A Birthday!

I'll let Tim post more about this.

Tea Time!

Last week's tea - there was cinnamon toast, apple slices, almonds, organic cheddar cheese, and healthy-ish cookies. The tea was a blend of berry teas.


Miss M's was one apple slice, a wedge of plain bread, half a wheat-free chocolate sandwich cookie minus the cream, and a wheat-free chocolate chip cookie. And a spoonful of tea at the bottom of her Fisher Price tea cup. :)

The Wind

I wrote this for a creative writing class I'm taking:

Summer turns to autumn,
Leaves begin to brown;
With a rush of branches
The wind comes dancing down.

She teases all the trees--they
Toss their haughty heads,
Dropping summer's raiments
Upon the grassy beds.

She races to retrieve them--
Gives chase across the lawn--
Twirling, spinning, whirling
Until her breath is gone.

Only for a moment:
She soon returns to play,
Chasing with the faded leaves
The fading year away.

Autumn turns to winter,
Golden turns to grey
I see the changing colors--but
I saw the wind today.

My Active, Inquisitive Toddler

Miss M is so alert and eager to learn and do everything! She can be a handful. This morning she wanted to try to get into her sippy cup--which she did. Orange juice was all over the floor, and her favorite bear is recuperating in the bathroom as a result. So now she's carrying around a stuffed yellow chick, cooing to it, asking, "aww, hurt?" and trying to nurse it. Then she wanted to "tuh-low" (color), so I got down her pencils and we drew a kitty and a teapot (she can say 'teapot' perfectly clear!) The phone rang, Daddy wanted to know if I needed anything from the store. In the couple of minutes while I was on the phone, she had gotten into something. She came out wiping her hands on her onesie, saying, "diddy" (dirty). Her chin was dark berry-stained. My mind raced. Had she eaten something poisonous? Did she find a marker and suck out the ink? Her tongue was stained. too, and her fingers. Then I saw the purple pencil with the lead broken off, and I knew what had happened. Luckily, they're non-toxic pencils!

She's quietly going through her toy dishes now. Daddy just came home with stuff to make pasta for dinner. That excited her. She's shouting, "PAH-duh! PAH-duh!" and hurrying to put her dishes away so she can eat. I guess she doesn't realize that it takes time to boil the pasta and heat the sauce.

I'm a Pirate!

My pirate name is:

Mad Dog Rackham

Part crazy, part mangy, all rabid, you're the pirate all the others fear might just snap soon. You have the good fortune of having a good name, since Rackham (pronounced RACKem, not rack-ham) is one of the coolest sounding surnames for a pirate. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from fidius.org.

Ahoy!

This here be Talk Like a Pirate Day. A fellow buccaneer gave me this site, and I fixed me'self a proper moniker fer' a gentleman of fortune.

My pirate name is:

Mad Tom Cash

Every pirate is a little bit crazy. You, though, are more than just a little bit. You're musical, and you've got a certain style if not flair. You'll do just fine. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from fidius.org.

Set yer course to the Great Scot's post at the Beehive if'n ye be a landlubber lackin' lingo.

My New Computer Wallpaper

Isn't it cute? Tim found it for me by doing an online search for kitten wallpapers. The wallpaper I had before (below) is a sketch by John Singer Sargent. I loved it, but after months of seeing it every day, I woke up yesterday and could no longer stand the sight of it. I think Miss M will love the new one, and I rarely get tired of cute kitten pictures.

Dumbo

Miss M saw this for the first time this evening. We haven't seen it in a long time, I'd forgotten what a great movie it is. Every minute of the animation is well-done, the songs are catchy, and there are so many little details and jokes worked in so that there's always something interesting going on, even if you've watched it a million times. They must have had such fun making that movie!

Miss M liked it okay. A Madeleine cartoon came on next, and she actually liked that one even better. LOL!

Character is Destiny, ch 1 - Thoughts

I read the first chapter of Character is Destiny yesterday. The main points seemed to be these: 1) there is a difference, not always recognized now, between personality and character; 2) we (and we alone) can change our character, or make the decision to; and 3) it is impossible to improve society without first improving personal character.

The reading also got me started on this thought:

Let's say Joe, a man of good repute and good character, is accused of stealing. "Oh, that's impossible," says his good friend Chloe, "Joe could never do such a thing--it's not in his nature."

The Christian and the Humanist have different replies to this. The Humanist says, "You're right that evil as such is not a basic part of human nature, but--well--we all get into a tight spot sometimes, and it's certainly possible that he did."

The Christian says, "You're wrong; evil is a basic part of all our natures. We're all capable of it. But good character (such as Joe's) is good character because it can be relied on not to. You see, I could, in theory, willingly jump off a skyscraper tomorrow. But the odds against it are so great that it's well-nigh impossible. True character is reliable."

The Humanist thinks the man is basically good, and then decides not to trust him; the Christian knows he is basically evil, and decides to trust him in spite of it.

View from the Backyard