Pinewood Castle

My Cellist Friend

Not too many friends or family members have been brave enough to come for a visit since I moved to Minnesota. Only my mother, sister, my friend Petra, my friend Donna and a family we met in Iowa have ventured this far north. My friend Marie can now be included in this highly elite and adventurous group! Actually, she was really coming to MN for the Suzuki Teacher's Conference but she flew in two days early just to hang out with me and my family.

Marie and I met eleven years ago at a two week international chamber music program in Morges, Switzerland. We American girls stuck together and ventured out on all kinds of excursions. Sight-seeing in Lusanne, a boat ride across Lake Geneva to Yvoire, France and a long hike to see a chateau at sunset. Oh, and the really long and memorable hike Marie and I set out on one evening. We walked along the shore for a while, headed to a village, peeked into a church and interrupted a Taize rehearsal which we were invited to join. We did! One of the ladies even invited us over afterwards for dessert and gave us a ride home!

Here is a photo from "then" - at a train station. She's on the left. I'm on the right. Rhonda's in the middle. She played piano.


Almost to the chateau


 Magnum bars lakeside.


The daily view: vineyards, Lake Geneva, mountains. Mont Blanc was visible. Evian, France was just across the lake. 


Sticking with the lake theme, on Thursday we drove in to the cities, picked up a pianist friend of hers also here for the conference and motored around the Chain of Lakes and to Linden Hills for lunch and shopping and of course ice cream. It was her birthday after all! Yes, we had cake at home that evening!

Here we were this morning before I took her to her hotel for the weekend: 


We see each other one more time on Monday. She wants to see St. Paul and the Mall of America before flying out. So, tomorrow will be a lazy Saturday (what's that?) doing yard work and planting annuals. Sunday of course is the Feast of Corpus Christi, procession and all. Have a wonderful Memorial Day weekend!

Book Club

I forgot to take pictures at book club again, but thought you might enjoy hearing about it anyway.  It was my turn to host the theme dinner for Dickens' David Copperfield. 

Who better to ask for suggestions than my cousin who now lives across the pond?  The first request resulted in an idea I would rather not even mention.  The second probing request garnered a help web link: Victorian Food.  Thank you, Sarah!

The ideas I used:
During Victorian/Dickensian time a working class diet was simple. The standard meal for a working class family included: bread (from a local bakery), butter, potatoes (fingerling - yum!), bacon, corn, and beer/tea. These families relied on open‑fire cooking or they just ate the meals cold. (we had lemon rice pudding for dessert)

The ideas I did not use!
Poor families didn't always have quality food to eat, which left them with contaminated food. The food was   contaminated with human waste that contained hallucinogens such as strychnine, coculus, and inculus. The mustards were infected with lead chromate. The ice cream contained fleas, lice, cat and dog hair, bugs' legs, and cocci. Resulting diseases from eating these harmful foods were cholera, tuberculosis, diphtheria, scarlet fever, and typhoid. This concludes the working class section.

Good Mail Day

Dawn's Good Mail Day brought a smile to my face.  I savor those days too!  Here's one of mine from last week.  Catalogs and a Valentine from my friend Donna in Tulsa.  She even sends Easter cards!  She's just that kind of gal!

Another Respite

My dear husband did without me for two Saturdays in a row, folks.  What a sacrificial guy!  Due to the number of opportunities lately to recharge, I am thinking that it must be relatively common knowledge that people are prone to burn-out this time of year, homeschooling mothers being particulary at risk.  In fact, even the evening news recently did a piece on Seasonal Affective Disorder last week - reporting that mid-January is the most challenging time for those who suffer from S.A.D.

This year I am happy to report that for the most part I am claiming victory over S.A.D. with the help of full spectrum bulbs and SAM-e.

And weekend get-aways!

This past Saturday I enjoyed the wisdom and encouragement of speaker Diane Hanson at a Homeschool Mother's Day of Renewal.  As a woman married for 41 years. mother of 11 and grandmother of 15, she has taken life's lessons to heart and generously shared her experience and advice with us "girls". 

A few notes were jotted down in spite of the interruptions of my squirmy baby who has just learned the dropping game.  My own thoughts and reactions are in parentheses:

• You are your child's first image of God (my thought - wow how many people have a negative view of God based on what their parents are like!)
• The Blessed Virgin Mary served a small sphere of people - Joseph and Jesus (why do we think we have to serve such a wide sphere?)
• We have one chance to raise these kids and we can't do it alone - ask God for help!
• Pray to God - "You have to supply what I cannot do!"
• Others will depend on our kids to know what home life is really like because our kids get to experience so much of it.
• Ask yourself, "What is it like to be married to me?" (horrible at times, I'm sure!)

Oh, how I wish I could hear this talk about ten more times.  I kept my notes on the counter today as a reminder to ask God for help.  Lots of it.  When I put the baby down for a nap and she wouldn't nap and just cried in her crib while I started our main lesson block an hour late.  When I nipped at my 6yo for drawing the Bugle Fairy on the wrong page and she burst into tears (why did I do this to such a sensitive soul?).  When I just sent the kids up for quiet time after read-a-loud time and I was about to fall asleep on the sofa but the baby woke up after only 20 minutes of napping. 

