The month ahead...

The month of december is always a favorite of mine. So much to do, see and make! It always comes fast after thanksgiving and I'm usually quite behind in my planning and preparing feeling like I need a break after thanksgiving before jumping in to Christmas. But after an impromptu trip up north for thanksgiving, I returned feeling ready to plan December, because planning always seems to make things seem less chaotic ( such profound thoughts I have!) anyway... Today I spent some time planning out our advent calendar. This is where planning can be a good thing since last year the advent didn't make it into our days. There were a few blogging mamas that posted there lists for their calendars and they inspired me to get on the ball. Each little tin will have a slip of paper or a gold chocolate coin. On each piece of paper will be something to do, or make or see. Giving us a little bit each day to enjoy the season, do some merry making, and be together. I'm excited about it, one of the first things will be tickets to a play in Philly that my sister and I have been talking about taking them to: Charlottes Web! Should be fun and a great way to start off the month.

Last week...

Last week I:

Planted in my garden
Sat in a quiet house with a hot cup of coffee and a good magazine
Washed what seemed like a hunded loads of laundry
Felt the urge to purge, so I'm going with it

Enjoyed seeing our tent set up in our front yard for a few days
Missed writing in this little space

Drank a lot of coffee

Bought a cozy for my french press

Went to 4 baseball games, and saw my son hit his first triple!

Decided I really need to pick my knitting needles up again

Decided my sewing machine has been neglected for too long as well

Discovered this band via this most lovely blog

Visited Terrain and sought and found inspiration

Made a Strawberry~Rhubarb pie to share with friends

Played musical beds

Heres to another great week!

Happy Monday!

This moment...

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

{via soulemama}

signs of spring....

As we settle in back home with unpacking, laundry, cleaning, and finding our spaces again in our house, the kids have been spending a lot of time outside.

The signs of spring that we are all finding are making our transition a little bit easier. I am thankful for the timing of our trip, knowing that the cold winter is behind us and the darkness is quickly turning to light but still giving us a wee bit of time to prepare for spring.

The weather is still in its confused state, bouncing from cold and cloudy to sunny and mild even in the same day. Today is cold but the air is refreshing and it's not stopping the kids from venturing out and playing.

The cold days will soon be behind us and the warmth of the sun will return, the grass will turn green once again, the flowers blooming, and the garden will grow in size, with a season under our belts now I feel more confident in our growing this year, even a bit ambitious. Soon the indoor play will be replaced with mostly outdoor play and weeding and sowing of seeds, and planting of flowers and bushes and smalls veggie plants.

Soon our schoolwork will be taken outdoors to the shady spot under out cherry tree. Soon baseball season will begin to interrupt our evening dinners and Saturday mornings, and with two players this year, Mama and Dada will be stretched just a wee bit in juggling schedules (though hopefully not too much!)

We are noticing the small changes now the small bursts of color that are beginning to peek out from the brown dirt, the greens, purples, whites, yellows are all catching our eyes, and we are giddy to see such beautiful colors, such is the way with the seasons, they allow us to be excited about the same things year after year, season after season. They allow to see the same thing with a newfound appreciation each time. The cold snowy winters allow us to be thankful for the warm sun and colorful pops of color showing through the dirt, just as the hot sun, and dying grass allows us to marvel at the bursts of color of the leaves on the trees and the fresh cool air beginning to blow, which allows us to marvel at the first snowflakes falling from the sky coating everything with their tiny specks of crystallized drops of water. Truly we are blessed with the change of seasons and as much as I loved visiting Florida and soaking up the sun and the beach, I wouldn't trade it and miss the seasonal changes we get to experience month after month.

So as we wait for spring to fully arrive, we will soak up this quiet, this time of rest before our days are once again busy and full of work and play and in between.

home...

