Little House On The Mesa

Changes of fall are in the air

2011-09-30T07:44:00.002-06:00

Fall is my favorite time of year in Taos. The colors are brilliant from the leaves that start to change to yellows, oranges, and reds to the summer wildflowers that are still in full bloom like the rabbit brush, sunflowers, and Michaelmas daisies. My two favorite colors, purple and yellow, dot the huge expanses of desert prairie. We've been driving out to the property quite a bit now to smooth out the land and uproot leftover sagebrush stumps. I've been really enjoying the drive with all of these pretty colors. It is so peaceful to see nothing but wilderness and mountains in the background on all sides.

So we've been using shovels and rakes to work on the land, a little at a time because 2.25 acres is A LOT to work by hand and honestly we aren't clearing the whole property. There is a slope toward the road with lava rock that we will probably just leave be. Right now we are content with the nice plateau we have on the hill for the rv. You can see our little car at the bottom of the hill.

The kids have been real good sports about helping out. Even Willow has been helping with her plastic shovel. The teamwork has been super helpful. Sometimes the kids even fight over the tools. Ugh. You can see the main road in the background here so we aren't too far from a good paved highway. That will be peace of mind in the winter.

walking up the "driveway"...everything on the right is our property up to where you see the buildings in the distance....

Last but not least, our road sign, haha...

Monastery of the Holy Archangel Michael

2011-09-25T21:36:00.000-06:00

This year our very spontaneous and quaint "summer vacation" consisted of a a visit to the local monastery. The road trip was just spectacular. The monastery is nestled in the mountains in Canones which is in the greater Abiquiu area. We are continuously excited to discover new places which are within an hour or two to Taos. Here is a photo of our camp which was unbelievably inundated with rain the entire weekend...

We were disappointed that most of the days were so cloudy but the church is nonetheless lovely

This has to be my favorite photo of our group leaving one of the daily services

Then the kids were able to see how the monks make their beeswax candles which are distributed to various churches and places for sale

It was a lovely trip overall although I came back with a horrible cold which was odd for the end of summer. I attribute it to getting out of my tent for Matins services at 3:30 am in the cold rain for a couple of days. I don't think I could have done it without Ashley waiting from the guesthouse with her flashlight.

Moving to Carson

2011-09-11T09:55:00.000-06:00

I haven't been able to post comments to other blogs or on mine for awhile because I had to be on googlechrome, which I don't like using for a lot of reasons I won't go into here but at least I figured out what the problem was.

Sooo.... the big news is that we are buying a piece of land in Carson. We hooked up with a really nice couple who has lived out there for years and is willing to owner finance a 2.25 acre parcel to us. This is of course off grid land with no electricity and no water. There is a community well or you can haul it from a nearby spring. I've been wanting a piece of land for years now. I've spent the last decade or so poring over Mother Earth News, Countryside Magazine, and every homesteading book/online forum imaginable. We've spent hours talking about alternative energy and housing. The funny thing is that we knew most of those things were out of our reach living in Fl and we had to move someplace else to do it....and yet, we've done nothing but shuffle our feet since we got here a year ago. In hindsight we should have done it last year but we were trying to be prudent, having just arrived and not really knowing what winter would be like or if we could financially survive here. Truth be known, we would have probably survived better financially if we had just gone ahead and done it instead of renting a house.

For those who aren't familiar with this area there are a lot of areas in Taos County where you can buy offgrid land for fairly cheap and there are little to no restrictions. The downside is that this of course attracts all sorts of people. As a family of four I'm not into living next to twenty somethings who live out of their bus and stay up all night partying. This is one of the reasons we really like Carson. It is a community of mostly older folks who were hippies here back in the heyday of the 60's and 70's. They are mostly established with their handbuilt homes and have a real sense of community. The property we will be moving to is very close to the main road which will be easier to get in and out of in the snow. The best part is that we are within walking distance of the post office and the general store, the two only amenities in this little town. The general store is like a little camp store but is fully stocked with healthy and organic foods. Even better, they have washers and dryers in there. I will say that since we only have one car and I am the one home all the time that it makes me feel real good to have these amenities nearby.

However, in some ways this anticlimactic because it isn't the ideal time of year to move out into an rv with no power....not with winter at our back door. This will enable us to afford and save a substantial amount of money that we couldn't last year renting a house. We are glad that Riki is one of the few employees Graham's has agreed to keep through the winter but we also know that business will go down considerably along with income. This seems like a more sustainable alternative to staying in the house we are now and then finding ourselves out of money in the middle of the winter with an rv that isn't winterized or ready.

