December is Here!

Good morning and happy first Monday of December! I hope this day finds you well and in the Christmas spirit. We finally got all of our Christmas lights up yesterday. Granted, we could use more lights, but we put up what we have and we are done for this year. Everything is festive and smells like Christmas trees around here!

My son has one more day of his homeschool co-op where he will take a comprehensive exam, but then we’re finished with formal school until after the new year. I know that’s a really long break, but we’ve been at it hard since the beginning of August and all of us are just about at our breaking point. I still have two more months of coursework for my Functional Medicinal Health Coaching program and we will continue with small amounts of school work throughout our break (hello, math!), but we scale it wayyyy back. We’ll be doing life school and that’s the most valuable education of all.

These days, my kids, who are 12 and 14, are needing some additional lessons in kindness, generosity, patience, selflessness, and…I think you get the idea. So that is what we are going to be focusing on.

In addition to all the moral stuff listed above, I want to raise people who can cook nutritious meals for themselves someday. I do 99.9% of the cooking around here. Number one, because I enjoy it and number two, because I’m selfish with my kitchen. So over our break, my goal is to help the kids come up with a list of meals they can, or want to try to prepare and get them started cooking dinner one night a week. We will also be doing a lot of cookie baking.

Thinking about our cookie plan is really what prompted this post in the first place. I was going to write up our plan – yes, Christmas cookie baking requires a plan (if you’re me 😊 ), but I looked back and I have already said all I really want to say about this cookie baking extravaganza that is about to begin.

Please read up on how to find balance and still enjoy lots of better for you goodies in this post:

Let’s Get Ready for Christmas Cookie Season!

I was trying to find a picture of the kids baking with me. I know I have lots of them, but I couldn’t find any this morning, but I did find some other goodies I’d like to share with you:

Here we are planting our garden. This is much more virtuous than baking cookies.
And my children would ALWAYS choose a head of home-grown broccoli over a cookie anyway. Maybe that’s a little fib.
This one was making a “world” cake as part of a tasty geography lesson.
It’s so hard not to dig right in!!
This is how we counteract all those cookies – lots of time outside, preferably hiking.
That little one on the end with her bouquet of leaves is just killing me.
I love these people – and when they’re trying my nerves, I like to remember these moments.

They’re not so little anymore, but they’re still pretty cute, if I do say so myself. I like that big guy a lot too. 🙂 

I hope your December is off to a great start!

And seriously, I do have lots of wholesome, paleo treat recipes for you linked in that cookie post above. There are classics like gingerbread men and sugar cookies and some of our own creations including fudge bars and raspberry almond bars. I’m sure you’ll find something you like that will please even the pickiest eaters in your house.