Been a long time since posting...life is so hectic as summer winds down. No matter how we want those long and lazy days to last, they don't.

Overnight, the garden goes into overtime, producing tons of tomatoes all-of-a-sudden, or so it seems.
Overnight we go from quiet mornings to busy homeschoolers.
And overnight, the leaves are changing colors, nuts are falling from the trees, and the sounds outside in the evening are not the cheery calls of robins, but the steady hum of desperate insects hoping for one more big date before the first frost.

And so the wheel turns.

Garden Pix from July

This is the start of the hydrangea season...will put up a post of it in it's full blue glory...


this one isn't from the garden, but the living room couch where Lissa was snuggling with the pooch...
Look who was looking at me taking pics...'hey Mom...watcha doing?"
The perennial green garden (there are a few blooming daylilies there later in the season, and of course, the bleeding heart on the right in the spring)

A Weekend of Little Blessings

A View to the Backyard

After weeks of cold, of rain, of just general "blecch"...we leap-frogged over spring and headlong into summer. From the low 50's to the 90's in one short leap...

Yet it was perfectly timed to coincide with Memorial Day weekend, and how can one protest a sudden, unexpected heat wave this early in the season on the official Summer Kick-Off Weekend?

not even I could grump about that!

Lee got home early from work on Friday, and we had a long, luscious weekend of quiet. I still had to work Saturday, and it was a surprisingly active day at the clubhouse...followed by a Sunday that can only be described as languorous. Slept in a wee bit, then off to the restaurant for breakfast, since it was Lee and my 33rd anniversary!

Breakfast at IHOP was a bit disappointing, though the kiddo's seemed to enjoy it. The moms? Not so much. Our waitress was a peach, however, and was very accommodating to our large, sometimes loud, group, including a differently-abled adult son.

At home, we tended to gardens, to front lawns gone to hayfields, to hedges.

Even Monday was laid back. Gosh, two days in a row could spoil a family! We went for a lovely hike at Wachusett Meadows Audubon Sanctuary, clambering through fields and woods, finding the glacial boulder and watching the kids scramble up and around it fearlessly. Then onto Browns Hill where we summited quickly, and KC led us down the tricky trail back to the meadow!

A quick stop at the "Twinkie-Winkie" Store in Princeton garnered ice cream treats for the kids, and then home on a leisurely back road.

And after much de-ticking (yes we were *loaded* with the little beasties...ugh!) I remembered the community garden meeting last night and got there in the nick of time! So now it's official, we have our garden plot for the summer. Tomato's and squash and corn and pumpkins....and hours of fun, peace, tranquility, bird watching and garden sweating to come!

What a weekend of little blessings it was!

May, 2011

I am soooo loving May this year!!! First early azalea to spring open with warm, sunny days....

..while tiny violets nestle into the small spaces between the rocky steps to the backyard..
The ferns and hosta have bolted up, from tiny promises 10 days ago, to rich full green-leaf.
and I'm loving being outside for as long as I can before the sneezies get me!

It's funny, this is 'my' Japanese red maple, one of my favorite trees in the garden...and the kids climb it like little spider monkeys. KC proclaimed it "the best tree, ever!" Since it's not much bigger than they are, there is little chance of serious injury, (crossing fingers!), and it delights me to see them loving being outside playing without hundreds of bought toys, but with imagination, and fun.

This is what May is all about, really.

Kirsty goes to NYC

Can you believe it? I was in the Big Apple. The city that never sleeps. New York, New York! Somehow, I found myself volunteering to be a driver and chaperone for the youth group at church.

Best impulsive decision, ever.

I'm such a rube. A hick. A tourist..... and yanno what? Could not care less!!! I had the best time. From architecture, to the incredible weather (sunny. blue skies. 40-50's...not a drop of rain!); from street vendors to the fascinating people, and all the incredible food..WoW.

New York pizza? omg. And the bagels? Srsly? Who knew?

