Allergy pills only make Rebecca tired during the day.

Attention to all you parents who take pictures of your kids to put on Christmas cards and think they're cute. Well, maybe they are, but they will never, ever be as cute as this picture taken for a Christmas card in the 1950's:

( Click Here! )

I went back to the house today to pick up my and Sara's Christmas ornaments. I really love getting them out of storage every year. I've had the same ornaments since I was little: a really ugly candy cane I made in kindergarten, an ornament of Mary and Jesus, also made in kindergarten, a miniature blackboard from my elementary school, a white bear from the summer camp I used to attend, a carousel horse, and a silver rocking horse (my favorite). BUT I wasn't able to find the Christmas ornament that I bought at a street fair in Villers-Cotterets and mailed home last year; it was a bear in a Santa suit, holding a mini Eiffel Tower. I had assumed my family put it with the rest of the ornaments, but I looked through every box and didn't find it. I am NOT happy about this.

Anyway, we haven't hung up any of our ornaments yet because we don't have a tree. Sara didn't want one at first, but I think I might be able to talk her into getting a small artificial one, if we can find one at a cheap price. I strung up our stockings in the living room (We don't have one for Sable! How crazy is that? I'll have to get him one.) but for me it doesn't really feel like Christmas without a tree.

Today my awesome aunt gave us some curtains for our bedroom, so I have taken those off my Christmas list. It took me forever, but I finally got them hung up in the bedroom. They're dark and thick, so I think they'll be excellent at keeping the sunlight out in the mornings.

A few days ago I read a really wonderful children's book, Bird Lake Moon, by Kevin Henkes. Henkes is best known for Olive's Ocean, which won the Newberry Honor medal a few years ago; I read that too and while it was good, I think Bird Lake Moon is far better. The style is simple yet powerful, so that every word seems important, and even brief interactions are full of meaning. (A good example is the short conversation between Mitch and the girl he meets while looking for Jasper; it's fleeting but lingers in Mitch's mind and the reader's.) It reminded me very much of The Goats, by Brock Cole, which is one of my all-time very favorite kid/teen books.