Dancing Queen

 

She is a Star, I tell ya.

A Day in the Life

The girls made a video the other day with a friend.  It's always good to be able to laugh at yourself.  Enjoy!

Uluru

To celebrate my 40th birthday my sweet husband took me to see a BIG rock. Sounds good to this rock hound!

The whole family got up at 5am to meet the tour bus at 6am for our grand adventure. It was still dark when we got on the bus. This picture was taken at the roadhouse about halfway down the road to Uluru. We can highly, HIGHLY, recommend this tour company. They were great!!

True to the tour company name, we got to see some Emus at that roadhouse. Do you know how hard it is to take a picture of an Emu's eye through a chain link fence? If you do, you know how chuffed I am with this photo! Look at me, sounding all Aussie!

When we got to Uluru, after a pit stop at the visitor center in the little town, we headed for the other big rocks there, Kata Tjuta, or the Olgas. Did you know that this outcrop of rocks is actually bigger and more varied than Uluru? We were only allowed access to one spot around them, since most of the area is used for ceremony by the aboriginal owners. We got to hike a short trail in between the first and second domes, from the right. I was totally geeking out over the cool conglomerate structure of the rock.

Then it was on to the cultural center at the base of Uluru, where we could learn about Uluru from the indigenous perspective, and a little about their culture. It was fascinating and convinced C and I not to attempt to climb the rock, which we had planned to do. The tribes feel very strongly about us not climbing it, and after getting a look at the very steep and precarious trail up to the top, we opted to skip the climb.

So, instead we stayed with the group and got to do several walks at spots along the base, and hear the stories of the creation of the features of the rock, both geological and aboriginal. The girls loved the stories and finding the pictures in the rocks that went with them.

This is taken from inside a cave, at the base. There are paintings on the cave walls and if you look closely you can see the Emu tracks painted on the upper point above.

One of the walks took us to a waterhole. It was so lush and green and peaceful, I could have sat and soaked it up if we had had more time. But by then it was getting on in the day and the grand finale was calling.

So, off we went to our champagne dinner while watching the sun set on Uluru. It was yummy and fun and a great way to top off our day.

This shot was taken just as the sun was going down behind me.

And this is how we celebrated 15 years of marriage!

Don't worry, when you come visit, I will take you to Uluru if you want to see it, no matter how many times I have to go! I could spend a year there and still not see all that those big rocks have to show us.

Kangaroo Sanctuary

We went to the Kangaroo Sanctuary today to meet the roos. The main focus of the place was education about how to care for orphaned kangaroos. It is the law in Australia that if you rescue a roo, you have to try to release it back to the wild if at all possible. The kangaroos there could not be released to the wild for various reasons and would be destroyed by the government if the sanctuary did not exist to care for them. A full grown male red kangaroo, raised by humans and not afraid of us, is a dangerous animal. They can disembowel you if they decide to have a little kickboxing match with you. A wild one would just run away and find another male roo to play with.

It was great to get up close and personal with animals you don't get to get close to in the wild. Everybody got to hold a joey. His name was Fidget and he was very cute.

A likes to impersonate whatever animals she meets. Here is her joey impersonation:

We went on a walk around the 50 acre enclosure that houses the 20 roos that live there. The guy who runs the place had a bucket of food and the roos followed us around. He'd throw down some food and we could pet them as they ate.

Some of the joeys still need to be bottle fed, so we got to help with that, too. All in all, it was a great time!

Golden Orb

While out shopping the other day, we spotted something amazing above us on the grape arbor. Can you see it?

Here, a closer look:

That there is a Golden Orb spider and she was huge and gorgeous. We have heard about the Huntsman spiders that are even bigger and fuzzy like a Tarantula, but have yet to see one. Not sure I am eager to, to tell the truth! In the airport in Sydney, they had a big poster on the wall that showed the 1000 spider species in Australia. We did not have time to stop and look and A was probably happy to pass it on by. She does seem less phobic about the spiders lately. Good timing, I'd say, now that we are here!

