Small Town Halloween

 This year's Halloween was a joyful and simple one.  There was no race between the sewing machine and time because I declared early that I was not making costumes.  Charles got to wear the skeleton suit that was painted for Peter's first Halloween 8 years ago.  Just like Peter he is a skinny baby so the suit suits him.

William was some sort of a Jedi guy, I made an exception to sewing this one because of his enthusism.  The hooded jacket was made out of a curtain picked up at the thrift store and I was so impressed that in his desire to finish it up he actually sewed half of it himself!  I needed to admit to William that I threw away all the light sabers in a moment of mom rage after someone got a black eye a few years ago.  He was disappointed but made due with a swimming noodle, pvc pipe and duct tape. 

  

Maryanna pulled together a cowgirl ensemble.  By Halloween night however it was completely soiled so she then pulled out the old Sacajawea costume.

Clara got this witch costume from a friend and tried really hard to be a scary, that was almost impossible because she is too sweet.

We found this great dinosaur costume at thrift store for Henry and he liked it enough to wear it around for the day. He said his penguin costume was warmer though so switched into it for the night of Halloween.

Peter is a football guy almost everyday so his costume was no surprise to me.  What did surprise me was his quick change before heading out to the neighbors, he went back to the army costume because he knew our Veteran neighbors would appreciate it, and they did.

James was a mad scientist and used a piece of coal from the wood stove to cover his face and goggles.  Everyone thought that was a good idea and have been decorating their faces daily ever since.

George was a chubby robot and just like Henry has been wearing it daily as outwear.

I threw together a witch costume and even painted my face with a green face crayon.  

 There is so much to love and not love about Halloween.  Each year as we create a space in our home for celebrating I am faced with the dilemma of keeping our festivities in line with our values.  What I value are experiences that nurture both body and soul and with regard to Halloween it  has been our experience that candy (even a little) = unhappy and soon to be sick children, and similarly bringing attention to the creepiness of Halloween = weeks of nightmares.  For this reason we opted out of our church's trunk or treating activity and even decided ahead of time that we would not be trick or treating the night of Halloween.  Some may call me a kill joy for this decision and to them I say we obviously do not share the same definition of joy.

Keeping on the joyful side of Halloween I was thrilled to hear of the tradition of a parade our small town hosts the Saturday before Halloween.  

There were big tractors and floats

The local high school marching band performed in costumes

And it was small enough that had I not been wearing a long witch dress with big black heels I would have march along with them pulling a wagon of smiling dressed up children, next year.

Later that evening our neighbors hosted a neighborhood cook out complete with a huge bonfire and Christmas lights strung among the trees.  We engaged in warm conversation and sat close to the fire while as we ate savory chili under the stars.

Halloween morning I was nervous the kids would turn on me for the decision not to go trick or treating.  It never came up, in fact, it made no difference to them, they were buzzing around begging to carve pumpkins and begging to lick the batter off the spoon from the pumpkin muffins.

We carved 12 pumpkins in total and during the gutting Peter was careful to save seeds from the best of them while the rest were prepared for roasting.  While they were engaged in carving I quickly went to the itunes store and put together a fun Halloween mix and for over 3 hours they carved they jammed to Purple People Eater, Ghostbusters, Monster Mash, and Chicken Monkey Duck.

Among the pumpkins there was a winged helmet, the Star Wars logo, Boba Fett, Frankenstien (which Peter named Matt McGloin), a ghost, Hello Kitty, several different faces and a few simply bored with holes.

Thinking of all our kind neighbors we thought it might still be fun to dress up and visit them with our own offerings of pumpkin seeds and muffins, Maryanna then quickly went to work on hand drawn cards.  The kids did pick out 3 pieces of candy and bag of popcorn from the visits but the source of their joy was seeing our neighbors and their excitement over the costumes,muffins and Halloween cards. 

Though the temperatures were low, this was a warm and memorable Halloween for our family.  We have successfully broken mainstream tradition and carved out a new way to celebrate this holiday in a joyful way.

A Season for Knitting

I love to start knitting projects and I'm very pleased when I actually finish one, it seems that happens only once a year.  This hood was started just before our trip Up North and was lucky never to even enter the basket of unfinished projects, it crossed the finish line and onto my head within just a few weeks.  Maybe it was the thrill of doing cables for the first time or the buttery feel of the wool/alpaca yarn, or maybe I was motivated by dropping temperatures, this was a project I could not put down.

