parade photos

I haven't had time to mention that on the Fourth we had a parade right in front of our house. It ran all the way down our street, Park Way. In the past we have gone to the parade in Hillsboro which is quite an event and lasts over two hours. This year we decided to check out the parade right out front. It lasted about an hour and was a fun community parade with many families and kids and dogs all dressed up in red, white and blue. They walked, rode bikes, pulled wagons, drove cars and there were a few floats as well. There was a father and son who drove their fancy motorcycles together and a little terrier dressed up as the Statue of Liberty and one momma who painted her pregnant belly. Very decorative. And of course no parade is complete without a bag of candy to take home.



The parade begins, little ones riding bikes, doggie paraders...



Fun tuba-like instruments, fancy cars...

Eva's photos

Here are some photos Eva took yesterday. Everything is from her view point. If you think of where she is coming from (size three feet, age four) it greatly enhances the photos!

what I know about radishes so far...

Lately I am in the food groove. The kids and I go to the u-pick a couple of times a week to pick berries. These days we have to go early to beat the heat. We are, in fact, going tomorrow because right now is a very exciting berry time. There are many different varieties of berries in season right now and many of them will not be in season long- black raspberries (black caps), boysenberries, Marion berries... When I am not u-picking I am thinking about what to do with all of the berries and other produce- lots of veggies- that have currently taken hold of my life. We have a basket of veggies delivered from a local farm every Friday and of course my garden keeps on coming with unbelievable abundance. I guess I should start to believe it, because it is right there in front of me! And we go to the Portland Farmer's Market most Saturday mornings. I used to buy most if not all of my produce from the market before this basket subscription and my garden. Now I buy a few items each week (like fresh tuna!), although with more and more fruit coming in season I will doubtless buy more- cherries, apricots, nectarines and melons!

This week I made two different kinds of jam- more raspberry and some really delicious boysenberry. And raspberry syrup, which turned out to be really sweet jam. Oh well. And some egg rolls. And I bought pickling spices and hope to make carrot and beet pickles. And I am going to try some kimchi. I have tried other fermented products, but all of them were dairy- yogurt, Keifir, creme fraiche. I am not the biggest fan of dairy and no matter what I try, too much of it makes me and my kids ill. So I am going to move on to some vegetable ferments. Kimchi looks interesting and I can use some of my radishes.

Which brings me to what I know about radishes so far... First, of course, that you can eat the root and they can be quite spicy. Eva introduced me to radishes a couple of summers ago. I had never bought them before because I thought they were too spicy. And they were- at first. Then they kind of grew on me, but only a little bit. Eva kept insisting we buy them until they became a sort of staple, not quite like carrots, but definitely more common for us than say Kohlrabi. That brings us to this year when we planted some in the garden way back in February. When we first started harvesting the radishes, Eva tried them and promptly spit them out. "Yuck! I don't like spicy things." Great, I thought. What am I going to do with all of these radishes now?

The first thing I found was of course you can eat the leaves, which I read are "better for you" than the actual root. Not sure about that because aren't roots supposed to be really amazing as well? It seems kind of like a moot point at this stage of the game for me but I still love to know what is edible. The next thing I learned is that if you let them (and when I say *let* I mean that you don't pick them when people normally pick them) they will flower and they have such lovely pink flowers I brought them into the house and put them in a vase. You can eat the flowers, of course. The flowers will grow and grow into a very large plant and vine out and then they will make seeds. The seed pods are edible too and if you eat them your mouth will once again recognize the spicy radish taste. In fact all of it including the flowers taste like radishes. The seed pods are VERY spicy. I thought about pickling those but I would need to find someone who likes very spicy things. Dad? Are you interested in some spicy-pickled-radish-seed-pods? Not your average Christmas gift I guess.

Anyway, I am pretty excited to try making the kimchi, never mind that when I tried it many years ago I did not like it. I didn't like radishes then either, though. And I certainly didn't know most of what I know about radishes now. Maybe kimchi will end up being more than just a fun project. Maybe I will make it once a week and end up using it as a staple in my home... Ah well I can dream can't I? And all of this from radishes!



Yellow broccoli flowers with pink radish flowers in the background.

rocket fuel

Today I paid Samuel $10 for a jelly jar full of rocket fuel. While I was making raspberry hand pies (a.k.a turnovers), Samuel came into the kitchen asking for supplies, ingredients, "corn starch, flour, anything at all". I gave him a bowl of whole wheat pastry flour and he went on his way. He was having a secret club meeting in the back bedroom and I gathered from his request that he had found a *reason* for his meeting that he was happy with.

About five minutes later he came back into the kitchen asking for some more ingredients. I told him I didn't have much and gave him another bowl of flour after looking around a bit. He and Eva had long ago cleaned out many of my "supplies" during their last round of concocting witch's brew out on the patio. Stores of baking soda, vinegar, corn starch have all been turned into something else. No matter, he seemed pleased with the whole wheat pastry flour, which is great because I was using spelt for the pies.

I returned to my pies and over the next half hour Samuel came in and out asking for water and then some of my olive oil. I gave him a little peanut oil, a little more grudgingly than I am happy to admit. And then voila! He offered me rocket fuel for $10. Of course I was intrigued.

