A tree severely pruned

I've been getting back into genealogy research lately, because I don't have enough projects to keep me busy, yah right.

On my dad's side, I can trace one shoot back to about 1600 in England, with very early immigration to what would become Massachusetts. Pretty exciting stuff, reading about long ago ancestors fighting in King Philip's War and the Revolutionary War, owning large farms and mills, and generally being interesting colonial people. (With the family name Blood, how could they not be cool? Still looking for any links to pirates.)

On my mom's side, I can trace her father's ancestry back about as far back in Sweden, thanks to a cool hand-written family tree her father passed down.

But on my mom's mother's side? Her grandparents are the oldest generation, and for them and their relatives I have almost no information. Thanks to the Holocaust, it's a complete dead end. The only thing I can find is that some of them indeed died, in Auschwitz and Riga, Latvia. Thanks to some combination of luck and pluck, my grandmother made her way to Shanghai, China where she met my grandfather and continued our family line. Otherwise we'd all be not even memories, just some tiny bits of data about lost grandparents in some backwater of the internet.

Bleh. Maybe I have reverse Seasonal Affective Disorder, and I'm depressed because of lack of show and balmy weather!!

The stuff that's been littering my brain

Last night as we went to the the car for a dinner out (no-one was up for cooking or cleaning) Napoleona took a flying header as she ran down the road toward the parking lot. She cried for a while but all seemed well. Then this morning as I'm changing her clothes I discover a huge bonk on her upper forehead, complete with puffiness and those little red spots from the rough concrete. Felt like a very lame Mama for not checking under her bangs last night. Have been assiduously applying arnica gel ever since.

I've been reading Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma. Such a depressing book really. For purely financial reasons we've been eating less organic foods lately, and for some reason more meat, and now it all makes me feel queasy reading this book. So now my brain is filled with thoughts of the interdependence of cheap corn, feedlot animals, fractionated corn products comprising most processed foods, farmers going bankrupt, cows heavily medicated to accept food they were never meant to eat, why potato chips and Wonder bread cost less than fruits and vegetables, and the fact that there are now more "overnourished" people in the world than undernourished. Can't wait to get to the section about hunting and gathering, hopefully much expanded from his article in the NY Times Magazine of 3/26/06.

Funniest holiday moment: the 10 minutes it took the kids to notice the play kitchen next to the Christmas tree, because they were too distracted by passing out presents and opening stockings. Grandpa literally had to say, I think there are more presents under THAT BIG THING OVER THERE!!!

Saddest holiday moment: the night before Christmas eve, spent cleaning and soothing Napoleona as she spent the whole night throwing up in her sleep every 20 minutes.

Most Christmasy holiday moment: singing Silent Night holding candles in Grammy's church with the kids.

Most annoying holiday moment: realizing that the only snow we were going to see for the entire vacation was on the day we were leaving to go home. Grr!

All Quiet on the Holiday Front

Well, things have been really quiet here in blogland. We spent 7 days in New Hampshire with Grammy and Grandpa, which was great overall.

However we all got some sort of stomach flu, so that at any one point in time at least one of us had either vomiting or diarrhea. Luckily on Christmas day everyone felt OK, and we were able to fulfill SillyBilly's wish to cut down our own Christmas tree.

I had true intentions to post here while on vacation, but it never happened.

On a completely different note: anyone have any opinions on blogging with WordPress?

What I'm doing instead of wrapping presents...

I found a link to these incredible Goddess dolls on Strollerderby. I've never seen something so original in "Waldorf" style toys.

Whoever can make a cool little doll out of Kali (complete with skull necklace), Tethys (with tentacles and cowries) or Boudicca (torc, woad and all) is simply awesome.

I've been thinking a lot about how the Waldorf world is a bit stuck in convention and dogma (another future post), so it's refreshing to see someone branching out a bit.

Yet another meme...

I'll have to add memes as another reason to blog! This one courtesy of White Thoughts.

