Food

Maybe it's just me, but nothing tells the story of the seasons quite like food.

It's spring now. How do I know? Rhubarb. Strawberries. Preferably together, in a pie.

Happy spring to me!

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My (Revamped) Garden Thoughts

The herbs on the left and the top right and the lettuce on the bottom right are in a patch of dirt on the side of our house. It's a high traffic area and whatever is there receives a lot of attention and, so, I always thought whatever grew there must be highly decorative.

Since moving in the spot has housed many things: zinnias (looked nice), porchulaca (looked OK) and later, roses (they looked horrid in the spot-- they didn't do well there plus I don't know how to keep roses looking effortless and gorgeous).

Finally, after years of trying to create other peoples' visions, I am doing what I want. Flowers, shmauers; herbs, lettuce and spinach are beautiful too.

Mother's Day

As a family, we have never been too into Mother's Day. My mom, seen above with Madeleine (on or about Mother's Day 2001), preferred to spend the day gardening until the last drop of sun melted into the horizon.

As a new mom, my biggest wish was quiet. Peace. Though, now, as the kids grow, my desire for solitude on one certain day has waned proportionately.

Yesterday was another perfect Mother's Day. It was perfect in its utter simplicity. As I lived it, I knew it would be forgotten; just another Mother's Day thrown into the file of faded memories of Mother's Days past. Church. Hours-- all six of us!-- at the barn. Then, after, a few hours at a park. A simple dinner out.

I hope all you moms out there had a perfectly forgettable Mother's Day too. In my experience, they are the very best kind.

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Location:Home

Happy (Second Day of) Easter

I love how pretty our church's altar looks on Easter morning. It's even more beautiful after seeing it stripped bare on Thursday evening.

But. 

The lighting in there is horrible. Every picture of I've ever seen in our sanctuary is marred by this orange-ish glow that frustrates me to no end because 1. it looks bad and 2. I don't know enough about lighting and photography to know how to fix it (if there even is a way).

However, I also love photo editing software. With just a few clicks of a mouse, I was able to create a passable picture. The lighting is still imperfect and a few of us are wearing weird expressions but, hey, we are a family of six: good enough when it comes to family snapshots is better than nothing.

What Happened

On the left, a googled X-ray picture of the shoulder, as it's meant to look.

On the right, Madeleine's shoulder, as it looked last night.

She fell, on some ice. There is no great story; no exciting tricks that went bad. Simply, the ice was slippery and Madeleine fell, very unluckily, directly onto her left shoulder. That is all.

At the hospital, doctors conferred and, eventually, the orthopedic doctor on call left the confines of his home, finding it necessary to inspect Madeleine himself, in person. Her bone was manipulated and pushed back into place and, the hope is, that it will not drift out of place.

Tomorrow she sees another specialist. But, for now, she is home sporting neither a cast or an immobilizer. Instead she is armed with a make-shift sling, an ACE bandage, a heavy dosage of pain killers and direction to hold that arm still.

Madeleine is, and has been, impressively brave throughout all of this.

Today reality has slowly been seeping through the Percocet haze and into the sleep deprived brain. Yet still, the sun shines and Madeleine smiles. If you think of her, I know she would appreciate your prayers.

Hank and the Piano

Once upon a time, when our older kids were much younger, Joe and I made the theoretical decision that it was necessary to push our kids to take piano lessons. It was something, I felt, that had benefited me quite a lot as a child.* When Madeleine came of age, we did force her to take lessons, despite her very vocal objections. It was for her own good, we reasoned.

A few years, and many wasted dollars, later, Joe and I finally capitulated and gave her the choice of whether she would like to stop or continue. Madeleine took about a half second to reconfirm the decision she had made many years prior: she would prefer not to continue. As an aside, after two (or was it three?) years of lessons, Madeleine still knows very little about the piano relative to what she knew before she started.

During this period, Hank came of age. He, unlike his sister, showed some interest in taking lessons. Unlike his sister, he is (most of the time) happy to sit and practice. He likes to play for fun (as he told me yesterday, "I like to play the piano, but only when someone isn't telling me what to play."). He, unlike his sister, cares about performing well at his annual music competition. He, unlike his sister, chooses, on his own, to continue with his lessons; and he is advancing in knowledge and skill at a far faster pace than his big sister did.