Well, New Yorker's know. Buy a slice for a buck and you've got a meal! Run 'round the corner and buy a just-made bagel...oh so soft inside, and just perfectly firm on the outside....

Oh, and the walking... oh my gods above and below!!! We walked from Battery Park, to the financial district. There were somber moments at the World Trade Center site...it hits you like a fast blow to the gut...or a fist grabbed tight around your throat..shocking and unexpectedly painful even after all these years.....then, tears and shivers, a soft-spoken prayer, and a heavy heart.

We proceeded to Chinatown for an authentic Chinese meal. (omg--i'm gonna be saying that a lot.)

Then on to SoHo, and the Village, and St. Marks (a 'place', not a church!). All told, we walked for 11 hours. We sat down once in all that time, at the restaurant, for an hour.

yes.

Eleven. Hours. Of. Walking.

And that was just *Saturday* !!!

We walked nearly all day Sunday as well, (7 hours!) taking in the beauty of Central Park (omg!!), and "my" group heading to MOMA (Museum of Modern Art)...and get ready for yet another OMG....

Jackson Pollock....Picasso...Monet....Manet...Andrew Wyeth (omg i got to see Christina's World....!!!! And too bad I didn't discover until *after* we got home that Starry Night was there...*pout*...well, tis a reason to go back, right?!)

just a few of the many, many things I was so lucky to see there..

Just a small aside here....I don't think you can fully experience the sheer genius of Jackson Pollock unless you see his art up close and personal...I was not a fan...until Sunday.

Wow. His work blew me away. It is raw, and visceral and intense...so full of humanness...and no, I've never seen the movie about him...but he spoke through his art.

There were so many paintings and wood block prints and sculpture (there were these perfectly round marble "balls" and an "urn" that were to represent "woman" on a round marble disc...wait, lemme see if i got a pic of that....)

Yes! (pictures? how about over 300 in 48 hours?!) So this is the "breast and symbolic opening of a woman, representing her ability to bring life into the world."

As a woman who never gave birth to any of her kids, that didn't resonate with me, not at all. Yet frankly? I was mesmerized.

The thing about those marble "breasts"? They were *perfect* spheres, and the sheer smoothness of them...the marble was as slick, and smooth as skin... it was amazing that hard cold marble could be transformed into something so perfect.

and there was this one, same artist and sorry I didn't get his name.....

the ball might have been gypsum? it too was perfectly round, but not slick the way the marble one was...this one had shimmer/gleam to it...

And oh my the "memory maker" things...a wild turkey in Battery Park (where the Staten Island Ferry leaves for Ms. Liberty)

...the long subway ride to the park at the start of our epic trek, packed like sardines....the Elvis impersonator who was more than a little bit kinda freaky...the Broadway show( omg! )...the Chinese Lady who chased me through her little shop in Chinatown selling me a purse for "10 dolla...8 dolla...okay for you ...5 dolla" (i did buy it for $5!) (this after buying $50 of other things there...she really liked me... )

And the buildings. Gosh.

Like this one (just outside of Battery Park, in the Financial District):

the mirrored front reflected the sky, the passing clouds became living art... I was enchanted with that..and the mix of old and new living in some sort of strange harmony...St. Pauls Cathedral all gothic architecture, right next to tall glass-fronted sky scrapers....the statues,and the people...great green goddess, the people.

The energy there is electric. At 11 p.m. it is nearly as hubbub-filled as at noon. (and in the Village? MORE people than at noon!!)

And the streets, all stories in themselves...Wall Street, Fifth Avenue, Central Park South, (yes I did take pictures of them all!)...and Broadway. Omg! me, hick from the stix...ate lunch on Broadway .... !!!

and Times Square?! OMG...where to look? oogling *everything*...look up and see Radio City Music Hall, and down there to the building where the New Years Ball drop happens...

Would i go back there again?

oh, yes!

(but not, please, until next year...I'm still processing...and my feet? they might leave me)

Always i cannot figure out the uploading-- so these of course are backwards....

So backwards this post will go!

