She is Magical

Maybe it's the late night conversations in bed, or the endless meal stories. Possibly this all stemmed from that Question asked to myself weeks earlier, "What is your childs/childrens Birth right?"  Is it me choosing to be present. But I can't help but notice the magic in Truthys voice, her toes, her smile, her laughter, her body language.

 Everything is Magic. From her eyes gazing up at the sky noticing and asking "look mommy it is beautiful, who did this.?" (noticing the blue sky). Or the excitement from windows open as we cruise in  the truck and her love for WIND! I love her stories. I love her presence. I love that all she knows is the NOW. She doesn't remind me of yesterdays nor care about what is to come. I love her bold statements about "my feet are too little, I want yours." to "I am a girl, I like girls, Stella, Marley, Sally, they are my friends, they can all sleep with me!!!" But nothing gets better then watching her nurture her brothers, babies, stuffed animals....and saying 'I Love you..which sounds like "I wove you." She helps to keep me in check. To ask myself what could be more amazing then truly loving life. Pure happiness. Pure LOVE.

In Honor

A friend morns her loss today. And I honor a man I never met. We all have our family. Mine complete with my parents both happy, healthy folk. We have those blood relations that hold stronger then any other in times of happiness and crisis. And then there is friend family. The generation I'm in seems to hold strong friendships like family. They become our  extended sisters and brothers. Our kids Aunties and Uncles if you will. They hold the strength needed in friendship and the love needed in family. I am honored to have a great friend family as well. Today I honor my sister Sharp's papa. Her father I never meet but  know he must have been one heck of a man to have a daughter as solid as Sarah is. She is true to herself. She carries pure love. She shares her loud solid laugh, big beautiful eyes, her passion for life and others. I listened to her tales of the last year and a half. Of her father getting cancer. Of how he was/is a fighter for life, he fought hard for more days with his family. I have heard of all the many times Dr thought he couldn't fight more and for the many extra months he lived a joyful life. I sadly heard of his transitions in health over the summer. How Sharp sat by his side while he slept just to be with him. And I too crossed my fingers for many more days. And then like cancer does so well it ended his life. And again I have been shocked by how solid Sharp maintains everything. She keeps it in perspective. She celebrates and I imagine keeps her family going. So here is to you Papa Sharp. For a great life, and a great daughter..my sister Sharp. Today I hold a heavy heart but add a glass of wine and a positive light.

Forest School

" When we get out of the glass bottles of our ego,
When we escape like squirrels
Turning in the cages of our personality
And get into forests again,
We shall shiver with cold and fright
But things will happen to us
So that we don't know ourselves

Cool, unlying life will rush in,
And, passion will make our bodies taut with power,
We shall stamp our feet with new power
And old things will fall down,
We shall laugh, and institutions will curl up like burnt paper"
-D.H. Lawerence



Our Forest School. Our home in homeschooling. Our purpose for family time in this wild, open forest space. We have gathered for years now in this forest play. It has swayed from purposeful hikes with destinations, to a forest to simply exist in. It was our outdoor Enki classroom for a time. It was our Friday classes with Simon and Wild Earth's Children. It has been a place for Mamas to chat and kids to play. Over the years we have evolved. We have decided what makes this important. The community has changed. The reasoning new. This is our home. This is our treasure as a family. This is where we throw out the supposed tos of life truly use our intuition and go with the present with a plan for the future...A future plan with no time line. The purpose is simple to gather in the forest with a community that also craves, needs, makes it a commitment to there as well. Come rain, snow, hot sun, cool winds we will be there. We play, we wander, we plant seeds without a needed outcome. We taste the air like snakes, wander like deers, examine scat, follow tracks, build shelters, run, walk, hide, laugh, find pure silence and go back to our roots. We are alive and well. We leave filled up and crave our next visit to this magical place we have created. I am so blessed to have this place, these people, my family to share this with.

From Pasture to Plate

I am thankful for our land and space. I am thankful for living a true cycle of life with our flock of Freedom Ranger chickens. I am thankful for Organic farmers, healthy birds, and all who contribute to my families meals. We began eating meat as a family just about a year ago. As major as the transition we felt good about our decision. To buy local, farm raised, grass fed, pastured animals. We always feel good about supporting our local farmers market. We attempt to garden through the weeds that take over our veggies as well. We enjoy gathering fresh eggs daily and truly becoming one with our food. My kids love to farm. They love there animals, garden and  other farms we support. We decided after years of wondering  if we could process our own meat. Could we truly become one with our food. Would the raising of an animal create pets and not meals! Could we one day hunt as well?

