what a mother

The other day I heard a fascinating story on NPR about a woman involved in the construction of a mosque in Turkey. About midway through the piece, there is a lovely description of the installation of glass raindrops beneath the dome:

On one particular day, beneath the mosque's 130-foot diameter dome, Nahide Buyukkaymakci instructs a worker on how to hang dozens of blown-glass rain drops from an asymmetrical bronze and Plexiglas chandelier.

The glass drops are inspired by a prayer that says Allah's light should fall on you like rain, Buyukkaymakci explains.

And all I could think was: Oh god, that would be so hard to clean.

rockets and rabbits

To celebrate Juliette Gordon Low's upcoming birthday, the Girl Scouts gathered at Palisades Park to make rockets and eat cake. We were instructed to bring a 2 liter plastic bottle, which was a bit of a challenge as we don't drink soda. So, after my long group run in town early Saturday morning, I stopped by the Conservancy to go dumpster diving. I looked through three different bins before finding one!

Once at the park, Leah decorated her rocket with stickers and markers:

All the parents were wondering how the rockets would be lauched. See the contraption below? A hose and an air compressor are routed through the same line, which is attached to a foot pedal. The spout of the 2 liter is screwed onto the nozzle of the water/air hose. The group counts down -- 3, 2, 1 -- and the Girl Scout slams her foot onto the pedal. For anyone who has never actually experienced this, I cannot emphasize how amazingly freaking fast and high these things fly. They then turn right around and come crashing down to the ground. It is a most spectacular display.

Leah waits her turn.

I wish I had a picture of a rocket in mid-air, but they shot up much too fast for me to even try, and once they reached their peak and paused for just a moment before dropping back down, they were too far up in the air to be snapped.


Upon landing, pieces of Leah's rocket flew off in all directions, but the kind lady with the tape assisted in putting it all back together again.

So that was how Saturday started.

A little later, we took both Leah and Neal to Paw Paw and Dee Dee's for an overnight campout. Their cousins Meredith and Travis were there, too. The kids ran around while the adults chatted, until suddenly Leah walked up to Lee and said, "Uh, Daddy -- we have a rabbit situation." In the meantime, Meredith and Travis were yelling, "Aunt Meg! Aunt Meg! There's a rabbit!"

Now, there are a great many rabbits where we live, so I assumed they had spotted a regular old brown rabbit with a cute little white tail off in the woods behind Paw Paw's house. I was wrong. This rabbit was gray and white, and was coming within inches of the children. This was not a wild rabbit. This was somebody's pet. And I'm guessing you can guess whose pet he ended up being.

Here he is, in our living room, eating an apple:

We're going to try to determine whether he already belongs to somebody, but, sadly, odds are that he was intentionally released. Which is okay, because he's just about the cutest thing you ever did see, and we're happy to have him.

diagramming sarah

This is too good not to share. Grammar geeks rule.

the buzz on pumpkins

First, a couple more shots from Falls Mill:

Spinning Wheel

Wagon Weight List

And now back to Hayden, where Neal and I went to the Great Pumpkin Patch to pick ourselves a great big pumpkin.

I'm not sure there's much distinction between big orange pumpkins and big orange balls. I had to keep reminding him not to throw, roll, or stand on the pumpkin, lest it become pumpkin mush.

It was surprisingly cold and overcast given the weather of the past week. Neither Neal nor the ponies seemed to mind.

The chosen one.

Pumpkins were once pollinated by squash bees, but now mostly by honey bees. The decline of the native squash bee is likely a result of pesticide sensitivity, which is particularly troublesome given the recent increase among honey bees of Colony Collapse Disorder, also thought to be at least in part related to pesticide use. Look people: Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday and I LOVE me some pumpkin pie, so quit poisoning everything already, okay?

After the pony ride, the wagon ride, the jumper, the hay maze, the petting zoo, the patch, and lunch, we were tuckered out and ready to fetch Leah from school. I love this Charlie Brown time of year.

t is for tennessee

We've just returned from a long weekend at Tims Ford State Park in Tennessee. It was the absolute perfect time to go -- the leaves were beginning to change and there were folks playing bluegrass all Saturday long. It was a lovely and, thankfully, short road trip: red barns, blue sky, and white clouds, reflected on a smaller scale in the cotton growing along the roadside.

I can't complain about not being in any of the pictures -- here is my arm in the side view mirror of an otherwise lovely scene.

I used to ride for miles and miles at Oak Mountain and all over Southside, but it had been so long since I'd ridden my bike that Lee had to put olive oil on the chain. And I can attest to the fact that you use your muscles differently when you ride versus when you run. While I can run ten miles without feeling any soreness in my calves, I am still feeling the bike rides.

