Poop

Good morning! Actually, I’ll let you know how good it is in about six minutes when I know if Amena and Cedric both got on the bus. Actually, I’ll let you know if it is good at that point. If it isn’t, I’ll be catching up with the bus. Or at least if they don’t get on the bus, I’d better be catching up because I’m not making three trips to Barre today.

Yesterday was okay. Saturday was okay. Friday was okay.

I like this picture.

Friday Seth, Joseph and I went to Barre Falls Dam to plant Joanna’s Wild Child letterbox. I was expecting to do a loop but when we were at about the 1.7 mile mark I realized I should have looked at the maps more closely because there is a gap in the trail when it comes to a river. A gap where there used to be a bridge that is no longer there.

I like this one, too.Except that there are obvious issues with the "stitching" that took place. You should let me know if you find one or more. One thing for sure--Massachusetts isn't all that green right now.

So, Covered River Road is no longer appropriately named. We could have gone on a different loop but with just my phone it was hard to know for sure how long it was.

There might be something hiding on the other side of this tree/these trees if you happen to go letterboxing.

It looked longer than the one I’d been hoping to take and I knew that if we took too long we’d be dealing with the sun setting so we just went back the way we’d come and found a place to plant Joanna’s box. I think we found a good spot and in the future sometime, I want to take that other loop.

Just hanging out.

Saturday involved collecting food for Scouting for Food and planting garlic and cleaning out one room for the goats. (Amena made the bus but at the other end of the driveway.) Collecting food was easy. Cleaning out the goat part of the barn was easy. Planting garlic was easy. Cedric was supposed to empty the manure out of the truck into the last two beds I currently have in the garden and took all day. Joseph helped with garlic. We had to pull some grass out of the bed first and it was the stuff with the really long roots.

The garlic bed before working on it.

When I had the garlic in but not covered he thought one of the cloves was some of the grass and pulled it up. His expression was priceless but of course I didn’t catch it with the camera. He did a fine job of returning it to the dirt.

The garlic bed ready for garlic.

The main reason I wanted to clean out the goat barn was to mulch the garlic and Egyptian walking onions (they were planted Saturday as well). That was accomplished and I covered two other beds with mulchy stuff as well. I’m not sure when I’ll get to the rest of the barn but I’ll cover as many beds as possible with what I get from it. I need to fix the two beds behind the house and decide where I want them so that they can be filled, hopefully before snow flies.

Yesterday was just Sunday. Other than Paul, Seth and Joseph taking the collected food to Rutland, it was a pretty typically average Sunday.

One thing I thought interesting which I don’t really want to elaborate on much, Dan talks to Joanna and tells her that the reason he isn’t smiling in any of her wedding pictures is because of me and he has nothing good to say about anyone and thought that none of us wanted him there (which may have been true). He called two Sundays ago and the boys weren’t here so he wanted to talk to me and he’s all just the same as usual; somewhat awkward and telling me that he thinks we all need counselling and then making a big point of telling me that Laura said goodbye when he left. Great. Interestingly, Cedric and Amena had the biggest problems they’ve had for some time within 48 hours of this conversation. Yesterday, he told Cedric that the reason he called back at 9:00 the previous Sunday (which call was not answered because I didn’t hear my phone ringing because someone turned the volume off) was to see if perhaps Cedric had wanted to ask if he could go live with Dan. Really? He still has nothing good to say about me or any of the rest of us even after going on rather extensively when he came out for the wedding telling me how he’d been working on forgiving everyone. I don’t think he has. I think he is an interesting mix of a narcissist and something else and the only feeling I have for him now is pity that he must stay in the past and is not able to move on. Well, that’s not entirely true but I’ve spent more time on the subject than I was going to.

