Each February we get together with friends and make candles. It's part of finding brightness in the darkest season, and we were first introduced to the ritual through the candlemas festival in Waldorf. This year we made lovely globe votive candle holders with beeswax. Not only are they easy to make and you end up with a fabulous product, but they are fun too!
You fill a water balloon and dip it multiple times in wax.
Let it dry then pop the balloon and drain it.
Stick in some sand and a tea light (also beeswax) and voila! Your home has a warm glow and the best aroma there is.
Hannah's week has been a busy one. She loved folding origami, and made many different pieces. Her favorite was the simple cup (which could also be a hat). Her drumming lesson was as fun as ever, as she continues to work on Billie jean. Hannah's challenge is relaxing her hands. Both in her piano playing and drumming she uses so much force because she is concentrating so hard on what she's playing, to get it right. She needs to relax and let her fingers dance over the keys and the sticks bounce off the drums. We're working on it, but it's tricky. After much perseverance she has picked out and memorised a Sound of Music song on the piano, and a Harry Potter tune as well.
This week Hannah, her Grandma and I took part in the Great Backyard Bird Count. You count over a period of 4 days. Armed with all our bird books and binoculars and paper and pencil, we've ventured into forest, meadow and urban street to look and listen for feathered creatures.
Man is it tough! When we have Grandma along we have hope, because she knows her local birds and has been a bird-lover for years. But when Hannah and I venture out solo, we are lost. We watched a group of birds in some shrubs yesterday and between looking them up in various books and playing calls in our great bird sounds book, we narrowed them down to a kind of wren, perhaps the Winter Wren. But we aren't sure. We *think* they were wrens, but they could have been something else entirely. Hummingbirds we can spot, and theirs is a song I recognise, so it's a start.
In keeping with our birdwatching interest, I found a suet feeder kit this week and Hannah put it together. She read the instructions and matched up the parts, and then we went for a walk to find berries to attach to it. It's lovely!
Unfortunately, there are no trees or shrubs right near our house, so no shelter or camouflage is available for the birds to hide in. So our feeders are not popular yet, but hopefully we can remedy this for next year.
Hannah baked lovely valentine cookies this week, two layer sugar cookies with raspberry jam in the middle and a heart cut out on top, so the bright red jam squeezed through. They were both pretty and tasty.
Leif is still into hockey. Surprised? Wait until you see this:
Yes, he figured out how to build his own goalie out of patio pavers. Now he can go out and take shots whenever the mood hits. He's trying to get me to make a fantasy hockey team list of my own, to compare with the one he's making, but I am clueless. We're enjoying watching the Olympic hockey games together, and last night watched some figure skating. I noticed the new scoring system and that launched a discussion on the old vs. new system and the scandal that caused it to be changed. He pointed out flaws in the new system, so we stopped talking and watched them skate. The Canadians fell down. Boo. But we also got to see the Canadian mogul skier win our fist gold medal, which was awesome!
We surfed Wikipedia this week looking for the 7 Wonders of the (ancient)World. Most of the have been destroyed. It was hard to explain why these are wonders, that building them then (or even now) was an incredible feat.
Leif is back to making his own smoothies, and tried out some new recipes this week. Very tasty!
Leif and Kit have started reading the Hobbit together. They call me in whenever any elves are singing, as that was my role when Kit and I read LOTRings together so many years ago (pre-kids).
Leif and I listened to Quirks & Quarks this week, and the topic was weightlessness in space travel. Bob interviewed a Canadian astronaut who'd been in space for 6 months and how his body had to adapt to life with gravity when he returned.
Together we have been watching The Road to Avonlea series from the library. We're starting on season 1 and are about halfway through. I've been looking forward to doing this with the ids, hoping it'd catch their interest, and it has. They need a lot explained to them as the terms and phrases used are so foreign ("If providence allows" and so much talk of pride and gossip) so we pause it alot. The kids built forts in the living room and have been sleeping in them all week, so we watch our nightly Avonlea from there and then I sit beside them and knit while they drift off.
Speaking of knitting, I finished my first project, a lovely hat. This picture is not the greatest, but I'd just finished it and wanted a photo to share. Yes, those are my new glasses too.
I've ordered more patterns and can't wait to start my next project. Meanwhile my sewing projects are in piles on the table, as our basement is in such disarray I'm not motivated to get down there and sew. I shrunk/felted a bunch of wool sweaters this week to cut up and make ponchos and arm warmers out of.
When I get to those projects I'll share pics.
The photo of the week? Ivy finding her perfect colouring spot in the front yard, atop a stack of patio pavers.
Kisses
C
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