Forthcoming Posts

When I finally get my pictures off my camera, there are a few posts I hope to do.  Here's the list. 

A Weekend Away
Charlotte is Walking!  (at 9 and 1/2 months)
Homeschool Art Adventure
Family Felting and Fun Party
St Lucia Day
The Importance of One Child Outings
Christmas Collage
Family Photo?
Resolutions!
Book Making
A Trip to Zumbrota
Making Felt Balls, Take Two
The Loppet

Charlotte is One

Felt Balls for a First Birthday

I love felt balls.  Round, soft, warm, bouyant (yes, they float), and beautiful, I could hardly ask more of a ball.  I was inspired to make a handmade gift for my (almost) one-year-old by Amanda Blake Soule's lovely blog, Soule Mama.  She also happened to make felt balls for  her one year old, using the knit-then -felt method.  Since I am a novice knitter, I went for the straight felting method.  Following these directions, I produced three rainbow-hued, baseball-sized balls in about an hour.  If time permits, I will add pictures via needle felting.     

Gardens in Winter

The frost on my window is so high only a sliver of scenery is visible, and outside the once-soft snow has sublimated into something more like sterofoam.  Without a doubt,  January is the perfect time to plan and dream of gardens.
    Bright tomatoes, with bottoms like sunsets and tops like pumpkins, grace the cover of my Seed Saver's Exchange catalog.   I fell in love with Seed Saver's colorful heirloom vegetables back in my days of apartment living.  I gardened vicariously, planting their blue potatoes, red dragon carrots, and yellow watermelons.
    Now I get to pick for real.  My desk is fill of lists of possible produce and areal drawings of my yard, spiffed up with crayon to make my gardening intentions clear to the whole family.  Solomon has insisted on potatoes, and has chosen the yukon gold variety.  Nova is most looking forward to watermelon--surprisingly, she is a vegetable traditionalist (in terms of color) and has picked out the handsome Chris Cross strain.   For Charles we will plant cucumbers, though he may have to eat them in the form of pickles since he will be away.  I, of course, want tomatoes.  The rest (including the fruit trees) are yet to be decided.  

 

You may have noticed that I often post about things we do away from home.  I love cultural events and museums, history and the outdoors.  I love travel and outings, encapsulated time bound up in a well planned sequence, with every need prepared for--even spontinaity.

But there is another reason I rarely write about home.  I'm not particularly fond of it.  Yes, I was (and still am) thrilled we were able to buy a house last Fall.  Yes, I like the floor plan, the hardwood floors, the 1940s doorbell that chimes once for the back door and twice for the front; but I don't love my home.  It feels, not like a refuge, but more like a big closet--with beds; a place we dump our stuff and sleep when we are not out in the wide world.  In short, it is not cared for.  I have often told myself that the barrier to a more inviting home is money.  Lack of funds for decorating and so forth.

But that is not true.  I knew it the minute I felt warm, fuzzy house-pride after putting up plastic to insulate our 70-year-old windows.  Window plastic is ugly!  But it made me feel so good about my living space because it was evidence of care.

The point of this long ramble is to explain my challenge to myself.  Make my bedroom into a warm inviting place with a focus on using what I have.

I was planing on putting up a before picture.  In short--I chickened out.  Maybe I will put one up alongside an after picture. 

  

When Asia was the World

What a fascinating place mideveal Asia was!  Europe was certainly not the place to be from about 600-1500 AD/CE, but it was an excellent time to be in Asia.  During Europe's Dark Ages, glass making, silk, cotton, sophisticated trade, the rise of new religions, and the invention of zero were just a few of the things going on east of the Ural mountains.
    I've been reading  When Asia was the World by Stewart Gordon in preparation for studying Persia, India and China with the kids.  The book follows the memoirs of a different traveler in each chapter, giving plenty of backround information about the greater historical context.  I love it!  I must warn any who pick it up--it is history, not fiction.  It does not read like Devil in the White City (History as a page-turning, heart-thumping thriller).   However, it does feel like a whole new fantastic world.  There is so much out there we just never get to in standard History survey courses.  All of Asian history is like a great big epic I've never heard of before.  Lots of place names are new and almost all ancient historical figures are unfamiliar.  New History, what fun.