Joey Licked Me!

Last night, our sponsors took us to see the local wallabies that come down the mountain to be fed. That was the coolest experience ever! I don't know of any place that let's you feed wild animals like this in America. The wallabies were so tame, you could pet them: A looking like a wallaby herself:

The cutest thing ever was when a joey poked out of the pouch of it's mama:

This joey was the one that licked my finger when I went to pet him! He was so cute! We loved petting the wallabies because they have very soft fur. They would grab your hand when you held out the food for them. And they chewed it very thoroughly before getting more.

I can't wait to take our visitors to feed the wallabies!!

I'm THAT Mom

I'm that Mom who says YES to getting ice cream from the ice cream truck at the park, not once, but twice in one day.

I'm that Mom who goes out of her way to accomodate her kids need to see their friends, encouraging two night sleepovers, bringing random extra kids home from parkday, and setting up whatever playdates are desired. And who makes homemade pizza, lemonade, and ice cream when those friends come over.

I'm that Mom who sees beauty and passion and value in whatever my kids do, whether it is dancing down the street, drawing anime on the computer, loving on a chicken, or seeing how late they can stay up at night.

I'm that Mom who thinks having fun is the point to life, so if my kids want to stay at the park with friends until 10 pm at night, we do.

I'm that Mom who still picks up her 9 year old like a baby and rocks her when she is sad or hurt, and who is still allowed to do that for her 11 year old.

I'm that Mom who kisses her kids goodnight, wishes them sweet dreams, and then crawls into her bed to sleep, knowing they are capable of shutting down the house and going to sleep when they are ready. And who tip toes around the house in the morning, allowing them to get a full night's sleep, even if that "night" ends at 1pm.

I'm that Mom who will negotiate a side trip to accomodate my kids needs when we need to go out and run some errands, like a stop at a favorite store, an ice cream cone, or a drop off with a friend so they don't have to go along.

I'm that Mom who knows that kids are people, too, and who treats them that way. The one who thinks their needs and wants, and whims, are as important as mine, sometimes moreso, and does what she can to help them get what they need, want and desire out of life.

I'm that Mom who knows that adult life is full of work and responsibilities, but childhood is for playing, who believes that the time for adult stuff is adulthood, and who does not force responsibility on her kids. I am also the Mom with kids who are responsible beyond their years....

I'm that Mom who spends three days of her life sitting on the couch with her kids watching the entire three seasons of Avatar: The Last Airbender. And loving every second of it!

I'm that Mom who knows that childhood is short and too precious to hurry, life is too short to waste, that making memories is what it is really all about. And that one day too soon these amazing little people I have been entrusted with will grow up and fly the nest so I should treasure every moment I have with them.

This was inspired by Flo and Ronnie and you are invited to join in!

She's a Finalist!!!

We just checked and found out that A's book has made it to the finalist circle on the Book Arts Bash novel writing contest!!!! I'm so excited and proud of her. Now, she has a one in five chance of winning her age category and a three in five chance of getting critiques from literary agents. We only have to wait for April 1st to find out how she did. Yikes, I can't wait!

Novel Idea

Hey, I gotta brag on my kid for a second here. A has been writing a book for the past year or so and I think it is pretty darn good. Anyway, she just entered it into a novel writing contest for homeschoolers. This is it here. She is pretty darn excited about this. She does not even care about the money, all she wants is the critiques. She told me she wants to be on the NYT bestseller list someday. Wish her luck!


She gave me permission to post the first chapter here. I think she wants to put it up on her blog, too, sometime soon.

BLAZE

CHAPTER 1

The young rabbit hopped along, her blue pelt shining elegantly in the sunlight as she passed through patches. The octagon-shaped diamond swung on its silver chain around her neck. Her mind was focused on two things: harvesting whatever was edible, and not getting caught, unarmed, by a wolf – she had had far too much experience with the creatures and bore a scar to prove it. A long time ago she had been cornered by a young, although quite fierce, wolf; she had taken a leap to the side, but the wolf had turned in time to slash her hip before she could fully escape.

