Ordinary Time

This afternoon we headed over to Kline Creek Farm, a living history farm near us, because I saw that they were sheering their sheep today. I've seen sheep sheared before, but with electric clippers. Because this is a living history farm, they sheer their sheep with long blade scissors.  It was still a little snowy from the storm that passed through the other day, but only about 33°, so not uncomfortable. Not uncomfortable if you wore the correct clothing. If you chose to wear a tank top and sweatshirt, then you might have been a little uncomfortable. Walking through woods in the winter is one of my favorite things.  But we were there for sheep, so that's where we headed. The farm has Cotswold sheep. One of these sheep has been sheared and the other was waiting her turn. I don't know why they're facing into the corner. The sheep are put into a series of holds that allows the shearer to remove the fleece in one piece but also keeps the sheep calm during the process.  I th...

This is the phrase that indicates that R. is having an aura, which, 95% of the time also means she is is going to or has had a seizure. It is one of my least favorite phrases ever. It is also the one she woke up saying early this morning after she screamed and woke J. up.  Crap. Crap. Crapety. Crap.  We used our emergency medicine and after a while she calmed enough to fall back asleep in our bed. This is the first time in about a year that we have had to do this. I won't think about the fact that people with linear nevus sebaceous syndrome have a tendency towards becoming immune to seizure drugs. Nope, not going there at all.  Instead, I'm going to focus on the fact that she has been perfectly herself since she woke up again. She shovelled snow, she built a snowman, she ate meals, she played with her favorite toy... all perfectly normal. That is not what would happen prior to this past year even with rescue meds.  So instead of spending my day sitting on the couch h...

Here we are at the first weekly update of 2024 which just seems a little unreal. I did a very brave thing this afternoon and sat down to pay the bills. I didn't want to. We had been hit with some big car repairs and some dental bills, so that combined with even a very modest Christmas felt... well, terrifying, frankly. So I avoided all things money. The trouble with the avoidance technique is that as I'm avoiding things, my brain is making them bigger and bigger. All of this combined to make me very reluctant to sort it all out. But I did. And it wasn't as horrible as my brain had built it up to be. It helps that the car repair place and my hay guy are flexible.  Last week D. decided to go around the house and count every book. I forget the actual number, but I think he came up with slightly more than two thousand. Of course that also didn't include any picture books or books in his siblings' bedrooms. Probably the more accurate number is closer to 2500. (We have a ...

It's the season for soup, isn't it? The weather is cold and it's cozy to have a pot of soup cooking in the kitchen. Soups also tend to be an economical meal, which is a big reason why we've been having quite a few of them recently. (The checkbook is not happy right now.)  There have been a few in the past week or so that are so good, I thought I'd share them. (Don't get too excited, though, you're going to have to check a couple of books out of the library because I don't share copyrighted recipes.) The first is Julia Child's onion soup recipe from her book, Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Don't let the book intimidate you, because it's really not difficult, it just takes a longish cooking time. But it is so good! While I rarely follow a recipe exactly these days, on this one I do. It is worth it. Even my children who have a tendency to pick out onions from their food eat this soup. Really, just try it. The next is one we made a few days...

Which is why I would like to pause and thank my August 2023 self for not scheduling our winter semester to begin until next week. J. went back to work today, so that is the first step to easing into our schedule. We also started back to our usual teatime reading which had also fallen by the wayside during the holidays. (We even had a teatime treat because I found gingerbread cookies on sale for $0.29 a package. I might have bought a few )  We haven't started a new teatime book yet because we needed to finish up some reading from last semester. We'll be finished with that tomorrow. By then I should have our new book here from the library for Friday. I'm keeping that title under wraps for the moment, but it has absolutely nothing to do with the Renaissance. I think everyone needs to think about something different for a while.  So maybe with this slow approach, we will all be able to handle our usual schedule come Monday. Maybe. I'm pretty sure everyone else will be fine....

 Here it is, my reading list from 2023. As usual, I'll first give that basic stats, then I will list each book. If I think it was exceptionally good, I'll put a "*" next to it. I'm picky about my five star ratings, so those will be a small fraction of the total titles read. (There are a lot of mysteries on the list and many of them are very good, but unless a mystery is something exceptional, it doesn't rate an asterisk in my personal rating system.) And to remind you what my abbreviations mean: F - fiction NF - non-fiction M - mystery RA - read aloud YA - young adult or a book aimed at a juvenile audience The totals for the year: 80 books read (which is an average of 6.5 books per month)     29 - non-fiction     21 - fiction     29 - mystery 13 books not finished 11 book read aloud 24,635 pages read in total 2370 pages read aloud The list: Rosie's Travelling Tea Shop - Rebecca Raisin (F)(260 p.) Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise - Anders...

With W. and MC recovered (for the most part) from Covid, we all made plans to have a second round of Christmas that they could participate in last night. We would have all been together except that B. and his fiancee (yes, I need to figure out an initial for her) were exposed to Covid. While they were testing negative, they didn't want to accidentally expose anyone, so they stayed home. Darn Covid. Everyone else was able to come, though we missed those two.  We exchanged more gifts, made bibimbop for dinner, played games (including hearts which is a family New Year's Eve requirement), and laughed until our sides ached watching K. in his dinosaur costume. Some people had to work early this morning, so headed home early. Others of us decided the new year would arrive just fine without us and went to bed, and I think there were a few 14 - 17 year olds who stayed awake to welcome 2024.  I want to show you what some of my children have to me and made me a little teary.  These ...