And, I’m sorry to say, I’m not done. I did not spend any time writing anything between October 5 and about the 15^th. I picked Dan up from the train station in Fitchburg on the Thursday before the wedding which happened to be my and Paul’s anniversary. I gave Dan, Seth and Joseph a ride to Dunn Park later that day. I gave them a ride to Walmart the next day. Saturday I picked Dan up and took him to the wedding. I may not have particularly enjoyed my time with him but I think that Joanna did the right thing in inviting him and I was doing my best to do the right thing as well. It is true that Paul did not want him to be there. He didn’t want to sit at the same table as Dan and I can understand that. Joanna had her reasons for putting him at the table with us and I happen to agree with them. It annoys the heck out of me that I went out of my way to do things for this man and all he can do is say that it is because of me he didn’t smile for the pictures. Get over it.

Now I’m done. For today.

Up for today are fairly typical Monday-type activities.  I am going to make an apple pie with dried apples later today and see how much pumpkin I have in the basement for pumpkin pie. I’m not feeling any particular urge to make any other pies so I probably won’t. I think Paul said yesterday he’d cook the turkey. Honestly, that’s the least of my worries. It’s super easy to take care of the turkey; it’s everything else that is time consuming and I usually hate doing. Thanksgiving is fine and we should be thankful for our blessings but I think we overdo it and I honestly hate having to make all this food so we can behave in a gluttonous manner for a few minutes. Seriously. Where else do people spend days cooking and baking for a meal that takes about fifteen minutes to consume? Really. I timed us a year or two ago. Everyone was done eating in about fifteen minutes. That didn’t include pie because, unlike Paul, I like to have my pie later, but still. Fifteen minutes and it’s done.

Have a wonderful day.

Mockingjay, Part 2

Good morning. The link to sourdough carrot cake still is not working so I guess there won’t be any today, either. That’s okay because we really don’t need anything like that. I mean, I did make sourdough chocolate cake yesterday and Joanna brought us cinnamon rolls last night. It just doesn’t get much better than that. The amazing thing is that after eating two of them, Lincoln said he really doesn’t like them. Joanna says he’s perfectly happy to eat the sticky buns or whatever they are that come in a package for a dollar. I think he and Paul must be related; they both like crap from the store way too much. Paul may like more of it, though.

If you haven't read the book or seen the movie and you plan on going to watch the movie, you might want to skip the rest.

Joanna and I went to see Mockingjay Part 2 and it was good. It didn’t depart from the book as much as I thought it was going to from the previews which is good. There were some annoying places where it obviously did but overall, it was good. I do wonder about a couple of things, though.

Did Snow really think that Coin had been playing her own game in a bid to take over his position? I personally think he did. I mean, a snake can see and recognize a snake, right? Honestly, I think I like Snow better than Coin (if you can imagine liking either of them) because, as he said, “At least I don’t waste resources.” Coin obviously was quite willing to do so. This is evident when she was willing to send in the bombs that first killed many innocent children and then the medics and others who’d gone to assist the victims of the first blast.

When Boggs told Katniss that Coin had wanted Peeta all along, it seemed clear that he knew what Coin had planned. In spite of the fact that he worked for Coin and was loyal to her, he also knew what the focus needed to be. He knew what Katniss had planned to do and he supported that. On the other hand, Katniss was more likely to be killed by going to the Capital than by staying in District 13 so in a way, Boggs was actually doing Coin a favor. I think Coin was perfectly aware of how things were likely to play out when she told Katniss to stay in District 13. I like Boggs. In the book I like him a lot more. In the movie it just seems too obvious that he is actually playing into Coin’s hands whereas in the book, he is helping things move along as they need to. This, I believe is at least partly attributable to the timeline in the movie versus the timeline in the book. What takes weeks to unfold in the book happens in just a couple of days in the movie.

Then there is Plutarch. Did he know what Coin had up her sleeve? He obviously knew Coin before the events unfold in either the book or the movie as he was part of the underground movement but how well did he know her and what she ultimately wanted? I think he knew a lot. Coin wanted Peeta. Plutarch wanted Katniss. Peeta would have been perfect for what Coin wanted from a mockingjay; saying and doing the right thing was instinctual for him. Peeta would not have worked for what Plutarch wanted and knew would need to happen, based on my thought that he knew exactly what Coin was up to. Katniss worked pretty well as the mockingjay; all that needed to happen for her to say the right thing was to get her angry. Maybe angry isn’t the right word. She needed to have her righteous indignation riled up. That isn’t the same thing as being angry. Still, Katniss was exactly what Plutarch needed to bring about what was ultimately best for Panem.