And so it began. We ordered 50 Freedom Ranger chicks. They were shipped from a farm in Pennsylvania and the kids were in love. There soft little bodies only 2 days old. There little peeping sounds and waddling legs. We had a new family to care for! And if done correctly we'd be feasting all fall on these wonderful birds.

The chicks stayed warm in the coop. They survived under heat lamps for 4 weeks until they were ready for the Chicken Tractor. Our friends the Bailey's had hoped to be apart of these chickens lives, helping by making the tractor and in the end processing the chickens. By the time we headed to the tractor we had 47 chickens as a few didn't make it through the first couple days.

Our job got greater at this time. We were now protecting our chickens in a tractor from predators including our non-farm dog Nesta! They lived in the fresh pasture space. They were moved to another part of the yard daily to peck on fresh grasses and bugs. They all seemed quite happy. We learned quickly that quite possibly they were most at risk while we rolled the tractor to the new fresh spot constantly dealing with caught chicken legs. Other animals included the midnight resuce where Jody saved them from a Great Horned Owl,  We saved another from being pecked by her chicken friends..it ended up when we threw feed in was a job. If the feed landed on another chicken they would peck her for the feed and eventually kill her. Chickens are not smart was a repeated phrase around here for months. Nesta assisted in a few deaths on an evening we weren't home. A few others heat got to them..we lived and learned throughout those 8 weeks. We were ready to process by Sept 1st about 11 weeks from birth. Jody watched a bazillion YouTubes, the Bailey's helped gather supplies and on Labor Day we began the processing.

The kids seemed excited to help. To give thanks to these beautiful chickens for their wonderful meat. They did so, and wandered up the yard with the first 2 chickens. We took a moment to thank them, the boys turned and ran and the families began a long day of work. It truly was a smooth time. Our stations set-up, the chickens went from cones, draining blood, de-feathering, gutting to cooling baths and bagging. In all we successfully processed 37 chickens. We worked, feasted, worked again and feasted on 2 birds that evening.

With all said and done. A freezer full of plump, large, organic chickens I can definitely say I could do it all again. I am so thankful for this process and friends along the way who saved chickens, feed chickens, and helped us process them all!

Empty plates. Chicken gone!

Friend Family

Cedar and Benjamin at the Rodeo Parade

Old friends celebrating! Or as Sharp says my friend family enjoying time together...laughing harder then usual, dancing, eating, drinking, biking, enjoying the present times we have together!

We love our time with friends....

Happy Kids

Auntie Sharp and Truthy at Rockygrass

Mama Family!

Sharp and I

Summer Family

If I  had to sum up the our summer it would be simple....time spent with family and friend family! We always feel spoiled all summer with our MN travels, Music festivals, camping, parades, celebrations, and simply summer fun! Summer is my season. Hot, sunny, busy with friends, social, I LOVE SUMMER.

Love for Grandpa!

Mimi, the boys and cousin AZ swimming!

Mimi, Truthy and Orien out on the boat

Grandpa with the whole gang

Summer traditions....traveling to MN to visit family.....boating, swimming, eating ice cream, biking, Duluth, friends, more family time, humidity, sunshine, ponds, lakes, cities, we love our traditions!

Cedar and Grandpa bonded on bikes...they rode nightly all over Maple Grove

And then we enter the 4th of July! Always love seeing the kids so happy riding in the local parade and watching foreworks in Estes! And of course a little T-ball....the boys played on the same team and loved it.

Orien ready to bat

The 4th of July Parade

Cedar throwing in a ball from out field

Summer with Emily.

I guess you could say it was a fast, warm, playful, eventful, time for us. I apparently shut off the computer often enough to skip our life in a blog. Maybe these times away create a space that excites me to return. Fall always seems like a place of returning, organizing, planning, committing, changing. Our summer created our changes. Emily changed our family. We live in great space, high on the mountain side, a bumpy gravel road leads us there. We drive daily to visit town, play, socialize, rejuvenate via gym, toss a ball at T-ball. When we retreat we garden, play with chickens, mountain bike, hike, play...alone with Eamonn way. Then Emily moved in across the street. Cedar, Orien and Truthy were so ALIVE with a neighbor friend. Cedar fell in love with his perfect life....mountains, friends and neighbor. It has brought on big conversations of finding a neighborhood that will fill us up but not over do it. We aren't city folk, we like a little privacy, we like to know our community...and so Lyons will one day be our next  home.

Summer in a blurrr goes like this....Cedar turns 7!!!!!!



Cedar turns 7 Little House on the Prairie Style!




We built a Log Cabin like Pa for his Party!



Cedar and his new mountain bike