It's moments like these that make you realize you aren't in Kansas anymore…. and that your boy needs a haircut. (where DID the good clippers end up?)
Brendan caught sight of these beauties while we were walking down the street. He is a fan of all things Matchbox but seeing the British cars was exceptionally cool.
My girls are posting snapshots of London to their Facebook walls at this moment while I do…. as little as I possibly can, actually. It is the day of rest after all. : ) So far that has consisted of fishing an old cricket bat out of the kids' bathtub where it was soaking. (No idea. It wasn't there when I walked by last time) I finished Pioneer Woman's Black Heels to Tractor Wheels. Best read in a looooong time. You might need to be a sanguine sort to appreciate as much as I did. Can't remember when I laughed so hard. When I wasn't wiping the tears from my eyes I was reading exerpts to anyone close by so they could laugh too. But just to show that I do think big thoughts here and there I've also begun one of my new library books so chosen because a) the base library is small and b) it has a couple shelves of brand new books and I have grabbed some unlikely combinations. Then again, maybe not so unlikely. I read like people watch tv. I need several channels to choose from at a given time.
In between I have edited a lot of pictures, watched Winnie the Pooh in the original with the littles, and eaten some chocolate. There was a freak accident involving the tragic amputation of the princess Polly Pocket's arm. Abbie said I should just help her put on her plastic gown anyway because she was pretending that arm was invisible. Girl after my own heart. We keep calm and play on.
Oh that all crises were resolved so easily.
So, pictures. These are from our horsing around the other day after fishing the kids out of the pool. (hence the pool hair ; ))
I made an awesome simple strawberry shortcake with fresh cream, thanks to a daughter who actually enjoys whipping it by hand. Pretty sure it came from Food Network here because we have enjoyed everything we have made from there.
With any luck that will be all the breaking news from this end. Uneventful is good. <g> Hope your holiday weekend (for you American friends) is restful and full of family fun. And some cake. There should be cake.
…the photographic journey is about discovering your vision, allowing it to evolve, change, and find expression…. It is not something that you find and come to terms with once and for all; it is something that changes and grows with you….
It is about what you - unique among billions – find beautiful, ugly, right, wrong, or harmonious in this world. And as you experience life your vision changes. The stories you want to tell, the things that resonate with you – they change and so does your vision.
– Within the Frame, David du Chemin
A similar message in Aliki's Marianthe this afternoon: "Some stories are told with words, and others with pictures."
It all has me thinking about purpose, clarity, focus, and articulation.
And I often think better in pictures.
Growing up I lived and breathed horses. My grandparents owned a boarding stable and I was on horseback before I could walk. I devoured Billy and Blaze, Marguerite Henry's Misty, the Black Stallion. I went through every copy of the Timber Trail Riders my aunt had saved. For years, next to the photograph of the ponies in the mist still in its shrink wrap, this poster hung on my wall. I memorized the shape, size and color of every breed listed.
In our area of the country we had Quarter horses and Arabians and Appalosas. As I grew up I occasionally spotted draft breeds or gaited horses. But it wasn't until we came to England that we met our first cobs with their flowing fetlocks.
Welsh Cobs are an ancient breed. They have pulled carts, hauled coal, ploughed fields and gone to war. Today they mostly carry delighted children and smaller adults in riding events. And greet grateful people like us at the fence.
…coming down on a sunny day
"Someone told me long ago
There's a calm before the storm,
I know
It's been comin' for some time.
When it's over, so they say,
It'll rain a sunny day,
I know
Shinin' down like water."
– John Fogerty
"The true picture of the effective home teacher is more often a secure and happy mom. She and the children do straightening up chores the first thing each day so that the home with provide an organized, clean environment for learning. She selects learning tasks for which each child is ready. She requires only enough daily practice or drill to allow her children to progress appropriately to mastery of basic skills. Fun projects are used to integrate and reinforce basic skills. And much of the day is framed around the children's interests with work and service that build genuine golden rule citizens,"
– The Successful Homeschool Family Handbook, Dr. Raymond and Dorothy Moore
Golden rule citizens. Leave to dear Dr. Moore to help us articulate the highest and best vision and to lay out practical ways to get there. It occurred to me that my homeschool library probably seems highly contradictory. (as well as outdated – intentionally) Still, I find these older books have common messages at their heart which still inspire me to begin again each year just as enthusiastically as I did with those little boys long ago.
(We have begun again, a little bitty bit, with a brand new bookcases in a very old house. The school room is coming together and I am so enjoying this new old space.)
Moira is on a braiding spree thanks to Pinterest. Thought I would start sharing some of these do's for fun in case you might want to try your hand.
Here you have fishtail braids. I am not sure why they call them fish tails. The only tail I have seen braided like this was my Arabian's before a show. It was harder than it looks back then. It is pretty painless now since I only man the camera and not the comb lol.
If you want to give it a whirl there is a tutorial with good graphics here.
“All in all, it was a never-to-be-forgotten summer — one of those summers which come seldom into any life, but leave a rich heritage of beautiful memories in their going — one of those summers which, in a fortunate combination of delightful weather, delightful friends and delightful doing, come as near to perfection as anything can come in this world.”
– L.M. Montgomery, Anne's House of Dreams
I put it off as long as possible, this pool thing. Together with 'planes, trains, and automobiles' water is high on the list of things I abhor. Being an only child of a non-swimming mother (from an entirely non-swimming clan on both sides) probably took care of any chance I would turn out otherwise. I have no happy water memories. Cannot even begin to list all the things I dislike and distrust about bodies of water, starting with getting wet.
I have driven my children to swimming lessons. I have encouraged them to sign up for camps that involve canoeing and tubing. Whenever invited, I have happily packed their beach towels and sunscreen and sent them along with friends to swim. I take pictures of them swimming. I am a swimming enabler of the highest degree. Just please don't ask me to get in the water. Please. Especially if you are in the teeniest pink tankini ever made, swaddled in layers of flotation devices, with two bitty pigtails.
And freckles.
This time I got in. It took a good half hour to gradually lower myself into the bracing English water, despite all the directions from the peanut gallery side of the pool to just jump in. See, I don't generally "jump in" to things easily. But I do get there in my own time.
Eleanor Roosevelt said to do one thing every day that scares you.
Check.
In fact this has been my motto many days these past two years. The upside being that every day you do that there is one thing that scares you a little bit less. There are lots of ways to die to yourself. For most of us it is done by this petty martyrdom available to us everyday. Little opportunities to face your fears, to thwart your will, to make someone else happy. And that it did.
But it was still cold.
My ducks in a row. May you splash with this much joy and abandon all your days.
Starry Sky Journal 