Family

So my 2nd daughter was bemoaning the fact that she doesn't look like the rest of the family...she does but she does have features that remind me of.....this morning it came to me. She looks like my Grandmother Rosetta Byrumn Boyce. She has the nose and the tiny frame...it is interesting that people we have no knowledge of can affect us in ways that are so beautiful. My Grandmother had 8 children 5 girls and 3 boys. She was a gentle soul and I really never knew her beyond the great soft biscuits and dumplings she made. I slept with her on her twin bed when we visited . I was little and so was she. I never felt her in the bed with me. She came after I was asleep and she was up early...so was I but never before her. She was a wonderful woman and my aunts were fun women who loved their mother and took care of her. She lived in the home my Daddy built for him and my mother when they were first married and then paid on and paid the bills for the rest of her life. She passed when I was 18 and it was a sad thing that I did not go to her funeral but life had to be lived my senior year...she only came to visit us once when we lived in Rome New York. We took her to see Niagara Falls and her comment was "that could grind allot of cornmeal" That was the only time in her life she left her small world.

Dinner with the girls

Last night I enjoyed a lovely dinner with the women from High School. One of the women has a lovely home in Blue Springs and we enjoyed her dinner and then a trip to see the progress on the old home they are restoring. It looks so much like our home in SD. I was surprised at how much alike they were. I miss that house so much. It was my dream home. I still dream about it today. I don't really miss how much work it would be to keep it up now but I do miss the house and its beauty. That is what is calling me to one of those homes in Lawrence, old home, still in Kansas for school for Noah and did I mention old home?

A Year in transition

It is almost a year since we have moved and finally today we brought home some furniture that will make the rest of the boxes melt away. It always takes about a year to settle into a new place. If it is shorter than that you feel like you are just on a long vacation. I know I will not want to live here more that 2 more years when Caleb is finished High School but I also know I do not want to move again after that. I want a place where we can stay put. I do like living in new places. I like all the variety that new places bring but I am very tired of the work it takes to make a place a home. I think I can use that energy in other ways and I want to do that rather than keep on finding pieces that fit a new house so you can feel settled. Time to do other things like study and get my masters in something... need to work on that too.
Downsizing in every way, children, stuff, house, cars, food, that is what we are doing. It will be interesting after this summer with only 2 home...now is the time to travel. I do so want to go places and do things that are different. Carl's brother and his wife are on a cruise this Christmas. That would be so fun. Different not cooking and buying but resting and relaxing. That would be a vacation. Will have to look for ways to do this. Fun!

Bread

Be gentle when you touch bread
Let it not lie uncared for--unwanted
So often bread is taken for granted
There is so much beauty in bread
Beauty of sun and soil, beauty of honest toil
Winds and rain have caressed it,
Christ often blessed it
Be gentle when you touch bread.
I have 20 loaves of bread sitting on the counter cooling. I have been making bread for 23 years. It is a joy I have to give this to others. Nobody bakes anymore and it really cheers people up to do this for them. Noah has so many people who take care of him and make it possible for me to do other things besides care take and I love to give them bread. Christmas is a time I can do that will ease and I am so glad I can this year.
Today I gave the new principal I will work under while I sub in music a loaf and the teacher I will replace. She is doing well and may come back after Christmas. I hope she does for a few weeks. I really will miss my study and the women I study with. One of the woman's mother passed last night. We will cook and bake for her and then serve at her home afterwords. I will enjoy serving alongside my girls. I am glad Catherine is coming home she will be a big help. Ruth will enjoy this also. It is not a sad going. She lived a long life 91 and was very ill and Nan took such good care of her. She will be missed and I sure hope that will be true of me when the Lord calls me home.

It's late

 I am writing stories, stories about me life and finding allot of joy in the memories. I have had a good life. There have been terrible sorrows, things that have broken me and things that have torn me but things that have shaped me too. Made me who I am because of, it is not either/ or as my friend Peggy says but both/ and a 2 column life as my friend Chaz says. The memories are great. There are things I really have forgotten and at the time I thought who could forget this. I am so glad we have pictures. They are a real joy in memory helps. Today Anna, Peggy and I went to a paper store as Peggy and Anna are creating works of joy for their children. Scrapbooks of life. Not fancy pages but memories and pictures. I will do that too. It will take such time but I started with my sister on her 60th and we will continue. It may not be finished but it will be started.  These stories are a part of this gift to my children. I know later in life they will really be glad for them. I am already.

