This Week in our December Waldorf Homeschool

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This is the quick snapshot peek into our recent days with our Second Grader, Kindergartner and seven-week-old:

On Monday, we got up and went for a walk.  My almost five year old can now ride a two-wheeled bike all by herself and is excited about trying this out each and every day!  We came home to jump rope to jumping rhymes and snack.  Then I took out my flute and we did a little circle for Advent tailored to my Kindergartner and I told the story, “The White Bird”.  Then we launched into my second grader’s Main Lesson, which really was a combination of Math from November that we are a bit behind on with a new baby in the house and Language Arts for December. The Math Lesson we did was review of some times tables through movement, and then we did the story and freehand drawing for the sixes times table from Dorothy Harrer’s  math lessons book.  This lesson is about a King and his six sons  living in a six-sided kingdom and the drawing progresses from a hexagon to a six-pointed star to finding the triangles within the hexagon-star.  Each of the colors used in this drawing relates back to certain soul qualities and was exceptionally lovely (This lesson is copyrighted or I would share more, but it was beautiful!).  Then my second grader copied a poem about Winter into her Poetry Main Lesson Book after we stood up and recited it together.  After that, we started our Saints block with a story about Saint Nicholas.  Then our German tutor arrived for some much-needed help and we made plans for Advent crafts and baking as part of our German lessons.  During my oldest child’s Main Lesson, my younger one was eating more snacks, playing with a wooden dollhouse and then I gave her butcher block paper and markers to draw roads for her wooden mini- rollie car.  After our German tutor left, we ate lunch, had some quiet time and did some Advent crafting! 

On Tuesday, we jumped rope to begin and we have also been drawing with our feet once a week for my oldest (although my Kindergartner likes to watch this!)  We did our Kindergarten things and then we pursued more math by reviewing all times tables we have covered so far (with special emphasis of those 6’s from yesterday and the relationship between the products of the 3’s times table and the products of the 6’s times table) with jumping and stomping, snapping and clapping, bean bag tossing.  We also went back and reviewed time and copied a poem in our Main Lesson Book for remembering seconds, minutes, hours, days. My oldest then had another poem to copy in her Poetry Main Lesson Book about Winter and we re-visited the story of Saint Nicholas with some vocabulary/spelling words that I wrote on the board.  Then we made cookie dough and put it in the refrigerator and played indoors and outdoors the rest of the day!  We also made a no-cook salt dough recipe, but it was not nearly as nice as the cooked kind.  I had a little story to go with the making of the salt dough.

On Wednesday, we started with Kindergarten things again and making a peace dove for our Christmas tree with a star on the forehead just like White Bird in the story.  We went into math, reviewing place value that we already covered with the help of Donna Simmons’ squirrels and moving into adding two and three digit numbers with carrying (my daughter’s request to practice, so we did several blackboards full of problems I made up of the top pf my head) and ended by introducing the 11 times table.  Then my oldest copied the 6’s times table into her Main Lesson Book  (Not the best three day rhythm for math at this point, but playing catch-up has kind of thrown me off!).  We re-visited the story of Saint Nicholas and drew a picture with a summary in the Main Lesson Book and reviewed all the spelling/vocabulary words from the previous day.  Then our Spanish tutor arrived for some reading.  After  lunch I read a chapter from the new Gnome book by Sieglinde de Francesca called “A Donsy of Gnomes”. (http://www.teachwonderment.wahmweb.com/store/ – I promise I will do a review of this book at some point on this blog!)  The first story is about Pebble, who gathers bits of fallen stars and grows them into crystals as a crystal gardener.  It was pouring down rain, and I happened to have one of those “grow your own crystal” kits in my closet so we pulled that out so we could be crystal gardeners too!   After that we cut out cookies from the cookie dough we made yesterday in star shapes and I told the story of “The Smallest Star” from Seasons of Joy’s Advent Ebook.  The rest of the day was for playing and building forts and giant train tracks all over!

And somewhere in all this was not only the sweetest little baby 🙂 but also two needy dogs and the household chores. 

Just a quick peek at part of our week,

Carrie

Cultivating Boundaries: The Inner Work of Advent

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Like so many of my posts, they just come to me in a spurt of doing something else and I am drawn to sit down and write.  What came to me today is this notion of working on boundaries, and today I would like to talk about boundaries for ourselves.