I found the pattern ( Morning Glory hood ) on raverly last year after I made the gnome hats for the younger kids.  I love the versatility of it going from hood to cowl.
 

And back to hood again because it is getting cold here!  My (older) kids laugh at some of the things I wear these days but I told them to get used to me in this hood because I like to stay warm and comfortable.  There are no fashion standards to up hold here, my daughters have taught me to dress with full authenticity and spending much of my time outdoors I've learned to dress accordingly.  

Meanwhile I've decided not to start another knitting project until I finish a few things from the basket.  Next up is the stocking I started for James 7 years ago.  It is funny how obvious the change in tension is as I've picked it up and put it down several times over the course of those years.

In the basket there is also a baby sweater I started for Maryanna 8 years ago and a toddler sweater I started for James 10 years ago.  It is only in brief moments that my hands hit the needles so I cannot be sure to finish them all in this season in my life.  I'll pick them up when they call to me and finish them as there is a great need for them.  Right now we have too many sweaters to fit in our drawers but we are short one stocking so wish me luck in completing it before the season arises to hang stockings.     

  

Homeschool these days

It seems at the beginning of each new school year I tell myself, "I'm going to do it right this year", I order all the necessary supplies, create spread sheets to dictate our time and tasks and even create a complex system of rewards.  I am usually pleased how it works for the first week but have found that the rigidity of a schedule often compresses me, it creates more work than what is needed and has led to more frustration than discovery.

My vision of homeschool is one where we can inspire our children with the joy of life long learning, to take that joy and apply it in practical ways.  Specific mechanics (reading, writing, math) are introduced along side projects (and sometimes even distractions).  There is so much to do and so much already happening here on the farm that there is no shortage of opportunities to learn.  

After morning chores the younger children gather for what we call "fun school".  Basically it is an activity they can do on their own while I nurse the baby, check email, make phone calls or whatever else calls my attention.  Usually Peter directs this and being 8 years old he has the gift and ability of keeping things fresh for the younger crowd.  He has organized a stuffed animal zoo with tickets, animal plaques, a real kettle corn stand and even set up a gift shop with stickers.  In addition, they set up a dinosaur park in the sandbox, made maps to hidden pirate treasures, had bike races and played kick ball and hide and seek in the garden.  Here they are building lego castles on the front porch.  Some mornings are smoother than others and there is always a need for constant cleaning up with this age group.  

Meanwhile the time has come to outsource some schooling for the older boys.  I am not in a position to challenge them in the ways they are now ready to be challenged.  Last year James took a few online courses through Williamsburg academy and we were very pleased.  This year he begged to take almost a full load, he is taking biology, personal leadership, writing and Euclidean geometry, and it is challenging him.  Sometimes that is a good thing and sometimes it is not, but if all was well all the time we would be robbed of some of the most important lessons life has to offer.  

James is a natural scholar, his online classes are his "fun" and is more quick to do his chores when there is "more important" stuff like studying to do.  That said James does get tired of the screen and relishes the time where he can balance it out playing with his brothers outside.  

William is participating in the first year of Williamsburg intermediate academy.  This has been a good fit for him because it is project based.  The lectures are not nearly as long as the high school courses James is taking and there is much more flexibility with the assignments. He enjoys connecting with new friends online and has integrated much of our farm work into the weekly leadership projects.  When he's had too much time in front of the screen I'll find him laying under the beech tree or spending time with the animals.

We all have need to recuperate in nature.  Just last week I set the laundry, dishes and cooking aside and we dragged Paul away from his desk to play football in the hay field and hunt for firewood in the woods.  It was a perfect autumn day.

 

Our property stretches an acre into these woods but we rarely go back there.  It was a treat to be together in such a quiet secluded place.

Maryanna gasped when she discovered how black the soil was, she said it smelled so sweet and wished we could bring some to our garden.

She played in the stream and said being in nature makes her so happy that she can't help but sing, she wonders about living in nature, if it's magic, and if we'd be more loving to each other if we were always  surrounded by nature.



Maryanna took her shoes off because........"I like to feel the living dirt, it is so soft and I feel it go up my legs and into my heart".  It was in that moment that she became my teacher.  And becoming a student myself is a gift of homeschool.





 

The younger ones carried home a collection of treasures, in Clara's purse I found moss, sticks, feathers and a milkweed pod.  Henry brought his scissors to help Daddy cut some more hay.

