The Children of the Royal Wedding

Here's more about the children in the wedding, including my favorite, little Grace, who clapped her hands over her ears when the planes flew over the palace. Such a cutey.

I love that one of the children is the child of his former nanny, and another the son of his secretary.

Growl

Headache.
Overslept after a rough night.
Pip is at work, Jenny and the FYG are at a self defense class.
The FYB is mowing Shasta's lawn.
Blynken, Nod, and the Cherub are here with me. Alone.
Poltergeist opened top kitchen cupboard and shot out a couple glass casserole dishes, shattering them, leaving shards of glass from one end of the room to the other OR said glass pans were precariously placed in the cupboard by one of the kids. You decide.

Last time their mother called and asked if they could come over and we said only if they were not sick because we go see Strider on Sundays. She assured me they were not sick. I said, "No runny noses?" She said no, not at all. Dropped the boys off and scampered, which surprised me as she usually lingers for hours. Nod had a runny nose. We coped by having the kids take turns playing outside with the boys so they didn't get Striderling sick.

This time? She told one of my girls he has asthma and is on medication for his asthma. When she dropped them off, we learned he has bronchitis & is on an antibiotic for a viral lung infection. You don't get an antibiotic for asthma. Fortunately for the boys, the HM has other commitments and can't go see the Striderling tomorrow and so he will be keeping the boys with him. But we're going to have to have a talk in which I am afraid I am going to have to use the liar word. As in, "I have never called you on the lies you tell me because they don't matter to me and they don't change the way I would do things anyway. Apparently, this has misled you into thinking I am incredibly stupid and easy to fool. But actually, I do know the difference between asthma and bronchitis, and I do know what an antibiotic is for and I do know what a runny nose looks like and that Nod did not develop one in the 20 miles between your house and mine. I am not letting you put my grandson back in the hospital. Do not drop sick children off here again. If you try it, they will just end up getting right back in the car with you."

This lie matters. And that's more than I should say about that.

In one hour this morning have had 16 arguments with Nod, all ending with me saying, "Stop talking. We are not arguing about this anymore." Am really thinking, "I am bigger than you so I win."

Argument number 32 and 33-
Nod: you can tickle somebody to death.
Me: I don't think so.
Nod: Yes, you can.
Me: I don't think so.
Nod: You can, but it would be a miracle.
Me: No, it wouldn't.
Nod: It certainly would be a miracle.
Me: Miracles are good things.
Nod:I know that. But you can tickle somebody to death and that would be a miracle.
Me: Being tickled to death is a bad thing. So it would not be a miracle.
Nod:
Nod:
Nod: I can eat my foot.

Yeah. I'm a sweetheart this morning.

Yeah, World, I'm snarling at *you.*

Updated to add:

The Equuschick reminds me that a sense of humour is a remedy for temper, and asks if we lose our sense of humour temporarily and that makes for bad temper, or is it the other way around? She also suggests a pair of funny underwear. I'm assuming these are to be applied to the head, but she didn't specify. In lieu of any funny underwear, I give you Danny Kaye:



I feel better.

Plus, the boys are down for quiet time.

American Home Magazine, 1943

Kitchens, redecorating, gardening- fun stuff.

The cover is not quite so vibrant as this picture makes it appear- my flash kind of cleaned it up a bit. It is pretty, though:

I really liked this idea for making a vertical garden:

click on the picture to enlarge. It looks like this would work next to a garage, and even on a deck.
This section on kitchens is cute:

Right now this and several other vintage mags of the same era are on the trunk that serves as my coffee table.
And since that trunk is the one my grandmother took with her to college back in the 20s, and the magazines belonged to her mother, it strikes me that these same magazines and trunk may well have 'seen' each other sometime before.



Linked at Smockity Frocks gardening tips

Royal Wedding: Hats

The FYG actually spent the night at Granny Tea's and got up at 4:00 a.m. to watch the Royal Wedding. She didn't watch it all, because there were so many hours of coverage.

She loved the hats- even the ones she didn't really love. She sent me this link, saying the first one (on the right) shocked her. "It's not a hat at all!" She pronounced indignantly. It is more like a squiggle in the air, isn't it?

She treated me to a running fashion commentary on the hats as we looked through the pictures together. I wish I could have recorded it, the FYG can be so droll.

She is delighted to learn that Royals do not get married in sleeveless, strapless gowns, and appreciated the classic design of Princess Kate's dress. I appreciate the restraint in her train- it's only around 8 feet long. Lady Diana's was, what? 20 feet or something like that?

She loves the little bridesmaids and pages- I watched some footage later of the group on the balcony, and they are adorable. I particularly felt for the small miss who clapped her hands to her ears and squinted fearfully when the planes flew overhead, while everybody else was smiling happily (and the newlyweds sneaked in another kiss). You can see the small miss with her hands on her ears here.

After looking at the pictures of hats at the link above, you should watch the video here.

Old Curiosity Shop

I like symmetry, so I was delighted when two primitive wooden bowls showed up at the Rattery:

I found these brightly colored wooden dominoes a few years ago at a thrift shop.  Children have played with them, sorting colors, matching number patterns, adding dots on a domino, just making domino trains to knock down. 
I dumped the bag into one of the wooden bowls this week, and it's been fascinating to see how many people stop to run their fingers through them, to pick up a few and examine them.

I love symmetry.  But this isn't quite symmetrical, is it?
Now I need to find something of equal interest to put in the other bowl.  I have an old wooden block set to build the old city of Jerusalem.  I have some sea shells.  I have a number of wooden thread spoons of various sizes.  I have some vintage wooden alphabet blocks. 

I'll probably try each one out for a week or so and see how I feel about it.

"God Almighty first planted a garden...

...And indeed, it is the purest of human pleasures." ~ Francis Bacon

I don't know if it's the purest (snuggling a baby is pretty good too ;), but this year I'm relishing the bit of it that I'm doing.

Last month I finally began to move out of the funk, exhaustion, and residual stress left from the Striderling's long hospitalization (for newer readers to the blog: our newborn son spent his first six weeks in two hospitals and was diagnosed with a rare genetic syndrome that causes breathing and eating difficulties now with the potential of renal decline later). The days were dark, literally and metaphorically. I've never been a fan of January and February... they're dark, cold, bitter, inhospitable, ugly... and did I mention I don't much care for them?

In March, things began to get better. The sun came out a bit more, for one. And I got confident enough with the Striderling's tube feedings that I actually managed to read while feeding him. This was a joyous achievement. The first book I read was Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life... and there couldn't have been a more serendipitous time for reading it. This is a book full of fresh air, green growing things, delicious comestables, and optimism and delight about the quieter things in life.