PS  The link embedded in the title will take you to Amazon, not because I'm urging any purchases, but because the look inside feature gives a chance to peruse the first few pages.   

No More Pig Flu! (as Nova calls it)

   H1N1 has come and (almost) gone... from this household, anyway.  Charlotte's fever was gone this morning, and we will be free and clear to be out in public starting tomorrow.  As a result of this 5+ day confinement I have learned;

1.  We are over scheduled and it is nice to have a few days "off"

2.  More than three days in the house is enough to drive me bats.

3.  Some very nice homeschooling can happen just reading out loud on the couch (followed up by a couple of trips to our maps in the basement).

4.  Artificial dyes and preservatives (such as those found in children's Tylenol) have a pronounced (negative) affect on Nova.  (We will be starting the Feingold diet as soon as the materials arrive).  

5.  There is a blog called The Happiness Project that looks intriguing.  Actually more than that.  I'm now a follower.    

6.  There is surprisingly little information on training your very own messenger pigeon online.

7. "The Name of the Wind" is a good book--at least up to page 482, which is all the further I've gotten.

8. "Harry Potter" is just as good the second time around.  

9. Babies really sleep best while they are being held (I guess I really already knew this one, but I wanted to explain to the rest of you why I spent so much time reading and online).

10. It is good to check up on your credit cards now and then even if you aren't using them--it saved us $2,000.00 this week.

11.  Sitting outside in a sunny spot in your yard feels great! (and is not technically breaking the quarantine).  

12.  Sitting in a parked car overlooking the Mississippi river valley is also not technically exposing other people, but provides all the sensations of "getting out" a bit.

13.  I like parenthetical statements.

14.  The flu is no fun!

15. Oh, and, last of all, being sick is always worse at night.   

  

Blend and Super Blend

I was asked not to write about this so as not to "give away"  the secret recipe, but it is one of those sweet childhood things I know that I will forget about sooner rather than later if I do not write it down.  

Several months ago when Charlotte was a very new baby,  Solomon was helping out by making very many peanut butter and jelly lunches.  One day a disagreement erupted between Nova and Solomon about her sandwich.  She wanted jelly first, then peanut butter, and he had  made it the other way round.  I was about to come down and break up the impending fight when they came up with the most childishly ingenious solution--flip it over!  From then on this type of sandwich has been known as the Super Blend.  Regular (unflipped) sandwiches are known as Blend.  For weeks, the question at lunchtime was "Blend or Super Blend?"  There was even much talk about a restaurant--which is why I was under strict instructions not to share the "secret" recipe.  

So, please enjoy your Blend and Super Blend, but don't tell anyone else!  

My facination with Cleopatra

When the kids and I were discussing what they wanted to learn about this year, I discovered that they felt we had never "finished " studying ancient Egypt because we had not had our "Egypt Meal" (a rough approximation of ancient Egyptian fare, eaten with much pomp and circumstance and created by all).   We last studied Egypt almost two years ago!!  

Ancient Egypt, Round Two

This time the kids wanted more than just mummies and pyramids and daily life.  They wanted history, and out of all ancient Egyptian history, most of all they wanted Cleopatra.  I do not even know where they heard about Cleopatra.  All I knew about her at the time was that she was supposedly very sexy, had an affair with Mark Antony, and was the last Queen of Egypt.  How to make this appropriate for an eight and five year old?  Luckily I found "Cleopatra" by Katie Daynes , published by Usborne.  I love Usborne books.  Still in the kids section I found the less discrete but oh so fascinating "Cleopatra; Ruler of Egypt" by Kerrily Sapet.  

Some highlights include

-Cleopatra was Greek!

-Cleopatra was a distant relative of Alexander the Great

-Cleopatra's parents were brother and sister, a common practice in her family

-Cleopatra was the first in the very long Ptolemaic dynasty to bother to learn Egyptian

-Cleopatra had a son with Julius Caesar

-Cleopatra was about as politically savvy as they come

-Oh, and she first met Caesar after she had been smuggled into her own palace (seized by her little brother/husband and his scheming advisers) wrapped up in a rug.  

Now, if you caught this part of ancient history in school, none of that will be a surprise, but if you didn't, go back and take a look, Cleopatra is fascinating. 

