springtime tides, reoccuring

Despite cold weather, slight rain and cloudy, it IS summer according to the calendar.

Thus a springtime jumble of memories from up in Fitjadalsveien is at hand. 

first bike ride in march, snow banks still intact!

noa the man, in purple, he loves it.

thanks to ramona, we learnt how to make pom-poms. all the time.

defuzzed

garden cortado coming up. 

embroidery for three year olds. amazing.

egg found in elf forest. "very mysterious, how did they know it was easter soon?!"

easter nature table

very simple this year, dying eggs  with onions.

Apples, Autumn and Dwarves

Autumn Harvest , Ruth Elassar

We have picked the lot of the apples on our property and Anders made A LOT of applesauce, and a wonderful apple cake involving, well, applesauce, and a cake lid made up of ground almonds, a la Jamie Oliver's Plum and Almond Tart (which is dangerously good btw!)

Last of the apples. Notice the kid nibbled ones. 

Rural living: escaped sheep in the garden.

I have hung up a board. But what to hang on it? Current songs and poetry!
This weeks poem: Come little Leaves, from A Journey Through Time with Verse and Rhyme.

Wonderful collection of verse. 

The book also contains quite a few for Michaelsmas, which has just passed with dragons and jewels and quests. Among others, JR Tolkiens epic "Over the Misty Mountains", which I am going to clip in here for you to understand what I speak of:

Far over the Misty Mountains cold, 

To dungeons deep and caverns old, 

We must away, ere break of day, 

To seek our pale enchanted gold. 

For ancient king and elvish lord 

There many a gleaming golden hoard 

They shaped and wrought, and light they caught, 

To hide in gems on hilt of sword. 

On silver necklaces they strung 

The flowering stars, on crowns they hung 

The dragon-fire, on twisted wire 

They meshed the light of moon and sun. 

Far over the Misty Mountains cold, 

To dungeons deep and caverns old, 

We must away, ere break of day, 

To claim our long-forgotten gold. 

Goblets they carved there for themselves, 

And harps of gold, where no man delves 

There lay they long, and many a song 

Was sung unheard by men or elves. 

The bells were ringing in the dale, 

And men looked up with faces pale. 

The dragon's ire, more fierce than fire, 

Laid low their towers and houses frail. 

The mountain smoked beneath the moon. 

The dwarves, they heard the tramp of doom. 

They fled the hall to dying fall 

Beneath his feet, beneath the moon. 

Far over the Misty Mountains grim, 

To dungeons deep and caverns dim, 

We must away, ere break of day, 

To win our harps and gold from him! 

To Rivendell, where Elves yet dwell 

In glades beneath the misty fell. 

Through moor and waste we ride in haste, 

And whither then we cannot tell. 

We must away! We must away! 

We ride before the break of day!

I love Tolkien. I look forward to the day I can read for my children. I think my dad read the Hobbit to me, quite young, but how young? I don't know. Ten years old? Maybe younger. I have to admit I loved the Lord of The Rings films as well, but they are definitely not for children, . The books on the other hand are exquisite. Reading this poem again has reminded me how important verse, poetry and words are. And I believe young children benefit from hearing it, even though they do not understand, the flow of the voice, the beautiful words are enough. And they listen, they move around, but they listen.

Speaking of dwarves, we made a few of our own, since we figured our dwarf of the day was getting a little lonely in his underground house, with only nuts and silly hedgehogs to talk to all day. It took about ten minutes, plus time for the glue to dry overnight. I found the idea in small craft book for gnomes, but I just cut the jackets by freehand and sowed them up with each kid hanging around my neck. Sorry, no pictures of cute little ones putting wool on their little autumn gnome, due to the dangers of picking up a camera in close proximity to glue, scissors and needles.

Two bodies in the making.

Four little gnomes waiting for a beard.

Busy gnomes on a walk outside on the October Table.

Mother Earth welcoming all the flower children home.
Jasmin's reenactment of the Root Children story.

House Guests

"Uro"- mobile #1.

apple season, picked at the ONE tree we have on old house property.

autumn nature table. 

So, we have visitors and a house full of guests is wonderful!

Now Ramona nd Joshua are here for two weeks to begin with. The children love it, and get to practice thier English everyday with someone other than me. They get to train on all those sticky social skills and how to just BE... THen they are off to California for a wedding but will be back mid-October. They MIGHT be staying through the winter, waiting to bike on, and get to experience the Norwegian winter. I think it will be grand opportunity to be with friends one doesn't se so often, and learn how to live together. It is actually easier to make dinner for 7, since there are more adults to help out. Looking

forward to meal planning and new recipes!

beautiful guests had birthday same day. 

Outside the Autumn is falling literally, and it is COLD. Anders put up a rope bridge a few weeks ago. Wonderful.

monkey jasmin.

finally a good shot of all three of them.

St. Michael.

Working, even from home, during the day causes all new dynamics in the home. I have found it necessary to plan and protect our waldorf-iness, lest it dissolves into everyday-ness.

