A Magical Yule Beginning

Unless you live under a rock you are aware of the total Lunar Eclipse that occurred in the wee hours of the morning, which is also the Winter Solstice. This hasn't happened in 372 years (1638) and won't happen again until 2094. Since you are reading this, you obviously don't live under a rock (and if you do, I am very impressed by your wireless server!).

The boys and I spent yesterday learning a little bit about lunar eclipses. Basically they learned that it is caused by the Earth casting a shadow on the Moon because the Earth is between the Sun & Moon. Shannon will be 7 in January & Tristan is 4 1/2. I don't expect them to grasp much more of this, especially since I had to look up the info to be certain of what I was telling them.
We also talked about how long it has been since the last total Lunar Eclipse occurred on the Winter Solstice and how long it will be until the next one. I told them that, if they're lucky, they might be alive to view the next one. I tried to explain why Justin & I wouldn't and how nobody on our planet now was alive for the last one. Those were more difficult concepts for them to grasp.



Shannon found a scrap piece of paper yesterday and created this for me, without me being near/over him or knowing what he was creating. This is what I love about homeschooling & unschooling.

We went outside last night, and like so many people saw only clouds. Although we would've love to seen the actually Moon & eclipse, we weren't saddened. We still woke up the boys and, with them in our arms, wandered out onto our deck to gaze at the reddish sky for a while. It was beautiful. Magical. Dark. Softly glowing red. The air filled our lungs and bodies. We knew so many other people were outside, gazing up with us, and we felt connected to them all. A sense of awe spread through us. We felt loved and whole.

I am saddened to read comments on Facebook this morning of disgruntled people who also saw the clouds but didn't see the beauty. There is a saying 'you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink' and I suppose this holds true now. You can look upwards and still not see the beauty.

The Winter Solstice also marks the beginning of Yule. Different people celebrate this in different ways. It is an ancient celebration that has, like so many other ancient ways, been melded into modern celebrations. From now until the 1st of January will be the 12 days of the Yule celebration, more commonly now known as the 12 days of Christmas.

Holiday songs fill my head right now. Particularly I have James Taylor singing 'Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas' playing in my head. I will share it with you.



Whatever you choose to celebrate, if you choose to celebrate, know that we are all connected. As we stood outside and breathed in the night air, we felt our breathes in sync with all of you.

Happy Yule Y'all.

Looking back at October

November is well underway, so it is past time to reflect upon October. I'll get the Harvest Tally out of way first:
Eggs for October - 34! Quite a drop in production there. The gals are going through their first molt, and so we've seen a HUGE decline in eggs. As I type this, we've yet to get ANY eggs in November.
Harvest for October - 15+ pounds. Ok, I'm being lazy here and not looking at the book.
We harvested one birdhouse gourd that weighed in at well over 7lbs, and then over 7lbs of Jerusalem Artichokes. These are native to North America though now grown all over the world. They can be quite invasive and are often called "sun chokes." Their name is a misnomer, as they are a member of the sunflower family, and not actually an artichoke. They are very tasty and can be cooked like potatoes (and are good in mashed potatoes!) ~ but, be warned, they give you gas. I've read the effect will decline the more you eat, but so far it's been a lot of windy fun around here!


~Boo, y'all!!~

Halloween is always HUGE around here. Seriously, we get over 200 kids every year! You actually do see them being dropped off by the bus-full. It is insane, but in a fun way. Since I grew up in this house, this is how I've always known Halloween and it was quite a shock to move somewhere where you were "lucky" to get 10 kids. I was happy to return.
One thing we do every year is to have a Halloween Party, always on Halloween. It started out of an invitation to friends who lived on a mountain, for them to bring their kids and trick-or-treat here .. and if you're gonna invite some people, might as well invite more and make it a party!
The dads tend to take the kids trick-or-treating, the moms hang out on the porch and hand out candy. We're lucky, our kids go spend the night with Grandma and Grandpa after they've gone through our neighborhood, so the adults get a chance to let loose. Everyone is in costume.
This year, a friend went as a Zombie and asked me if I wanted to help with her costume and do her make-up. I agreed to. She was one rockin' Zombie. I then did my make-up as well as Justin's ~ we went as a dead/corpse bride & groom. I got to wear my wedding dress again which was a lot of fun. I gotta say I think I have a knack for Halloween make-up.
This year, as I'm sure you remember, Halloween was on a Saturday. Much to our shock, we had a lot less kids than usual. Still well over 100, maybe between 150 & 175, but a noticeable amount less. I think there were a lot of churches doing stuff since it was a Saturday, so we'll wait till next year to see how things go.
The other odd thing we noticed was a lot less kids dressed up, and also kids with very little enthusiasm about it. Where did the fun go?? Where was the fun of going house to house, seeing pumpkins and people in costumes, and of course, getting candy?? Maybe these kids get too much candy on too regular a basis? Maybe imaginations have been killed by tv and video games? Maybe the commercialization of it has taken the magic out? I don't know, but it was a shame. Keeping the magic alive is vital.