Field of Poppies, that changing wind, "two-year old" issues

field of poppies

Ah, it's Saturday and the moodiness is starting to lift. The sun is shining today and the sky is a glorious blue. The wind I enjoyed last week for flying a kite has become hair-whipping and full of pollen and seems to have affected the moods of everyone around me, including myself. Wind has that tendency. The stomach flu has been making its way around the blogs I've been reading and in the people I know and love. I hope it is on its way out.

In the middle of the night last night I couldn't sleep and so I read from a book that I've kept handy since Tristan was just a wee babe! It's called You Are Your Child's First Teacher by Rahima Baldwin Dancy. The writer uses Waldorf-inspired child rearing principles and I enjoy reading it because it is the gentle path to raising a child. I refer back to it now and then - especially when I hit a bump in that child-rearing road. Lately, Tristan seems to be living up to that ubiquitous "two-year old" personality I've often heard about. Clean-up time and tooth-brushing are two of the major problem areas. Today I avoided issue with the clean-up issue by not talking about it as clean up time, but merely playing a game of "ba-doop" - the sound I'd make as I through something in its container. I asked Tristan to "ba-doop" something in the container too, and it seemed to work. We got through cleaning his playroom, and when we were done (save for sweeping) he said, "My room is clean!" So although I was worried that I was manipulating him into cleaning up, it looks like that wasn't the case at all. He seemed to be aware I was making a game out of it. Phew. That's all I needed - confirmation from him!

Today my hubby brought home some tomato, cucumber and green onion plants to put in our garden. Our current house is not a permanent home so I haven't wanted to invest too much time in a garden, but we'll have a few items at least. We seem to have a small strawberry patch in the front yard, so we may add more strawberries to that! Anyway, this afternoon and tomorrow is planting time. The weather is perfect for it.

Zoo and a cute little bag from a free pattern!

zoo animals

Today, we went to the zoo again, to appease my little one's daily need of adventure. Sometimes it's equally a way for us to get out of the house, we're a little out of sorts today - according to the ephemeris the moon was void of course and went to Leo at approximately the same time we left for the zoo. Things did seem to improve at that point, but the wind didn't help. In any case, Tristan may have been fine remaining on the pile of dirt in the backyard with his sand toys all day. We got home in one piece, less grumpy, and Tristan went to sleep fast! My good friend is in town and I am so looking forward to seeing her! Our boys are 6 weeks apart - we sort of wanted to be pregnant together and I was sort of waiting for her to get pregnant so I could too...nice way to do pregnancy, with a friend.

Anyway, there are bills to do, but I wanted to post this picture of a cute little bag from a free pattern I got from JCasa Handmade. I used fabric I already had (can't believe I actually had 2 different fabrics that go semi-well together!) - I don't have much fabric on hand, but it turned out pretty good - except the handle on this one is a little bit too lengthy.

kidlet wall pocket bag

(l)Tristan kite-flying! (r)compost hole

Yesterday, Sunday, was very industrious. We finished digging our compost hole in the backyard, and it got to be so windy that we decided to give the kite another try! We went back to the very place where my kite-flying memories took place, back in the junior-high school field. After several nose-dives our big-fishy kite took up, up, up to the sky! My husband is from Iran and told me that when he was young he would make and sell kites, so he taught me a couple of things about flying yesterday. Once you've got that baby up there, put the string directly onto the ground, not the roll of string, the actual string, and the kite will start to come right up above you. And when it starts to nose dive, give it some slack instead of pulling on it, and it will float in that tiger wind instead of fight it. Yeah! We have different ideas on how to get it up in the air initially, he likes to unreel it and have another person lift it up and let go of it once it catches a wind. I'm more of a DIY kind-of-gal (he might say stubborn!) and I like to hold the reel and let a little string out until the kite catches a small wind, then unreel slowly as it goes up, pulling and releasing as necessary. Both ways worked yesterday!

When we came home for soup and garlic bread, my son decided he wanted to go to our neighborhood ice cream shop after lunch, so I volunteered to make ice cream instead (not wanting him to have the sugar, especially just before nap!). I'd been wanting to try this ice-cream in a bag anyway that everyone except me seems to know about. I'd bought some rock salt, put it in a big bag with some ice. Combined soy-milk, strawberries, half a banana and a little agave syrup in our little Bullet (small blender) and blended it, poured it in a smaller bag and sealed it, then put the whole thing in the bag of ice and salt, sealed that and shook it vigorously for 5 minutes. At the end of all that, we had a small serving of soft ice-cream (although not as soft as I thought it would be). All the online recipes called for milk, sugar and vanilla flavoring, none of which I wanted to give Tristan - he's never been a cow-milk drinker since his dad and I are lactose-intolerant, and I attribute sugar to many of the worlds problems (not to mention a diabetic epidemic on my hubby's side of the family)!

While Tristan napped after lunch, I finished my latest collage-card paper-cut scene - A field of poppies! I like this one. Then I watched T.V. - Sunday afternoon? Not much on. Came back to my "office" and started making this cute door-handle bag with a free pattern I got from a great new blog I discovered called JCasa Handmade (on sidebar too). She's got some free patterns, interesting subjects and is fun to read.

So it was no wonder I slept like a log and woke up a little groggy...ah Monday...gym day. I'll knock this groggy-ness right out with a steam-room session!

