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mystical michigan

October 17, 2008 by Rachel

AVA: Mama, have you ever thought about moving to Michigan?

MAMA: No. Why?

AVA: Cause that’s where the unicorns live.

MAMA: Unicorns live in Michigan?

AVA: Yes, Mama, it’s a faraway land. And that’s where all the unicorns live in the faraway land at Michigan.

MAMA: Unicorns?

AVA: Uh-huh. They have the things on their heads that light up and then they change colors. They can change colors lots of times. It’s really true. And they live in Michigan cause it’s a faraway land. It’s like Romania. It’s really close to Romania, isn’t it?

MAMA: No, actually it’s not. Michigan is kind of close to Minnesota. And Romania is kind of close to France where Grandma Penny is. So, they’re not close.

AVA: Yes, they are, Mama. And I know why God gave them the things on their heads that light up. It’s so they know where to go. Cause they have to go to Romania and then if they go the wrong way the thing lights up and then they know they are going the wrong way. See, isn’t it so good that God gave them that?

Posted in the ones about ava, the ones about badgers & friends | 6 Comments »

raising royalty

October 15, 2008 by Rachel

Each fall Ava’s preschool sends home a star-shaped questionnaire for the parents to fill out and the child to decorate. In the center of the star is a spot for the child’s picture and each point has a question.

The top of the star reads: “When I grow up….”

Last year Ava responded that she wanted to drink pop and be a good girl.

Tonight she tilted her head to the right and said, “I wanna be queen.”

Perhaps that explains this.

And here I thought she was a wannabe mountain-climber in the land of lakes.

Posted in Uncategorized | 8 Comments »

maker of the mountains

October 13, 2008 by Rachel

“I lift my eyes up to the mountains

where does my help come home?

My help comes from you

maker of heaven and earth”

–Psalm 121:1-2

The story of my childhood was played out at the foothills and crests of the magnificent Rockies. When my family exchanged the forests of Montana for the desert of New Mexico everything about my surroundings changed except the presence of mountains. Great, glorious mountains. They were ever-present, ever-visible. It as if the giant spires are the bookends of the earliest chapters of my life.

In middle school the landscape of the playground was always changing. Each day, I needed a new map to navigate the fluctuating friendships and relationships. As the circles of friends rotated, there were days when I stepped into our station wagon feeling the strain of a day in the shadows.

And each of those days, I would be lean my head against glass and gaze up at the purple peaks of the Organ mountains. Then one day I realized that the mountains never changed. They never shifted. They never crumbled. They were there before I was and would be after I wasn’t.  They were unaffected by the climate on the playground. They did not reflect the trends of the morning or change allegiance to whatever alpha girl was wearing the crown that day.

As I lifted my mind to it’s peak and I realized that the God that made the mountains is greater than the mountains. They were strong and unshakable, because he is strong and unshakable. My help came from one who is vast, transcendent, and not shaken by the storms that brew in the valley. And while the mountains could not see me, their maker knew me and loved me. I did not need to place my hope or security on the shifting sands of the desert play yard, but could build my hope on the one who made the mountains.

The misty melodrama of seventh grade has long since evaporated and I have passed through much greater storms. The truth, however, that was pressed into my heart as my head pressed a pane of moving glass has risen high in my soul. There is a God that promises to be my keeper, my guard, my protector.

Each time I see the mountains, I find that they are an altar leading me upward to worship that one that made them. The Lord, the maker of heaven and earth, is my protector. Blessed be his glorious name.

Posted in Uncategorized | 7 Comments »

fashion faux pas

October 1, 2008 by Rachel

Yesterday, when I picked Ava up from preschool, her teacher glanced up from the line of children and said, “I’m sorry. Ava and her friend got a bit carried away with the paint today and I didn’t get a chance to clean them up.”

The fact that my daughter was sporting blue whiskers had already tipped me off to this point.

“That’s okay, ” I said, happy to know that she had been painting and thinking that a warm washcloth would wipe all evidence of this creative experiment.

Oh, I was naive.

As we walked out to the car, I asked Ava what she had been painting that had turned her hands and face so blue.

“This Mama, look,” she said holding out her skirt.

I look down and gasped. Ava’s dress looked like it had been in a paint ball tournament and has lost. Badly.

How was I supposed to know that the art project WAS Ava’s dress?

“See, Mama, the blue paint made my red dress purple. I think it’s so pretty, don’t you?”

Hmmm, no.

I distinctly remember not looking for a dress designed by Jackson Pollock while shopping at Land’s End last fall.