I have been planning and preparing for Michaelsmas festival, on the 29th of September. Hoping to create a small littel celbration, with dragon bread and a combined harvesting/ Autumn festival, even though the season is early. We have been telling the story in various forms, we have been cutting sticks for swords and I have been planning their capes, to be made ready for them to get on the day of the party. I have an excellent little pamphlet on celebrating St.Michael written by a Inger Brochman, Used the resources for Autumn from Live-Education, Little Acorn Learning has a little and  the Rhythm of the Home website has a little piece on it, AND a pattern for making the dragon! We have been practicing singing Falling stars from a wonderful parent resource I would like to recommend: Sing a Song of Seasons by Schunemann. 

Falling stars, falling stars, shoot across the sky.

Falling stars, falling stars, bring to earth your light.

Seasonal songs in English, with a CD so I can learn the melodies first, usually when I am driving. Beautiful voice, lyrics and so easy for both mom and child to remember these tunees.

A new story book I stumbled over on Amazon: The Tale of Tiptoes Lightly, the first book in a series of stories about the forest fairy Tiptoes and her friends Jeremy Mouse and the little dwarves.

A wonderful collection of small simple, nature loving stories. It fits Jasmin perfectly, the two small ones drift off and play cats on the floor, as I read for her before bed time.

I am reading the first one in the series for now. Today I plan to read the one on of the Autumn stories,as it contains a story on Michael and the dragon, just another way to introduce it to Jasmin.

Package from Beneath the Rowan Tree

It took me a while to reorder the playsilks after the fire. I did not want to go for these Sarah Silks which I didn't really like, so I found a wonderful woman on Etsy.com, Beneath the Rowan Tree, who hand-dyed them and sent them to me in Norway. Absolutely wonderful quality and colors! I am so happy, and so are all the kids, they have been in use ALL the time. Really the best toy ever.

My unwrapped magic.

Basket of silks

In addition I ordered 7 little dwarves, one for each day of the week. Have to switch them out every evening, but Jasmin is already finding a little joy in finding them in the mornings, aknowledging their color, the color of the candle and todays dinner on the menu planner.

Thursday hiding in the trees

A beautiful little gnome for today

Chores in The Waldorf Spirit

Helping and encouraging the children to help out is not just simply to make our lives and days a little easier. It is also for their own good. To bring rhythm, the single most important aspect of home life, is exactly what cleaning up and chores are, the utter consequence of things.

But it is not always easy, and it takes a lot of work, or stamina to see it through. Even when one would simply like to sit and enjoy that one cup of tea after dinner, trying to talk to each other, you know that being able to hold the space, and see it through the evening ritual is absolutely necessary.

A couple of weeks ago I had left the blocks out on the floor in the evening. We usually clean pretty well before we go to bed, but we have been working on the insurence papers practically every evening, and opted to get some sleep over picture perfect. The first thing Jasmin says as we stumble down the stairs at 6am, to make tea and make a fire, is : Oj, what a mess! I was heartbroken and so proud at the same time. Well, at least she has expectations, and has learnt how nice it is to be met by a clean inviting space t the beginning of a day.

Helping in the kitchen is our forte. We are incorperating the "island" in the kitchen in the new house, simply because we love having the kids help. And they are quite capable if you just let them ahave go at it. ( With a healthy dose of fear for the big knife...) They can see forst hand what goes into the compost, the necessary ingredients for baking, the process of whipping cream and making my coffee. They roll and cut and stir and especially love watching the popcorn pot, waiting for the first corns to pop. (A great opportunity to do tongue twisters by the way. Pop, pot, stop, a lot...)

A quick look in our "helping out" rhythm for a four year old on a regular day:

Putting away nighties in the morning.

Clearing breakfast dishes.

Sweeping.

Wiping table.

Washing pots in the sink. Water play in reality.

Putting wool clothes back in shelves when we come in. Hang up suits.

Put away playthings.

Set table.

Sort silverware from the dishwasher.

Light candle for King Winter on the Nature Table.

The list could go on...

This was an uplifting exercise, seeing how much she actually tries to do.

Happy days with the children to you.

The Star Money.

I have been telling the story of The Star Money quite often these past weeks. I like the idea of repeating the same story, using original language, singing songs, enacting, and talking about the same story everyday. And I have firm belief that such stories will speak to the small child for every repetition. I am not a musical person, nor am I fluent on any sort of instrument, but I did try to go through this wonderful Star Money Circle found in the Live-Educations Kindergarten curriculum, consisting of 4 different verses, and speech.

by ruth elsaessar

Candlemas and snow, snow, snow

For all you in Norway, I looked up Candlemas to be "Kyndelsmesse", originally the same festival of shining lights, when Marie brought Jesus to be purified to the temple 40 days after his birth. Now, at least in the Waldorf tradition, it is a day of cleansing, spring cleaning, rolling/ dipping /lighting many candles, making apple pancakes for breakfast, (the circle a symbol of the sun.)

And most important for Jasmin today:

If Candlemas Day be clear and bright,

Winter will take another flight.

If Candlemas Day be cloud and rain,

Winter is gone and will not come again.

Blue sky and crispy. Perfect.

The sun arose over the mountin at 9.30 in all its splendour and continued to shine and melt the day until the very end. Winter is here to stay. We have dug our paths and hills and caves in the yard, we are out several times a day for hours, in to to eat and rest and out again before nightfall.

Preparing the apples for pancakes.

Watercolor painting after lunch.

Snack at 2pm was "Apemad"- a Danish Monkey Dish with cut fruit,

whipped raw cream and vanilla and shredded cocoanut. Beautiful.