It's Kitten Time!

A Kitten Puddle!

For the last couple of months we've been fostering four of the cutest kittens ever for the humane society and they are almost ready for adoption. They were found in a cardboard box in front of the downtown Safeway and weren't weaned yet (yuck!). Now they are healthy, happy kittens in need of homes. All of them absolutely adore people. If you are interested in adopting any (or all) of them, let me know ASAP!

So meet the kittens:

Krinkle

Krinkle is a fun loving spirited girl. She loves people and loves to play, play, play.

Lyra

Lyra (named for the strong, female main character in Philip Pullman's "His Dark Materials" trilogy) is a smart, loving girl. She loves to give LOTS of kisses. She has her moments of wrestling with the others, but as soon as you pick her up she settles down and purrs. She is very petite, but she is always the first to learn new things.

Chester

Chester is a wild little kitten. He loves to run and play and he is oh-so soft!

Teddy

Teddy (or Teddy Bear) is SO SOFT and cuddly! He is also HUGE! He is a total cuddle-bug who is destined to be a large cat. He always melts in my arms every time I pick him up - even when he is in the middle of a wrestling match and he purrs like crazy. (He also always squints his eyes when we try to take pictures of him - he really has gorgeous round eyes.) If you want a totally cuddly cat, Teddy is your guy!

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Amazing Transportation Photos

Lords of the Logistic have some amazing, and inspiring photos of transportation from around the world. Just to prove that you don't need an SUV, large truck, or even a delivery van!

Two of my favorites are:

You Think YOU Have a Tough Commute?

Family of 5? No Problem, a Motorscooter Will Do!

Hey! My brain is Blue!

Your Brain is Blue

Of all the brain types, yours is the most mellow. You tend to be in a meditative state most of the time. You don't try to think away your troubles. Your thoughts are realistic, fresh, and honest. You truly see things as how they are. You tend to spend a lot of time thinking about your friends, your surroundings, and your life.

What Color Is Your Brain?

Teenagers, an excellent essay

I just read the greatest article about teenagers and the parent/teen unschooling relationship ever!

Ronnie (or Frank - can't tell who) from the LIFE is Good Conference is the author, and I just LOVE EVERYTHING she says.

Thank you, Ronnie (and or Frank), for your inspiration.

Come See My New Venture

I'm a Life Coach specializing in helping unschooling families find more freedom and joy in their lives through my articles on my blog, "CHOOSING FREEDOM" and one-on-one phone coaching.

I've been coaching with Reggie Adams, a wonderful life coach from St. Cloud, MN for four years and I've learned so much and believe so strongly in what life coaching can do that I've decided to be a coach! Reggie has been very encouraging and has given me great pointers. I've been business coaching my Creative Memories downline for ten years, and I always end up doing more life coaching than business coaching with them, so I've got lots of practice.

I met Scott Noelle at the first LIFE is Good Conference and I was so inspired by his Daily Groove that I just had to go for it!

I'm excited to offer coaching to parents who believe in their kids and respect them as people! With all the traditional parenting examples around, unschooling parents sometimes need a little help with gentle reminders that, YES! they are on the right track. This is what I'm offering.

Oh, and I'm learning so much as I try to figure out all the website stuff! Can't wait to get an actual website up, but I've got to learn it all first. Yes, I'm an unschooler, too.

Great Essay on Productivity

My LIFE is Good friend Karen shared a link to this essay today and I absolutely love it.

In it, author Aaron Swartz shares his views on how to be productive.

There are so many things he says in the essay that I just love, but one, very subtile comment is, "Most people's time is eaten up by things like school and work. Obviously if you attend one of these, you should stop. But what else can you do?" YES! I would so love to talk with him about more of his views.

Aaron is a big Alfie Kohn fan, who, coincidentally is speaking in Portland on the 24th of July. Unfortunately, I won't be there, as I have a family commitment that night.

Makes me wonder if Aaron speaks - could be a great addition to the LIFE is Good lineup (Mary, I know you're reading!).