  

 

The Blog Avalanche; Or What We Did This Summer Part II

Fiddle camp was a blast!  I've never seen Solomon happier than he was at the finale performance!  Here we are dancing as the teachers fiddled on.  As you can tell, there was a lot of movement.  Hopefully we will have audio on here one of these days, so I can share the sounds too. 

A visit to Zumbrota!  We had lunch with GG John and GG Rose, then went on to the county fair with GG Rose showing us all the highlights.   It was a delightful afternoon. 

Camping...at least we still call it camping.  We opted for a cabin this year because of the wee babe.  Our original plan was to go to Glendalough State Park out in western Minnesota, and then perhaps on to Canada.  Due to a very unhappy little traveler, we opted for William O'Brian State Park, just 45 minutes from home.  We plan to go to Canada next June.  

A last hurrah of summer at Como Town, a pint sized amusement park that proved to be just right for our family.  

Charlotte and Dad at the amusement park.

Solomon 8, Nova 5 1/2, Charlotte Magdalen 6 months 3 weeks

If technology allows, there may be a video of Charlotte, pre and post crawling, posted here some day.  At present she is 8 months and has been crawling for six weeks.  She taught herself to stand two or three weeks ago and is extremely proud of herself.  She just looks ecstatic every time she stands without holding on to anything.  Her brother and sister clap and cheer wildly. It's a lot of fun.  

The Blog Avalanche; Or What We Did This Summer Part I

Hello All,

I know the idea with a blog is to post things bit by bit, even day by day, giving everyone following said blog a window into the author's thoughts and/or life.  It didn't work that way for me for this season.  Here comes a big long list of everything we've done since June.  In one night.  

Frog Dissecting!

Nova wanted to get the most out of this as possible (the whole endevor was her idea).  She insisted that we get at the brain.  There were no instructions for this, and the skull was harder to crack than a nut, but we got it.  Frog brains are VERY small.  

The Minnesota Zoo

 

The kids did see some animals too.  The Grizzly Coast exhibit was our favorite place to hang out.  We have fond memories of many trips to the zoo this summer.

Charlotte Finds her Feet!

Here is Charlotte at five months.  Grabbing her feet was one of her favorite activities.  She also liked sticking out her tongue at this age.

As it turns out there is too much for one night.   This takes us through about mid July.  Be on the lookout for a second installment.   

New Radio Story

I've got a new story up on KFAI's archive.  It is about Coldwater Spring, the last natural spring in Hennepin county.  I encourage you all to check it out (in person and via the news story).  It will be posted at www.kfai.org under Programs, KFAI Evening News, 8/20 for another week.   Or just click here.   If you go, be sure to gather water from inside the pump house (the stone arch structure in the background).  

Sure enough, tooth #2

In less than a week, Charlotte's second tooth appeared, right next to the first one.  Her first food, banana, has gotten mixed reviews.  She got her first taste on Solomon's birthday--at Nova's suggestion.   

Solomon Turns Eight!

On Monday, Solomon turned eight!  I can't quite believe it, though he certainly looks the part.  A recent growth spurt has put him level with my collar bone, and a few weeks go someone mistook my sandals for his (we don't actually were the same shoe size yet, but at a glance it is hard to tell).  

His birthday started with a leisurely breakfast and a bath, and then he was off to fiddle camp, which happened to start Monday as well.  I heard that everyone sang him happy birthday at lunch and that fiddle camp was "great!"  That was welcome news to Charles and me.  Solomon has been home schooled since first grade, and we found ourselves with a case of parents' first day of school jitters as we packed his lunch and stuck labels on his belongings.

While the birthday boy was at camp, Nova and I put the finishing touches on his present. 

Tonight we get to hear what he has been playing and even dance along at the camp's finale.    

Charlotte's First Tooth!

It is just a little white line, but it is there...a baby tooth.  I first felt it yesterday, and have yet to actually see it, though others have been privileged by a one-toothed grin.  (Solomon assures me my description is correct.)  There has been a little crying and fuss, but mostly lots of chewing and drooling.  Based on Charlotte's continued taste for washcloths and fingers (any fingers--hers, mine, or yours) more teeth are coming soon.  Pictures will be up as soon as she opens her mouth for the camera.  Nova can't wait to feed her, but, with her sore gums, Charlotte hasn't been up to any first tastes just yet.     

