Ordinary Time

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...

This is what I've been working on for the past couple of days and it's far more interesting than showing you a picture of my computer and telling you I spent the afternoon on Teams. (A new online  Certificate program in Equine Assisted Services began today, which I am co-facilitating.) This is the English paper piecing (EPP) project I have been working on. After fiddling with the placement for a few weeks, I finally had something I liked.  This is seven hundred hexagons. You can see it wasn't quite enough. I figured that would be the case, so I wasn't surprised. Here are the three fabrics I'll use for the last forty or so hexagons. In the meantime, though, I really need my studio table. I was also more than a little concerned that some animal or child would accidentally move them around. Today I spent labelling each hexagon with it's place in the design. (It's paper piecing so there are papers inside that I can write on.) I went by column, giving each colum...

As you pull into our driveway, the first sign you see is this. You'll notice that would be 'ducks' plural. But we haven't had more than one duck for several years. I love ducks and ducklings; I don't love brooding them. It's the biggest reason we have had just Duck for so long. L. promised she would be the one to take care of ducklings, so in February I ordered four Welsh Harlequin ducks.... three hens and a drake... with a hatch date of May 18. They have been eagerly anticipated. Yesterday I received the notice that they had hatched and shipped. All we had to do was wait for our post office to call and say they arrived. I don't like little baby ducks (or chicks) to have to live in their shipping box longer than necessary, so I was relieved when the post office called about noon to say they had arrived. L. and I immediately cashed out to collect them.  I'm always relieved when I peek in the box and see that everyone has survived.  Can you see the little ...

But it was an intense weekend with a lot of people-ing and I don't think I have the bandwidth to write much of anything. So instead, enjoy a couple of pictures of the bagels Y. made last night. There is jalapeno and everything. They are very good.

I've spent the day getting things at home ready for me to leave for the weekend. The laundry, kitchen, and food are all in order for everyone at home. I have even nearly finished packing, which is good because I have a flight leaving first thing in the morning. I'll be heading to New Hampshire to attend the Horses and Healing Symposium for equine assisted services professionals. It also means I get to catch-up with friends from Athena , which if I'm honest, I'm looking forward to even more than the actual symposium. I have no idea if I'll have time to check in here while I'm away. I will certainly tell you about it when I get back. I'll probably also post a few updates on the Bittersweet Farm Facebook page if you're really dying of curiosity. 

With me going out of town this weekend and the temperatures supposed to become ratter warm, it was time to finish shearing the sheep. I sheared Clark on Monday, though I don't have pictures, and I finished Fred today. Plus I was getting very tired of having to look at his ridiculous haircut.  The before: And the after: I get a little faster each time I do it, but I think I probably have years before it feels natural and easy. 

When I was doing demonstration weaving the weekend before last, many people were curious as to what I was weaving. The answer was dishtowels that were going to be sold at Fine Line. More than a few times, certainly enough that I started to become aware of it, the reply to my answer was, "Oh, that's too pretty! I could never use it as a dishtowel!!"  After multiple occurrences of this particular conversation, it started to rankle a bit. Because the truth is, the yarn for the loom was all bits of leftovers. There really wasn't anything precious about it. It was also 100% cotton, which is also a pretty ubiquitous fiber. Even me pointing this out and adding that handwoven cotton towels last a very long time and actually dry things, most of the commenters still insisted they were too pretty to use.  Why don't we allow ourselves to use beautiful things for utilitarian tasks? It seems that adding beauty to your life, even for such a pedestrian task as drying dishes, woul...

That would be otherwise known as Mother's Day. When asked what I wanted to do, I suggested going to see The Sheep Detectives, so that is what we did. It was good. It was not very close to the book (Three Bags Full) though. I think I would have enjoyed it more if it was. I now need to read the book again because I read it so long ago that I don't remember some details and it's driving me a little nuts.  Many children joined us and we played outside, had focaccia pizza complements of G., and just generally enjoyed the day. I can't think of a better way to spend Mother's Day.