Kingsolver and her family, for some of that quieter life, decided to move from Arizona to the Appalachian area of the country and spend a year eating only off their land or from local producers. This book is about that experience and how their experiment went. Before getting on to the things I liked about this book and the way it helped inspire and motivate me, I'd like to get the critical comments out of the way.

I did not like Kingsolver's occasionally preachy tone... especially when she was inconsistent in her lectures. We are told what a terrible thing it is that fossil fuels are used to transport produce across the country and how bad that is for our health (global warming and all that), but then she spends quite a while defending tobacco farmers because they have to make a living for their families. Uhm. Last I checked, tobacco was guaranteed to be bad for you and I'm also not certain why the farmers are more deserving of income than truck drivers. It's also a non-food crop that easily depletes soil of its nutrients, making it even harder to understand why it is defended by someone who is all about sustainable planting and healthy eating.
Sooo, yes, she can be a bit lecturesome about their stands; some times she acknowledges this, other times she seems to be unaware that all of her views are great for someone with the income she has (which she's rightfully earned! I do not begrudge her the income) but can be a stretch for families who scramble and carefully work to afford living in *one* place, let alone being able to own homes in two states or fly off to Italy (consuming fossil fuels again ;-) for an anniversary trip.

None of these criticisms should keep you from reading this treasure of a book, though. Any negatives are far, far outweighed by the excellent things Kingsolver offers in this book. She is one of the best writers of our time, for one; her prose is warm and captivating, the type of writing that shows the enchantment of the ordinary.

Her main points in this book are also ones that Americans need to stop and consider. We have let ourselves fall prey to the machinations of big agricultural corporations, of relentless advertising, and to our own appetites. We aren't attuned to the natural seasonal cycle of foods or how they make their way into the world, pushing up through the soil, soaking up the sunshine, displaying their beauty as they mature, fighting weeds, and finally giving forth their fruit. We ignore the possibilities of locally grown produce whilst grabbing whatever sounds good at our grocery store; depriving ourselves of better food and our community of more dollars. We try to sustain ourselves on whatever processed food is shoved our direction, never realizing the joys of simple meals (ever had a tomato with toasted mozzarella and fresh basil on it for lunch? It's goooood).

There IS a better way, and Kingsolver shows it (well, with the help of her husband and oldest daughter, who also contribute well written and pertinent essays to this book). Growing food is not impossible. Visiting a farmers' market is a worthwhile and enjoyable endeavor. And if we all tried just a tiny bit of it, Kingsolver contends, we'd be hooked on it, healthier, and happier.

I think she's right. And, getting back to what I said about reading it in March, I couldn't have read it at a more perfect time. Last year I considered gardening but was one of those pregnant women that threw up immediately if I got too warm (sorry if it's tmi...sometimes the truth is just that). My mother-in-law planted a garden and my help consisted of grating and freezing zucchini after it was harvested. I told myself that this year I'd actually get into growing things. Then the Striderling's health issues hit and I found myself thinking that there was no way I could do things with a garden this year either.

That was before I came to my senses. As I read this book, I relished the happy descriptions of fresh, local produce. I resolved to go to the farmers' market this year (we have a large and well established one). I also realized that if I kept putting off growing things because of busyness/health issues/not feeling well, I was *never* going to grow anything. So in cold, dreary March I resolved to try for at least some growing things in the warm, green spring and summer. Kingsolver might lecture at points, but mostly she just encourages... and her encouragement cheered me on.

Now we're almost done with April and I'm further cheered by my own efforts. I'm container gardening on our apartment deck and my prospects look good at present. I've got peppers and tomato plants I got already started from a local greenhouse; I've got tiny tomato seedlings from seeds I planted; I've got lettuce sprouting from seeds; the parsley seeds I planted just sprouted yesterday; my basil is doing quite well. I definitely planted my tomatoes and peppers a bit too early for our colder northern clime (especially cold and wet this year, it seems) so they are requiring a bit of coddling, but the coddling seems to be paying off and I have earnest hopes of getting to eat fresh veggies later this summer.

It's invigorating and refreshing, too, to tend these plants. I place the Striderling in a Moses type basket outside on the deck while I check on the plants, water them, gaze at them in rather idiotic delight. We both soak up the sunshine, birdcalls, and springtime aromas. Then he usually naps and I get a chance to read a bit more. It's good.

No, wait... it's very good... and I'm thankful for Kingsolver's book and the way it's helped me reach out into the world of sunshine, hope, and growing things again.

Sideways Tornado Footage

Here.

It's pretty terrifying, and there's some language muttered under the breath by the amateur filmer.

The huge tornado may have carved a path from downtown Tuscaloosa to downtown Birmingham, about 60 miles (97 kilometers) apart. The tornado appears to be a mile wide and seemed to be on the ground for more than two hours.

Our thoughts and prayers with those in the tornado blasted areas- and those with friends and family there as well.

Gleanings from Benedict's Rule of Order, adjusted for family use

Thoughts and goals mother does well to bear in mind:

Pursue temperance in my food, beverages, and entertainment.

Recognize that laziness is a character flaw and a sin, not a charming way to excuse sloth.

Practice the spiritual discipline of fasting.

The world's ways are not my standard.

Hold eternity in my heart and recognize choices today may have eternal consequences.

Know that none of us are guaranteed tomorrow.  Make the most of the time I have.

Be diligent to keep constant guard over the actions of my life.
I want to guard my tongue against evil and depraved speech.  Towards that end, seek to think before I speak, not to love much talking, not to speak useless words or words that move to laughter at inappropriate times.

Obey in all things the commands of God.

Love not the praise of others- strive not to wish to be called holy before one is holy; but first to be holy, that one may be truly so called.

Love chastity.

Hate no one.

Pursue a generosity of spirit that rejoices with those who rejoice; strive not to be jealous, not to harbor envy.

Do not love contention.

Beware of haughtiness.

Respect the seniors and teach this to my children.

Love the juniors, and teach this to my children.

Pray for one's enemies in the love of Christ.

Make peace with those with whom I have had conflicts before the sun sets

This is a huge order, isn't it?  I fail at some of these daily.  But I do better when I realize that these are outpourings of time spent at the feet of the Savior, they are part of the 'fruit of the Spirit,' and fruit is the natural outcome of a well watered and fertilized plant.

Spend more time at the source, with the Master Gardener, and He tends to take care of the fruit.




You may enjoy other posts that adapt the Rule of St. Benedict for family use (we love this rule, and we are not Catholic!)- just click the label 'Benedict's Rule of Order for Families.'

Having People Over

Hospitality- My parents always cooked enough extra on Sunday to have somebody over for Sunday lunch. I used to try to do that, too. That way, anytime there was a visitor to church, we invited them home. They didn't usually accept, but the offer was open. We don't do that now because we don't come home after church Sunday afternoons.