When we got home she quickly shed her altered dress as she is always game for a costume change. I sprayed Shout on the wearable art and sent it down the shoot to await it’s fate. Then I leaned against the wall, crossed my arms, and contemplated how best to handle this situation.

I want her to have the freedom to play, to experiment, to get dirty, but I also want to teach her to be a good steward to what has been given to her. Flinging paint on a dress crosses the line from accidentally dripping paint on a dress while flinging it on paper.

I know that the conventional wisdom of parenting suggests that consequences should be given in close proximity of the offense. We talked in great length about the importance taking care of our things. And lest any of you assume that she didn’t know that she shouldn’t paint on her dress, let me assure you she was most adamant that she knew that this was the wrong thing to do. However, I couldn’t think of a fitting consequence and so the day wrapped up with little less than a scolding and a still disgruntled mama.

This morning when she came marching out into the kitchen in a pink twirly skirt and a purple shirt with ruffles, it became all too clear what needed to be done. I sent her back into her room for some uglier clothes.

As I handed her a plain gray t-shirt we use for painting projects and a faded pair of jeans, I explained that she couldn’t wear her pretty clothes to school because she painted on her dress yesterday.

“Not ever in my whole life?” She gasped as she fell into a heap of despair and then quickly crossed her arms and declared, “When I’m eight I’m going to wear this everyday!”

Because clearly, every consequence I dole out has an eternal value. And by eternal, it ends at age eight.

“Well, Ava if you are still painting your clothes when you are eight then you still have to wear ugly clothes. But if you learn to take care of your clothes and paint on paper, then you can wear pretty clothes to school.”

“But I can’t wear that! It’s so uh-guh-ly!”

I put the clothes on her bed and explained that if she wanted to go to school this is what she was wearing.

“Well, then, I’m not going to ever paint on my ugly clothes, at all!”

Perfect. That’s precisely what I was going for.

I have to admit it felt strange sending her into school in an outfit previously reserved for wall painting and worm relocating.

Then I remembered that this was preschool. And those activities could very likely be today’s activities.

Posted in the ones about ava | 14 Comments »

bring out the spice

October 1, 2008 by Rachel

I love to cook. I don’t love to knock over every jar in my cupboard to shake out a little rosemary and thyme. And I am slight of stature, which make it difficult to see in the back spaces of upper cabinets.

For years, I tried different spice organization tips. I tried the stair-step tray. I tried the spinning wheel.  These both required either a step stool or arm extenders. Then a neighbor recommended stashing the spices in a drawer and taking a sharpie to their lids. That work fine until we moved to a home with too few drawers.

Two Decembers ago, I was peeling a Christmas clementine while staring at it’s crate. I don’t know what it is about those little wooden boxes, but I love them. I always want to find some good purpose for them.

Before I had finished spitting out all the seeds, I was loading cumin and coriander into the crate.

Now instead of trying to reach the unseen spices, the spice rack comes to me.

The spices are arranged alphabetically. So even if the name’s not written on the lid, they are easy to find.

Works for me!

Posted in the ones about cooking | 11 Comments »

on my mind

September 29, 2008 by Rachel

Phew I have so many little insignificant things to tell you that I don’t know where to start. The trouble with gorgeous weather of any kind is that it calls me outside and offline. And now that I’m online, I can’t think of how to get through all the past post ideas in my brain and proceed to the present.

So I’m going to take a cue from my friend, Lizz at And So Is My Heart and subject you to a brain dump.

…

This very same Lizz gave me my first bloggy award ever!

I blushed and grinned and felt all warm and happy in my heart. Her kind words were even greater than the award, especially since I am a big fan of her blog.

The best part of this award is that I get to pass it on. This is tough as I read a lot of great blogs. This one has to go to Mental Terresse, one of my favorite haunts. Her posts are like gems, rare and beautiful. Each facet is carefully crafted. When I see her in my Google Reader, I wait until I know that I won’t be interrupted so that I can savor her writing. I especially admire how she intertwines lessons from her life with beautiful works of art. And I would be completely remiss if I didn’t point all of you to this post. It’s one of my absolute favorites.

…

I’ve come back to this century! I have a cell phone and not just any cell phone, a wi-fi phone, which I think puts me smack dab in the middle of now.

The best part is that Shanel is talking to me again. It was a little touch and go there for awhile, but we are once again connected at the ear.

And after jiggling about some crumbling, antiquated wires in our basement, HungryMan fixed our landline too. However, he then decided that landlines are so last century, hence the paper wires, and that we didn’t really need three phones.