Finally, when did Katniss decide to kill Coin rather than Snow? I believe in the book she had only the one arrow. In the movie I don’t recall if she had one but it seems like she may have had more. Had she made up her mind before she marched out? Did she make a final decision just before she let lose the arrow? I do not believe her action was premeditated. Clearly, she had to meet Snow and have a conversation with him in his garden because without that, she would not have known exactly what kind of a person Coin was or what her intentions were. That she was not a kind or even a good person, Katniss knew. That she wanted to take over was beginning to be noticeably apparent when she answered Haymitch’s pointed question about the length of time she would need to be an interim president. He was obviously quite aware of the inherent dangers of this action.

All of this just leads to one question: what would have happened had Effie not pulled Prim’s name out? From that moment, everything began working to bring about the downfall of Snow and his government and, ultimately, Coin’s ambitions to take his place. Were there others in other districts who could have done what Katniss did? Was there anyone else in District 12 who could have? Maybe, maybe not.

Anyway, just some of my thoughts. I’m ready to go watch it again, but from the back of the theater this time (we sat pretty close to the front and it’s kind of hard to watch the whole thing from that angle), and if the new Star Wars movie does as well as Mockingjay Part 2, the world will be a good place for a few hours.

Have a spectacular day!

Creative Sleep

Good morning! Yes, it is almost time for the boys to start school. Yes, it is true I am still sitting at the table just finishing my cranberry orange bread and milk for breakfast. Yes, there are a million things I could be doing. However, I was perusing Facebook because the recipe for sourdough carrot cake won’t load from the King Arthur Flour website so I had to do something, right?

While in the middle of said perusing, I came upon a post by a friend. Or perhaps repost is a better word. In either case, she’d posted, or reposted, an article about sleeping late and how people who do are smarter and more creative. Hmmmm. Becky might agree with that, I don’t know. It was in composing a response to this that I determined it is because of things like this that a blog is really the way for me to go—most people post relatively short responses to posts. I attempt to write a book. Or at least a lengthy essay.

I’m not sure I agree. I like getting up early. Honestly, 5:00 is a bit much but usually only when I have to in order to make sure Amena and Cedric are getting up. Really, all I’m doing is waking them up. They don’t typically GET up until I go the second time which is supposed to be 5:30 but sometimes isn’t. If I were getting up just because I wanted to, the story changes altogether.

Going with a completely voluntary getting up in the morning, I still like to be up sometime between five and six. It is quiet; there usually aren’t other people up and about and if they are, they don’t often have demands. I can get things done (think creative here). I can work on log/notebooks. I can knit (which I don’t usually do unless I have something to watch/listen to). I can work on my own school work. I can wash dishes (which provides time for thinking creative thoughts). I can do nothing. I can read. I can bake and/or cook. I can look things up online which is usually for a creative or educational purpose (but not always).

When do I go to bed? Well, in order to get up at 5:00 because I need to wake children up, I need to get to bed around 10:00. In order to get up between 5:00 and 6:00, I can go to bed later. In Idaho, I found it very easy to get up with the sun in the summer before 5:00 and go to bed with the sun after 8:00. Keep in mind that just because sunrise is at 4:42, the sky is getting light before that and just because sunset is at 8:51, the sky is light beyond that. I remember being up at 10:00pm and it not being dark and I remember being up at 3:00am and it not being dark.

What does this all mean? Just that I don’t think when I go to bed or get up has anything to do with my creative juices. On the other hand, if I’m feeling particularly creative at 9:30 at night, I’m not likely to want to go to bed at 10:00 and probably won’t. I may or may not have trouble getting up at 5:00 the next morning. But I really don’t think it makes any difference when it comes to my creativity. I won’t comment on my intelligence and you can infer from that whatever you’d like.

And that, my friends, is why I should have a blog rather than just post replies to what other people post, or repost, on Facebook.

In other news, I think I’m done with my Hywel and Cailín story. I don’t have a title for it yet and Laura is going to do some proofreading for me. I’ve sent her the first ten chapters so far. I’ve been reading/proofreading for her as well. I’ve done everything she’s sent me so far and now I need more.