Times like these are when I need to turn to God for help.  For grace.  For patience. For humility.  Lots of it!

Thank you, Diane Hanson.  You really spoke to my heart!

Mom's Midwinter Break

I used to have an adventurous streak.  When I was young I went to summer camps and band camps.  In college I went to music festivals in Michigan and North Carolina.  I spent a summer in Washington D.C. as an intern at the Kennedy Center.  After grad school I spent two months in Europe, traveling there and back by myself.  But the last time I have been on an airplane was for our honeymoon in St. Lucia over seven years ago.  Since becoming a wife and mother we have limited our trips to neighboring states - with the exception of two trips back to Oklahoma.

So, getting away has become a rarity for me.  I have become accustomed to being content at home - a homebody - something I thought I'd never be!  Until last weekend, I had never spent the night away from both my husband and children.  Yes, it's true - for the first time ever, I spent the weekend away from home without my husband or children.   It was weird - and wonderful!

This respite was courtesy of a book club friend whose father-in-law opened his lake cabin to us.  We ate, we slept, we talked.  And talked.  We went out for lunch.  We had a little pampering at an Aveda spa. I had the longest facial ever.  We ate pizza, played games, drank a little and talked some more.  Nothing crazy.  I did take my nursing baby so she only put a little crimp in my time away.  I knew I had to turn in early to handle her early rising time so I missed out on a few hours of fun.  Oh well.  Having only one baby to care for was a cinch, especially with five other women vying to hold her, oohing and aahing over my "Gerber baby"!  (Thanks, gals!)    

The weekend was so stress-free that I didn't mind our hostess getting lost for over an hour on rural Wisconsin roads in sub-zero temperatures!  It was so stress-free that the biggest decision we had to make was whether to cook risotto or order pizza.  It was so stress-free that on Monday when I was trying to home school with a fussy no-napper baby (who got spoiled from being held all weekend) (if I put her down the friendly dog would come lick her on the head and terrify her!)  I realized how much stress I really do endure every day!

Pray for me - I need to learn how to breathe and get through the weary hours with much more grace!!!

I also have to hand some kudos to my husband for his willingness to do without me for 44 hours and for handling everything while I was away.  He earns an A+ for doing a science experiment with the kids, dusting and vacuuming the upstairs, fixing the furnace humidifier, showing them movies and serving popcorn (on National Popcorn Day), reading Pippi to the kids, giving them baths, taking them to church and making sure I came home to a picked-up and vacuumed home!  Thank You!!!

My next ten Sunday nights are now booked!

Minnesota Moms - Are You Going?

A Homeschool Mother’s Day of Renewal

Saturday, January 26^th, 2008

Holy Family Catholic Church

5900 West Lake Street

St. Louis Park, MN

 

Featured Speaker:  Diane Hansen – Mother of 11 (all grown), with 13 grandchildren & 2 more ‘on-the-way’.  She’s been married 40 years, home schooled for 20 years, and regularly speaks on married life, family life, and home schooling.

Join us as we renew our spirits and lift our hearts up to God!

• 8:30am Rosary

• 9:00am Mass (celebrant Father Kasel)

• 10:00am Confessions & Breakfast (coffee, juice, rolls, fruit)

• 11:00am- 12:30pm Featured Speaker

• 1:00pm Luncheon (optional)

 

All women are welcome, including non-home schoolers & mothers with nursing babies!

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Register by January 12^th (postmark date) for discounted fee of $10.  Afterwards, please remit $15.  Luncheon is $10 extra.  Scholarships available – please inquire.

 

Name _____________________________________      

Phone ____________________

Address ___________________________   

Email  ______________________________

 

Mail registration form & payment to (checks to: Mother’s Day of Renewal):

Tina Robbins, 9301 Xylon Circle S, Bloomington, MN  55438

or contact Tina for more info at:  952-941-6110 or trobbins5@comcast.net

Book Club

The children are going bonkers with cabin fever.  Somehow I cannot make them stop singing "I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas".  The baby is perpetually fussy due to teething and constipation.  She doesn't want to nap or be put down.  I am taking vials Oscillococcinum to fend off the cold that threatens to explode my head into a million pieces. I cannot get enough sleep.  Six consecutive hours is good these days.

It is time for a night off.  And I got one yesterday.

Book Club night!

We ate, we drank; we were merry! 

We discussed Huckleberry Finn for, oh, at least thirty minutes out of the four hours we were together.  We paid homage to the southern classic by enjoying our host's crab cakes, sweet potato fries, shrimp gumbo, collard greens, biscuits with honey butter and pecan tarts.  (The novel-inspired cooking is new this year.  We like it!)

Another tradition we also like our second-annual homemade Christmas gift exchange.  I actually remembered to take pictures:

Greeting card assortment:

Photo note cards - sunset on a Minnesota lake:

Winter photos of scenes in our hometown:

Necklace of which I was the lucky recipient:

My contribution:

Who wouldn't welcome this?

Strawberry applesauce:

Mmmmm snack mix:

Momento ornament:

Thanks everyone for your talents and friendship!