June Seven

Oof.
Yesterday I was down, friends. (I succumbed for a day to an irritating illness. hmmph.)
I not-so-gallantly waved the white flag.

Today, I am happy to report...
we once again have the Jolly Roger flyin' loud and proud (true story)-- amidst dirty dishes, piles of unorganized dvd's, not put away groceries, and all the other "Mama is out" shambles.
Whatever. We'll deal with that later.
Let's have some fun, shall we?

Oh, wait, before that-- Little Peep is doing verra well, friends. A couple of you voiced concern for him.
We're feeding him waterfowl baby food, he is brought in at night and stuck in a large rubbermaid storage box with a pie dish full of water for swimming, a bowl of water for drinking, a dish of watered-down food, a towel, a teddy for snuggling, and a lamp with a warm bulb to keep him warm overnight.
During the day he is brought out to his tractor (which is on the grass and a patch of clover and contains his cleaned pie dish and food bowl), and gets to swim in the pond and hunt for worms, slugs, and larvae until he is ready to leave.... just like children, friends, little Peep knows when he's done. And, just like children, he lets us know.)
So he's doin' just fine.
My only concern is that he may be deaf from Annabelle gettin' too near a couple of times and barking down his eardrums. Poor darling. (Yes, we try to keep her away.)

On to it!

Trevelyn (funny boy) started out his day as he has sometimes lately-- with a few exaggerated stretches, a diatribe about physical fitness and how he needs to treat his body well and get it going, and then followed up with a few push-ups and other exercises. Cracked me up.

Mama headed directly out to the gardens to collect rose petals for making Rose Petal Beads.I've been in love with this idea since I was about seventeen years old... I met a friends rosary beads that smelled of roses, and she told me they were made from rose petals. I thought that was just about the finest thing ever (and since these were the only Rosary Beads I had ever met, I assumed they all were made of such). So... here I am, twenty-something years later, making rose petal beads.
I don't expect them to be pretty, but I do expect them to be special.
So that's begun.

I lost my dang spindle the other day.
I suspect Maddie has put it somewhere.... but it's been days and I still haven't found it. Well. We have wool to dye and roving to spin and yarn to make for our Earth Scout belts. So what to do?
Make spindles, of course.Check!
That would be two with heavy wooden knobs, one with knob for Mama, one dinosuar/poly, and one pink kitty/footprint poly(mer).
And I discovered today that one can spin yarn upon a tabletop. Cool.

What else?
Responsibilities with the Peep.
The babes are learning to take him (/her) from the tractor and place him into the pond. And they're willing to stand guard over him all the while.
That's good.
They're also very observant about Peep's growth - he amazed us today with his foraging-under-the-rocks-around-the-pond skills. Our little Peep is growing up.

Blondie came over to play.
And the babes talked over the fence to Little Girl Next Door (who comes to visit her Daddy on weekends). She passed over "walnuts" across the fence that she was digging up in her yard... many looked like Peach nuts to me... and some Maddie insisted upon investigating. Almonds? Whatever... they were fun and interesting to tear apart.

Maddie's been writing her version of her name, Mama's name, and many other things. I think tomorrow I'll show her the writing/tracing pads we have, and remind her of The Letter Factory videos. It seems that she is ready to get serious about reading and writing.

Trev has come to another Rite of Passage... Reading. The backs of cereal boxes... while eating.
That makes it Official, don't you think?
(Yes, yes, sometimes we buy Cocoa Pebbles. Whatever.)

Daddy came home from fishing grring and stomping and grumbling in his Papa Bear voice about barbecue and campfires and other such Fine Things.
So we all headed outside and planted a few more things into the garden, and began our Outdoor adventures... since the rains had stopped and the sun had shown itself.
Now we're all hungry and settling a bit...
Mama is thinkin' about her book
Maddie is making messes
Trev is racing down the hill on his bike
Daddy is saving his cooking fires from the come-again sprinkles...

Life is good.
'Til tomorrow, then.