Monday, April 13, 2015

Five Good Things

La Mano, again.


Artist: Karin Grow



Well, it's happened. We are here, Monday, and the long anticipated and deeply appreciated spring break is behind us. Done and gone. Kapoot.

Sigh.

Deep deep sigh.

I think this is the first time that Geoff's comp-time, earned during crunch-time, coincided with the children's school break. It meant more family time, more liberty, and togetherness. That was nice. It was also nice that Max could have three, or more, game days, and a sleepover, with friends. It was nice that family was in town, and we had a rousing game of Apples to Apples with cousin Elias... his marketing degree serves him quite well. It was nice seeing some movies, playing music, sharing silly videos from the Internet, staring blankly into space from the comfort of our lovely porch. It was nice visiting art shows, galleries, gardens, walking through parks. It was nice that no one got sick, or injured, or carried away by mosquitos. And it was very, very nice to only pack lunches for picnics, to have no mornings rushed, and afternoons harried by driving through school traffic! Thank goodness for breaks, for something different, for a change of pace.

Now we count the days 'til summer break? Too soon? It's about 68. Sometimes I think it's necessary to maintain two countdowns... one includes school days only, and the other for every single day between us and freedom! Well, there are forty-eight days in school, more or less.

The other day we were counting something else, too. Blog posts. Chickenblog posts since May 2002: 2,932. Maria was impressed, and she remarked how interesting it is that it began with one... 1 post, a single blog post, and I picked it up from there, noting how I doubled my posts in no time at all. From 1 or 4, even 10, it's not too difficult to double up, to make twice as many postings, eat twice as many chips, walk twice as many feet. But now... to write 2,932 more posts to Chickenblog? That would be quite a feat. Aloud, I pondered what if I wanted to double the number of posts written for Chickenblog, in one year... how many posts per day would that take? Alex paused a moment, then replied "About 8. Eight posts a day would do it."
{Don't worry. I have no intention of even trying for that record.}

Good Things...

1. Max did well on his SAT exam, which is a good thing, because he is adamant about not taking that again.

2. Alex found a dowel, which he used to attach the chicken he carved, to add to my walking stick that he made me for mother's day many years ago... now my walking stick is even more awesome.

3. Geoff wants to visit the Salton Sea, and Alex and I want to stop at the International Banana Museum, which we hope isn't too far from the World Famous Crochet Museum. So, obviously our summer plans are looking quite awesome thankyouverymuch.

4. We have four bottles of white glue, a bucket of brushes, boxes of paint, loads of glitter, and more... we are blessed, and quite a bit overstocked, but mostly blessed.

5. Perhaps we should take all of our good things and make more art, which would mean even more good things.

Are you counting down to something good? Are you in the middle of something good right now? Please share... we'd love to hear from you.




2 comments:

Michele H. said...

We have, strangely, five large bottles of mustard in the pantry. Neither one of us will admit to being the guilty party. If you should find a use for mustard in one of your art projects, give me a yell!

I'm getting 20 bags of manure for my birthday...I'm old, and can use the manure, and I won't have to dust it later one. After the spring plantings are done-roses, veggies, and yet more herbs-and the niece's wedding is past in May-I'm catering it, I don't know what I was thinking-I'm just going to sit back, and watch summer bloom and grow.

Natalie, the Chickenblogger said...

You've reminded me of a an app I created (in my mind)... it's for neighbors who want to sell-gift-barter-trade anything they have in surplus. It could be extra zucchinis, or lemons, household items, glitter, glue, even mustard! Before running to the market, we check our app, and lo! next door they have extra eggs, a cup of sugar... we'd have our own local market for goods and services!

Your manure birthday is simply brilliant. The kind of gift that keeps on giving, right? Well, if anyone asks me about Mother's Day (hint hint, children,) I might ask for dirt! And flowers, too. A summer sitting back watching the days bloom sounds marvelous! No more dusting!