Simple Gifts #4: Small Stockings

For reasons unknown, I woke up this morning singing a childhood Sunday School song: 

"Thou didst leave Thy throne and Thy kingly crown
When Thou camest to earth for me.
But in Bethlehem's inn did they find no room for Thy holy nativity.
Come into my heart, Lord Jesus,
There is room in my heart for Thee."

What a great song!
I'm not sure I have the words right, but that's how I remember it.
(And now all of you who know this song are singing it too. 
That makes me so happy).   

Our new stockings are so little, Santa can hardly fit anything into them.
And it's better that way.
It's too much work for the big guy to fill big unwieldy stockings, in addition to bringing all those gifts for under the tree.
Last year I made these out of old linen clothing and some pillowcases.
I've always hated throwing out (or not utilizing) the beautiful trim on the edges of vintage linens.
I used lace, scalloped edging, and even raw edges for the cuffs of these stockings.

I highly recommend making Christmas simple by getting smaller stockings.
Of all the changes I made last year, this is the one that saved me the most time and money.     

Remember, I had to hang these on dining room chairs this year, because Malachi pulled down the stockings hung by the chimney with care.
This stocking cuff has the handmade lace from an antique European pillowcase.   
This was Anna Kate's tag, but the baby pulled off all the paper tags from last year.
I replaced them with number place-cards I found at the thrift store.
(probably originally from Target)  

 

Here is Caleb's stocking (he is Child #2). I love the scalloped edge (also from a vintage pillowcase).
Of all our kids, Caleb was most bitter about the loss of the old, cavernous stockings.
That son appreciates candy.    
A person can be 22 years old, and a responsible med school student, and still love to open a stocking.
I remember being married by the time I was 22, and quite unhappy about not getting a stocking that Christmas.            
       

Isaac's stocking is in front.
You can't tell, but I left the linen edge raw. It looks sort of manly, and it sure was easy to make.

Julia's stocking edge is a vintage doily.   

I'm not giving instructions or templates, but here's an idea of the shape of our stockings.
I had to make them narrow since I didn't have much fabric.
Otherwise I would have made the tops a bit wider.   

"

Baby Mick's stocking.
He's too little to care that it has a fair amount of lace on it (which you can't see in this pic).   

Have a wonderful weekend.
How are you simplifying the house this year?

Here's an excerpt from one of our favorite Christmas stories:

"Ma took one of Mary's clean stockings and one of Laura's, and she hung them from the mantel-shelf, on either side of the fireplace. Laura and Mary watched her over the edge of their bed covers.
'Now go to sleep,' Ma said, kissing them good night. 'Morning will come quicker if you're asleep.'

She sat down again by the fire and Laura almost went to sleep.
She woke up a little when she heard Pa say, 'You've only made it worse, Caroline.' and she thought she heard Ma say: 'No, Charles. There's the white sugar.' But perhaps she was dreaming.

Then she heard Jack growl savagely. The door-latch rattled and some one said, 'Ingalls! Ingalls!' Pa was stirring up the fire, and when he opened the door Laura saw that it was morning. The outdoors was gray.  

Laura saw the stockings limply dangling, and she scrooged her eyes shut into the pillow. She heard Pa piling wood on the fire, and she heard Mr. Edwards say he had carried his clothes on his head when he swam the creek. His teeth rattled and his voice shivered.

'It was too big a risk, Edwards,' Pa said. 'We're glad you're here, but that was too big a risk for Christmas dinner.'

'Your little ones had to have a Christmas,' Mr. Edwards replied. 'No creek could stop me, after I fetched them their gifts from Independence.'

Laura sat straight up in bed. 'Did you see Santa Claus?' she shouted.

'I sure did,' Mr. Edwards said."

From Little House on the Prairie
by Laura Ingalls Wilder


     

Simple Gifts #3: Cookies

These days the baby is so busy, staying home all day is tough.
He's good in his car seat, and he's a pretty patient shopper, so it's much better to get out of the house if we can. But yesterday's temp hovered around zero, and we wouldn't have gone anywhere except that a local theater was performing during Chapel at Northwestern.They are so good, and I've wanted to see this performance for so long, that we bundled up Malachi and headed out into the deep freeze.

Remember Chapel? When I went to college, we had to sign in on clipboards, organized alphabetically by our last names. Now the students scan their ID cards.

Before we left the house, I whipped up a batch of these Toffee Bars. They are one of my Top Favorite Cookies of All Time. My mom made them in Peru, so you know the ingredients are pretty basic.

Toffee Bars

Preheat oven to 350

1 cup butter, softenened
1 cup brown sugar
vanilla to taste
1 egg yolk (if I have scrambled eggs for breakfast, I take out one yolk and save it for this)
pinch of salt
2 cups all-purpose flour  
Chocolate chips for the top 

In a large mixing bowl, combine all ingredients except for the flour.
Whip for a long time, about three to five minutes, scraping sides of bowl occasionally.
The butter and sugar will become light and fluffy, almost like frosting.

Add flour, mix just till ingredients are combined.
Dump cookie dough onto Pampered Chef stoneware Bar Pan.
If you don't have this pan, buy one.
If you use another kind of pan, they won't turn out as good. Just saying.
But if you must use a metal pan, line it with parchment paper. That should help.  

This is the only slightly tricky part.
The cookie dough is so crumbly that you can't spread it easily.
The best way to press it into the pan is to flour your hands (repeatedly if necessary),
and using mostly the heel of your hand, press the dough.
This cookie dough is so delicious that at this stage, I have to fend off my family from eating it.

Bake at 350 for about 25 minutes.
You want the edges to be nice and brown and crispy.