Blaze hurried forward as she spotted a large raspberry bush. A small leather pouch was attached to her shoulders and her back with straps, the pouch itself secured to her underbelly, enabling her to stand on her hind paws and pick fruit. She was lucky to have one – only few rabbit requested that their pelt be made into leather for family members to use. Studying her paws as she thought of her older brother, she occupied herself with filling the pouch to the brim with raspberries.


As she hopped off to the edge of the trees, she had the intention of visiting Fleur’s shop. The ferns and other forest foliage decreased as Blaze entered the vast meadow in which most of her kind dwelled. She passed various types of flowers – tall cosmos, mallow, phlox and many other late-summer plants. Her eyes surveyed the area, taking in the beautiful plants and lush grass that cushioned her paws. She drew nearer to Fleur’s burrow with the surrounding sunflowers that now stood at their full height; the wide variety of herbs that grew underneath them. Blaze finally reached the entrance to the shop. Before going in, she stood on her hind paws, but it was no use. She had wanted to see if the seeds on the sunflowers were ready to be harvested. Instead she let her front paws retreat to the ground as she sniffed at a little plant with many tiny green leaves. Closing her eyes, she murmured "Mmmmmm, mint…"

Entering the burrow, where she was not surprised, for she had been there many times before, to find that it the hole was rather steep. She skidded downwards until it flattened out and stopped before a small wood door, the perfect size for a rabbit. Blaze put a paw on the knocker, and then pulled it back. Something was there that she hadn’t noticed before. A rose carved into the center of the wooden knocker. The rabbit knocked, a sense of unease beginning to form inside of her; although there was no reason to be afraid of Fleur. She was friendly, wise, and the healer of all the wounded rabbits in the meadow.


"Come in."

Blaze slowly opened the door to spot Fleur sitting calmly at her table, her tortoiseshell fur as sleek as ever. She was wearing the silver rose charm on a chain around her neck. Like all rabbits, Blaze and Fleur always had a unique accessory about their bodies that described their names. Her full name was Diamond Blaze, but of course not all rabbits had full names.


"Ah, Blaze. How may I help you?" said Fleur in a soft and reassuring voice. Blaze guessed that this was the tone she used to calm hysterical patients. She carefully leapt out of her chair and took a step forward.

She blinked as she realized the herbalist was waiting for an answer. "Uh, I need – can I have some honeysuckle nectar, please?"


Without a word, Fleur set off for her cabinets, which held vials of strange things even Blaze could not name. She heard the quiet chime-like clank of glass against glass. Soon the sounds stopped; the padding of paws floated to her ears. The tortoiseshell doe hopped back into the room a few moments later. Holding up a clear vial, which at first seemed empty, she put it up to a small window that had bright sunlight flowing through it like water. Now it seemed to be filled with a soft yellow substance.

"There you are, the nectar. Now, are you trading or buying?" Fleur asked.

"Trading," she answered politely. She opened the flap of her pouch to reveal the raspberries and gestured towards them with a paw. Fleur nodded and said, "Very well. That will be fourteen berries, please. I worked hard for that little vial – it’s very hard to harvest honeysuckle nect –"


Fleur was interrupted by the sound of two pairs of paws as they scrambled frantically down the burrow and hurriedly to the door. Blaze half expected that the rabbits would knock, but instead the door was thrown open, and there stood Ruby and Stormsong.
**********
Voila! Want to read more, don't you?

UWWG

The Unschoolers Winter Waterpark Gathering. We are going! Crazy, but fun for sure. I just registered yesterday and we are sharing a suite with two local families, one of which is new to the unschooling conference experience. And we will get to see a bunch of people we only see at conferences that were not at Good Vibrations this fall. I am looking forward to hearing John Taylor Gatto speak as well. Anyone else going?

