Five Minute Friday: Imagine

I'm joining in on Lisa-Jo Baker's Five Minute Friday. The rules are pretty simple. One word. Five minutes of writing. No editing.

Imagine

I put on a light jacket, roll up my jeans and put no shoes on. It's early in the morning so all you hear is nature, moose grazing in the field, seagulls flying in and out. I am so grateful for this moment. The air is misty with salt in it. My coffee so warm, it warms my soul. The closer I get a tear forms in my eye. It's beautiful. I can feel the sand that has been tracked onto the beach beaten path. Then that moment comes when I first set eyes on the ocean. All my senses going out of control because they are on overload. The smell of fresh air. The taste of the wind whipping salt and sand into my mouth. The beauty of the ocean. The sound of the waves lapping up on the shore. The feeling of sand in between my toes. I'm home, free, and clean that's what this place does to me. It cleanses my soul.

Show and Share: Knots

Three boys plus one craft loving Momma... let's see what we get into!

It's summer time and I love being outside! For some crazy reason we hear the boys tell us how bored they are or that there isn't anything to do. Seriously! So, I'm working on crafts that can be done outdoors. We, I say we cause this Momma has little experience with it, are learning how to tie knots. That's right they are taking their string outside and tying up a storm... hopefully not each other. There is definitely an art to tying these knots. I can't wait to get into Celtic and Nautical knots, absolutely beautiful!

I have a few places that have been great resources for knot tying info:

Survival Outdoor Skills

Animated Knots by Grog

Art by: Katherine Codega

Seriously thought there is some beautiful artwork with knots. I can't wait to get the boys further along! There is also tons of ideas on knot tying on Pinterest!

Stay calm and knot on!

Two for Twosday

Two for Twosday: two thoughts/ updates/ photos/ something that I don't want to forget or am flat out oober excited about.

1. Schools out for the summer! The boys had their last day of school on Friday. So very proud of all their hard work that they all put into school every day.

2. We went camping and had such a great relaxing Memorial weekend. Small story that I have to share. On our way home from camping we stopped at Toot Toot. If you haven't been, absolutely go try it out. We hadn't showered in a few days and definitely looked like we had been out... well... camping. We sat down from making our way through the buffet line said our prayer and started to grub. A few moments later our waitress came over to tell us our lunch had been bought for us. We all sat there shocked. Five adults and three children is not a small meal to buy, someone had though. They bought our lunch because we had said a prayer before eating. We didn't get a chance to say thank you because they wanted it to be anonymous. It was a simple but wonderful act of kindness and I sat for a few moments in the beauty of it. Thank you to our anonymous lunch buying friends. God bless you for making this worn out groups meal. God does provide in  beautiful ways.

{this moment}

{this moment} -  A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

Shadow of Night

Shadow of Night
By: Deborah Harkness
FOUR out of FIVE stars

my thoughts:
So this is the second book in the All Souls Trilogy. The first book is A Discovery of Witches. So picking up from there... they travel time. SPOILER! They make it.

The drama begins from there though because Matthew is in this time and only one Matthew can exist at one time. There are a ton of new characters that come and go in the book, not all of them stick around. Think about it though... how would they they are in the past.

Difficult part in this book was all the little historical things going on that were brought up. Matthew in this time era was well... busy. There were so many little stories that it did at times make the book as a whole loose it's path. The perk to that too is that one of the characters actually says that in the book that they had lost sight as to why they were there. DING!

There is a little back and forth as in future to past. That was super easy to follow though. I mean they are very distinct time eras. Beyond that though Harkness did a beautiful job bringing the past to life. It was soo easy to get lost in the past.

Great read. I am waiting as patiently as best I can for the last book.

the run down:
Historian Diana Bishop, descended from a line of powerful witches, and long-lived vampire Matthew Clairmont have broken the laws dividing creatures. When Diana discovered a significant alchemical manuscript in the Bodleian Library,she sparked a struggle in which she became bound to Matthew. Now the fragile coexistence of witches, daemons, vampires and humans is dangerously threatened.

