We took Zach and Megan to one of my favorite places this week. The water was nearly still and the weather quite warm for January. I wish we had more time. But, don't we always wish that?
Category Archives: England
a little off the sides
Such a week. We have been walking, walking, walking. Walking the fens, walking the streets of cities large and small. Staying up way too late watching movies and playing board games. Reading the last of the Christmas library books and eating up the cookies. And taking pictures. And having heated fantasy football draft sessions.
That's my life this week. I hope your's is equally full of goofiness and exhaustion. Will be back to post more pics tomorrow. Probably. : ) Meantime a street shot from this afternoon.
a look back – 2012
What a year it was. We rang it in with fireworks in a tiny farming village on the highest peak in our part of the Rhineland Pfalz. We closed it out watching magnificent fireworks explode over the London Eye. (and can't wait to share!)
In between there was dancing
in Stuttgart, Ramstein, Munich…
and in Ireland. Beautiful Ireland.
There were parades big and small.
There was a lot of football. From little boys playing alongside the flight line to American pro football in Wembley Stadium
to English football in Manchester.
There were great celebrations. Holy Communion…
Confirmations.
As well as solemn memorials to a good man gone too soon for us.
We cheered at a high school graduation and a college graduation.
And then there were the road trips. Lots of them.
Luxembourg
Köln
Trier – a couple times.
Some of them hiked the French rock formations along the old Roman road.
another put her toes in the sand on the Italian coast
Others splashed along the Suffolk coast.
We watched another cross the finish line in Prague
Prague, the city which stole Abbie's heart.
And we boarded ship for the white cliffs of Dover, not a road trip but to make a home.
Where we pal around in Cambridge and London
From flowering rapeseed in Germany to the bowing fen grasses of East Anglia.
We have been blessed to share this year's adventures with over a half dozen American students as well. The one face you don't see in these pictures is our son Asher. He spent 2012 in Korea. Major goal of 2013 is a picture of him next to his mama.
It's been quite a ride y'all. I count it as a singular blessing to have been able to share it with the people I dearly love near and far, face to face and via this screen. 2012 saw a lot of boxes and suitcases and smiles – as well as tears. Life is full.
It is never easy.
It is always good.
Life is good. Hold on to that.
Shop til you Drop
So goes the saying. It took far less time than you'd imagine. Zach and Megan had tickets to a Manchester United soccer game and the girls and I thought it would be fun to drive up together and make a day or two of it. Turns out there is a Vegas-style mega mall in Manchester. We haven't been to any sort of mall in a couple years. Absence makes the heart grow fonder….and the memory dim. We freak out in malls. At least in malls boasting 11,000+ parking spots. We found ourselves in a vast sea of humanity pressing in from all sides. Even things the girls had hoped to see were hard to focus on in that crowd.
It took several hours to work our way from one end to the other of what is billed as "The People's Palace" a lavish tribute to retail utopia. We left with one bag between us, purchased just before we left. We will never win any shopping awards unless it is "Most Likely to be Overwhelmed."
This sabbath day finds us happily encircled by beech trees and hedgerows once more.
Home for the Holidays – lifestyle photography
I had a lifestyle session with a local family just before Christmas. We had a challenge on our hands given that it was the darkest day of the year – literally just hours after winter's solstice. Rain kept us inside their cozy English farmhouse where we worked to catch a few glimpses of Christmas at home in a large family like my own, with some kids close by and others spreading their wings and flying around the world.
I am grateful to have shared a little bit of it with them.
December’s breath
become part of the silence
A line from a book I read recently described the tree branches in winter as like arthritic fingers. I thought of that as I gazed out my window the other morning. While I stood there a group of dove-gray pigeons came to roost on those frost covered limbs, puffing out their chests as they rested there.
"In order to see birds it is necessary to become part of the silence." – Robert Lynd
It is a wonderful thing to find the quiet even if it is in tiny little pockets of the day.
sweet shop
When I was little the was a restaurant in the mall decorated like a turn of the century sweet shop. It was right around the corner from the skating rink – when malls still had indoor rinks and you could sit on the second level watching the skaters spin around below, dreaming Dorothy Hamill dreams. It had those little dot candies on long rolls of white paper. There was an elaborately carved candy counter where you could order ice cream sodas with impossibly high mounds of whipped cream, which would be served by a man in a red and white striped shirt with a bow tie and suspenders.
And there were swirly lollipops. Giant, rainbow-colored pops as big as your face.
When I went to the farm store with friends some weeks ago I knew I was coming back to the sweet shop. It's not nearly as big as the shop in my dreams but it has swirly pops and my girls, yes my big girls, were every bit as excited about them as I was. It's not always easy getting Moira to go shopping but even she felt she hit the jackpot on this one.
catching up and heading outside
It turned out to be a pretty darn good day, especially considering it began with stepping into dog doo. That doesn't always bode well, you know. But by and large the past 24 hrs have been on a slow, but steady-ish, upswing after a rougher go of it this week.
Yesterday was a down day. Well a dress-down day anyway. We still did a full day of school but I did a good share of it in my pjs. Around 2pm I noticed the sun was shining for real, and not just teasin'. I threw off the jammies and Moira, Abbie and slipped into sweaters, boots and jackets for a walk to soak up the little bit we had left for the day. We haven't done that in a while with all the rain we've had.
The sugar beet fields have been replanted and a fringe of winter grass stands all trembly replacing the bushy root tops seen here not long ago.
Now that the foliage is dying down you can see the drainage canals which run alongside the farm roads. We live in the Fens, which are reclaimed marshlands much like the Netherlands. The area has been drained over the centuries and now supports large grain and produce farms such as this one. This is the lowest elevation in England and the ground here is still a bit unstable, sinking as the soil becomes more or less saturated.
Abbie Rose found tracks of something by the road. Oddly we only saw that one.
The walk was pretty hands on for her as you can see. Ay ay ay. She was flat out in a puddle a mile out. Everything had good washing when we got home – child, coat, boots. Hot chocolate and a hot bath fixes a girl right up though.
It was pretty much dark when we got home. This is the afternoon sky at 4pm these days. And today we woke to a frost covered wonderland and temperatures which plummeted overnight. I am glad we got our hike in before we hibernate again, but hibernating is fine by me too. We have a lot of crafting to do.
The frequent heavy rains are stripping the trees of their autumn coats and it makes me a little sad that every time the sun peeks out again there are fewer leaves left clinging to the branches. Every week the boys and their dad gather the strays from the courtyard and the little girls collect fat fistfuls for very fleeting bouquets.
This is my bliss. : )
Another sweet thing – Tess tried on one of the ponchos the big girls and I learned to make when I was on bedrest with Brendan all those years ago. She loved it. I love that she does.
Starry Sky Journal 