jael and her pavlova

lately i have become more and more convinced that you don’t succeed in doing anything unless you do it all the time.  otherwise you’re simply dooming your good intentions to failure.  so whenever i get an evil scheme i look for a way to connect it to something else that already happens on a regualr basis.  and since i want jael to grow up proficient in the most effective feminine wile, i made the smooth move to incorporate her baking into grocery planning day.  (instead of the much more elusive and theoretical “someday.”)  she already has her own kid-friendly cookbook collection, so when she sees me getting out my cookbooks on monday, she grabs hers.  she is allowed to pick one recipe and we add it to the shopping list.  which means, sometime during the following week i am cajoled by irresistible nagging into making baked meringue – in the shape of a tutu, named after a ballerina.  end of story.  does she look like she takes no for an answer?

i am going to try the same thing with the boys science experiment book that their grammy got them.  if it’s guaranteed that we have the stuff on hand and they are already looking forward to it, then there really is no resistance.  especially when something is promising to explode.

boys + electric pencil sharpener =

i had to pull one out the other day with tweezers.

memorial day

if no one else has to go to work, i guess neither do i.  it’s only fair.  i spent the whole day in the driveway painting instead. four antique folding chairs, a hutch, cabinet base, kids’ table, two stools, and a hanging shelf.  making for 27 coats of paint all together.  excluding cutting in the bigger pieces between coats and the precursory sanding.  which might be why i am finishing the day with shin splints and a limp.  not to mention a messy kitchen.

however, i love salvage work.  the antique chairs i found alongside the road.  i had to glue and clamp them some as they were starting to delaminate, but they are good as new now.  i had to beat off a half dozen people wanting to buy them.  random cars would pull over, “can i have that?”

“uh, no.”

i found them on the street first, they’re mine.  the aqua paint was a find bequested on me by my mother.  the hutch will go in my all white room and was a generous gift from a friend.  the kids table was $15 on craigslist and i painted it with leftover orange from jael’s dollhouse project.  and the shelf i found at the youth ranch surplus center for a dime, painted leftover green to match the rest of the nursery furniture.  and that my friends, is how you do “eclectic.”  the people on home and garden tv do “gay and obnoxious.”  because, frankly, you can’t buy love.  i actually tried last week – i saw something in a store and bought it.  talk about bad juju.  it went back the next day, now if only i could cleanse my conscience.  moral of the story, never let being “strapped for cash” be an excuse to not make your house your home.  because it is quite the other way around.  money is the root of all evil as well as soulless decorating.

it just comes naturally

yes, that’s my son.  what’s he doing up there?

reading.  what’s he doing right now?  reading in bed with his flash light.  i’m pretty sure.

still, i think this brings us to an all time low in his history of reading multi-tasking.  or high….

i’m just impressed with how comfortable all the children are getting up in the tree.  daddy hoists them to the top and then they lower themselves down at their leisure.  gideon came down on this branch and walked out to the end of it as if it were a sidewalk.  when you’re up there, moving horizontally is much trickier than it looks.  ”out on a limb,” so to speak.  some day they will make their daddy and granddaddy proud.  and their grandmothers nervous.

malmesbury

this was one of my favorite places.  i think it was the copious amounts of shopping all crammed together in lopsided fashion.  marc and i squeezed into a store as big as our laundry room, with 6 other people, two shop attendants, and twenty pairs of wellingtons.  it was not exactly your typical walmart experience.  (all that acreage and the place still makes me claustrophobic.)

notice the mirror on the corner?  we didn’t realize what it was for until we got to the corner and had the sneaking suspicion we were all going to die from an imminent collision.  those brits are clever.  and so safe.

a dreamy window display.  it seems obvious to me now that i should have bought that dress.

in the center of town is some righteous gazebo.

it kind of marks the entrance to the church green and the abbey.

or what’s left of it.

here is a drawing of what it would have looked like in the 14th century, before it fell over.  which, frankly, sounds rather dangerous.  whose idea was it to stack rocks that high in the first place?

a volunteer at the abbey was telling us how all the carvings would have originally been painted in bright colors, making the place the epitome of stunning.  i didn’t believe him.  then he told us about the “church of the holy innocents” in highnam, which still retains all of it’s interior paintings.  you know, if i ever wanted to see it for myself, ye of little faith.  i googled it instead.  and what do you know, jesus decorates like i do!  and you all thought i wasn’t classy.  ha!  i guess it was the trend with a lot of the medieval cathedrals.  they limed them up and then went all vegas on them.  here is a link to amiens cathedral where they have rigged up a complicated lighting system to project the colors onto the facade.  if you thought christianity was somber, think again.

a display of flowers in the alcove.  the abbey was probably the most hospitable place we visited and also the warmest.  i don’t know how they heated that whole place, but it was quite divine.

the interior.  i like to think of it all done up in pinks, teals, and oranges.  now that he’s got me going, i won’t know when to stop.

i have no idea what the little room was up there, but it is rather irresistible.  i want up.

tomb of king athelstan.

stained glass window.  i’m just amazed that after they had a storm that knocked over half the building that they still have stained glass windows to show for themselves.

and you know what, i bet all that woodwork was painted too.  cuz it’s not a sin, see.  and i can paint all the antique, carved, boring, dark wood furniture i want to.  mother. ♥

my favorite; the nursery.

it’s like a little cell for children.  darling.

on the way out we were shown the tombstone of hannah twynnoy.  a barmaid who was ate up by a tiger and then eulogized?

it really was the cutest little town.  albeit a little crowded, but i think that was because it was a bank holiday.  this is one of the places i would go back to.  much more authentic than london, which was more like visiting india.  even though we did love the food.  mmm…indian food.

i’m still amazed my husband got us out alive.  try driving on the wrong side of the road in a rabbit warren of alleys at 40 miles an hour.