It's Thursday morning, the kids are playing with Legos, Eliza is on my lap (correction "was"), and I am taking advantage of this quiet moment to write. We left Florida Tuesday morning early, really early 415am early, plopped our still drowsy littles in the car, said our goodbye and headed North. The all fell back asleep quickly and the ride was quiet and peaceful. The stars were out and out my window was a very bright one, I made some attempts to figure out if it was a start or planet but came up empty... As the miles past by us, my thoughts turned to our 3.5 week stay...to our transition back home, to starting back up with our schooling, to the spring planning that will begin, to ordering seeds, to spring cleaning to how I'll miss that warm sunshine state and my mom.

We made 5 stops that day and at 930 that night we pulled into our driveway here in Delaware. 17.5 hours from Venice Fl to Wilmington De, we are crazy, I know. But the kids were great a few moment here and there, but they read books, played games on the computer and Daddy's phone took naps, and watched a couple movies...so we pushed on. Darkness turned to light and light turned to darkness and we were home, and the kids crawled into their beds (two in our bed) with big smiles on their faces happy to be home.

Delaware greeted us with dark, cloudy and cool skies yesterday and today a dark cloudy rainy day is what we were greeted with. Yesterday I struggled with the weather, the transition, all the things that need to be done, the unpacking, the cleaning, and the list went on. Today Michael Franti is playing throughout the house, there is giant rainbow hanging on my wall, a person with a giant smile hanging up too, the kids are playing and happy, and when I look out the window and see the rain pouring down I know that spring is near, and that means warm weather sunny skies, flowers, playing outside, picnics, baseball season (with two players this year!) and our garden. All of which are making me happy. So today while the rains come down I will be thankful for our time spent in Florida, for the break we had from the winter here, for the sunshine and beach we had, for time spent with Noni, and for all the wonderful things the rains will bring to us.

thankful too of course that we are all back together again....

family....

Jaden, Annie and Eliza with their Great Nana and Grandpa...

a walk is never just a walk...

It's an Adventure!!

We loaded up the stroller and the bikes yesterday to head out for a walk along the intercoastal near my moms house.


We were searching the water for manatees and the mound of grass/dirt beside for gopher turtles. There are all these poles stuck into the ground and beside each one is a gopher turtle hole...it just so happened that almost all of the holes had turtles peeking out of them! Which was so fun, especially since Eliza is obsessed with turtles, seeing them, saying their name...which started back in Delaware and continued on here as Noni is a turtle lover and has them all over here house.


This turtle stopped traffic as it crossed the walkway to get some grass for nibbling. We watched it for a bit, all the while holding Eliza back from running up to it and quite likely picking it up on the spot without much thought.

off trail searching....

sisterly love..holding hands...trying to keep Eliza on the right side..lots of bikes going past us!




after both girls got tired and Annie decided she was done riding her bike and Eliza was just not willing to share the only "seat" in the front...a bit of creativity was needed as I needed one hand to push a stroller and one hand to pull a bike and no hands left to keep the youngest from running into gopher turtle holes and/or into the path of the bikes..Also Annie was just refusing to walk.so on top of the stroller Eliza went, quite happily too!

We were right next to the airport and as we headed back the planes we flying right over our heads as they flew in to land. So cool! The kids loved watching them fly over us we could almost see inside the cockpit!

the kids had fun but we were definitely tired by the end...

beach day...

As the temperatures continue to rise so do the daily requests to go to the beach. This Moma is not a beach lady. In fact I actually find it odd that I am not a beach lover, as I grew up on the beach living just 5 miles from a hidden, secluded, pristine and beautiful beach called Cranes beach up on the North Shore in Ipswich, Ma. We spent many a summer there, long walks in the evening and even walks in the morning were always the norm. But there was always something about the texture of the beach that didn't quite mesh with me. The sand, sticking to your feet, hands, face and every other body part in between, the sandy sandwiches and sandy car ride home...the salt water and the water I would get the chills after a hot day at the beach mixed with the cool ocean breeze...it really wasn't my thing. BUT my kids love it, and since we are regular beach growers up in Delaware it is a treat for them here in Florida to have beaches within walking distance and or a short drive up the road.

