HALLOWEEN 2008

4 years old is such a great age to be mystified by the holidays! Lo was really into Halloween this year. She was both intrigued with the costumes, decorations and the "Trick or Treat" ritual and disturbed by some of the images she saw. Halloween is a difficult time of year to remain consistent with the Waldorf philosophy of providing our children with an environment of beauty and safety. Sometimes starting as early as the end of summer, everywhere you go there is the gratuitous explosion of Halloweenism. A simple trip to the grocery can be a scary experience for a small child. Giant mummies that burst to sudden electronic life, laughing skulls with blinking red eyes, werewolves, dismembered hands, frightening canned “Halloween “ noises(Lo totally freaked out every time this commercial with creepy music came on the radio)-enough to implant some pretty scary imagery into a child’s brain and haunt them when the lights are turned out at night. I've tried to keep her sheltered from the onslaught. Lo delighted in the more innocent aspects of trick or treating, the other little kids who were out there before it got too dark, the friendly faced Jack-o-Lanterns, the kind people dolling out candy -and she’s still little enough to enjoy yelling “Trick or Treat” when the doors open-the older kids just stand there…..weird. She was also notably more freaked out about some of the sights and sounds this year. It didn't really seem to phase her in the past.
When Dea was small, we would take her to the Anchorage Halloween Symphony Concert on Halloween night. The symphony would play well known classical pieces to coincide with goofy Halloween skits on stage! Later, the 3 floors making up the concert hall would be set up with tables sponsored by various local business and companies(free advertising and capitalism at it’s finest!)so that the children could trick or treat from table to table. It was a fun but expensive evening. A little cultural exposure and a huge bag of candy to boot. Once, we tried Trick or Treat Town(Pretty much the same deal as the symphony, sans the symphony)…but so did the rest of the town. It took 10 minutes of waiting just to get a piece of candy thrown in her pumpkin at each station. Kids + candy+ “waiting”= TEMPEST.

Since then, we’ve simply enjoyed good ole fashioned Trick or Treating with our friends, the O’s . In Alaska, most people don’t T&T in their own neighborhoods. The houses are too far apart. Instead, there is a mass exodus to the nearest zero lot line neighborhood. We meet up with our friends down in town to storm the rockinist Halloween neighborhood, Eaglewood. Houses built within an arm’s reach of one another are conducive to full heavy pillowcases and plastic pumpkins . You can cover a lot of ground in a short period of time and get a TON of candy. Huz and I always make sure each child pays up the “Parent Tax” in candy before the night is done.

Sadly, this year was the first year that Wolfman O (14) opted out of trick or treating. Dea hung in there with us-it’s easier when you have a little sib. You can experience it all from their perspective and it’s probably not so lame to the peers when you’re T&Ting with your little sis. Nature Lady, Liesel O and her friend joined us.

Another thing about Halloween in Alaska. It’s usually snowing and/ or very cold. You HAVE to wear your snowsuit. So costumes are usually incorporated into said suit. This year Lo was a “Princess Dragon”. She had the perfect costume for an Alaskan Halloween. A fleecy dragon hood and “claw” gloves, a tie on tail, wings and, of course, the tutu. Earlier in the day Dea helped her BFF paint her room and got paint all over herself-actually, I suspect most of it was there due to paint fights and self- adornment – and Voila! An instant costume! Painter!
We lasted for about an hour before everyone got cold and we headed to the O’s warm home for dessert.

HALLOWEENS PAST:

Last year's Fairy, Penguin, Skeleton and Cereal Killer.

Who can guess what I was?!!

2006 Ladybug and Padma Patil(Harry Potter)

2005 Mother Earth and Kitty

Got recommendations?!?

OK! Long flights in small seats! I'm looking for a kick-ass book or two to read! I'm not into formula Daniel Steel type stuff and prefer fiction right now, but non-fiction is ok, if it's engrossing. I'm looking for something that will grab me and suck me right in. I'm dying to devour a book again the way I did Children of God by Mary Doria Russell. It had everything. Astounding character build-up, erudition, humor, time paradox, politics, socio-cultural anthropology, archaeology and biological anthropology, religion, and sci-fi excitement.

Anyone have some great recommendations?!?!? If you haven't left a comment yet HERE, I'll add your name to the NYC schmunsky prize giveaway if you give a recommendation!

So here are the results of Sunday's labors:

Dollhouse #2!

My own design. I love the organicy-ness of it and there's plenty of room for many little hands. I made this for the Aurora Waldorf School's auction this weekend. The rest of Lo's class worked on birch bark furniture for it! We won't be there on Saturday and I can't wait to see pictures! Huz was a HUGE help handling the mathematic calculations, assembly, and such! He came up with the idea for a natural branch post.

Pumpkins!

Dea did an amazing job on her witch and Lo picked this interesting cat inside a ghost pattern. Yesterday I bought a Funkin and I have big plans for that thing.

And...Punkin seeds. They're just about gone now.

