I love how much art and music envelop us at every turn, and how the boys have learned to channel their own feelings through art and music to take the edge off of some of those overpowering emotions. They know they are not alone in their highs and lows, because they listen to musicians who can speak their pains or their joys and allow their listeners to feel the connection and the parallels. Continue reading “Can Music Save Your Mortal Soul…”
My mood is always more settled, almost nestled in and snug and happy, when I am tending to the needs of my soul. Continue reading Body in Motion
And it dawns on me. The lesson. These things happen sometimes when something someone says intrigues me so, that I want to ponder it, mull it over, hold it in my hand and carry it like a talisman until its wisdom breaks open for me. Continue reading In the Silence
We talked about the power of nature to heal our souls, to refresh them, and cleanse them from the dust of every day life. Continue reading Nature’s Cathedral
My 13yo son asked me a question last night. He turned to me and asked, “What does it mean to be a hero? Do you have to save someone’s life to be a hero?” Continue reading What Does it Mean to be a Hero?
Do you listen intently to the words of songs your kids listen to – the stations, the kinds of music they like?
Continue reading They Don’t Want What We Want, by Asking Alexandra
Always the lists. Give me too much free time between calls at work, and a fairly slow day with no nearby neighbors to visit with, and I used pages and pages of scratch paper to make lists for the New Year. Lists about working out, and menus, and lists of chores and how to rotate them. Lists about writing and making time for the things … Continue reading Learning to Laugh
I have gotten out of the habit of writing, and my world is suffering. The walls start closing in on me when my creativity is on hiatus. When I am drawn like a moth to bad news, and the marching feet of the demise of our civilization, I sit stoop-shouldered and spineless and terrified – sucked into more and more bad news and my head … Continue reading Books will Save Us
My boys and I see pictures in the sky. We see big, bold, ridiculous, pictures sometimes, and we laugh and point. This is beginner imagination building that we have been doing since they were tiny. Now, they can create a story out of thin air. (The picture here looks a little like Olive Oil, from the Popeye cartoons, doesn’t it?) Some of my favorite spottings … Continue reading Imagining Pictures in the Clouds
Last night at dinner, we got into a conversation about music lyrics, and my husband and I were both telling stories of growing up in a time when we had to guess at half the lyrics. We had to listen over and over when a song came on the radio, or try to record it with our little tape recorder, if we happened to catch … Continue reading Wonder of Wonders, Miracle of Miracles
Because Ben and I are both artists, and experience a large range of emotions, we’ve had to learn about anger and how to handle it, manage it, subdue it, understand it and live with it. We each have a tendency to fly off the handle and we’ve had to study the Primitive Brain otherwise known as the Fight or Flight part of the brain that … Continue reading Primitive Brain – Fight or Flight – and Homework
What a completely blissful day. These are the new rockers we picked up at a garage sale this weekend, and this is the view looking out onto our back field in Southern Oregon. It goes on and on and we end up with stunning sunsets all summer long. I sat out here and read the first chapter of The Conscious Parent for a new reading … Continue reading Endless View from Rocking Chairs
Yesterday, on the way to music lessons, there was a lively conversation in the car between my six-year old and my nine-year old about whether the word muzzle and snout could be used interchangeably. Ben is a huge reader, and he was saying that a writer will use muzzle instead of snout sometimes, and then other times talk about a snout. At first I … Continue reading Muzzles, Snouts or Beaks
Gears are at the heart of so many things around here. Scott is building a race car for the Drag Strip that is around the corner from our house. Both boys like to build motorcycles and bikes, and finger bikes, and scooters and anything else with wheels, really. I can see them going into fields like engineering or design or drafting. They are artists. Anything … Continue reading Gears, Math and Contrary
The other night at dinner, Scott explained to the boys about The Mom Flower. He told them that moms need hugs and kisses and sweetness from their children to survive, and that being cross with a mom makes her wilt. Ben said, “So, if we’re nice, she gets prettier; and if we’re mean, she’ll turn into a raisin?” Essentially, yes. “You’ve seen your mom when … Continue reading The Mom Flower
