Showing posts with label books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label books. Show all posts

Thursday, August 11, 2011

Around here

It is HOT around here, so hot in fact that it is hard to do much of anything.
Even so, things are moving forward. Most of the main paths moving through the land are completed and the meandering feeling of these curved walkways, for there is intentionally no straight lines, gives the Land a much needed inviting feeling, and makes you want to go deeper.
I think we are very close to breaking ground on our house, next week if all goes well, 
and that is very exciting. 
(The crocodile has not been seen since last week, and we wonder if perhaps he found it too crowded and moved on, that would be nice indeed. We are starting to clean out the Cenote,
 so if he is around he will be found and moved)
Meanwhile this is how we have been passing the time....
The butterflies have now moved on, but the memories remain
We made it to the beach for a short while this week
I have been fermenting cabbage and such, with the help of Wild fermentation, a long time favorite around here, the sauerkraut was very successful and I am really enjoying the sour salty flavor of the kraut, I have not managed to convince anyone else in the house though:)
...on the other hand I have had many frustrating episodes with my sourdough starter, the one pictured below is now dead, but the one on my counter currently seems very promising, three is a charm right?
To the right was the beginning of a rye bread, which was going so well, and on the third day, the day of baking, it stopped bubbling, I baked it anyways, but ended up having to throw it out,  it simply would not bake through, so I am guessing that I had not added enough flour.
I have not given up and plan to bake some delicious sourdough bread this week.
I wonder if the heat has anything to do with all this, or if I am simply not feeding the dough enough, I did not have these problems with sourdough in North Carolina, as I remember anyways.
We, Kaleena and I, I have been working on multiplication, at first Kaleena was not at all excited about this, and did not understand the concept, but that same evening I found her outside working math problems with sticks and cherries, I love homeschooling....
Another beautiful gift at the end of the day...
We have been reading The Windboy, and are more than halfway through it, it is so very lovely, so well written and the story has the three of us captivated.
I have read other whimsical stories, such as The Seven Year Wonder book and the Book of Fairy Princes by Isabel Wyatt, but neither the children nor I could really get into them, sweet stories but the constant repetitions were too much for us. 
This book however is so thoughtful, magical and innocent. Beautiful!
I highly recommend it!
One of the mango seeds that we planted a few weeks ago sprouted about ten days ago and look at it, so healthy and growing so fast
and the avocado is just about to leaf out.
The avocado took somewhat longer, it was sitting halfway in water for a couple of months until it split open, then I planted it, and now it is slowly reaching for the sun.
These two trees will be planted right around our house in connection with our grey water outlets..
Ohh, and we have a new family member; meet Lily the cat.
She found us and adopted Kaleena straight away..
~Blessings~

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Yarn along

Joining Ginny at Small Things for another round of Yarn along.
I just finished knitting this little gnome, inspired by lasts weeks yarn along in fact. I found the simple pattern on Plain and joyful living, it took about an hour to complete, and is so sweet.
Still haven't gotten into a book just for me, but thought I would share my love of these simple little animal stories by Thornton W Burgees, that we are reading every night. The children absolutely adore these sweet little animal stories, with their gentle lessons about nature, life lessons and the personality of each animal. The only thing that bothers me a bit about these, is the pictures which has the animals dressed and on two legs, however the pictures are few and I still highly recommend them...
~wishing you a lovely day~

Tuesday, August 3, 2010

A lovely read

I have been wanting to share a few of my favorite books for children, but have not found a way to incorporate this into my posts, so I thought, why not do a book sharing day.
I love books, especially for children and always love when I come across or is recommended one that I have not yet seen myself, therefor I am inspired to share one of our favorites here today.
I am one of those momma's who is very picky about the books I choose for my children.
(come to think of it, I am picky about a lot of things when it comes to my children:))
I adore books of natural beauty, simple pictures and stories, pleasing colors,
and books with meaning and magic, anything that will encourage the wonder and magic of the natural world, and the magic of life.
There are so many wonderful children's books out there, with beautiful pictures and stories, however the one in particular I want to mention today has very few pictures, in fact only a limited amount of black and white drawings in the corners of some pages, yet the stories of these books, for there are 4 all together, are absolutely enchanting. I am talking about the books of Tiptoes Lightly.
We have read all the books, yet presently have just  2 with us. The favorite these days is 
"The magic Knot", this is in fact the last in the series. The first being, The tales of Tiptoes Lightly, then comes; The festival of stones, then Big-stamp two-toes the barefoot giant (centers around spring), and finally the Magic knot. They can however be read independently of each other and in any order.
The festival of stones, centers around the autumn and winter festivals, 
and would perhaps be appropriate if you were to consider getting one book now. 
These books are free-flowing adventures into the realms of wonder and magic
characteristic of little children. They were written and used by a Waldorf Kindergarten teacher, and are simply such wonderful little books. If you haven't yet, they are most certainly worth a read. I have yet to hear of any child who doesn't just Love these whimsical stories of fairies and gnomes, water and wind spirits and a wide range of animals found on farmer Johns land.
So here they are again with a link as well.
I hope your children might enjoy these as much as mine.
Do you have a special book that you would like to share, if so I would love to hear about it.
~Happy reading~