Happy New Year!!!

New Year's Day has always seemed sacred to me. A time to review the last year of life and think about the one ahead. How will I spend my  days, my hours, the moments that I'm blessed with? It seems a big responsibility and I want to get it right. I don't want to let the hours and days, the weeks and months slip by without purpose and meaning. How can I fully experience life? Where do I focus my attention? The ordinary lists that I've composed year after year that always include a healthy diet, regular exercise, daily prayer and meditation,learning something new, expressing myself creatively, serving others; these continue to be my intentions, but I find myself overwhelmed with the image of a new canvas, this big clean canvas. I want to paint a lovely picture. More importantly I want to dive in with abandon, go wild with new colors and splash it on the canvas without worrying about how it looks, or if it's good enough. Can I let it BE? Can I let myself be? 

I ran across a blog called, ON BEING with Krista Tippett. I love it. It's full of wonderful, intelligent, inspiring stories and articles. I hope you check it out. (onbeing.org). There I read a poem from Mary Oliver (one of my favorite poets):

"No one of us can provide all of the light we need. But every one of us can shed some kind of light. Every day we can ask ourselves, "What kind of light can I provide today?"

Isn't that a great question? It's really pretty simple. We do our best. We pay attention. We are present. AND we notice the ordinary, every day gifts and give thanks! Which brings to mind one of my favorite books that I read last year; "One Thousand Gifts" by Ann Voskamp. She dares us to LIVE FULLY right where we are!! Her book is  so beautifully written I cried as I read it, a practical guide to living a life of JOY by being THANKFUL in all things. She kept a running list, which now numbers over 4,000 gifts, made up of the easily overlooked small stuff of life, the graces, the "love gifts" that are waiting to be noticed. 

She expresses so beautifully some of my private concerns, fears I've never been able to articulate; 

" ....Which road through this brief land? What is all most important? How to live the fullest life here that delivers into the full life ever after?...Desperately feeling along today for a way to live through this fleeting blink of a life. How do we live fully so we are ready to die?"

Continuing excerpts from her book;  

"The answer; Giving thanks in everything. Learn how to be thankful and happy, whether hands full or hands empty; a secret worth spending a life on learning. Stop. Pay attention. Notice. Give thanks.

Being in a hurry. Getting to the next thing without fully entering the thing in front of me. I cannot think of a single advantage I've ever gained from being in a hurry. But a thousand broken and missed things, tens of thousands, lie in the wake of all the rushing... Through all the haste I thought I was making up time. It turns out I was throwing it away. Hurry always empties a soul.

I only live the full life when I live fully in the moment... Weigh down this moment in time with attention full, and the whole of time's river slows, slows, slows. Wherever you are, be all there.

This is where God is. In the present. I AM. His very name. It's not the gifts that fulfill, but the holiness of the space.

This full attention slows time and I live the full of the moment, right to outer edges. When I'm present, I meet I AM, the very presence of a present God. In His embrace, time loses all sense of speed and stress and space and stands so still and ... holy.

I keep my eyes wide open. I move slow. I sense the wonder of each moment. It's ridiculous how much joy a moment can hold."

New Years Eve in Wisconsin

So when I checked the weather this morning it was -8 degrees!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It has warmed up to 1 degree but the weather report says, "feels like -17 degrees".....

That's minus seventeen degrees!!!!!!

You know how people from the midwest cannot imagine how we can possibly survive when it is 115 or 120 degrees in Arizona????? Well, I think this is kinda like that in reverse. You dress appropriately,

you go about your business and you just deal with it. And you tell yourself it's not that bad....

What makes it bearable today is that the sun is out in all its glory. Radiant ribbons of light, streaming through the trees, casting long shadows, making the snow glisten like diamonds on the ground. But don't be deceived!!! IT IS COLD!!!!

FOG FROST...so pretty!

Luce

we've had as many as 13 wild turkey in our front yard

deer visit us often here

This morning the cardinal is back at the feeder. It's the female; we know that because we visited the natural history museum at UWSP yesterday (after the tour of the fire station) and bought a book on birds of Wisconsin. What a wonderful museum! The kids loved it and kept Mike busy asking him for help to locate the various animals, fish, birds and minerals throughout the museum as they checked them off their worksheets.

Today we plan to play games and share a fajita dinner. Afterwards we have tickets to go to Bernard's and listen to the very popular band Horseshoes and Hand Grenades. You can check them out on YouTube.

Hope everyone has a safe and happy New Years Eve.

  

visiting fire station #1

Mike arranged for a tour of the local fire

station as a special treat for all of us!

Harlow,Lorelei,Wilson,Clara,Zia,Joy,Jonathon,Mike and I arrived at 1:00 and had a one hour tour that included all the trucks, the ambulance, learning about all the equipment and tools they use and visiting the fire fighter's living quarters.

Oh, and we bought the 2015 Calendar strictly for the purpose of supporting the fire station! All of the guys in the calendar work there!!! :)

Candy Party

candy party at Kirsch Camp!

It's an annual event at the Kirsches that all the neighbors look forward to every
December between Christmas and New Years. Usually there are about 50 attending
the festivities.

Just in case you're not familiar with CANDY MAKING;

It is an ART... a SCIENCE... and TIMING is EVERYTHING!!!!

This year the tradition is being passed down to the next generation, so Jonathon and his sibs and even a couple of neighbors learned what it takes to be a candy maker in the Kirsch kitchen! 

Dad (John Kirsch) made it look effortless all these years!! But there is a technique that must be developed. It's about patience and then swiftness of movement when Joy (who has been stirring the pot continuously for about fifteen minutes and keeping an eye on the candy thermometer),  yells "HOT CRACK!!" and the sweet bubbling lava is poured onto the marble slab. Now the candy makers jump into action! 

We are teams, all of us, anxiously waiting with our scissors at the kitchen counter that is completely covered in powdered sugar. The first batch is peppermint and the aroma in the kitchen is amazing. It's like a burst of energy. The cutter at his place in front of the marble slab cuts sections and whisks them off the slab to the powdery countertops where we cut like crazy before the candy hardens. We cut little pillows and roll them in the sugar. Each batch that follows is a different color and flavor; anise, lemon, cherry, root beer, clove, cinnamon, wintergreen and tangerine. In between batches the candy is picked up and placed in a big sifter where the excess sugar is shaken off and the candy put in jars. At the end everyone has their very own colorful collection of sweet confection to take home and share!

Here are some pictures from a few years back when John, the Master Candy Maker, was at the helm.

CANDY MAKERS NEXT GEN

Jonathon's First Time at the helm!

Wilson and Clara sifting

Cory and son Drew, Jonathon and Mike

Lorelei, Wilson and Clara