Snow Days!!!

As snowy, frigid weather sweeps through the Midwest, its nice to take a break and focus on being cozy.  Luckily, I hit up the market on snow-themed books in the children's section at our local library. But books and hot chocolate and movies can only get your kiddo so far when the wiggles start to set in.  By noon, we took it outside for about an hour to shovel the pathways and romp in the snow.  

After drying off and warming up, we were both content to stay in the coziness and do crafty things together.  We made snow scenes with paint and construction paper shapes, then we whipped up  Coconut Snow-Cream.

Most days I try to avoid using tempera paints and go for the Crayola no-mess sets, but sometimes real paint is just more fun.  I had an empty egg carton and cut off the lid.  I filled the lid with a couple tablespoons of water and laid paper towels over the water to absorb it and work as a sponge for paintbrushes.  Then I mixed pastel colors separately in the grooves of the crate.  I left a space between each color mixtures so we wouldn't have spillover issues and muddied colors.  It worked out great!  The most non-messy painting session we've had to date!

I picked out a dark color of construction paper for the "canvas" and white for the snowman shapes.  My little girl helped me find different sizes of circles in the house to trace our snowman shapes. It was good practice the size sequence concept - each time we cut or glued the shapes, I would ask her to point out the biggest circle, bigger circle and smallest circle.  We cut-out the shapes and glued them to our canvas to make our snowy scene.

We glued cotton balls on the bottom as snow and used the end of a pencil eraser dipped in white paint as snow.  It was a fun!  

But the main event was definitely making ice cream from snow - my little one was amazed!  We happened to have some coconut milk and coconut shreds and one thing happened after another … yada, yada, yada … and we had ourselves some fluffy, coco-nuty, sweet, snowy goodness!

Coconut Snow-Cream

Yes, it does taste as good as it looks!

5-6 cups of fresh snow (or enough to fill up a large mixing bowl)

1 can of Coconut Milk

1 cup of granulated white sugar

1/2 cup shredded coconut (chopped finely in a food processor)

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Just put all of this in a really big mixing bowl and whip on high with an electric beater.  It mixes up pretty fast - like under 3 minutes.  Serve immediately or store in the freezer for later, but definitely eat within 3 hours of making it.  I would be prepared to use the mixer again for snow-cream stored in the freezer because it hardens up.

I am listening to one of my favorite songs by Burlap to Cashmere, Love Reclaims the Atmosphere.  This song speaks to me anew every time I hear it … and for that reason, you'll hear it loop on my blog media player.  I just heard the line, "I used to walk on water, but now I fan the flame," and it speaks exactly what I've been feeling today.  Some days I feel like a superstar - accomplished, eyes focused, patient, balanced; other days, I feel like all I can do is barely fan the flame in my heart to keep it burning.  On these days, I find myself asking, "Do any of my efforts even matter?"

For me, there is a definite division between dream-driven goals and purpose-driven goals.  Dream-driven goals aren't necessary to my life, but they are novelty and natural at the same time.  My dream-driven goals include to publish a book for children and to achieve reasonable livelihood from my art.  My purpose-driven goals hit to the very core of who I am, who God created me to be, and His lot for my life, such as mother, wife, sister, daughter, friend and lover of Jesus Christ.  At times when these two states of being intertwine, it makes sense - but sometimes it just doesn't!  Nevertheless, my God-given precious lot trumps all.  What hurts is when I have a day where I feel like I'm not any good at ANY of it!  I don't think I'm alone in feeling like that sometimes, but in the midst of it I can tend to get a little (aka - a lot) melodramatic.

Despite all of the melodrama and emotional hiccups - one thing keeps me grounded, thankful and strong:

Photograph by Nigel Howe

And I know that despite how ineffective, unorganized, disconnected, behind-the-mark and unaccomplished I may feel at times - God knows my heart (Psalm 139), loves me ALWAYS (Isaiah 54:10), and only has precious blessings and good gifts in mind for me (James 1:17).  He never condemns me, never berates me and never thinks less of me.  He gives me a new day everyday and His promises to me are eternal and unchanging.  Not one person is exempt from God's unending, never-failing, all-encompassing, extravagant, honest love.  

Knowing all of this, I am immediately able to respond to my self-condemning questions with, "God sees everything I do and, to Him, everything matters."  It's all going to work out (Romans 8:28).  It's all going to make sense … eventually (1 Corinthians 13:12).  He's got it covered.