spoon carving

Andy continues his love of spoon carving and last weekend at the Driftless Folk School spoon gathering, the girls got into it too.  It was sweet to watch.  Two days of carving, listening in as the adults talked (and talked) about carving, taking a break to play with friends and carving some more.  On the last afternoon the carvers gathered in a big circle, each with a spoon blank.  Everyone began carving a spoon and then every ten minutes they would pass it to the person to their left.  That went on for over an hour and then when they called “time” you passed once more and that was the spoon you got to keep.  Iris really enjoyed her part in that carving circle and ended up with the sweet heart spoon.  You can see it in the photo of the circle of spoons.

It felt like a great kick-off to the school year.  A weekend of eagerly leaning into learning something new. And now we are also playing math games, making fall art, reading, reading, reading and much more.  It’s so fun to school with these girls! 

The week ahead brings a birthday celebration (10!) and visits with family and friends.  We’ll soak up each moment just like we do these days of late summer sunshine.   Andy is feeling well and our hearts are positive.  His next scan comes soon too.  Amid the worry there is still so much love and joy that carry us along.

rice camp

For several years Andy has helped a friend harvest wild rice up north.  Usually the girls and I hang out back at camp with kids and whoever is not ricing at the moment.  Andy loves the labor, being on the water, knocking the rice in the boat and the satisfaction of seeing it all drying on tarps.  He loves the community of ricers and learning the skill.  We also love the sweet share of rice we get for the winter!

Last year we were in the depths of chemo and could not make the trip.  This year we went without hesitation.  Three days and nights of playing with friends, jumping in the water, sitting around the fire, catching leopard frogs by the tens, and falling asleep to the deep hooting of the barred owl, left us exhausted but ever so thankful.

Thankful for this community of caring friends, for the sweet clear waters of the north, for late night conversations around the fire and for the continual opportunity to celebrate being together.

thankful

There are days when finding the silver lining takes work.  But more often this experience makes our blessings ever more apparent.  Today we paused several times in several ways to remember the good. 

We are ever thankful for this time to heal, for the amazing support of friends, family, community. We are so aware of the privilege of living where healthcare is first rate, food is plentiful and there is ongoing access to the resources we need to make healing priority.  

Our love and commitment are strong.  Our children are blessed in so many ways.   And we can finally get some sleep tonight because the cat came home.  

So thankful.

perspective after paris

It’s been a rough week.  Paris and treatment and all.

It seems like some rounds of chemo are tougher than others and this one has been a doozy.  Still Andy presses on through it all, determined and steadfast, and truthfully pretty out of it, due to all the anti-nausea medicine.

I sit beside him and worry and take meticulous notes, and keep close tabs on the nurses (who don’t need it) and peck away at work tasks and worry some more.  About Andy and this world our children are inheriting.

The girls ride the wake of being left for three days without us.  They are in such loving hands with friends and family and plenty to keep them occupied, but they are wearing thin.  They don’t know about Paris.

I write this not to make you worry.  I write this because it’s our reality right now.  I’ve probably even made it look a little prettier than it is.  But I don’t want you to worry.  Not about us.

What I came here to write was, instead, about kindness.  Kindness that is shown in so many ways every day.  Kindness that comes to us because of cancer, but also not.  Kindness because you are our family, our friends, our co-workers, our postmaster, our grocer, our nurses, our neighbor, our hairdresser, maybe you are even just a friend of a friend, but you are our community.  Kindness because this is what we do for each other.  Because this is what is good in the world.

There is evidence of kindness all over the internet, all over the world, for Paris, for Muslims, for our human-ness.

So many hearts are aching, on every corner of this globe.  Ours are just some.

Thank you for your kindness, your selflessness, your giving in the face of fear.  Thanks for remembering we are all human and adding your strength to the greater good.  Thanks for being there for us too.

elsa mae

Mae and I celebrated her half birthday yesterday, as is now our tradition.  If the pictures look familiar it’s because she insisted we do exactly the same thing as last year.   She rides (and sings) I walk behind and carry the hot chocolate. We headed to her beloved Kickapoo Reserve and the sparkly water of the bird blind pond.  She remembered it all. This year there were no ducks and it seemed a little, well, unexciting (to me, anyway) but Mae persisted, as is her way, and soon found several small red dragonflies flitting about.  She was delighted.  We followed them back and forth on the path, we sat and waited for them to light on our palms (they never touched me, but landed on Mae several times), we noticed their ragged wings and she wondered what will happen to them in the weeks to come. We spent well over an hour admiring them.  Then we found some scat with a raptor talon in it and that was just over the top!

I love spending time with this girl, whose focus is something to be admired.  Whose determination–to wear fancy purple shoes for a hike and bike ride, to play an instrument different from her sister, to ask big questions and understand their answers–serves her well as the youngest member of this family overflowing with big issues that can easily overshadow someone so little.  This girl stays so present every step of the way.  Her heart is overflowing with wonder at the natural world, she wears her joy and sparkle right there on the surface for all of us to see.  She is generous and loving and fiery hot.  She is sure of herself.

Riding/walking back to the car she randomly said (as is her 6 1/2 year old way).  “Nonnie is really little”.
Me:  “Yes she is.  Nonnie is little but powerful.”
Mae:  “Yeah, I’m little and powerful too.”

