I finished reading an advance copy of "The Time Traveller's Resort and Museum" by David McLain. (A big thank-you to Mirror World Publishing for choosing me.) The official description goes like this: “If you need to know men's secrets Or if there's something you need to find If you want to see the dinosaurs Or the insides of your mind. If you want to watch the earth begin, Or see what the apocalypse will leave behind, You need to thank Alice Anderson, For Alice is the mother of time.” That was how the rhyme went. Every time traveler knew it. Everyone that is, except of course, for Alice herself, since she hadn’t invented time travel yet. Since returning to London, Alice’s life has been turned upside down. She’s been accused of murder and lost her position in the scientific community. Her only ally in this journey is a strange man who seems to think that Alice may be about to open up a strange new world of possibilities, but is probably not telling her everything he knows. I really enjoyed the book. It's filled with witty humour, a realistic heroine, and quirky time travelling fun.
Alice, the world's sexiest astrophysicist, is accused of murdering her ex-boyfriend. She ends up travelling through time with her pet mini triceratops to find out who actually killed him and why. January can be a hard month to get through. Christmas is over and the left-over outdoor decorations are either frozen to the ground, or have been sadly forgotten. The winter blah's seem to set in along with biting cold. Recently I came across a Danish word - Hygge. It isn't really a word that can be directly translated into English, but it is more the feeling of belonging, living in the moment, and celebrating small moments everyday.
The winter weather seems to have abated, and we are teased with warm days. I haven't seen any birds migrating back North again, but I have intrepid gardener friends already planting cool-weather crops.
I had meant to show you the project the kids & I have been working on, but then things happened and it will have to wait until another time. Instead I'm going to show you a mitten pattern I created in February 2013. I call it "The Secret". Winter is a time for planning. We take out books from our local library and pore over different ideas. We read up on things and come up with plans. One of our plans for our homestead is to put in an orchard. We plan on putting in an orchard on our homestead. Last spring we planted a Montmorency Cherry tree (Prunus Cerasus Montmorency) which is classed as a sour cherry. I don't find the fruit to be all that sour though and you can find me right alongside the children, searching for any fruit the birds have missed. We have one of these trees in our yard now. The cat is tethered near the tree and the kids play there as well. That also means we get a few more cherries than the birds. We've had this tree for about 4 years and get about 3 to 4 cherry pies from it (plus some eating cherries). We first found a natural clearing in the woods where we want to locate our orchard, then we planted the tree. (My loving husband got to haul the 6 foot tall tree in its pot through the woods.) I was browsing Pinterest, looking for a new slow-cooker recipe. Nearly all the recipes I came across use canned ingredients. But I have real vegetables at home - things like rutabagas and pumpkins.
I have learned over the years to take the idea from someone else's recipe and translate the "can of pumpkin" to real pumpkin and still get pretty amazing results. I harvested and dried my lavender once the buds had fattened, but not yet opened. I only harvested from one of my bushes (I have 5) before we had a lot of rain. The buds opened on the others so the bees ended up enjoying the lavender. Oh well, I don't begrudge them.
We have decided to add Lynn Seddon’s Exploring Nature with Children to our homeschooling curriculum this year. Living in Canada, we will probably have to add 4 more weeks of winter ideas to make it work for us.
I was happy to get a wonderful deal on Mangoes at the supermarket. They were on sale for 40 cents each if you bought 5 or more or $2.50 each if you bought less than 5. I bought 25!
What does a person do with 25 mangoes!? I made Mango chutney. I managed to dig over my veggie garden this weekend. It might not sound too awful, but I have to do it by hand with a garden fork. Usually I have help, but Hubby dear works shifts and is on nights now. I think it sucks for him 'cause it is finally sunny out and he has to sleep in the cold, dark house while we soak up the sun.
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AuthorJulie is a Mom working from home. She runs her own yarn business, homeschools her two kids, and gardens in her spare time. Archives
August 2015
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