Weekend Lovin'

I've often said to folks, "When my husband's gone, he's gone." Meaning, he works an hour away at a job that requires him to work twelve hour shifts doing some really tough stuff. When his days off turn up during the summer we're pretty relieved to have him home and are ready to go out and have some fun. Unfortunately, our kind of summer fun takes us to the great outdoors, and up until this month, the great outdoors has been pretty soggy in these parts, especially, it had seemed, on my poor husband's days off.

But finally, finally we've had some truly fabulous weather, and every day he had off the weekend we found ourselves out doing something just so nice.

Friday:

Out on "grandma and grandpa's lake" with my parents. The sweet sunshine, delicious food, jumps into the lake, and looking at beautiful lakeside homes. 

Saturday:

We were up at 4 o'clock Saturday morning to drive to Lewiston to watch the morning launch for the balloons at the annual Great Falls Balloon Festival. It was a beautiful morning that was followed by a yummy breakfast at a local diner. E. had a wonderful time and was very happy to finally have a chance to wear her balloon outfit. 

Sunday:

It seemed fitting that the week of our wedding anniversary my husband wanted to take the kids and I up to Frenchman's Hole in Newry, one of the places he took me when we were first dating. With a little grilling and some swimming later into the afternoon, it was a very pleasant and relaxing end to a really perfect summer weekend.

Abundance

This week I'm joining, for the firs time, the Make Your Home Sing link up party over at Mom's the Word. So very excited!

The season for blackberry goodness is upon us again. We have a ridiculous amount of blackberry bushes on one side of our property that have yielded a ridiculous amount of some of the most delicious blackberries I've ever had. In the past two summers that we've lived in our little house (with it's small surrounding jungle) these berries have never tasted so good. Big, juicy, sweet (with that lovely hint of tart) berries that quickly fill our bowls and bellies.

Every other afternoon, the kids and I have been going out and picking berries, setting some aside to make something special. E. is begging for blackberry pie, but I'd love to make this from Cinnamon Girl.

With the blackberries comes the extreme green of summer at our house. Everything is so vibrant and growing so well, but...I don't know what half of it is. And most of the other half are weeds, or there's just a lot of it (it being hosta, bee balm, day lilies, iris, some sort of weird monster plant that grows to enormous heights, and six-foot-tall thistle that I have a love/hate relationship with).

There's one particular part that is abundantly overgrown (pictured just above) for which I have high hopes. For the last two years I've been desperate for a vegetable garden. But our yard is woefully shady in most places, except for this one particular crazy patch of ground that's afloat amidst our lawn. So, while logic might dictate (or at least it does to me, a person with limited gardening experience) that we simply tear up what's there and plant a garden (I realise it's slightly more complicated than all that, but that's the gist of it).

But it can't be that simple, of course. Two reasons: that particular patch is over part of our septic system and those crazy monster plants grow non-stop, no matter what, and, as our neighbour informed us, the only way to really guarantee their demise is to rip them all up (thankfully the pull out easily), put down a layer of newspaper followed by a black tarp and leave that there for upwards of a year.

So, in order to unite my desire to have a veggie garden and to get rid of those crazy plants (all while not using potentially icky, septic-contaminated soil), we've decided to try raised beds over the layers of black tarp and newspaper. Win, win, right?

We're in the midst of phase one right now, which mainly involves me ripping up the crazy amount of weeds, and trying to figure out if I'm capable of ripping out a six foot thistle tree bush. After that we'll put down the newspaper and tarp and settle in for the cooler temperatures. Over the fall and winter I plan on beefing up my gardening knowledge and spending those chilly months being an armchair gardener, hoping to put my new knowledge into use come spring.

We'll see how that goes. Hopefully, come this time next year, we'll have quite the abundance of home grown veggies to fill little and big bellies alike as we do home grown weeds and wild blackberries.

Or I'll have a lone zucchini (possibly from our neighbours garden). Either way, I'll call it good.

Poetry Sunday

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:
The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar:
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home:
Heaven lies about us in our infancy
Shades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing Boy,
But he beholds the light, and whence it flows,
He sees it in his joy;
The Youth, who daily farther from the east
Must travel, still is Nature's priest,
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended;
At length the Man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day.

- William Wordsworth

I recently saw this segment of the ode Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood in the book You Are Your Child's First Teacher. With a child still so new in our home, this touched my heart in a special way. There is something about an infant that seems ethereal. He's not quite entirely there with us, sometimes, as though a part of his being is still mingling with God or some timeless force from where he came.

This is a seriously beautiful poem, and is quite a bit longer (this is only one small section). I would recommend reading the rest if you find your heart hungering for some meditation on the beauty of childhood. The rest of the poem can be found here.

