After hiking Arabia Mountain, we headed over to visit the Monastery of the Holy Spirit. It was interesting to visit a modern monastery since we'd only ever seen ancient ones (like St. Anthony's in Egypt, circa 300 AD). The Monastery of the Holy Spirit was founded in 1944. At first the monks stayed in an old barn on site (in an interview with the last surviving founding monk, he said that staying in the barn wasn't always comfortable, but if Baby Jesus could be born in a stable, they could handle staying in a barn).
On Thursday before the weather turned cold we headed out on another hike, this time to Arabia Mountain, a large granite mountain in the Lithonia area that used to serve as a quarry. It's no wonder that Lithonia was named, as it was, after rocks. It's a very rocky area (pity we didn't get to visit while Rachel was in her geology class)! The etymology of Arabia Mountain is not well-recorded, but the consensus seems to be because the quarry workers used to complain about things being "as hot as Arabia" while they were cutting granite in the summer.
Having been hiking in Southern Utah, I can imagine how hot it gets when the sun starts beating down on all that exposed rock. We'd like to return later this year, perhaps when the diamorpha are blooming, but I don't think we'd consider this hike in the summer!
Here's Miriam at the start of the hike, in front of one of the little pools:
Monday (Christmas) and Tuesday (Boxing Day) were warm and wet days. We received so much rain that the river is threatening to overflow its banks. So we stayed at home and did Christmassy things, which we might have done anyway, given that it's Christmas and there's much to be done at Christmas.
Today was chillier, but drier, and still we stayed home, working on our book binding skills (Uncle Patrick, our expert book conservator, is a very patient teacher). To be frank, a large part of our reasoning for staying home today was my terrible monthly cycle, which lately has included a migraine (both as prelude and postlude, a very painful set of bookends), frequently threatens to overflow its banks (just like the Chattahoochee River today), and as some kind of a sick joke decided that a 21-day cycle is as good as a 28-day cycle (and thus showed up twice in December). I have not been very happy about it, so we largely stayed home and worked on our books.
On Saturday we hiked Kennesaw Mountain. The timing of our departure may or may not have been selected to ensure our absence during a hot chocolate stand some kids in the neighbourhood were putting on. I...just have this...thing...about lemonade stands. I can't stand 'em! They feel a little coercive to me and I don't think they really teach children about entrepreneurism. Unless they state that the funds are going to be donated to a good cause, I just can't put down $2 per cup of hot cocoa. (I have hot chocolate mix in my house for much cheaper than that, thank you kindly). We've thrown a hot cocoa stand, ourselves...and then donated all the proceeds to Lifting Hands International, a favourite non-profit of ours. But, that could be just me, and I've been know to be a bit of a Grinch sometimes.
Anyway, we left in the morning and didn't get back until the afternoon.
First we visited the museum and the kids all worked on the Junior Ranger booklets. They even had "Wee Ranger" booklets, which Phoebe really enjoyed. It was her first time earning a badge and she was over the moon to be doing "math" with the big kids!
After spending a few days doing—in Benjamin's mind—not much, we were all happy to go on an outing to the High Museum of Art on Thursday (December 21). We knew Grandpa didn't get off work until noon, but Patrick was supposed to meet up with friends later in the day, so we decided we'd leave earlier in the morning, so we didn't invite Grandpa. But then I remembered that the kids were supposed to be on puppy duty, so we wouldn't be able to leave until right around noon (when they go to visit the puppy), so we decided that if we were leaving that late we should just invite Grandpa and leave right around noon. And then soon after we decided that, our neighbour texted to say she'd be working from home and thus wouldn't need the kids to check on the puppy, so we could have left earlier in the day, anyway...
It was a confusing morning, but we managed to get out the door around the time we said we were going to leave. And we got back home with time for Patrick to pack for his sleepover. So it all worked out!
Here we are checking out an outdoor exhibit called "Happy Joylanta."
One thing Uncle Patrick wanted while he was here was a haircut from Miriam. She was a little nervous because she's only done buzz cuts on her dad, grandfather, and brothers, but Patrick wanted something a little fancier—a haircut with the top left long. I've been working on learning how to do such haircuts for my little boys who—unlike their father—don't like buzz cuts, so I helped a little and Patrick was helpful in walking Miriam through the process as well.
