Genre Cookshop

SPRING PLANTING
Well, spring digging anyway. Boys and dirt just go together.

Labels: children, spring

EVER STOP AND WONDER
Hey, what am I doing? And why am I doing it? Seems to be part of the human condition. Part of the rodent condition too!

Labels: animals

BOOK SOUP

Child hungry for stories and for lunch must decide on which to focus.

(Personally, I always gluttonously go for both!)

Labels: books, children, food

LOVE TRAIN
My friend and neighbor Chavis taking his son B for a little ride the morning after the big storm last week. It was a great chance to catch up with a lot of neighborhood folks. Everyone was out shoveling, salting and chipping! This ice/snow amalgam set like cement. So lots of chat and cheerful commiseration. I even exchanged a few pleasant words with the guy on the block we think of as The Grumpy Neighbor. This is such a friendly block, that he sticks out like a sore thumb. He never makes eye contact, smiles or waves, let alone says Hi but there he was out salting his path. I asked him where he got that brand of salt he was using, and he told me! Progress.

Labels: children, neighborhood, winter

MORNING TABLEAUX
A random scattering of plastic toys on a letter from school, or, hidden meaning? What do these playmobil entrails scattered across the sacred spelling bee information letter REALLY mean? Only time will tell.

Labels: toys

HUNGRY BUNNY
So, we have started letting our recently adopted rabbit out in the afternoon for a few hours. We did this a few times before it occurred to me that he might get hungry and thirsty while roaming around. When I set down some food and drink Bunny fell upon the food like it was manna from heaven. I felt guilty at not having realized this sooner, but also relieved that I eventually figured it out! There is definitely a learning curve to pet ownership.

Now, when H lets him out, Bunny follows me around like a little dog. Whither I goest, he goest too. Even when I was on the computer this afternoon I eventually realized Bunny was curled up patiently at my feet, idly nibbling my shoelaces. I think he has imprinted on me as She-Who-Supplies-Food!

Not unlike every other living creature in this house (human, animal and even houseplant) now that I think about it a minute!

Labels: animals, food

SILHOUETTE

Even my housebound cat
knows spring is coming-
more flies to watch

*************************************

This is my friend Theresa's big cat named Oscar. She let him out after a while and he promptly lost all interest in fly-catching, and just lolled in the sun. Only while the flies were unattainable were they so enticing. Now, isn't that always the way?

Labels: animals, haiku

BABY GAZE

Clear as calm water
baby eyes rest on my face-
the smile floats up.

***********************************

This my friends Shawna and Andrew's baby C. She is six months old and visited me this morning. I have babies on the brain just now as my brother Jim and his wife Lisbeth just had their fourth little boy yesterday. I can't wait to meet him! Boys sure run rampant in this family. I am the only girl in three generations...how'd that happen? Boys are wonderful, but I do love a little rosebud and ruffle fix every now and then. Thanks for stopping by baby C!

Labels: babies, children, haiku

FRAGILE ADDICTION
I am addicted to growing things. It is not such a bad thing to be addicted to, really, is it? My mother always had lots of houseplants crowding the windowsills when I was a little girl growing up in NYC, and she really came into her own when we moved to the suburbs and suddenly had a lot more space. I was fairly indifferent to her hobby, except that I hated the prickles on her cacti. But the seeds of plant-loving must have been lying dormant within me. One day in school we planted beans in dixie cups...and I was hooked!

I recently found these bulb vases in a thrift shop and ran out to buy hyacinth bulbs to force in them. But I was too late! The season for selling loose hyacinth bulbs was over. I happened to mention this, very much in passing, to my next-door neighbor Fay who is a big-time gardener herself. She immediately whipped open the door to her fridge and pulled out two hyacinth bulbs! The wise gardener stocks up for just such gardening emergencies.

These two delicate beauties are now perfuming the air in my studio.

Labels: flowers, studio

BOY IN THE SNOW
A happy combination. Notice the lack of coat? I have given up nagging on this issue.

Labels: children, winter

COLLAGE
done by my ten year old son, H. An assignment to do a collage based on his art class's study unit on Hieronymus Bosch. This actually appalled me somewhat when I found out. If you look with any degree of attention at Bosch's images you will see that they are horror-movie inspiring, nightmare-making and frequently sadistic. Great art though, sure. Just not convinced of their appropriateness for close study by fourth grade children. (But of course nobody asked me, and I only found out after the unit ended. Things like this make me wish I had the guts for homeschooling.)

In any case, this is what H came up with: "Creatures of Creation". It was immediately flagged by his art teacher for inclusion in a district wide student art exhibition! So, that was nice.

Labels: art

ALONE
but not for long. These English Sparrows always travel in a pack. Flock is the right term, of course, but they seem kind of like the local bullies, despite their tiny size, so I think of them as a gang. I saw them move a female cardinal off the feeder the other day...no direct assault, but it was done very neatly by sheer number of sparrow bodies.

Labels: animals

ROOFED GATE
in my neighborhood. Utterly charming. In summer, it would need only roses spilling over the fence and a cat sleeping in the yard next to an old bucket for complete cozy quotient. And maybe it will have those things...I'll have to go back and check at the end of June.

Labels: neighborhood

BUNNY SLIPPERS
We have a new housemate and here he is. He is a methuselah rabbit, by which I mean he has lived so long that he outlived his previous owner's interest in him. She got him in middle school (I think), and eventually went off to college and graduated and started a working life that has no room for bunnies. Understandably so! The bunny has far outlived his expected span of years. H was thrilled to be handed down this cute little guy who is friendly and lively despite his great age. Of course, we talked about the fact that Bunny could pass on at anytime...but H decided to go for it, nonetheless. Life lessons with a twinkly nose. Not sure if this was the wisest parental move I have ever made (I am thinking of vet bills almost definitely ahead) but then...I seem to have misplaced my Wise Parent's Handbook somewhere. Let me know if you see it, OK?

In the meantime I'm off to buy a salt lick.

Labels: animals