s t i l l

the festival of martinmas

Golden light is turning grey,
Mists begin to rule the day.
Bare the trees, their branches lift;
Clouds of dead leaves earthward drift.

Through the field the farmer goes,
Seeds of ripened corn he sows'
Trusts the earth will hold it warm,
Shelter it from cold and harm.

For he knows that warmth and light
Live there, hidden from our sight;
And beneath a sheltering wing,
Deep below, new life will spring!


-elisabeth gmeyner

our local waldorf preschool celebrated the festival of martinmas today with a puppet show and lantern walk. they shared this poem, which i love. i now have it beneath a magnet on the fridge. it will remind me that although the days are mainly dark now, light will come with time.

also... i am taking a knitting class and learning so much. did you know i am a left-handed knitter? neither did i. i will share what i have made soon.

chocolate-y

we made the chocolate rice crispy treats from the october food magazine. they were delicious! i had planned to make them for our halloween party but ran out of time. so on friday i made them with calvin and our neighbor. it was great recipe to make with kids. they could taste all the ingredients as we made them (no raw egg to contend with...). it was calvin's first introduction to the marshmallow. he did not like the raw marshmallow, but loved the finished rice crispy treat.

the party and the day after

our halloween party was a success. the little ones had fun and played well together. all of the moms and dads got along as well. i did not want to go overboard on decorating because a) we don't have a lot of money for decorations and b) the decorations you can buy at party stores are often a bit cheezy and get thrown away so quickly. so i went for the less is more approach and ordered these little paper trees from here. i punched holes in each one and hung them on some baker's twine. i also got 10 helium balloons with extra long strings on them so that the little ones could reach them easily. i just threw them in the livingroom and i was done. oh and i also put up the birthday bunting i make for calvin's first birthday. i liked how it turned out... festive without being overdone.

it was a potluck. everyone brought delicious food. i tried to make the chedder cheese cobwebs out of this months food magazine. see photo above. they looked great until i cooked them. then they turned into chedder cheese blobs. they actually tasted okay and they were gone by the end of the night. we also made the acorn squash quesodillas and the kale and swiss chard gratin. they were perfect.

saturday morning sam and calvin spent a long time palying the guitar. it is amazing to me that right when calvin picked up the guitar he started strumming and singing. no particular song, but definitely sing-songy words came out. then today at breakfast he started singing 'a bushel and a peck'. i melted right there. then when he got to the end, he pointed at me when he sang "about you, about you". i choked back tears as my little one kept singing.