I finished this newsletter on Christmas Eve and distributed it to a few friends and family members, but I'm just getting around to posting it here today—on Christmas itself. We didn't take pictures until December 18 (the day Uncle Patrick flew in) and we've been busy, busy, busy since then.
We had a pretty wonderful year and I can see that next year is shaping up to be just as full. And I suppose that's what we want—a full life. I have heard so many analogies about what makes life beautiful—pianos need both black keys and white keys, music needs dissonance and resolutions (those are actual terms, right?), tapestries need both warp and weave (sometimes it's your turn to really let your colours shine and other times you sit silently at the back of the fabric, lending quiet strength). What makes life sweet and unique and wonderful is taking all those things—the difficult and the pleasant—together. So this year, like all years, wasn't a perfect year, but all in all, life is wonderful.
I got an email telling me that my library privileges have officially been revoked, so I guess that means it's official: I've graduated!
I'm really sad about my lack of library privileges, but I've graduated.
I didn't go to graduation but that doesn't mean we didn't celebrate! Graduation happened to fall on our anniversary, so we'll count our anniversary celebrations as my graduation celebration as well.
To make things really official, I asked on the Buy Nothing Group if anyone had some robes I could borrow and a neighbour responded that he happened to have his daughter's robes in a closet at home—along with her mortar board and tassels (from UGA's education program, so they were even the right colour!). It seemed like a perfect fit, so I borrowed them...
Now, am I missing the Master's hood? Yes.
Did I know I was supposed to put both tassels on the hat? No.
Was the robe sized for someone between 5'1" and 5'3"? Yes.
Am I even close to being between 5'1" and 5'3"? Not really, no.
But, if you ignore all of that (and only take pictures from the waist up), I looked like a real-life graduate! So I prettied my family up and then dragged them out into the woods to take family pictures by some rusted-out tractor bits. Naturally.
Here I am holding the books I analyzed in my thesis:
Uncle Patrick arrived late on Monday night, so when the little kids woke up in the morning—surprise!—they had a visitor. It wasn't really a surprise; we'd talked about it before his arrival. Rachel and Miriam had gone to the airport with Andrew to pick him up. Benjamin, Zoë, and Alexander were unquestionably excited for him to come. But before I took Phoebe downstairs for breakfast we talked about Uncle Patrick again (and pulled up some pictures for her to look at and so forth).
She did a pretty good job accepting him into her home, though I'm sure the treats that he gave her (hand-selected by Uncle Patrick's special someone in Vienna, who felt—probably correctly—that the children would enjoy sweets more than the ornaments he'd picked out for them (though I think they still appreciated the ornaments)) helped her warm up to the idea of...him.
This evening our stake had a Christmas musical fireside and all of the kids (except for Phoebe) got to participate. The primary kids (Benjamin, Zoë, and Alexander) sang 'The Nativity Song' and 'Estrella de Luz.' They missed yesterday's rehearsal (because we were busy dismantling that clubhouse), but I'd worked on the music with them on my own so they still went up to sing. I love how our stake often (even usually) does something in Spanish at each event. We have two Spanish-language units in our stake; I think it's only fair to switch off on which language is being privileged (or utilized).
The youth (Rachel and Miriam) sang a song together that no one in our ward knew about until today. So that was interesting. At the very least their bodies made the choir look bigger.
Miriam also participated in a youth orchestra (comprised of one violin, one cello, two basses, and Miriam at the piano). They did very well together.
Miriam also played 'Angels We Have Heard On High' at the organ. She'd practiced at this building on this organ several times and nothing had ever gone amiss, but in the middle of her performance the air conditioning system kicked on and blew her music away! First one page fluttered away, but she wasn't too concerned because she'd already finished playing it...but then the page she was on flew away, too! Fortunately another pianist up on the stand retrieved it for her and put it back up, but it was a real knuckle biter for a second there.
My hands flew up to my mouth and everything.
Once again I didn't take any videos of anything! But people from the stake were filming it, so I hope they'll distribute video of it. Who knows. Otherwise, perhaps we'll record Miriam playing her piece after church next Sunday.
After church today, Grandpa recorded Miriam playing a couple of pieces on the organ. The first is 'Still, Still, Still':
