Green Parent Weekend

Another fabulous family weekend, sharing and chatting and crafting and madness and mess and mayhem and fun.  :)




This photo of Leni may just be my favorite of the whole weekend.  Gorgeousness!

Our walk in the spectacular Forest of Dean...  Nothiug like wandering in the woods at this time of year!  Rowan kept shouting "Totoyo" [Totoro] she is a funny baby.





I think I just have to let these pictures speak for themselves.  *giggle*









Rowan demanded her waterproof suit off because she was too hot, and then turned around to run to me because a car was coming along the road (she freaks out at cars nearby even though she was already well out of the way) and fell face first into the biggest puddle.  Being the supportive loving mummy that I am, I took pictures of her unhappy stickiness before cleaning her off and changing her into dry clothes.

I was a bit tired and snappy this weekjend really, poor DH got the brunt of it, but all I can say is thank goodness I got to have a tired snappy weekend somewhere the children could roam freely and nobody expected anything of me.  It's a blessing to have friends I can relax around so thoroughly, and I never want to come home from these meets - but alas I think if it was more than a weekend I would have to persuade the children that sleep is their friend.  Ours were very nearly the last people in bed both evenings. ;)

One last dance around the hall while the grown-ups got ready to go home...

And a detour on the way home allowed us to drop in on more lovely friends, and meet their not-so-new beautiful daughter Cerys.  :)

Bits and Pieces

While I'm finishing sorting clothes, herding children, and trying to leave the living room in a reasonable state when we head out later, I thought I'd share these little bits of randomness. :)
A little Derby-made antique glass bottle found in a frankly insane but gorgeous shop in Wirksworth. I was very glad I hadn't taken the children in, because how could I possibly resist touching *everything* - beautiful objects stacked all higgeldy piggeldy so that in order to reach a sweet little jug I wanted to get as a wedding present I had to lean on a very expensive table stacked with glassware, and reach around a stack of paintings! Love it!

Oh how I love the ability of a charity shop to meet my exact need. This book is INCREDIBLE, offbeat, quirky, arty, lively, and above all loving. You can find out more (and get some free resources) here at Planet Sark. And her online Journal.  I didn't know I was looking for this book until I found it, and my heart is overflowing.

Well, OK, jumping on the bandwagon a little, an improvised owl hat.  Well why not?  And another baby gift also, this, a version of the Scattered Mama hat from Ravelry.  Now...  What project to pick up next?  I'm finishing sewing some embellishments on a plain sling today, but my hands are itching to pick up the crochet and knitting again too...

Paper and Crayon

Must be the weather, but we are using lots of paper around here. :) Recycled, scrap paper, good quality art paper(s), notebooks, it's everywhere right now.

Jenna: Can I have some adding up please mumma?
Me: What kind of adding up?
Jenna: On paper, for me to work out, with just the numbers. I can do taking away too.
Me: Um, OK sweetie. I'll write you some questions.

I am still taking the approach of not marking her work. I find it interesting to note that she doesn't make the same mistake over and over, and that often if she decides to check her answers (or ask me the answer) she can see where she has gone wrong (if at all). I don't tell her how to work something out unless she asks, and my first answer is always, "How do you think you could do it?" I don't direct her to answer them in order, or answer ALL of the questions, or tackle puzzles in a particular way. I also don't refuse to tell her the answer if she asks because she hasn't managed it.

She did all of those unaided, and even realised the one that she had made a mistake with (because "I was just thinking and thinking four is between five and three" she said). She often uses her fingers to count on (without being shown to do this), and sometimes jumps to an instinctive answer to a difficult question that is right first time, unable to say how she knew. I think she is one who is drawn to the academic and to knowing things or doing things for the sake of the learning itself rather than seeing a useful end. It's rather fun watching such determination and creativity in action!

A poster of "a caterpillar and some patterns".

Love the interesting perpective in this garden with a pond. The blue on the tree and the ground is frost. *grins*

And another angle on "a house on a hill with a waterfall".

Sometimes her work is really filled with symbols and I can see where she has borrowed ideas and images from - sometimes there is something SO like an image in a picture book or a program - and sometimes I am at a loss how they learn this language of images. The house in that picture, archetypal simple lines, nobody taught it but it is borrowed pictoral shorthand. Sometimes the intuition makes me startle - a child who has never eaten cheese with holes in points to a picture in a book and says, "cheese" (Jenna aged 18 months).

"I'm going to make a Cat-in-the-Hat book, but I need you to make me some words..."

An assortment of coin rubbings and colour. She used to draw outlines only, and has recently decided that she likes to fill the whole page with colour instead. I am loving the bright rainbow stacks of pictures all over the house.

A Meeting (From my Weekend)

How many friends do you get to meet, for the first time ever, in their wedding dress, wearing jewellery you made for them? Let's put that down to another unique and perfect experience afforded by the amazing community of women on the internet who have befriended and supported me, and generously given of themselves. It was an honour to be there in love and support, for you, precious friend!





My children wore themselves out. And got wonderfully sticky. And slept all the long drive home.

Weekend Wanderings

The gorgeous Wollaton Hall, in deer rutting season no less.






We had a large group of young males run up and stand around literally metres from us, so close that I had the children back off although these are the more shy fallow deer (not the big boistrous reds)!



The children made boats from bits of bark, leaves, and so on.










After looking around the natural history collections at the hall (again) we headed home with a handful of chestnuts and a bag full of leaves!

Book Sharing Monday: Little Blue and Little Yellow

When little blue and little yellow hug, they turn green. A quirky fun bright simple book that all three of mine equally love. :) Obviously this one always inspires some crafting!


Well, it has been a while for book sharing! And after a lovely bookish Monday I thought it was about the right time of year to bring back the tradition. :)

Light and Dark

On the brink of winter, the perfect time to remember that the world is not dying only cycling through its anual change of light and dark, fullness and barenness, activity and stillness.  The light is never gone from the world, only buried deep down inside until the spring.  The tree withdraws itself from the frosts, until the first leaves are safe to emerge, new and yet the same.

How do we carry our own spark?  Do we let ourselves show, brave and fearless?  Do other people get to see us as we really are or are we always wearing masks, hiding our truths and the light of love in us, afraid to be vulnerable, afraid to be wrong or afraid to be rejected?

We learn the lessons of the season, over and over, and as the wheel turns it has always more lessons to bring.  We humans are cyclic too, and so atuned to the experience of living in a cyclic world.  It is a trick, day by day, balancing the rhythms and compromises of living together, in this beautiful world, seeking the grace and the goodness and the sweetness in the here and now. 

This is the dance of our days.