There is one particular beach Caspersen that is famous for it's sharks teeth that roll in on the waves and onto the shore. People dig with special diggers as if panning for gold, all day every day, looking and hoping to find some teeth. The shark teeth we are told are from millions of years ago and for some reason are found quite specifically on this beach. I will post some pictures tomorrow of some of the ones we have found...

On this particular day we went just a bit North to Siesta key beach which has the most beautiful white sand beach....that is made up of quartz crystals. My mom says it is one of the vortex's and is one reason why this are is so full of alternative minded folks they are drawn to the area. The sand is so soft and really quite lovely....for some reason one of my lenses was producing a very strange washed out shot, that I had not realized till after we came home...Some of them are very white and others not as much...it created a very interesting look, very artistic and portrait like...
I played around a bit with my not so great photo app on my computer trying to see what I could come up with to enhance the pictures that were really washed out. One lens was my short range lens with a hood the other was my big long range lens with no hood..any ideas on which was causes the washed out look?? The one without the hood perhaps?

Eliza had a blast...splashing and picking up seaweed running in the waves and running away from the waves....
There was lots of sand castle building, trench digging and drip castle making.

There was also a lot of just squishing our toes into the sand and watching them disappear beneath the sand...

There was lots of water play and making new friends...always new friends every where we go...my children are always introducing and playing with other kids, running and playing and laughing, its good to see.

but there is also plenty of time for their own space when they need it, by themselves...and that's good too.
we were surrounded by beauty, as far as we could see and we took delight in spending the day in the warmth from the sun, the salty ocean (I mean Gulf) air and the sticky but soft sand beneath our toes...and with clear skies and more warm sunny days ahead of us..I see more beach days in our future as well...I am still not a beach person but the joy the beach brings along with happily, content and tired babes I'm working on changing my mind about the beach

Of course the best is when Mama pushes around a tired wee one and between the lull of the waves and the rolling along stroller she falls asleep in a sweet slumber of dreams of water, and the waves and the sand and seashells...

Naps at the beach and after the beach are the best, of course a good cup of coffee is always good (and needed) too.

This moment...

inspired by soulemama

{this moment}

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments for all to find and see.

For the birds..

and the squirrels too...

We decided to put our tree outside and decorate it with some treats for the animals.

Eliza mostly just walked around eating the snow...

We had saved our huge sunflower heads and seed from our garden and had them drying in the garage we took one down got some loose seeds off of it and mixed with some raw sunflower seeds we coated a toilet paper tube with sunflower seed butter (all I had) and rolled it in the seeds, poke a hole in the top strung it with string and voila instant bird feeder.
Annie decided we should stick the big sunflower head on the top like a star..
We had a couple storms come through that left us with a couple inches of snow...and since it has been quite cold it has stuck around which has been nice. We are currently hunkered down while outside the snow falls quickly and quietly, Jaden is hoping for a foot as am I but the weatherman is saying not so much...In the morning we will be greeted with a beautiful view of freshly fallen snow and three children who will be ready to go out within minutes of opening there eyes.
It'll be a good day..a day spent outside and inside and outside and inside. A day of soup and hot chocolate and warm woolies....Ahh love those snow days.

Stopping in...

I thought I pop in on here really quck and say hello! I have a quiet house and a chance to write. my computer appears to be sick...it's running very slowly and so it's a pain to use.

Life has been busy but quiet these days, it's amazing how big of a presence Samson was, without fully realizing it. So we (I) are adjusting to this new quiet without him around, it's not the same to come home to an empty house.

The cold dark November skies are just begining to appear, we have been lucky so far in having a very Sunny but fairly mild Fall. So with the turning of the weather begins the inward turning of our days to the house, the kids go outside as often as they can, and I encourage them to knowing that their days will be limited soon.

