by Kat | Nov 15, 2021 | General, In This Moment
In a week that did not at all turn out as I hoped or even in my wildest dreams imagined this poem from last Friday has been my lifeline.
At some point, Elizabeth Bishop renamed the poem… but I found her original name, Early Sorrow, to be so profound for me. But, the new name… Sestina… has stuck in my head and the words of the poem keep echoing there as well. It is a good time to plant tears… not very bright or cheery for a Monday but every day can’t be all sunshine and rainbows…
Sestina by Elizabeth Bishop:
September rain falls on the house.
In the failing light, the old grandmother
sits in the kitchen with the child
beside the Little Marvel Stove,
reading the jokes from the almanac,
laughing and talking to hide her tears.
She thinks that her equinoctial tears
and the rain that beats on the roof of the house
were both foretold by the almanac,
but only known to a grandmother.
The iron kettle sings on the stove.
She cuts some bread and says to the child,
It’s time for tea now; but the child
is watching the teakettle’s small hard tears
dance like mad on the hot black stove,
the way the rain must dance on the house.
Tidying up, the old grandmother
hangs up the clever almanac
on its string. Birdlike, the almanac
hovers half open above the child,
hovers above the old grandmother
and her teacup full of dark brown tears.
She shivers and says she thinks the house
feels chilly, and puts more wood in the stove.
It was to be, says the Marvel Stove.
I know what I know, says the almanac.
With crayons the child draws a rigid house
and a winding pathway. Then the child
puts in a man with buttons like tears
and shows it proudly to the grandmother.
But secretly, while the grandmother
busies herself about the stove,
the little moons fall down like tears
from between the pages of the almanac
into the flower bed the child
has carefully placed in the front of the house.
Time to plant tears, says the almanac.
The grandmother sings to the marvelous stove
and the child draws another inscrutable house.
Elizabeth Bishop ©
I learned last week that my years-estranged sister has been evicted (yet again) and has spiraled down to the bottom of the bottom of the bottom of the mental health ocean. There are volumes to this story that I am just not ready to share and my Monday is going to be full of making calls, asking lots of questions and I am hopeful that I will find an answer or two. I am sorry, but I have closed comments for this post… I hope you all understand.
See you all back here on Wednesday.
by Kat | Nov 8, 2021 | General, In This Moment, Uncategorized
(a weekend update, and an answer!)
Debate over the Vintage Mixer continued on Friday evening and we made a plan for Saturday morning. Our plan… if and when it became too full to move around and still maintain safe distancing that would be our key to leaving. We arrived a little after the doors opened, hoping to avoid the initial rush of opening, but we still got hung up in a bit of a line. And from roughly 10 am to noon we had a wonderful time. We looked at so much fun stuff! We people watched all the “Vintage-dressed” people! (They are just so fun!) We had a beer and some Pie Bird Potato and Leek Breakfast Pie (yes, beer for breakfast!) and we did a tiny bit of shopping before it became almost impossible to move at all. It got so busy and so full. I have to confess that the female portion of the attendee’s seemed to have major issues with keeping your mask on correctly, despite there being signs EVERYWHERE about covering your nose and mouth. The men did not seem to have this issue at all, and frankly… I was a bit outraged at the women (can you say stupid??)
I was sad that I did not see a number of vendors that had previously attended… and most notably, Rick Sebak was not there. And we only bought 2 things! But what fun things they are! We got a set of vintage cocktail glasses and a very old little cast iron pug. I have plans to put out the Dickens Village this year and I thought this little pug would be perfect companion for Fezziwig!
Last week, Patty expressed curiosity about my Cinnamon Syrup making so I thought I’d share my little concoction with you all! Years ago I found a recipe on Pinterest for Cinnamon Syrup but it was way too sweet for my taste… so I tweaked it quite a bit. My recipe: 1.5 cups of water, 1 – 8″ length cinnamon stick or 3 small sticks (note… I buy cinnamon sticks from Costco, they are larger, fresher, and less expensive that the regular grocer – but they don’t always have them in stock) and 3/4 cup brown sugar (not packed… just loose scoops). Bring the water with the cinnamon stick to a boil and once it is boiling, turn off the heat and cover the pot and let it steep for 20-30 minutes. Remove the sticks and add the brown sugar and stir until dissolved. Voilá, the perfect hint of cinnamon-y sweetness to add to your coffee. (And if you froth your milk and sprinkle it with a tiny bit of ground cinnamon, you have yourself an incredible treat!)