The children do their best to keep a record of our homeschool days.



And in case you can't read it on my face, I am exhausted.  My life is overflowing, sometimes I wonder if I am the luckiest woman in the world and sometimes I wonder if I am completely out of my mind.  Day by day I'm taking it, homeschool, farming and the great responsibility I have in raising our family.  I am grateful for the opportunity to record a small portion of our days here because children grow as quickly as seasons change.

 

Seed saving with Peter

It has been a joy to eat out of our garden, and as we near the end of this year's production we are already thinking about next year.  More than any of the children Peter has enjoyed tending to the plants and was independent in furthering his interest in gardening and self sufficiency.

One of the ideas he is most excited about is seed saving.  He watched over an hour's worth of You tube videos on the subject and read about it in a few gardening magazines, I personally was not going to bother with it this year but he insisted.  And since he insisted I pretty much let him do it himself.

One of our neighbors is a master gardener so when I told her of Peter's idea she invited us over and spent the afternoon teaching us about flowers and allowed us to collect seeds from them.  I am overwhelmed with how much I want to learn and also very humbled by the knowledge and generosity that our kind neighbors offer.  And to think I ever thought I might get bored and lonely living in the country!   

Peter ended up with over 50 different types of seeds and is storing them in these mini envelopes that fit perfectly in the protective sheets for baseball cards.  They are labeled and organized in a binder that will be stored in a plastic bag in our freezer (this idea he got from a You Tube video).  The storage supplies we ordered on amazon and he was so excited about collecting as many seeds as he could that he even thought to save some from lambs quarter and yellow dock, I assured him they were already saving their own seeds in our soil.

  

Peter is hoping to collect some kale seeds because that was his best crop, he showed me the envelope that said "satisfaction guaranteed".  He was so happy with the kale crop and not so happy that we had to eat it almost everyday.  He likes to feed it to the goats but there is still much more to share.  He also thought to set up a "kale stand" but wondered who his customers would be...........

I cannot say I am the most attentive gardener, another neighbor gave me a C- on my tomato crop and I accept that as an honest score.  I will be honest also in saying that this year's garden experience was as magnificent as the weeds, there were some great successes and some even greater flops.  All that aside I feel most satisfied with the opportunity I had to share this experience with my children and the witnessing of an 8 year old boy discover a hidden talent and the passion he now displays in pursuing it.
"Satisfaction Guaranteed" indeed.

p.s. do not leave the drying seeds out on the counter at night, it might attract the interest of mice!    

Two new kittens

Maryanna and Peter had the joy of picking out two kittens a couple weeks ago.  There were 5 of them and they were irresistible, it was too hard to choose which ones would come home with us so we ended up bringing home 3 and brought one to a friend's home to be loved by all her children.

This beautiful mother cat  is also the mother or grandmother (not exactly sure) of our two cats Andromeda and Luna. We've been missing Andromeda since July, it was James' cat since "she chose him", and our hearts ache every time we think of her. It is a mystery of where she went or what happened and we still believe she may return.  About a month ago I found Clara in a corner by herself with tears in her eyes holding a photo of Andromeda, she said "I just need a private moment with this picture".  It was in that moment I got to share with her my belief of letting go to higher purposes and how it is in that space that we witness miracles.

These little kittens are not intended to replace Andromeda, James has reassured me nothing could, they are a balm to young aching hearts and will be raised to do what they do best, cuddle children and keep the mice population in balance.

This black furry one is named "Luvee" and Maryanna is hoping he "chooses her".  He really is a lovey kitten and is unique in the way he melts into the arms of who ever holds him.

This one is named Crystal.  When we picked them up she was in our friend's garden playing with a crystal.  She is unique in her beauty but will only tolerate limited handling, she loves to climb to high spaces.

Kittens are irresistible, I love the way they torture even an almost teenaged boy with their cuteness.

William is very casual in the way he allows Crystal to ride on his shoulder.  He is a natural with all animals so they are natural with him (sometimes in the most unnatural ways).

By now I'd say Luvee has "chosen" Maryanna, he actually "chooses" anyone that hold him but as you can see from the following series no one else is really given a chance.  I love to see Maryanna in full mother mode, she is a natural.

I am actually finding my cat allergy is fading the more time I spend with them, that is in contrast to the intensive itching and sneezing I experienced last year when we first brought Luna and Andromeda home. So happy that I am finding experiencing relief because it is such a joy it is to share our life with these sweet animals!