We said goodbye to Qwest and hello to wi-fi. And if you don’t count speaker wire, which I do, we have fully merged into the wireless generation. So don’t trying calling my home number, cause that number is now homeless.

…

Oh, so your menu planning tips were so helpful. Primarily for kicking me in the pants.

You will be happy to know or at least I think you will be, that thanks to all of you and your marvelous ideas I have meals planned and purchased through the middle of next week.

I especially like the idea of saving menu’s for future months and making many meals on the weekend and eating them throughout the week.

One of the best tips that I got was from my friend, Tiffany. She has made her own cookbook with binder and plastic sheet protectors. Instead of saving too many magazines with good recipes in them, she tears the recipes out and puts them in the binder. Brilliant. And instead of stashing online recipe print-outs who knows where, she puts those in the binder too. Again, brilliant.

So I went right home and tore up my beloved issues of Real Simple and Cottage Living. And I sorted through my stash of online print-outs. I now have a binder full of our family’s favorites. I couldn’t bring myself to tear up my Everyday Food collection. I was a pioneer member back in 2003 and have a whole color coordinated set. I have organized them by month, because I too love to make what’s in season. I have been indexing my favorite recipes to make finding them easier.

This post is just riveting, I know.

…

And while I’m at, I let you know that I’ve gone into organizing overdrive. This, in addition to my keen attention to the outdoor weather, has kept me far away from the keyboard.

The amount of upheaval in our home has caused Ava to suspect that leprechauns have reappeared. Of course the two-inch men are now being blamed for mischief caused by a forty-two-inch sprite. I’ve set out traps. It remains to be seen who will get caught, but I’m going to put money on the one with pigtails.

…

Early this summer, HungryMan rolled out some new grass on the base of our front lawn. It was green and lush and wonderful until the clouds rolled away. We had weeks of scorching sunshine. Which is great, if you love to go to the beach. But it’s not so great if you trying to transform your lawn from an eyesore to a lush meadow.

Where we once had grass, we now have shredded wheat.

Bring your shears and bit of brown sugar and you will nearly have the breakfast of champions.

On Saturday, HungryMan rolled up the scorched sod and sowed grass seed, while Ava performed search and rescue on the worm community. After establishing a relocation shelter for the displaced worm families, she gave me a tour of the facilities and introduced me to some of the residents.

“Mama, look. This is the daddy worm. He’s the biggest!”

“Worms are good for the earth, Mama. Did you know that? Did you know that? They’re good for the earth. It’s really true.”

…

Last week, Ava and I drove with our friends to see Sarah Palin and John McCain at a rally north of here. We the mamas thought it would a great opportunity for the girls to get a glimpse of the political process in our country and for them to see a potential president. As it turned out nearly every other person in the Twin Cities had the same Friday morning agenda.

Surprisingly from our stellar vantage point, we neither saw nor heard McCain or Palin. I was told by a very tall man with stilts for legs that the candidates were somewhere under the “N” in Palin. Ten point if you can find them.

Ava and her friend’s educational experience was reduced to a greater than/less than lesson conducted with diminishing pieces of a Cliff Bar.

While we weren’t able to hear the candidates’ speeches, we did get quite an earful from protesters.

Taking the above photograph proved to be the tactical error of the morning.

“Look! There goes a WAL-MART FAMILY,” a man yelled at me as soon as I snapped the photo. Others joined his taunt sending Ava and I marching to the beat of “Wal-Mart family! Wal-Mart family! Wal-Mart family!” Just as we were turning away from them, another one hollered, “Hey! Where’d ya get that backpack Wal-Mart family?!?”

Evidently they weren’t too familiar with my blog. Or maybe they were and knew that was an insult that would stick.

…

Last Wednesday morning, Ava and I were about to leave for preschool when she turned and dashed back to her room.

“Oh Mama, I forgot. I’m supposed to wear three necklaces today,” she said as I walked in on her throwing everything out of her accessory drawer.

“Why are you supposed to wear three necklaces?”

“Cause Sarah and I are going to wear three necklaces today.”

“Sarah and you are going to wear three necklaces today?”

“Yes, Mama. I already told you,” she said as she grabbed my hand to go out to the car.

On the way to preschool she gave me the long version of a short story. While riding home on the bus from the apple orchard, Ava and her friend had made a pact to wear three necklaces.

Of course, I wasn’t sure if this explanation was true or not as it came from the same child that had found a leprechaun in her bedroom that very morning. He was a very kind leprechaun, who liked to sit in Ava’s hand and tell her stories. She tried to put him in a jar, but somehow he ran away. “It’s really the truth. It wasn’t a dream at all!”