We often have people over for singing hymns, for playing games, just to visit. WE don't have to have a special occasion. We just ask, "We'd like to have you over for dinner __ ___ night. Is that a good time for you? IT's nothing formal, we just thought it would be fun to get together." We don't serve fancy meals, we don't set the table with the white cloth and fine china- we just have a family meal and visit together. Sometimes we even just use paper plates. It helps if you think of things to talk to them about before they arrive to keep the conversation going if needed.

We invite people over from church, dh has invited people home from work, I've invited ladies in the homeschool group over to talk about homeschooling or budget cooking, and our daughter has a history of
inviting home one of her classmates from college.

I've had people over for lunch, for coffee and dessert, for popcorn and a movie or popcorn and a game. We have had families we met over the internet into our home. We have also taken food to people- cooked muffins or single serve meals and brought them to older people at church; we've had more than one family live with us while they were in between homes and jobs. I've had hsing families over (one at a time) for a picnic lunch, and I've had a potluck bar-b-que where everybody brings their own meat and a side dish to share.

We've even invited home somebody who stopped us in the thrift shop for conversation (our headcoverings really have opened up huge doors for discussions with strangers about Christianity)- but I don't recommend this to everyone. It worked for us, but we haven't felt like that was the right thing to do most other times, and I can see why others would not feel safe with this.

If you live near a college or a military base, you can call and ask if anybody there would like to come to your house for a family meal. This is especially nice at holidays. Incidentally, we have done this every year since we got here, and have never been taken up on the offer. If you live near a military base, you would contact the chaplain's office. I forget the contact person for colleges.

There are also foreign exchange programs in many areas. We've kept a couple dozen Japanese students, only one or two girls at a time, for no more than three weeks. This was a wonderful experience for our
girls.

Some people find it easiest (and I did for a while) to just have a regular 'company' meal and keep the ingredients for that in stock. Mother's was potroast, salad, rolls, and texas sheet cake. Mine was Chinese savory beef and rice, or spinach lasagna and garlic bread. Dessert was peach cobbler for a while, no-bake chocolate oatmeal cookies for a while, and now I just make extras of whatever we'd be eating.

My husband has a gift for hospitality, and most of our lives we've had company over more days of the week than we didn't. Since hospitality is my dh's gift, I kind of just had to go along if I wanted to live with him, and I did.

So I mention all these things _not_ to make anybody feel bad- just because I suspect that one of these ideas may appeal more to somebody than the others. Pray about it, and ask God to open your eyes to those opportunities to practice hospitality that He wants you to take. And, of course, be sure your dh is in agreement.

Oh, and if you can get your hands on Karen Burton Mains _Open Heart, Open Home_, please do. It's a terrific resource on hospitality!

Four Moms Q and A

It's the last Thursday of the month, which means that we are having a Question and Answer session!  Don't miss what the other three mamas have to say:

Kimberly at Raising Olives shares her wisdom here.
Kim C at Life in a Shoe sharesher wisdom here
Connie at Smockity Frocks shares her wisdom here.

Q. What is a useful feature for a house to have for a homeschooling family?

A. A place in or near the kitchen where children can work while Mom cooks.  I don't like a separate school room- not even a little bit. It doesn't work for us at all.  But I do like an island in the kitchen, a desk, a breakfast nook, a spare counter with room for them to put their legs under it- something near the kitchen or in the kitchen where they can work, or I can sit and read aloud while they work.=)


Q. So what are you calling that adorable new granddaughter?
A. The Equuschick has spoken and she says she likes Ladybug.  Here's our little Ladybug.
And to the right she's being held by her uncle, our 12 year old son.

Q. How's the Striderling doing?
A. Amazingly well.  He is five months old now, and keep in mind how touch and go it was when he made it to five minutes old, and then five hours, and then five days, and then five weeks.  I had serious doubts we'd bring him home from the hospital, and yet I was holding him yesterday while he babbled and grinned at me, and the doctors are talking about weaning him off of oxygen in May!!!  His speech therapist is working with him on sucking from a bottle and suggesting perhaps he could just go from g-tube to solids.  He needs lots of therapy as there are many physical delays, and his parents have had to be painstakingly diligent about never letting him have the right side of his head against a surface (he came home from the NICU shockingly lopsided because they never turned him there), but he's surpassed all our expectations and keeps doing so.
That's his daddy holding him, btw.



Q. How's the Dread Pirate Grasshopper taking to being a big brother?
He does not like tandem nursing.  He does not like sharing nursing at all.  He does not approve of the new baby any more.  He's pretty unhappy about it all right now, poor dear.

Q. Did you seriously just use a Four Moms to brag about your grandbabies?
A. No Comment.

Q. Have you no shame?

A. No Comment.

Q. How do you use AO with a large family?

A. In my case, AO (AmblesideOnline) never had the years my two oldest girls were needing until after they no longer needed it.  My younger four used AO, my oldest two used whatever I devised, and The Cherub, of course, has done preschool for 20 years.

I did things like having the older children narrate into a tape recorder while I was busy with younger children, or have older children take turns reading or playing with younger children while I worked one on one with another child.  We used some of the books as family read alouds for all of us.  We had younger children just sit in on readers with the older children.  It was easy some years, it was a tricky balance other years.

Keep in mind AO is a framework, not a written in stone schedule.
It is also not an easy curriculum in a box. It's a program that works best with Mom's involvement.  So you use AO with a large family either by being very amazing in your time management skills and having lots of independent reading, or you use AO as a collection of ingredients from which to make your own unique blend.

There are several ways to approach this:
Combine children - the FYG and FYB have always done the same year even though they are 2 1/2 years apart in age. Jenny and Pip were in the same year for a couple years, then I separated them, then I put them back in the same year- I split them because the younger of the two girls read much faster than the older, and there was a kind of competition and subsequent hurt feelings. Neither Jenny nor Pip realized that Pip's speed reading was just a gift, not a sign of innate superiority. We worked on that, they overcame, and then they were back in the same year again. Yes, this means that the FYG will probably graduate high school at year 10 and her brother will still complete the remaining two years- but AO's higher years are extremely challenging and many children have gone on to college after completing only year 10. It's okay.

Balance schedules so that older children are reading their own books while you read to younger ones, and then have younger ones do something independent while you hear the narrations for the older children.

Combine some things so that all the children are listening to the same poetry being read aloud, pick a family read aloud from one of the children's free reading lists.
Have a time line and have a time line period where the children make and put up figures on the time line and share a few words about their figures with the rest of the family. =

Or- and this is something I have long intended to work on-  combine 'matching' years and come up with a new version for a large family-  You can do this because the years do not strictly represent 'grade levels,' a somewhat artificial construct.  You can do something like this:
.

Years 2 and 7 cover roughly the same time period,
History: 1000 A.D. to Middle Ages for year 2, and 800-1485 for year 7- put these two years together, then look through and choose the books you want to do and figure out how you want to do them- older children should be reading independently as much as possible, but pick a couple books to read aloud as a family. Choose your art for picture study and your composer to match the period of history studied..