I am turning my thoughts to our house, and with one winter past in which I didn't accomplish very much I am planing out my to-do list for the coming days. There are bedrooms that need love and a kitchen that needs reorganzing a laundry room that is doing a terrible job of keeping itself tidy and a garage that needs lots of people to come and take away our unwanted, not needed, too big, to small, stuff~

I'll leave you with a list of things that are inspiring me::

Salt and chocolates inspiration journal

Elizabeth Mitchell's new song

Soulemama's library

this rug

there are more, but alas I am on my husband computer and so I can not remember the links that I have saved on mine....I shall return soon with pictures, I am trying my hardest to remember the camera, sometimes I am so caught up in the moment I forget to capture it on film, but I am trying!

and one last thing, next week will be our first Thanksgiving alone, just the five of us and while I am excited about cooking and alll I am a but sad there will be no family around. I am trying to come up with a menu that includes a little bit of both of our families foods with some new ones too to start our own traditions. What are your favorite foods, traditions for Thanksgiving? I'd love to hear them!

~peace

Missing Sam...

"Samson, Sam, Sammy, Salmon, S-dog"


We laid our Sam to rest this morning, in the backyard. We will plant some flowers soon. It was a strange goodbye, the kids watched the guys digging the hole and Jaden wanted to help. As the dirt was covering him I sensed Jaden's angst and told him it was just his body, his spirit was no longer inside, his life spirit had left his body, he seemed to calm down and decided to help a little after that. I told Annie the same thing and she too seemed calmed.

They both process emotions differently, Jaden bottling up and not expressing or understanding his emotions, Annie opening up and describing word after word She commented to our friend yesterday when he came down to help was that Sammy was "dead. dead." I explained to them that his spirit the part of him that makes him walk and talk, and breathe and eat and be happy had left his body and was now all around us, we just couldn't see it. I told them his heart stopped beating and he stopped breathing and was gone. Simple, but for now it's enough, for them and for me.


I remember bringing him home 10 yrs ago this coming New Years Eve. Wrapped in a blue and white dog bone blanket that we bought on the way, I cuddled him and held him tightly as he shook and trembled the whole way home. He had more energy than we had ever thought, 2am wake ups to run circles in our bedroom through many many months was not exactly what we were expecting! But he was adorable and sweet.

He grew bigger, way bigger than we had ever thought. But he was a good dog, aside from his crazed desire to steal your food, off your plate and even out of your hand, his manners got worse the older he got. But he was a good dog, he loved us and we loved him.



He was a good dog, a protective dog, he was loved and will be missed. but he will always be with us, in our hearts, our minds and by our side, his spirit carrying us through our days, forever.

home again home again....

Well after a 2 week hiatus in which I had planned on posting and putting up pictures, which as you can see did not happen, I am back. We took an originally planned then canceled then back on again trip Westward. The five of us a Great Dane and a suburban! We were bringing our foster doggy Bella back to her owner (jay's boss) out in Wyoming, along with his car. The plan was for the kids and I to stay at Nana and Popa's house while Jay went on to Jackson Hole to drop off dog and car and spend some time with Keith.