I see so many mothers who seem to feel almost defeated by parenting and homeschooling, or often feel apologetic for “not doing more”.  I think we need to set a boundary on our own negative thoughts!  Why we are kinder to strangers than to ourselves??

When a child is learning to walk or ride a bike, we provide support and encouragement, not a bunch of comments that will tear that child down.  Let’s vow to give ourselves that same kind of  support and encouragement as we learn and grow.

I have spoken with mothers who literally cannot find one nice thing to say about themselves.  If this is you, ask the people who know you best what nice things they would say about you, your best traits and your best talents.  Write it down if you have to!  Affirm yourself, and have confidence!  You are a wonderful human being and a wonderful parent!  Your child picked you to be their parent for a reason!

Let us also learn to set boundaries with those who are negative toward us.  People who quiz our children on what they are learning in homeschool, people who have only negative things to say about the way we do things or our opinions need the boundaries that we provide them!

Stop expecting perfection out of yourself, your family and your homeschooling.  No one is perfect, yet how often do we act as if the world is coming to an end when things don’t go as we planned?  We all do the best we can do at that moment with the information we have at the time.

And do not compare! It is very easy to look at more experienced homeschooling families who have older children and think they must do everything perfectly.  Every family and every homeschool has its own strengths and weaknesses; just like teachers in a public or private school have their own strengths and weaknesses.  Be content that your children are right where they should be!

Cultivate a few good, trustworthy friends; the kind of friends who will tell you if you are doing something that really does need a second opinion!  But most of all, learn to trust yourself.  Pray and meditate, learn to trust what God is telling you and learn to trust your own gut responses.  How often we negate our own responses to things instead of being confident in our own intuition!

Let your quiet confidence lead you!

Carrie

Cultivating Rhythm: The Inner Work of Advent

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I hear from many mothers of small children who are concerned about their ability to homeschool because their lives are “chaotic” without much rhythm.  They wonder, can I homeschool if I am hopelessly disorganized and lacking in rhythm?

My first answer to this is to be easy with yourself.  If you have three or four small children under the age of 5, know that your life will look so much different than when those same children are much older.  Be easy, forgive yourself.  Sometimes it really does deserve a medal just to get through the day with everyone fed!

However, my second answer to this is yes, think how one can cultivate order and rhythm out of chaos.  Please don’t just throw up your hands and give up and not try.    Children by their nature are often irregular and need your help to obtain some kind of rhythm to their days and weeks.  And yes, Waldorf homeschooling in the grades will certainly be much more successful if you have basic rhythms for rest, food, outside time in place!

In Waldorf, rhythm is extremely important. Steiner recognized 12 senses (if you need a remedial on this, please hit the “12 senses” tag in the tag box).  We look for development for the lower four of these senses during the first seven year cycle in particular and rhythm is important in developing three out of these four senses – The Sense of Life, The Sense of Movement, and The Sense of Balance.   The Sense of Life is the Sense of Well-Being, of feeling “all is well with the world”, a sense of wonder and awe, an inner flexibility.   On The Association for A Healing Education website, Nettie Fabrie, who I believe is a Waldorf Remedial teacher on the West Coast, was quoted as saying that children who do not have this Sense of Life/Sense of Well-Being often have feelings of being unsafe, of fear and of guilt, sometimes with heightened addictive tendencies.  The Sense of Life/Well-Being has direct correlation and development to the Sense of Thought later on.  The Sense of Movement provides qualities of industry, purpose, healthy purposeful movements, connectedness to the body and knowing where one’s space is and ends. I am a physical therapist, and in one sense we would call this the proprioceptive system, but it also is so much more! The lack of  Sense of Movement can manifest itself in children as failure to pick up nonverbal or societal subtleties, depression and inwardness, inattentiveness and fidgety movements.  The Sense of Movement is intimately connected to language later on.   The Sense of Balance provides a feeling of inner balance, an ability to move between tension and rest, a sense of appropriateness, the ability to calm oneself, the ability to give focused attention.  An obvious lack of development of this sense would include impulsivity, inability to slow down, inner agitation.  The sense is connected to the Sense of Hearing later on.  Obviously, this is a glance at this topic, but something to consider and think about.   A sense of rhythm is one thing that is very important to developing all three of the four of these lower senses! 