Yourself: wheezy

Your partner: unsettled

Your hair: shiny

Your mother: silly

Your father: happy

Your favourite item: shell

Your dream last night: lonely

Your favourite drink: coffee

Your dream car: biodiesel

Your dream home: tidy

The room you are in: stuffed

Your ex: none

Your fear: inadequacy

Where you want to be in ten years: farm

Who you hung out with last night: Anthropapa

What you’re not: slim

Muffins: chocolate

One of your wish list items: space

Time: naptime

The last thing you did: breathed

What you are wearing: angora

Your favourite weather: cold

Your favourite book: magical

Last thing you ate: chocolate

Your life: transitioning

Your mood: curious

Your best friend: Anthropapa

What are you thinking about right now: blogging

Your car: surviving

What are you doing at the moment: breathing

Your summer: green

Relationship status: working

What is on your tv: dust

What is the weather like: cloudy

When is the last time you laughed: 11:30

What's a Blog For?

I've been trying to figure out why anyone blogs. Here's what I've come up with:

1) To keep in touch with friends and family, especially with pictures.
2) To express their opinions.
3) As a creative expression.
4) To disseminate information.

Those are all nice reasons, but what's missing for me is true dialogue. I love reading comments on this blog (LURKERS: please quit hiding and tell me what you think! I know all those ClustrMap hits mean something.) I love posting comments on blogs of friends and strangers alike.

Maybe I'm just missing something about the technology, but blogs don't seem to engender real dialogue. Perhaps threaded messages work better, I'm not sure.

The Blogger function where I get an email every time someone comments here is great, except unless I have that person's email address already, I can't respond to them other than commenting in my own post.

O ye 3-4 readers, what do you think? Why do you blog?

Wasting time instead of making Christmas presents...

Congratulations. You are 38% dork.

Almost, but not quite, entering the realm of dork-dom. You know that computers are capable of some nifty stuff, and you've even tried to partake in it. Ultimately, however, you enjoy natural lighting too much to really clinch the title of 'dork'.

The dork/nerd quiz
Quizzes for MySpace

2-year-old non-sequitur land

We like to expose the Huntlings to many cultures and religions, so they're familiar with Jesus and Buddha (I have to read up a bit more on Mohammed), Christmas and Hannukah, etc.

Yet the following comment from Napoleona still amazed me:

We're sitting at the dinner table, talking about nothing in particular that I can remember, when all of a sudden we hear a little girl voice say

"The Buddha said, life is suffering."

Whoa nelly, we've got a live one.

...On a stack of Bibles?

I just read about the incoming Muslim Congressman who is already under fire because he wants to carry a Koran at his swearing-in ceremony. I can't help but comment.

Asking a Muslim to swear an oath on a Christian Bible would be completely illogical, because the Bible is not sacred to Muslims.

Now, we here in the US have a powerful cultural image of our politicians taking oaths on a Bible. However, as the Monitor points out, this is actually a cultural image (from the swearing in of the President) and not an actual requirement of office.

Au contraire, it would actually be a violation of the US Constitution to require anyone to swear any religious oath: "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

I feel that I have to quote Dennis Prager, something I would not normally do, in order to most aptly express the opposition to Keith Ellison's consitutionally protected religious expression:

"Insofar as a member of Congress taking an oath to serve America and uphold its values is concerned, America is interested in only one book, the Bible. If you are incapable of taking an oath on that book, don't serve in Congress."

Last I checked, America has about 300 million people. Saying that "America" is interested in only one thing is ridiculous. Does Prager think we work on absolute consensus here?

I agree that a nation can have shared values (shared by a majority and/or historically in that culture). And I agree that the Europeans who first colonized this country were Christians.

However I disagree that for the US the Bible is the only religious document that expresses our values. President Bush's first campaign focused on "compassionate conservatism." What better to teach us about compassion than the Dhammapada? Where can we find a better guide to ethical, generous charity than in the Torah?

