eating with another is fellowship, is communion. Whom you eat with is just as — perhaps even more — important than what you eat.

For the last year my husband and I have been working at practicing — even pursuing — hospitality. It is something that gets easier with practice, even being able to have dinner conversation, which for myself is more difficult than preparing a meal and cleaning up afterwards. But I believe one hurdle we invent for ourselves in this regard is thinking that hospitality means entertaining, or hospitality means feasting. There are times for feasting, but hospitality does not require it. In fact, hospitality can even be hampered by it. The heart of hospitality is sharing your home, your table, your life with others. So usually, when we have people over for dinner, I don’t cook anything out of the ordinary, I just prepare more. Chicken alfredo and whole wheat rolls and salad; homemade pizza and salad; soup, bread, and salad. Simple fare, but plenty of it. The showcase is not the meal, but the sitting together and sharing this piece of life, this daily necessity of eating.

Of course, I do think that homemade bread (my hobby and, really, quite simple) and a bottle of wine add the festive note to the meal, whatever the main dish might be. Not only that, but it helps with the setting-at-ease.

It has been interesting to see this last year, just how much connection eating together does bring. Talking after church is one thing, but somehow sharing a meal does provide more “now we are comfortable together” connection to subsequent meetings and conversations.

Of course, how much more is this true in our immediate families. With a table of six as it is, we constitute a little dinner party every night. You have to use your imagination most nights to see it that way, true, but that reality is lurking there underneath the mundane surface and the spilled drinks and the floor of crumbs. The children’s identities are being built up just as surely as their bodies are. And that makes the planning, the shopping, the preparing, and the cleaning up worth it, even when it’s difficult to slog through or difficult to see. It gives dignity and magic even to macaroni and cheese with hot dogs. It makes that work all eternally valuable ministry.

Laundry is one of my least favorite household responsibilities. Food is just as relentless as laundry, in fact, moreso, since it insists on attention three to five times a day. Still, I have always enjoyed cooking, and keeping a stocked pantry and a plan in the kitchen has been one of the challenges I have tackled head-on and tackled with vim and vivacity.

Laundry, not so much.

However, it might just be that the light is breaking forth in this dim area. And, probably not coincidentally, it has come only after I admitted defeat, sighed, and admitted I was going to have to deal with laundry every day, whether I wanted to or not.

A common concept that seems to run in self-help areas, whether it be housekeeping or paying off debt or weight loss or anything else, is that real change comes after the frustration level hits top, giving you the energy and motivation to kick into gear and Get Things Done.

The factor that fueled my frustration was hearing, more often than not, “Mom! I don’t have any pajamas/pants/socks/underwear.” Here I was, trying to deal with laundry as minimally as possible — that is, as infrequently as I could possibly manage — and more days than not that call for help would sound forth and absolutely break my bubble, ruin my mood, and start me fuming. For, of course, it wasn’t always true. And I maintain it’s not my fault that they have no clean socks if they have shoved them all under the bed or behind the couch. So, I’d have to go in, ready for the recriminations, but hounded by the fact that in one third of the cases, I really was at fault. Every time that plea came ringing down the hall, it was as if I was being hit over the head: “Fail!” Even if it wasn’t a laundry fail, then really, it was a “not running an orderly household” fail nonetheless. Defeat. Ignominy. Gloom.

I hate laundry.

And that didn’t help things.

So. I started my one-load-a-day routine, and that helped tremendously. There are often wet sheets in the mornings around here, so that helped feed the necessity to get the load going first thing in the morning. I just tossed in whatever needed to be washed in with the sheets. And, really, one load of laundry takes less than 10 minutes to fold and put away. I can do anything for 10 minutes, even fold laundry. Then, when suddenly it wasn’t an hour or more of laundry-folding I was staring down weekly, but just 5-10 minutes. It didn’t seem like such a big deal anymore. Who cares about laundry? It’s no biggie.

Whew.

Then, finally, the week after Christmas, after reading these chapters on clothes in Keeping House, I realized clothes management really would be much simpler and easier if I weeded through all the kids’ clothes and only kept what they need, what they wear, and what fits in the drawers we have. Really, Knox does not need 10 shirts, particularly not if I wash kid clothes every other day. So, I decided on the objective amount of clothes that was “right” for us (about 6 t-shirts for the older boys, and I packed up the ones that were starting to run small; 2 nicer pants and 2 play pants each; 3 pairs of pajamas each; etc.) and weeded. Some clothes got packed away for the next child up, some got packed to pass on to the next down the line in the church handmedown cycle, some just went to the Goodwill.

I hate putting away sheets, because the drawer I have for the twin sheets is stuffed so full it is difficult to open and close. Why do I have 3 twin beds and 9 spare twin sheets? I weeded through those, too, and kept 3 spares. Three of the weeded sheets were plain white or an almost-white green and soft, thin flannel. Those are in my bin to turn into cloth napkins. Others just went to Goodwill.

Oh, I do love the feel of a good purge! Now in the evening, after running a load for the day, I go around the house and toss straight into the washer my kitchen towels (they don’t get musty! They’re only damp with dishwater anyway), the cloth napkins from dinner, an assortment of kids’ clothes, and the hand towels from the bathroom and sometimes bath towels. That runs in the evening, first thing in the morning I move it to the dryer and start a regular load (jeans or whites or such). I must thank my friend Zoae for the inspiration for this routine; it has really been working for me!

And, I am never short on kitchen towels (I purged and sorted and rearranged these, too), the bathroom always has a fresh hand towel, and the kids don’t run low on clothes and pajamas. And the drawers are half empty and thus easy to open and close and use.

Not only have I had these successes in this area of former dread and defeat, but laundry is losing its status as a foe, and is actually, just maybe, beginning to feel like something I might actually be getting good at.