Tonight H. and I are going to a benefit gala for the organization that runs her Friday gardening program. I was going to just post a picture and leave it at that, but I've been reading a book and absolutely needed to share a quote from it. Maybe you'll get the picture later. The book is The Biology of Belief by Bruce H. Lipton. Now, I have to warn you if two things if you're going to read it (and at over halfway through I do recommend it). The first is to ignore the cover. It gives off a really sketchy New Age-y vibe and I'm sorely tempted to wrap the book in brown paper. The second is that because brains are weird, it ventures into territory that might not be comfortable for you. Except for brain science books that maintain a hard mechanistic line (an example is Behave by Robert Sapolsky which is interesting, a bit of a slog, and vaguely depressing), most brain books end up there. There is a lot of hard science in this one.  I have another blog post also related to thi...

I've fielded a lot of comments regarding our family and our educational choices over the past thirty years of homeschooling. Well, actually, while I have fielded some comments, as in so many other areas, I tend not to get nearly as many as other people. The comments and questions have changed a bit over the years. Long ago they were about legalities and how would a homeschooled child be able to function in the "real" world. Recently, I spend more time saying what kind of homeschooler I am not to differentiate myself from the Christian Nationalist types of homeschoolers. And trust me when I say I have my own long list of questions for them.  All this to say, I'm a bit thrown off when I have someone comment to me that "studies show" that homeschoolers don't succeed in college. That only 20% will actually graduate who begin. Clearly I must know an awful lot of homeschooling freaks who defy the trend. The comment did not make me happy as you might have guess...

I woke up feeling not quite right this morning, including having some vertigo which is mightily unpleasant. I knew the pace of the past couple of weeks was fairly hectic without my usual amount of downtime, so I wasn't surprised. If I go too long without getting my schedule back to manageable levels my body forces me to. I'm feeling better and am hopeful that after a good night's sleep I'll be back to normal. Even better, the next few days are pretty light schedule-wise, so I can get in some more resting.  Since all I did was nap and read today, I'll share some pictures of the vegetable garden that G. has claimed. As well as the cold hardy seeds in the pictures, the guest room is bursting with seedlings waiting for some decent weather to go outside. Also the rest of the garden beds have been turned and are ready for the seedlings and the warm weather seeds. This has been all G.'s doing and I'm thrilled. 

Today was R.'s 21st birthday. She chose cereal for breakfast and a green curry chicken and green bean stir fry with dumplings for dinner. Chocolate cake was her dessert of choice which we had with fresh raspberries.  Cool cards from Grammy  Opening Grammy's gift Happy birthday, dear girl! We love you!! But how on earth can you be 21?!

To be clear, there is nothing finished to share, but there is significant forward motion. First, I had my last hardanger embroidery class tonight. I'm realizing I shouldn't take night classes. I am not a night person and not at the top of my game. But anyway, I finished learning the rest of the techniques I needed to know to finish my piece. Here is where it stands currently. Because of the white fabric on a white table it's kind of difficult to see the cutwork. Here is a better view of where it's cut and how the wrapping will look when it's finished.  The other bit of forward motion is that the loom is dressed and ready to weave. So, finally, all 40 inches and 900+ ends have been threaded, the warp is wound on, the front has been tied on and the tension evened out, errors corrected, and the warp opened up to weave. The combination of the width with the stickiness of the wool yarn could mean this will be a slow weaving project. We'll see. We'll also see abou...

I spent all day talking about weaving and the Fine Line Creative Arts Center in the Fine Line booth and the Fiber and Fabric Craft Festival today. I've pretty much used up all my words, so you get pictures.  These are pictures of the moon that L. took a while back that I never shared. The rest of the garden around the pond that I finished. It has been the sum total of my gardening in the past couple of weeks.  Y. braided Buddy's mane. Timmy and Kaspian are good enough on their halters now that they got to go in the rotational grazing pen. And loved it. And pictures K. took on his way home from work tonight.