Most adults understand that where there are means and passion, knowledge is gathered, or a skill is mastered. In theory, I know this too. It's just that, sometimes, it's nice to be reminded. Yesterday, hearing Hank play in front of a judge and a room monitor, I was reminded of this, not because he played, but because of how he played. He played with poise and confidence. He played as one who took the experience seriously, and enjoyed the chance to be judged. And this morning, after weeks of preparation? He's back at the piano, plunking out tunes. For fun.

*I forgot to remind myself that, as a child, I as given the choice if I wanted to take lessons or not. Yes, my mom encouraged me to want to, and it helped that my second grade teacher, who I liked, was to be my piano teacher (the excitement of visiting your school teacher's house!), but ultimately the decision was mine. I am no proficient, by any means, but I did, and do, enjoy putzing around on the piano.

Item Number Four

Yesterday my to-do list looked like this:

1. Pay bills
2. Run M to stable
3. Target returns (buy wipes!)
4. write for 30 mins.
5. wash cleaning rags
6. call W. re: hockey tournament
7. email J. re: GS
8. email A. re: hockey tournament raffle

By the end of the day, each item had been crossed off my list-- save item number four. It was easy to push aside. After all, Wells Fargo would take a dim view of me skipping over item number one. And poor Willow, well, she's been on stall rest for about three weeks now, and she needed to get out and be ridden. And if I didn't make it to Target while Madeleine was riding then I would need to make a whole separate trip up on a different day when it would be less convenient. And on and on and on.

I am not a writer. I have no serious aspirations of book deals or bylines. My biggest ambition at this moment in time is to keep my house a comfortable, harmonious, and inspiring place to live and learn.

And yet, as evening threatened and I rightly prioritized washing dishes and making dinner over crossing out that last non-chore on my chore list, I admit I was a bit disappointed in not making time for something I enjoy, something that allows me to explore and connect the disjointed thoughts floating about my head.

And so, here I am. It is a new day with a shorter, more manageable to-do list. Writing, for me, doesn't mean blogging, necessarily, so I don't know if my newly found determination will translate into more blog posts (I suspect it will not) but, for today, I am here, spending thirty minutes of this lovely, snowy day with my MacBook in front of me and my cold cup of this morning's leftover coffee at my side, writing a post for my blog. I am happy to have made the time to cross this off my list today.

Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day, Blogosphere!

Love,
The Absent Blogger

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Willow

This cute little girl is Willow and, for the next year, she is half ours. We finally made the plunge into horse land (and it's just as foreign to me as Neverland or Oz might be) with taking out a half lease on this dun colored American Quarter Horse.

Madeleine was half leasing a school pony (our beloved Cocoa Puff) from the stable where she lessons but, sadly, Madeleine continues to grow in both height and ability and Cocoa couldn't grow either of those ways in his older age. So, a few months ago Madeleine's trainer started looking for a small horse (Willow is only 14.3 hands) who had enough tricks up her hooves to give Madeleine room to grow, ability-wise.

I could go into the exasperating saga of how Willow went into heat after arriving at our barn (and, for your horse people, Willow seems quite mareish, even when she's not in heat, so you can imagine . . . ) and hurt her right eye badly enough that she was unrideable for a solid month, but I won't. I'll focus on the positive: she's well and she's back to work. I'm simultaneously thrilled with excitement to see my childhood horse dreams fulfilled through my daughter and terrified to enter this new, unknown world.

My Trick-or-Treaters

My '80s Pop Star (too wet and rainy for the super fab '80's boots she had intended to wear):

My little soldier (he was pretty impressed with all the salutes that came his way):

Rapunzel (as represented in E's favorite movie, Tangled). How absurdly ridiculous and cute is that dumb wig?