Ice Skating

The local homeschoolers have arranged with one of the skating rinks here in town to have a special season rate during one skate session on Wednesdays. Which means we can go ice skating every week from the end of October till the middle of March for one low price. Which is awesome and fun. Which we love.

Today was no exception. Here are a few videos I grabbed at the last minute, because I was having too much fun either skating, or chatting with friends, or both, to get my camera out! The rink looks pretty deserted, but there were a lot of kids out there before I got the camera.
Here is A showing her mad skills. I said do something and she said watch me go really fast:

This one is E showing her stuff:

And finally, E caught me practicing my spins:

My goal is to spin on one foot by the end of the winter. Considering that I am totally making it up as I go along, it could be a while. But I am making progress, so....

Stel-laaaaa!!!

Meet Stella:

She is a black French Angora rabbit, eight weeks old.

This is how happy we are that she is finally here:

Even the kitty is happy-she thinks she has been given a big snack to catch, if she can only figure out how to get in that cage. This is Stella's home:

Did I mention how happy someone is?

A is soooo excited to have her bunny. And I am so proud of her for all the research and prep she has done to get ready, and for how nonchalantly she handed over the cash to pay for both the bunny and all her set up. I wanted her to have full ownership of this venture, and if she gets it to the money making stage with the fiber and/or with breeding, she gets to own all the profits. Or she gets to learn about how hard it is to make a profit. Either way, it will be a great life learning experience. And in the meantime, we get to pet a soft sweet little bunny and enjoy her no matter what the profits!! Oh, and did I mention the poop? She makes quite a lot of it. It will make my garden very happy. Yay for poop!

Galumpha!

Today we went to see a show at the local historic theater venue, The State Theater. The show was Galumpha, and it was awesome! A and C are working on a Galumpha inspired act for the talent show at the Good Vibrations conference this fall, as I type! Yes, I said C. My sweet unassuming husband has decided it would be cool to do acrobatic stunts with his daughter on stage in front of a room full of unschoolers. Whodathunkit?
Here is sample of the show:


Galumpha - The Blues from AWP on Vimeo.

From the Galumpha website:

Anthropologists have found “galumphing” to be one of the prime talents that characterize higher life forms. Galumphing is the immaculate rambunctiousness and seemingly inexhaustible play-energy apparent in puppies, kittens, children, baby baboons – and also in young communities and civilizations. Galumphing is the seemingly useless elaboration and ornamentation of activity. It is profligate, excessive, exaggerated, and uneconomical. We galumph when we hop instead of walk, when we take the scenic route instead of the efficient one, when we play a game whose rules demand a limitation of our powers, when we are interested in means rather than in ends. We voluntarily create obstacles in our path and then enjoy overcoming them. In the higher animals and in people, it is of supreme evolutionary value. --Excerpt from "Free Play – Improvisation in Life and Art," by Stephen Nachmanovitch, pp. 43 – 44, used with author’s permission.

Sounds like unschooling to me! I have always been the type to jump up on a wall to walk, instead of staying on the ground, or ride across the parking lot on my cart full of groceries. I like to galumph! How about you?

Bunnies!

If this isn't the cutest thing you have ever seen, you must be blind!

Today we went to meet with a local lady who raises Angora rabbits. She had this litter of French Angoras available in a few weeks. A has been thinking about getting into the rabbits-for-fiber scene as her cottage industry, so when I saw the listing on Craigslist, I had to look into it. She was so excited when Charlotte emailed back and invited us to come meet the babies and to learn all about rabbit keeping. I knew as soon as I saw them, and Charlotte told me she was the only person who raises Angoras locally, that we would be getting one. Not that the girls would have let me say no! The only problem now is which color...

A is partial to this one, called a Smoke Pearl. The color will lighten up as she grows older.

E held this one, a Ruby Eyed White, but she voted for one of the black ones. Well, it will be A's deal, so she gets to choose, but we will see what we can do to get E on board with A's choice. A has already promised that she could hold the bunny and help her groom it.