And finally… my question of the week involves those ever-present stacks of paper that live in a house. Sadly, Steve and I are both paper collectors… but different sorts of paper. I like to print out recipes because I can make notes on them, but the kitchen drawer is overflowing and so this morning, I am culling the recipe herd and only keeping the ones we really love and I will be putting them in a new recipe book. Steve’s paperwork is a bit more “all over the house” than mine – he is a receipt and coupon hoarder. He doesn’t know it, but they are all going in the trash this morning… but how long do you all keep receipts? (and I am not talking grocery or fast food receipts… and yes, he keeps those too… sigh) I am talking ‘big ticket’ items, warranty items, etc.
But really, I want to know… how do you battle the Paper War?
That’s all I have for this morning… the stacks of paper are calling!
by Kat | Nov 5, 2021 | General, In This Moment
In November, the smell of food is different. It is an orange smell. A squash and pumpkin smell. It tastes like cinnamon and can fill up a house in the morning, can pull everyone from bed in a fog. Food is better in November than any other time of the year. — Cynthia Rylant
It felt like summer lingered for much of October and it was truly glorious, but November arrived with hints of winter. Colder temperatures, a crisp smell in the air, winds that now have a wind chill factor as part of their equation, and clear, quiet skies at night.
These things have encouraged a desire for seasonal cooking. I have a grocery list full of autumn-y things that includes the ingredients for the Cranberry Pie that Bonny shared this week. In addition, there was extra joy in making cinnamon syrup for my morning coffee… gosh, that cinnamon-y smell is just the best but it is even better on a chilly November morning!
I was even happy to see heavy frosts several mornings in a row! I am very ready to settle in to the beginning of the “indoor” seasons!
Porch-view this morning.
We have a large maple tree in our front yard that on Wednesday still had most of it’s leaves. This morning the branches are almost bare and my yard is covered in a carpet of gold. And while I am not thrilled about raking… gosh it is just so gorgeous right now! That yard full of leaves stirs up the joyous memories of childhood walking through the crunchy leaves. I even remember *liking* raking… making huge piles of leaves and laying in them…throwing them at my cousins… and laughing the entire time!
Steve and I have debated (each of us firmly on a very different side of the debate) attending the return of the Pittsburgh Vintage Mixer. Steve is very…leery about attending because COVID numbers are just not going down in Allegheny County and have increased over the past week. However, I feel confident that it will be okay to attend because of these two simple requirements: EVERYONE must wear mask. No mask, No Entry. And EVERYONE must be FULLY vaxxed. No Vaxx, No Entry. (These should be the rules for everywhere…but that is a debate for another day!) Steve is worried that because it is the first event following last year’s COVID Hiatus that it will be packed full of people… perhaps too many people, making social distancing challenging and he really hates crowds. But, as of right now… we are planning on going which means that I am currently winning the debate…for this moment in time, lol.
And with that… let’s get this weekend started! Happy Friday everyone! I will see you all back here on Monday!
by Kat | Nov 1, 2021 | General, In This Moment
“October extinguished itself in a rush of howling winds and driving rain and November arrived, cold as frozen iron, with hard frosts every morning and icy drafts that bit at exposed hands and faces.”
― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
My October ended exactly as J.K. Rowling describes…windy and so rainy! And the start of November seems to be on track for her words as well (the cold is here!!) Yes, the heat is on in my house…and I welcomed turning it on!
AND!!
Welcome to my new Monday format…Monday Question’s! Some weeks, I will be asking you a question or two as I seek your opinion/advice… other week’s I will highlight a question you have asked me in comments!
This week, I have a question for you! This question is a hot button issue in my house these days… it almost always instantly takes the conversation from 0 to 60 in a nanosecond. So… help!
My question this week involves recycling… or rather the recycling of a specific item… the varied assortment of cardboard boxes that arrive in this house over a two week period. Now, our “Recycling Body” (i.e. Scott Township) takes “flattened cardboard and paper” … which means to me, flatten all boxes and place them in the bin. Someone in this house thinks you can just put whole boxes in (as do my neighbors…whole cardboard boxes overflow their bin and if there is a breeze they go all over the place) The heated discussions revolve around the fact that Waste Management takes *all* the recycling from the street… flattened boxes and unflattened boxes, but I believe that things that are not in “compliance” are thrown away – defeating the purpose of recycling, imo. (And, personally this feels like a ploy to NOT break down boxes and leave them for me, just sayin’)
So…break down boxes? Or don’t?