So, please go read the essay and let me know what you think.

8 things about me meme.

~~~Each player lists 8 facts/habits about themselves. The rules of the game are posted at the beginning before those facts/habits are listed. At the end of the post, the player then tags 8 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know that they have been tagged and asking them to read your blog.~~~

1. I’m average. I often wonder if you create a composite of all American women you wouldn’t get me! My hair is that non-descript medium brown, my eyes are hazel (which just means they are all colors), I’m 5’6”, I’m a size 10 in clothing, and I wear a size 7.5 shoe (which means I can never find shoes on sale, ‘cause so many people share my shoe size). When I was a kid, the average age at which girls started their periods was 13 and a half – mine started on that exact day!

2. I have this disgusting habit of chewing my cheek/lip and I can’t stop! Ugh!

3. Even though I’m totally into my kids, being a radical unschooling momma and all, I could have just as easily not had kids. I would never have gone through any kind of infertility treatments. Given my life as it is now, this factoid just seems really odd to me.

4. I’m not good at keeping in touch with people. I would love to have really close relationships with friends, but never want to bother them. My journey is teaching me to be better at communicating with others, maybe I’ll be able to get over this.

5. I love to stay up late, and I’m not too bad in the morning either. But 2:00 in the afternoon – forget it!

6. I’ve been a Girl Scout for 36 years.

7. I am a total “Princess and the Pea” kind of gal, especially when it comes to my feet! I absolutely can’t stand having anything stuck in my shoe, and socks are even worse – the tiniest grain of sand will bug me to no end.

8. I really hate doing these kinds of things, and it has taken me a good long while to do it – I was good until about #6, then got totally stuck (or totally tired, since it was after midnight one night when I started) and then forgot about finishing it. The only reason I’m doing it is because my very dear friend, Mary tagged me. (She has a lot of influence on me – good and bad :-P!)

So, I may or may not successfully tag others, but at least I did some not too serious writing!

I'll tag... okay, I have absolutely no idea who to tag. All chains eventually end with me!

LIFE is Good Tribe Member

Today I got an email from the Zenmomma herself, inviting me to join the LIFE is Good blog ring.

What fun! I love reading the blogs of other radical (whole-life) unschoolers, and some of my favorite people are connected with this incredible conference.

I hope that readers of my blog click around a little and explore the writings and/or musings of others who are choosing to live their life authentically in all respects.

Serafina

We have one female cat and two males. Our female, Serafina hates other cats and loves people. Her whole name is Serafina Pekala from Philip Pullman’s trilogy, “His Dark Materials”. She is named after the queen of the witch clan introduced in book 1, “The Golden Compass”, and her birthday is Oct. 31 (which is why we had to find a cool witch to name her after).

The thing that’s funny about Serafina is that she likes to have us wash her face. She will jump up on my lap (only when there are no other cats anywhere close), lick my fingers and then rub her face on my wet fingers.

Now, I normally hate when cats lick people, especially ME! But Serafina has a history that caused me to not mind so much. We got her from the humane society about a year and a half ago when we were getting kittens for the girls for Christmas. She was a bit over a year old and was so beautiful (she’s a blue), soft and loving.

Turns out that she was found on the street, half starved at 8 months old with a litter of kittens. She went into foster care with her kittens, who were all adopted out once they were weaned. Shortly before she was supposed to go to the humane society, an abandoned litter of kittens came in. One was so sick they didn’t think it would make it, but Serafina nursed it until it was strong enough to be adopted (wouldn’t nurse any of the others, just the sick one).

So Serafina went to the humane society and was adopted out really quickly to an older woman. Serafina is prone to eye infections, sneezing and stuff and the woman who adopted her was afraid that she would catch Serafina’s eye infection in the only good eye she had (impossible, but that was her fear), so she returned Serafina (living in fear is such a sad way to live!). Serafina had been there for so long when we met her, her former foster mom was worried she wasn’t going to get adopted and actually put together a stocking of goodies to go home with her.