(sorry mom, when we move i don’t know if you’ll be able to visit us without having a panic attack.  i couldn’t help but think of you.  in fact, i can just see you gripping your office chair as you watched the video.  totally called it, didn’t i?)

a little bad funny

i bumped into these the other day and thought they were (unfortunately) rather keen.  what might be even sadder is how well ryan gossling represents the long-suffering, homeschooling dad.  i think they like to give us a wide berth simply for fear of us saying, “fine, you do it.”  but really, it might be to their benefit if they just beat us once in a while.

or, in my case, “it’s 6:30, which kid have i forgot to pick up from soccer?”

my boys just finished their trench last week and moved on to another one under the tree.  which my husband, only this morning, kindly asked me to have them fill in.

i can’t wait until i have a 15 passenger van.  i want a sprinter, but i would totally drive around in an airbrushed shag wagon.

seriously, all the time.  and my husband usually can match the recipe to the friend.  ”have you been hanging out with kimberly again?”

if only there was a way to do this without me having to learn the progression of the kingdoms in egypt…i would be soooo happy.

a constant worry.  someone pulled over the other day to tell me that my daughter was on the roof of the truck.  frankly, i could care less.  but the neighbors…gah.

try 40.

or, as i’m fond of saying, “i’ll stay here and whip out my handy bench scraper on the post-dinner table, floor, highchair, wall – you flee while you still can.”  love it.  however, the rest of them were really bad.  do homeschool moms stay in their pajamas until noon, substitute documentaries for school, avoid math like the plague, don’t do their hair, or the laundry, and serve cheerios for dinner as a majority?”  tell me it isn’t true.  if that is a common flaw i would suggest it’s a simple inversion of priorities.  children are not first, your husband is.  and thankfully, he doesn’t ask for much.  make love and dinner.  (taking the time to look nice is a simple indicative of the former.)  honor your husband first and then mess up his house and spend all of his money on over-priced and under-used curriculum.  at which point, he could really care less.  it’s all about strategy.  but really, reading all these gave me the impression of homeschool moms as a flock of weak-willed women chasing the latest theory and trampling their heads in the process.  i’m just thinking we can do better.  so when you read these, don’t take them as an excuse, but a challenge.  homeschooling deserves a much higher image because it truly is a high calling.  girl.

the ol’ blog

blog birthdays are kind of hard to keep track of.  sometime in may i always get a sneaking suspicion.  it’s a good thing it’s not a child otherwise it would be offended right about now.  (although i must say, it wasn’t as bad as last year.  i think i missed it by four months.)  so, in keeping with tradition, i’m going to belatedly give something away.

it’s what i call “music to clean toilets by.”  plus, she’s just dang cute.

i listen to music after lunch as a nap alternative.  someone has to clean the kitchen.  the kids go out for recess and i break out the “gangsta nancy sinatra.”  otherwise i would succumb to gravity.  and so far, that’s the only reason i ever listen to music.  jogging and cleaning toilets.  so if you need help in any of those areas, consider this the girl for you.  leave me a comment, preferably telling me what music you disinfect by, and i’ll draw next thursday.  *m

bibury

we did get to swing by the village of bibury after all.  one of the numerous quaint spots in the cotswolds, “an area of outstanding natural beauty.”  it’s true.  i think if we were ever able to go back i would love to take the children on a walking holiday.  there are 100′s of miles of trails in the cotswolds, linking all the little old towns together.  dreamy.

i also decided to get a sheep.

here i am trying to adjust to the fact that i’m not in a desert anymore.  the english are all frigid.

these little towns even had their own churches and schools.  it took me a while to figure out that people actually lived here.  so not fair.

i kept on wondering if living surrounded by such sickening cuteness led to any kind of dementia.

at the top of the hill was a beautiful house up a private drive with a whole pasture for a yard, wonderful views, and i took you a picture of their pump house.

boy took a picture of gutters.  these are actually on arlington row.

the famous weavers cottages.  perhaps the most photographed spot in england.  and people still live in them.  entirely indifferent to the fact that i don’t.

the view up the street and what i would call a “lucky duck,” right there in the center.

they are streets by the way.  you kind of have to climb the retaining walls when a car comes through.

one of the cottages.

so they cram everything together, make the roads no bigger than sidewalks, and then keep a herd of sheep in their front yard.  because look at all that room.  my favorite are the country roads, where you have to pull over for cyclists, while there is nothing but pasture as far as the eye can see.  i wouldn’t change a thing.