From the top...the broken-limbed birch from the infamous ice storm 2 years ago; those azure sky's are only to be found this time of year...and certainly no portent of the impending storm hurtling towards us even now...

Other than this hopeful sign that faces towards the front door...and the cirrus clouds as KC and I had a "brisk" walk (that said with multifaceted meanings!) to the dentist this morning at 20 degrees and windchill too cold to think about...

And back about 3 weeks now the Princess Cake for the Princess. The ladies' dresses all have battery op-tea lights underneath, buried in the cake (and I thank goodness for Cake Boss showing me how such as this is done!!)...with the hills and vales requested by Ms. Princess herself. "So the Ladies are outside dancing in the snow" she said....

Perhaps because she has discovered the unequaled joy of throwing herself onto a sled and careening down the hill into the backyard....someday that little girl will wind up in the brook as her Mommy did so long ago...

So for these joyous moments of Winter..we smile and grit our teeth, knowing...knowing..that the days are growing longer every day (415 and still light out this afternoon!!)...and the wheel turns us click by click back to Spring....

...and the seed catalogues are getting dog-eared from all the love...

A Mural is Born

As usual, I can't make heads or tails of how to load the pictures in any semblance of order, so this final picture of the series is the only one in proper order!

The kids painted all the "bricks" by spatter painting red paper with black, white, and gold and silver sparkly paint. The used "recycled" bottle brushes, which make perfect smudgy-spattery marks. I cut them into the "brick" shapes, and they're glued onto the white background.

This year the kids can do so much more! They painted Santa's boots coming down the chimney, and helped shred and glue the "fluff" at the bottom of his pants, which hang down over his boots.

The star at the top of the tree was done tracing the shadow of a star that hangs from the dining room chandelier, in the only 5-minute window the light reflects off the neighbors windows and into my dining room window...just a kewl confluence of events. I had to capitalize on it!

The tree was quick-painted with the chisel-edge of a foam trim brush!

Tomorrow the kids will make paper "stockings" to hang from the "mantle", and I'll paint ornaments on the tree, as well as gluing 3-D items onto the "branches"...and the kids will "glitter paint" them to give them pizazz....

(and don't get me started about the hour we spent assembling the gingerbread house...it was a kit but the kids had a BLAST!!!)

Such a creative, positive energy day!

Ready for the Big Day...and I'm Not Just Talkin' Turkey!

Untraditional.

That's the word of the day. The word of the Year. The word that most aptly describes this year's Turkey Family Fest.

Or Feast. Whichever *grins*...

Turkey being done in a new way...being "brined" for 12 hours before cooking it, partially downside up, then flipping to "golden" the breast

Stuffing not done *in* the turkey (I wonder if my brother will freak out more than my sister...or vice versa?)

A traditional apple pie....and a non-traditional, done with a "cookie" style topping rather than in a crust.

And the biggest tradition breaker of them all?

A Buffet-style meal, served, not in our beautiful dining room, but in the living room. With the television tuned to the New England Patriots, who are playing football on Thanksgiving for the first time since *I've* been a football fan.

And it will be the first time the family will see the "new" kitchen...the new floor, the wallpaper, and the 2/3 updated paint job. Yanno...I didn't even sweat not getting the painting done. *shrug* they all come here for family, for food, for laughter, and remembering...but I doubt any of them will say ..."Gee, how come Kirsty didn't get that paint job done"...(I'm laughing here coz, my brother the painter, well, he's cut from a different bolt of cloth and as a professional painter...he just might!! C'est La Vie!!)

We spent today getting things ready and it was fun. Busy for the last 13 hours, non-stop things to do...but it was good. Only a wee spat and that corrected fast and I was left with the happy glow of getting things done, being ready, and being happy.

And isn't that the best feeling of all?

Holidays Come Pouring In....

Yay oh Yah, we're starting to swing into my 2nd favorite time of the year. And yanno what? All those picayune details that I spent weeks worrying about? The wallpaper, the painting, the curtains...it's so close to done that I've decided to package up my "worrying" and put it up on a box in the back of the closet.