The drive out there was fantastic, it took 2 FULL days and then we had just a short 1.5 hour drive on the third day. The ride back was a bit more eventful, with the other suburban we were driving back home broke down just close enough to the off ramp that we were able to roll up the exit and over to the gas station. Were we flagged down a farmer just getting off of work, who called his buddy to come and help, and whom them called the local tower to come get us. The guys could talk! As can Jay and so we spent a hour talking and waiting and talking some more, the kids played in he car all the while. We learned that all those sunflowers they grow are for oil, the weird grain growing that I could not figure out what is was is Millo, which is grown for feed for the cows but apparently is EXCELLENT when cooked like popcorn! We also learned that one Windmill (of the hundred we saw) can produce enough energy to heat 300 homes~ We also learned that Famers in Kansas DO NOT like cars from outside the USA and so thankfully we had a Chevy, otherwise they may have just left us there~ of course Chevy is a gov't engine and so it has it's own issues, one famer was a Ford guy the other a Dodge....The Dodge guy has just recently returned from a stint in...I can't remember but his troop was called upon for the army reserves, he has a wife and 8m old., they are moving back to Ellsworth(the small little Kansas town we broke down in) and he just got a job with one of the farms there. There is something I like about hearing the stories of others. Always seems to bring me back to earth from wherever I seemed to have too. So anyway our "non-hick" town had a hotel, gas station Alco, DQ, Pizza Hut, John Deer supply store, auto body shope and a car dealership (used), of course it was 11 miles from the highway, so we all piled into the front of the tow truck, with kids on laps and drove to our "non-hick" town. We then ate at Pizza Hut, slept in the hotel, then woke had a hotel breakfast, shopped at Alco, and just before we left ate Blizzards and lunch at the DQ! Ahh it was grand....grand i tell you!~ The mechanic had to drive an hour each way to get our parts and thanfully had us on the road again by 12pm the next day. We were thanfull to them all for helping us without a second thought, without wanting anything, just happy to help because they can, they insisted we pay it forward and do the same for someone else, we agreed.

Of course missing aprox. 9 hours of driving time and really throw things off, so to make up for it Jay insisted we drive till midnight that night( remember this is on the way home) I should also state that by breaking down where and when we did, we missed a softball size hail, tornados and lots of wind and rain...so I'm totally cook with breaking down, rather than going through storms.

The rest of our journey was good, crazy at times but good, and we made it home safely around dinner time on the third day....

to be continued.....

sick...

This has been the standard position for the last two days well going on three now. If she's not sprawled out, she's curled into a ball under our sick quilt. Which is in need of mending these days...it's really very much loved!



They girls are sick, sick, sick. Stomach bugs, most likely.Rotavirus perhaps? they are troopers though, both of them. Annie is sleeping the days away waking here and there to attempt to be involved in whatever I am doing...not long after her head is down on whatever object is closest to her and she is back in a haze. Eliza has been her happy, go- lucky self until this afternoon. They've both had it for the last two full days and I am sure it will still be around tomorrow. They are both drinking, little sips of plain water, coconut water, and watermelon juice, and eating a bit of yogurt, baby cereal here and there. Which is good, of course they are throwing most of it up but I think at least some of it is staying down. Trying as best I can to keep them from dehydrating.

Somehow I have had lots of down time (the girls do love to just sleep when they are sick, which is really a blessing, and I am thankful they're bodies know what they need)...and with a bit of a push on my part managed to actually sit at my sewing machine and ease back in to sewing...it's been forever it seems since I sewed something. It's still in the works, both of the projects but I'll get them up here as soon as they are done. They are both projects that I can sit for just a few minutes and get a little bit done each time. Not huge time takers which is good.

The rest of this household, is fighting really hard to keep those germs away from us, especially this mama! Ginger and garlic tea, along with some probiotics are a must!

My computers charger cord got chewed so it's been dead for the last little while, so I haven't downloaded any pictures lately, that will be a good project for today.

shifting...

In the coming days, months you will begin to see more of us here, more of the kids and what we are doing with our days. It will become more of a portfolio of sorts. We have decided to keep Jaden home this year. It just wasn't working, there were too many fights, too many struggles, along with unhappy changes in his behavior, and of course not being able to learn at his pace, at his level and at the intensity he wants to learn at.

There will be planning, much planning on my part, to keep us busy, and some planning on their parts (jaden and annie)so that they are as much a part of it as possible.

There is no official start date, just an easing in. Adding a bit more rhythm to our day as we go

his writings...

a couple more days to to watch
the fireworks that go up and down
a special day for the sky and sun,
it is on it's way,
just three more days for it to come,
for the moon and sun
it will be here,
it is on one day of the year
it is a special day for people
because there really pretty
and people are always watching them
you know what they are
fireworks
I know you know what it was, I was right,
I know it, I know it
YAY!

~Jaden age 6