Prager again, in a more recent response: "The Bible is the repository of our values, not the Constitution ... and I'm asking him to honor that and include the Bible along with the Koran."

Last I checked, things like freedom of speech and religion, both protected in the Constitution, were American values.

Books We Love

As we are surrounded by gifts at this time of year, I have been thinking about one of my favorite things: books. We are a big bookish family. SillyBilly, who is 4, wants to read but can't yet. We're not pushing him, but if he wants to, he will (I learned when I was 4 as well).

So, I've been thinking about desert island books. The ones we couldn't live without.

Huntlings

Anything by Shirley Hughes
These books are marvelous for young children. Alfie and Annie Rose happen to be just about the same ages as my children, so we delight in reading about their adventures. The books have a lot of humorous situations and detailed illustrations. We love Out and About for its seasonal poetry and images.




Frog and Toad by Arnold Lobel
These stories are very funny for kids and parents, and are short enough to be good bedtime reading. Frog and Toad are sort of like amphibious toddlers: they can't stop eating cookies, they have tremendous misunderstandings, and they love both a good walk outside and a warm bed at night.






Seasons books by Gerda Muller
We especially like these books because they have no text; we can make up stories and talk about the detailed pictures afresh each time. They are large board books so that they are sturdy yet not too "babyish" for big brothers to read!



Anything by Jan Brett
These books have very detailed illustrations and are full of good humor. Often there are little surprises, like the animal-shaped mountains in Daisy Come Home, or the hedgehogs that appear at least once in almost all of her books.

Anthromama

Any fiction by Wendell Berry
The stories about the fictional Kentucky town of Port William make me laugh and cry, sometimes on the same page! The characters are so well developed that I believe these are real people that Berry knows. The stories are beautifully intertwined and reflect a deep love for traditional farming communities.




The Robber Bride by Margaret Atwood
I keep coming back to this book time and again. I love how the characters are so richly drawn, written with both humor and sympathy for their foibles. The three protagonists could not be more different in background and personality, yet they forged friendships that lasted decades.






Hounds of the Morrigan by Pat O'Shea

This book is full of Irish myth and legend in a contemporary setting. Some of the characters are unforgettable: a talking earwig who thinks he's Napoleon, and the gods Angus Og and Brigid disguised as tinkers Patsy and Boodie. The plot is full of adventure and good bit of horror for a "children's" book. I also like the beautiful and tender way the older brother looks after his little sister.



Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson
I have read this, along with the subsequent Green Mars and Blue Mars, again and again. I'm not a huge fan of techie science fiction, but these books balance the science with intriguing socio-economic ideas and enough plot to keep things going. I'd say the first book of the trilogy is the best.





Belinda by Anne Rampling (Rice)
Pure, unadulterated escapism. An erotic/romantic suspense novel about rich artists living in Italy, San Francisco and New Orleans. I read this when I don't want to use too many brain cells to enjoy myself.

Equal time for goofballs

Because little girls can be just as silly as their brothers...

Random goofy pictures of the boy...

because he's been away with Grammy and Grampy for a week and I miss him!

A boy and his dress

I just finished reading this article on gender confusion in small children (from a link at daddytypes).

Wow. What to do? I'm torn between the idea that a young child should be supported emotionally, and the idea that as parents part of our job is to teach our children about the culture in which we live. What's the happy medium between self-esteem and social ostracism?

My son has expressed the desire to wear pretty clothes, including his favorite red flowery dress. However he doesn't say he wants to be a girl, and most of his other chosen activities are typically masculine (as defined in our culture) such as playing with tools, toy cars, going to Home Depot with Anthropapa, and trying to sneak in gun play whenever he thinks I'm not looking.

