.: Catch Up :.

Has is really been one month since I last joined you here?  Yikes!  My only excuse is that these days we've got a roaring fire in our wood stove most nights and blogging by the fire is just not nearly as enticing as knitting by the fire.  It's been a month of transitioning out of those glorious autumn days into the long winter nights, celebrating with family, working and playing at our "school", and busily preparing for the holiday season.  

We made our annual trek to Ohio over Thanksgiving to be with Robb's family.  Neva and Frances had a fantastic time with their cousins...

Now we find ourselves in the heart of the Advent:

This past Friday we celebrated St. Nicholas day...a sweet and simple celebration I really enjoy and endorse! In keeping with tradition, the girls set out their shoes the night before with some carrots for St. Nicholas' donkey.  

 (Frances looks just thrilled, right?)

In the morning the girls found their shoes packed with a few little treasures...stickers, clementines, a small chocolate and two books (that we already owned but hadn't read in a while)  Talk about keeping it simple!  They also each received a pair of new mittens (Neva pondered, "I guess St. Nicholas knits too, Mama!")  I guess I'll let him take the credit for the sake of a little magic.  Happy Advent!

w e e k e n d i n g

 

Our Frances

 

Our sweet girl, our wild one, who spent the majority of September and October with an enormous bruise on her forehead.  Oh how we love you.

Going on.

Autumn is in all it's glory here in Philadelphia which means for us lots of playing outside, working on our "playschool", knitting, growing, laughing, and savoring. It also means not a lot of blogging.

 (visiting Robb at work at the Morris Arboretum)

 (Sunday afternoon in the backyard...knitting, snacking, squeezing sweet baby feet)

(my little readers!!!)

Since you don't have much to read on this blog lately, why not read this fascinating and important study conducted by the Alliance for Childhood regarding children, education, and play (link below). I'd highly recommend it to anyone with small children or educators. I found it very encouraging! Enjoy!

Crisis in the Kindergarten

Squeeeeeak!

Robb went to town with some WD-40 after dinner tonight...no more squeak!

We've been

It's been a while my friends!  Much working, playing, thinking, eating, learning, reading, digging, discovering, running, jumping, twirling, and loving....just not so much blogging.  Which I think is probably a good thing. So, here's what we've been up to:

  

.: soaking up every last bit of summer we can 

.: cheering Neva on as she is starting to finally get the hang of her tricycle! (She is quite taken with this new sense of freedom.  She likes to direct me, "Mama, you just stay there and I'm going to ride far away from you.)

.: listening with joy at Frances' almost constant "chatter", every now and then we actually recognize a word!

.: making a day trip to the beach last weekend (we saw dolphins are the Jersey Shore y'all! Crazy)

.: taking down every last bit of bamboo on our property (that's really more of a "Robb's been...."  I've been looking at the now empty spot of thinking: chickens) 

.: happily adjusting to our new rhythm of "playschool" twice a week (hopefully I will have a chance to tell   about it some time this week!)

 

.: enduring the tumbles that come with a very adventurous toddler (see second picture below)

.: smelling, hearing, and watching autumn makes its entrance

my "students" Liem, Frances, Neva, and Jubilee.  A pretty sweet bunch.

Sandbox (and the 100th post!)

One of the other highlights of this summer has been our sandbox!  I found the pattern here and thought it was such a sweet and practical design. As you can see in the picture, the cover opens up to form seats, creating a really cozy and happy spot to sit together.  I showed to it my father and, naturally, it arrived about a week later!  He never ceases to amaze me.

We've already had so much fun with it, playing there many times each day.  Thank you so much Popeye!

 

As a side note, perhaps some of you know that we've begun a new rhythm this week in hosting a small Waldorf inspired group here with our dear little friends Jubilee, Liem, and my friend Kristen.  It's a new adventure for us all!  If you're interested, I'll be sharing occasionally here what we're up to!  If you want to read a bit more about Waldorf homeschooling, I recently read this article by Donna Simmons that I thought was a good introduction. 

Grange Fair

This past weekend we were very excited for what has now become a Grace family summer tradition:  the Wrightstown Grange Fair.  There's truly something for everyone: cows, chickens, bags of raw wool, chainsaw displays, Belgian horses, piglet races, handwork competitions, goats...you get the picture.  You can reminisce about our trip last year here.

But the absolute highlight of the day (I think for us all) was Neva getting to ride a real horse!  What a delightful moment.  Neva sometimes has the tendency to be very excited about new experiences but then sort of panic in the follow through, so this mama couldn't help but think that maybe Neva would have a bit of a breakdown upon actually getting on the horse.  I was wrong!  She was quite pleased with herself, and I was beaming to see her feel so confident.  She even went with "no hands!" for about a half second.  ooh how I love that kiddo.  

 

Worms

What better way to spend a Saturday morning than running around barefoot, hanging laundry, sipping coffee, and digging up worms.  Neva and Frances were delighted at the ease with which they were found and Frances took great joy in their squirminess.  They were held, studied, carried, tossed, swung in the rope swing and, okay, there may have even been a bit of nibbling.  How grateful I am for this magical time of childhood, with nothing for the girls to do but explore, wonder, and delight.

It made me think of one of one of my very favorite books The Sense of Wonder by the wonderful Rachel Carson, a beautiful reflection of the importance of children experiencing nature.  

"If facts are the seeds that later produce knowledge and wisdom, then the emotions and the impressions of the senses are the fertile soil in which the seeds must grow.  The years of early childhood are the time to prepare the soil.  Once the emotions have been aroused--a sense of the beautiful, the excitement of the new and unknown, a feeling of sympathy, pity, admiration or love--then we wish for knowledge about the object of our emotional response.  Once found, it has lasting meaning.  It is more important to pave the way for the child to want to know than to put her on a diet of facts she is not ready to assimilate".

{this moment}

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

In bloom

Our hydrangea trees are in bloom which makes it a treat to step out onto our porch, particularly in the early morning or late afternoon.  The blooms are alive with the buzzing bees and I bring them in by the fistful to decorate our table, mantles, anywhere.  I find them particularly beautiful while the children are napping, sipping coffee with knitting in hands, but I think this maybe happened once this summer.  I remember these trees being in bloom last year when we first came to look at this house....Maybe it's the approaching change of seasons, the cooler night air, the leaves that are starting to fall or Frances' talking more and seeming very much like a toddler and not very much like a baby but....I feel very aware of the passing time.  How precious to be here!

Slowing down

Since we returned from our big trip, the girls and I have been enjoying being real homebodies...nothing to do, no one to see, no where to go.  It's my favorite type of day, when we are able to move at our own pace.  Lounging on the couch reading books, playing outside all morning in our pjs, or going on an adventure if we feel up for it.  Certainly this slower rhythm really makes me feel we are soaking up the last days of summer.  And oh how I love to soak up the minutes with these girls.