Happy 2012! (tomorrow)

My New Year's resolutions are in threes as follows:

To post the blog three times a week (minimum)

To practice yoga three times a week (minimum)

To eat three meals a day (maximum - and no snacking!)

Perhaps I don't need to apologize, but I feel like I should say I'm sorry for not posting the blog in the last several weeks.  I suppose I could give you any number of plausible excuses, but they'd all be just that, excuses.  The truth is I didn't want to post, so I didn't.  I do understand the importance of the blog for my family far away, and as a record of my children's lives for their own benefit, (also I really do enjoy it most of the time) hence the New Year's resolution. 

I plan not to fall asleep on the job again.

The benefit of having a temperamental child is that sometimes their temperament is sweet

Last night after brushing his teeth Luke disappeared.  Naturally I assumed my three-year-old had gotten distracted and wandered off to play race cars, or snag a plate of cookies, or sneak outside with a flashlight to look for owls, or gone to lay a trap for the next person to walk down the hallway.  After looking in every other room in the house I finally looked in his and Seamus's shared room.  He was laying there in his bed, and when I opened the door he sat up and held his arms out to me.  What a sweet hug he gave me!  Grammy had been alerted to his absence and came in behind me.
While she squeezed him she said, "What a big boy you are, putting yourself to bed!"
"Oh, yeah," Luke sleepily droned.
"Well, that worked out pretty good for you, didn't it?" asked Grammy.
"No, not really.  I couldn't put myself to bed very well.  My foot was sticking out." 

Luke says

Luke is screaming because I took away the box with the model car inside it that Dad bought for them to put together tomorrow.  He saw it and threw a fit when he learned he couldn't open it today, so I told him if he couldn't adjust his attitude I would take it away.  He didn't, so I did, and he threw himself on the floor and the crying quickly escalated into angry screaming.  When I told him he would get a time-out if he couldn't calm down, he just waved his arm at me disrespectfully.  Time-out was officially called.  He tried to slam the door on his way in, but Mom and Dad's house is pressurized with all the windows closed and the door hit the buffer of air before it hit the door frame.  He is still screaming, fully venting his anger.
I feel like smacking him, but thankfully I can restrain myself long enough to realize that would make things worse.

And all this with a three and a half hour nap this afternoon.  I thought that was wonderful, a good sign!  Just like a relaxed day back home.

"Keep it up if you want a spanking, Luke!" I say down the hall, "You're on a time-out to adjust your attitude, but you're not working very hard at adjusting your attitude are you?" I ask through the door.

The screaming stops for a moment, considering.  The door swings open slowly and a tear-stained, splotchy face looks up at me.  "I'm ready to come out", he says with a hiccup.  I explain what a good attitude looks like, "No pouting, no whining or screaming.  Are you ready to have a cheerful demeanor?"

He nods, walks out the door and throws himself face-down on the floor.

"That looks like pouting to me", I say.

Suddenly a glaring, toothy, squinty smile tears across his face and he shouts, "I'm a cheerful demeanor!  SEE?!"

I hope he didn't see my grin before I turned away.

Home Jiggety Jig

with the sheep on the Frantz's field

One week until we are home in Manitoba with Derek, dear friends, sleeping in our own beds, and with our own routines.  One more week of California adventures, Saltbush Ranch relaxation, outdoor activities in long sleeve shirts, the home I grew up in.

This morning Christmas arrived in my attitude.  I think it got lost in my excitement about our trip to California and I didn't want to think about it because it meant that our trip was coming to a close.  But this morning as I heard Straight No Chaser sing "I'll Be Home For Christmas"  as I drove down the 99, I got a lump in my throat thinking of the home my husband and I have made with our children.  That song usually makes me cry with longing for California and the foggy Christmases of my childhood, but today it made me long for my husband and the home where I'm the Mom (that's who).

So this evening we decorated my parent's Christmas tree and admitted (finally), that we will have to leave this wonderful place, the home of my earliest memories, the home of my dear family; simultaneously welcoming Christmas.  But those of us who are leaving have more to look forward to than those left here in California, because we get to keep the memories and take them back to Manitoba, to a home of our own, where (I just decided tonight) we are going to have a new (to us) tradition of filling stockings with fruit and nuts and candy canes.  And where we will be welcomed home by a leapingly slobberingly grateful friend Linus, and the Dad-man we call our very own: Derek.

I don't think anyone can make you understand before you live it, this feeling of having your heart pulled in two directions.  My home is in California, my home is in Manitoba, my family is in both places, and so is my desire, so are my thoughts.  I hate to leave, I love to go, I fly gladly into the open arms awaiting me...in different directions.  I cry to go, I laugh to arrive, I sigh ... wonder, where will my boys call home?

I struggle to be present in today, to enjoy where I am right now, instead of checking the weather for Winkler and Shafter and always thinking, "It's ten o'clock here, eight o'clock there". It's true what they say, "Home is where the heart is".  But what about when your heart is in two places at once?

Awkward Yoga on a Mountain, Pose

Chair, without the mountain, on a mountain, without the chair.

It's all happenin' at the zoo

We went to the Fresno zoo today.  It was pretty cold in the morning (for Southern California) and none of the animals were out when we rather efficiently and uncharacteristically got there right at opening.  So we took a break, got some hot chocolate, and basked in the sun with the lemurs (Sup Lemur-man?).  Perhaps the most exciting part of the morning was feeding the giraffe.  Her name was Golly, but the deaf in our midst kept calling her Dolly; I prefer the mispronunciation "Jolly"...festive, isn't it?  I've been making these jokes for days and I'm still the only one laughing.  *sigh*  Miss you, Derek.  You would laugh at my jokes, wouldn't you?

