Checking the tights to make sure you've got the ones with the seams that lay just the right way.
You can rush through. You can argue. You can loudly proclaim that it ISNT A BIG DEAL and those are the only tights that match and just wear them please! Or you can get the ones that don't make tears in the early morning and take ten seconds more to straighten them out across tiny toes. Exactly even. And then wait five seconds more so she can do the test step or two. Just to be sure.
Lone flower, hemmed in with snows, and white as they
But hardier far, once more I see thee bend
Thy forehead as if fearful to offend,
Like an unbidden guest. Though day by day
Storms, sallying from the mountain-tops, waylay
The rising sun, and on the plains descend;
Yet art thou welcome, welcome as a friend
Whose zeal outruns his promise! Blue-eyed May
Shall soon behold this border thickly set
With bright jonquils, their odours lavishing
On the soft west-wind and its frolic peers;
Nor will I then thy modest grace forget,
Chaste snowdrop, venturous harbinger of Spring,
And pensive monitor of fleeting years!
– Wordsworth
Thousands of sheep, soft-footed, black-nosed sheep — one by one going up the hill and over the fence — one by one four-footed pattering up and over— one by one wiggling their stub tails as they take the short jump and go over — one by one silently unless for the multitudinous drumming of their hoofs as they move on and go over — thousands and thousands of them in the grey haze of evening just after sundown — one by one slanting in a long line to pass over the hill…
– Carl Sandberg
The meadows of the Ickworth Estate boasted such soft footed, black nosed sheep at every bend in the road. They never fail to stir up great affection within me. My Gram had a small heard of Suffolk sheep, six I believe. At least in the beginning. (I inherited her tendency to multiply projects.) I remember she took a night course at the local extension office. She bought the sheep, bred them. Soon there were twenty, then fifty. I think there were several dozen by the time my grandfather was overwhelmed and the sheep project came to a close.
We learned a lot in the interim however. All those biblical analogies take on new meaning after watching a sheep's unique response to challenges (to give up, by and large), towards pack mentality, and the tendency to flee. Yet, we loved them she and I. In later years she framed a watercolor of a young woman in a nightgown with a winter coat tending a needy sheep in a snowy pen because it reminded her of those late night emergencies that would so often crop up.
In the late 70's, while we chased those sheep through hill and dale, I certainly never expected to see a herd while standing in Suffolk itself. It is a singular blessing. I know it would make her smile.
and yes this sky is from the same hike. It was a brief clearing!
The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing.
– Blaise Pascal
May your hearts be sweet, full to overflowing, and and generously given to others.
We are now card carrying members of the National Trust which makes me ever so happy because now I can wander through the gardens and manor houses of 300 historic British estates. The first on the list was Ickworth where we stumbled upon the most elegant wedding party this past weekend. This may have set the bar rather high for our daughters I think. Not that they are even dating, mind you. This was the sort of scene that plants all sorts of romantic ideas into a girl's head though. So classically British, it was like a fairy tale.
I am so looking forward to the weekends now. You know where you'll find me. : )
Martha's heart-shaped sandwich cookies were made by Moira and Alannah one evening after work. That's what they do for kicks ; )
It's love week here. : )
Are you doing silly happy things for Valentine's too?
These are a sugar cookie base, versus a peanut butter dough, mixed up by Moira with a kiss plunked down on each by a very happy four year old. Someday some of them will arrive in America for their brothers. I was not kidding when I said my boxes run late….
And now, I am off to get back to my Grammy's. Delayed broadcast and all, but awesome.
Much love -
and kisses
from a wonderful walk around the pastures of Ickworth Estate yesterday…
We had a sort of slow rolling week productivity wise so I did the logical thing and picked a really tediously slow project to work on. : ) Due to my procrastination – and the fact that I have not tracked down the thread since we unpacked – we had accumulated 5 buttons that had fallen off various coats. Seemed like a good opportunity to teach everyone who couldn't how to sew on a button, starting with how to thread a needle. This part took a loooooong time.
I did my best Jessica Hulcy impression and let them figure it out themselves with a minimum of grabbing away of needles, thread, or buttons. This, by the way, is the most important job of the home educator says Mrs. Hulcy. She used to say that if she could give parents two things it would be a gag and handcuffs. We jump in too early and too much. We talk alot – explaining and correcting and offering tips ad nauseum. She was right. Standing by, quietly answering questions as needed, and allowing the time to work through tricky things is better than all the lengthy lessons we can offer. They may forget what we say, but they remember what they figured out. You can't learn for anyone, after all.
So, our coats are all in tip top shape now. They know something they didn't.
win – win
Rolls right off the tongue doesn't it?
I love words. Have I mentioned that?
Our cranky GPS rarely takes us to or from a place the same way twice. Keeps things fresh, know what I mean? So while we went to Manchester by major highway, we returned along a rural road through some rugged high country dotted with little hamlets like this one near Derbyshire. I really wanted to stop and get some shots in this one because this one had sheep.
Like many European country villages there was one main thoroughfare and I couldn't tell if the side streets were wide enough or two way etc until it was too late to turn down them. This really exasperated one son who shall remain nameless, but you can boo at him here just the same. ; ) I may or may not have passed up an additional dozen or two farm drives because it was impossible to tell if the drives were truly drives or closed gates. Hence we traveled a couple miles out of town before I had a big ol' public drive to turn around in and head back to those sheep. I am nothing if not cautious. (…worry wart, overthinker, scaredy-cat, whatever <g>)
We parked on a wayside initially and Alannah and I walked a quarter mile back to the pasture we saw them at the first pass by. They were no longer by the road however. They had ambled alllllll the way up the hillside. Contrary to what that son might tell you, I wasn't gone that long turning around. They made good time moving uphill though. So after some grumbling between us we hightailed it back to the vehicle and into town.
Green for January, yes?
I want photography points for actually scaling the back of the little cemetary wall for this one:
The little town was classic, sort of post industrial, though some old buildings date back to the 1600's. Just what I would have pictured. We walked for a bit and then headed off. Most of the passengers fell fast asleep but, my adventures in U-turning now forgotten, son and I enjoyed some very Colorado-esque views from the top of whatever wild barren hill we were on.