Years 3 and 8 cover roughly the same time period- 1400-1600, or 1688 in year 8, so, as above, combine the booklists, then look through and see what you can eliminate, what you can do together, what you can assign to older children to read independently- and eliminate some books so that you don't all go crazy.

Years 4 and 9 cover the same time period to within a few decades (1700s to the French and American Revolutions) so, as above, combine the two years in a single document and then look through it to see what can be eliminated, what can be combined, and what will be done separately.

Year 5 covers 1800-1914 up to WWI, while year 10 stops in the early 1900s. You can simply borrow some titles from year 11 to get more WW1 coverage, and work out a schedule as above.

The first term of year 6 can be combined with year 11- both cover the 20th century. You'll need to find more books for younger children with this one.

Ancient history covered in the last two terms of year 6, year 12, and to some degree in year 1

Year one is pretty simple and shouldn't take much time each day anyway. It's not strictly chronological, as the children read Island Story up to Edward the Confessor (1066), but also read some 'hero tales' such as William Tell, and biographies of Americans.

You can have younger children do this year and have the older children do another.

When the younger children are reading the Burgess Bird Book, the older children can be studying the habitats of those same birds, studying bird anatomy, using something like Birds (Peterson Field Guide Color-In Books) and  Manual of Ornithology: Avian Structure and Function

When the younger children are reading Aesop's Fables, older children can be using those same fables for writing practice. 

Like that.=)

Q. Thanks. But about that shameless grandbaby shilling....
A. I don't know what you are talking about.

Did you see the one with my husband holding the Striderling? That's the FYG looking over his shoulder:

Any further questions?

The President's Birth Certificate

He finally released it.  CNN has the birth certificate here as a PDF file.
He explains the timing:

Okay, not really.  Because nothing here explains why he didn't release it earlier.  Actually, the question that annoys me more than anything else is why didn't the media express some journalistic curiosity earlier.

Essentially, he says it was and is a distraction and we can't afford this distraction anymore.  What that means is it was to his politician benefit not to release it before, but not so much any more.  And you know what?  That's okay.  He is a politician and politicians play games.  Politically, he did the right thing for him and unlike some political games, it wasn't harmful to the country.  Him, I do not blame for not releasing the long form of his birth certificate.

The media?  Yeah. I blame them.

Updated: Here's a good explanation of why (emphasis added):

When I read in Dan’s post yesterday about how the White House was also releasing the relevant correspondence between Obama’s lawyers and the Hawaii health department regarding the certificate, I said to myself: “Okay, we are finally going to learn that there’s been some bureaucratic complication beneath all this intrigue.” But no: The request for certified copies of the birth certificate was (finally) made last week, on a Friday, in two short letters — including a four-sentence letter signed by the president that obviously took him considerably less time to review than it takes to stretch before teeing off at the first hole. The birth certificate was produced the following business day (Monday) — with the health department expressing hope that its production “will end the numerous inquiries” it had gotten over the years, which “have been disruptive to staff operations and have strained State resources.” And Obama was able to do his dog-and-pony show yesterday morning, only five days after asking the health department to produce the document.

If George W. Bush, Sarah Palin, or even a Republican the media likes (say, John McCain) had taken purposeful steps to block examination of so basic a document, the media would surely have turned such obstinacy into a scandal. The public might not have leapt to extravagant conclusions about whether they’d really been born in Kenya, or on Mars, or wherever. But they’d have thought it was intolerably strange that campaigns were retaining lawyers and amassing affidavits rather than just producing a seemingly innocuous, readily producible document. The story would never have been about the people asking for the birth certificate; it would have been about the candidate who was moving heaven and earth to prevent people from seeing it.

And let’s not ignore that Obama did move heaven and earth. This is not just a matter of him thumbing his nose at a fringe collection of nutty “birthers.” There have been several court cases. It is flat out bizarre that one should have to be sued to compel conformance with a routine that millions of Americans comply with every day. Many of these court cases, if not all, could have been short-circuited (indeed, many of the later ones would not have been filed at all) if Obama had just produced the birth certificate. Instead, he not only refused to produce it; he and his campaign paid thousands of dollars in legal fees (in some places it is reported to be well over a million dollars) to fight the lawsuits — and Obama’s lawyers even threatened to seek disciplinary sanctions against lawyers for daring to file the lawsuits. Since Obama has been president, moreover, not just the time of courts and private lawyers has been tied up; government lawyers have had to spend their time — on the public’s dime — on this nonsense.

[,,,]

So, assuming as we should the legitimacy of the long-form birth certificate produced yesterday, the only thing that makes sense is that Obama knows the mainstream media is in his hip pocket. That is, he knew that he would not be held to the same standard as other politicians, and that if he acted in an unreasonable manner by withholding basic, easily available information that any other person seeking the presidency would be expected — be compelled — to produce, the media would portray as weirdos those demanding the information, not Obama and his stonewalling accomplices.

Incidentally, I hope you noticed what the President did immediately have the 'press conference' (where he took no questions) complaining about how this was all such a distraction, the country had far more serious issues that occupied his time, issues that mattered?  He appeared on Oprah (just like the last time he was campaigning) and he went to Democrat fund raisers.

Amazon Stuff

Here are some things we purchased with Amazon bucks from affiliate links and swagbucks this month:

Nomad black paisley boots- this is what the FYG picked out to buy with her birthday money.  However, she bought a used pair for ten dollars, not the forty dollar pair.


This Country of Ours this is what I got myself for my kindle- only I did the Gutenberg download for free.  The Amazon downloads often have useful additional features, hyperlinked chapter titles, better navigation, etc.  But I like free.  Actually, I downloaded a lot of free books to my kindle.

Created for Work- the subtitle is 'practical insights for young men.' Our son actually has an incredible work ethic, but I thought this might be something he'd enjoy reading with his dad after they finish Preparing Your Son for Every Man's Battle, .  They had been reading Douglas Bond's Fathers & Sons Stand Fast in the Way of Truth  I also know another young man who might benefit from it and we'll loan it to him, but I thought it might go down easier if we were also having our son read it.

Temple Grandin, the movie.  This movie was amazing. Claire Dane was incredible.  Temple's story is inspiring, encouraging, uplifting- you should see it if you haven't seen it already.  We did not edit it at all for our family.  When watching it with friends with younger children we muted two words and explained one scene ahead of time (macho dudes smear bull testicles on her windshield- and one of our young guests was a little boy who nearly passed out a couple months back when he witnessed a cow giving birth).
We've shared it with several other people since we first watched it, but we had to rent it each time.  We decided it was better to own it.
You should watch it.  Come on over.  I'll make popcorn.

The Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships: Decoding Social Mysteries Through the Unique Perspectives of Autism
I thought this might be useful for a number of reasons, and I'd like to read more about and by Temple Grandin.  I also want to read her mother's book, A Thorn in My Pocket.

Toad Cottages and Shooting Stars- this is a book for Shasta's mother- it's about fun stuff to do with your grandchildren.  I already bought a copy for the Striderling's grandmother.

Omron HJ-112 Digital Pocket Pedometer this is a Father's Day gift for my husband, and I am gambling he won't have time to read this post.=)

Annie's Naturals Organic Ketchup, 24-Ounce Bottles (Pack of 6)- we were out of ketchup and weren't going to be going into town soon, plus it takes me forever to find corn syrup free, sugar free, not unhealthy ketchup.Yeah, I've heard you can make it.  I'd like to try that sometime.  Do you know how many houseguests we have had over the last two weeks?  Neither do I, actually, but it was a LOT.

We also got it on the subscribe and save program, saving even more money, and I don't have to worry about running out of ketchup.

Nutiva Organic Extra Virgin Coconut Oil, 15-Ounce Tubs,
Also on the subscribe and save program.  I love Nutiva, and this is a better price than my co-op has.  We go through it pretty fast, too- especially when we have a lot of houseguests.

The Grammar of Poetry : Teacher's Edition (Imitation in Writing) We actually have the student edition somewhere- or at least, I did once own it.  but I've wanted to use it with my youngest two for the last three months and can't find it.  I think I must have loaned it out.  I really didn't want to spend the 17.00 on a new one, used versions weren't any less. It's a great book, worth the price, but when I knew I already had purchased it once, I didn't want to do it again.  Then I remembered that the teacher's edition will work with just a little creativity, and I could get it for 5.00.  YES!  I'm very pleased to have figured that out!

The next item we did not buy- I won it free, from Amazon's Vine review program.  It just came today and my son is over the moon over 'new technology,' and I am thinking I need a remedial course is longitude and latitude:

Magellan eXplorist 310 Waterproof Hiking GPS

Pretty sweet!

But it struck me as I was looking over these things- the utter incongruity of buying food, boots, electronic devices, e-books, a movie, a pedometer- all at one store without ever leaving my bed.  It's a very weird age we live in.

What's In Your Bucket?

this is a slightly edited repost

When I was a young mother of two children in diapers an older lady at church shared the bucket parable with me. The basic idea is that as you go through life, you are carrying a full bucket. And sometimes in your day to day life, you get bumped or jostled and this causes you to spill out some of the contents of your bucket, sometimes small spills, sometimes large. Sometimes you'll just get a little splatter on yourself- drops so small and so quickly dried that nobody notices. Sometimes you splatter the contents of your bucket all over yourself and anybody else nearby.

What is it that spills out of your bucket?

It's what you are carrying in your bucket in the first place. Doesn't that seem obvious? But we don't think that way. We tend to blame the circumstances or people that 'jostled' us and made our buckets unsteady, unstable- but nobody else fills my bucket for me- I alone am responsible for the contents. Nobody else fills your bucket, either- you are the only person who decides the content of your bucket. Circumstances or people may trip you up a bit and make you drop the bucket (although even there, I think if we have a strong enough grip on the Father's Hand as we walk through life, it won't be that easy to trip us up) - but you can't spill something that isn't in your bucket in the first place. If you filled your bucket with water, you won't find vinegar sloshing out when you stumble over a rough path.

In the same way, we go through life getting our buckets jostled about by other people and we say, "He makes me so mad," and "I would be a patient mother if you children would just...." and "I never would have been so rude if she hadn't...."

But other people don't fill our buckets. They just bump us around and jostle us, as we do them. We can only spill out what we already have inside our buckets. If all you have in your bucket is the milk of human kindness, vitriol is not what you should see splashing out when you're crossing over a bumpy place.

If we fill our buckets with the milk of human kindness, we won't find that the vinegar of spite or the hot sauce of rage is what sloshes out of that bucket when we go over the rough spots of life. If we fill our buckets from the source or Living Water, we shouldn't be finding that they splash speech that tears down instead of building up on others when we stumble through a rough patch.

It's easy to only show the best bucket contents to people we like and to people who pretty much give us our own way. They don't bump us about and we don't spill our buckets on them. We think that smooth sailing is somehow due to some virtue in our own character, when, in fact, we just aren't being challenged.

Contrariwise, it's easy to perceive the people we don't like through a lens designed to show them in their worst light, and then blame them for the nastiness that spills out of our buckets when we are around them. But those who rub us the wrong way are the very people who can do the most to teach us how to turn the sour lemon juice into sweet, refreshing lemonade. If we look at it the right way, they show us just where the weak spots in our buckets need patching up. Being irritated by somebody may just be the best opportunity to practice careful and judicious bucket mending and carrying, and to examine what it is we've put in our buckets in the first place- because, again, nobody can 'make' you spill something out of your bucket that wasn't there in the first place.

Your mouth speaks out of the overflow of the heart. Luke 6:45

The things that come out of the mouth come out of the heart. Matthew 15:18

What did you spill the last time your bucket got bumped around? Is that really what you want to keep carrying in your bucket?

Guard it at its source. Proverbs 4:23

There are an awful lot of holes in my bucket and I am not fully satisfied with what splashes out of it on every occasion. How about you?

Carnival of Homeschooling

It's up over at Corn and Oil.


I particularly enjoyed The Visiting Professor:

He began to describe Swedish culture by sharing that the women in Sweden are emancipated because they all work. I began biting my tongue. He went on to explain that the government of Sweden provides day care, preschool, and public schools free of charge. He did admit however that the 50% tax burden on every worker made it impossible for a woman to do anything other than work since no one can survive on one salary. This is where I released my tongue and gently explained that from my perspective being forced into the workplace by excessive taxes was not my idea of emancipation. I told Klaus that I had stayed home to care for my children and my two daughters were staying home to raise their children. And then I dropped the bomb.

Click through to read the rest.

Mama Squirrel is always a good read.  She is one of the most brilliant women I know.

There are a lot of good reads- and where else can you find links to great posts by fellow homeschoolers  about owls, deisel trucks, brick walls, special needs, college, controversies in the hsing community, ancient Ugarit, math, philosophy, and coping when going through crises all in one place?

Vaccines and Autism In The News Yet Again

http://www.cafemom.com/group/99198/forums/read/13862205/AUTISM_AND_VACCINES_RESEARCHER_FOR_CDC_INDICTED_FOR_FRAUD_AND_MONEY_LAUNDERING


http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/vaccine-autism-researcher-indicted-for-fraud-120224134.html


http://sanevax.org/blog/?p=2171

Those are the best of the links I could find. It's difficult to track down well referenced details- what seems undeniable is that he was guilty of stealing over a million dollars from the CDC, using money intended for research to himself a beach house, a motor cycle, and other goodies. Some pro-vaccine sites say that's bad, but it doesn't mean his research is bad. However, it also seems that one of the ways he 'proved' there was no link to autism and vaccines is by changing the method used to count autism cases without accounting for that in his research, hiding it, in fact (if you follow climate-gate at all, it's very much like the 'hide the decline' scandal. If you don't, never mind).

