Would you do me the honor..

of following me on a new adventure??

I am taking a leap into a new cloud of creativity.  I am calling it RED HOUSE.  Living a handmade life is its theme and I am super excited about it.  

Apparently I can craft, cook, and sew... but I cannot, for the life of me, switch over to Word Press smoothly.  I miss you all.  I want you to join me.  I can't do it on my own.

Just CLICK HERE and see what I have been up to.

xo

Chop Chop Chopping...

down our Christmas tree.

Just another perk to living in this magical place.

It's beginning to look a lot like...

Christmas.

I wish I was an artist...

I have wished to be an artist since I can remember.
I wish I could draw, nicely.  I wish I could paint, beautifully.  I wish I could strum the guitar, musically.  
But all these years I have accepted that it just wasn't me.  I am left brained.  I do math, I make lists, I am timely, I think ahead.  Being a whimsical artEEst that wears a beret and lives in Paris, that plays acoustic around a campfire, that paints for hours in a studio... is just not who I will ever be.
I think about this all of the time... mostly when I am scrubbing my house, on my hands and knees, in my jammies, wondering just what it is I am doing here.  I scrub and I scrub and I think about my place in this world.  Sometimes I feel like I belong to this BIG life of mine.  And sometimes I feel awfully small.  
But I never feel like the artist I have always longed to be.
BUT THEN I REALIZED...
in my jammies, in rubber gloves, with my head in the toilet
I am an artist.
My life is my art.
My house is my painting. My children are my pottery. My marriage is my architecture. I cook, sew, craft, build, create.  I rock out, I dance (alone when I clean), I write...
And suddenly everywhere I look I see art.

Happy Day.

11/07/12

Manifesto:
The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

by Wendell Berry

Love the quick profit, the annual raise, vacation with pay. Want more of everything ready-made. Be afraid to know your neighbors and to die.  And you will have a window in your head.  Not even your future will be a mystery any more. Your mind will be punched in a card and shut away in a little drawer.  When they want you to buy something they will call you. When they want you to die for profit they will let you know.

So, friends, every day do something that won't compute. Love the Lord.  Love the world. Work for nothing.  Take all that you have and be poor.  Love someone who does not deserve it. Denounce the government and embrace the flag. Hope to live in that free republic for which it stands.  Give your approval to all you cannot understand. Praise ignorance, for what man has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.  Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias.  Say that your main crop is the forest that you did not plant, that you will not live to harvest.  Say that the leaves are harvested when they have rotted into the mold.  Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.

Put your faith in the two inches of humus that will build under the trees every thousand years.  Listen to carrion - put your ear close, and hear the faint chattering of the songs that are to come.  Expect the end of the world. Laugh. Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful though you have considered all the facts.  So long as women do not go cheap for power, please women more than men.  Ask yourself: Will this satisfy a woman satisfied to bear a child?  Will this disturb the sleep of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.  Lie down in the shade. Rest your head in her lap. Swear allegiance to what is highest your thoughts.  As soon as the generals and the politicos can predict the motions of your mind, lose it. Leave it as a sign to mark the false trail, the way you didn't go. Be like the fox who makes more tracks than necessary, some in the wrong direction. Practice resurrection.

Life Lately...

Featured below was my original sketch on what my perfect fall porch would look like.  I made a presentation/proposal to Mister Witt and it was approved.

The end result... 

(and there is a pumpkin, 3 in fact.  Somehow I missed them in the picture taking)

My very first bona fide wreath.

a row of Hunters

My blushing bride WHITE hydrangea's.  I think my house turned them red.  Weird but brilliant.

stacked wood.

Another part of the proposal...

and another...

and one more...

The beloved fire.

and my very first WHITE pumpkin.

now on to eat as many apple crisps and scoops of pumpkin ice cream before the month is up.

Life lately...

In photograph form...

My hands are too busy sewing, cooking, cleaning, fire tending, and lunch packing to write anything on here lately.  But this is what it looks like and I am in love with it all...

Hope you are well too.

For the very first time...

I wish time would stand still.

A man and a wife A son and a daughter A dog and a cat A house in a village 2012 33
I will be 34 tomorrow.  Everything will be just the same as it is today.  But I loved you thirty + 3.  You were my favorite age thus far.  I will sincerely miss you, now and forever.

Back to School Dinner Celebration. Year 2.

Tradition as follows...

Set a lovely table.

Make a delicious dinner.

Present survival kits.

Discuss being a good person.

Goal...

?

I don't know.  To raise two conscious human beings.  Hoping to give them the perfect mixture of humbleness and toughness to make it in this world. To know how to be a good friend not a good follower.  To know when to make a stand and when to walk away.  To lead with humility and and a kind heart.  

I am just trying to raise people over here.  It is just a little ol' job you know!  No big deal.  This once a year dinner ought to do the trick, don't you think??

New this year.  One Free Personal Day.  It is a new holiday in our house.  Everyone deserves a day.

Just so we are clear. I wasn't' feeling so hot on back to school dinner night.  The first sign of sickness for me is bad hair.  Yes, I feel illness in my hair follicles first.  But gratitude was my favorite word on the table with a side of dark circles and wonky locks.

Mister Witt likes his words with a side of chili.

Heres to another good year.  5th and 3rd grade.   Please have the courage to be kind to those who others are not.   To laugh at yourself.   To be grateful every day.   To show perseverance in your most challenging obstacles.  Always lead with love.  Look for adventure. Be conscious. Consider others around you. Have a genuine heart. I love you both, to the ends of the Earth.

I quit my job...

This is us celebrating.
I am home now.  Full time.
Life is so. much. busier. 
and way better.

.

Day number 2 of our trip provided me this gem.

Best. Family. Picture. Ever.

Matt looking dapper as ever of course, and twinsies with the wife earns him extra bonus points.  Me hoping my dad doesn't drop my phone while figuring out how to take the picture.  Noah in pure travel out-of-his-head exhaustion mode. And dear Gabrielle...It's a framer.

But look at the guy in the red shirt standing on my shoulder.  That is a bona fide punter, leaving this picture as firm evidence that we have been somewhere cool.  Somewhere far away.  Even if we looked like this when we were there.

Here are a few more pics of this fine day...

 The interesting thing about this trip was that we weren't so much tourists.  I mean Sue probably thought different for as many times as we thought the car turning right was out of control and going to hit us...

BUT. aside from that. and the lack of Starbucks...

We were just chillin' with family.  Checking out the neighborhood.  Eating. Drinking. Visiting.  It was really the best. I snapped photos with Instagram but left my big camera at home.

Our daily schedule went as follows:

Get out of bed at 10am. yes please.

English breakfast until noon.

Out the door on a small yet perfect adventure.

on to a pub, or two.

Gabi having at least 3 J2O's a day, wasn't sure how she would live without them.

Dinner. Some out, some cooked at home. All great

and usually capped with some good ol' tele.

I highly recommend:

it is on my Christmas wish list.