Farm Friends

No, I'm not talking about farm animals, I'm speaking of my dear friend Sara and her wonderful family! We spent the day with them at their farm yesterday. Friday is their big harvest day for the weekend market, but Thursday is carrot harvest day. I helped Sara wash and bunch 8 bushels of carrots! And you can probably imagine how many freshly dug carrots the girls ate... when they weren't too busy taking care of little Ila.

Now, Sara is wonderful for so many reasons. Here are a few of them... she is the one who taught me how to knit, years before either one of us had children. She had her first baby shortly before I became pregnant for the first time, and therefore passed on much wisdom regarding homebirth, labor, newborns, etc... And when our youngest, Chessa, was born weighing barely over 5 pounds Sara even came over that first morning and nursed her so she could get some extra nourishment.

Sara has quite the family now, 3 boys and a baby girl. You should check out her blog and see the amazing farm life they have! http://farmama.typepad.com/ Click on her sheep/wool/spinning category on the left and you can see one of her latest fiber projects. She is getting ready to knit a sweater (now yellow, not green) for her youngest boy, starting with roving from her own sheep, which she dyed with apricot leaves, and is now in the process of spinning! I tell you, this woman is talented. And hard working! They are Waldorf homeschoolers as well. How does she find the time to be such a good friend?

Did I mention that beautiful baby of hers! The girls are in love. Can you blame them?

Unfortunately I didn't have my camera with me. I took a few with Sara's but nothing really great. Lots of farm pictures on her blog though! I did get this cute one of Chessa getting a feel for the spinning wheel.

Dear Sara, I am so grateful for your friendship!! xoxo

Touch the Sun!

We spent the morning sitting by the lake. (This is not a picture at the lake, but I love how the sunlight is shining down on the little meadow.) The girls wandered about and I sat and read in the sun. Reading and thinking about the sense of touch. Of course it is not just our hands that touch and feel, because are whole body is covered with skin. So our entire body experiences the touching sensations. (And our soul shares the experience too!) Our clothing touches us, the water touches us, the wind touches us, and the sun touches us. So then really aren't we touching the sun?!!

weekend knitting & garden blooms

Morning chores. Knit hat. Feed children. Knit hat. Laundry. Knit hat. Feed children again. Knit hat. Make dinner. Knit hat. Eat. Knit. Sleep. Wake up. Knit more. I think you get the picture. Jason is going backpacking tomorrow and requested a hat to keep his head warm up amongst those 12-14,000 foot peaks. Of course I was happy to do it. Even happier that I was finally able to get the ribbing at the bottom right. I do know how to do a rib stitch, but on those double pointed needles, with several tries casting on, 96 stitches! Not something I want to take out and retry over and over again! So I'm pretty pleased with it. This is only my third hat, and when I tell people I am using double pointed needles instead of circular needles they look at me like I'm crazy. Well, I'm sure I am, or silly at the least. I can prove the silliness... in true Waldorf knitting style I had to make myself a little rhyme as I did the decreases... "one and two, together me and you, one and two, together me and you." Go ahead, laugh. It helped me! (And now I notice in the picture it looks like there is a little hole at the bottom, but really there is not.)

In other exciting news... the hollyhocks are blooming!

And calendula.

And cosmos.

Oh flowers, you make me so very happy.

evening visitor

rainbows and dirt

So, I'm wondering if this could count as a contribution to rainbow week? And will you all forgive me if I confess that my house is not full of rainbows?

Our summer nature table is very, very simple at the moment. Wildflowers, some bright colors, and seashells from my beloved Carmel beach. Will be adding more nature treasures and handmade goodness when autumn comes though!

And this was the view from the upstairs windows today! Jason went chasing down dirt trucks again, letting them know that they were welcome to dump their dirt here. And so they did!

Do you think there is any chance of the clothes coming clean? Or their bodies for that matter?

late night with the girls

Today was our go to town day for the week. But since the yarn shop was having a sale starting at 5 this evening, we didn't go as early as we usually would. Yes, being in town at 5 in the evening is a late night for us! So I'm guessing that the girls are now looking something like this. Older picture, but it's how they often sleep!

We also went to the library. Lots of books to return! Yes, we have a house/building obsession. No, we don't want to live in a yurt. And we don't plan on building a log cabin. The cabin book sure was neat though. And I love that Tassajara Cookbook. Not just because it is full of pictures of beautiful Carmel Valley! Great recipes too. Sadly though they did not have On the Banks of Plum Creek. I guess our Little House journey will have to be postponed.

Can you believe I actually have a bag that holds 21 library books?!!

wild berries and wonderful books

These were sitting on the kitchen counter when I came upstairs this morning. Wild raspberries that Jason harvested at work the day before. There will be more to come! And wild strawberries too. Hooray! We had raspberry pancakes for lunch!

The girls and I had a nice quiet day. Read the last three chapters of Little House on the Prairie. I find it very hard to pace ourselves with those books. Maybe because I feel like I have been waiting my whole life to read them with my daughters! The girls also did a lot of drawing today. These are their pictures inspired by Little House in the Big Woods.

It rained all last night and much of today too. I won't mind if it continues all week!

second grade fables

I am really looking forward to sharing some of our school work here. We are going to be starting our 3rd year of Waldorf homeschooling in the autumn. (Fourth year if you count kindergarten, but I guess I'm not, as it was so informal.) This past year we did second grade with Chloe, while she was 8. We started off with a week of form drawing with Native American stories, and then did a language arts block of fables. I highly recommend the book Teaching with the Fables by Sieglinde de Francesca. It was my favorite resource for this block, so beautifully written and illustrated. (Her Coloring with Block Crayons book is wonderful too.) So here are some of Chloe's lesson book pages from that block.



I will be back soon to show some of what we did for our blocks on Stories of the Saints. I was one of our favorite parts of the year!

Camping Girl

Chloe returned home exhausted and emotional. She said she didn't have any fun at all. And then spent the rest of the afternoon chattering about all the fun and exciting things they did. But sometimes I do wonder if 9 years old is still too young for sleepovers.

No pictures since we weren't with her :( but here are some from her first camping trip alone with her daddy two summers ago.

Hopefully we will get to go on another family camping trip soon!

moments...

Little sister in the garden...


A campfire gathering...


Tired big sister…

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