First day

 

 Yesterday really felt like the first day of Spring.

First thing in the morning, as the sunlight streamed through Nik's bedroom window, I changed our nature table for spring.  Keeping it sparse, just like our pokey spring, I still included a couple flowers, and a few little fairies to help get things moving. 

 

 I opened the windows and then, inspired by two books I am paging through right now, 'Fifteen Minutes Outside' and 'The Rhythm of Family', I went outside with my kids in both the morning and the afternoon.

We kicked at the snow and ice, and opened the sandbox. 

 

 Our neighbourhood was waking up from a sleepy winter.  The sunshine inspired the birds to sing, and the boys across the street to come out and jump their skateboards and scooters.  Seniors, and new parents with strollers walked by on the back path, and the young and fit jogged past them.

We unlocked the shed and pulled out the outside toys.  The kids found the sidewalk chalk and got to work brightening our play equipment.

 

There was a chill on the ground, but warmth in the air, and it really felt like something was beginning.  Fresh air in my lungs.  Mud on my pants.

Eventually, Nik tried to cross the back ditch, insisting to me that the snow was strong enough to support his weight.  As he winter boots filled with water, I knew we would be heading in to warm up soon.  Three sets of fresh clothes later, we settled down at our living room table for a tea party, to celebrate mud and birdsong and the first day of many outdoor days to come.

Breaking out of the funk

Spring is late this year.  If you didn't know it from looking out my window, you'd know it from the shear amount of griping about it on Facebook.  Everyone's kids are hyper, and stay at home parents, especially, are getting grumpy.

Being stuck inside gets depressing.  It is so easy to fall into a behind-on-housework, no motivation funk.  My personal challenge to myself has been to get the laundry folded and put away, but I have been failing to complete this for about 2 weeks. Sickness and busyness threw off our routine, and I just can't seem to get it under control again. Each day I do a little, save Sunday which is my day off, but I am starting to feel like Lucy next to the candy conveyer belt... There is always more coming!

Times like this, I have to fall back to my go-to "break out of the funk" strategies.  Maybe they can help you, too, next time you feel depleted and overwhelmed by the repetitive nature of home making.

• Change the atmosphere.  I make a cup of tea, put on a favourite cd, and open the curtains. These are things that are mood lifting for me. I do it even if I don't feel like it because I know it helps.
• Focus on one thing at a time.  I like to tackle the most obvious, annoying, in the way problem first. This might mean I clean the kitchen or living room, at the expense of the whole rest of the house. 
• Make a 'Done' list. To Do lists are depressing and exhausting. Done lists are energizing. List everything. Changed a diaper. Tidied toys out of the living room. Loaded and ran the dishwasher.
• Reward yourself. It can be as small as 'I fold this load of laundry, and I get to play a level of Candy Crush saga' to as big as, if I work for two hours this morning, I am vegging out on FB for an hour (or more) after lunch.
• Do something that lasts. Do an activity with your kids and take photos. Bake something. Organize a cupboard or drawer. Anything that will stay done for a least a few days counts.

 

We made a gingerbread house.  See the mess in the background?  Who cares?  Candy!

• Get out. Take a walk. Go to the library. Make a meal plan and shopping list, and get the groceries. Bonus if you do this in the morning, because it forces you to dress yourself and your kids, and eat something.

Life is made up of days, and days are made up of moments.  Focusing on the big picture can be overrated, and overwhelming.  Just take it one breath at a time.

To everything, a season

Nik's joyfully 'flying' with a playsilk cape on.

 We dabble in a little Waldorf goodness here at our house.  And by 'we dabble' I mean I pin things to Pinterest like crazy, and occasionally actually follow through with something in real life.

We have a few Waldorf dolls and some lovely wooden doll furniture.  We have a really beautiful wooden rainbow stacking puzzle.  We have a set of three lovely playsilks.

But the place in our home that seems the most Waldorf inspired is the seasonal display we keep on the dresser in the kids' bedroom.  We have kept it for a year now, and have grown into it.  At first, I was the only one in our house who was interested in it, but as time went by, and as we spent more time outdoors in the summer months, Nik was often heard saying, "Oh!  I should bring this back for the nature table, Mom!"   My parents even got in on the collecting, bringing a giant leaf, and a bag full of acorns back from their fall holiday in Mississippi.