In practical terms, the foundations we lay are the foundations that our children may keep later on and come back to, even if they are rejected at points as the child grows.  I liken this to this small example:  I had one child who dealt with sleeping in a sling a lot with no set nap schedule, and one child who had a consistent nap schedule.  Guess which child took naps longest?  The one where it was part of the routine.   I am not saying rhythm is the only reason why this was so, but rhythm certainly can be your helpmate.

Rhythm can provide you with a balance.  If you never take time to care for yourself, always going from one thing to the next until you fall over at night, how will your children learn balance?  They are watching and imitating you!  Remember, rhythm is not about a Schedule with Checkboxes.  But it is about a general order, a general flow and that balance of rest and energy, tension and ease.

Here are some open-ended questions regarding rhythm:

  • Do you have rhythms set around mealtimes and rest and bed times?
  • What is your rhythm for  your own inner work, your own work you may do for pay, and other roles you may play besides Wife and Mother?
  • What kind of rhythm do you have for spending time with your partner? 
  • Do you have a general rhythm for taking care of your own health?
  • What is your rhythm for homeschooling?
  • What is the rhythm for balancing being home and being outside of your home?  Are you always going, going, going?  Do you find it difficult to say no to outside things?
  • Do you have seasonal rhythms?  What festivals speak to you –why and why not?

Perhaps as part of your work during this Advent, you can meditate on the concept of rhythm and what that means to you, what it means to your children, and how what rhythm means to you and your children may change as your children age.

Many blessings and peace on this wonderful Advent night,

Carrie

Cultivating Gratitude: The Inner Work Of Advent

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There is a lot of buzz these days around the word gratitude.  Gratitude journals, counting things to be thankful for, making lists of things we are grateful for before meals, an Attitude of Gratitude,  have all been popularized.

Gratitude is an important piece of this time of year, and a work for exploring the inner soul of Advent.  As a Christian at this time of year, I have gratitude for  a Creator who  experienced  life as a mere man.  He is always accessible and ever-present within me, as He has walked this path and experienced the heart ache, the challenges, the temptation, the joy and the sadness of being human.  Such openness and intimacy in that relationship.

John F. Kennedy reportedly said this:  “As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.”

How often do we fail to live up to that highest challenge?  How often do we complain to our girlfriends about what our husbands don’t do?  About the challenging spots our children are in developmentally?  About the never-ending chores of maintaining a home?  The never-ending planning for homeschooling and the actual hours spent in lessons, sometimes with children who seem far from appreciative?

How can we live in gratitude?  If we can model this, then our children will surely imitate what is in our hearts.  Our home will have a different tone as we do this. 

To me the key is this:  if I can radiate a positive attitude within  myself  no matter what the circumstance, then I am expressing gratitude.

A mother within Melisa Nielsen’s “Be A Beacon” program had a wonderful idea regarding stopping negativity. She said one thing to consider would be to wear a bracelet, rubber band, etc on your wrist and if you had a negative thought, just take it off and switch it to the other wrist.  No judging, just move the bracelet. The goal, of course, would be to see how many minutes, hours or days one could keep the bracelet on the original wrist.

Back to JJFK’s statement!  This week, can you show your family how much you appreciate them?  Even better if you can do this with joyous action, not only  words.  Show your spouse how much you love and respect them.   Show your children your respect and love for them.  Enjoy cleaning your home and making it nice for your family!  By taking care of the people, pets and things that we love, we are showing our gratitude that they are in our lives.

Is there someone that helps bring back the spark within you after it has been extinguished?  Your spouse, for certain, but perhaps also a close friend?  Does that person know that?  It is never to late to tell them! 

With your children, can you start to cultivate gratitude in them?  An excellent start is by modeling a positive attitude and taking care of your family and  environment in a joyful manner.  Then, can you reach out to help others in your neighborhood, within your circle of friends or within your community?  This helps to build gratitude and appreciate for what gifts we have and can use to help others.  Every day, bit by bit, year by year, we build our children’s hearts.  Let us be thankful for the opportunity!

Many blessings,

Carrie

PS – Please see Melisa Nielsen’s excellent comment below!  It is not too late to join her program if you are interested!!

The First Week Of Advent

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The day before the first Sunday in Advent, I set up two Nativity scenes: one on the Nature Table in our schoolroom, and one “adult” nativity scene in a different room. I am very lucky in that my husband’s grandmother made our Nativity scenes in her ceramic shop a long time ago.  She died right before our first child was born, and it gives me such pleasure to look at her beautiful handwork.