Poetry Sunday is a day to find a piece of poetry that stirs your soul and makes your heart race in that oh-so pleasant way and share it with the rest of the world.

Though She Be But Little, She is Fierce

Oh, when she's angry, she is keen and shrewd! She was a vixen when she went to school. And though she be but little, she is fierce. (A Midsummer's Night Dream, Act 2, Scene 3)

 

Kindergarten is coming. Not this week, not next (though we do have an open house to attend), but the week after. Just under two weeks away, to be exact.

Outside, with that cool, dry air moving about us, you can smell school. When I stuck my head outside to let the dog out and took in that lovely deep lungful of breath, I could smell a warm breakfast, waiting for the bus, and school bells ringing. It's very September-y out there.

I've had quite a lot of turmoil, knotting very nicely in the pit of my stomach, about sending my big little off into the less insular world of "big kid school" (despite the fact that her preschool was actually located in the local high school). But I am also getting excited about this new adventure, and E. is, too. She's also very anxious.

Five year olds don't tell you, "I'm really scared about going to a new school, having a new teacher, and being with new kids who aren't my friends from preschool."

No, instead they tell you their bed is uncomfortable and they must sleep in yours (as if she'd stay in her own bed anyway...and we're okay if she doesn't). Instead, they pinch their baby brothers when you're not looking and tell you it's because he, "Gave me a mean look!" Instead they won't stop telling fart jokes or pretend to fart or poop on everything, even though you've asked a thousand times for them to stop. Instead, even the littlest thing takes them completely off kilter and results in an entire evening of, "But I want it!" and "You're the meanest mom EVER!" when previously they've never been one of those kids before in their lives.


Why didn't anyone tell me this would be so tough? Why didn't anyone tell me that in addition to feeling that little bit of sadness about my baby growing up was going to be mixed with the heart wrenching guilt and questioning of whether or not we're making the right decision in sending her away from our little home.

 

I know, in my heart, that once school starts and she starts to relax and feel comfortable with where she is going every day, things will settle down and our happy, not-quite-so-stormy girl will be back in full force. And I hope my own excitement about school will help her feel easy about it all the more (and I swear, she is excited, too). But then I wonder how long it will take her to
relax. What are those first days (weeks) of school going to bring us? Is it all going to be worth the emotional turmoil in the end?

I have been reminded over and over that kids are resilient. And they are. But should I have to make her be resilient?

Just Smile :-D

I'm joining Mama Kat this week (for the first time in ages - so happy it's one more thing that's making me smile)!

10 Things to Smile About (inspired by Things I Can't Say)
Here are 10 things that are making me smile today.

1. Learning new things (this past week I've read this and this and am reading this)
2. Impromptu photo shoots with E. with her new school clothes for Kindergarten!
   
3.  Finally getting to go for a run and really running. 
4. Beer brewing in our house. (And it has chocolate in it!!)
5. A delicious forecast expected for the rest of the week, perfectly coordinated with boat rides, balloon festivals, and a trip to Mackworth Island. Love August in Maine. 
6. These last few weeks of uncomplicated nursing with M. It makes me smile, but shed a tear or two as well, not knowing what to expect once I start working part time again. 
7. Seeing my name in print in the adult ed. brochure! 
8.  This song:
9. M. and his sleeves. 

   

   What...what are these??

10.  Ocean State Job Lots and a giant bottle of $7 organic extra virgin olive oil 
    
    
    What's got you grinning?

Why I Don't Hate Wal-Mart

I dont' know if it's just my Facebook feed or if this is something that's really “happening” on the interwebz right now, but there seems to be a lot of Wal-Mart hate going on.

And I get it. Wal-Mart has a pretty crappy reputation in most departments. I, personally, don't enjoy shopping there. It's loud, gives me some pretty serious sensory overload, and makes my kids (read: five year old and husband) act out (seriously, I blame the store, they're perfect everywhere else). You know, and I'm battling some internal feelings about my personal consumerism, minimalism (or lack there of), buying locally vs. at big box stores, etc.

But I won't say I hate Wal-Mart. Now, this is a reformist attitude on my part. I used to say I hated Wal-Mart. Swore up and down it was the worst place ever, that I avoided going there at all costs, but then I realized two things. One, I was being a huge hypocrite by saying, “I hate it there!” and still going, and two, while I have some serious issues with Wal-Mart, I don't know that I actually dislike the stores quite so much as I dislike the company.

Now you, the reader, can certainly go on and say whatever you like about Wal-Mart, good or bad. You can choose to shop there or not shop there. But here, I think, are some reasons to give pause before you say something like, “I hate Wal-Mart!!” or the like (and are my personal reasons for why I stopped saying it).