We decided to compromise on the dress-wearing thing. I told him it was for "dress-up" time only, when he and his sister put on play clothes, fairy/butterfly wings, funny hats, etc. And the other boundary is that we only play dress-up inside the house. I feel like I'm protecting him from negative social judgments, while giving him a safe boundary in which to express that part of himself.

However, I have also made a point to tell him gently that "where we live, usually only girls wear dresses." (We did know a man back in California who would regularly wear sarongs, but I don't think SillyBilly remembers that!)

I feel like I'm helping him learn what is expected in his cultural milieu. But am I making him feel bad about himself at the same time? The NY Times article said "Studies suggest that most boys with gender variance early in childhood grow up to be gay". I've felt strongly from before his birth that I will support and love him in whatever paths he takes -- though we joke that we won't support him being a pimp, killer-for-hire, or right-wing Republican : ) -- but am I subtly telling him that wanting to be more feminine is wrong?

Holiday traditions

It's that time of year again. The time when I struggle to create traditions for our family.

I struggle because there are too many conflicting sources of symbolism, ritual and custom to choose from. I grew up with a completely secular Christmas celebration. Now my mother celebrates Hanukkah, and in the Waldorf community many people celebrate both Advent and the Twelve Days of Christmas/Holy Nights.

One year before the kids were born, we combined Advent and Christmas by putting up a live (in a pot) Christmas tree at the beginning of Advent, and each week added decorations based on the kingdom for that week (mineral, plant, animal, human). That was nice, but impractical now.

With the kids we've started having an Advent calendar, and on their nature table I will be adding the kingdoms each week until it's time for the Nativity figures. We're not religious, but the Nativity is such a basic image of life, birth, light, family, etc. that we've chosen to incorporate it.

The symbols of Christmas are so rich, and so full of ancient wisdom. I love to sing old songs like "Green Grows the Holly", "The Holly and the Ivy", "Deck the Halls" for the kids because they are so full of winter images, pictures of the triumph of life over death. And then the more religious songs are wonderful too. Rebecca sits oh so still and gets a far-off look in her eye when I quietly sing "Silent Night" to her. Even if she doesn't understand all the words, the mood of the melody says something to her.

Then there's Santa Claus. Not an image that has remained unscathed in our materialistic society. However someone once reminded me that he could be seen as a visitor from the spiritual world, flying about the starry heavens bringing gifts from above. So for now, Santa brings the little things in our stockings, and the presents under the tree are gifts for each other. When the kids get a little older I'll bring in the relation to the gifts of the Magi a bit more.

Now that we live in a cold climate, we've started to focus more on snow and winter. Last year we made borax snowflakes, a very cool craft. Candles and strings of lights pop up all over the house to drive back the darkness of the winter.

Another part of the struggle is that we have been away from home every Christmas. We're always with one set of grandparents or another, so it's hard to feel that the home celebrations are complete. We're not home for the last week of Advent, or the week after when I would put the Holy Family and the Three Kings on the nature table. The Advent calendar goes unopened, unless we bring it with us. We've not had a Christmas tree since we're not home to attend to it (and it would just become a big, messy cat toy.)

Privacy

It's funny how little comments can stick with you. Over the holiday weekend, Grammy asked if we ever worried about putting our kids' pictures and names on the internet, because of "predators".

I've never given that much thought. Perhaps I'm naive but I just can't imagine anyone taking the time to track down some random child. I know my kids are gorgeous and brilliant, but what could follow from someone reading this blog?

But then Anthropapa pointed out that all of our favorite parents' blogs use pseudonyms for themselves and their kids. So I'm wondering, what level of privacy is necessary? What are the assumptions behind the privacy of information on the internet? What are the actual risks?

Any thoughts, O my loyal 2-3 readers?

Thinking Thanksgiving Thoughts

We're starting to get ready for Turkey Day around here, busily stuffing the fridge and doing strategic cooking planning. It will just be 4 adults and 2 kids, but we'll still cook the whole shebang. We decided on a mostly native foods menu this year, with turkey, bread stuffing, cornbread, wild rice, green beans, peas & pearl onions, cranberry sauce, apple pie and pumpkin pie. Lots to give thanks for.

