almost six...

the milkweed "seed babies" are flying... another sure sign that a certain boy's birthday is oh so near..



* go on over and enter a sweet handmade giveaway at one of my most favorite Waldorf inspired mama hangouts

September

Went by too fast...
I became a juggler with too many balls, and some of them fell.
But Pala Dhondup has held steadfast to the new house, and is installing the most beautiful floors for our family in literally every free moment, while Tenzarelli makes the dirt pile in back his castle.

There was one ball I kept held high, a project near and dear to my heart and one that Tenzarelli looks forward to every year and this year. Mr. Tenzarelli eagerly worked to share it this year with his kindergarden class - helping sew each silk a seam to slip their finger knitting through - and we came tromping over the meadow with Jamaploo in the Ergo backpack, his hand on one side of the basket, mine on the other. All of the children brought their marigolds and the goldenrod we'd collected on our morning walk and we gently added them to the big pot while teacher built the fire with the wood the children struggled to carry and pull in the wagon.

We sang "The light of heaven comes to earth, so that the colors may come to birth" as each child reverantly took a turn stirring the flowers in the pot with a stick.

It bubbled and the flowers gave their color to our dye all day, and when the bell rang to announce the beginning of the Michaelmas celebration for the school, the children all came back to dip their silks into the pot we'd nurtured.

As evening fell, the silks hung vibrantly over the meadow drying and a rainbow emerged over us just as it was time for the play to commence. The knight Micheal came forth in the circle of villagers and slayed the evil dragon. The golden capes we made will help all of Tenzarelli's friends remember this day and overcome the dragons they might encounter in the future...

Mama Manifesto #1 .:in progress:.

When I started this blog, I thought long about the motivation behind it, and overall, had a hard time defining what I wanted it to offer - both to myself and to the community of people who may encounter it. My lack of clear direction held me back from beginning it at all for some time. I decided finally that maybe that could be the direction - a space to help me sort out the process and the work.

The subtitle of this blog is : a rambling path through art, food and motherhood. Lately in my life I feel the truth of that statement as a description of my habits... the truth is, I am interested in just about, well, everything. I'm addicted to learning, to joy, to books and community. I feel that it is necessary to attend the meetings at Tenzarelli's Waldorf School, to be the driving force behind the children's group at Deer Park, to knit, to sew, to hoard food like a squirrel for winter, to read A Wrinkle in Time again, to take on the project of installing our wood and tile floors in the house that love is building, and to get the boys enough outside time. No, my house is not clean today and the contents of the refrigerator are, um, suspicious...

But I'll defer to Louise Erdrich on that one... that amazing writer whose fantastic Birchbark Bookstore I recently made pilgrimage to... Her advice sounds pretty true to the two boys whose photos in their moments of joy make me sure there is nothing more you could want than all of this.

Advice to Myself

Leave the dishes.
Let the celery rot in the bottom drawer of the refrigerator
and an earthen scum harden on the kitchen floor.
Leave the black crumbs in the bottom of the toaster.
Throw the cracked bowl out and don't patch the cup.
Don't patch anything. Don't mend. Buy safety pins.
Don't even sew on a button.
Let the wind have its way, then the earth
that invades as dust and then the dead
foaming up in gray rolls underneath the couch.
Talk to them. Tell them they are welcome.
Don't keep all the pieces of the puzzles
or the doll's tiny shoes in pairs, don't worry
who uses whose toothbrush or if anything
matches, at all.
Except one word to another. Or a thought.
Pursue the authentic-decide first
what is authentic,
then go after it with all your heart.
Your heart, that place
you don't even think of cleaning out.
That closet stuffed with savage mementos.
Don't sort the paper clips from screws from saved baby teeth
or worry if we're all eating cereal for dinner
again. Don't answer the telephone, ever,
or weep over anything at all that breaks.
Pink molds will grow within those sealed cartons
in the refrigerator. Accept new forms of life
and talk to the dead
who drift in though the screened windows, who collect
patiently on the tops of food jars and books.
Recycle the mail, don't read it, don't read anything
except what destroys
the insulation between yourself and your experience
or what pulls down or what strikes at or what shatters
this ruse you call necessity.

Louise Erdrich from her 2003 poetry collection, Original Fire

One

(Here is Dorje, just a few days old)

My Jampaloo is ONE today. From that tiny babe (OK, not SO tiny, at 10 pounds, 3 ounces) to this amazing boy, who hammers at his pounding bench and has a grin that melts hearts all over town. The "stinker face" cracks us up without fail...


You're a boy who loves to eat... who loves his big brother....who loves to see the neighbor's ducks each day (and can even WALK after them now!)

Dorje Edmund Pema Tsagong, Happy Birthday!
Your joyful heart and tender spirit are gifts to the world.

Knitting for Jampaloo

Finally sewed the buttons on the Pebble - "manly baby vest". It knit up super fast and was fun, then it took me at least 2 weeks to add the buttons...


I think it'll be a perfect fall vest for my lotus boy. Some Tenzarelli knitting action is on the needles now (I started to feel guilty about how little knitting I have done for him when he said "what are you making, something else for Dorje?" so I figured it was high time I made something for him.) It's a surprise for his birthday, which comes around the festival of Michaelmas... so a hint... it's something any true knight would need...

Abundance

Late July has felt so full.

The house that love is building



Painted lady butterflies emerging in Tenzarelli's butterfly treehouse


A frog found in the nearby Bark River jumps for glory at Dousman's annual Frog Jump (not the winner - but this big boy did jump TEN feet for Tenzarelli!)


Jampaloo discovers popsicles (our favorite so far: honeydew with cream, honey and pistachios - and yes, Martha made up that recipe, bless her!)


Baby friends

More baby friends (I can't resist)


Cup Cake Walks with some good pals who missed our Cake Walk at the May Faire.


In just this past week, I've shared stories and laughs and babies with three of the sweetest ladies I know 'round here. PLUS the Shutter Sisters gave me a picture of HOPE to hang in the studio that is under construction in that new house that love is building.

AND I have 5 pounds of blueberries in my refrigerator. 'Nuff said.

The Way It Is

This poem by William Stafford

The Way It Is

There's a thread you follow. It goes

among

things that change. But it doesn't

change.

People wonder about what you are

pursuing.

You have to explain about the thread.

But it is hard for others to see.

While you hold it you can't get lost.

Tragedies happen; people get hurt

or die; and you suffer and get old.

Nothing you do can stop time's

unfolding.

You don't ever let go of the thread.