While participating in the Training for Transition I came to a profound realization. One of the most powerful exercises in Transition is the positive visioning. People sit in two circles, one inside the other, facing each other so everyone is paired up. The people on the outside are the elders of the future, who have …
Category Archives: pain, illness, death
The Skinny (1) on Honey: Antioxidants
(Oh no, it’s another series!) Amie and Mama and their first honey harvest ~ I’m so sore from my workout yesterday. I was shredding leaves for two hours and also moved the contents of one (full) outside Earth machine to the Earth Machine inside the hoop house. Going by last year’s experience, this compost won’t …
Dandelion Tincture – Part 2
Today I pressed the dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) tincture that I started on 14 October (roots and leaves). It has been sitting in my herbal medicine closet (dark, cool and accessible) for over three weeks (14 days is the minimum). I shook it twice daily. It has become a saying in our household: “Mama’s shaking her …
Power Down
Do you think about the future? Do you wonder what it will be like? Or do you live like it’s always going to be the way it has been? ~ I found at least 5 entries like this one, all in drafts, abandoned. As I prepare for the growing season with more resolve and urgency …
100-Books-a-Month-Challenge Update and Flu
Here is our list so far – click for larger but not necessarily for more legible. We just got a batch of Roald Dahl in, and more Cynthia Rylant books. Amie also loves Lauren Child’s books, for the stories (e.g., Charlie and Lola) as well as the illustrations. So I was excited to see she …
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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 …
Your Average Sunday Afternoon
It’s coming down hard: thick globs of melting snow. The wood stove is giving off enough heat to dispel any gloom: it’s merely cozy, as long as I don’t need to go out there. Which I did have to, earlier on. One of the rain barrels was overflowing, and not through the overflow tube. In …
Thinking of Transition
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Pictures of My Garden for my Grandfather
My grandfather passed away a few weeks ago, after a prolonged illness. Again I couldn’t be in Belgium for the funeral, nor could I fly over to see him during those three weeks that he was in the hospital. But I did call him at the hospital every other day. Usually the conversation was very …
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 …