The crap they sell at Wal-Mart isn't any worse than the crap that they sell at [insert any big box or other non-specialty chain store]. Junk from overseas is junk from overseas, regardless of where you get it. It's not like the sweatshop kids who manufactured your downgraded designer t-shirt from Target  any happier or paid any better than the ones who made the shirt you could have gotten at Wal-Mart. Even if you buy from a more local store (like in Maine, we have the chain Reny's), it's still the same thing.

Sometimes, you just don't have a choice. Maybe it's different for those in more urban areas or who don't live on the lower-end of the middle class (or lower), but sometimes there just isn't anywhere else to go. Sometimes you are a parent and you realize last minute, as you look at your calendar ,that it's your kid's friend's birthday party the next day. Even if you wanted to order something online  (and pay for shipping) or make something (because, you, the working parent, has so much time for that), you can't. And because it's a Friday night and you live in the middle of nowhere, nothing “local” is open (and even if it were, the next question would be, could you afford something local?). You're left with one option – Wal-Mart (or Target, I sincerely feel that the two, in terms of quality of items, in most cases, are interchangable, though Target doesn't seem to get slammed like Wal-Mart does).

“Wal-Mart People” aren't a reason to not shop somewhere. You've seen the memes, the ones with the obese people riding scooters in their pajamas. Yes, people who look like that do exist and yes, some do shop at Wal-Mart. Sometimes people, for whatever reason, can't or won't dress up to certain expectations. They won't look how you* think they should look. Who don't take care of their bodies in the same way you do. That's life. Different strokes for different folks. To go around saying that you don't like shopping at Wal-Mart becausee of those people is your perogotive, but understand where it comes from inside of yourself. You're letting the state of other people's lives (which is no one's business, even if part of that life is displayed in public) prevent you from going about your own life.*

I (and you, too, possibly) know people who work at Wal-Mart. At our local Wal-Mart, which is also a major employer in our largely lower-middle class community, I know several employees. They're people I went to high school with, parents of kids I knew growing up, friends who's kids play with mine. They are all people who I know to be kind, intelligent, and hard working. Knowing and spending time with people who work at Wal-Mart is probably the single biggest reason I've changed my tune about the store, which brings me to my  last reason I've stopped saying I hate Wal-Mart...

Regardless of whether or not you know someone who works at Wal-Mart, how you feel about their products, or if you disagree with their company policies, it's people who run that store every day, and they do not deserve anyone's hate or dislike. While I don't believe people who disparage Wal-Mart have any ill will towards Wal-Mart employees, one has to wonder – if someone is going to spend the time to say how much he hates Wal-Mart, what is he saying, conciously or unconciously about the people who work there? I don't enjoy hearing folks badmouth my place of work (and I work for a public school system – trust me, I hear it) and I would think it's the same for many Wal-Mart employees* (and, keep in mind, just because you don't like it there it doesn't mean everyone else feels the same way, store employees included).

And quickly, here are some things I know (but may not be readily obvious from what I've written above):

• Things need to change at Wal-Mart and many other stores in regards to how employees are treated, receive benefits, and are paid.
• Wal-Mart kills local businesses. I believe whole-heartedly that it is best to shop locally, when possible. That said, Wal-Mart employs local people in ways that small businesses can't (i.e. On a large scale.)
  
  I know that I am not an expert in economics, business, or policies regarding these and related areas and don't claim to be. Everything written above are my informed observations and personal opinions. And no, I'm not being compensated by anyone, Wal-Mart or otherwise. [There is supposed to be a bullet here,  it won't format for me...]

*Generic “you.” I don't mean YOU you...I think.

*I could go on and attempt to talk about the interconnectedness of classism and the disdain for “Wal-Mart People”, but I don't think I could speak to it as clearly as necessary, but know it's on my mind.

*Keep in mind, that even if someone who works for Wal-Mart is not happy abou the treatment of the company and stores' employees, it doesn't help to continually hear how much where they work sucks.

Starting Over, All Over

Here we are. Again (well, again if you're familiar with any other blog I've written, and there have been a few). I'm really quite good at starting over. I think it's a secret joy of mine, creating and recreating these little spaces online (well, maybe not so secret, since it's rather public). So, while I find a lot of fun in starting these spaces up, I do hope to keep this one going for a while longer than my last start up (which lasted from January to July of this year - those posts have been imported here). And though I could go into the great saga that has been my "This Domestic Life" blog, I won't. I'll simply say that I've given up on Wordpress, moved my blog love back to Blogger, and that you can find my previous thoughts and account of my pregnancy with M. here. I also kept a blog here before that one.

All right, enough housekeeping. On to blogging.