After Samuel handed me the jar of rocket fuel and I handed him ten dollars, or rather Eva and I handed him ten dollars, Samuel left to put his money away and Eva and I contemplated the rocket fuel.

"Do you think it really works, momma?" Eva asked me seriously.

"I don't know," I told her. "Do you have a rocket to try it out in?"

"No," she shook her head. "But I have a horse that can use it."

So we added a little, glug glug to the back of the unicorn. Then we waited to see if it would work.

Samuel had said the rocket fuel "was the first rocket fuel ever to be able to take you to another planet". I wasn't sure what to do next but Samuel had already thought of that. Eva told him we gave some to her unicorn and he said, "No no, it doesn't go in a horse!" He then asked for some toilet paper rolls and disappeared into the back bedroom again. When he reappeared he was holding a toilet paper roll that had tape across the bottom. He spooned some of the rocket fuel into the roll and taped up the top. Then he told us to follow him outside. I had no idea what to expect at this point.

"See," Samuel said, "a rocket needs fuel!" Then he showed us how to throw the rocket, now full of fuel. Basically, you chuck it really hard into the air and then it lands on the ground. After a couple of times it pretty much explodes onto the pavement.

I have to say I was impressed. It was creative, really fun and even included Eva. She liked it so much she paid for two extra rockets after the first. Did I mention the rocket fuel did not come with a complementary rocket? Rockets were $3. Eva got a deal and paid just $1.22 for the third rocket. Pretty good, I would say.

Samuel now has big plans for setting up a rocket fuel stand out front, complete with rockets and jars of fuel. "How many people do you think will stop to buy some?" You just never know...




Here is the rocket and the rocket fuel. Samuel added the fuel to the rocket.




Here are Samuel and Eva with the rocket fully loaded with fuel, ready to launch.



Here is Eva after the first throw, watching to see what will happen. And finally, you can see the rocket after it has been thrown repeatedly.

more on right brained- visual spatial learners

I was looking through a homeschooling blog I like and have posted about before- Throwing Marshmallows and came across another great page of posts about visual spatial learners. I like this quote- "Right-brainers are not broken! If there are left-brained learners and right-brained learners, why isn’t there a plethora of negative labels for the left-brained learner? Each type of learner should be valued for what it offers. Each learner should be allowed to flourish in the environment that supports their timeframe and process. Just because the left-brained value system is so prolific in our society and culture doesn’t mean it is superior. It means it is accepted, which means the supports are in place, which means it is easier to value what already exists."

Much of what is written about right brained- visual spatial learning is negative, as though something is broken and needs to be fixed. What bothered me in the book Upside-down Brilliance was this attitude. That the kids- people- were not getting things properly or in the right time frame. Never mind what they DO get. Stephanie from Throwing Marshmallows point this out as well- "It [A Global View of Strategies for Visual Spatial Learners] assumes that phonics is the correct way to learn to read and if you don’t learn by phonics at age 6 or 7, then you are “poor at reading” i.e., something is “wrong”. Yet, r-b kids, if not forced to try to read before they are ready or in a manner which is contrary to their learning style are NOT poor readers. They are not even “late” readers. They are “right on time readers” for them. It is only the system that labels them “poor” or makes them feel “less than”.

Another blog for this sort of dialogue- Apple Stars. I have to read a little more...

Here is a great post about reading for r-b visual-spatial learners, also from Apple Stars.

And here is part of an interesting outline she has on her blog-

"1. Not here to give you a label to attach to child

2. Two reasons to understand this style of child

a. Mass schooling teaches in left-brain fashion

(1) most of us were taught there

(2) we often start with this teaching style

b. Society thus values left-brain traits

(1) help you recognize which traits

(2) help you learn to value right-brain traits

II. RIGHT-BRAINED TRAITS (from our family’s experiences)

A. Visual Interests

1. Give value

a. video games/computers

b. drawing

c. music

d. theater/dance

e. building

2. Encourage gifts

a. get supplies

b. create availability

c. subscribe/collect

B. Alone Time

1. Create time

a. takes time

b. requires concentration

2. “Perculating” time

a. concepts solidify through thinking

b. concepts solidify through interest exploration

3. Pursues interests

a. gifts require time and commitment

b. views world through interest

C. Resists Teaching; Loves Learning

1. Because don’t teach the way they learn"

photos!

Eva says this is a momma pine cone with her baby pine cones nursing on her. She set it all up today on the nature table.


These are little scenes I caught around the house the last couple of days. The first is a group of playmobil guys and Eva said they are all partners and she put their hats on them and lined them up. The next two are the happy gorillas having a tea party of sorts. This scene gets set up repeatedly so I decided to get a picture because it is obviously important. The other day Eva was pretending to be a happy gorilla and throwing her hands up in the air like they are.




This is a tea party Eva set up. We tried to make a sort of teepee but ran out of large enough sticks to build it all around with. Eva said this was a fun party but the tea had too much sugar in it.



This is how Eva dressed up today (and for the past couple of days). Those are pillow cases and one is clipped to her in back and the one on her head is draped just so. I let her fix it because she has the right touch. She calls it her maiden costume and I think a lot of it is in the attitude. The shoes help too- little flower flip flops that sparkle in the sun.

words from Owen Meany

Owen Meany said, "If you care about something, you have to protect it- if you're lucky enough to find a way of life you love, you have to find the courage to live it."