Weaving

The first time I saw a loom was in a store in Harvard Square. It filled the loft room and the room was flooded with fall light from floor to ceiling windows. It has been a dream of mine just like the dulcimer was.  Today I began the weaving part of my life. It was just like I thought wonderful. The setting up can be tedious but if you just enjoy the process it has a real calming effect. Then the weaving part is just a matter of tension and rhythm. It will be easier with music but today it was wonderful. Ruth and I had so much fun and then after she went to a toy store and I a material shop. Then we ate at a wonderful Greek restaurant in Lawrence.It is such a nice college town. Real shops and people milling about, stores and galleries. It is a place one could enjoy living in.  Old house  filled with quilts and weavings. I am beginning to get a vision here.

A Bushel and a Peck

Noah knows so much more than I can tell sometimes. Last night we watched Julie,Julia and in it they play the song A Bushel and a Peck and he just started to jump and sing with it. Now I only sing that song to him. As far as I know he has not heard it sung by anyone else except family. How wonderful it made me feel. Tonight we watched The Muppet's Christmas Carol and again it is a favorite of his. When he was ready and in the bed he just hugged me and hugged me. He was so happy to have watched his movie with others. I am glad I took the time to sit with him. What better could I have been doing?

A new way

 I read, I used to think I just read some but now I know I read allot. I so enjoy reading and sitting that I have to make myself exercise or the new Craig's list overstuffed chair and I will soon look alike ( eating cookies and cake are involved in reading) but I am so glad I took the time to do all this reading all my life as I am using it now in my second career. I can also remember it which is unusual as a woman stopped by with a friend of mine to spend the night on their way and she told me she came to my house and helped with a tea I gave. I have no remembrance of the tea. I am quite concerned that I can't remember a party I have given let alone a person who assisted me. YIKES!
Yesterday I gave a workshop for a group of preschool teachers. It was soooooo much fun. They liked me, They liked the presentation and a woman asked me to come to Topeka and give a talk this summer. I am enjoying this so much. " She has so much to say and is so willing to share it" That is what my Kindergarten teacher said and she was so right and now I have lived long enough to say and share it! YEA and  get paid!!! That is a big bonus!!!!
People are asking me about what I did before....I have already told them I am almost at the end of raising 8 children....and homeschooling them what do they think I was doing????  People ask strange questions... they don't think before they ask. Maybe they are just trying to engage me but that is not a good way. I consider what I did in the first part of my life my best work. The kids are doing so well. Each is doing what they love and that is the best part. I will just now be going out of the house to do what I like but what I love was being home and reading to my kids it was the best time ever and I miss it sooooo much.

New Friends

Kate Braestrup was interviewed on NPR this weekend. She has written a book I intend to  read  Here if You Need Me
I was so impressed with what she had to say about caring. The end of the story is known...I often read the end of the book so I can enjoy the whole book, suspense isn't what I like in like so if I know the ending is good I can enter into the story and breath without skipping parts or fast forwarding as my kids tease me about. ( I have been known to fast forward parts like lions tearing people apart in order to enjoy a movie)  So we know the ending we can walk easier in life and the part that makes it easier is those who walk with us.
I enjoyed having lunch with most of my girls this weekend. It is not often that we get to be together but I try 1 time a year to take them out and listen to them. I like to guide conversation but my grandson was with us and it was fun to just let them talk and for me to listen. They are part of my group that walk with me in life and it is really nice to have people you know so well be the ones to join you on the journey. 
Yesterday I gave a lunch with some of my favorite people who have encouraged me this past year. It involved women from their early 30's to their 70's, bus drivers to women going to school in their late 60's. These women inspire me so much and they like to cook and eat which is a must for friendship with me. What a blessing to me to have these women surround me like this. It was really fun as I had 3 of my 4 lifetime women who live in other places just call yesterday.It was a day full of friendship. That is the part of life I like the most.
So now Kate is a new friend of mine. I like to have friends of people who don't even know I exist. Some of the best of my friends who have influenced my life are dead friends, writers can be very close to people and never know it. Elizabeth Goudge is my best friend now. I am so loving her works and finding them in used book stores. It is alway a joy to own a new book and make a new friend in the process.