She has always hated the two kittens and has been pretty uncomfortable in our home. It took her six months to purr for us at home, or even to sit in our laps. I’m sure it was partly the pesky kittens, and partly her traumatic beginnings of being homeless, having a home, and being returned. I can’t help but wonder if she thought she would be returned yet again – she had had so many homes. So I’m thrilled that she finds pleasure in interacting with us, and I’m willing to be a little grossed out to help her find her pleasure.

Another really weird thing about her is that she loves going to the vet – I think mostly because she gets us all to herself and she gets to sit in a lovely window seat and watch the birds come and go from the bird feeders that our vet has placed right outside each of her three exam rooms. She purrs and purrs when we are there. She is so relaxed and happy at the vet – makes it really easy for our vet to examine her.

This makes me wonder what people’s stories are and how I can find compassion in view of things people do that I find weird. What is their story, and how do I find out without being nosy?

Hmmmm…

What a Trip!

My friend Alicia and I recently got back from taking some of our Girl Scouts to Washington DC and Williamsburg/Historic Triangle. It turned out to be two adults and four girls (Alicia’s two daughters, Steffi and a girl we borrowed from our old troop, ‘cause we like her so much!).

We were gone for 12 days and truly had a fabulous time! I swear the only things we didn’t see were the Library of Congress and Ford’s Theater! It feels like a really successful trip, which is really satisfying after all the time and effort I put into it on the front end planning every last detail. (The girls are still a little young to plan their own trips – it was all they could stand to pick out what they wanted to do and see!)

We loved where we stayed in Washington – the Doubletree Suites in Foggy Bottom. It was a smallish hotel in a very, very quiet neighborhood (no sirens, no traffic…), 1 1/2 blocks from the Metro, 2 blocks from the Safeway at the Watergate (really, NOT impressive!!), 4 blocks from Trader Joes and within walking distance of the Lincoln Memorial.

Soaked! On our first full day in Washington we went to the zoo. This ended up being a highlight for everyone, as we were stuck in the zoo during a particularly fierce thunderstorm that made us all scream out loud. (Not all highlights are positive!) We were totally drenched and ended up skipping down the street to the Metro singing all the weather songs we could remember.

On Memorial Day we decided to go to the Arlington Cemetery Memorial Day Ceremony, where we ended up sitting in the third row of the White House guests reserved section and seeing President Bush deliver his address. We’re guessing it had something to do with the fact that we were wearing our Girl Scout uniforms.

We happened upon the Supreme Court Justices reading an opinion on Tuesday! We had no idea that that would be happening, or even that you could see it, but it was and we were some of just a few of the public who were let in to observe (after being stripped of everything we owned!).


Steffi’s 11th birthday was on Thursday, and we celebrated by getting dressed up in Colonial dresses and going to dinner at Gadsby’s Tavern in Old Town Alexandria. What an experience! The food was great and the entertainment was even better. It was a treat to imagine George and Martha Washington entertaining guests in the very room we were dining in.

After spending a full week in Washington, we rented a car and drove to Williamsburg, where the girls had a great time parading around in their Colonial dresses. They attracted a lot of attention with the dresses, making it totally worth packing them all the way across the country. We went on a ghost tour, hauled water from a well, smooshed clay with our feet in the brickyard, and taught other tourists “the courtesies”.

12 days of traveling and the girls were just such good companions! I would definitely travel with this group of fabulous young women again!

Saying a Sad “Goodbye”

Today is a sad day on our journey. We had to say Goodbye to Sirius this afternoon. The cutest, sweetest little black kitten ever!

Back in April we took him to the OSU Vet Hospital to see if they could figure out what was wrong with him – he hadn’t been well the whole time we’ve had him and our vet had suspicions, but no diagnosis. So, they shaved his little belly and gave him an ultrasound, which confirmed what all the professionals were thinking – FIP (Feline Infectious Peritonitis), which is fatal.

