Small World

I just had a strange incident. I was looking for an artist that was at a craft festival earlier this year so I looked at the festival's website. Bizarrely, I'm in the photo at the top of the page. I was there for just a short while, but somehow I got captured.

Update

Saturday I had one of the most productive days of this fall. I managed to:
1. hem my jeans that have been waiting for over 2 months and I used this cool method I'd never heard of, but worked quite well.
2. make two pans of spanikopita for Thanksgiving.
3. Nora and I decorated hand turkeys and construction paper leaves to decorate the table on Thursday (I even traced real leaves - pin oak, tulip and maple - I feel so Martha)
4. sorted and resold a stack of Nora's clothes back to Kangaroo Kids where I got $30 in store credit, which I promptly spent. The rest of her old clothes went to Alana, my cousin's little girl.
5. We went to see Todd and Natascha and had a wonderful time catching up and planning for a crafty girls day.

I cannot believe I got that all done. Of course I've done nothing since then, although we did see my Aunt & Uncle and Nora went horseback riding again with Ellen. Maybe next time I'll get up on a horse too.

In other news, we took Nora to the allergist this morning. We got good news and bad news. On the good front, Nora was able to get a flu shot and it looks like she is non-reactive to peanuts, so we get to do an oral test with those. On the bad front, she is still very reactive and shows no progress towards outgrowing her egg and milk allergies. She is also allergic to almonds which sort of rules out all other tree nuts since they are usually processed together. We plan to do an oral test with her this weekend with peanut butter and I'm really hoping all goes well. It is very daunting to give your child something to eat that has the potential to make her very sick. Wish us luck.

Which Witch is Which?

A few photos from Halloween:

Pumpkin Hunt

This weekend we visited the pumpkin patch at Eckards in Grafton to find the perfect pumpkin for the jack-o-lantern this Halloween. Nora wandered all over the hillside and it was a cold morning. Just when the wagon was about to return for us, Nora finally settled on the perfect one. 23 lbs!




Afterwards, the day turned really pretty and we took a hike a Pere Marquette State Park, had some excellent beer at the Rotten Apple, and then took the river road further north to get apple and gourds at Ringhausen Orchard at Hardin. It was a terrific day.

Things I Could Be Doing

when instead I'm playing Bejeweled Blitz and reading trashy romance novels:

Finish recovering the baskets for Nora's dresser ex-changing table
Laundry
Reading The City & The City - which was featured on Unshelved last week and is also sitting on my nightstand
Making arrangements to be elsewhere next weekend
Planning my future
Visiting pumpkin patches
Swimming
Viewing the fall colors/Hiking in the woods
Making popcorn balls
sleeping
Making cute little stuffed birds
Buying/making birthday and Christmas gifts for loved ones
making Nora's appointment with the allergist
turning in 3 mail in rebates totaling over $125 due before the end of the month
figuring out how to use my phone
catching up on the news
updating my blog, twitter and facebook statuses
changing the sheets (okay it's not that bad, I did change them last weekend).
catching up on all that tv I haven't been watching
cleaning the bathroom
getting my flu shot
sending Nora's artwork to her non-local grandparents along with recent photos

My World Is Changing

I've been hearing about Richard Louv's Last Child in the Woods for a while now, and I finally got around to buying it this summer when we were in Arkansas. But it wasn't until I committed to go to a book discussion about it for work that i finally got around to reading it. I cracked the book yesterday and I'm almost finished - unheard of for me and non-fiction, which usually takes me weeks to finish - and now I can't stop talking about it. This book broke something open in me, and now I'm so emotional about it, I'm a mess, which is sort of a problem since I have to speak about it rationally tomorrow. Anyway to organize my thoughts, this is why I like it:

1. Louv could have gone a completely different way with the tone of this book, when I first started reading, I immediately bristled wondering if I was going to feel like a miserable parent for not taking Nora backwoods camping at the age of two. But he didn't. Yes, he clearly does stuff like this with his kids, but really what he's advocating is for parents to ensure that kids get out of the house and into a natural setting everyday. This could mean trips to the park, but it can also mean growing a seed in a dixie cup or watching the birds land on the railing. In one of the best passages of the book, Louv reassures us that making the reconnection is possible, that it doesn't have to be a giant task, and he gives us permission to have fun and to learn things too:

" But before I take you on this hike, let me say something about the pressures that parents endure. Simply put, many of us must overcome the belief that something isn't worth doing with our kids unless we do it right. If getting our kids out into nature is a search for perfection, or is one more chore, then the belief in perfection and the chore defeats the joy. It's a good thing to learn more about nature in order to share this knowledge with children; it's even better if the adult and child learn about nature together. And it's a lot more fun."

2. He makes a really strong case for our need for Nature for a. mental health b. cognitive learning c. physical health d. the creative process. Our disconnect from nature is really messing us up on all four of these fronts and ruining the earth for everything else on top of it. Really that's it in a nutshell, but this book is so much more.

3. This book should be required reading for parents, educators and policy makers for Chapter 8 - the section on ADHD and the benefits of being in nature to combat it- alone. If you don't read any other part of this book, read that chapter, it is incredibly powerful.

4. He puts the responsibility for making our re-connection to nature on a multiple shoulders (well actually everyone) but he doesn't hang parents or teachers out to dry by saying its all their fault or that they are the ones who can fix this. He takes on universities, environmental groups, government, corporations,educators, parents and everyday folks and gives extremely sound advice about how to make this work. i.e.: this book doesn't just tell you there's this huge society wide problem that is destroying us, but it also gives ideas on how to fix it and points to places where folks are doing it right. Louv also cites lots of research to back up his claims but he also tells us where no one is doing any research, or not enough research, or the research is faulty to support his arguments to encourage more work to be done.

5. This book is readable. It doesn't overwhelm you with statistics (although there are plenty), it doesn't feel like you are being lectured, it's well set up and most of all it is extremely interesting, not just for parents and not just for educators and not just for green folks (although I am all three of those).

So, please check the book out. You can borrow it from me or buy your own copy or go to the library. Whatever it takes. If you want the readers condensed version check out the link to the Orion magazine article he wrote (it's where you will go if you click on his name above). Maybe you won't have the epiphany-revealing, earth-shattering, emotional reaction to it that I have, but maybe you'll like it anyway and maybe it will convince you to go take a walk in the woods. I hope so.

It's that Season

It's that time of year again, the leaves are turning and football is back in season. Not that football, the other one - what we call soccer here. Okay, soccer is always in season someplace, somewhere, but our house is now in full frenzy over the EPL, which is somewhat more frenzied than MLS season or the US women's season, and oh yeah, it is even more frenzied since there's this thing called the World Cup next year and everyone is trying to qualify for it. This means that for the next months I've been asked to avoid driving on streets named Arsenal and Manchester and we are supposed to wear lots of navy blue and white (with just a pinstripe of yellow), unless we're supporting Ireland, and then it's that flag, and all of our weekends have giant two hour holes in them. However, when we are not gazing across the pond at our teams over there, I thought I'd give you a heads up on a team right here in STL and a great player that is actually related to me. My cousin's son, Sito has been named a finalist in ESPN's National Soccer player of the Week! He's one of three boys (young men) chosen from across the country and here's his write up, in case you don't want to follow the link:

Sito Sasieta, Chaminade (St. Louis, Mo.): Sasieta, considered the top midfield prospect in the St. Louis area, assisted on both goals as Chaminade edged FAB 50-ranked Peoria Notre Dame (Peoria, Ill.) 2-1. Sasieta, a senior who has committed to St. Louis University, has one goal and five assists through three matches.

Yay Sito! Congratulations!