gone fishing

Posted on August 19, 2013 by Kim Halloran-Fry

It feels a little that way. Days have been full of special friends who are helping us squeeze the last bits of fun from this summer and pictures are piling up while we are out and about. Soon enough the days will shorten and there will be plenty of hours in the house though.

These are from an afternoon we spent walking with Abbie Rose by the marina in Ely. Two of the men we passed were ribbing each other:

"Know what's the best bait for that fish?"

"What?"

"Whatever's not on your hook, it seems!"

We sat at the cafe seen just beyond the second boat while I drank tea and Abbie had a lemonade. Lest that sounds too idyllic I will add that we spent a good deal of our tea time swatting wasps from our drinks. Are they bad in your part of the world right now as well? We successfully dodged them on this outing but I am sporting a large welt from sting at the park.

ribbit

Posted on August 17, 2013 by Kim Halloran-Fry

Heavy rain has brought all sorts of little things out from wherever it is they hide. This one found his way into the laundry room. Successfully relocated by Moira.

a visitor

Posted on August 16, 2013 by Kim Halloran-Fry

"The ornaments of your house will be the guests who frequent it."

~Author Unknown

I am so very happy to know that tomorrow my door will open to a fellow farmgirl from Colorado. Oh, how I am looking forward to her here at my table.

work, rest, nature, books…

Posted on August 14, 2013 by Kim Halloran-Fry

“A quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one's neighbor — such is my idea of happiness.”

– Leo Tolstoy

And such makes up my days.

The little girls had a lovely and long awaited playdate yesterday. We made peppermint playdough mostly because it was the only extract I had on hand. There were a lot of giggles. It occurred to me today there are always a lot of giggles around here though. Those girls of ours are giggly. They find each other endlessly entertaining.

There has been some Tolstoy, too with one of my teens who handed me the essay as I headed upstairs last night and wrote, "What kind of ending is THAT????" on the bottom of it and let's talk about it tomorrow. So we did. We also talked about the value of curriculum that asked one to analyze and interpret versus filling in the blanks. I did more of the talking on that one. One of those you'll thank us later sorta things. <g>

The kitchen cabinets are now nearly completely reorganized. I could use a little more infastructure but am trying my best with temporary and removable wire shelves and dividers since this is not my house. It has made such a difference already.

The dresser drawers are being reworked too. The little boys have purged theirs back down to what can comfortably fit inside. I bagged the extras but kept them close by to replace those which will be inevitably lost to knee blowouts and such.

Husband is reading Willie Robertson's memoir aloud to me and the boys. Duck Dynasty maybe doesn't belong in the same post as Tolstoy. It actually does happen like this at our house though.

I bought more scrapbooking supplies. Only noteworthy because I have not actually scrapbooked by hand since we lived on the ranch. (read: probably four years) Please don't ask me how often I have purchased scrapbooking suuplies in the interim. Prints are being ordered to rectify that. I think photo books would be easier, or possibly just cheaper, but there is a great deal to be said for dimensionality and handling prints versus keyboards and….. plastic covers over the pages.

How's that for stream of consciousness blogging?

everyday blessings

Posted on August 11, 2013 by Kim Halloran-Fry

“As the years pass, I am coming more and more to understand that it is the common, everyday blessings of our common everyday lives for which we should be particularly grateful. They are the things that fill our lives with comfort and our hearts with gladness — just the pure air to breathe and the strength to breathe it; just warmth and shelter and home folks; just plain food that gives us strength; the bright sunshine on a cold day; and a cool breeze when the day is warm.”

– Laura Ingalls Wilder, Writings to Young Women from Laura Ingalls Wilder

thundercake

Posted on August 11, 2013 by Kim Halloran-Fry

Finton came into our lives one hot, muggy late 70's summer. My grandparents had few neighbors and we knew them by name. Just down the road was a retired university professor. He wore a starched white button down shirt and suspenders while driving his tractor. His adult daughter had seen much more of the world than most of us in that isolated pocket of Wisconsin farmland. On her travels to Ireland she had befriended a family with a son not much older than I, whom she brought to the farm for the summer.

Since the neighbors had no children, Finton found his way over to our place quite regularly where he quite regularly drove.me.crazy. He had a round freckled face, a head full of black curls, and bright blue eyes that danced with mischief. All summer I was hyper alert, never knowing what lay around the next corner. He might well be poised with one of the horses' water buckets ready to douse me. He was always asking about 'the wee lass' a nickname my family adopted with glee. That drove me nuts too. They teased that he was sweet on me. I was sure he had dedicated his life to tormenting me.

Finton loved British comedy and his family would send him little cassette tapes of his favorite comedians. I didn't really get it. He said it was a British thing and urged me to just listen one more time. I still didn't get it. Some 30 yrs later I wish I could tell him my guilty pleasure is Mrs. Brown's Boys ; ))

Finton was a Catholic and our neighbors were Protestant. I didn't realize at the time what an incredible cross-cultural connection was happening there, nor how incredible the whole exchange was, given 'the troubles' back home for him. What I knew was that Gram and I took Finton to mass with us that summer. On the drive back home one day the sky turned dark and Finton went quiet.

The neighbor shared with us later that he was dreadfully afraid of our wild summer storms, the tornado sirens, how the sky could go from blue to yellow and sickly still, then erupt. I didn't realize then how mild Irish weather is by comparison. I guess I thought it thundered fiercely all over the globe. But, it doesn't. That big boy-man trembled which softened my heart some.