I got a little book for the kids about Thanksgiving, but what a hard decision. There were many to choose from at the local chain bookstore, but most of them are either too cartoony, or don't seem to be telling a story even remotely close to the real history. The one I chose seems to be trying to tell most of the bits that would be comprehensible to young children, without the religious persecution, Manifest Destiny, King Philip's War, native peoples ravaged by smallpox, etc.

I did find a cool website about The First Thanksgiving, as part of my research into my latest burning question: Puritans vs. Pilgrims. I thought that they wouldn't be called Pilgrims until they left Europe, and that they were called Puritans in England.

Turns out in England the initial Protestant splinter group was called Puritans, which then split further into an even more radical reformist group called Separatists who sailed on the Mayflower, then in early Plymouth they were First Comers, then Forefathers and then Pilgrims.

I also learned that the first settlers were heavily indentured for many years by merchant investors, and that they had already moved to the Netherlands more than 10 years before sailing from Southampton, England. There is no evidence that the Pilgrims landed on any rock in what was later named Plymouth.

Anyway, now I need to find a little ritual with the kids to help them remember what they are thankful for. Any suggestions?

But then, they make up for it...

Tonight before bedtime SillyBilly made a little bed on the floor for his most beloved friend, Banjo the puppy. He then proceeded to sing lullabies (Oh How Lovely is the Evening and This Little Light of Mine) in a quiet, off-key, little boy voice. He also played the pentatonic lyre very gently and softly to complete the bedtime mood.

Tantrum Land

Well, we've reached a new phase in the Anthrohaus....tantrum land. Napoleona has decided that it's her way or the highway, about every living thing. Today at Target she wanted to ride in the giant carts with two kids' seats in the front, and when I said no she started freaking out. Those behemoths weigh about a thousand pounds and invariably one wheel has given up the ghost. So using one is pretty much like steering a water buffalo through quicksand, and I just wasn't up for it.

So now my challenge is, how do I work with her to 1) calm her down so her shrieks don't pierce my eardrums, 2) get her to listen to what I am trying to say, and 3) remember to not freak out the next time, all without resorting to major violence?

She is pretty stubborn, but luckily she's only 2 1/2 so I can still rely on some mother's helpers: distraction, her complete lack of rationality and logical thinking (oh yes, that's actually helpful sometimes), and my newest friend, Consequences.

We've been becoming more and more acquainted with Consequences lately...

"If you can't stop screaming and sit calmly in the cart, we will have to leave and go home."
"If you hit your brother again, you will go sit in your room."
"If you step into the brook and get wet, we will have to stop playing and go inside."
"If you don't start using nice words and an inside voice, Mama's head will explode and you'll have to clean it up." (Haven't actually used that one yet, but it's been tempting.)

Sometimes distraction works well: "Hey look, those seagulls are eating up all the french fries that lady just dumped out of the back seat of her car!"

Sometimes irrational thinking works: "If we keep our house neat and clean, the monsters will be repelled by its beauty and stay away!" (Caveat: I'm not big on scaring kids into submission, so I tread carefully with this one. I have never said "If you don't clean up your room, the monsters will come for you!"...but I have been tempted.)

And then there's the bonus action of the big brother egging her on or having a tantrum of his own....

Light and Dark

I’m finding myself a bit melancholy this autumn. I think in some way I’m experiencing a true autumn, in that the profound changes in nature in this part of the world in this season have really penetrated my emotional life. Though I don't celebrate any festivals honoring the dead like Samhain, All Soul's or Dia de los Muertos, I still find myself thinking about people I know who have passed over the threshold.