Last week Steve, Steffi, and I went to Alaska, leaving Beka home alone for the first time. I was a little nervous about Sirius, because he had really started to have trouble walking and eating. He was about the same when we got home, but on Saturday... His back legs were not cooperating with his intentions (anyone ever have THAT feeling?), and his food kept falling out of his mouth as he tried to eat. It was SO SAD!

Yesterday, Mothers’ Day, I held him most of the day and last night I slept in the living room with him so he wouldn’t have to go upstairs (he always sleeps with a human!) and risk falling downstairs to get to food and litter. (Okay, okay, it was after midnight – I didn’t even think about the fact that I could just bring all that stuff up the stairs for him! Duh!)

We discussed our options last night, and everyone agreed that he really had experienced the best life he could and that his short little life really was over. What a sad, sad thing to have to decide! I think it was a little harder for Steffi, but she came to peace with it as well.

Neither of the girls wanted to go with me to the vet appointment, so I did it alone. We have the most incredible, loving vet and she was just so kind and supportive. I can’t imagine euthanizing a pet with anyone else – it would make it so much harder.

So, Sirius is gone from our home – and we donated his body to OSU to help study FIP. Maybe he will be a little help in figuring out a treatment for this currently incurable disease.

He was such a fabulous kitten. He really, truly seemed to love us just as much as we loved him. He would follow us around when he wasn’t already being held. He was always jumping up onto my lap for a snuggle. And he will live forever in the memory of our vet as the amazing little kitten who insisted on getting into the litterbox before vomiting – three times!

Today is definitely a sad day… Sirius, honey, we will miss you!!!

Yes! Great explanation of unschooling!

Check this out!

This is the first in a series of videos by the woman who was on the Dr. Phil Show on unschooling (who was, unfortunately, trashed by Dr. Phil's prejudiced agenda). She has a good explanation of unschooling.





And this this one delves into the details of Radical Unschooling (or Whole-life Unschooling):

I Love Living Here!

Today was one of those (many) days that I’m so appreciative of. It was one of those perfect Corvallis days. The weather was unbeatable – low 70s, the sun alternated with the clouds just enough to not get too hot, there was just a hint of a cool breeze, and there was fun stuff going on.

Yesterday Beka decided to plant a garden, which is something that Steve’s been contemplating since we moved here. But when Beka decides to do something, it usually gets done quickly. I had already figured out what needed to be done because Steve had asked for that information well over a year ago, so we were able to go get most of what we needed. I realized after we got home that I had forgotten a few things, and we had picked up some games at Blockbuster, so we played and watched a movie last night, deciding to finish up the garden today.

This morning I was reviewing the Square Foot Gardening book to make sure I know what we still needed and one of the lines really struck me, “Once limits are placed on almost anything, you will find it much easier to take care of it and therefore you will be more comfortable with it and enjoy it more.” Of course, I immediately thought of all the sparkly, gloriously free unschooled children I know and compared them, in my mind, to all the children I know who have no limit to the limits set upon them. Much easier to take care of? Hmph, not the traditionally parented kids. Enjoy more? Definitely NOT! I’ll take our sparkly, gloriously free kids over the limited kids any day!

So, back to our beautiful day… we went back out to get the rest of the stuff we needed for our new garden and picked out our seeds, too. Back at home we built our box, mixed our magic dirt, cleaned out the stinky, slimy compost that I’d left to rot since we filled it with fallen, wormy apples from our neighbor’s tree (I’m really, really hoping I can get the new and improved bin really hot really fast, ‘cause it was so gross, I’d have a hard time even describing it!), and almost got it all done before I needed to get cleaned up to go to the “thea’ta”.

One of the things I LOVE about living here is that we are blocks from OSU and all the fun and funky happenings there. Tonight I met Jon & Mary at a benefit for CARDV (Center Against Rape and Domestic Violence). The show was “The Dark Side of Abbey Road” – an excellent performance by many, many artists who got together to do Abbey Road and Dark Side of the Moon – both albums all the way through.

After the show, I was once again completely impressed by my fellow Corvallis citizens – the traffic jam wasn’t in the parking lot, it was at the bike racks! It felt like half the people at the show had ridden their bike to the theater! I really love it here!