As best as I can make out, the anti-fax sites say that in compiling his statistics for autism rates, the 'Danish Studies' made it appear that autism cases went up after thermiserol was removed from vaccines, thus 'proving' that there really could not be any correlation- but he did this by essentially switched to using a different data base as a source for his numbers starting the year the mercury was removed from vaccines- but did *not* make that clear in his research or acknowledge that this new method of counting resulted in a paper that counted autism cases one way up until a particular year, and a different way after that year without acknowledging the difference. If this is true, this is, at best, really poor scientific practice, but more likely scientific fraud and ought to result in all papers relying on his research being withdrawn from publication. However, that's a big if.

From the third link above:

The 2003 Danish Study in question was skewed with manipulated data to such an extent that its legitimacy in the overall autism/vaccine debate can no longer be considered valid. Essentially what Thorsen did was to double Autism levels by covertly adding  Outclinic Registries  – where 93% of autism cases are reported. Denmark removed Thimerosal from vaccines in 1992; therefore by suddenly opening the floodgates on reported cases of autism the actual numbers tracked within the framework of the study increased considerably based on this unique method of census taking.

However, according to this link, Thosen's role in those papers was minor, and he did not have the level of influence. However, that article does not really address the specific allegations.  I'm not sure it really matters how minor his role was, though.  There seem to be some legitimate issues with using the Danish studies as a basis for vaccination practices in the United States.

Joel Lord writes (in an admittedly, um, passionately anti-vax article:
The 2003 Danish Study in question was sqeuwed with manipulated data to such an extent that its legitimacy in the overall autism/vaccine debate can no longer be considered valid.

Essentially what Thorsen did was to double Autism levels by covertly adding Outclinic Registries – where 93% of autism cases are reported. Denmark removed Thimerosal from vaccines in 1992; therefore by suddenly opening the floodgates on reported cases of autism the actual numbers tracked within the framework of the study increased considerably based on this unique method of census taking.

The entire Industry fueled justification for vaccine uptake depends 100% on this data to verify its conclusions as the penultimate truth; discounting any ‘autism-mercury in vaccines’ relationship (limiting claims for compensation from vaccine related trauma/resulting autism in vaccine court) while further justifying the use of Thimerosal in vaccines.

He then goes on to say:

‘As a SafeMinds critique of the study noted, “Therefore, their purported increase after 1994 can be explained entirely by the registration of an existing autism population that did not require hospitalization.” To compound the problem, Denmark also changed the diagnostic code they used, to the more universal ICD10 code, beginning in 1993, which would have further raised the rates. Danish children receive 75% less Thimerosal than American children, they receive immunizations when they are older, and the U.S. autism rate is TEN TIMES the rate of Denmark (Denmark is 1 in 1,600, U.S. is 1 in 166).

It is the equivalent of doing a study on “Divorce Rates in North America” and counting Mexico and Canada only for the first few years, then adding in the United States, and noting that divorce rates went up.’

That article has several links worth pursuing, and one question in my mind is, if Thorsen was such a minor, insignificant figure in the vaccine research industry, then why was the CDC paying him so much money?

According to United States Attorney Yates, the charges and other information presented in court: In the 1990s, THORSEN worked as a visiting scientist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Division of Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities, when the CDC was soliciting grant applications for research related to infant disabilities. THORSEN successfully promoted the idea of awarding the grant to Denmark and provided input and guidance for the research to be conducted. From 2000 to 2009, the CDC awarded over $11 million to two governmental agencies in Denmark to study the relationship between autism and exposure to vaccines, between cerebral palsy and infection during pregnancy, and between childhood development and fetal alcohol exposure. In 2002, THORSEN moved to Denmark and became the principal investigator for the grant, responsible for administering the research money awarded by the CDC.

The following is from the indictment:

Defendant THORSEN
promoted the idea of awarding the grant to Denmark for studies
related to infant disabilities. Defendant THORSEN scheduled
meetings with the Danish Medical Research Council, Aarhus
University, and Odense University Hospital about the proposed
Danish research. In addition to initiating the meetings, defendant
THORSEN provided guidance and ideas for the grant that the CDC
ultimately awarded to Denmark.
4. ...From 2000 through
2009, the CDC awarded over $7 million to the Danish Medical
Research Council and over $4 million to DASTI, totaling over $11
million, for the Danish research studies.
5. Aarhus University and Odense University Hospital
administered the CDC grant under the direction of a principal
investigator, who was assigned scientific and administrative
oversight.
6. In 2002, after CDC awarded the grant, defendant THORSEN
went to Denmark and became the principal investigator, responsible
for administering the research money awarded by the CDC to Denmark.
Defendant THORSEN also held a faculty position at Aarhus
University, where scientists performed research under the grant.
In those positions, he submitted invoices for payment to Aarhus
University and Odense University Hospital for work and expenses
related to the CDC grant.

This is interesting as well (from the first link above):

...internal emails obtained via FOIA document discussion between the Danish researchers and Thornsen which acknowledge that the studies did not include the latest data from 2001 where the incidence and prevalence of autism was declining which would be supportive of a vaccine connection.
The emails also include requests from Thornsen to CDC asking that the agency write letters to the journal Pediatrics encouraging them to publish the research after it had been rejected by other journals.
A top CDC official complied with the request sending a letter to the editor of the journal supporting the publication of the study which they called a "strong piece of evidence that thimerosal is not linked to autism."

For those interested, after reading the above material, especially this link, compare the graph and story here (relying on the Danish studies) to this story explaining 'Hide the Decline' in climate-gate in laymen's terms.  The similarities are striking.

My conclusion remains unchanged- which is that I don't think there's good evidence to conclude that vaccines have contributed to autism, but there is also not enough evidence to close the book on the question.  It's still very, very much an open question.

Vintage Cooking, from a WW2 era Magazine

Sour cream berry muffins

2 cups sifted cake flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 cup sugar
1 cup thick sour cream
1/2 cup milk
1 egg, beaten
1 cup blueberries, thoroughly drained

Reserve 1/4 cup flour and sift remaining with baking powder, soda, and sugar. Mix sour cream, milk, and egg together and barely mix with dry ingredients.
Dredge blueberries in the reserved 1/4 cup flour and add to muffin mixture. Do not overmix. Bake in oiled and floured muffed pans in hot oven (425 F) 15 to 20 minutes. Makes 18 small or 12 large muffins.