We walked into Ava’s classroom and Sarah came running up to us with three strands of beads bouncing about her neck.

Who knew coordinating outfits began at four?

…

Well my mind feels relieved; I hope yours has survived this too long post. Apparently Ava’s not the only one that prefers the long version. But you already knew that, didn’t you?

Posted in the ones about ava, the ones about merriment, the ones for fun | 17 Comments »

falling for autumn, take two

September 24, 2008 by Rachel

So as I was saying, I’m falling for autumn or at least this autumn.

The past week and half the temperatures have hung lazily at 75 degrees.

Each day promises to be the last of sundress weather.

And I am powerless to the beckoning of sunshine. I can no more stay inside than I can go outside when the sun hibernates.

On Sunday we celebrated the last day of summer by not picking apples.

Unless you count the ones that were already on the ground (and the two or three that Ava prematurely pulled off the the tree).

Of course we and our friends drove out to the orchard with every intention of picking a bushel of apples, but apparently we weren’t the only that were enticed by late summer sunshine. All the ripe apples had been picked for the day. So we picked hand-fulls of clover instead.

While this compromise was appealing to little girls who found clover crowns

and clover chains to be a “cute” accessory,

clover brats and baked clover crisp are not very enticing. Unless you happen to be a goat.

Thankfully there was an apple concession stand to save Hungryman and his co-horts from starving.

Or eating clover.

We finished our outing by picking pre-picked apples out of giant bins and eating hot apple crisp.

Perhaps fall is a warm and scrumptious after all.

I think it’s time for me to let go of sweet summer and fall into the crimson hues of autumn.

As for our friends, they are following the sun west to L.A.

I’ll miss them and the sun.

Posted in the ones about friends, the ones about merriment | 14 Comments »

falling for autumn

September 23, 2008 by Rachel

Can it be? Can I actually be falling for the season that precedes winter?

Well, I’d love to tell you about it, however, WordPress is punishing me for not posting for nearly two weeks–the nerve! It is refusing to post the rest of these pictures and the story that goes with them. I will wrestle with WordPress again tonight. Stay tuned–I’ve missed you!

Posted in Uncategorized | 7 Comments »

the sun still shines

September 10, 2008 by Rachel

when you are wearing a hoodie. It’s true.

Though if you would have told me that yesterday, I would have denied it.

And after one day of wear, your jeans relax and remind you why there are your favorite. Also a mug of hot tea warms cold fingers.

Yesterday I was too busy complaining to be bothered with such truths. And my fingers were too occupied with researching warm locations to relocate to to wrap themselves around a cup of tea.

I have to admit that a bowl of pumpkin soup sounds down right savory now.

Though yesterday I would have stuck out my tongue.

And while I loathed to let go of our weekly trips to the beach, dropping Ava off at preschool does have a few intrinsic rewards. Primarily two and half hours of uninterrupted quiet space.

There is nothing like raising an overly extroverted child to drive you to introversion. Or reclusion.

And while I’m still not excited about nine months of goosebumps, I am thankful for a closet for a coats that will keep me from hibernating or hiding. Even more so, I’m thankful for summer-soaked memories that will warm my heart long after the sun retreats.

So I’m going to wrap up in my khaki trench coat and redeem my thirteen days of summer here by recalling that moments that made this summer amazing.

Posted in the ones about the cold | 11 Comments »

i am a willow when summer is over

September 8, 2008 by Rachel

I’m a fan of William Carlos Williams. His Willow Poem is not only one of my favorites, it’s the sum and total of my thoughts regarding the current shifting of seasons.

It is a willow when summer is over,

a willow by the river from which no leaf has fallen nor

bitten by the sun

turned orange or crimson.

The leaves cling and grow paler,

swing and grow paler,

they are so cool, so drunk with

the swirl of the wind and of the river–

oblivious to winter,

the last to let go and fall

into the water and on the ground.

…

Oh, summer I don’t want to let go.

The air has grown teeth, and I have traded summer skirts for restrictive pants. Ava’s preschool opened its doors and she rushed right in.

The apples are ripe for picking and this seasons pumpkins have made their debut at the farmer’s market.

Yet, I want to hold out my hand and stop the fall. I want to pull my down comforter over my head and pretend its the summer air beckoning me out for another walk around the lake. I want to soak in a few more skeins of sun to knit myself a sweater before the cold winds blow.

The calendar promises fourteen more days of summer.  Does anyone know where I can go to redeem those?

Posted in Uncategorized | 8 Comments »

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