Since this area is primarily mixed deciduous forest, we have incredible leaf colors. Burning scarlet maples, yellow walnut and weeping cherry, and every color in between. Our feet scuffle through thick layers of rotting leaves on the forest paths near our home, and the little brooks become clogged and even dammed by the piles of leaves. After rainy days, mushrooms pop up through the earth, and after windy days the paths are littered with sticks and branches.

Though we are blessed with the bluest skies of the year, our attention seems drawn down to the earth along with the falling leaves. The warmth and light of the sun now decreases in the heavens and comes closer to the earth, in the bright colors of falling leaves and autumn harvest foods such as pumpkins and apples.


Autumn seems to me to be a time of hard thoughts. In summer we are more physically active, outside most of the time, and full of the same abundant life forces we see in nature. In autumn, those life forces are dying away in the outer world, and we must struggle to maintain our inner light in the face of the coming cold and darkness.


In Waldorf/anthroposophical communities, we celebrate an unusual yet ancient festival, Michaelmas, at the end of September. In the Bible we can read in Revelation about Michael casting out the dragon from heaven down to earth. This image corresponds to the modern struggle between spirit and materialism, light and darkness. The scaly, cold, earthly dragon opposes the fiery angelic spirit.

I see a correlation between this casting down to earth of darkness and the festivals of light at this time of year. We are surrounded by jack-o-lanterns, bonfires and candles for the dead on Samhain and All Soul’s Day, the lamps of Divali, and lantern walks for Martinmas, another ancient festival celebrated in our community.


Two nice quotes about autumn:

St. Martin recognized the divine spark in the poor man of Amiens, and gave it the protection of his own cloak. When we make a paper lantern, we, too, may fell that we are giving protection to our own little “flame” that was beginning to shine at Michaelmas, so that we may carry it safely through the dark world.
-All Year Round, Druitt, Fynes-Clinton, Rowling.

The season of hope and promise is past…We are a little saddened because we begin to see the interval between our hopes and their fulfillment. The prospect of the heavens is taken away, and we are presented only with a few small berries.
-Henry David Thoreau

A knotty knitty problem

Maybe it's the trees almost devoid of leaves, bare branches against darkening skies, and the cold winds blowing from the north hurrying us indoors. Maybe it's the time change, where more hours of the waking day seem to be spent in darkness, within the small pool of light that is our home.

Or maybe it's that Christmas and Hanukkah are only a few short weeks away, and I've committed myself to many home-made presents this year, but right now...

It's all about the crafting.

I have about 42 projects going on at once, including knitting a sweater vest, a pair of mittens, a hat, and a teddy bear sweater; a truly cool knitted/embroidered/latch-hooked farm landscape for the kids about 1/16th finished, and one cross-stich project as yet unbegun. I also want to make a flannel dress for Napoleona, a sweater vest for myself, hem about 10 pairs of pants for Anthropapa....


It all started back in August when I was visiting my mom. When I found out she didn't have a Hanukkah sweater for her favorite holiday teddy bear, I promised to make one for her. Then Anthropapa gave me some red wool yarn for my birthday. Then I found a funny little cross stitch project to make for one of the grandparents. Then I took a class on knitting in the round at the Sunbridge Craft Studio so I could learn to make mittens for the kids. Then Anthropapa complained one too many times that I never knit him anything, so I had to start on a sweater with some great yarn I found on sale. Then at the Eurythmy School Rummage Sale I found a cool book about knitting fantasy figures and landscapes (knit a castle, how cool is that?), which included the farm landscape that just begged to be created.

It's all snowballed into a bit of crafting hell, where something I love to do is slowly but surely being overshadowed by a looming deadline. Anthropapa kindly let me off the hook (ha!) by saying he didn't expect a whole sweater by Christmas, and I know that really the kids don't need the farm landscape right away either. But still, that's a lot to do in the few weeks I have left.

I can't decide if it's just a problem of short attention span and lack of focus, 2 weeks gone by either sweating out a fever or visiting with grandparents, or just that I need to learn to knit much, much faster.