If thin sour cream is used, milk may be omitted. To reheat place in a brown paper bag and put ina hot oven (425 F) for 5 min.

From a July, 1943 issue of a magazine called The American Home

On the back cover of the magazine is an ad for Armour cold cuts, with recipes using frankfurters, star salami and old-fashioned use. Armour meats are so concentrated, the ad copywriter explains, that they really help stretch your meat points. Furthermore, these recipes were worked out in Armour's special kitchen and designed to be so easy that 'even a man could make them!'

Linked at Vintage REcipe Thursday If you like vintage recipes, be sure to click on the 'vintage cookery' label at the bottom of this post, and visit our recipe blog- The Common Kitchen

And...

The Common Room, has been nominated in the Homeschool Blog Awards in the following categories:
Best Homeschool Variety
Best Current Events and Opinions
Best Family or Group Blog

Voting ends midnight, November 18th.

Clothesline Tips

These are from a magazine that went out of print years ago.

Take a bleach bottle or a clean milk carton and poke holes in opposite sides of the top- run wire or string through the holes to hang up on the clothesline.  Punch holes in the bottom for water to drain through.  Cut a square opening in the side, towards the top.  Tape the edges down with duct tape to make it smoother.  Put your clothes pins in the bucket and hang it on the line, pulling it along as you hang up clothes.

Let toddlers and preschoolers 'help': Set up a drying rack near the clothesline or look for an old wooden toddler bed, crib, portable play pen- anything with rails. Tip it on its side and give them some small things to hang up.  You can also set an old ladder on two chairs to make a low 'line' for the youngsters to use.

When space is short on the line, go vertical- you can clothespin things like t-shirts, dish towels, or diapers to the bottom of other like items.

Menu Plan, week of April 25th

Breakfasts:
lemon ginger muffins
Boston Brown Bread Muffins
cottage cheese pancakes
Date-nut bread with cream cheese
Crockpot oat groats

Lunch:
Salmon quesedillas
Sandwiches on Irish soda bread, and perhaps we'll try the 1940s era date and nut filling here.
Tongue with crackers
Grilled cheese and tomato soup
Leftovers


Supper:

Spaghetti with meatballs, salad, french bread, and pistachio cake

Cheddar and ham skillet pie

 Crockpot chicken and beans

Basil Walnut Mayonnaise over chicken pasta salad

One pan dandy - an easy, skillet meal with corn, tomatoes, ground meat, and a bit of cheese

chicken curry over east Indian rice ring- both recipes from the Frozen Assets cookbook

Mexican tamale pie, from a recipe my great-grandmother clipped from the newspaper sometime in the forties (the backside of the clipping talks about how various Hollywood personalities are serving in the midst of WW2

Linked at Organizing Junkie's Menu Plan Monday

The Homeschool HighSchool Panic Dance

You may know the one- the one where you clutch your head in both hands, fingers clinched in your hair as you moan over all the things still untaught that must be covered in the next one, two, three, four years. The hyperventilation two-step as you do the bunny hop through through the book cases pulling out so many books to cover that an elephant laboring under that load of books could do the limbo- would have to, in fact. You time with them is almost over, and there's so much left to cover, and what are you going to (shriek, gasp, wail) do? How can you get it all done? Where did the time go? How can they graduate if you haven't made sure they know how to ....? How can they start a family before you've taught them....?

When my oldest girls were in their teens I kind of had a four year panic attack.  There was SO MUCH I still wanted to teach them, wanted to see them learn, thought they needed to know, habits I wanted them to develop and there was suddenly NO TIME!!!!

Here's a little secret those girls taught me: If we've taught them well- and sometimes even if we haven't- they keep right on growing, learning, developing, figuring things out on their own- because - are you listening?  Come in a little closer and listen carefully- it's not all our responsibility after all! Perhaps this seems so obvious to you. I can only say it wasn't to me. Somehow I had it in my head that we had to be 'finished' with this list of things- a very long list that nobody could ever finish.   Well, they did not complete my list.  And now the oldest two girls are married.  They are mommies.  And even though there were some things I really wished I'd done better at instilling before they got there, who did I think I was, really?  They are persons of their own. They were born persons.  They have their own relationship with God and He deals with them and shows them things in His word without my intervention (I think I thought that the verse about Christ being the only mediator between God and men left out 'except for MOM').

Furthermore, they have their OWN husbands who each like things done very differently to how much husband likes them, or how the other brother-in-law likes them. Their marriages are their own marriages, a unique creation, a special blend of their particular personalities and their husbands'.

All my panic was just... well, silly. 

Here's something else I discovered- They aren't supposed to know everything when they leave home.  There are supposed to be gaps. 

We say we never want our kids to stop learning, and we forget this means there must be things to learn, which means that there are things they do not yet know- no, not even after homeschooling for 12 years.

Don't be negligent, but don't panic over the gaps.   Do you know what else we could call 'gaps?'

Room to grow.

Sunday Hymn Post

How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
Is laid for your faith in His excellent Word!
What more can He say than to you He hath said,
You, who unto Jesus for refuge have fled?

In every condition, in sickness, in health;
In poverty’s vale, or abounding in wealth;
At home and abroad, on the land, on the sea,
As thy days may demand, shall thy strength ever be.

Fear not, I am with thee, O be not dismayed,
For I am thy God and will still give thee aid;
I’ll strengthen and help thee, and cause thee to stand
Upheld by My righteous, omnipotent hand.

When through the deep waters I call thee to go,
The rivers of woe shall not thee overflow;
For I will be with thee, thy troubles to bless,
And sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.

When through fiery trials thy pathways shall lie,
My grace, all sufficient, shall be thy supply;
The flame shall not hurt thee; I only design
Thy dross to consume, and thy gold to refine.

Even down to old age all My people shall prove
My sovereign, eternal, unchangeable love;
And when hoary hairs shall their temples adorn,
Like lambs they shall still in My bosom be borne.

The soul that on Jesus has leaned for repose,
I will not, I will not desert to its foes;
That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,
I’ll never, no never, no never forsake.

Midi file here: Midi File



There's an mp3 file here with a sort of bluegrass/roots flavor to it.

This is a good hymn to take to heart in situations like these.

My purpose in life is fulfilled

Me: My girls are sitting blushing, saying to themselves, "I can't believe my mother said that!"

Pip, politely: "No, not really. We're thinking, 'there she goes again.'

No time for 'me?'

From this week's Frugal Hacks post:

Day after day- in magazines, newspapers, on blogs, on the television, on the internet, on the radio, on billboards, we are subjected to a barrage of messages that appeal to our inner Ms or Mr Malcontent... about how we, in this age of convenience, have no time for ourselves, as though we have somehow divorced ourselves from ourselves, as though we have nothing to do with us and how we got where we are....