Between riding and fishing, we ventured to the Swiss Pantry, a Mennonite bakery in nearby Belvidere, Tenn. It's stocked with bread, cookies, candies, preserves, and cheese, to name but a few of the yummilicious things we found there.

We noticed there are also quite a few Amish establishments in this area. My understanding is that Mennonite and Amish are two branches of the same Protestant Anabaptist church. The main difference is not so much what they believe as how they practice their beliefs. The separatist Amish shun the world, while Mennonites live simply but without separation. Whatever -- they can bake, is what I'm saying.

On Sunday, again between bike riding and fishing, we found Falls Mill, a water-powered grain mill in Belvidere. The water wheel is huge, and powers many smaller, belted gears inside. Leah has an Eric Carle book called Pancakes Pancakes, about a boy named Jack who wants pancakes for breakfast. His mother instructs him to gather the wheat, take it to the miller, gather the firewood, put it in the stove, fetch the jam, and so on, until the pancakes are finally ready to eat. It was nice to see her connect the mill to the book, and both she and Neal were so excited to watch the water spin the wheel that spins the gear that spins another and another, and so on.



In addition to gears and grains, the mill also has several old spinning wheels, looms, broom presses, and a working nickelodeon. And, they sell their flours, meals, and grits, so of course we came home with a bag full of stone ground grits!

This tree man lives beside the mill.

We returned today, stopping at Ave Maria Grotto on the way, where Brother Joseph Zoettl created miniature reproductions of many of the world's most famous buildings. He incorporated marble, glass, beads, jewelry, and shells into his work.

I especially like the dragon (above) peeking out from under the Castle of the Fairies (below).

A good example of the Brother's fondness for shells. He was well suited for this kind of craftmanship: maimed in an accident, he was a hunchback whose miniatures required an attention to detail perhaps best acheived by hunching over his work.

The kids loved the Lizard Condo, complete with toy lizards.

The Tower of Babel.

More to come. Right now I'm gonna go snack on some Mennonite cheese.

historic preservation

Based on conversations with locals, we believe our house was built in the latter half of the 19th century. The original supports consist of rock piles and timber. That's right -- rocks stacked up with no mortar, and tree trunks or branches, in some cases with the bark still on.

We're investing in a bigger wood burning stove, so we wanted to be certain the floor would support the weight. Harry, who rents our old house in the city, drove up to help Lee bolster the house. Leah and Neal played together nicely while I napped after a nine mile run. Every now and then I heard voices drifting from under the house, and then, suddenly, I heard rather loud, rather freaked out sounding voices. Fearing the worst (whatever that was), I quickly shifted from halfway asleep to fully awake and began mentally listing the things it could be. I will not list those things here. They are too weird. As it happens, the thing it was is pretty weird, too. There are hundreds -- hundreds -- of big, old, glass jars beneath the house.

Back in the day, there was no garbage service (we were actually quite relieved to learn that we have it now), no way of storing that many jars inside for re-use, and no way of disposing of any excess. It's possible they were using the crawl space as a root cellar, in which case they would have stored vegetables and preserves there. I've been reading about root cellars lately -- perhaps it's something we can add to our long list of homesteading to-do's.

There was too much other work to do to add fruit jar removal to the list, and we don't have enough storage space above ground, so we'll leave them be for now, saving the excavation for another day.

downsizing

These are our teenagers. There were six, but one of the black and whites was beheaded by a predator. They're not as old as our original chickens, and not as young as our chicks. (Well, we call them chicks, but they've long outgrown the cute fuzzy yellow stage.)

The teenagers are our friendliest chickens. The old birds are kinda jumpy (it doesn't help that they peck at the coffee grounds in the compost), and the new birds are the jumpy birds' progeny. The teenagers seem to like people, and they're not so skittish.

We only ever wanted to collect eggs, but now we have so many birds that we're contemplating downsizing to just the teenagers and maybe a rooster. Perhaps we'll meet some people who just moved out to the country and are interested in raising chickens....

four oh

Happy birthday, Will! I'm never entirely certain whether it's safe to call the stateside line and just leave a message when I know you're sleeping, or whether it might wake you up in the night. (Lee got the kids some walkie talkies, and last night, my dreams were interrupted by someone ten-fouring his good buddy at three o'clock in the morning. One of these days I will have eight hours of uninterupted sleep. Right?)