Whoops. I seem to have a habit of occasionally creating posts and then forgetting to publish them. This one was meant for Sunday. It was quite the productive day. It started off with this early morning shot of the first hint of the sunrise beyond the horizon just starting to touch the wispy clouds over Bear Pass. It came out orange-y in the picture but when I saw it out the window after going to the bathroom, it looked kind of blueish and I thought it might be the aurora. It was 5 degrees outside so I went back into my nice warm bed to spoon my toasty hunny. But then I thought,"Man. Am I gonna let this rare chance to photograph the aurora reaching horizontally across Orion slip by cuz I'm being a pussy and going back to bed?!?!"

Of course, as I stood outside the door neckid but for my robe and snow boots, I realized it was just clouds when the picture came up on the display. Back to bed with me-but it was worth the shot!

The rest of the day saw much activity with bread baking, dollhouse making, homebrew bottling("First Snow IPA"), pumpkin carving, pumpkin seed roasting(I made a KILLER batch! Hold me back!), and movie watching with skirt steak and potatah eating.

I'll post the results of our labors tomorrow.

Catalyst into the day

This is what Huz and I woke up to one early morning last week.

Perfect weather for watching the aurora. Not so cold that you're running back inside after 5 seconds! Just wrap up in a blankie, sit out on a deck chair and enjoy the show.

It's time of year when those pesky bears are going to sleep and I can go for the occasional 6 am run. If this doesn't motivate me to run, I don't know what will. There is nothing that makes me feel as light as air and with boundless power as when I have the aurora and all those stars(often times shooting!) to run to.

And a couple mornings later...Ye GODS....our first snow.

This is the first year that I have not felt "ready for the snow to FLY!" After the non-summer and split second fall.... I'll have to work at rearranging my head around it!!! What about all those fall-sy activities yet to do?!?! "Well, chances are this will melt." I said...

The first snow man of the year!

No hesitation here folks. At least these 2 are jumping right in!

And good morning, Monday!!!! With four more inches. ~sigh~

My rhythms are all SNAFU, but I can't deny the splendor of this place when first veiled in white.

Nature Table

SUMMER...

INTO FALL...

My first attempt at a needle-felted mushroom

Pickin' Blupers

Sunday was a good day to get out with our dear Friends and go berry picking. I was need of some fresh air after being holed up on Saturday and we knew it would probably be our last chance before the berries start to turn. Our Friends, the Prof, Nature Lady, and their kids W and T came up for dinner and we headed down the road for blueberries. We've enjoyed picking blueberries with our friends for years. Usually we try to get in one good hike up onto the mountainsides or valleys for berries but this year the weather held us back. And as I said in my last post, everything autumnal is transitioning so fast. We were lucky to have gotten out Sunday to pick the last of the berries that were a bit beyond their prime. I think it became more of a time to enjoy the misty afternoon and each other then it was a serious berry harvesting!

It seems like yesterday when these kiddos were just pre-schoolers and a toddler.

Now, they are 2 teens and a tween.
It has been so wonderful to watch these kids grow through their many stages together in the comfort and depth of strong friendship.

...as evidenced below!

Playing "Smash the berry...then each other."

I smell a Jerry Crisp recipe comin' on....

FALL EQUINOX

"Come, little leaves"
said the wind one day.
"Come over the meadows with me, and play.
Put on your dresses of red and gold.
Summer is gone, and the days grow cold."
Soon as the leaves
heard the wind's loud call,
Down they came fluttering,
one and all.
Over the brown fields
they danced and flew,
Singing the soft little songs they knew.

~George Cooper

Teeny Tiny shroomies! I can just imagine a minuscule village of sprites in there!



Nature Lady is holding some yummy bolete mushrooms we picked at Eklutna lake

Red and green and wine entwined. Our Fall has burst into life quite quickly but is following suit with all the erratic weather of the seasons this year. It's brilliance is already being extinguished by a great deal of rain , wind, unusually chilly weather, and the distraction with absurd politics! We've been in a scramble to experience that slowing down of days, the progression of the summer's fruition coming to an end- but it's happened so fast! Last year's magnificent Fall(the best I've witnessed yet)allowed us so many active days of marveling in the changing of colors-the leaves took their time through that glorious metamorphosis of color, each day bringing a slight variance from the day before. Now, the leaves are spotting, fading and decaying so rapidly that if we miss a day, we miss so much of that transformation. Last Fall we observed the birth and death of various mushrooms and fungi, we breathed in the smell and touch of that ubiquitous crisp air, and it afforded us the leisure to enjoy so many Fall and harvest time activities and crafts.... I'm disheartened that this season is slipping by before we have had much of a chance to review the knowledge we gained from last Fall and embark on a fresh journey into new Autumnal perceptions...

But, as always, we will try to make the best of it , perhaps learning to see in new and different ways. Maybe what we are offered is a paradigm shift for reasons yet to be revealed.

Either way, the world is turning, time continues forward in and out of the seasons. As we travel with those rhythms , we wish you all a joyful Equinox!