All things happen as they should, all things will get done if you keep to it. And I have. And..yeah, it's so amazing and good.

Leaves are up and done, and my new floor has it's first waxing completed. All that's left is the drying, and the putting things back.

When the family arrives on Thanksgiving, they will be met with a nice tidy (well, within reason, Martha Stewart might cringe a bit...) home, but the things they will notice aren't the new floor (my sister was oblivious when she came out a few weeks ago). They will notice the scent of turkey in the oven, the smiles of my kids, the warmth of love that will spill out of every corner and wrap us all in the embrace of love.

Now, that, to me, is Thanksgiving.

Ponderings

I've been going to church for the last few weeks as a conciliation to my wife. Church is very important to her, less so for me.

That sounds callous, but my church is ...everywhere...which is not to say that I don't get great food for thought at our Unitarian Universalist church.

The hardest thing for her to understand is that I need time, true alone time, to recharge. As a full time stay at home mom, homeschooler, earth-mom type, I am on call all day. Mind, I am far from perfect, but I am a good mom. I am a good teacher. I am a good wife.

But I also need some me time. My diet coach helps me get that when I get something in my inbox that says "have you walked today?" Walking helps me calm down, slim down, and take notice of the wider, natural world around me.

Still, I find I need more than the 3-4 days a week a get a 30 minute walk. One of these Sunday's they will head off to church without me and I will rake leaves, or paint my kitchen woodwork or ...something. I'll do it in silence, a rare commodity for me. For several hours there will be no one asking me a thing, no one I need to speak to, just letting me charge up and breathe.

I so crave that.

And, despite a deep-seated pessimism, I am working hard, so hard, to embrace my pagan beliefs fully, to find the blessings that are hidden in plain sight, if we but take a moment to see them. Things like the brilliant iridescent green on a mallards neck that I spy as I drive past a small pond; the glimmer of a bold yellow leaf before it falls, the absolute purity of a white, fluffy cloud drifting silently overhead.

Sometimes the blessings come from people I speak to, or things that I read, or even something I overhear.

Today I found my hidden blessing in church. Heh. Who knew?

"You need not think alike to love alike."

That was Francis David, a Unitarian "martyr" (one of a very few U/U martyrs) just about five hundred years ago in Transylvania (google him, he was pretty neat...) .

Five Hundred Years. And a message as fresh today as ever it was then.

Thank You, Francis David.

Home Work

No pics, but...at the end of a terrible and frazzling week....

the leak in the upstairs supply line was found, and fixed...

....which necessitated ripping out 9 tiles from the kitchen ceiling installed last year....

.....................which necessitated ripping out an additional 25 tiles because of the way they dovetail...

Raised the blood pressure (again)....

but tis done. (and we won't even talk about the welding that had to happen )*( that close to the almost 200 year old floor joists....)

New ceiling tiles came home with Lee yesterday, and were installed in under an hour today. Well, okay, 2 hours, including ripping out and prepping the strapping. My butt is reminding me that I am not 25 anymore, and going up and down a ladder 50+ times is not an exercise that came even close to replicating my normal walking routine!

I bought a shelf to mount between the kitchen windows, and when I install it, will prep the last wall that needs painting prior to...

....painting all the woodwork so that I can.....

.......................install the wallpaper.

Can't start either job until Monday as I am working and churching and working again this weekend. Glad I get a chance to sing in the choir this week, been two years and I've missed it. And alto's are a valuable commodity in the choir! (isn't it nice to be needed?) Then, Sunday I'm in charge (OMG?!) of the Halloween Party at work for the kids at the Village, the apartment community where Lee and I work.

Kids, with multiple issues, in costumes.

Yeah, just another regular day at work (ha ha)!! My "costume" consists of an orange tee shirt I made last year...jack-'o-lantern in the front, and "Staff" on the back. Yay.

