happy moment

i learned how to make butter today! just mix up some whipping cream, salt, and honey, then shake and refrigerate. cool! goodbye, store bought (though i do buy the yummy vegan kind...ah, this will be more whole...) yes, i visited a local farm for their family farm day. i was very upset with myself that i hadn't brought my camera along, as there were some beautiful shots ... but lately i've been actually wanting to leave it behind because sometimes i think i tend to lose out on actual experience cause i'm too busy fiddling with getting the scene "just right" .. when it's usually like that already! it was a wonderfully beautiful day, hot but with a breeze, lots of sun. lots of gorgeous little children running around in wellies and sundresses. very country. i also attended a bread-baking demonstration, and got to talk with some of those volunteers who run the farm ... i am going to help harvest garlic and tomatoes in the coming months! ... and they assured me i could also work with the school groups that come out to learn about sustainability. this venture is perfect for me, really. i'll get free lessons in farming/growing, maybe make a new friend or two, and finally, FINALLY, get my hands dirty!! I want to overcome my fears of worms and snakes, what better way than to face them, right?

anyway ... i had brought a picnic lunch along, and got some reading and much needed thinking done, while staring up into a wind-blown tree, hundreds of years old, hearing the light lilting musical notes of some nearby instruments being played ... and there i was, realizing that this, THIS, not the subdivision with nearly identical brick mansions and the swanky-esque country club the farm lies behind, is what my life has been leading towards. a life spent working hard to sustain, sure, but a life where my children are nature people and my feet can swish barefoot through the scratchy grass, and where beyond the cares of sustainability there just aren't the frets that other people face. the frets of bigger, better, faster, more. it's so happy and peaceful to know that the foundations of my childhood (which weren't rural, but which did encourage doing simple things for fun and making do with what one has ... probably cause my parents busted their butts at jobs for years and didn't make much money, so life was like that by default) have lead me to such a beautiful place in my life. for, as i am learning by starting to read maria montessori's books, that's where it all begins, really. and so it will with mine. so it will with mine.

namaste, dear like-minded folk of the wood!