A very small post script… I am happy to report that my pinky toe is NOT broken but I have arrived at the How Many Colors Can Your Bruise Turn Stage… but I will take multicolored bruising versus a broken toe!
Happy Monday everyone!
Photo by Olya Kobruseva from Pexels
by Kat | Oct 29, 2021 | General, In This Moment
“I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.”
― L. M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables
If you ignore all the news in the world, October was simply a glorious month. Perfect autumnal weather… darker morning and evenings, some rain, some sun to warm the days, crisp nights, and my favorite season has arrived: Sweater Weather and an Extra Blanket On The Bed!!
Gone from the days is the birdsong choir which has been replaced by the solitary calls of the Carolina wren and the Cardinal. I like the difference that a quieter morning and evening bring to my day. It is as if nature is encouraging a deeper meditation at the start and finish of each day – a welcome change from the busyness of the long summer days.
This week, I grieved when I finished reading Finding the Mother Tree by Suzanne Simard. It was the perfect book to read this month though despite it being a book (conversation?) that I never want to end! It is a book that I will be thinking about for a long time to come which has led me to think about one of my maternal grandfather’s favorite poems… Trees. It was a poem I memorized early in my life… and reciting it together with my grandpa was so much fun. MS may have kept him from the forest, but it did not prevent him from sharing his joy of the natural world. Reading Simard’s book brought thoughts of my grandpa to the surface because there was just so much to think about and wonder over in her writing. I know he would have been as in awe and amazed as I was.
I also was happy to welcome “cooler weather foods” this week..things like baked pork chops, beef stew, and spaghetti! I love how “slow cooking” makes the house smell so wonderful! And it is nice to be able to get something started, put it in the oven, and then walk away to do something else while it cooks! All that “slow cooking” has Big Foot Sock One through the heel and racing down the foot! This is proof to me that if you have several 20 minute knitting sessions during the day, you can get quite a bit of knitting in!
And with that… I am off to *try* and finish up this week’s “ornaments” for the Advent Calendar. Yesterday I had a wee accident and dropped a can of beans on my foot… and of course, it’s my “driving” foot for my sewing machine. I am going to give it a go though. (Yesterday I thought my little toe was broken… and it might be. The bruising tho… well it is even more spectacular this morning than yesterday… oy.) Moral of the story… Birkenstock sandals are not appropriate footwear to unpack boxes from Costco! And here I thought I was done learning lessons the hard way! LOL
I hope you all have an amazing weekend and I will see you back here on Monday!
by Kat | Oct 22, 2021 | General, In This Moment
It was a random week, punctuated by a few maddening moments.
With the latest update from my daughter… the tooth is still wiggly. Or at least it was on Monday! My daughter is back at work, which means Winston is in daycare and has had one illness after another. While we were there she shared how stressful being a “single parent” is (which I sadly know about all too well!) She is exhausted and I really wish I lived closer to be able to help her more! This is maddening moment number one for the week.
I sat down to begin the Great Advent Calendar project and as I read through the instructions again. I realized I need some ribbon… maddening moment number two because I made a list and got “everything” I needed… or so I thought. I will be making a trip to JoAnn’s today to get a spool of ribbon.
I have been valiantly trying to do Stitching In Hand and failing miserably, which brought maddening moment number three. I tried to give myself a bit of a grace period… you know, learning something new can be a challenge to the brain as well as the hands! It seemed easier to go in one direction… or so I thought, until I found that I was not going over enough threads on one row. I have ripped out all the “new” stitches put my hoop back on and went back to my tried and true method. Sometimes you cannot teach and old dog new tricks… or perhaps I need to practice on larger spaced cloth!
Being gone for several days at the beginning of October meant I did not get my act together to do any “Halloween” decorating until this week. I hauled the boxes upstairs from the garage (This is Pittsburgh… our garage is in our basement!) and then contemplated what to put out with less than 2 weeks left in the month. I pulled out my “Fall” decorations that can stay up through November and just got out a couple of things for Halloween. Some is better than none… right? Now I just need to make a decision about some kind of outside lights for Halloween night itself… None of which is maddening, thank goodness! lol
Have a great weekend everyone! I will see you all back here on Monday with my October Word update! (fun times!)
