We’re Going to Homeschool

We decided – Amie, DH and I – to homeschool Amie for the coming semester and probably also fifth grade. We love the school she is going to at present. It’s a smallish (ca. 400 kids) neighborhood K-5 school where kindness really matters, where the teachers are deeply caring and the staff a charm. Amie …

Kale Chips for School Lunch

Today, I wore my Green Team cap and handed out kale chips in my local elementary school’s lunchroom. I had mixed the kale with lots of olive oil and salt and pepper and dehydrated the leaves at 110F overnight (10 hours). They were cri-ispy! A big bunch of kale shrank to just about enough to …

Coyote Creates Land

Amie and I are enjoying reading and telling creation stories. We weave in evolution, the Flood, how Coyote created land, fossils, Darwin and Lopez, and how the first people came out of a bird’s egg. “If stories come to you, care for them. And learn to give them away where they are needed. Sometimes a …

Daily Bread No. 8, and First Pumpkin Foundling

Today, the day after Halloween, we found our first punkin orphan, dropped off at our mailbox. Amie ran to welcome it. We reminded people of the composting program when we were out trick-or-treating, and many were enthusiastic. And I met one elderly gentleman who was the first to live on this street, and he and …

Hive Inspection and Preschool Bee Talk

I did a quick hive inspection today. It was hot – at 10 am – and I had forgotten to tie my long hair back, thinking the hat might keep it back, but no… So I made it quick, and just pulled out the frames to check on the pattern of brood, honey, pollen, and …

First Letters from My Daughter

Amie has taken to writing me letters – she’s been watching My Neighbor Totoro, in which the oldest girl writes letters to her mother. I can’t come anywhere near her when she is writing. “Don’t look!” she says – not aware, perhaps, that I can hear her perfectly as she sounds out what she is …

Transition: Becoming Indigenous to a Place

During the Transition Training we watched a lot of images and videos of Transition Initiatives, and at first I watched them with mixed feelings of joy and anxiousness. My heart sank because I inevitably thought: “I can’t make that happen.” That sinking feeling stems from the fact that, though I arrived here over 11 years …

Amie Talks about Death Again

“That is the Mama skeleton, and that is the Baba skeleton, and that is the big sister and the baby brother skeleton, and…” Yesterday evening I was helping Amie get to sleep – I just lie next to her in the dimmed light, in our bed (we still cosleep), hold her hand, and read a …

Art Work, Reading, Writing and Algebra

We’re all retreating into the living room around the warm fire. There’s so much to do in this contracted world. Art Not a day goes by when Amie doesn’t work at her art. She’ll often pronounce “I am practicing because I want to be an artist.” She enjoyed discovering the technique of splashing by rubbing …