Nik's bike basket filled with pine cones for the nature table.

If you are thinking of creating a nature corner for your own home, I really encourage you to just go for it.  Make sure and find a permanent space that will not be in the way, because it takes time for the nature table to become a normal part of your family culture.  If it is in an inconvenient spot, and your kids don't really seem 'into it', it will be tempting to scrap the whole thing.  But Waldorf is different from the flashy stuff generally vying for our kids' attention.  It is quiet, and needs time to be discovered.  Provide that time.

The other main piece of advice I would give about setting up your own nature table is to not worry about it not being waldorfy enough.  This advice that I read at 'Here We Are Together' was a comfort and encouragement to me as I began, and again every time that I would venture in to change the table with the season.  Blogger Miri says, "This is a place for you and your little ones to bring a little bit of the outside world inside. There is no right or wrong way to set up a Nature Table, and as long as you enjoy building it and adding to it then it is perfect."  Sing it, sister.

We have kept our nature table for nearly one year now.  When we started, it was certainly nothing to write home about.  Just a tray, with a green playsilk representing grass, a couple pinecones (which are now a staple on our table) and various hodge podge of Easter things I had lying around the house.

The tray turned out to be a brilliant beginning, and we have kept that up.  I actually later read in 'Style At Home' magazine that items grouped on a tray automatically look more pulled together, almost like they are framed.  I had no idea I was so fashion forward.  (Hidden benefit of the tray: It keeps little bits from rolling off of the silk, onto the floor and under the dresser.  Yay!)

After Easter, I took the Easter-related items off of the tray, and added anything I could find that seemed like Spring to me.  I ended up borrowing liberally from the Little People bin, adding Maggie in her raincoat, two bunnies, and a arbor swing decked out in florals.  Again, I had to rely on Miri's words to build my confidence: "Don’t worry if it doesn’t look waldorfy enough or your only seasonal things are made of plastic." 

After we got started, each transition got easier.  Isn't that true of so many things?  I started to keep my eyes out for things made of a variety of materials, and we added driftwood, seashells (found at the thrift store), and a pottery bird in the coming weeks.

When fall arrived, it was really fun to make the dramatic change of switching out the green playsilk for our fiery orange one.  Nik added more and more pine cones, and rocks that he sifted out of our sandbox.  I also bought a lovely hand-painted wooden goose from an artisan at the farmer's market to add to our 'stream'.

And then came the seasons of Christmas and winter, and we changed up the display again.  Blue silk and fibrefill 'snow' made for a fun base to build on.   Lots of underloved Christmas decorations found their way on the to nature table, and into the supply box for seasons to come.

 

The nature corner changes have been a quiet little reminder to us of the rhythms of the natural world.  Nik took an interest in the summer, and now even Alexa, at nearly age 2, has started to play with some of the items in this touchable display.  But both are very respectful of this space.  Even when Nik has a meltdown and throws things around his room in anger, the nature table is spared.  Children seem to have an understanding of what is sacred.

Categories

Just getting started with this blog, I know I want to create posts that relate to a life lived richly on a number of levels, in a myriad of ways.

Home life - Posts about all that relates to the inside of the house and home, so organizing, decorating, home renos, and other goodness

Life outdoors - Posts about being outside in the backyard, gardening, nature, and the changing of the seasons

Family life - Posts about parenting, marriage, sisters, brothers, parents, grandparents, cousins, oh my.

Life at play - Posts about fun things, family outings, cool kids stuff, vacations.

Spiritual life - Posts about faith, tuning in to the divine, and taking care of the spirit.

Life in my head - Posts about mental health, positive thinking, happiness, and other head case stuff.

Food life - Posts about cooking and recipes, buying food, growing food, and otherwise celebrating what we eat.

Creative life - Posts about the various things we make, and the arts we enjoy.

Life's rhythms - Posts about our various routines, traditions, and annual patterns, including birthday and holiday celebrations.

Life costs money - Posts about our struggles and triumphs with managing money, spending wisely, and living within our means.

Community life - Posts about our place within our church, neighbourhood, and parenting group, and the memories made being part of these communities.