Many months ago, Jon started what he calls his “pathetic social life”, and Steve and I are happy to be included in it, since it is way better than our “non-existent social life”! So Saturday night is Squirrel Burger Saturday for our little group with nothing else to do. Tonight as I was biking home from the bar after the concert I was thinking we might just have to rename our Saturday outing, because it sure didn’t seem very pathetic tonight!

Did I mention that I love it here?

Happy Conference After-Glow

Ah, the incredible experience of being surrounded by unschoolers. Joyful, authentic unschoolers!

It is late Wednesday night after the LIFE is Good NW Unschooling Conference, and I have a living room full of conference stragglers. I’m so happy they are here.

How did I end up with a living room full of stragglers you ask? (Well, even if you didn’t – I’m gonna tell you!) My husband’s sister and her family came up from Northern California for the conference, but her husband had to work on Monday, which meant that they had to leave on Sunday. Well, we weren’t even CLOSE to being done having fun, so Steffi and her cousin Andria figured out a way to extend the conference. They found some other families leaving later and arranged for all three of the cousins to hitch a ride! So tonight I have the three cousins, and the kids they are riding with (fabulous new friends from the Bay Area).

I’m very happily tired and I’m so glad that everyone didn’t leave all at once – that would have been such a let-down. But they didn’t leave all at once and I am very joyful!

Balance Among Busyness

(Note: I wrote this back on April 6, but when I realized what I should be doing at the time, I stopped writing and worked on it instead. That's what I get for "shoulding" on myself!)

I thought life would calm down after the cookie sale was over! Ha! The girls exceeded their goal, selling 3152 boxes of cookies between the three of them! So immediately after the cookie sale ended, we started planning our trip to Washington DC!

So now I’ve got at least as many balls in the air:
∑ Trying to help my friend with the LIFE is Good NW Unschooling Conference (and don’t think I’m doing a very good job at it)
∑ Co-coordinating the UU Services Auction (and realizing that I’m always a little late in contacting who I need to contact to get done what needs to get done)
∑ Running our new GS troop (okay, I’m feeling a lot of success around this one – it is going really well and the girls have gone from meeting for three hours to meeting for four hours every Thursday!)
∑ Trying to get all of our lodging and activities lined up for Wa DC (which is what I SHOULD be doing right this minute!)….
∑

Keeping Up

I don’t know how my blogging friends do it… keeping up… it seems that when I’m living the spirit of my blog I don’t have time to write, and when I’m in a funk and not living joyfully, I don’t want to write!

At this point in my life the house is a mess – Girl Scout cookies EVERYWHERE! We’ve been in and out so much toting cases of cookies that there are leaves and mud clods everywhere.

But I love seeing what happens with the girls when they set high goals for cookies. Steffi can now count back change in any cookie situation as can her two friends. They’ve gotten so good at this whole cookie thing that their booth sale last night came out to the penny (which, if you’ve been involved with this thing, almost never happens – what with donations and three people buying at the same time – lots can happen!). They can now pick up the phone and make a pretty professional sounding call to a customer. They are working so hard and learning so much. It’s very exciting to see.

(They’ve sold 1300+ out of their 3000 box goal (not sure how where that gets them on the map – if you know an easy way to figure that out, let me know!) and have gotten over 300 boxes out of their 500 box goal donated for the Food Bank.)

Beka (who just recently took a “K” out of her name) is getting ready for the LIFE is Good NW Unschooling Conference by making lots of beaded things to sell – really great things! The project is all over the living room floor – right up against the disaster of cookies staged for delivery.

But I love seeing the creativity! She is taking beads and wire and making it all beautiful.

In the midst of cookies, my friend and I are starting a homeschool Junior Girl Scout Troop – are we crazy??? But it’s going to be so great – they will be meeting every Thursday for three hours. There is so much we will be able to do with three hours a week! It will be so much fun.

I’m also trying to work on the local UU Services Auction, help my friend with the LIFE is Good Conference, become a Master Recycler, grow my Creative Memories business, learn Irish Step dance, get in shape, and keep all these crazy balls in the air and not drop any of them!

