Ordinary Time

Years ago, I made a preposition activity box for H. because she really struggled with what various prepositions meant. I figured if she could physically manipulate something so that she could see what was happening, prepositions would make more sense. For the most part, I was correct and her understanding of prepositions greatly increased. (First and last are still a bit baffling, but as she reads more and has more experience tracking, they are making more sense.) It occurred to me I could get out the activity box which had been languishing on a shelf to help my preposition averse group identify them more easily. (Really, there was no ability issue on anyone's part. This has been far more of an interest issue, and I'm rather tired of it.) So I presented the box to them this morning.  It's a pretty simple concept. There is a plastic tapir, some blocks, and some laminated cards each with a different preposition. (It used to be a plastic baby elephant, but he was wanted to pla...

As the day progressed and I thought about the week ahead, I realized that it would be wise to go to the Asian market to get what I needed for Tet/Chinese New Years on Tuesday today rather than trying to squeeze it in on Tuesday. I'm glad I did because my trip to one store became a trip to three stores. The first was Park to Shop. Being a mainly Chinese store, I was pretty convinced that it would have everything I needed. I could go, grab the things on my list, and head home to be back in time for tea. When I got there I realized that this was not going to be a fast in and out trip. It was busy! I've never had to park so far away and there were no shopping carts available. This last turned out to be okay because the one thing I really, really needed wasn't there. Earlier, when I had asked my people what they wanted to have for dinner, they chose a stir-fried dumpling dish that they all love and Y. really wanted some stir-fried lotus root. I don't know if you've notic...

You know what I love? When our adult children who are in the area decide to spontaneously all stop by. We saw everyone but D. today, with most people staying for dinner. I love spending time with my adult children and I love that they enjoy spending time with each other.  J. and I (and some adult children) all had a moment of two after looking at the post I shared on Thursday from when G. and L. were three. I think we all really wished that we had a time machine so we could visit them at that age again. But you know what? I really love my adult children, too. We may miss all of them at those young ages, but we like our children and who they are. They are interesting, intelligent, and fun to be with. We are most certainly blessed.

In hardly breaking news, it's still cold. That above sentence could kind of sum up my existence. I carry water to the barn, I throw hay to the horses, I cancel lessons. It's been nice to have some snow, but now I'm done. As crazy as it seems, I need to start planning my spring and summer horse classes and retreats in the next couple of weeks.  Is anyone else a little preoccupied with all of the myriad of different pronunciations of the Ukrainian capital? Every NPR announcer seems to pronounce it differently. Our neurologist appointment went well this past Monday. She is pleased with the progress that both girls have made. Some crafts sound far better on paper than they do in reality. I'm afraid that the papier-mache globes may be one that list. We repaired, as best we could, the holes and splits which occurred due to the expansion of heated air inside the balloons. Today everyone attempted to draw the continents on their globes so we could begin to add the different bio...

I've been thinking about this for a while, but decided to write about it after talking with a friend this afternoon. We both have children who span a wide range of ages, and both of us agree that give us a fussy baby or toddler any day because that seems so easy to manage. Were those fussy babies and toddlers easy in the moment? No (well, not the first ones, the latter ones seemed significantly easier , though if you've read here for a long time, you'll be aware that L. was not an easy baby or toddler) but this kind of proves my point. So much of it was my perspective. When L. and G. came along, I already had teens. I knew first hand exactly how fast the years go even if the hours can crawl. I really did regret being so focused on my first children making progress and learning new things and hitting the next benchmark that I forgot to really relish them as they were at that moment. Because I knew that G. and L. would do all these things much sooner than I was ready for the...

Well, let's see... I could talk about the weather. How it's just been terribly cold for what seems like years, and tonight we're supposed to have our coldest night yet. According to the weather report, it will be a balmy -13 degrees when I go out to feed the horses in the morning. (Don't worry, they are all tucked up in the barn with their blankets on and all the doors closed, along with plenty of hay. They're going to be fine.) But, that seems too depressing to contemplate, so let's not talk about that. Or, I could talk about all the paperwork I am still avoiding doing.... guardianship things, horse things, and pretty soon we will be heading into tax things. But I think I've completed the paperwork for too many adoptions because paperwork fills with me dread and anxiety these days. Let's not talk about that, either. I could tell you more about what projects I plan to make in the fiber realm, but I'm trying to keep that to Mondays, so that's out....

