Ordinary Time

You all know that I dislike advertising and try to limit my exposure to it. I tend not to watch television which means I get to miss the ads which go along with it. In my social media I delete or block pretty much any sponsored item or promotion that comes across my feed. I listen to either the classical music station  or NPR, neither or which play a lot of advertisements. Probably the place I view the most advertisements is on the tollway along the stretch with the endless billboards. I really enjoy my lack of exposure to advertisements. Sometimes, though, I do catch something here or there which catches my eye and is where I'm leading with all of this. And I can't even tell you what the advertisement was for except that it was some sort of store because I clicked through to the block page before seeing the rest of the text. What I did see was, "Simplify your life, buy ___."  If this doesn't sum up our material age, I don't know what does. In my personal bubb...

K. has been taking a lot of photos recently. Here are some of his latest ones. 

One of the things we typically do when everyone is over is have epic badminton games. That would be epically hilarious as none of us are fantastic players. A really good volley is four consecutive hits that make it over the net.  Last summer, we realized that the state of the rackets and birdies were virtually non-usable. A. surprised us with a new badminton set and J. had also gone and picked up some more birdies. These things made playing a lot more enjoyable.  But as we were playing one last "game" this evening, we noticed that the birdies were shredding.  We decided it was time to get the other new birdies because we were well stocked. We don't know if those birdies will shred or not because we didn't use them long enough to find out. They were so light that when you hit them, they would go for a bit then looked as though they stalled out and then just drop to the ground. We went back to the shredded one because at least made it over the net. Hopefully glueing in ...

(All photo credits to K.) Duck is definitely one of the most adored animals here at the farm and her popularity has risen even higher after the events of last night. I've decided that everyone could stand to be a bit more like duck.  Duck is kind When Fluffy the Rooster took himself off to live alone in the barn, Duck would always come up to visit him. Sometimes a random hen would make the trip, but Duck was faithful with her visiting. (Sadly we lost Fluffy a few months ago.) Duck stands up for herself More than once someone has seen Duck grab Zorro (the rooster who is twice her size) by the neck and yank him out of the way when he tried to push by her. Duck doesn't put up with that. And really don't even think about taking the eggs she is sitting on. Duck doesn't put up with nonsense. Duck stands up for others Last night we are all convinced that she saved the young hen's life and probably all the other chickens' lives as well by holding the raccoon at bay unti...

If you are a long time reader, you are aware of out ongoing battle against the raccoons we inherited when we bought the Big Ugly House. It took years before we had finally managed to get the house raccoon-free.  We have been free of raccoons for many years now. It was lovely. Then a couple of weeks ago we started seeing raccoon evidence outside. This was not met with joy, I can tell you. Then, this morning, when I entered the kitchen to get the day's first cup of coffee, I found L. in the middle of making a hearty breakfast and looking as though she had been awake for a while.  This was because she had, in fact, been awake for a while. She had been awake since 5:00 am, when she was awakened by some very loud sounds from the chicken coop. Being a good chicken carer, she rushed outside grabbing a shovel on her way. The shovel was a good idea because when L. got to the coop, she discovered a raccoon INSIDE the coop. It escaped through the wire roof when it saw L. coming after it ...

When I'm talking with parents, I often urge them to try to use humor to lower the emotional temperature in their home. (To be clear, using humor that is just generally funny or self-deprecating to the parent is what I mean. Making fun of a child, especially one who is struggling, is never going to end well.) Humor can help make things less intense and take the edge off things. By using humor, we show our children that we aren't angry and the situation is much less dire than it could be. These are all great reasons to nurture your sense of humor. Imagine my excitement when I was reading a book about a totally different topic this afternoon and came across yet another reason to add the use of humor into your parenting (or relationship) toolbox... it helps create a sense of felt safety and connection. I know I am always nattering on about felt safety and connection, but the more I read, the more I parent, and the more I work with other parents, I become more and more convinced tha...