Service: Sterabithia Trash

We have a place in town where we go to pick up trash, maybe once every season.  Long ago, after reading the book "The Bridge to Terabithia," someone in our crowd named the spot "Sterabithia."   So, that stuck. 

The creekbed sometimes has water, but in the colder months it does not.  We've found the most surprising things:  a scooter, a grocery cart, lawn chairs, a table, tons of kitty litter, a broken tricycle, a whole mattress foam, clothes, and endless food trash.  It makes for satisfying work, a real sense of progress, although we have to remember that it's kind of disappointing really.

I've learned that the trick to making the trash pick-up happen is to keep a box of trash bags (along with the kitchen sink) in our car.  Then when we happen to be in the neighborhood, we're fully equipped and ready.  There or anywhere.  And everyone does enjoy themselves.  After all, we're just outside playing in a ditch.  But, I it does helps that the older ones now get school credit for their service work.  

And sad but true, until I put the box of bags in the car, we never had enough trash bags to hold all that we find. 

The No-Hit Necklace

This morning, John directed my attention to his necklace:  "When I want to hit people, I can hold my necklace and it makes me calm.  It takes my hit away."

By habit, I was initially tempted to address John's all-too-present desire to hit.  But actually, if I'm honest enough to own it, I could use a calming necklace here and there myself.

We talk about "taking the hurt away," but why not gently take "the hit" away, too?  It's sort of the other side of the coin...

So, I am refreshed by John's honesty, and I have renewed affection for necklaces.

Cooking: Crepe Cake

Here and there I begin a non-sensical project at 11 pm.  I know I'm not alone in that particular insanity.  (Can't speak for other insanities...)  Years ago in North Carolina, it was my friend Edna's "fruit" (also known as cake mix) pie.  Now, for Will's 6th grade class mind you, I am making a Chocolate Hazelnut Crepe Cake.  What happened?!?

Well, the recipe is so advanced, I had to take breaks from cooking and go bang on the piano every 10 minutes.  My brain can't wrap around browning butter AND creaming custard AND skinning hazelnuts AND pouring a perfect crepe AND melting chocolate with a double boiler.

The recipe is from Deb Perelman, in "The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook."  (Thank you, Jenny!)  Her book is beautiful.  Her photos are etherial.  A stark contrast to my honest kitchen, adorned with chicken scraps, homework, art supplies, broken eye glasses, food-stained bills, dead plants and more.  Really, I shouldn't have Perelman's photos it sitting around at all.  It's like a diamond in the rough.  Will spotted it and was probably so taken by the novelty of clutterless kitchen scenes that, unbeknownst to me, he submitted this recipe to the school fundraiser cookbook and committed to a taste test the following day.  Where is this boy's sense?  I pushed back, but only bought myself a couple of days.

But now, even as I'm tired, and not exactly the picture of a joyous cook, gratitude still rises to the surface.  I'm grateful for having this boy.  Grateful to mix some love into his hazelnut pudding. And grateful he likes Chocolate Hazelnut Crepe Cakes.  I guess.  Though Edna's cake mix pie would be much simpler, and probably a bigger hit.

Making Things: Pom Pom Curtains

Recently, I sewed some pom pom trim onto my girls' cheap white curtains.  I did it by hand.  Stitch by stitch.

It seems like a slightly frivolous use of my time, attaching pink pom poms.  Just the title to this post makes me feel a little trivial.  And the endeavor was not even all that creative.  I connected things.  I didn't make anything up.  And the lives surrounding these pom poms are busy.  I can barely feed everyone, let alone sew them pom pom curtains!

Still, it gives me such a sense of satisfaction to have "girls' curtains" on my to do list.  And holding a needle and thread can make me feel right with the world.

So now that the pom poms are done, I am ready to put something new on my list.  Something equally... small.

Maybe I'll try ric rac.

Ritual: The Family Selfie

We have a family ritual on my birthday of going to a restaurant that has a wall of mirror windows nearby.  Because it is my birthday, my family indulges me a 5-minute photo shoot.

Up above is our first family "selfie" in that window, before the selfie trend was born.  It must be from 2010.  Since then we've taken quite a few more, to varying degrees of success.  In the process, I realize that family selfies can hold life lessons.  Here are a few:

• try to catch the best light;
• be careful what you focus on, not the car in the background, the person walking, or the back of someone's head;
• keep it centered;
• keep the camera subtle;
• stay close to each other, but not so close that personalities get stifled;
• a little blur is not such a bad thing;
• black and white can be nice and simple;
• shut the van door;
• get up close, but not too close;
• point straight ahead;
• look straight ahead;
• try to keep the family front and center;
• let John be;
• be mindful of June's legs;
• don't let Clara hide;
• enjoy Will's expressions, subtle as they may be;
• don't cover up Jeff;
• catch the moment quickly - it's fleeting;
• hope for the best!

PS - These are more pictures than you care to see.  Only in two did we half-way get it right.  The others drive home the points above, in photos as in life.

Ritual: The Practicing Rock

John goes to preschool, a few days a week.  Sometimes, I want to live there.  

The minute we walk in the door, we begin our rituals:  John hangs his coat and fills his cubby; I sign him in; he washes his hands; and then... he moves his "practicing rock."  Yes, he moves a rock from one position to another.  But, here are the elements that make it great:

• it involves a soft, round, solid rock;
• you get to wrap your fingers around that special rock twice a day, coming and going;
• the rock calls out to you with your name in gold letters;
• you get to put your rock into a cool wooden grid;
• you can do so while wearing a bell around your neck;
• your cozy rock is surrounded by rocks with all your friends' names on them.

How dreamy it would be to have everyone come home from school and move their practicing rocks.  Ahhhhhh, right.  We are currently working on the "practicing coat." Take off body.  Put in closet."

Still, I do consider myself lucky to get a dose of Zen mind through John's rock.

A Walk around a Lake

All too often, there is a strange glue that binds me to my house.  In particular, my kitchen, my washing machine, my inside clutter, my outside clutter, even the elusive higher purpose manifested in my computer.  But during my mornings with John, I work hard to push us out the door, and I am never sorry.

Recently, we ventured to Coot Lake.  It is a trail to avoid in heat or high winds, but on a clear blue sky day, it is transcendent.  In fact, John looks fittingly philosophical in every picture - peering into the distance, surveying the land, contemplating the sky.  In reality, he is probably looking for dragons or thinking about a rock in his shoe or counting the seconds before he will ask for an "uppie."

Actually, he was quite proud to walk the whole way.