The journey is joyful, whether I’m keeping up on my writing or not!

New Kitten!

Back in December my oldest talked me into taking her to the Humaine Society. All the way there I reminded her that we were not bringing anyone home with us. As we got out of the car I reminded her that we were not bringing anyone home with us. As she sat in the kitten play room I reminded her that we were not bringing anyone home with us.

Also as she sat in the kitten play room the cutest, sweetest, little black kitten kept curling up on her lap and purring just as loudly as he could. He would jump down and eat, then curl back up on her lap again. A few minutes later he would jump down and use the litter box, then jump back up. Then another few minutes later he would jump down and play, then jump back up. Basically he was showing us that he was absolutely the most perfect kitten ever!

Of course, we had to bring him home. We knew Serafina (our two year old cat) would hate him, but she hates all cats. We were hoping, however, that our two one year old cats would accept him. Well, accept him they have! The three of them are buddies! They curl up an sleep together when we are not holding the kitten.

Tamwyn and Sirius curl up on my office chair

Tamwyn, Rafiki and Sirius barely fit!

Sirius!

Big Goals

My youngest is 10 and in Girl Scouts. She and her two friends (also homeschoolers) have decided that they will each sell 1,000 boxes of cookies and they are doing it together - which means that they are selling 3,000 boxes!

They are wanting to go to Washington D.C. in June to attend the 95th birthday celebration. Since Washington D.C. is about 3000 miles from here we picked up a US map today so they can track their progress - 1 box = 1 mile. They've sold about 600 boxes so far - 600 miles - they've just passed Boise, ID and are almost to Twin Falls.

They are also trying to get at least 500 boxes donated to the food bank. They've gotten over 100 boxes donated so far - so I think they are doing GREAT!

They've been taking orders since Jan. 6. They get their cookies Feb. 9 and then the race will really be on! At that point we will be living and breathing cookies!

Writing with Meaning

At the beginning of this month I started off writing like crazy for NaNoWriMo. I had told several people about NaNoWriMo and had inspired some of them to try it. I even gave a speech about it to my Toast Masters club. It was a fun speech full of enthusiasm, and by the time I finished the speech I was 90% there, actually doing NaNoWriMo.

When my pacing partner committed to doing it, I knew I had to try, even though November would be an insane month for me to do this this year, since I would have only 20 days (which breaks down into 2500 words a day).

My pacing partner is struggling with her mother’s imminent death and decided to write a book about the lessons she is learning through helping her mother and how she is expressing that learning into her relationship with her daughter. Wow! Talk about writing with meaning!

Inspired by her book, I thought, well, I’ll write out into the future about our annual getaways – the two of us plus our life coach. Long about year five, projecting our getaways became pretty uninspiring! How much can this event change and be interesting. I started writing about how each of us changed from year to year, but it became so outrageous that I scrapped the whole thing.

I know I could have pushed through week two because they say it is the worst – pure crap, but I really, truly could see no end to the crap that was spewing forth onto my computer screen.

Some would say I quit. I say I stopped the insanity that was becoming my November. Some would say I failed. I say there is never failure when learning happens.

When I stopped writing my NaNoWriMo, I started writing this blog. I decided I would rather challenge myself to really think about things that were churning around in my head and put them out to the universe (which is really scary to me – to know that just about anybody can now read what I’m writing – I have this little perfection hang up which is how I became involved in NaNoWriMo in the first place).

So my coach asks me this morning, “what is the meaning you are needing to write about?” She always has such good questions! I wish the answers were always forthcoming. Some times it takes patience to find the answers. I’m learning to be more patient.

But when I think about it, the meaning is this – this Journey of Joy. This is not a nonfiction NaNoWriMo book! This is life and how we choose to live it. And if I can help just one more person live their live as a Journey of Joy, then that truly has meaning for me.