And our little . . . um . . . I'm not sure what she is, exactly. We were all set for Caroline to wear the same dog costume that all my other kids wore when they were two-years-old (shown here on Elisabeth). But when it came time to put it on Caroline ran away and shrieked, "NO GOG! NO GOG! DON WANNA BE GOG!" I then had the ingenious idea of simply painting a dog face on her since, at this point, I just assumed she was scared of the costume. To the idea of face paint? "NO GOG! DON WANNA BE GOG!!!" At this point it was about five minutes before trick-or-treating, all my other trick-or-treaters were dressed and ready to go, so I ran upstairs and yanked the first dress I saw out of Ellie's dress up bin. Caroline saw the dress, smiled and said, "I be pincess." So, I guess she was a crown-less princess, or someone who, no matter what, gets her way.

A Kayak Ride

All things are artificial, for nature is the art of God.

--Thomas Browne

On Wednesday I pushed my kayak off the sandy shore and paddled across Black Bay to the opposite shore. My eldest daughter accompanied me in a long, blue kayak, a stark contrast to my short red one. We wore jeans. Fleeces. Tennis shoes. It was cold and gray, and ode, perhaps, to our proximity to the Canadian border, a country whose very mention, fairly or not, conjures up visions of cold. It was a lengthy kayak ride considering the late afternoon hour, but the water was still and quiet, the wind having finally dissipated and moved on to a more easterly location, and it was too wonderful to do anything but paddle, then drift and then observe and take in our surroundings. 

Opposite from our starting point was a Minnesota state forest. To the east a small island, with a lone inhabitant, and beyond the island, a swampish shore. To the west was a small channel, which days earlier had taken our party, by pontoon boat, into the larger areas of Lake Vermillion, but was quiet that day, with a few lone fisherman braving the cold of the weekday, and none making their way into Black Bay, on the northern most end of the lake. 

Though we had seen scant boat traffic throughout the week since our arrival the Saturday prior, that Wednesday saw none. We paddled to a small rock island and floated, breathing in the smells of the lake and the pine trees and the crisp air. The slight breeze ruffled leaves on birch trees, creating a quiet, rhythmic duet with the waves licking the sides of our boats. 

Eventually it was time to turn back. Dinner, overlooking the lake, was to be eaten, campfires to be made and inky, pitch black night skies with bright, glowing stars were to be enjoyed, as they had been the nights prior. But we didn't feel particularly hurried or rushed. We took our time, exploring another rock island and, eventually, paddling and drifting our way back to our home base.

The week was a great one, one with lots of excitement (tubing!) and lots of relaxing (morning coffee on the pier), but that kayak ride was a standout moment, and one I won't soon forget.

Look Who's Eleven

--Children are unpredictable. You never know what inconsistency they're going to catch you in next. 
Franklin P. Jones

I have managed to acknowledge all my kids on their birthdays here on this blog, give or take a day, since this blog's inception. 

Until now.

Maybe, like my daughter, my blog is maturing. Growing.

We'll see. In any event, my eldest, my Madeleine, is now eleven.

Anticipation

The start of the school year is so full of promise. It has yet to be marred by unmet goals, unfinished work or kids who are anything less than perfectly compliant, interested and engaged.

Reality will soon kick in (September sixth, for us), but until then I'll bask in the anticipation of what could be and, maybe, on those really fantastic home-schooling days that remind of all of why we persevere, of what will.

(Belated) Independence Day

I must confess, should I be accused of romanticizing certain things that I am to talk about later in this post, that I have loved Independence Day most of my life. I mean, what's not to love: usually reliably warm weather, family, friends, relaxation, hot coals on the grill, fireworks . . . need I go on?

But now that I live here . . . now I love it even more. The town that I live in lives for Independence Day. I mean, our Civic Foundation and other village groups do a lot things throughout the year, but nothing compares to how we go all out on the fourth of July every year.

There's a parade. A festival that everyone walks up to after the parade (literally by following the tail end of the parade up). At the festival there are games, food and a dixieland band. After the festival we go to our house and do nothing. Nothing. We won't even walk inside to get a drink, instead we keep a cooler close at hand containing all our favorite beverages so we don't have to move. We grill out and, if I may say, this year's meal was ridiculously delicious. And then, of course, fireworks.

The whole day feels idyllic. Magically idyllic, as if the stresses and worries of real life are paused for one long, too-perfect day.