Seeking safety, Diana and Matthew travel back in time to London, 1590. But they soon realise that the past may not provide a haven. Reclaiming his former identity as poet and spy for Queen Elizabeth, the vampire falls back in with a group of radicals known as the School of Night. Many are unruly daemons, the creative minds of the age, including playwright Christopher Marlowe and mathematician Thomas Harriot.

Together Matthew and Diana scour Tudor London for the elusive manuscript Ashmole 782, and search for the witch who will teach Diana how to control her remarkable powers...

View

I'm joining in on Lisa-Jo Baker's Five Minute Friday. The rules are pretty simple. One word. Five minutes of writing. No editing.

View 

I let the my emotions take over yesterday and put a somewhat vague status up on Facebook. It went to the tune of...
"It's like this. I have my opinion. You have yours. Sometimes they match. Sometimes they don't. When they do, great. When they don't, great. Different opinions get us to talk, get us to share our thinking, different views. However do not assume that because we do not agree that you are right and I am wrong. Do not assume that by yelling over me that you are smarter. Bad move sir. BAD move."

No, the sir is not my husband. Yes, we have different opinions on different topics. We respect each other enough to hear each other out... most of the time : P Seriously though. I do understand that we are all passionate about certain topics. So yes, I do get that there will be heated topics out there. 

An example... hmmm.... let's see... we could go with one that strikes the fire in me (people using the r-word). Let's keep it simple though. You like the color blue and I like the color green. There might be reasoning behind it, I like green because University of Oregon's color. You like blue because it's Boise State's color. We might disagree on what team is better, Go Ducks. We might joke about who has a better winning streak, Ducks. We might talk about who has snazzier uniforms, Go Ducks. 

The fact is, we all have different ideas, different views. We need to stop and listen to what others have to say. Maybe you hear something that you've never thought of before. Maybe you don't. Maybe listening to the other person's view makes you even sturdier in your view. Maybe it doesn't. 

My point in all this ranting though, don't forget the golden rule. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. If you want to be listened to on your view, listen to the others. If you want to have your view taken seriously, take others seriously too. 

Unless they like Boise State.... that blue field is terrible. :)

Keep calm and Quack on!

School days

You ever have one of those mornings you wake up and you just can't get the teary eye emotion out of you. Hello Thursday! Tomorrow is Samual and Louis' last day of school. Samual is moving on to second grade and Louis is moving on to first grade. Rian has a class graduation coming up. Sigh. My boys. When did this happen, all this growing up?

I remember every single year the first day of school my Momma would cry. We would all roll our eyes and tell her to stop, "It's not a big deal it's just school for pete's sake". Now I'm the Momma. Even writting that makes a little tear well up. My boys are heading off to school.

I braved through the first day of school... well. I don't know if I should say brave per say. I know that I pestered the poo out of my husband and co-workers in complete worry. The what if... what if he doesn't know what class to go to? What if he gets lost on the bus? What if he doesn't make the bus? The list went on and on. I had to stop myself from calling the school multiple times. I am ashamed to say that I did give in and made one phone call. The same happened the next year when we sent our second son to school. The what if game was a little more intense.

Now we have a few years under our belt. The first day still brings worry and I do shed a tear every year. The thing that gets me the most though is the end of the year. That last day. To see how much they have grown, not just physically, but intellectually. To see how on the first day they weren't too sure about who to sit with at lunch. Now they have stories upon stories of all their friends at school.

Yesterday I got their class schedule for summer school. Summer school is not like what it was when we were kids by the way. It's a cool thing to go to. You aren't in trouble. There are cool classes that you get to take. You get rewards on your attendance. It was the first few sentences that weighed on me. Samual's second grade agenda. Louis' first grade agenda. Whoa. 

Today they take their yearbooks in to get signed by all their friends and teachers. Tonight we are going to work on a thank you card to their teachers. I'm not sure how to really say thank you. How do you tell a teacher thank you for all that they did. Caring everyday for my child. Teaching them what they need to know. Allowing them to tell their silly stories. Laughing with them and standing by them when they needed them to. Thank you teacher. Thank you for everyday that you taught, not just the curriculum, but the everyday as well.

So to the school year of 2012-2013, I say farewell with tissue in hand.