here is the house that went with the sheep.

the end of the road.

arlington row again.

i need to get my husband to carve my name in stone.  i would like that.  except i’m sure his thoughts would go another direction entirely.

steps down to the stream.

and a parting shot from the car.

all in all, if i could ever go back, i envision traipsing through countryside followed by a trail of chidren all wondering “are we’re there yet?”  a host of little villages, tea shops, and picnics.  that would be perfect.  whatever you do, don’t go to london, and don’t drive anywhere.  you might die.

a little twisted sister

people often ask me about homebirth.  to which i reply, “ew.”

i suffer no romantic notions about the subject.  yet, upon consideration, there is one thing that would cause me to give birth the old fashioned way, and that is sticking it to the man.  seriously.  when we had baby rabies we were under the mistaken impression we had maternity coverage.  which means when they handed us our baby there was a $15,000 price tag tied to her toe.  nothing like extortion to make you realize your husband could very well have caught the thing at home in the tub.  the whole experience made me think twice about insurance.  there i was, going my merry way, thinking that having a baby only cost $5,000.  you know, that’s reasonable.  i’m sure the kid’s worth it.  but $15,000?  like hell, someone go out back and find me a stick to clench between my teeth.  i’m not going to stand for it.  the fact of the matter is that people don’t like being had, or more particularly, being overcharged.  yet i suspect we endure any number of indignities in the name of “deductibles.”  you don’t have to pay for it, so you don’t care.  only i suspect if you did, you would.

why is medical care so expensive?  it’s not because it’s private and free market driven, that’s for sure.  it’s because indolent americans teeter around imagining doctor’s visits are only $20 and prescriptions $10.  it’s because our medicine is socialized already.  i find it humorous that many think they can fix the problem by making it more so.  genius.  let me suggest you just tell them where to get off instead.  try that.  recently marc and i switched to samaritan international, which is a health cost sharing ministry where christians help pay each other’s medical bills.  i know, go figure.  i didn’t realize it, but there are any number of programs like this.  some are more reminiscent of traditional insurance than others.  this one isn’t.  like i said, i’m feeling frisky.  my favorite thing is the $300 deductible.  that’s more like it.  feeling snuffly?  drink some tea and huff some vapo, you’re fine.  or, you know, you could run to the doctor and get some antibiotics.  i’m just betting when you find out how much they cost  you’d rather go to the library and check out “mommy diagnostics“ instead.  face it, would you have otherwise?  i imagine our dependency on modern medicine is mostly rooted in laziness and the lack of necessity to try something else.  i, for one, appreciate the kick in the pants.

the other thing i like is that since samaritan ministries is in fact a “ministry,” it flies under the “government gonna tell ya what to do” radar.  you don’t like paying for other people’s reckless godless lifestyle choices, their abortions, sex reassignment surgeries, contraceptives, sexually transmitted diseases, and voluntary sterilizations?  well too bad, nobody asked you.  ohhhh, you thought insurance was a free and private business?  well it’s not.  as far as i can see, the only dignity left to us is the fact that we can still leave.  write not one more check to the dirty bastards.  you know, while you still can, because someday they’re just going to be taking it out of your taxes.  even though at this rate i doubt we’d notice.  and face it, insurance isn’t that great.  they sucker you in with fear and an imagined lack of options and then take you for what you’ve got.  they even con you into liking it.  don’t we all wish for that government job with posh insurance?  well a school teacher in idaho can pay $900 a month for a family of two.  that’s like a second mortgage.  i have a friend who works in the medical field and was paying $1300 a month for coverage until he told them to die and go to hell.  i’m pretty sure that’s what he said.  i can only imagine the world would be a better place if we all did the same.

so how does it work?  you pay a monthly premium of $150 for singles and $355 for families.  there is a deductible of $300 and needs are publishable up to $250,000.  every month you are assigned a family with a medical need.  you are told who they are, what their problem is, and then you mail them a check in a get well card, signed by your children with smiley faces, who all remember them in their prayers.  no obligation, no contract, no overhead.  just helping out a brother.  and it sure beats selling your soul to blue cross (a.k.a. satan) every month.  on the receiving end, say you have a baby.  you send your bills to samaritan, they parcel them out to families, and within the month you’re receiving money and notes of congratulation in the mail from total strangers.  the upside is that you handle all these bills yourself.  you know what they were for, what you were charged, and you pay them all with actual cash.  green stuff.  crazy.  which means you are more likely to say, “holy cow this place is a rip off.    i’d rather eat my weight in arugula than come back here again.”   amen sister.  i may not run around the block for my figure, but i totally would if it meant i could thwart just one medical professional and the healthcare “industry.”  samaritan ministries, your first step out of the feed lot and into the free world.

p.s.  if you are considering  alternative healthcare coverage and want to read something less snarky and more reliable.  perhaps with the title, “why we chose samaritan health for our family, we love you jesus.”  then just google it.  there are lots of reviews and lots of options out there.  i’m just here to say, i’m totally with the big sexy hair on this one.

$2

for reals.  meet my new teapot.

as i’m fond of saying, hooray for yard sale day!