beautiful week

We've spent most of it outside it's been so lovely. Today we spent a good amount of our time out doors making fairy houses and finding leaves to dip in beeswax for our nature table. The leaves came out lovely and add so much to our table. (Sorry still no pictures...) They smell so lovely. Beeswax will always make me think of Christmas and dipping candles with Ike and Nadia.

I tried a new cookie recipe tonight and they all loved it. Francesca asked me to teach her how to make them so she could make them for her children. Then they all started talking about the different things I cook that they want to learn to cook for their children. It made me feel warm fuzzies. I've discovered we do better when I make a huge batch of cookie dough to store in the fridge then just cook a couple of batches for them to eat right then. If I make them up all at once everyone in the house sneaks them and eats them all straight away... When I chide Chris about it he just laughs so... now I just bake a few cookies at time. I figure in the winter it only warms up the house anyway.

I've been busy planning for Christmas. I already have quite a few things squirreled away and I'm busy creating when I get a chance to sit down. LOL! I feel bad Francesca has been hounding me for some knitted gnomes like I made Ollie and I keep putting her off so I can use them as a stocking stuffer. I gave in and showed her how to make the little fairys I make. So there went one stocking gift already so I have to stick to my plan and not give in. She is a persistent little girl though!

So far my favorite gifts are a lovely wooden Eskimo set and a beautiful red wooden Candelabra. We light candles every night when we read stories before bed,it sets a lovely soft mood and smells so good! They really enjoy lighting and blowing out their candles (It never gets old,you think it will but it never does).

We actually do not have a lot of toys. The few we do have are usually beautiful. Well they started that way some of Nadia's waldorf dolls have seen better days LOL! She still will not give them up though. I mentioned retooling one of her favorites for Francesca and she was no way that is my doll. It's a faceless blanket baby that she loved and played with more then her bitty babies,american dolls,waldorf dolls all of her babies. Nadia was a little girl that adored playing babies it was her favourite play game. She loved (loves) her simple blanket baby. So I need to make Francesca one. Francesca hardly plays with dolls. She prefers fairytale stories but recently asked for a doll.

So they start out beautiful at least.... Our favorite toys are open ended toys meaning you can usually pretend a LOT of different things with them. Toys like blocks,play figures,puppets,play silks or cloths etc... We have some playhouse,play work type of things,dress up clothes etc.. Tons and tons of art supplies which are always at their disposal as long as they clean up after themselves. Quite a few toys are handcrafted by us both the children and Chris and I. Some of them are things you find in nature bark ,tree branches,shells rocks etc... Things you might not expect on a toy shelf but are wonderful toys in the hands of an imaginative child. In fact the less directed a toy is (example the directed play eskimo set I bought vs. just a box of mixed little wood figures) the more it's played with. I steer clear of plastic toys for the most part. They have some they play with in the tub and that is about it. I wouldn't mind some playmobile sets and we love legos so I'm not against plastic,I just find so many of the plastic toys not very imaginative and ugly.

Sometimes they are given something we're not keen on keeping. Some things we out right exchange if they are given a barbie (Chris hates Barbies. The clothes,lifestyle and the wierd body) we replace it. Others usually they play with them for time and get bored and I just put it away or give it away. I have a Christmas list I created for my "dream" toys for this year for my reference. There is no way I could get them all but I slowly get some of them. If you want to have a look to see what kind of things I'm talking about, here is a link http://www.amazon.com/our-christmas-wish-list-toes/lm/R3H5S6O90WT01Y/ref=cm_srch_res_rpli_alt_36 Or another list I created http://www.amazon.com/beautiful-playhouse/lm/R15U9KEYZ5GV52/ref=cm_srch_res_rpli_alt_2

If it doesn't come up search listmania for toes. LOL! The second list look for waldorf kitchen. If you still can't find them my favorite toy store in the world is playstore. http://www.playstoretoys.com/ Many of the things they sell you can find (ebay is fantastic) or create less expensively but I love to go there and window shop.

PS. Do forgive any grammatical or spelling errors please! I usually write these at my most tired time of day and well.... I get brain fuzz...