When the bars are done to your liking, sprinkle them with chocolate chips.
I like the butter crust of these cookies more than the chocolate, so I don't use too much chocolate.
(Maybe about 1/2 cup, although you may want to use more.)
Place the bars back in the oven for a few minutes until the chips melt.  

Spread the chocolate almost to the edges.
At this point, I sprinkle walnuts on one side of the bars.
This creates what I like to call a "healthy cookie."
Since the crust is so good, I leave the edges plain.
When they cool, you can cut them into diamonds.
I usually cut a diamond in the corner so I can follow the lines.  

Malachi Jude, waiting for a cookie.

The play was excellent.
It was wonderful to sit in Chapel with my daughter and baby son.
When we came home, someone had reduced the cookies by half, and eaten off all the walnuts.
Good thing they're easy to make.  

What are you baking this year? What's the one cookie you can't give up?

(If you're in the market for a good play, and you live in Minnesota, check out Theater for the Thirsty.) 

Simple Gifts #2: Space to Listen

This week we are in a deep freeze.
Outside, nothing is growing.
The weather guy said that normal snow is at a moisture ration of about nine to one,
but yesterday's snow was so fine and dry that the ratio was about 20 to one.

It's a good day to hunker down,
enjoy the sunshine that pours through our south-facing windows,
continue the battle against dirt and chaos,
and still my soul enough to listen,
both to God and to people.

It's so difficult to hold still.
To be quiet when someone is talking.
To listen with my whole heart.

I heard some advice last week about how to come alongside those who are suffering.
I wanted to add to that conversation, but there wasn't opportunity.
(I had to be still and listen).
I would have said this:
Sometimes, in a time of darkness or sorrow, certain people know just what to do.
I believe they are led by the Holy Spirit.
Different ones have different gifts, and darkness is a place where those gifts shine.

We have had friends show up at our door just to pray with us.
We didn't have to respond, which was helpful, since we couldn't.
We let them pray for us, and when they were done, they quietly left.

Two years ago, when I was twelve weeks pregnant and cherishing the mystery of an unexpected baby,
an acquaintance showed up, on a cold and snowy night,
bringing bags and boxes of toys and food (he reminded me very much of Santa Claus).
We were scraping the bottom of the barrel at the time,
and those bags of gifts, once I returned them for store credit,
meant we had presents under the tree.

But here is the gift that is the most rare,
and the hardest to ask for.
It's the gift that is needed above all others.

It's listening..

Just listening.

A few people, very few,
knew how to listen when I needed to talk.
They did not interrupt.
They did not give advice.
They did not try to cheer me up.
They let me talk until I was done, really done.

That's what I would tell my pastor,
if this was a conversation.
That in a time of suffering, or grief, or just ordinary discomfort,
be aware,
be ready to help, be willing to receive help.
All those tangible needs and provisions are always in front of us.

But what is beneath,
under the talking and the noise,
is a yearning to be heard.
Every one of us has that yearning.
And so I would say,
Be the one who has created space to listen.

This is my gift to you.
It's an Advent gift,
because it requires intentionality,
and time,
and space,
and most of all,
it requires the Presence of Jesus.

This is my prayer
on a winter day that is cold, white and icy,
in the time of year that is most dark and most busy.
"Jesus, how can I make the space
to listen with my whole heart?" 

"Why spend money on what is not bread,
and your labor on what does not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good,
and your soul will delight in the richest of fare.
Give ear and come to me,
hear me, that your soul may live."
(Isaiah 55:2-3a)

Simple Gifts #1

I feel kind of bad, because I'm always on a bit of a rant about music.
I don't know if it's a first-born tendency, or just the way I'm made,
but for some reason I have a terrible time letting this go.
I'm the same way about baby names (I want to tell people, "Name your baby this, not that.")
And about decorating.
I want to follow strangers around Goodwill and beg them not to buy the stuff, the worthless
and exhausting stuff, that they have piled into their carts.

Not just Goodwill, either.
Macy's and Marshall's and Target and every other store is filled with things
that simply should not be brought home.

It's better to have space, and simplicity,
than to cram the house from stem to stern.

So here's my little gift to you,
take it or leave it.

Make your Christmas simple.

That's it.

I'm learning this as I go, and it isn't easy.
For one who loves to make everything beautiful and memorable
(while not spending money),
this idea of simple is hard to follow.

It helps to have a baby who's into everything.
It helps to have a husband who puts down his foot about getting boxes from the highest shelves.

It helps, so much, to wake up singing,
"In the morning when I rise,
In the morning when I rise,
In the morning when I rise,
Give me Jesus."

A wonderful thing about December is that my usual rant about music abates somewhat.
Except for the occasional rendition of "Christmas Shoes,"
a song that should go away forever,
the radio is a safe and happy place these days.

Yesterday I listened to my new Emmylou cd, a birthday gift from my sister.
We played it all day long.

I hope you love it too. This track has background vocals by Dolly Parton, Linda Ronstadt, and (gulp) Neil Young. I know Selah sings this song. But most of you have probably heard their version, and not Emmylou's. 
I'll link it at the end of the post. 

Malachi thinks Daddy's mandolin belongs to him.

His big hands remind me so much of his Grampa Murphy's hands.

In the weeks before I wrote this, Nate cleared tons of stuff out of our basement and garage.
I took two trips to Goodwill to unload things.
It felt great.
Then I threw away my dried hydrangeas (I recommend throwing out all dried flowers, you won't regret it).
Then I cleared off a kitchen counter. Just one.
But it was a start.

How are you keeping Christmas simple this year?

I'd love to know.

Listen to "Light of the Stable" here.