open

this morn.  a day when both sisters are at school in the morning, and max and i have some time to do some work together.  he writes in his journal.  cuz i make him.  but he goes along with it just fine.  oh, i forgot to make him wear his glasses!  oops.  he is writing about going to work with his dad at the bakery this morning. we had about half an hour till david was ready for him.  we found a nice picnic table, that max asked so funnily, 'is this just a deserted table in the middle of nowhere?'  that cracked me up.  it was right downtown, just not near a playground, but sitting in this open space block park area, so i can see why he thought it was a little strange.  he wrote in his journal  'max and dad werk at the bakery.  max makes cookies.  me and dad werk on the laptops.  then me and dad make mor cookies.'


one of two sweaters i'm challenging myself to finish by november 1.  i feel like squealing with nervous excitement in response to a deadline like that.  it's the olearia sweater, that i learned about a while ago from tania.
i've been centimetering along all spring and summer, and now, i am inching.  i cast on one for big o and one for big z at the same time, so they'd be done at the same time, and not have any hassle that way with jealousy.  max is cool, he trusts he will get one next, and has no worries about it.  ha.  well, his will be a different pattern.  i'm thinking hoodie.  maybe something like this?  if anyone has a good suggestion for an awesome hoodie pattern, please tell!

how sweet is that happy face?

i took this one from outside.  looking in through the window.  i would have liked to stay and watch them together the whole time, but that would have made max feel like he was performing, which makes him act horrendously dorkish,  so i chose not to.  he has been counting the days till today, tuesday, when he gets to go help dad at werk in the morning.  this is something that i know has happened because of the work david and i have been doing in therapy.  we are opening our hearts, kind-of centimetering along, and choosing to do things that matter to the heart, not the mind.  this is such an opening for david.  not that he's an unfeeling guy.  not at all.  but this is taking a step back, taking things down a notch, speedwise, and putting the child's wishes first.  it feels good.  we had our second therapy session last week.  follow ups are really important for changing patterns.  i could feel us slipping out of the inspired place we'd been in the first two weeks after the first appointment.  the hearts were struggling to lead and the minds got so loud again.  refresh.  it's just the nature of being human with this giant brain or something.  we are not simply instinctual.  i sometimes wish we were.  but not really i guess.  being human brings with it so many fun possibilities.  we do get to be instinctual.  and so much more.  like we get to bake and knit.  and write and photograph. and talk and argue.  and laugh crazy loud laughs.  and cry softly.  or hugely.   and play house.  and make music.  and listen to music.  and worry about birth control.  that one is such a cluster for me these days.  i do envy those sweet wild animals who never think twice, or once!, about birth control.    still pondering what to do till we feel ready to do something permanent.  copper iud and me were not buds.  i took the pill when i was a young young woman.  i might try that again.  scary!  anyhoo.  being human!  learning how to do so many things with as much grace and forgiveness and heart as possible.  i am really inspired to not fear birth control.  i want to be able to tell my girls that something worked well for me, besides having babies and then daddy getting a vasectomy.  you know?

well.

the car is fixed.  thank you.  i've been getting up a little bit earlier.  it is helping.  i would like to get up even earlier.

and i need to get olive another pair of shoes, or two?  the child has a shoe fetish.  i  bring her to the thrift store, and that's all she wants.  more shoes.  she will stare at all the shoes and choose new shoes over toys everytime.  and STILL will feel that she does not have the right pair of shoes for her outfit in the morning.  it is maddening when we are trying to get out the door, and she is just sitting there pouting because she doesn't feel like any of her shoes are quite right.  today she finally got out the door, because i succumbed and allowed her to wear her high heeled red sparkly dorothy shoes to school.  i was saying no, cuz they're not good for running and climbing, and she has a new love of climbing the trees at school.  but what else could i do?  she wasn't gonna leave.  i guess it just wasn't a tree climbing kind of day.  i fully understand. i really do. the other day i went out to the car three times, only to go back to the house three times, to change my outfit.  it just wasn't feeling right.  i guess it's striking me as odd, though, for a four year old to be having issues like this.  culture.

unless we are hiking.  the child refused to wear any kind of shoes on our last hike.  look at that trail.  very rocky.  she never complained once.  she was so comfortable and actually psyched to be barefoot.  she led the pack and went the furthest.  david had to finally tell her it was time to turn around, cuz he feared he'd have to carry her back at some point.  but no.  she walked all over that mountain barefoot.  so funny her  shoe issues.

(rock photo by zhi)

her sister however, has gone off in another direction.  she will only wear sneakers.  she LOVES sneakers. wearing a dress these days, is an anomaly.  mastering the monkey bars is all that matters.  traction and strength is what zhi is about right now.   standing back and watching these kids grow and go through phases is so interesting.  letting go of control and judgement and fear about what it all means (like, for instance, i can fret about wondering if zhi is losing touch with her feminine strength and is that something i need to work on keeping alive within her?  should we be painting our nails more often?),  is so liberating and honestly feels like flying.  and i have done a bit of flying, in my dreams, so i know what i'm saying here.  usually in my dreams, i don't fly by will though.  the wind takes me and then i go with it.  rarely do i go with it without huge fright.  but i have.  zhi has many times.  she flies in her dreams regularly.


i had a dream the other night that some neighbor friends of ours came over to our house.  they knocked at the door.  bill had a wrench in his hand.  elizabeth was standing beside him.  they were both shivering.  they told us their heater broke and that bill just couldn't get it working again.   he was refusing to let anyone else fix it.  i'm not sure what they wanted from us, maybe just some company, or a place to warm up. or maybe some advice on how to fix it?  that was the extent of the dream, though.  they looked like that famous farming couple that stands together steadily with the pitchfork in hand.  just with a wrench and the shivers instead.

i told david the dream when i woke up, and we both thought it was the funniest thing, and laughed like crazy for a few minutes.  i'm not sure why.  morning mind space is open and maybe i told the dream just right, and it led to such good laughter.  thanks bill and elizabeth for that good laugh.

oh!  the fruitbats are my new favorite band.  i heard a song on the radio the other day, and actually called the radio station once it was over to ask what it was.  i haven't done that in my whole life.  i usually wait for them to say what they played, or i write down a note to remember to go online and check the playlist later.  the fruitbats.  i don't know where i've been.  but i'm glad i'm here now with their beautiful awkward lyrics and sounds.  this is the song that i heard on the radio.  i also love this one.

and this one.  it took me six listens before it dawned on me what those cool lyrics are talking about.  i can be so slow sometimes is is disturbing.   'when you love somebody and bite your tongue all you get is a mouth full of blood.'  seriously.  one of the truest things i've ever heard.

and for fun, cuz i'm tooling around on you tube now and did an ani search.  this song reminded me of the work david and i are doing with max right now.  looking for the overlap.  searching for where both hearts, or all three, or all five overlap and feel each other.  love.  i've never listened to it and heard it in this way before.

alrighty then.