Pottery by Mama and Amie

Amie visited my pottery class a couple of weeks ago, just for 10 minutes while DH picked up pizza down the road. We were glazing but I fired up a wheel for her and stuck on a blob of clay and centered it, adding lots of water. Then she put her little hands on the sloppy, turning clay and – wow! she could have stood there for hours, smiling, holding, feeling, turning with the wheel.

When it was time to leave she got hold of four chunks of throw-away and went to ask the teacher very sweetly if she could take it home. There must have been something forbidding in the situation – all those adults suddenly so intent on hearing what she wanted to say – because this is how she asked:

– Lisa, can I please take this clay home? Here [holding out one chunk] you can have this. And this one too [holding out another one], you can have this one too if you want?

Lisa accepted the gifts – quickly, before Amie offered her all of them – and everyone laughed benevolently. Amie was a bit flustered but happy with the chunks she got to keep. Oh, and I remembered those awkward social moments, and realized that this was a glimpse of the struggle she is heading for, quite fearlessly, as she exits that part of childhood when it’s just her and her closest family, and enters the world where things are asked and deserved and owed in certain, mysterious ways.

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I brought home the pots and plates I made. I was more adventurous with the clay this session, with the result that there were less pots to bring home (and give away), but more lessons learned. I took some pictures but in bad light conditions (it’s been so rainy here!).

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I loved turning those plates, what a great tactile experience! And that glaze really put the birds up there in the sky (it’s a translucent white, the blue background was put on before firing as a pigmented slip over paper cutouts of the birds).

I’m so keen on a pottery wheel, but honestly we don’t have the space to put it or, with everything else that’s going on, the time to make it turn as often as it should. But we’ll be doing some handbuilding for sure.

Arts and Crafts on Robin Hill

Amie’s grandmother arrived to stay for 5 weeks. Amie brought a bouquet of buttercups to the airport and rode the escalators while waiting for Thamm to appear.

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They settled into a regimen right away, part of which is “school”, “where Thamm pretends to be a teacher, and I pretend to be a student, and our house pretends to be the school”. They read and write and most of all engage in lots of crafts.

Here they are sketching each other – Thamm is attempting to sketch her every day:

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Here are the results:

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Amie (to one of her dolls): “You know, my Thamm is good at arts and crafts. But she still needs to use an eraser… That’s because I can’t sit still.”

So true.

We have also been working on a dragon. After rescuing some boxes from the recycling bin, we wrapped them in newspaper and painted them – the newspaper takes the paint much better, and as a bonus it gives the wrinkly look of dragon skin! Gruesome teeth were added.

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Wait, he (she?) is not finished yet! More boxes and paint and glue to come…

Morning at the Farm

Taking a break from our construction – we were setting tiles till 4 am – and gardening Amie, her grandmother and mself ran off to our favorite place in the US (aside from our own Robin Hill, of course): Drumlin Farm.

There were birds, wild (Eastern phoebe?) and tame:

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And farm equipment (defunct):

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And strawberry picking – and eating:

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And, when we returned, the littlest Robins of Robin hill (not so little anymore):

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{Update} They have left the nest…

Birds of Spring on Our Robin Hill

  • Grosbeak

In the early morning I passed by the window without my glasses on and spotted something colorful at the bird feeder. Something very colorful and unfamiliar, though hazy. I rushed to get my glasses: it was a new bird, and I guessed that it was a Grosbeak. I got the camera and the bird obliged, visiting for another ten minutes.

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When I sat down in the sofa with my bird book Amie immediately imitated me, getting her animal book, sitting down right next to me, and finding the animals she was spotting. It was incredibly sweet. Turns out it was a Rose-breasted Grosbeak. It’s a summer resident.

  • Eggs

A week ago I also found some eggs in the garden where a tree was cut down. One was broken, the other two intact, which I took inside and put into one of my bowls, thinking I might find a way of preserving them. Then I flat forgot about them, until today, when I found one broken (or rather, burst) open: it had a half developed little chick inside.

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I threw them in the compost. Anyone know what birds these eggs belong to?

