light

I'm one of those people who never has a camera at hand in case of tremendous photo-op. I just don't ever think of bringing the camera before I start out going anywhere, although I think about my forgetting it most of the time while on my way here and there.

 So unless I set out to take pictures (photographing is a different level), I can only use words to describe what I enjoyed along the way- today the light was spectacular, not in the Kodachrome way but more in pastel and contrast. Yeah, words fail me too. : )
Greetings!

a little bit of this and a little bit of that

I am not sure if I have anything entertaining or thoughtful to share - our weekend was great, there is good news all around...

Having T home for longer than a little bit, getting to have dinner with our expanding 'family', and breakfast with some others, it all made me very happy. Discussions and teasing and laughter. My love with me after a week without. Baking (and eating!) an extravagant apple/almond cake.

Worries too, about our little boy-kittens. They turned out to be very sick, and our vet told me that little kittens can fade very fast and that she was not sure if they would make it. But make it they did! After an overnight at the vet, medicine, and syringing cat-sure into a very weak Charlie, both of them greeted me on Sunday morning with energy and were eating on their own.

Charlie (white and grey) and Gus

They are sweet, and very different-  skinny Charlie more daring, more outgoing, more social than his solid brother Gus. Charlie walks around with his  long tail straight in the air and is quick to purr like a big guy. Gus takes a minute or so to warm up. They play together (attacking the curtains) and cuddle together.

Before long I hope to introduce all the felines to each other. It is quite the menagerie we've got going here.

I have been thinking a lot about all the 'things' in my life to be thankful for (which are not really things of course) - after all, it is the month of thanksgiving here in the USA. When I attempt to list them, I simply get overwhelmed with all the love and good that surrounds me. Of course there are negative points, not everything is always going the easy way, but over all- if not wealthy, we are in any case very very rich.

not yet

We have two sweet little kittens, but I do not have good pictures of them yet. They arrived three nights ago, traumatized after their surgery and move to a new home, and are currently quite sick. They will get better, but not yet.

a steel sculpture by E

T will arrive tonight and I am going to make a family favorite dish, for which I have to do some grocery shopping. My love will arrive later yet, and miss his son by several hours (he is due sometime after midnight), because T will leave soon after dinner, to return again briefly on Sunday, perhaps we will all be home at that point, but today not yet.

Ceramic creepy hand, by E

I interviewed for a new job yesterday, but I have not officially been hired yet, so I can't tell you more about it until then.

I have started knitting several projects, but I can't show you yet because some of them are Christmas gifts.

mobile in our kitchen, not finished yet I believe, also by E

The naming of the kittens is always a days long affair for our family, and I think we have pretty much decided- however until the human males arrive and give their final blessings, I will not share their names yet. For now, they are hiding under our bed, one solid grey, one white-and-grey, cute, skinny, and scared.

anyway

Is what I often say- as a summary, or the end of an inner dialogue for instance...anyway...

It has not even been a whole year- but almost- since my love decided to have the rickety book case upstairs dismantled and left us with stacks of books haphazardly in the corner of the loft and on the bedroom floor, and already we have (finally) found a solution! As it turns out, there is a store where they sell the shelving system which we started with many years/moons/lifetimes ago in a far away land on distant shores...

The whole undertaking is sort of a domino effect because now we are using part of the system that currently houses the TV, and so then we had to get something else for that, and then we saw a rug, and then we went to look at kittens and... anyway...

Luckily none of the kittens looked like this one (by Giacometti of course), unluckily they were all very cute.

'The naming of the kitten' has become a multiple-day event and J even took out his phone during dinner to look up names. Vetoes were flying left and right. Suggestions went north and south. Last year we ended up renaming Lucy after settling on Alice for only a day or so. We do take democracy serious in our family.