I LOVEEEEE Halloween, and the only part of my job I truly hate is that I miss dressing up, and handing out candy at my own home. Still, it's a good job, and I am lucky to have it.

Things are coming together, and the kitchen will (hopefully) be done by the end of next week. The saga that began in early July with the mysterious leaking dishwasher hose floating my floor tiles, will finally be put to rest, and I will have (a completely unexpected) kitchen rehab.

If Wishes Were Fishes...

I can't believe it.

I missed it.

Okay, I didn't *miss* it...I missed the opportunity to photograph and forevermore capture the much anticipated highlight of the fall leaf season.

Two days ago, such beauty, such incredible beauty surrounded our house. We are the only house on our street that is totally surrounded by maples.

Shades of yellow, gold, tinged with auburn, deep ruby, russet, blending into oranges...poised for a moment in time.

Colors that teased one's eyes to *look*, *look*, dear Goddess, *look*...

Drink it in, suck it deeply into the spirit, let it gild you...

My words cannot adequately describe the intense, vivid beauty.

And yet, I am reminded of that blog I read recently, the monks creating their mandalas of sand, only to let them be carried away on the wind.

Such beauty, we are reminded, is transient.

The beauty we long to capture...we can.

We can hold it in our hearts, and carry it forth into the world.

Autumn in New England Means...

Well, it would have been better if blogger would cooperate and switch the photo's but the pie came first, the jelly second.

Being somewhat frugal, a few years ago I bemoaned all the peelings that went to waste after making a pie (actually I had made apple pie filling and canned it, which uses a TON of apples). And yes they are *lovely* in the compost bin, but I always felt there must be more.

And guess what...there is! Apple Peel Jelly, is made using the peels and cores, cooked down, left to seep out all the good yummyness of the apples, and then strained into syrup.

The resulting jelly is a beautiful pink (even if you use green apples!) and the flavor is ... just the right balance of crisp apple, and sweetness.

I'm glad I was able to can something this year! T'was a very slack year for canning, though I did a lot of freezing.

Next years garden is already being planned...tomato seeds, and pumpkin seeds and and ... in time. Can't make myself order the seeds until the New Year...a traditional way of saying "yes, this winter will end, see, my seeds have arrived!"

But for now, there is fall, and apple pie...and jelly.

Fall Posting

Suddenly it's really Autumn here in the Northeast. The leaves turned almost overnight from green to yellows and gold. It never fails to grab me how fast the passage of time has been flowing around me of late. And by "of late" I really mean the last 6 years or so. Something about adding a few kids to the family managed to simultaneously speed up and slow down my internal clock.

Lest you think that's an impossible juxtaposition, I beg to differ. Suddenly, it is Thursday. Wasn't it just July and I was frenetically packing for our camping trip? And yet, yesterday, didn't the kids and I spend 5 minutes, that passed like 5 hours, trying to catch the breeze-blown leaves fluttering from the maple in the side yard?

Something about them makes me younger. I may joke about being 'old woman" but inside, I still feel youthful. Maybe they help me look at the world from a tighter perspective. All this talk of global economy, and global village leaves me feeling powerless, and often, frightened. But bring that wide world down the the microcosm of a 6 year-old, and suddenly...there is joy and curiosity, and beauty in every thing I behold.

Funny, I started out thinking I was going to write about my disordered kitchen, the way I am feeling stressed and trying desperately not to be...

and instead I find myself looking things from my kids viewpoint, and am feeling the thrill of discovering what's under the old wallpaper, wondering about the transformation of new wallpaper, and what will it look like when the plumber pulls apart the wall upstairs to find our leaking pipe...

and not like a nervous adult wondering about the mess, the cost, the fuss...

Funny what a change in view can do for the spirit...

Been Gone So Long

Life has been busy. Full-on hectic, as life with kids can be. So hi and welcome back and yeah. Sorry I've been neglecting!

Updated pix of the youngest kiddos....Rob in March, using our "leprechaun" glasses as "goggles"...too funny!