We had to come to California to play in the snow

The hills are alive!

A fallen, burnt out sequoia that you can walk through.  It's amazing!

For my friend Katie Elias :)  We didn't forget Oregon.

oh the captions could get interesting here!

This photo doesn't do the tree justice.  The General Grant tree's circumference at the ground is 106.7 feet.  It is the third largest living thing in the world.

Luke sings himself to sleep: his song

Sometimes we have to do what we don't want We don't like pirates Pirates don't do anything they don't like We are pirates who don't like anything Sometimes we do things because we have to, Not because we want

A Walk at Saltbush Ranch

 

 

Roots

    I spent the first seven years of my life on the Shafter Cotton Research Station.  My Dad's first spoken word was "tractor".  My grandfather grew up on a farm in Rio Bravo with two work horses named Jack and Dan who pulled the cultivator.  My great-grandfather Pete grew cotton and alfalfa.  My great-great grandfather Jake moved from Oklahoma to Kansas to California and farmed the land in each place.  I am descended from generations of people who worked the land, and I am proud of it and feel connected to this land and my food because of it.

    This year the cotton is coming off late in Shafter and I was happy to get to see it.  I even ran into the owner of this particular field while I was out picking dried cotton boles and when I rattled off my genealogy we discovered that he used to ride the bus with my grandma Judy.  

    Farming is becoming more and more of a big business and less and less of a family oriented task.  It makes me sad, but in my own generation not a single one of my grandfather Walter's grandchildren is involved in farming (besides the backyard variety).  I don't know what, if anything, I should or can do about that.  But it seems wrong to me. A break in tradition. Losing a bit of where we've come from.  Where will we go with no roots to feed us?

 

Luke says:

There's no more muffins, just this many muffins (holding up two fingers), two!

I don't like apples, I won't eat them.  I changed my mind, I love apples only I don't like the skin I just love the inside but not the seeds 'cause they are yuck.

(trying to imitate the song Aroostishaw)  A rooster shot, a rooster shot, a rooster shot shot!

me: Ouch!  You just hit me with the basketball.  What do you say?
luke:  You should have catched the ball.

Dear Derek,

      The boys and I are missing you.  Especially at bedtime when you would normally read stories, help bathe and dress Luke, and give hugs and kisses before tucking him in.  Seamus seems to know you're missing too and keeps saying, "Da da da da da da", which we are pretty sure means, "Where the heck did my Dad go and how come he didn't take me with him?!" 
       Today we went to the beach with my parents.  We all squeezed into Mom's corolla and hit the road around 9am, which I thought was quite an achievement considering we were only out of bed and blinking around 7:45.  Well, except for Dad, who was up earlier to go to Shafter and help Phil and Carol with an alternator thing...I don't know what all.  We managed to make it to Tobin James in Paso Robles before we needed a stop.  Bad timing I know, to need a bathroom break just when we get to Tobin James.  But we decided to make the best of the situation and taste some wines.  Look up the wine Barberra.  That's the one I'm coming home with.  The merlot I also purchased will not make it home I'm afraid.
        We made it to Pismo just in time for a bread bowl of chowder from Splash and a walk on a very windy and sandy beach.  Poor Seamus, I set him down on the blanket on the sand for about TWO seconds and the blowing sand got all over him.  We'll be finding sand in his crevices for weeks (and my camera's crevices!  ick.).  He was brave though, no tears, even though that had to be strange and uncomfortable.  We had stellar weather.  We were all peeling off layers of sweaters, and long sleeves.  Luke decided to streak while we were trying to get his swim trunks on...I have some pretty funny pictures of that to show you.  If not for the wind, it would have been a perfect day to play in the water.

         Anyway, we ended up in Arroyo Grande Village to have ice cream at Doc Bernstein's and then at a wonderful antique store just up the way and when we left the antique store it was 4pm!  We had planned on driving up the coast towards Ragged Point to let the boys get a nap, but we only got as far as Morro Bay before the sun set and it was dinner time.  So we watched the sun set over the bay, enjoyed a spectacular show put on by some hungry pelicans (they were truly amazing circling and then DIVING into the water with a mighty sploosh!  Luke laughed out loud and shouted, pointing.  He would have jumped up and down but we were already buckled back in the car when we noticed them), and drove up to the rock to watch some waves crash against the breakwater.. 

         Then, in true California fashion, we had supper at Taco Temple where we met Santa Claus and Luke got his photo taken with Santa next to his plate of half-eaten burrito, and Grandpa told Luke all about the poor forgotten shiny-tailed reindeer George, who is the reason car's tail lights are red, and who everybody ignored once Rudolph turned up with his glowing red nose to steal all the glory.  And we drove home in the dark, whispering over the warm, sleeping heads of our two wonderful sons.

           I sigh when I think of today because it was such a splendid, beautiful, warm, sunny day after four?  five? days of dark cold fog.  And I sigh when I think of today because it was so incredibly wonderful to share our boys with my parents, and see them together, and think sadly of all the time we don't get to spend with them (an unhelpful exercise, I know, but I can't help it).  And I sigh when I think of today because it was so close to perfect, if only you had been here.

xoxox,

laura

"It's not a car," he insists, "It's not a truck!" he exclaims,

"It's a Jeep," he sighs and stomps on the gas.

Thanks to Ezekiel's grandparents for sharing the vehicular joy an open-air Jeep can provide.  They also took me on my first open-air Jeep ride when I was a kid.