So here are the immediate plans. We will be moving in around 30 days to the property. We'll need an extend a stay to hook up our own propane source without having to drive the rv and get it. We will need a generator and/or solar setup to keep the battery charged so that we can run said furnace heat. I am thinking this will bide us some time until it gets super cold around December/January. In the meantime we will need to skirt the rv. Many recommend hay bales but I'm worried about critters taking camp there so something like plywood might be a better option. I am looking into some kind of supplemental heat to keep the furnace from running constantly, and believe me, it will. I am interested in a catalytic heater but also concerned about safety so I think we would opt for one of the more expensive models like an olympian wave which would be super efficient on the propane (it hooks into your current propane source but uses much less than the furnace) but also has more safety standards than the cheaper catalytics.

I will need to get the kids some wool or down blankets to go over their current bedding. I know nothing about these things being from Florida and the variety of types of down blankets/prices makes the choices overwhelming. I am leaning toward some Pendleton wool blankets because they were used by early pioneers in the northwest who camped OUTSIDE. I figure if it kept them warm that it should keep us warm inside an rv with a heat source.

I'll admit that I'm extremely anxious about wintering in the rv. I can tell you that probably 9 out of 10 people would try to talk us out of it and give us a bazillion reasons why not to do it, as if I'm not already aware of any of them....and yet I think about the pioneer settlers who didn't have electricity or a heat source or in many cases had to camp outside. What about the Native Americans? It is as if we have forgotten that once upon a time people didn't have the luxury of heaters...and I know that many places like New Mexico were a lot colder in the winter 100 years ago than they are now. That certainly doesn't mean it will be easy but I'm hoping we can make it work and come through to tell others how it can be done.

Good old fashioned cleaning

2011-06-09T12:53:00.000-06:00

You know, until my parents recently visited us we had not watched any tv for around a year. I have always said that television shows and movies are not nearly as offensive to me as the advertisements preying upon a weak minded consumer. It is fascinating to not watch tv for a long time and then suddenly see commercials again, especially when you live a lifestyle pretty far removed from mainstream culture. When you see that stuff all the time you are just desensitized to it and find it all pretty normal. Aside from the rampant pharmaceutical ads we were disturbed by this obsession with all things being clean and sterile. Cleaning commercials always feature laboratory white looking kitchens or stainless steel with women wearing crisp, usually white clothing and makeup. Combine this with ads on laser hair removal, weight loss, and other cosmetic enhancement commercials and everyone is just starting to look like aliens to me. Not only our sterile kitchens full of chemicals but people are also resembling some kind of laboratory created experiment which doesn't in any way resemble nature.

Sooo....as with most things, I am of the philosophy that God/nature has provided pretty much everything we need and that we need not look outside of that to fancy chemicals to make our houses and bodies look good. A friend of mine said something recently that sums it all up. She was visiting a friend's home where said friend proudly exclaimed that she had mopped the floors so it would be okay for the baby to crawl around. My friend told me she would have rather her baby crawl on an unmopped floor than one that was just freshly saturated with unknown chemicals.

Aside from philosophy sometimes frugality requires us to look at different cleaning options from what we see on the commercials. There is also the obvious concern of damage to the environment by washing toxic chemicals down the drain as well as the waste that is produced from all of the packaging.

You know, I've always been a proponent of ecofriendly cleaners and once upon a time you couldn't find them in most stores. You had to pay a fortune for them in health food stores or specialty boutiques. As a new housewife/mother using overpriced natural cleaners with concentrated essential oils made housework a little more luxurious back in the day.. You can even make your own cleaners this complex with natural ingredients. However, I am going to share my own very basic cleaning ingredients which are neither fancy or luxurious as I am on a budget and not interested in taking the time to create boutique inspired natural cleaners.

My list is quite short so read carefully or you might miss it, haha. Our staple cleaning ingredient around here is white vinegar. I can buy a big jug of it for around $3 and it lasts a lot longer than a tiny $3 bottle of commercial natural cleaner. We use it for nearly everything. I put it in a big spray bottle where it can be easily reached. We use it to clean bathroom/kitchen surfaces, countertops, and to mop floors. I add about a cup of vinegar to hot water in a bucket. You can add essential oils or dried herbs if that makes it more exciting for you. I'm pretty no nonsense these days.

I don't have a use for wood or furniture polish but when I did I would mix equal parts lemon or lime juice with olive oil and rub on with a cloth to make the tables shine.

As we have talked about many times before we often do laundry by hand and make our own laundry soap (which can also be used in the machine). We mix equal parts Arm and Hammer washing soda with borax and then grate a bar of castille soap. We use less than 1/4 cup of this mixture per load. We started using Fels Naptha which is an old detergent bar soap but it ended up being harsh so we now substitute a bar of Bronner's instead. I'm not going to tell you that old fashioned ingredients are always just as effective as their chemical counterparts. People in the old days were not used to their clothes or kitchens being as spotless or stark white as we are accustomed to in today's culture. I find that they are good enough for me because I'm not expecting perfection or for a dirty sock to come out of the laundry as white as it was brand new.