Joanna and I are going to go see Mockingjay part 2 tonight at 9:30. That should be fun. There is a showing at 7:00 as well but I want to wait until the boys are in bed.

Right now in the oven I have a sourdough chocolate cake. I’m going to put just regular frosting on it rather than using the recipe that is with the cake. That stuff is just too much. Too much sweet. Too much coffee flavor. Too  much volume. Also, I have a pot of Diane’s beans on the stove and a loaf of sourdough bread to go with them for lunch. I want the cake to be for lunch as well. I really wanted to make a sourdough carrot cake for lunch but the recipe won’t load from the King Arthur website and I’d kind of like to give it a try before another one. On the other hand, if it turns out that it’s pretty close to the others I’ve found, I might just be annoyed and irritated. On the other hand, I’ve got a chocolate cake in the oven so what difference does it make at the moment?

And that’s if for now. Have a lovely day.

Cold Camping

Good morning, one and all! What a lovely day it is! Cold, but lovely. I wasn’t going to write this morning because, like the previous several, I just don’t feel like it. However, there isn’t really anything else I feel like doing either so this won.

Happy Birthday to my baby sister, Marie!

Friday night Joseph and I went on a Bear Cub Scout campout. Friday night we had pita pizza, Dutch oven pineapple upside down cake, and s’mores. Not bad and all utilized the camp fire. The boys came up with some pretty interesting scary stories. It was cold, but we’ve got decent sleeping bags (each one consists of three bags and each bag increases the cold rating). In spite of the bags, I discovered that if you go to bed with cold feet, a good bag is not going to help. The rest of me was fine, my feet froze. As a result, and partly because I forgot my pillow, I didn’t sleep much. I know I did some because I had a dream, but not much. Plus, at least two of the other parents were snoring. Just FYI. The snoring didn’t keep me awake; I’ve slept through Paul snoring and if I can do that, I should be able to sleep through anything. Except cold feet.

Joseph and I were in the green tent. When I saw this picture and in light of the attacks on Paris the previous night, I wondered how many of these boys might find themselves at some point in their lives facing cold, unpleasant conditions as soldiers. While I hope it does not happen, it could. World War I was the "war to end all wars." What might the future hold for these boys? Indeed, for all of us?

In the morning, I mixed up the sourdough pancake stuff that I’d taken for breakfast and stuffed sleeping bags into bags and took them home so Seth and Cedric could use them for their scout campout/hike. I milked once I got home and then Cedric wanted to know if he could use my boots. Well, I left them at Brinker’s (where Joseph and I camped out) so we had to go get them. Once we left, Cedric realized he’d forgotten the food for dinner at home so we had to go home and get it. In spite of all the fun stuff, we still made it to the Carignan’s before 8:00. Only by three minutes, but still..... There was only one other car already there (not counting Carignan’s) and on the way out, I saw four or five going the other way. Most of them waved and/or I recognized.

Once I got back, there were two pieces of bacon for me and there were some still slightly warm pancakes so I had breakfast. After clean up there was knot review and then Whittling Chip fun. It was cold. But my feet were much happier with Birkenstocks than with boots. When I asked Joseph if he had fun, I fully expected him to mention the cold but he just said, “Yeah, it was fun.” He didn’t mention the cold at all.

For the Whittling Chip, Joseph took a bar of soap that I’d made, of course. The other boys had Irish Spring, Dove and Ivory. One of them said something and I said, “I don’t even touch that stuff.” One of the dads, after examining the label, said, “You just do everything, don’t you?” Well, yes, yes, I do. If I decide I want to do something, I do it. And since the soap I make is far better than the crap (oops, did I say that?) from the store, you bet.

This is Pack 12 at the top of Mount Monadnock holding a French flag to show their support for Paris. And, I think, the world. Cedric is behind the white stripe and Seth is sitting on the rock wearing the maroon sweatshirt.

