It's a Classical Life

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas in our house! The kids are all on holidays now and the sun is shining. After a couple of mediocre summers I am embracing a long, hot summer with Christmas to look forward to. What's it like where you are? Hot? Snowy? Windy? (We've had some really bad storms already this summer with wind taking down trees all around us). I have created this word search for you to enjoy this weekend. Christmas is the theme and there are twenty words for you to find in a large, easy to read font. The water paint was a new one I did this week; my first attempt at holly!   Downloading the word search is simple. Either click on the jpeg image above and print it, or you can click on the pdf link below. Christmas Word Search If you're interested, you can find the other word searches that I have created  here . My goal was to create one word search a month; this year I created and posted six. Fifty percent success rate! Not too bad. If you are interest...

  I absolutely love this quote and when I came across it again recently in my reading I knew I wanted to share it for Advent. Even if you aren't a follower of an organised religion or have a deep connection to a spiritual journey, I think there is much to be said about this time of year of peace, hope, waiting, and love. We can get caught up in all the bad things that are going on in the world but Advent and Christmas are meant to be times when we can focus on love, beauty and hope for the future.  The smallest acts of hope and kindness can mean the most to those who are suffering, especially at this time of year. I have just come back from a shopping trip on the other side of town and I was impressed by how kind and helpful the shop assistants were. There was no panic, no rudeness or impatience. One shop attendant even chatted with me about the weather! I was on a mission to get my shopping done and had to slow myself down to appreciate the moment for what it was - a blessing...

Happiness is not a state to arrive at, but a manner of travelling. Margaret Lee Runbeck I can't believe how quickly November passed us by! It felt like chilly October hung around a bit too long, but this last month has flown by. Spring, in all its variable and unpredictable glory, has come to an end and I thought I would share with you some reflections of life in general around here lately. The quote above was in a book that I was reading this weekend and it was a perfect reminder that the simple things really do matter and play such an important role in our day-to-day contentment and appreciation. In the garden Spring is always a tough time around here. We can get frost as late as November, so often we wait before planting out tomatoes, zucchini or other cold-intolerant plants. However, because there was so little frost this winter we took the chance and planted things a bit earlier. We are already enjoying zucchini and there are some tomatoes growing. We have three lots of tomato...

As we approach the end of the year, it is a nice time for many of us to stop, reflect and give thanks for what we have, who we have, and where we are in our lives. I know many of you enjoy the celebration of Thanksgiving, a mindset built around the idea of gratitude and giving thanks. For those of us who don't have a day to focus on this, I thought the beginning of December (and of Advent in our household), would be a good time to express our gratitude. We have a little advent calendar in our house with different activities and ideas in each day's pocket. The 2nd December says "talk about what you are thankful for." For me this week, I am thankful for the rain but also for the rainbows and the sun that have followed. In the bigger picture, I am thankful for our home, my family, my job, and my faith.  This quote by Aesop is a telling one. Living in a time when philosophy, religion and storytelling were all deemed as admirable qualities, one can assume that when he uses...