Yes, yes, I understand, I am starting to look like the crazy cat lady- but hey, if this is my midlife crisis, that is not so bad, is it? And anyway, my love is just as bad, he even joked about getting two- or was he serious?

open

I'll confess, I am procrastinating...I need to write some work notes but I have been lollygagging around on the web in various places. I even sat myself down at the dining room table instead of lounging on the couch with the laptop to make it feel more serious. The window is open because we are having a real indian summer this week- and I am enjoying the jungle-sounds and the breeze.

 We started early yesterday morning, the picture above I took when we were well on our way...

J with the shawl (knitted by me!), V hiding in her coat, and E putting on her 'less than enthusiastic' face...they had to stand in line while my love and I were free to explore the city. We did the outdoor art first, and found a beautiful mosaic by Chagall among other cool stuff just hanging out in the streets.

Detail

Then we went indoors, even though it was really a beautiful day- and found more inspiring art and 'old friends' (paintings I am very familiar with).

William Turner, always knew how to paint a storm...reminding me of some of my workdays. Social work can be like that, very dynamic and, well, stormy sometimes.

By the time we were picking a restaurant to have an early dinner with J, E, V and bf K (who happens to study in the big city already), I definitely did not feel like this 'dancing girl' by Paul Klee anymore.

We had a lovely fun dinner, said our goodbyes to bf K, and drove all the way home.

not counting

It is not that nothing is happening or has happened, it is more that I am not inspired to say something interesting about it. Tomorrow we are going to a bigger city for 'portfolio day' for my girls, who both want to study art in college, and thus I was supposed to cram two days of weekend (work) into one.

Thus, I will start a bread shortly and finish my vacuuming  upstairs- I was chasing the dust bunnies under the bed before dinner, and there is definitely some satisfaction from seeing a gleaming wood floor instead of  gray dusty planks.

Going to the big city is always inspiring, certainly the art inside the museum and outside on the streets and in the park. Our own city is not too bad either, enough to do of whatever you may be in to.

But after visiting, I am just happy to come home to our 'wooded lot', our not so fancy but oh so comfortable house, our cats, and the quiet.

The coming week is the last of my first 'gig' as supplemental social worker. I am sad to let go but looking forward to new challenges. I am also wishing for another cat or kitten, but my love is afraid that there will be no end to my quest to rescue whichever feline walks across my path.

remnants

...is the name of V's art concentration this year. One of her paintings depicts a dead chipmunk, but there are many interpretations of the word remnants, I'm assuming/hoping. Today my love and I worked on another type of remnant, a desk that was purchased at a second-hand (or who knows how many hands) store originally for E, then ended up in our bedroom when she swapped it for another multiple-hands desk which I bought a long time ago from friends who were moving (who had bought it at a garage sale I believe).

We sanded it down, removing all the written messages that had gathered on the painted surface over the years. The top turned out to be pine wood, to which I admit I am partial- pine trees and pine wood and tonight we did have pine nuts scattered over the red bell pepper salad.

I did my walkabout in the yard, and the pictures are really sort of remnants of that experience too- I can't 'picture' the sounds of fall, the singing woods, the crispy leaves under foot, the cats rustling through the undergrowth, the wind rattling the drying leaves...

There are some plants still flowering, the catnip (see above) and the forget-me-nots, the lavender and the black-eyed-susan. I am also processing some remnants from the past week of work, particularly Friday- it was an exceptionally stressful day, a sad day too, and for the first time since I started this job I am having some trouble putting it all to rest in order to fully enjoy the weekend.

November skies in October

This morning, T had the last piece of the Engardiner Nuss torte for breakfast before he left for a visit up north where his girlfriend goes to college. This evening, my love and I had dinner put together from left-uncooked things in the fridge- I severely dislike throwing unused fresh food away.

When I look around our home, I see many pieces with memories attached, some with past histories we will never know about. To the right of me my great-grandfather's 'smoke-table', to the left of me a small chest of drawers we bought at a garage sale from a couple newly wed (I remember them because they were so much in love that I felt we were intruding on their privacy by even looking at them).