Results of the Nothing Diet

After more than a month the results are in!  No dairy, no chocolate, no WHEAT!  Everything else seems to be okay (thank goodness I can have eggs and nuts!).  On the up side, Charlotte now just spits up a normal amount, instead of every time you turn around.  I've found that most sandwiches can be converted to baked potato topping, and those that can't do well on rice cakes.  Bread-like foods are harder.  Here is our favorite wheat-free muffin recipe to date.  I made it up.  

Peanut Butter Banana Muffins

Mix

2 cups oat flour

3/8 tsp baking soda

dash of salt

Add 

3 heaping tablespoons peanut butter

2/3 cup sugar

1/3 cup honey

splash of vanilla

one banana, mashed

2-3 tbs softened butter (optional)

I usually taste test before adding eggs.

4 eggs

Bake in greased muffin tins at 350 for about half an hour, or until fork comes out clean.  

 

Nova's new bike riding skills

About three weeks ago, Nova decided she was going to ride her bike without training wheels.  The video below is from about day two.  She had it mastered in less than a week.  (Notice the social equivalent of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle taking place).

Imagine a video of Nova biking...it will be up when the technical difficulties are over.  

A Wedding in La Crosse

Two weeks ago, my cousin Caitlin and her new husband Doug got married on the beautiful shore of the Mississippi river.  

Caitie, as she was called as a little girl, and  I had been regular playmates during family get-togethers in the early years, despite our seven year age difference.  Our sisters were a year apart and paired off,  leaving us to find common ground.  Luckily it wasn't hard to do.  Caitie was smart and remarkably mature for her age (and still is).  When I got engaged at twenty and she was just thirteen, however, those seven years felt quite noticeable.  And now she is married.  It is funny how time leads and lags, making a difference in years feel bigger there and smaller here.  

The wedding was sky-blue, picture perfect.

The trip to La Crosse was also the first overnight we've done with our new baby Charlotte.  She slept beautifully at the hotel.  She was a delight during the wedding (even the ceremony).  And she cried heart wrenchingly in the car.   As a result our family camping trip will now be one hour away from home instead of three.  But we are glad we made it to La Crosse, and congratulations to Cait and Doug! 

 

    

                  

 

Charlotte likes...

Here are some things Charlotte likes.  For those who are keeping track, she just turned four months old.

  

-Grabbing the rings on her bouncy seat (she is getting quite good at this and can sometimes get them all the way off). 

- "Head Shoulders Knees and Toes" (done on her).  This always gets a smile.  

-Her Bears.  These are the first toys she noticed.  They hang over her changing table. 

-Minuets II and III by Bach, played by her big brother.    

-Sucking her thumb and nursing AT THE SAME TIME!  She just started doing this last Wednesday.      

Picnic Perfect

First cousins, second cousins, first cousins once removed,  aunts and great aunts, sisters, moms and kiddos, friends.  However you say it, we had a lot of special people over a few weeks ago. I had plans of making pinwheels, but the sheer fun of outdoors on one of the first days of Summer was more than enough entertainment.  Running through the sprinkler and squirting each other with water pistols were enjoyed by the younger set (seven and under) and I think Katrina got wet too!  We wrapped up the afternoon with a picnic lunch and a lot of visiting. Thanks to all for coming, we hope to see you again soon!

Nova is reading (and she knows it!)

Nova has been working her way through the "Bob books" this year, a series of early readers.  Curled up on the couch next to Mom or Dad, sounding out the words (or occasionally guessing based on pictures), she has progressed from "Mat.  Mat sat." to "Suddenly, Joe drove his bike over a bump."  Still, Nova insisted she couldn't read--until last week.  In her words "I like reading!  I didn't before because I couldn't do it."

On Monday, she pushed through two Bob books in order to finish the fourth set.  Then she went on to A Fish Out of Water, which she read by herself.  The next day, I found her with one of A.A. Milne's original Winnie the Pooh stories, sounding out the names of the characters. (For those of you that only know the Disney Pooh, you should check out the originals.  They are charming and funny, even for parents.)  On a trip to the art museum this weekend she read "park" and "exit" at the parking ramp, then asked to play at the "park."  We have a reader!