When we got home, I had lots to keep me occupied. I finished some sourdough bread I’d been working on for a few days and made English muffins. There were dishes that had accumulated so a few got done and then I’d make more and then some would get done and then I’d make more. I also made some carmelized sourdough biscuits. The onions smelled heavenly but the biscuits are not on my list of have-to-make-again recipes. The bread turned out beautifully in spite of the fact that I forgot to score the top before baking and this morning I made my bruschetta using it and it tastes really good in spite of the fact I forgot to put salt in when mixing the dough. It has that lovely sheen that you expect from a good sourdough bread and it is most definitely on my list of have-to-make-again recipes. I’ll make sure to not forget the salt next time and I’ll start adding whole wheat flour and see what happens.

For dinner we had the English muffins and biscuits. To go with the English muffins we had a ham steak and eggs and I made hollandaise sauce as suggested by the blog for the English muffins. I would add more lemon juice next time but it is super easy and turned out super thick.

The dishes finally were done and I started folding the mountain of clothes on the couch while I listened to a couple of really good conference talks.

This morning I milked and had breakfast. Joseph had breakfast and is whittling another bar of soap. Amena went to take care of Ben, the horse next door down the street. Paul already showered and is actually eating breakfast.

At some point, I will need to pick Cedric and Seth up at Carrignan’s and this afternoon I have a midwifery workshop to attend.

Have a wonderful day!

Carving

This is going to be short because there is so much to do and so little time in which to accomplish it all.

Every stamp, at least those that I carve, begins with a drawing.

Life has been very life-like around here as of late. Yesterday there was no school for the Quabbin district so I scheduled Seth and Joseph for no school as well. I really think it would be difficult to get work done with the distractions provided by a Cedric and an Amena. I know they can be distracting when I’m attempting to get things done sometimes.

The drawing is transferred to the Speedy-Carve (which is a lot like a 4" x 6" x 1/4" eraser).

Yesterday I had an appointment with the dentist in the morning. That went well. No cavities. After, since I was already out and about, I decided to go to Michael’s to get some Speedy-Carve. That’s the stuff that I use to carve stamps. Since I was near the exit for Coggshall Park, I thought I’d go check on “To Have a Child....” because someone reported that they couldn’t find it. I parked in the parking lot and got out and realized Birkenstocks were not the best footwear for such an activity so I left and went home.

Then carving begins. This is really not a good picture but at least you can tell I've been doing something due to all the little shavings or whatever you call the little pieces of stuff I've carved off the block. Or sheet. Or whatever.

I really wanted to take the boys to Barre Falls Dam and do the Cold Creek loop but they took turns not cooperating so it ended up never happening. Very annoying because it was a beautiful day just perfect for a lovely hike in the woods. If they get done early enough today, we will go today instead. (Actually, I think these plans have changed since the Cub Scouts will be doing this hike Sunday and I would like to go with them. We will go to Dunn Park maybe and find some of the stamps we haven't there yet.)

All finished. Can you tell what it is?

There was a Pack 12 leaders meeting last night. Before I left, I told the boys that they needed to recite an Article of Faith for scriptures and that they should say family prayer even though it was only them. Cedric did the 1^st AofF and I thought he would only want to do that but he told Seth and Joseph to do one as well. Can’t complain about that. Seth did the 4^th (it’s is favorite, I think) and Joseph did the 6^th. Cedric also said a prayer. And, yes, I am relying on Seth and Joseph for reporting most of this.

I always have to try it out to make sure it doesn't need any fine-tuning. I didn't think this did so this is what it is.

There is so much more I could say but I just don’t feel like it. Although I will treat you to a paragraph that I wrote yesterday but did not post:

Doctors, especially obstetricians, must carry massive amounts of malpractice insurance. I’ve heard that this insurance typically costs in the neighborhood of $100,000 each year. The fact that in 2000 over 70% of American obstetricians had been sued for malpractice indicates. . . . what? That they have to have it in case they get sued? That maybe the reason they are being sued is because of what they are doing? I find that last suggestion to be an interesting one and suspect that it is true.

The progression from first idea (top left) to the final drawing (the one cut out) to the stamp and stamped. Any ideas which child of mine this might be for?

Have a fantastic day!