  • Robin Hill

You’d have thought the Robins would have chosen a different spot for their nest this Spring – no longer the rafters of our carport, where last year they had to fly off each time someone approached. They did choose a different spot… about a foot away from the old nest! It’s tough to photograph them – I don’t want to use a flash. Here’s a glimpse:

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There were four little robins at first, and then there were only three. One fell out of the nest, it was lying dead on the pavement next to the car. I took pictures, of course – dead wild animals afford that rare close look – and then disposed of the body for some lucky fox or cat. It’s part of the great cycle of life, but how sad.

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It’s not that I chose not to tell Amie, it just didn’t come up. She  climbed on the ladder to see the remaining three chicks and was wowed.

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Next year, if they choose to grace us with their presence again, I want to install a live webcam.

I have been looking for a name for our tiny homestead. We’re on a hill and have lots of chipmunks, so I was thinking “Chipmunk Hill”, but in honor of our Robins we’ll call it Robin Hill – I like the Robin Hood connotation!

The Mobility of Skills and Spirit

Someone asked me: What if you  would have to move now? This was with reference to the vegetable garden, to which I have devoted many, many hours of hard labor and a whole lot more of research, hopes and dreams. My answer was: It would be no problem. Really? You could leave all of this behind?

What would I be leaving behind? A half acre of land, some well-tended topsoil and some raised beds, and a fence. Possibly a season’s harvest.

What would I be taking with me? The knowledge of what vegetables, herbs and flowers are available for my region, where to buy them, how to sow them and tend to the seedlings, how to amend soils and dig beds, how to compost, how to space vegetables, plant companions, water them and wage war on bad bugs and weeds. What tools are needed (surprisingly few). Knowledge of the path of the sun in the seasons. Of the functions of the soil horizons. Of the fact that organic materials don’t “break down”, no: they are broken down, by fungi and bacteria and little critters. That chipmunks dig holes in the beds, deep ones. That it’s okay if a couple of bean seedlings are eaten  by an entity unknown: pull and reseed. That it’s good fun, “tucking in” seeds here and there. All that, and also a fitter body, more physical endurance, and above all a happier spirit for my entire family.

That’s what it means to be self-sustainable: to have skills and knowledge that can travel with me anywhere.

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Amie’s picture of Mama in the Garden (taken with her very own camera)

Birds, Some Sweet, Some Bitter

Just as we’re putting in the fence, up pops another predator: a big wild turkey, right in our front yard! I think it was munching the buckwheat, which is succulent right now. So just a few yards away from the vegetable garden (luckily, at that side, the fence was already up).

It’s bittersweet to spot it: a flutter both of fear and joy, because the turkey is of course another element of wildlife, along with the foxes and the deer. And it was very pretty, a shiny russet brown, and graceful too. The way I figure is that I can afford to be ambivalent about it as long as the fence will keep it from the vegetables, as long as that one lone turkey doesn’t bring its flock to decimate the buckwheat.

Speaking of birds, Saturday morning at 6 am I met one of my neighbors who is an avid birder. He took me around the neighborhood and told me all about the birds that live here. He pointed out their songs, then we stood very still (aargh, forgot the mosquito dope!) and he made a funny whistling, swishing sound, and the birds appeared, sometimes only a few feet away. They were curious what that noise was all about. “What kind of birds are those?” and more importantly, “Are they a threat tom nest”.

And so I saw (* indicates for the first time):

  1. 2 Eastern bluebirds*
  2. 1 oriole*
  3. 2 yellow warblers, Mr. and Mrs.*
  4. 1 bobolink*
  5. 1 red-tailed hawk*
  6. flock of cedar waxwings (7?)*
  7. 1 tree swallow*
  8. 1 tree sparrow*
  9. 1 catbird*
  10. flock of cowbirds*
  11. several grackles
  12. 1 wood duck*
  13. Canada geese

And I heard, for the first time consciously:

  1. 1 vireo (forgot which)
  2. 1 scarlet tanager

He showed me where some of them nest, so I can take Amie there and “call them”. And I got to discover another nature reserve, tucked away right in my backyard!

No pictures. We had binoculars, but since the birds came so close, we hardly needed them. I’m happy I didn’t have a camera on me: I really could enjoy them so much better. I think I’ll keep the camera for the birds who come ot the feeder, and those that “pose”, of course.