A happy Saturday to you all, dear readers!
Life has started to rev up again around the Parsonage here. We started back to school and some of the regular anchor routines are back in place. I confess that I need those routines after a summer of not much structure. This summer went by so quickly that I felt I could have done with a few more weeks of relaxing before all the things started again, but once everything started it felt good to have it all back in place.
One of our favorite things from the summer is weekly softball games. This is a community event we so enjoy participating in. I love to sit and watch the game and my kids play on long slow summer nights. It bring my heart so much joy to be doing something slow and intentional as part of living in this place.
General Life
To celebrate for this month:
Even though we don’t mark it with any kind of celebration, we do get excited to start school.
My father-in-law celebrated his birthday this month and we had fun singing to him and planning a trip to go see them next month.
Something to let go of:
I was not as organized about my first day of school as I like to be. This caused a bit of a sorry attitude for the first week of school, and a great deal of overwhelm for me. Only by the grace of God do I move and breathe through these busy days and these types of frustrations drive me closer to seek Him when I remember to view it that way, rather than beating myself up.
Homeschooling
We started school this month and our new theater co-op too. We all look forward to the production in November. Those of my kids not in the play are going with me on errands and we discovered a new library near to the practice place. Also, we are back to including nature walks in our school, which I am so happy about! This year, they are happening once a week instead of every day like we used to, but I’m happy to have them, period.
Canning
I was beginning to think I had lost my canning mojo this year. I love all the travelling we did last month but it threw a wrench into getting food put up. No matter though! I did a huge canning day, or a couple of days, and knocked quite a few things off my list. Green beans, sliced peaches, blackberry jelly, and strawberry jam all made it into my canning closet.
Gardening
My zinnias and cosmos are off and running this month. I’m not the most professional or consistent gardener, which means I have to lower my standards of perfection quite a bit. I could look at my flower beds and complain that they look scrappy and patchy because I neglected to water them enough during all the hot hot weather we had here this summer. But what I do have blooming is delightful and juuuust enough to cut bouquets for my centerpiece on my table, which is really all I ask for.
Reading
I’ve done a fair amount of finishing of books this month. I’m always reading different books at different times, so it seems like I don’t finish things much. But then every once in a while all the stars align and I finish a bunch of different books all at the same time. That happened this month.
We read aloud books at night to our kids. We have one book that the family reads aloud when we are all together at night and currently, we are working our way through the Green Ember series by S.D. Smith. We finished the second book this month. These are rereads for me but new to some of my younger crew. I still love the story of bravery and honor. #rabbitswithswords
When we are not all together for the night I have a few books I read to the individual kids that are home, special reads just for them so we still have some gathering time even when we are not all together. My oldest daughter and I are reading through all of N.D. Wilson’s books and we just finished Dandelion Fire this month, the second of his 100 Cupboard series. We love all the action and adventure in this series.
Our other family read-aloud in the afternoon has been the Vanderbeeker series by Karin Yan Glaser. We finished book 4 this month. We’ve been reading this series all year and it delights my family. It’s such a beautiful picture of a large-ish family that all love each other with positive parent representations, but lots of real-life situations the kids have to work through. We laugh, we cry, we talk about the characters like they are real and we know them. So good.
For poetry I finished a long slow read of haiku poetry I’ve been working on for months. I do love this form of poetry so much, simple and spare, but says so much. I’d love to know how to bring that into my own writing and art.
I try to always have a book of theology that I am reading too, though this is a very very slow read that I only tackle in the morning before the day gets rolling and I can actually think clearly. I finished up The Four Cardinal Virtues by Josef Pieper. His writing style can be a bit challenging at the beginning but I know from previous experience that he is like reading Shakespeare. Once you get into the rhythm of his writing it gets easier.
For my own fun reading, I finished Surprised By Joy by C.S. Lewis. I try to read at least one Lewis a year and this was it for me. He is such an easy relatable writer. I also read a lot of ‘guilty pleasure’ reads this month, like The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern and Sex and Vanity by Kevin Kwan. We all have our books that maybe aren’t the best for us but we still love to read them just for fun and those fit that need for me this month.
Finally, for Close Reads this month, we finished reading Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Unstead. This was the most amazing series about womanhood I have ever read. The discussion was so great on the podcast too. The hosts really dove into some great topics, even while they had to miss so much because there is never enough time to talk about it all. I can’t recommend this series enough, but I will warn you that you may want to throw it down after the first book. The main character is making some pretty foolish choices at that point and I’ve heard so many people say they couldn’t stand it, seeing her ruin her life. But the other two books go so much deeper and you get to see her choices and how they play out in the long term. So keep reading even if you feel like you can’t stand it because it is worth every minute of reading.
Art
I’ve been taking a lot of sky pictures this month, playing around with my panoramic setting on my iPhone a lot. The late summer skies are a thing of beauty that I need. Also, because so much of my creative juices were being poured into the starting up of my homeschool, my ability to work in my art journal was pretty slim this month. Sky pictures have filled a need for me to touch the hem of beauty and wonder and awe that sustains my soul.
My one art journal page was just me playing around with some different image transfer techniques.
Wrap-Up
This month flew by, as I’m sure many of you experienced. I have so many things to look forward to next month. Happy September to you all!