I was awakened by my phone ringing early this morning. I do not awake quickly, so I was clearly muddled as I got out of bed and staggered (really, it was a stagger) to my phone. I'm actually surprised I didn't accidentally decline the call because my brain was definitely interpreting the noise as an alarm and I was just trying to make the noise stop. I did manage to answer and it say hello. It turned out to be a welcome call since it was the neurologist's office saying she couldn't get into the office due to snow (snow? I didn't know we were due to have snow) and could I do a telemed appointment. Since we drive about an hour and half to this particular doctor, skipping the drive (in snow) seemed like a lovely idea, so of course I agreed. And we did have snow. In fact when I looked out the window it was still snowing. I think we got about five inches or so. I declared it a snow day because I had planned to be driving to a neurology appointment and hadn't planned ...

Have you ever had the experience of picking up a new book which has dozens of glowing blurbs printed on the covers which makes you very excited to begin, only to wonder partway through if the reviewers somehow were given a different copy than the one you hold in your hands?  I am setting aside the second book for 2022 already. It is The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton. It won all sorts of best book prizes for 2013, including the Man Booker Prize. The blurbs include statements such as, "The pages fly" and "A very clever, absurdly fun novel" and "Nearly impossible to put down". It makes you want to read it, huh? It is 880 pages long, but I like long books (if they are good), so that was a plus, particularly if the pages were going to fly by.  Truly, I do not think the book I have can be the same book that was given to the reviewers. The pages have not flown. I have been reading it for four or five days now and am only on page 188. The slowness comes not from no...

Yesterday, I visited a local arts school because I saw that they had a shop that sold weaving supplies. Since it was significantly closer than the only other store I know about, it seemed worth a trek. Fine Line Creative Arts Center is very cool. I can't believe I'm only now checking it out. Along with my yarn, I also brought home the list of classes being offered this semester. One of them was a two-day intensive learning to weave class which takes you through the entire process of learning to weave on a floor loom. I briefly though to myself that it was be great to be able to take it, but after glancing at the dates, thought that I had missed the first class. When another child was flipping through it while sitting next to me, I realized that I hadn't missed the first class, that it started the next day. So I called to see if I could still sign up, which I could, so I did. It was great fun spending the entire day weaving and learning new things. I feel pretty confident t...

We are moving into our study of biomes which we are doing in conjunction with geology. For the rest of the year we will learn about nine different biomes while adding in the bits of geology that we still have yet to cover. During my summer planning, I thought it sounded like fun for everyone to make papier-mache globes on which they will paint each biome as we learn about it.  In theory it still sounded like fun, and since it was a high of 21 degrees today, it would pass a good chunk of the day as well.  There is a lot of preparation which has to happen for a project like this. First, I realized that I was missing a key raw material... newspaper. This never used to be a problem when we actually had a newspaper delivered, but now? Newspaper was hard to find. Until, that is, someone suggested I ask at the library. You all know I'm in the library multiple times a week, so that was easy. And, the librarians had a whole stack of old newspapers that they were willing to give me. The...

I've been pondering this for a while now, usually while cleaning stalls because there's not a lot else to do while one is cleaning stalls except think about things. Over the past months, as I've been falling down the various rabbit holes of natural dying (this is on my to do list for summer when the weather is better), weaving, and spinning, I have come across the phrases, "you're dyeing practice" or "you're weaving practice" or "your spinning practice" often enough that I started to pay attention. And once I started to pay attention, I became intrigued. In this instance, the term "practice" is used in the context of continuing to learn and try things and get better at what you're doing. There is also the element of experiment in there as well. It is a given assumption that the way to learn these crafts is just to try things, to make mistakes (and possibly some ugly items), think about those things you made (both beautiful...

It wasn't a bad day, just a full one. Between school in the morning, teaching a lesson, doing laundry, as well as errands to the bank, library, and three grocery stores followed by heading straight out to the barn to bring in the horses and put on their blankets (it's getting cold again tonight), we didn't sit down to have teatime until 5:20. After reading, I was wiped out. I had planned to have a lentil soup for dinner, but in my exhausted state that didn't sound terribly appealing... plus we'd have to make it.  There are some days where we take the easier, more expensive shortcut. TM took a credit card and the six youngest and they had a lovely dinner at a fast food restaurant and thought it was a great treat. J. and I ordered take-out from a restaurant and thought that was a great treat, too.  Everyone is now getting ready for bed, which is what I'm going to do as well. I'm not sure I even have the energy to read, so we might end up watching another episo...