The Nativity Scene in the schoolroom is on a light blue silk and so far consists of Mary and Joseph on the right flanked by some very large conch shells  with a path of seashells laid out before them leading to the manger.    This Nativity Scene is actually a child’s Nativity with all chubby-faced children and fits in well with our schoolroom.  The shells are keeping in line with our first week of Advent that celebrates the mineral kingdom preparing to receive their Creator and King.

“The first light of Advent is the light of stone-

Stones that live in crystals, seashells and bone.” – attributed to Steiner

Over the week we hope to add some crystals to our Nature Table Nativity Scene.

The adult Nativity Scene is set up on a dark blue felt and is set up with everything with the exception of the infant Jesus.  Our Advent wreath is also in this area as well.  Little by little we will be decorating for Christmas.

Our plans for this week include daily readings from the Bible, making two kinds of cookies, starting a green and red construction paper chain with Bible verses on it to mark each day until Christmas,  and several Advent  crafts revolving around Saint Nicholas.  We are reading Jakob Streit’s “Saint Nicholas” each night in preparation for Saint Nicholas Day and also reading a story from “A Light In The Lantern” each night as well.

Our biggest plan for the week entails surprising our neighbors with Christmas cookies on Saint Nicholas Eve.  We are looking forward to that!

I hope you have a wonderful week as well,

Carrie

“I Am New To Waldorf: How Can I Find Out More?”

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This comes up quite a bit.  Honestly, I think the best place to start is Steiner himself and then delve into other people’s works.  Here are my suggestions: 

Introductory Works To Waldorf Education:

  • The Kingdom of Childhood  – Steiner
  • The Education of The Child  – Steiner
  • The Spirit of The Waldorf School  – Steiner
  • Soul Economy  – Steiner (Maybe more an intermediate level, but probably my favorite in many ways).
  • These books can be bought here:  http://www.waldorfbooks.com/edu/steiner_waldorf.htm

For Children Under The Age of 7:   one of the Following:

  • You Are Your Child’s First Teacher (check your library for this title) (Dancy Baldwin)
  • Heaven on Earth (Oppenheimer)
  • Beyond the Rainbow Bridge (Patterson and Bradley)

For the Big Overall Picture Of Waldorf Education – Otherwise Known As “The Kindergarten Years Are Very Short”:

  • The Waldorf Parenting Handbook (Cusick)
  • Waldorf Education:  A Family Guide (Fenner and Rivers)
  • School As A Journey (Finser)
  • The Christopherus Waldorf Curriculum Overview for Homeschoolers (Simmons)

 I hope that is helpful to some of you.

Many blessings,

Carrie

Using Main Lesson Dot Com

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Some mothers have been asking me how I personally use www.mainlesson.com

I use it to find seasonal stories to tell on  baking and gardening day, and I have also found several Saint stories on there I have used as well for my Second Grader.

Here is an example of what I used off of this site during November for my Second Grader and Kindergartener:

  • “Saint Martin” for my Second Grader on Martinmas
  • “The Story of the First Corn” on Gardening Day before Thanksgiving
  • “Saint Gerasimus and the Lion” for my Second Grader for a story during Handwork

In December, I will be using:

  • “How the Fir Tree Became the Christmas Tree” for whilst cookies are baking
  • “A Christmas Legend” as a Gardening Story
  • “Mrs. Santa Claus” on Baking Day
  • A story about Holly and Saint Nicholas on Saint Nicholas Day
  • “Silvercap, King of the Frost Fairies” on Gardening Day

Hope that helps some of you see the potential use of this site,

Carrie

Favorite Books For Gentle Discipline

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Specifically Regarding Anger:

  • “When Anger Hurts Your Kids” by Mckay, Fanning, Paleg and Landis
  • “love and anger the parental dilemma” by Nancy Samalin with Catherine Whitney

Under Age 9:

  • WALDORF:  “You Are Your Child’s First Teacher” by Rahima Baldwin Dancy
  • WALDORF:  “Beyond the Rainbow Bridge”
  • WALDORF:  “Heaven On Earth” by Sharifa Oppenheimer, although I cannot recommend the references to time-out.  Those of you who read this blog know I oppose time-out.  Many parents do love this book though!
  • WALDORF:  “You’re Not The Boss of Me!  Understanding the Six/Seven Year Transformation” available through www.waldorfbooks.org
  • WALDORF:  Donna Simmons’ Audio Downloads  on “The Changing Face Of Discipline” and also “Talking Pictorially and Living Actively with Your Young Child” – can be found here: http://www.christopherushomeschool.org/bookstore-for-waldorf-homeschooling/audio-downloads.html
  • WALDORF:  “The Challenge of The Will” by Margret Meyerkort and Rudi Lissau
  • DEVELOPMENTAL:  For understanding realistic expectations for each age, I still like The Gesell Institute books “Your One-Year-Old” “Your Two-Year-Old” etc.  They are available at many libraries and are also easily picked up used.
  • DEVELOPMENTAL/LOVING GUIDANCE:  “Mothering Your Nursing Toddler”  by Norma Bumgarner
  • ATTACHMENT PARENTING:  “Attached At The Heart”  by Barbara Nicholson and Lysa Parker (one chapter of discipline)
  • GENTLE DISCIPLINE:  La Leche League’s “Adventures in Gentle Discipline” –this also has a part about time out as mentioned by parents, which I oppose.    The voices of many mothers are throughout this book, so you will have to pick through what resonates with you.  Particularly if you are also a Waldorf family, the “talk talk talk” of some of the families with their tiny children  may not resonate with you!  There is however, a good section as to what “gentle discipline” is and isn’t in the beginning of the book.  A good place to start if you are new to gentle discipline and equate it in your head with children having no boundaries (which is NOT what it is!)
  • ATTACHMENT PARENTING:  “Connection Parenting”  by Pam Leo
  • GENTLE DISCIPLINE:  “Easy To Love, Difficult To Discipline”  by Becky Bailey
  • GENTLE DISCIPLINE:  “Playful Parenting” by Lawrence Cohen
  • GENTLE DISCIPLINE:  “Discipline Without Distress” by Judy Arnall – you can search through this blog for chapter summaries of this book, not all strategies in this book are compatible with a Waldorf approach but overall a helpful book
  • And may I ever so humbly recommend this blog?:)

Over Age 9:

  • WALDORF:  Specific to the Nine-Year-Old Change:  Donna Simmons’s Audio Downloads on Third Grade and also “The Changing Face of Discipline for ages 9 and up”
  • WALDORF:  Specific to the Nine-Year-Old Change:  “Encountering the Self” by Hermann Koepke
  • GENERAL PARENTING:  “Hold On to Your Kids” by Gordon Neufeld and Gabor Mate
  • GENTLE DISCIPLINE:  “Kids Are Worth It!” by Barbara Coloroso.  Has some good examples of how to “hold the space” in it. 
  •  GENTLE DISCIPLINE:  “Loving Your Child Is Not Enough:  Positive Discipline That Works” by Nancy Samalin with Martha Moraghan Jablow
  • GENTLE DISCIPLINE:  “Raising Your Spirited Child” and “Kids, Parents and Power Struggles” by Mary Sheedy Kurcinka  (I put these here because the strategies essentially involve emotion coaching and I feel that is better for an older child).

 

Over Age 12:

  • WALDORF:  Specific to the 12- Year -Old Change:  Hermann Koepke’s “On the Threshold of Adolescence”
  • WALDORF:  Also, several of Steiner’s works are now available for education and observation of the adolescent:   http://www.waldorfbooks.com/edu/adolescence.htm
  • WALDORF:  “Between Form and Freedom” by Betty Staley
  • GENTLE DISCIPLINE:  “Kids Are Worth It!”  by Barbara Coloroso
  • GENTLE DISCIPLINE:  “Kids, Parents and Power Struggles” by Mary Sheedy Kurcinka and “Raising Your Spirited Child” by Mary Sheedy Kurcinka
  • GENTLE DISCIPLINE:  “Peaceful Parents, Peaceful Kids” by Naomi Drew
  • COMMUNCICATION:  “NonViolent Communication”  by Marshall Rosenberg (and to me, once your child hits 15 or so, why not attend a NVC Group together and practice?)
  • COMMUNICATION:  “How to Talk So Kids Will Listen, and Listen So Kids Will Talk” and “Liberated Parents, Liberated Children:  Your Guide To A Happier Family” by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish

 

Let me be clear, one can certainly read the gentle discipline books for the older children when one’s child is younger and gleam things from them, but some of  the approaches are best saved for when your child is older!