I don't know what happened to Finton, but I thought about him fondly when we had our first thunder here the other day, so much closer to where he came from than from where I did. We pulled out Patricia Polacco's Thundercake and realized we had just enough of all the ingredients on hand. So we baked. And we talked about scary things and being little and getting braver and growing up and going to Ireland.

And then, the sun peeked out in time for cake. (recipe here)

Read with us? Who better to tell the story than the author herself.

High Country Adventure, Considered

Posted on August 9, 2013 by Kim Halloran-Fry

One of the very best days last month was spent hiking in the Lake District, even if it didn't go quite as planned. Maybe, because it didn't go quite as planned. Our best trips usually deviate pretty widely from the intended course. We walk our way through the different parts of the world to which we travel. Usually, when we read the guides, we choose the longer more challenging more scenic routes listed. This day was no exception. The first portion of the hike was very easy and well marked, a typical sight-seeing pedestrian path. We found the extension trail connecting to this one and began our climb. Up. And upandupandup.

We've done this before and fortunately our kids are part mountain goat and never complain. At some point the well marked trail became less well marked. The guide mentioned that might happen so we pressed on. And up. The view from the top was incredible which was good because there were moments I thought it might be the last thing I saw before I died. ; )

We ate lunch at the top. At that point we just gave up the trail and followed the creek back down. We saw a meadow of cotton grass though we didn't realize what it was until we could check the internet. We met a lone sheep. We watched a helicopter rise from the valley below and eventually fly right past us.

We were so proud of those littles for their gusto and good humor we stopped at a cafe and got ice cream after.

It was a phenomenal day. I was thinking about that after we got back home. It was simply a PHENOMENAL day. But, I realize some people wouldn't have seen it that way. I guess another way of looking at it was we got lost, we had a killer climb, the creekbed turned out to be a bog – which we also didn't figure out til we got to the internet ; D We tied the little dogs to the outdoor tables while we sat and had ice cream. Littlest dog's lead loosened up and he happily jogged through the restaurant with my husband chasing after. We are still laughing over that one, but I realize not everyone would be laughing.

So, you can decide if this is a charmed life. Maybe the point is that you can decide if your life is charmed or not. My dear friend's signature box says it this way:

"An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered; an adventure is
an inconvenience rightly considered."

– G.K. Chesterton

The choice is yours. It is a happy woman who takes that counsel to heart and discovers that, instead of one trial after another, her life is never boring. No two days are quite the same. No, instead of the monotony of complete control and predictability she is blessed with a life full of adventure.

If you want to see the world from that vantage point, you have to push through the climb.

under the starry sky

Posted on August 6, 2013 by Kim Halloran-Fry

“A great many people, and more all the time, live their entire lives without ever once sleeping out under the stars.” - Alan S. Kesselheim

That just shouldn't be. <g> So we pitched the tent and had a grand adventure under the starry sky. A stay-cation if you will. Because sometimes the best adventures can be had right in your own backyard.

princess of quite a lot

Posted on August 1, 2013 by Kim Halloran-Fry

She was invited to her first big girl birthday party, a princess party at that, and was oh so very pleased. I love her hair all damp with the heat and curls falling but the tiara, the tiara is still in place.

Posted on July 30, 2013 by Kim Halloran-Fry

A shepherd may be a very able, trusty, and good shepherd, without a sweetheart – better, perhaps, than with one. But what is he without his dog?

– James Hogg

We watched with rapt attention one evening as the shepherd took his dog to the pasture to doctor two of the sheep who were slightly lame. I have never seen a dog work a herd of sheep in person before. It was really nothing short of amazing. The dog followed voice and hand commands, watching both handler and sheep. It had the sheep under complete control, allowing the shepherd to isolate the two he needed and making sure the others were still and collected in the meantime.

We visited with the shepherd a while that night. He knew we had an accent but couldn't place it exactly, he said. <g> We were the very first Americans to have ever stayed at his home. When we told him we had most recently lived in Colorado he remarked that a local he knew had moved there to teach at a university. But, he added, the man returned here to this coastal spot for his holidays.

Smart man, I say, with all due respect to our beloved Colorado.

These sheep are primarily raised for meat. It seems that on this island which was built in large part on the wool industry, wool is nearly worthless today. The market is saturated with cheaper synthetics. This made me sad. It actually made me want to go purchase a thick, scratchy fisherman's sweater on principle. Even though it is July.

Our landlord later confirmed this wool market assessment. He, of course, blames the Irish. If you talk long enough you learn that many of the world's ills can probably be traced over westward way. (said firmly tongue in cheek by this very Irish woman ; ))

At any rate, be it the Irish, the EU, or the darned scratchy wool itself, rayon may be cornering the market but the sheepdogs are still cornering the sheep. And doing a fine job at it. I wish we had such a capable dog when we were chasing goats and cows.

A little bit of family history my children may not know. When I was growing up my grandmother went through a 'sheep phase' on the farm. The family business was actually a riding stable where they bred Quarter Horses but my grandmother had lots of incarnations as she created herself anew time after time. I particularly loved her as shepherdess. She attended courses at the local extension agency and bought a few ewes which later grew to a herd which overwhelmed my grampa. (we didn't have an awesome dog remember) I think I have written that part here before.

This picture is me (left) returning the orphan lamb I had convinced my mother to allow me to keep in the basement in town while I bottle fed it that summer. boo-yah! He looks great. I look pretty peppy too despite many night time feedings. Not sure why I am mid-flight here….

So with this newfound fascination with all things wooly and wonderful, the children have found our Floss books and are reading them over again with new eyes now that they have a real life dog to compare. Good fun.

If you'd like to have a Kim Lewis feast with us here are some titles to look for: