to like and not to like

Loving, not liking ~

My favourite piece of music ever. Epic, truly amazing, covers the whole spectrum of human emotion. I know it because I feel so every single time. I adore and can listen to this indefinitely, every day forever. We managed to unstick our old cassette player in the car and now this follows us along the country lanes. If music has ever achieved perfection in every sense it must be here. My kids request it, so there. In may be named Winter but it's my Summer listening.

not liking ~

crowds, people, towns, hot days - in combo



liking ~

the way that green is the colour of my days



liking ~

the unfurling of life all around me





liking ~

bare skin in the sun



not liking ~

having to clean my house, even just a bit, because being outdoors is more tempting, but still it is pleasing to see the hall start to take on the look of summer muddled in there with our winter 'stuff'.



liking ~

my bedroom window open, at night again now and the sound of the stream washing over
me

liking ~

quick meals; home made burgers (minced lamb/venison/rabbit beef with mustard, egg, mint, chives and seasoning) eaten with a big salad

liking ~

that I can wander outside and pick herbs for dinners



liking ~

the way the table gradually fills up over the course of a day, people doing and leaving and moving on and running in and out the front door (which is open from dawn 'till dusk right now) - and then dinner time lolls around and I simply plonk a jar of knives and forks down and we eat around it. Or better still, uplift ourselves and eat outdoors.





liking ~

striped legs



and coloured chalk





and boys who make bows and arrows, constantly



liking ~

how we all have time to stare, wonder and dream and lean over fences and wear what the heck we like, or nothing at all.







liking ~

finding myself lost, visually, where ever we may be, in the growth of every little tree, branch,seedling and flower (I think this was a car park and I think I was staring at swishing leaves)





liking ~

stream





and hill



liking ~

little girls that take such a long time explaing what purpose has a ladder





and ones who close their eyes and lift their heads to feel the seed blossom land on their faces



really liking that there's more to love in life today than not, as evident in this quick post :)

been :: deciding, and more

been :: knitting with my spun gold



been :: visiting with nanny - she came to us, we miss you already, you left us mama-made dishcloths, I will thank you and think of you as a I wash :: love

been :: out! Saw this guy and his band at our local going-out-to-place (old sofa's dogs, art grazing walls - my dh thinks it's pretentious but I don't care). He was good, I will take my boys to see him at the Festival this year. My dh the non-camper says he will take us all to The Green Man, so keen is he to see more live music.

been :: amazed and laughing with Esmé over our magic hen and it's freakish double yolks.





been :: baking the staple quick scone-bread. Goes with soups, stews and pretty much is an all round helpful addition to most meals. Chopped sun-dried tomatoes and fistful of chives. Recipe here (I use sheep or goat yogurt instead of milk, not that I eat it but everyone here reckons it's tastier that way and substitute spelt in place of plain flour).



been :: drinking water kefir. Fermented beverage with honey and lemon. Feeling glad to find a kefir that doesn't use milk to ferment. Cheaper by far than using probiotics constantly and much tastier. Bought mine here, it's pretty good. Instructions and information here on use.

been :: deciding, my hair will stay :) Photos - pj's, tangled bed hair and a bouncy wild girl with my very own hair too - in honour of her, I'll honour it. For now at least....

hair, mine and sheep's

We are having an early summer, the weather man said it was 27 degrees here today. So oddly enough I did some knitting. There is something very strange about holding merino wool in your hands while wearing a vest, being barefoot and lolloping in the sun. The hair of another animal, felt in such in heat is vulgar and pointless even. But all the same, I like to knit. So one must follow ones inclinations. I let my self lead myself, if you see what I mean. Perhaps it was the heat befuddling my eyes and causing carelessness but these Kanoko Pants are not symmetrical. All pants ought to be symmetrical so these are big dud's. Plus the legs are different lengths. Not a success that satisfies my perfectionist tendencies. Still if you pull and hitch they work out looking just fine. I am sure a baby some where (colder) in the big wide world might like these. Let me know, baby between 0 and 6 months of age, and I'll send you them.





From sheep yarn to my own rug like hair. Sorry the picture is ridiculous, you'd think I could get someone over knee height to take some photos of me but apparently it's not to be. I suppose I could have *asked* someone but the thought makes me feel so self conscious I'd have to then look away from the camera in squeamishness, so a rather pointless request to make of someone. It feels like walking along the same street with Esmé; she'll turn around and scream at us all to 'stop following her!' Um, ok, crazy person, we'll all go down some other street instead and leave you to it...... I think we are too similar in silly ways for words. So I had to take my own photo (very quickly, because even that makes me feel ridiculous), and all because I am contemplating cutting my hair off and wanted some advice and opinions?



Should I? Or not? And what should I do with it...style wise? Who knows, really, I braid into a fat plait down my back or wear it loose and that's about it. If you can think of any styles that don't, um, actually need styling or maintenance and that look good on people with fire-coloured hair lemme know. Or I guess it stays the same.... part of me thinks, well, it's so long now I might as well do the whole Rapunzel thing and just leave it be, let it go (grow?) where it wants.



From vanity to comfort - Girl and I dyed eggs. We had a whole multitude of colours to choose from but it was insisted upon by some that red was the only way to go. I borrowed this idea from The Artful Parent; crayon drawing over dry blown eggs and then dipping them in dye. They look hastily scribbled on (and were) and I think they are beautiful. But then mothers are apt to think so about their kids craftiness so I am biased.









Not much else to report, garden blooming and veg thriving, spent many happy hours digging and transplanting tender seedling and weeding some more. Today was spent cartwheeling high up on a hill and dandling hot feet in a mountain stream. Blissful.

be here now

I found myself early on Sunday morning walking fast and weeping furiously. I can't remember the last time I cried, it's been a while. Sometimes you just want to trade in the life you have for an easier one. It's fair to say I think most people have these desperate thoughts every so often. Although what would we learn living an easier life I wonder? Probably not as much about ourselves and life as when things are hard. I'd like to say the beauty of being out alone early in the morning walking quiet country lanes brought me out of my misery, but it was a good ten minutes of hard walking before I actually looked around to see the world.



That it was all there regardless. Of how I felt. Living and breathing. Cows lowing, lambs stretched out basking in early sun, flowers bursting every which way along the hedgerows. I snapped a flower head as I walked and looked utterly in awe at this tiny perfect thing; white petals, tiny and heart shaped, delicate stamen and yellow tips reaching outwards, for life, the continuation of. Come wind or rain or sun the flower still grows and hopes, silently, as a way of being. I long to emulate such things, without so much thought that goes into the living a messy human life.



I'd like to pretend that I had lots of deep and meaningful thoughts walking my walk about how to cope when you feel lost, but I didn't, I was like a toddler, distracted from tears by a pretty bauble (or flower in this case). I am not fickle, but am glad distraction comes as easily as it often does. Especially when there are some things in life you simply cannot change, the tears are thus futile in any case. I adore living this life, but it's hard. I suppose these things go hand in hand. Who appreciates an easy life when it's all one knows? Who though can appreciate the Good Things when there is also the rough for comparison? I try to remember to do this. To recognise, in the middle of busy, endless, often seemingly identical days of ordinary (beautifully ordinary) life.



Human emotion isn't really logical or straight flowing or easy to understand. I don't think our unconscious self knows what time is, sometimes in our heads we can be anywhere we have ever been in an instant. Mostly this doesn't make for happy living. Be Here Now is a Ray LaMontagne song. I like his simple acoustics and voice, stripped bare. Thinking only be here now helps keep me sane, (the thought, not the song). What else is there? Other than now? Tormenting past thoughts and their remembered feelings are as much real as a dream. They are totally gone. Choosing to remember is the only thing that can make them 'real' this minute. Remembering I have a choice is sometimes the freeing key to the self made prison I construct in my mind. See, don't humans make messy their lives?



I think it was Rimbaud who said he wanted to experience as much as possible in life with the greatest possible intensity. Embracing this sentiment means that there is, in fact, much to be grateful for. Tears, sorrow and all.

tree love