Carlie-Rose Cooks


This is a picture that warms my heart, Carlie is cooking a Mexican dinner. She has been taking lesson's from Sam's mom, Eleanor, and we have been the oh-so-willing guinea pigs (and pig is probably the appropriate word here...) of the most delicious fare. Almost very time she cooks she makes a batch of salsa; around here chips and salsa are their own food group!  I guess I should probably be learning along with Carlie for the day that is bound to come when she is no longer here to cook for us.


Here is a quote that I found in a book I purchased recently: "Being a writer does not necessarily mean being published. It's very nice to be published. It's what you want.  When you have a vision, you want to share it. But being a writer means writing. It means building up a body of work. It means writing every day. You can hardly say that van Gough was not a painter because he sold one painting during his lifetime, and that to his brother. But do you say that van Gough wasn't a painter because he wasn't "published"? He was a painter because he painted, he held true to his vision as he saw it. And I think that's the best example I can give you."   ~Madeleine L'Engle~


And that, in part, is why I created this blog. I need to write on  a regular basis and this is one kind of outlet that provides the opportunity. Hopefully, the reader will bear with me as I continue the writing journey.

Easter 2010

Last year JJ was too young to get a lot of enjoyment out of the Easter egg hunt, but this year he got quite the kick out of it.  He would find the egg drop it into his basket and scurry off to look for the next egg. He had his share of plastic eggs with candy in them, pretty sure he got a sugar buzz because he was pretty "animated" when his Papa was opening belated birthday gifts.
He would throw his arms in the air  and yell, "BIRTHDAY!" and then shriek with laughter when we laughed at him.  Funny how children become the focus of family gatherings, they are just so much  fun to watch as they experience things for the first time or learn something new.     
We played a new game that Heather brought over called Banana Grams, it is like Scrabble only each person plays their own game. We only played one game as it had grown late for  JJ, besides we wanted him to come down from his sugar-high at home...



                                                      

"Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme..."


Believe it or not, this is my rosemary bush, it is about five feet tall and probably healthier than I am! I love fresh herbs, I have grown oregano, basil, mint, and sage with  great success in the past. However, I inherited this rosemary when we moved into this house and it appears to thrive on benign neglect, an apparent necessity for living under my care, if you are of the plant species. I have wonderful intentions but too often they do not come to fruition. I tend to begin gardening projects with great gusto and finish with little fanfare, sad but true. Last year I grew tomatoes, the plants themselves were huge and put out tomatoes at an astonishing rate, we ate a LOT of tomatoes but by the end of the season they had become so out of control that I couldn't even get to the tomatoes to harvest them.  Lesson learned, this year I will put my tomatoes in a different location. The garden I had last year was also far bigger then I wanted to keep up with  so the end result was a very weedy patch with a lovely fence around it. We did have some amazing green beans and yellow squash out of it; but really there was a lot of work that went to seed, pun intended. Note to self: CONTAINER gardening on the deck.

These miniature daffodils have come and gone now, but they were the brightest ray of sunshine as you came up our front walkway. It was especially nice because they were blooming at the at the point in the quarter where I wanted to bang my head against the nearest wall and cry like a baby.
But all of that is over now, grades are out and I maintained my 4.0 GPA. Yes! I actually received an 'A' from my English class. It was so totally backwards all quarter long, Math was easy and English was tough, really tough. I am very thankful that all my hard work paid off, there never seemed to be a guarantee of that.
I remember the first day of the quarter (and this should have been the writing on the wall) the professor's first words to the class were, "Pick up your homework on your way by my desk." She followed that up pretty quickly with, "After my class, all your other college classes are going to be easy." She was not kidding. But I lived, hopefully learned, and added more layers to the part of my character that needs to practice staying with something even when you can't see the end result.
On another note, it is Easter week (how did this happen?!?!) and I am looking forward to having the whole family here for Easter dinner. It will be fun to watch J hunt for Easter eggs this year. Pictures to come!

Yesterday JJ came over to play. He is a precious bundle of joy and nearly unending energy. We went outside and saw a very hefty black and yellow bumble bee lumbering through the air; I was left to ponder aerodynamics, J wanted to follow it around and touch this fuzzy ‘fly.’ We watched in wonder as a helicopter (just like the ones he sees in his books!) moved across the sky with its distinctive 'thump, thump thump' sound. Like most kids, ‘ou’side’ is J's favorite place to be. Viewed through the wide eyes of a 22 month old child it opens up a world that tends to be forgotten once the vestiges of childhood are behind you. Soggy grass, rain, and chilly winds pose no deterrent, as a child you are completely unaware of these elements. ‘Outside’ is a veritable wonderland of delight with infinite possibilities for the imagination. J loves to watch the birds at the feeder, in the brambles, in the yard, anywhere they can be watched. He knows the names of the Junco, Chickadee, and seagull. It is so much fun to see knowledge upon knowledge being added to his information bank and amazing to think of all there is yet to learn! I am so grateful that I have a grandchild, it is an extension of having children and yet it is so profoundly different.

 

So, I made it through finals and lived to tell the story. It was a tough quarter but I made it. I was surprised to find that I was utterly exhausted the first day of Spring Break. I felt like I had run a marathon, and in a way, I guess I had. I feel a bit disoriented without the endless litany of classes, homework, and more classes.

Yesterday, Heather and I spent a significant amount of time trying to finish our 2009 scrapbooks. She finished, I didn't, but I am oh so close! I plan to finish before school starts up again on April 5th.

I am keeping JJ this afternoon so hopefully I will be able to get some good pictures and enjoy him without the guilt of feeling like I should be studying!

I needed to add something that made me smile for this particular day. I am in the throes of trying to complete my essay and I am a bit lost in Algebra. I hate having issues with Math, it makes me feel the frustration I had back when I was a kid. We are only spending two weeks in Algebra so I need to garner all I can from it. I am just frustrated, this too shall pass. I think that I am also feeling the pressure build as finals come closer, I don't want to stress, I just don't know how to avoid it completely.

At any rate, JJ makes me smile. I had him all of Saturday afternoon and into the evening, he is such a ray of sunshine! I was bummed because he doesn't call Maverick, 'Manic' anymore, which I always thought was adorable. We played hide-n-seek, played with his legos, went outside and picked up sticks and wondered around the yard. He loves to be outside and it was such a glorious day!