I hope you enjoyed a beautiful day, and that you wake up well rested and ready for your next trip around the sun.

lazybones

Today has been a lazy day. I was supposed to meet the girls at the coffee shop this morning, but it's mid-afternoon and I've still not taken a shower. It's so rare that we have the opportunity to be lazy -- I feel like I'm doing something wrong. It's also rare that we spend time in front of the television on a beautiful fall morning, but it's difficult to pull ourselves away from the news today. I suppose economic collapse can have that effect.

The kids are oblivious to the state of the nation. They pulled out their art supplies and set up shop on the walk this morning, and now they're building a tent out of furniture and blankets, desperately trying to avoid a particular spot on the floor that is apparently made of hot lava.

I think I'll go take a shower.

echoes

The leaves are starting to change, and Lee spent the afternoon splitting logs in preparation for colder nights. Leah and Neal sat on an upturned laundry basket watching while he pounded the axe against the wedge, the sound of metal striking metal echoing far off in the woods. I had a sudden recollection of standing at the top of my grandmother's driveway in Troy, shouting toward the garage doors just to hear the echo.

debates and dolls

Lee is in the other room explaining the presidential debate process to Leah. She seems very interested in such things. We are careful and thoughtful with our words, much as we are when we talk about religion. She is trying to sort out the relative importance of mayors, governors, and presidents. Meanwhile, Neal is constructing a house of Jenga blocks and Lincoln logs so that Biteman (which is what he calls Batman) will have a place to sleep tonight.

two hours later....

I've just finished reading the final two chapters of The Cricket in Times Square to the kids at bedtime, and I couldn't help but weep when Chester cricket returned to Connecticut. Fortunately, Lee found my Red Riding Hood doll at the old house, so I reckon I'll snuggle up with her and fall asleep while he watches the debate. I'm too tired to get myself all riled up -- it'll just have to wait until tomorrow.

(The doll is my favorite -- if you pull her dress over her head, she turns into Grandmother, and then if you pull Grandmother's hat over her head, she turns into the Big Bad Wolf. Forgive the quality of the pictures, particularly the blurry Wolf. I am buying a camera this weekend!)

crazy jambalacos

Lee and the kids like to poke fun at my crazy, makeshift dinners. The other day, I made something they dubbed 'crazy jambalacos' -- it was a taco dinner, but I didn't have any soy crumbles, so I used beans instead, mushing them up and seasoning them and topping them off with cheese. I'm not sure why, but they did end up tasting like New Orleans tacos.

Attempting to compete with my dinnertime improvisations, Lee whipped one up entirely based on shells: shells and cheese, peanuts still in their shells, and hard boiled eggs. For dessert: bananas and oranges (we convinced ourselves that peels counted as shells).

Speaking of hard boiled eggs, I would argue that once you've seen and tasted farm-fresh eggs, you can never comfortably go back to the ones you get at the store, even if they say they're organic and free range and farm fresh and all of that other good-sounding stuff. The color is just not ever the same as the vibrant orange of a truly fresh egg, and the taste is equally lacking. Unfortunately, our chickens are so free to range that they have decided to lay their eggs wherever they want, which is not always in the coop. We still manage to gather enough eggs for our family, but I really miss having enough of a surplus to give some away. Also, I've collected enough egg cartons to open a craft store, and they just keep coming (I told all of my coworkers that I was permanently collecting cartons a while back, when we were gathering six or seven eggs a day). So we read and we clean the coop and we put out fresh straw and we hunt the wild nests. I'm pretty sure the chickens are laughing at us.

yard art

One day, while Lee was chopping things down and carrying things around, I dragged some heavy concrete blocks from the fire pit to a tree and made a little bench. Then I found a small roll of wire fencing and placed it in a semicircle behind the bench. Then the kids and I began to gather sticks and branches and weave them through the fencing. It's not quite yard art, but it's a start.

There was a great bit on Tapestry, a local NPR program, about a woman who lives in Crestwood and weaves woolen fabric strips through burlap bags to make old fashioned rugs. It reminded me of the woman (I can't remember her name -- shame on me) at Pop's museum who worked the loom, her hands and feet moving in tandem to create intricate tapestries. I have two that were in Muv's house. They are beautiful, durable, and created using a tool that doesn't emit anything at all harmful -- now that's my kind of machine.

spider funnel

For the first several months after we moved out here, we slept in a tent in the house, mainly to avoid the brown recluse. The house had been dark and empty for some time, and we came across a few too many for comfort as we tore things apart. Now we see only harmless specimens. Luckily, the recluse is true to its name.

We still have a crazy lot of spiders -- I could sweep webs from the front porch on a daily basis if I were so inclined. No need for screens when the spiders do all the work. I let the tub full o' toys sit for several weeks, untouched by the broom, and this is what happened: a spider funnel. Sometimes we can actually see the spider that lives there, deep inside the hole.