After all, now I am succeeding not so much at the doing of the laundry, but at the goal for which laundry is only a part of the process: clothing my family and having at hand what is required.

Pretty

I found a new coat and I love it!

Thirty (coming in June) means I can be grown-up and sophisticated and put together without being silly and pretentious, right? I am afraid someone is going to tell me thirty is the new thirteen and I still count as a kid and not a grown up.

I am ready to meet the next decade, particularly if I get to do it in this coat.

Happy

I finished a cowl and I love the way it falls. (p.s. Elly: This is the yellow I found that actually looks good on me)

I made up the pattern as I went. Since I really like the way it turned out, I had better record what I did. It is quite simple:

Crochet hook K 2 skeins Vanna’s Choice 1 skein Jiffy wool blend variegated 1 skein Peaches & Cream cotton

With Vanna’s: Chain 90. Join into a round with one twist in the loop. Single crochet in each chain, slip stitch to join. Do two rows of double crochet in each sc, then another sc row, joining with slip stitch each time. Fasten off Vanna’s and switch to Jiffy. Do 3 rows of double crochet. Fasten off and reattach Vanna’s. 1 row sc, 2 rows dc, 1 row sc. Fasten off and attach Peaches & Cream. Do one row of half-double crochet. Fasten off and reattach Vanna’s. 1 row sc, 2 rows dc, 1 row sc. Fasten off and attach Peaches & Cream. Do one row of half-double crochet. Fasten off and reattach Vanna’s. 1 row sc, 2 rows dc, 1 row sc. Fasten off Vanna’s and switch to Jiffy. Do 3 rows of double crochet. Fasten off and reattach Vanna’s. 1 row sc, 2 rows dc, 1 row sc. Fasten off. Weave in all ends.

I love cowls!

Funny

The boys were playing together with Legos during quiet time and came racing down afterward to announce, “Mom! We built the Siege of Jerusalem! Our guys are Crusaders!”

I love homeschooling. I had no idea they knew about the Siege of Jerusalem. I, of course, allowed them to photograph their feat. When I checked my camera next there were 99 photos taken. I’ll spare you 97 of them.

Real

I had been hoping we’d make it through the winter without snow this year, but it was not to be. I caught them just in time; I sure wasn’t going outside just to get a picture!

Khan Academy explains why it’s scary, creepy legislation.

1. It makes the rellies happy.
2. I want to take more photos, and this helps keep it in mind.
3. The tagline “capturing contentment in everyday life” is a good goal, and I find taking a picture does help me see the event from a better perspective — seeing it with more of that rosy glow that memory might cast.
4. Moving toward more humor and cheerfulness in the day to day is my goal for the year, not a measurable resolution, but more like my “word” for the year. Taking pictures helps me see the pretty, happy, and funny more often, and keeps me in the habit of looking for it.

So, here we go:

Pretty

My pretty little girl turned four this week! She is quite pleased about it, as am I. She is tall, thin, and spunky.

We made her cake (chocolate with pink frosting) and ice cream (strawberry) together.

Happy

I got a few good pictures Christmas morning before breakfast.

Funny

In our house, the birthday child gets to choose a cold cereal for their birthday breakfast. Usually the children prefer to pick the giant Malt-o-Meal bags, because it’s quantity that counts with them, not pictures on the front (yay for kids who practically never see commercials and have no brand recognition!). However, a local grocery store had a breakfast sale a few days before Ilse’s birthday and so she got to pick boxes (I let her pick 3 to make up for the quantity factor; there was disappointment that boxes were the only choice). Anyway, the funny for the week was the health claims on the boxes. It cracked me up that Lucky Charms was supposed to be a good source of fiber, and Cinnabon “multi-grain” was a good source of vitamin D. What a riot. Matt suggested that maybe by “whole grain” they meant they actually did use one whole grain. Of course, it also said multi-grain, so maybe they managed to get two grains in there.

Merriment and mocking abounded, at the boxes’ expense.

Real

Hm. I wonder how these pictures got here?

I read 44 books in 2011, with 6 still in progress. Forty-four was my total for 2010, too. A little short of my goal of 60, but still not too shabby for a homeschooling mom with small children, I think. Actually, most of the reading was done at the beginning of the year, and my reading petered out by the fall. I’m not sure what that means.

1. Anna Karenina. Audio. Despite being Russian and depressing and partly about the economics of the time, this was a really good story. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

2. L’Abri. Besides Hidden Art, I haven’t read or really known about the Schaeffers at all. I found the story of L’Abri fascinating and intriguing.

3. Poetic Knowledge. Amazing. It was the first book club I got to host, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

4. Picadilly Jim & Leave it to Psmith. Every year needs a dose of Wodehouse. Lots are free for Kindles on Amazon, just in case you need an incentive.

5. One Thousand Gifts. Ann asks hard questions and tells the story of her learning the answers after approaching them through gratitude rather than resentment. Thought-provoking and inspiring, though rather overdone.

6. Practical Happiness. Believing in God’s sovereignty should look like something in our lives; it should look like joy and contentment.

7. Shaping of a Christian Family. Excellent. It was both Elisabeth Elliot and recommended by Cindy, so I knew I couldn’t go wrong to procure and read a copy.

8. Knowing God. Unexpectedly wonderful. This will be in the children’s middle school must-reads.

9. The Graveyard Book. My brother tricked me into reading a vampire book (it isn’t, really). It is a good tale, though I was mildly disappointed by the ending. Hans’ review: “It seemed at first like it would be scary, but then it wasn’t.” Still, it won’t be to everyone’s tastes or standards, so do preread before handing it to your own. Personally, I thoroughly enjoyed it.

10. Loving the Little Years. Short, but incredibly encouraging. Boy do I need to get more cheerful!