Multitasking

Confessions of a dilettante and the joys of sharing sleep

dining room table and chairs

I admit it, I'm a dilettante. A dabbler. A gal with lots of interests and no specialty. My aunt, whom I would say is a master hand-craftsperson, gave me some leeway today when I mentioned that to her. She said she went through that and that's just something people have to do to find out what they are really interested in - what strikes their fancies...well, she is so generous. I have an unfinished quilt (but 4 finished squares!), somewhere between 3 and 6 unfinished knitting and crocheting projects, one unfinished apron, several patterns unattended to, embroidery thread and materials that were generously given to me by my mom and aunt but never used (the interest rose...and then fell - not to say it won't return someday). Does this sound familiar to anyone? These have accumulated over the past 5 years and I truly hope to someday get to all of them. One thing I find myself finishing over and over again though are these little collage-card scenes. Glad I can start and finish something.

Speaking of completed projects, Ida Pearle (see her website on my sidebar) put out out a book recently called, A Child's Day: An Alphabet of Play. I am always so happy to see her charming artwork. She uses paper-cuts also, mostly of children in play mode. The children in her work have no features, but they have so much EXPRESSION!! Amazing what this paper medium is capable of...

And while I'm on the subject of children's expressions, very early this morning as I lay with my son while he slept soundly after having been nursed back to sleep, I heard him giggle. Oh the sound of a child giggling in his sleep must be close to heaven's music...it delights me and gives me hope that I am doing something right! I feel so lucky to share my sleeping hours with my son, as his sleep-giggles occur at least weekly, if not more often. When it's light enough in the room I also get to see the lovely smile that accompanies the sweet laugh. As tired as I was, it was a joyful way to start the day.

Sign of the Times

couch, lamp, early spring

The "clothesline" collage-card scene that I posted on March 21st seems to be following a trend of ideas that are indicative of the current economic situation as well as the environmental crisis that we face. I sit here everyday and can easily see our neighbors yard. He had a ton of space and used it to create a huge, beautiful organic garden including a small orchard with trees that have blossomed. It's great to see such bounty so close to such a busy street.

I've noticed the trend in my own home too. We are going to farmer's market lately - more often than we used to, and we are making a lot of our own food. My husband makes great homemade yogurt that we all love to eat daily. We strained it through a cheesecloth and made some yogurt-cheese to use hopefully instead of cream cheese. I've been making my own cereal by using old-fashioned rolled oats, nuts, dried fruit, honey, oil and spices and it is delicious. I eat cereal often and it is not cheap, so making it saves us a little bit o' money. We've been eating brown rice and veggies or salad with homemade dressing (also saves a bit).

On the going green gradually front, I've asked my hubby if he minded if we stopped buying the big plastic trash bags for our tall trash can and go back to using the paper bags we get from the store. He said yes - the only downside there is we'll have to be more conscientious about taking it out more often when it gets full. Also, I got the clothespins I've been looking for. Now my hubby has the lovely task of hanging a rope out somewhere in our backyard and I'll try a hand at NOT using the dryer!! We'll see how that goes.

Little by little is how this is going. Oh, and I found this great site through Elizabeth Mitchell's (the musician, not the actress) website. It gives specific info about having a healthier home environment for your children - (and more friendly for our Mother Earth) in "Five easy steps." If you have a child, this is a must. See the website http://healthychild.org/5steps for more information. I've also posted this in my "Places I like to go in digi-land" list.

On your mark...

well, I guess I should start by saying how excited I was to come up with "gennysent page" - it's my first name, middle initial and first 3 letters of my last name "genny s. ent" and "page,"which is obvious. Rhymes with "the innocent age." Innocent being this time in life where my son Tristan, 27 months, is and hopefully will remain for quite some time! "The Innocent Age" also refers to Edith Wharton's book of same title, a nod to fiction, which I love to read, and also a nod to history, which I can't get enough of. I will hopefully start school again in the fall to finish a masters in Public History. Part of the reason I've started this blog is because of the ideas I am coming up with in the areas of history I am most interested in, mainly material history: the history of things - that which you can lay your hands on, the physical evidence of time past/passed. At the moment I am in the middle of a creative explosion which came upon suddenly in the form of one of those materials: paper.

I've always loved paper, to touch fine paper, write on it with a good pen and now, as this creative endeavor has been going, to draw on it and cut it out and paste it onto cardstock in the form of something. A couch and lamp, a vase of flowers upon a table over a persian carpet, a dining room table and chairs, zoo animals, clothes hanging from a clothesline, and on and on...Initially this started because my friend Felicia sent out postcards of collage art every Chinese New Year with that year's animal. During a trip to Amsterdam last May at a sweet little brunch cafe there was some wall art of a cut-out tree with many leaves, each leaf separate and placed individually onto the wall like wallpaper. These two things started the idea, as well as falling in love with the chiyogami paper at the art store...

I have one son whom I love more than words can say, as all mothers love their children. I'm also crazy about my hubby who I've been with for 9 years. We had/have a mutual love of travel, which hasn't seemed to dissipate even with a young child. I find myself in the unique?, lucky?, position of traveling often and occasionally far, as my husband follows his teacher, Gangaji, from place to place. This took us to Amsterdam in May, took him to Vancouver, B.C. in July, and we took an East Coast trip to Boston, Berkshires and NYC last September when Gangaji was at the Kripalu Institute in Lenox, Massachusetts. Yesterday, we returned from Esalen in Big Sur, California, where Gangaji had satsang that my hubby attended. Tristan had his first hours away from mom (or, I should say, mom had her first hours away from Tristan) as he played intently with other children and teachers at the Gazebo school. And mom, yes, yo, got to have some serious down time. The first in over 2 and a half years. You are doing the math with the 27 months there, I can tell, so let me just ask, is it really possible to relax when you are past 6 months pregnant?