That woman who is a mother, she's not us, so all those mothering things we do are somebody else, and we have no time for us. 

...that's apparently some other woman, not ourselves, and so the ... woman 'has no time for herself,'... as though she's not related to ...the self who does anything, apparently, other than pedicures, bubble baths, and recreational shopping. The only thing we do for 'ourselves' that counts, it seems, is buying us a treat.

More at the link

The Agenda for Today

The agenda is varied and, well.... see what you think:

Strider's cousin is taking the Boy and a friend out squirrel hunting.  The Boy has a new hunting knife and an old 22 discovered at the Rattery. Two other 12 year olds are going along.  When told that all three younger boys had been given firm orders to obey him immediately and without argument, Strider's cousin grinned and said, "I have minions!  Cool."

Two houseguests are providing an ongoing concert- one plays the piano and one the hammered dulcimer (which he brought)

Horse-riding by another guest and the Equuschick, providing the EC can breathe this morning (her asthma has been acting up since the birth of her little baby girl- but otherwise, as you can tell, she is feeling great)

Sunday school lessons- Jenny and Strider's younger sister are working together on some children's lessons to take with them to the Philippines in May.

A walk in the country (away from the squirrel hunters) by numerous other houseguests and remaining Progeny.  They already watched a movie this morning, after staying up until 3;00 this morning to watch It Happened One Night. They have been told they must go outside because there is SUNSHINE!!!

Me?  I'll be sitting here praying for the safety of those squirrel hunters.

Values

From Donna LaFramboise:

Epidemiologist James Enstrom has worked at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) for 34 years. In 2005, he published a study that found no relationship between fine particulate air pollution and premature death.
The California Air Resources Board (CARB) is in charge of air quality in that state. In an astonishing turn of events it chose to ignore Enstrom’s published-in-the-peer-reviewed-literature findings. Instead, CARB had its employees prepare an internal document that reached the opposite conclusion.
The lead author of the internal document was Hien Tran. When he was hired, Tran said he had a PhD in statistics from the University of California, Davis. On that internal research document (shown in the video above), Tran’s name is followed by the claim that he holds a PhD.
But this man never actually finished his doctorate. Instead, he apparently purchased one for $1,000 from an unaccredited, online diploma mill (full details are included in this 12-page disciplinary letter).

It gets worse from there.

So whose job is at risk?  Naturally, not the fraudster.

IF The Family Budgeted Like the Government

Suppose that in a mere three years your family’s spending – spending, mind you, not income – jumps from $80,000 to $101,600.  You’re now understandably worried about the debt you’re piling up as a result of this 27 percent hike in spending.

So what do you do? What proportion do you cut?
It's insulting, is what it is.

How serious is it?
This serious. (crude language alert)

Today's Agenda

• Fold and put away about four super large loads of laundry
• Sweep the downstairs
• Clean up in my room, which involves either emptying out and putting away about four totebags and two laundry baskets of junk, OR stashing said stuff in my closet.
• Set up The Common Room for the singing tonight.
• Bake something for tonight.
• Make sack lunches for my husband and our three houseguests.  They need sack lunches because my husband took them to the Rattery where he is working them like borrowed mules.

Meanwhile, Jenny is over at the Equuschick's house helping her with the babies and housework- The EC is having a rough time of it with her asthma over the last few days, and Shasta's mama and bachelor brother will be driving down tonight when Uncle Fun and Games and Cool Toys from the Store gets off work.  They are bringing a pick-up truck because they have too much stuff to fit in the car.

Also meanwhile, Strider, the HG and the Striderling are on their way up- Strider will be dropped at the Rattery where he also will be put to work like a borrowed mule, only he has more experience with this sort of thing than the others.  The HG and Striderling will hang out here, and then the friend who took wedding pictures for both girls will come before the singing tonight and take pictures of the three grand-babies together.  She says the only payment she wants is to hold the newest grand-baby for ten minutes.=)

The Fellowship of the Likeminded

slightly edited repost

I was reading all this fun 1960s countercultural back to the land movement stuff, and I googled this and that to find out if these particular 'simple living' commune advocates kept their principles (some did, some didn't), and posted fun bits and pieces from reading. I shared some good stuff one of them wrote about creating a sense of community, what's necessary for community building, and I agreed with the hippie (although he was one of them who left the commune first and went on to live a hedonistic lifestyle including world travel and lots of restaurants), and said:

"And maybe it's not appropriate to take to the commune to create a community of like-minded neighbors before one has been able to apply the ethics and values mentioned above in the community of neighbors, co-workers, and acquaintances where one finds oneself."

We all want that comfort and warmth that comes from a fellowship of 'likeminded believers,' but we also want to come to it by shortcuts. The funny thing is that those of us who yearn earnestly for that community of likeminded believers are also some of us who dismiss pop culture, pop anything, especially our cultural drive for instant gratification, instant burgers, instant credit, instant coffee, instant oatmeal (which might save an entire 60 seconds at the cost of vitamins, minerals, texture, and taste), instant this and instant that. We decry this tyranny of the immediate, this slavery to the cult of the instant. And yet we are the same people who long for instant community.

Rick Saenz posted around the same time about experiencing the goodness of community in his small town. In the comments he said:

What is important, perhaps, is that the residents are rooted here, either by history or by choice. People did not gather here in order to experience community; they were already a community by dint of circumstances and geography and history and livelihood, and are just doing the things necessary to survive and thrive in this kind of community.

We've lived in several small towns (one had a population of 299) and I think this tends to be true of most of them, especially rural ones. Rural neighbors need to be able to rely on each other without taking each other for granted (good fences make good neighbors). We've helped look for our neighbors dogs, and we've helped hunt up their cattle when they got through the downed fencing on the creek onto our woods. They have helped us round up our horses a tiresome amount of times.

Small communities have a reputation, not altogether undeserved, for being small minded and often nosy. These things can certainly be true. Sometime we might tell you about the Great Water Debate over the girls at the animal shelter deciding to pay for a monthly bottle of water from a local supplier.  Or I could tell you about the current ongoing feud over a couple bricks and plank or two one neighbor used to get his truck out of the mud- and the small rut he left behind when he did it. You'd think it was the Grand Canyon. When we were building this house (and Granny Tea the house next door), we'd often find tire marks in the drive where people stopped by to see what was going on. And we'd hear from folks in town, "See you've got the windows in, now."

But somewhere else on the 'net (I've lost the source, but I think it was a comment from one of the hippies about moving into the commune in a small town and how they managed to make friends with the neighbors), I read this:

"To me, what I like about living in a small town is that everybody considers the whole town to be their home, rather than just the four walls they live in. So I see curiosity and concern about your neighbors as logical and correct."

It seems to me that this could also equally true in an apartment complex, a trailer park, or any neighborhood. But it has to start somewhere, and it might as well be us.