We'll start with the more pleasant things. I washed a whole bunch of yarn I have spun. It is the final part of the spinning process and it sets the twist, making a more stable yarn.  This is the yarn I'm spinning for the cardigan I want to knit myself as well as a couple of skeins that I had finished but never washed. I need to not let it pile up like this because it took a while to get it all washed. (Let's not comment on the ugliness of our shower. Painting the bathroom is on the rather long list of things we still need to do around here. Refinishing the yellow shower might be on the list as well.) I also finished the scarf I was weaving for J. It just needs to be wet finished and have the fringe trimmed, and it is totally done. I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out, especially since it is only the second thing I've ever woven. The unpleasant thing and the unmaking part of the title is this. Yes, that is the sock I have been trying to finish. On Thursday, I wa...

When I'm giving my presentation about meal planning, I encourage people to have a well-stocked pantry and freezer for those times when life gets in the way. If one is stocking up on things, it is always a good thing to try to do that stocking up when things are on sale. If you begin to pay attention to how much you pay for things, you begin to develop an idea of what a good deal is. For instance, my stock up price for meat is $0.99/lb. This is an exceptionally good price for meat at the moment and one I don't see nearly as often as I used to. I always go through the sales flyers for the local grocery stores each week just to see if there are any really good sales going on. (I do this for produce as well. A couple of years ago, a store had cantaloupes on sale for $0.79/each. This is a crazy good price for melon, so I bought a bunch, cut it up, and froze it. It was a nice treat to have in the middle of winter. I've also done the same with pineapple, except that I turned into ...

This could be short it has been a pretty uneventful week. I really don't mind uneventful weeks, but they don't make for terribly interesting blog fodder. My writing that we did school, took care of the house, took care of animals, and I worked in my studio over and over doesn't make terribly interesting reading. This is why I didn't post anything yesterday, there was just nothing much I had to say. I'm not complaining, but it does make it more difficult to write. D. heads back to school on Sunday. J. will be driving him. The original plan was that TM would drive him, but TM will be working at his new job all weekend, so we are on to plan B. We will miss having D. around, but he is enjoying school a lot and doing very well. G. and L. are having a sleepover at B's apartment tonight. They have been so excited that ever since Monday they have been counting down days and hours.  We are still caught up with our school schedule. This alone says that my functioning in w...

I've lived in the Midwest for 44 winters which is far longer than the first 18 I spent in the desert. Yet those first years are impressionable ones, it seems, because there is always the very small part of me which thinks that near the middle to end of January, spring should start arriving. This is disappointing if you are in the upper Midwest because spring is most definitely not arriving at this time. Not only is it not arriving, but the worst weather of the season could still be on its way.  Over the years I've gotten better about managing my expectations, but the cold weather and short days were still extremely difficult. I was never officially diagnosed with Seasonal Affective Disorder, but I have no doubt that it was part of my life from mid-January until the weather improved and the days grew lighter.  That was before horses. I realized the other day that since I have been taking care of horses I haven't felt the same mid-winter despair and ennui. While I'm sure ...

[This is attempt at a post number two. Blogger is functioning far worse than usual (which is saying quite a lot), and after about five hundred words everything I had written completely vanished, despite it being saved regularly. Am I happy about this? No, not at all. I think the first draft was better.] Due to friends sharing pictures, I realized that today is the six year anniversary of meeting R. for the first time. It also means that on the seventh, we had the six year anniversary of meeting Y. for the first time. Six years has that both too short and too long feeling about it. It feels as though it has been an eventful six years. I know I have quite a few new readers here. What you may not know is that a week before we were due to travel to bring our daughters home, my father unexpectedly passed away. My mother's first words when I spoke with her (a friend had called to break the news) was that he would have wanted us to travel... so we did. I was grieving, our new daughters we...

"There once lived a penguin. His home was a nice icy land he shared with his companions. His companions were named Goodly, Lovely, Angel, Neatly, and Perfect. His name was Tacky. Tacky was an odd bird." ( Tacky the Penguin by Helen Lester) We don't have any penguins, and if we did, they would definitely be more of the Tacky variety rather than Goodly, Lovely, Angel Neatly, and Perfect. What we do have is a nice icy land. Tacky and his companions would feel right at home.  (If you live in Northern Illinois, you don't need to look at these pictures, you can just look out your window.) Do you see how shiny the ground looks? H. asked yesterday why everything was wet because she was seeing the reflective ice as water.  In the pictures above and below, it's not as bad as it looks. In undisturbed snow, you can easily crunch right through the thin layer of ice on the top and walk steadily on the snow underneath.  What becomes a problem is any place where the snow was com...