(I stopped off at the dreaded WalMart on my way home from work today and strolled past a box of cooked bacon on a shelf. I ask you: has it really come to this?)

miscellanea

Just the other day, my sister-in-law at Kolo kolo mlynsky posted something about color theory, along with a picture of three colorful cars. When Neal brought home some of his artwork today, I thought it was a nice coincidence.

Leah got a Bozo punching bag as a late birthday present, and has named it Billy Griswald. Billy Griswald is the only "being" we are allowed to hit and kick. Poor Billy Griswald. We all like to punch his squeaky nose.

I went on a bit of a picture spree this afternoon, with my cell phone ridiculously pretending to be a zoom-worthy camera. I ended up with lots of closeups of flowers and locust shells where the subject is fuzzy but the background is absolutely clear. I'm posting some of the least offensive shots. One of these days I will spring for an actual digital camera. Sometimes I pull out the old Pentax, but the battery is dead at the moment.

fall, do

fall, do
through hot wet air
we wait for you

listless, a body
accustomed to itself

sweet, cool the sweat
gentle land the sheet

beneath a sun not new
grace ages
acquaints itself
propositions

fall, do
with longness of breath
we want for you

judge not

There's a fine line between being opinionated and being judgmental. I tend to be both, but I consider the judgmental leaning a weakness that I try hard to control. It definitely improved after I got pregnant the second time around. Kid #2 -- you're just not as uptight about some things. We still have our rules, most of which fit quite nicely with the Waldorf crowd back in Birmingham, but some of which cause more mainstream parents to look at us kind of funny, or to assume that we will judge them in some way.

Our kids don't drink soda, they don't watch television during the week (Lee and I watch after they go to bed, though -- come on, there's a House marathon on! -- and the Daily Show and Colbert Report!), they don't watch some of the same shows and movies that many of the other kids watch, they eat relatively healthy food most of the time, they go to bed between 7:30 and 8:00, etc. This is what works for us. We have beliefs that form the foundation for these rules, but we also try to be open-minded and accept that every family has its own beliefs, and sometimes it can be difficult to always live by your beliefs. My kids have eaten chicken nuggets and hot dogs with the best of them. Although I never once gave Leah a lollipop just to keep her from making a ruckus in the doctor's office waiting room, god knows I gave Neal a few.

What got me thinking about this is that I finally agreed to let the kids watch the original Star Wars today. I know, I know. What's the big deal? I dunno. So they're watching it now. Neal keeps wanting to know when Chewbacca is going to make an appearance. Leah, upon examining the packaging, asked why there was only one girl. I told her that was a good question and she should keep asking questions like that. I can't believe I thought Luke was the cute one.

friends

Today was girls' day out: Leah, Katie, and I went out to lunch, browsed around the book store, and wore ourselves out roller skating (wipe out!). I LOVE the sheer joy of rolling old-school, four-on-the-floor, around the slick wooden rink. I hope I am never too old to roller skate. (I have noticed that I tend to be one of only a few parents who actively participates in such things as roller skating and water sliding. I don't know what that says about me, and I don't care.)

The picture is of Leah, Katie, and Neal in one room of the chicken coop, with the 'teenage' chickens roosting on a branch behind them. Two of the teenagers are ameraucanas (easter-eggers), which means they lay blue-green eggs. They're not quite old enough to do so yet, but we're looking forward to our pretty eggs.

hey sarah

Quick: What's the Bush Doctrine?

Quick: Who is responsible for 9/11?

Did I mention I am a biologist? I can see nature from here.

blog for brains

I just performed my first act of kid-inspired blog censorship: I removed the first sentence of my last entry after Leah asked what 's*%ks' means. Not that it's a bad word, really -- just not the sort of thing you want the teacher to overhear.

I read the following brief blog blurb (say that ten times fast) in one of my work-related e-newsletters earlier this week:

Seed Media launches tools to label and tag blogs on peer-reviewed research

Science media company Seed Media Group (SMG) has launched a new technology that will help scientists make use of the explosion of discussions in the blogosphere surrounding published peer-reviewed science. The new technology provides scientists with tools to clearly label and tag blog posts about peer- reviewed research. Labeled posts are then aggregated, indexed, displayed and disseminated, effectively making blogging more functional to the advancement of science.

I love the idea that this kind of technology mimics the way the brain works, taking all sorts of stimuli and arranging and rearranging them into various organizational pictures.