Even I could not resist the adorable softness of an Angora bunny!

Charlotte was so nice and helpful. She showed us her spinning wheel and gave the girls a demonstration. A enjoyed trying her hand at the carding machine, although with one running about 200 bucks, she will have to make do with a couple of regular hand carders! She left very excited about Angora bunnies and confident in her ability to learn to spin. Charlotte even gave the girls a hunk of fiber to take home. It is soooo soft and silky. We also got a chance to say hello to her sheep and ducks. All around good day!

I Have No Excuse

My new laptop computer now has all my files and pictures on it, I have my photo editing software installed, and there is nary a box in sight that needs to be unpacked (never mind the ones I can't see right now!). I no longer have an excuse not to blog. I have gotten several bonks on the head from the universe lately to get blogging, already! The nicest was from a friend from Vegas who said I was inspiring. I was also told that people were waiting for me to start blogging about "what to do" after all my information posts. Yikes! Didn't you know I was empowering you with information to find your own solutions, should you choose to educate yourself further?!? Okay, okay, I'll share more of my plans, but don't quote me on whether they are the "right approach" to the world's ills.

I have months of pictures I took with the intention to blog about them in my computer, waiting for someday... I'll get to those, probably posting them with the date stamp of when they were taken. If you are on a feed, you will get them, even if they are buried back in the posts from June, but if you read from the site, I'll try to link to any new "old" posts in a fresh one at the top.

I have toyed with the idea to post daily. Don't hold your breath, but maybe I will find a rhythm that works for that in the coming weeks. I have always been drawn to the idea of "morning pages" from Julia Cameron's The Artists' Way, where you write stream of conscious type stuff every day, three pages worth, to clear out your mind to stimulate creativity. I fear, for your sake, that that is the best way to get me blogging daily - to give myself permission to spew. It could be interesting! Ha. Seriously, I have talked about being more Real on here. Maybe I can find a way to share without total TMI, on a daily basis, and we will both benefit. I'll learn to lighten up the Perfectionist and boost my creativity, and you will get more insight into our lives.

I have to let go of my fear of offending people with my opinions. If you read something here that runs counter to what you believe, c'est la vie! It is just my opinion, based hopefully on facts and my experience, but it does not mean anything about you. I'll still love you if you disagree with me. I am finding it hard not to share all that I have been thinking about these past few months. The internal censor must go, or least be reduced to a civilized size. I'll allow it to remind me not to swear, but I can't keep stifling "who I am", you know?

Okay, let this be the start of something new...

This is what you do when you get a lot of snow. At the end, I was cut off saying "Our own luge run, not quite finished yet". Wait till you see it at the end of the winter! Call it our snow engineering unit. ;-)

The Farm

We belong to a great CSA farm that has U-pick opportunities built into our membership. So, the girls and I went out to the farm to get our share of strawberries, and then some. We made a full day of it and had lots of fun.

Here are the girls on the wagon ride over to the strawberry field.

E with some of the scrumptious berries. We picked a total of 6 quarts, and ate probably a quart between us. Ok, not really, but we did sample!

After we got back and paid for our berries, we stashed them in the van and went to explore the farm. First, we said hello to the animals.

These were the cutest bunnies, eva'! It was very hard not to steal one and take it home.

Then we played on the rope swings.

And jumped on the awesome Pumpkin Pillow. The other kids were there for a school field trip. When they all left, it was soooo quiet and peaceful.

E had to hop up on the lovely cow statue for a photo op.

Here, A is sorting out her gemstones that she panned for in the sluice. The girls each got quite a haul from the one little bag we bought. Not to mention the fun it was to see what the water revealed!

It was a good day on the farm and we look forward to going back soon! We are also looking forward when our first box of goodies from the farm is delivered!

Pictures and Words

And now for something completely different....