Yes, you are sweet girl.  Yes you are.

forty two

Since he isn’t feeling all recovered yet (nor is Iris who has a stomach bug) we’ll stretch the celebration over a couple of days.  Yesterday, planting 42 bulbs with his girl…

…today waking to the birthday poster totally created by his ladies (Mae came up with the theme, Iris free-handed the drawing, I mixed the paint) and a couple of sweet presents…

…and tonight a birthday dinner and the apple crisp he baked himself (yes, I know, it was one of those days.)

Tomorrow we’ll get a visit from his mom to top off the celebrations.

We are so blessed by this beautiful man, this amazing papa, this good friend.  We are honored to be by his side as he celebrates his birthday, as he continues to walk this path of healing.

From morning til night and every, every moment in between, we love you so.

twelve+

 

Today we remembered twelve years ago when we gathered with two close friends on the shores of Lake Superior and tied the knot.  It was late October in the Northwoods, chancy time of year to have a ceremony outdoors, but the day dawned beautiful and warm and fall colors were at peak. We took it for the good omen it was.

We wrote our own vows, and in honesty, I haven’t read them for quite a few years.  Today I pulled them out.  Mine are wordy and flowery as you might expect. Yours are straight forward and true, just like you. And now, on this road we still travel together, they feel as true as ever.

Twelve years ago I wrote:
…I know that in the hours life leaves us naked, we will play for each other the music of hope.

Over and over and over, the music of hope.

…Together we have built a life that is strong, simple and so full of love. Each day I open my heart and lay down a gift of thanks for all we’ve been given.  I wish for us a life’s journey that is rich in wonder and joy.Today good friend and keeper of all my heart’s secrets, I am honored to join my life to yours…

A life rich in wonder and joy.  A life that is strong and simple and so full of love.

Right now. Right here. And I wouldn’t be anywhere else in the world.

I love you so.

two days: lanesboro, mn

Two days away.  Two days of bikes on the trail, poking around town, eating out, staying up late in the hotel and watching these awesome movies (you can see them on netflix or amazon too).  Two days to laugh and smile and relax in ways we haven’t been able to for months.  Two days to get out of town and celebrate.  

Yes, celebrate.  Andy’s scans last week showed that the tumors are shrinking. Something is working, everything is working!  The docs are happy with the response to chemo, so more of that to come.  But in the meantime Andy was given this fourth week between treatments off.  And he was feeling well enough to ride! We breathed in the crisp fall air, knowing that so much is still ahead, but still this. After 10 months of not-good-news, we’ve had to keep reassuring each other that we heard it all right.  It’s hard to believe in some ways, it’s hard to take it all in.  But here it still is, each morning when we wake up, this easy breath, this bit of comfort in our hearts, this sign of healing.  

This week it’s back to the clinic for three days of chemo, and many days of feeling yucky after that. But now we hold this new knowledge close and it helps.  We hold hope and gratitude and positive intention.  We hold all your prayers and loving support.  We hold each other and these two girls with so much love in our hearts.

Today we planted ourselves at home.  Taking care of a few things in the garden, hanging a laundry, brushing the pony.  Finding comfort in everyday things. 

Tonight I step outside with the dog and the sky is lite with stars.  It’s so beautiful.  I breathe in a vision of health and wholeness for him, for us. I breathe out. My heart is a vigil of prayer. 

homeschooling now

School is still a combination of things around here.  There is some of what you remember school to look like:  workbooks at the table.  There are also reading groups (comprised of Iris, Elsa, Andy and me).  This season there is a day spent with another homeschooling family- a day of group learning, and science experiments.  There is still Monday group just like the past 4 years.  There is Nonnie day for baking bread, learning about darkest Peru (after reading Paddington), art class on Wednesdays, and music lessons once a week.

There is still staying up late to watch the harvest moon eclipse (with self directed journaling!), and archaeology digs under the side porch, and monarch life cycle observation, and housekeeping outdoors, and calculating how many felted cookie cutter shapes you need to make and sell to grandparents to earn enough money to buy a horse.

I’m sure some people wonder how we pull it off these days.  And the truth is, of course, that some days we don’t. Still Iris’ reading has exploded, she loves math  (I’ll take that any day, no matter how slow her memorization of facts), she is eager to learn about ancient history, and world religion.  They both love story so much.  They re-enact what they see and hear in books and bring that learning alive in a way I never had a chance to do while I sat at my desk at school.  Their British accents are impeccable, their Balinese dancing and costume exquisite, their knowledge of horse care and horsemanship growing by the day.   Are they “behind” in some things?  I’m sure.  Will they fill in the gaps when they need to?  Absolutely.

Despite the hardships, or maybe because of them, homeschooling is still so right for us right now.  When your dad is on the couch and can’t get up because he is bone tired from chemo treatments and it hurts just to look at him, it’s good to go to a friend’s and let out your worry and fear by playing wounded soldier or orphan slaves all day.  When you dad is finally up and at em again, it’s good to settle in on the couch and read about magical worlds, and draw pictures from ancient times together, and contemplate in small ways why life works like this. Hard things happening to good people.

These girls are so tuned in to their world, so observant.  Sometimes that translates into noticing the first ripe tomatoes in the garden or finding the eggs where the wily hen has hidden them.  And sometimes that translates into holding the grief and worry you feel in your house.  It means now more than ever, they need the comfort that has always been home, they need us, their grandparents, their good friends.  We are all holding them, and teaching them, and learning with them.  Homeschooling for love and comfort.  What a blessing.