And finally, some gentle books for the mother:

CHRISTIAN:  “The Power of A Positive Mother” by Karol Ladd

GENERAL/BUDDHIST: “Everyday Blessings:  The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting” by Myla and Jon Kabat-Zinn

WALDORF/GENERAL:  “Mitten Strings for God:  Reflections For Mothers In A Hurry” by Katrina Kenison

Blessings,

Carrie

Saint Nicholas Day in The Waldorf Home

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Yes, Saint Nicholas is often celebrated in Waldorf Schools and within the Waldorf Home.  And before one worries about Saints being associated with the Waldorf curriculum, I urge you to remember that Saint Nicholas Day is widely celebrated all over Europe.

In the book “An Overview of the Waldorf Kindergarten” as edited by Joan Almon, this is written about the role of Saint Nicholas during Advent:  “(Saint Nicholas) is an archetypal figure of heavenly wisdom and is the forerunner of Santa Claus, whose very name is reminiscent of St. Nicholas. Santa Claus, however, is a more earth-bound, incarnated figure who dwells with elves in the North Pole.  Though he, too, if full of love for the children, his gifts are more of a material nature, even though he comes on Christmas Eve, a time of profound spiritual giving.  One can understand how he arose in our more materialistic, secular age, and one can hold him a positive way for the sake of the children who love him so, but one can also create a place in the Advent season to bring the original, more heavenly St. Nicholas to the children.”

I guess because I have German/Polish/Norwegian/French roots and my husband has Danish/German roots, we love Saint Nicholas Day.  Our oldest daughter goes to German School on Saturday mornings and I love to see it celebrated in the community there as well.  They leave their shoes out and whilst lessons are going on, Saint Nicholas is busy filling the shoes up with goodies. 🙂

Saint Nicholas Day is on December 6th, although I do believe my Dutch friends celebrate it on December 5th.  In Holland, Saint Nicholas comes with “Black Peter” and distributes gifts – some families use a “Sinterklass sack” (did I slaughter that, my Dutch friends??!!)  Sometimes he comes with a Golden Book of names to read the names of the good little children!

Saint Nicholas was born either Syria or Turkey in 3 A.D. and eventually became the Bishop of Myra in Asia Minor.  There are many stories about Saint Nicholas out there for telling – some involve the provision of a dowry for three daughters, some involve Saint Nicholas bringing food to the starving, some involve calming the seas.  He is the Patron Saint of prisoners (Saint Nicholas was persecuted for his faith and spent time in prison), children, sailors and is the Patron Saint of Russia.

Children typically leave out a clean shoe (we leave out wooden clogs from Germany and Holland on our hearth) along with hay and carrots for the horse of Saint Nicholas.  I believe some families also make honey cakes and leave those out as well.  Usually in return the children receive nuts, candy, chocolates and sometimes gifts as well.  Saint Nicholas Eve is the major gift-giving occasion in Holland.

This is a holiday that leads us deeper into Advent, and is one of great joy.  If you are seeking more information regarding Saint Nicholas, I suggest you try the Saint Nicholas Center here:http://www.stnicholascenter.org/Brix?pageID=23

Here are some Saint Nicholas crafts:  http://www.stnicholascenter.org/Brix?pageID=122   Every year we crack walnuts, hot glue the walnut shell closed and then hot glue that onto a piece of red felt that has been made into a cone shape.  On top of that we place the famous Bishop’s mitre and hang it on our tree.  Lovely!

Here is a Saint Nicholas story from Main Lesson Dot Com:

http://www.mainlesson.com/display.php?author=olcott&book=holidays&story=purses

Blessings,

Carrie

Advent EBook

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The Advent EBook from Seasons of Joy is here!  Please follow this link to Annette’s site to order:  http://naturalfamily.50megs.com/custom2_1.html

I have not seen it yet, but I am sure it will be a gift for the holidays!

The EBook  is centered around the famous verse of Steiner’s that we all know and love:

“The first light of Advent is the light of stone–.
Stones that live in crystals, seashells, and bones.
The second light of Advent is the light of plants–
Plants that reach up to the sun and in the breezes dance.
The third light of Advent is the light of beasts–
All await the birth, from the greatest and in least.
The fourth light of Advent is the light of humankind–
The light of hope that we may learn to love and understand.”

Many blessings,

Carrie