So, yeah. We had a great fourth, and I hope you did too!

The Madeleine Eye Roll

Ah, the Madeleine eye roll. Many times have I seen it, or had it directed my way, but never have I seen it captured pictorially. This eye roll, the I-can't-believe-you-just-said-that laugh, it will be how I remember Madeleine's childhood. 

And now I can prove it to her children.

Water Update: Almost One Year Later

A little less than a year ago, as many of you might remember, Milwaukee fell victim to a pretty nasty storm which resulted in widespread flooding. Since then, bit by bit, we've been repairing the damage, and now, finally, our basement is done, from top to bottom. It's better than it was before, though; the old basement I merely tolerated, this one I like, and enjoy spending time in. See what you think!

On stairs, looking down, night of the flood.

On stairs, looking down, today.

Looking into main room, from foot of stairs (southwest corner), night of the flood.

Looking into the main room from foot of the stairs after stripping paneling, drywall, etc., a few weeks after the flood.

Looking into the main room from foot of the stairs today.

West wall, night of flood.

West wall today.

Northwest corner, night of flood.

Northwest corner, today.

Northeast corner, night of flood.

Northeast corner, today.

South wall, a few weeks after flood.

South wall (southeast corner), today.

View from bottom of stairs, a few weeks after flood.

View from bottom of stairs, today. 

View from northeast corner (between TV and computer), today. 

View from northwest corner, today.

Horse Dreams

"There is something about the outside of a horse that is good for the inside of a man."  

~Winston Churchill

I confess: I often dream of moving out of this picturesque suburb and moving north. Not too far north, but north enough for a few acres. An outbuilding.

And a horse (or two, since horses are social creatures, and need company).

Curiosity

“Curiosity is the very basis of education and if you tell me that curiosity killed the cat, I say only the cat died nobly.”

--Arnold Edinborough

Toddler Terror

There is a reason I blog infrequently these days. Her name is Caroline.

If I turn my back for one second, she is up on the dining room table (where, usually, I keep a small tray handy with salt, pepper, sugar and a small vase of flowers), sometimes just sitting, but other times dumping piles of salt and sugar around the table. Or maybe she's scaling the windowsill adjacent to our big living room window (which she also fell off of the other night, and scored a black eye).

This girl is busy. Trouble. Peace is only attained when she is sleeping, and usually that time seems better spent on catching up with the big kids' schoolwork. Or laundry. Or collapsing on the sofa with a good book.

And now, there she is. Snack time is over, the Terror is out of her high chair (and therefore, her quasi-containment), and I must hit publish and be off!

Easter Recap, 2011

As long as Joe gets a vote, I think our family will be doomed treated to the early (6:30 a.m.), sunrise service on Easter Sunday. Amazingly, even little Caroline adapted just fine to being woken more than two hours earlier than normal.

Our Easter morning service was, as always, moving and wonderful after a long, somber Lent and, as a special treat, we were treated to some incredibly gorgeous music thanks to our talented organist and numerous brass players (all extremely talented volunteers).

After the service we tried for our annual family picture in front of the altar. I think we'll continue the tradition if for no other reason than to prove that getting a nice family photograph with four kids is an impossible feat.

The Easter Bunny is nice enough to accommodate our early morning schedule and hold off on his deliveries until after we leave for church. That means that following the fun of church and Easter breakfast at church we have more fun to look forward to at home. Hidden Easter eggs! Baskets! Small gifts!

After we watched the kids play around with the new loot, cut Caroline off her her jelly bean feeding frenzy and drank some coffee, I started in on getting the house ready for our guests. This year I got smart and put all the kids in the basement, which meant we were only ten upstairs, and all adults.

Shortly after that, guests began to arrive and my camera fell on my list of priorities as cooking and playing with friends and family took precedence. 

After lots of enjoyable hours spent sipping wine and, later, coffee with all assembled, Joe, the kids and I changed into our PJs at 7 p.m. and cuddled in to watch Tangled, one of the few movies everyone in our family enjoys. 

It was, if memory serves, one of the most fun, relaxing Easters, we've had in awhile.