And now I'm going to watch House. The DVR recorded about 20 episodes during a House marathon. Better than chocolate even.

cool weenies

Being accustomed to working with Outlook's email functionality, I find AOL both frustrating and annoying. But, I have to admit that I appreciate KAOL, the kids version that Leah and Neal sometimes use. It prevents them from going to any sites that aren't pre-approved, which came in handy the other day when Leah was about to perform a search for 'cool weenies' (she is enamored with dachsunds). Kind of reminded me of the time my friend Pam wanted me to know what the lead singer of the band Bush looked like, so she started to type the word 'bush' into the search field -- at work -- and was about to hit go when I said, Dude -- bad idea.

Speaking of weenie dogs, here is the original draft of a story by Lee and Leah, each taking a turn writing a sentence:

Somebody Ate the Weenie Dog

Speedy was a little brown weenie dog. He liked to go on walks. One day he was in the park and he saw a hot dog vendor. He walked to the hot dog stand. The vendor thought he had dropped a hot dog, so he picked Speedy up and put him in the box. When the next person came, he gave the box with Speedy to them. The person who got the box opened it up and pulled out Speedy in a bun. He opened his mouth and took a bite of Speedy's tail. Speedy did not like being bitten, so he bit him back and ran. The man screamed. Speedy barked. That just goes to show you, you should never put a weenie dog in a bun.

mission accomplished

Formerly a grody junk room, the kids' room now has paint, faux parquet flooring, and some cute wooden items we've picked up here and there. There's a great little antique shop in Hanceville called Lavender and Lace. There we found some small Raggedy Ann and Andy dolls, an old enamel wash tub, two metal stars, and a rocking horse. We picked up a bunk bed at a thrift store, and the rest of the furniture is handed down. Hanging on the wall, among other things, is a washboard that once belonged to my grandmother. It says DKC in faded red glitter -- her instrument when she played with the Dixie Kettle Club. I've got a great black and white picture of the band, all gussied up and ready to play.

The room has an intentionally rough finish to it, and the kids love dumping their toys on the floor, building log houses and train tracks. Today, Lee orchestrated an afternoon-long adventure, helping them examine maps and decipher notes written in code. Dragons were slayed, silver and gold was discovered, flowers and eggs were hunted and gathered. Neal let his sword lead the way, while Leah traipsed about in her black explorer boots and pink shoulder bag. At long last, with play, dinner, a bath, and two chapters of The 101 Dalmations behind them, they are asleep beneath their quilts, in their finally finished room.

theory of linguistic relativity

Sometimes I read back through my old posts. I noticed that I wrote "fewer than five minutes" in one of them. Typically, 'fewer' would precede a numeric quantity of something (e.g., fewer than five flowers), but time is abstract, and therefore I believe it's best to say 'less than five minutes.' For some reason, though, this has spun me into a philosophical monologue about the nature of time.

When I was young, time did indeed seem abstract: I was smaller, so it was bigger. Abstractions typically have a bigness about them. After I had kids, minutes turned into something more akin to cookies, consumed with the worried quickness of someone hungry for them. Always running out of cookies, we are.

other people's plants (and fungi) (and guns)

Lee's dad and stepmom are traveling through the Badlands in an RV for six weeks. (I've no idea how they afford the gas.) While they're away, my job is to water the plants. To date, there has been one casualty -- a potted plant sitting on a small table on the front porch. I think I must have overlooked it during the first round of watering, as all the other plants are hanging in baskets. Today was round two, and while I was there, I took a few pix. Mushrooms are popping up all over the place what with the rain of late. Crape Myrtle grows wild; I like the bark more than the bloom -- the way the smooth brown slowly peels away to gray. The close-up is the leaf of an elephant ear; I like the vascular look of it.

Weird thing: We went for a drive this afternoon, past the organic garden in Warrior, through the one-lane tunnel with the train track on top, and up to the high school, where there was barbed wire spiraled around the entrance, along with a military hummer and some young men suited up in full fatigues, slinging guns. We stopped and gaped for a minute, and then one of them walked toward the car. Clearly he had friendly intentions, but still -- I don't much like the idea of an armed military person approaching my car, particularly when my kids are in it. He explained that they were in the Army National Guard and were preparing for an emergency. Okay. I mean, I suppose they have to do such things, and you never know -- they might end up saving my ass one day. But still. I wonder what sort of emergency they are expecting.

nyuk, nyuk, nyuk!

Neal got his first real haircut at the barbershop today. Lee took him while Leah and I were at a Girl Scout meeting. Apparently, the barberlady combed his bangs straight down and then cut straight across. It's a Moe! Which I suppose makes me, Lee, and Leah some variation of Larry, Curly, and Shemp.