We have a great maple tree in our front yard that is fairly easy to climb, so the girls do.

I found some rope in the basement left by the owners or a previous tenant and decided we needed a rope swing.

A is helping to make a batch of strawberry jam by squashing the berries we got from the farmers market.

E helped by stirring the cooking jam. She looks a little apprehensive, don't you think?

One weekend we went to an arts festival in the next town over. There was a community mural that the girls and I put our mark on.

Despite E being done before the rest of us, we had a good time looking at all the art for sale and even bought some for our home.

The girls came home very inspired and painted for two days straight until I ran out of canvases!

This last one requires a story. One night there was a heavy rainstorm. Water was getting into our basement under two doors and even down our electric line. Then the power went out at 1am. That meant we no longer had to worry about the water on the power lines, but now we had to worry about water filling up our basement. C stayed up to bail out the cistern since the sump pump couldn't run with no electricity. He got me up, not that I could sleep worrying about water damaging our stuff in the basement, at 3am and I helped with the water bailing efforts until the power came back on at 6am. C immediately left to go buy a generator at Home Depot! This is a picture of A trying to get it started for a test run the next day.

The First Haul

Happy May Day!! Today was the opening of the local farmers market. It was sparsely attended both by the farmers and the customers because of a little rain, but that did not deter us. We grabbed the umbrella and put our hoods up and walked the two blocks to the market. And here is our first bounty of the year! Not bad for May 1st. Those asparagus look soooo fresh. I am eager to cook some up for dinner. And the strawberries are going to taste so yummy in a shortcake for dessert. It was nice to see some produce make it through the winter for us - the apples and sweet potatoes were grown last season. All the farms are within 125 miles from the markets in Fairfax county. I did not bother with asking for growing methods this time as getting truly local produce is my main priority, but I will find the ones that practice organic or as close as possible in the coming weeks. We just stopped by each booth and got a little something from each one.

I am going to try really hard to feed us from the market and the CSA we joined this year. And what little we manage to grow ourselves this year. I figure the balance will shift towards self sufficiency as we get better at doing it ourselves, but for now I am grateful for local produce! I am told there will be pasture-raised meat and eggs and dairy soon, as well. Hooray!!

p.s. Don't forget the book offer!

Vermi...what?!?

Vermiculture or vermicompost. Worm composting, that is. We began our adventures in turning food scraps into rich compost for the garden today with the arrival of 2lbs of redworms. I have been wanting to do this for a long, long time, so this was pretty exciting for me. The girls came to watch them go into their new home, and cooed over how cute they were, but other than that, they are not too jazzed to have a box of worms in the basement. I guess the thought of all that organic waste avoiding the landfill and the free fertilizer and soil builder for our garden does not float their boat like it does mine! For those interested in the details, read on!

That's the box I concocted from a crate left from the move and some scrap wood that was in the basement. I got a book from the library, Worms Eat My Garbage by Mary Appelhof to work out the details of size and proper bedding and how many and what kind of worms to get to eat the garbage we make each week. I think I shall have to buy myself a copy as it was very informative. Once I had the basics worked out, I placed an order online for the worms. I got them here as they seemed to have a good price. There are a ton of places online you could get worms, just look around.

When the worms got here today, a day earlier than I expected, I rushed to tear up some newsprint paper and wet it down for their bedding. Along with a few scoops of soil from the garden, and the latest contents of the compost bucket, we settled them into their new home. I set up a light to shine on them to keep them from escaping the box. After a few hours, I checked them and had to rescue a bunch that had crawled out. Here is a little guy heading for the door:

I'm told they will settle down and stay in the box in a day or so. I can't wait to see how this all works out. I'm looking forward to the first batch of vermicompost, in a couple months. Maybe by that time, the girls will be as fond of the idea of worms eating our garbage as I am!

Let Freedom Reign!

Tomorrow, we are going into Washington DC to lend our presence and voices to the cause of freedom. Anyone want to join us? Click the button above for details.