Lissa just got her hair beaded in this pic. It takes about 2-3 hours to braid and bead her. The good thing is that she's done for about a month after the efforts. And she loves tossing her head and having her beads "clack, clack".

And KC, doing a "Santa beard" in the tub.

In order, Chet is now 24.5, Rob just turned 14, KC is 6, and Lissa is 3.5....

I'm done with diapers, pretty much, bottles long a thing of the past, and the kiddo's are at that stage where helping Mommy is fun. Oh, how I love this stage!

Because Mommy wears long skirts all the time, our sweet lil gal also prefers dresses or skirts...however, she's a boy in girls clothing! Oh, my, that one is twice as much work as ANY of the boys...maybe even combined!!

She'll not take crap from any of the boys, stands up for herself, tantrums like a pro, and yet still is prone to random acts of sweetness, a hug for brother KC when he's sad, or a full-on body slam from across the house hug with her sweet face tilted back and an "I loooovvvee you mommmmmmy" as her wee arms wrap around my legs.

Life is good.

I Like It!

Moonsingers darker color...that's what you get for coloring your hair when the kids are up and you have to turn off the timer and then separate squabbling sibs...nonetheless...I Like It!

Just saw this quote:

“Risk-taking, trust, and serendipity are key ingredients of joy. Without risk, nothing new ever happens. Without trust, fear creeps in. Without serendipity, there are no surprises.”Rita Golden Gelman
.............on Quilters Coven and had to steal it... I Like It!

I've been decorating the house like a fiend for Yule...a few lights here, an arrangement there. Make a wreath here, and hang another there. Santa here, jingle bells there...aaahhh, the Yule Season is here once again...and I LIKE IT!

Happy Thanksgiving

Wishing you the brilliant colors of Autumn
the brilliance gleam of smiles
the spirit of love to surround you
and all things yummy to eat!

Blessed Be!

The Wheel Turns...

We have come to the end of a season. For me, Summer is fully "put away" when the leaf raking is done. Although there are a few straggly bits to take care of (noteably, the hedge where leaves blow from neighbors, and down the street..always a maintenance issue), the yard is essentially put to bed for the season. Compost bins are full and working overtime to produce beautiful soil for next season...the wheel isn't just turning just now, it's in full whirl! Above, the brook after a "cleansing" rain...

Another kind of wheel...the first apple pie of the Holiday Season! Yet to do are 3 more for Thanksgiving (apple), then a pumpkin pie, and finally, a chocolate mousse pie. That's today and tomorrows work. KC declared this "the best looking pie you've ever done, Mom," which is all the praise anyone could hope for! Blue ribbons have nothing on the adoration of your own kids!

It's so hard to see in this photo...but where the shadow of the house is...is an outline of the house in frost! It was so kewl to see! Didn't photograph all that well, but it was neat watching the shadow move with the sun, and seeing the frost *poof* into vapor as you were watching! Note the lawn is virtually leaf-free.

All is well in our corner of the world. Watching the spinning of the season wheel...the last geese stitching across the sky, the fast approaching gloaming early each afternoon, the deep darkness of nightfall, making 6 p.m. feel like 9 p.m.! When it's dark, this moonsinger feels like it's bedtime! Oh, how I envy those farmers of old....in this day and age, our rhythms follow those of necessity...the "gotta get dones"....even when our spirit cries for rest....Ahhh, well, there's always snowshoeing to look forward to!

It's...it's....it's...

More Powerful than a super Bug...
Faster than a fat momma pig....
and Able to Leap Small Children in a single Bound....

It's SUPER MOONSINGER!!!

This is what Moonsinger looks like after the H1N1 has knocked her on her ass and finally gotten back up:


A smile. Make up. Eyes still a bit blurry, but hey, they're blue, and not reddened, runny or closed. Progress on the forward road, my friends.

I have survived the Aporkalypse!!

Thank goddess you can't see all the gray roots in this shot! (prob'ly why I chose this one, eh? LOL!)

Before and After 10/24 + 10/31

From October into November in one fell swoop!