There are a couple of natural cleaning items I continue to buy because I haven't found a homemade counterpart that works...toilet bowl cleaner and dishsoap. If anyone has a basic recipe for either of these that doesn't require a lot of obscure or expensive ingredients I would love to hear about it!

2011-06-03T15:03:00.000-06:00

I've been struggling with the desire to blog lately. I've taken to privacy quite a bit more (thank goodness I don't have facebook, right?). Sometimes I just feel burdened by the idea of blogging and then realizing that what I want to talk about is too private or too controversial or too provocative or maybe even too boring....or the fact that I don't have enough pictures of something to make it interesting. Then the whole thing just seems superficial and I say nevermind. I've reached a point where I'm not so much inclined to want to irritate people or try to get them to think outside the box anymore. I'm pretty done with politics and it isn't a passion of mine like it used to be. This portion of my life is devoted more to spirituality and adapting to a corrupt world instead of trying to change something that will never be utopia. This idealism is only something we can strive for within ourselves and will never exist outwardly on this earthly realm. I've made peace with this and it is certainly a much larger sense of freedom than feeling like I need to constantly fight somebody or some cause or other hot button issue. I look up to those who have led more quiet and private lives, like the saints and monastics.

My parents came for a visit right after Pascha and we took a few pictures at the historic Adobe Bar....

the lovely ashford traditional

After the hooplah of Holy Week and my parents' visit from Florida I finally had time to invest in the new wheel and it has been very enjoyable. I still have much to learn of course but being able to process, ply, and skein a yarn from start to finish is quite an accomplishment for me, considering that last year at the wool festival just the idea of plying from a spindle was more than my brain could handle. Baby steps, right?

handspun yarn from the new wheel

I've taken to wearing mostly Israeli style tichels lately without makeup. I know I look about ten times better with makeup on but I'm trying to break my ties with vanity these days.

Ellery, the budding photographer

2011-03-31T07:28:00.000-06:00

I should probably clarify that the latest pictures posted on the blog were taken by me from a much inferior camera to the one Riki normally uses. I really wanted to be able to take my own pictures throughout the day, just because I want to document things, not because I'm in any way particularly interested in photography as an art form. His camera is way too complicated and heavy for this. Now that I have a tiny point and shoot type of camera Ellery has been also experimenting with using it and I thought I would post some of the pictures he had taken about a month ago.

So I think Riki took this last one but I thought it was cute

Spring happenings.

2011-03-30T07:35:00.000-06:00

I am thankful to report that Riki has found a job at Graham's Grille which is one of the most popular and respectable restaurants in town. This is where he has wanted to work since we moved here so it really is a blessing. He will do really well there in the summer and we will have to be mindful of tucking money away to survive the winter. Even so far his hours are only part time and the tourist season hasn't cranked up yet.

This Florida girl is trying so hard not to complain about the cold weather which extends into spring here. By now in Florida temps would be in the 70's and I would have already been complaining in January, haha. I don't so much mind the cold weather when there is something exciting to behold like snow but when it is just cold and windy and you can't even go outside to take a walk without a dust mask, I can't say I'm having a good time. So far I would say that spring is my least favorite season in Taos, having experienced the other three. Having said that I do have some springtime photos. It is a little exciting to actually see things starting to grow back, even if it doesn't feel warm enough for anything to grow to me. After all, in Florida palm trees are green year round so seeing the blossoming and hearing the birds chirp after a dead winter is curious for us all.

the little green blooms are coming back on this dead tree

I just love these wild desert plants but this is the first time I've seen the blooms on them

the kids taking a nature walk in our "backyard"

the kids always fight over doing laundry by hand. Seriously

Back to survival mode

2011-03-15T12:57:00.000-06:00

Well, Riki quit his job last weekend. In his defense he has never walked out on a job before. In the whole time we have been married this was only his second job, the first one he was laid off for after about ten years. The owners of Antonio's restaurant are infamous in this town for being unprofessional, unethical, and even not paying their employees at times. Virtually the entire hospitality industry here has worked for them, most only lasting a day or a week. So I guess it says something that he lasted longer than six months. I can't say I blame him and I wasn't the one dealing with being humiliated on a day to day basis so I have to defend his position, even if it has put me in a new state of anxiety. He is already looking for new jobs. We have discovered since we've been here that the key to getting hired is knowing people and since he now knows people we hope that will work in its favor.

Of course now I have insomnia, very well aware that we have a multitude of choices and aren't "stuck" anywhere in this life but not sure which choice is best, or if we will be graced with the luxury of being where we want to be. I decided last night in my hours of not sleeping that I am sure that I do not want to move back to the city. Any city. I have often fantasized about living in a modern urban environment where you can walk everywhere or take public transportation but I think I'm pretty over that now. I have experienced how living in the country has removed us from so many toxic forms of media and commercialization that I'm not interested in going back to it, not even for more money. I know we don't think much about it when we are surrounded by all of these influences but getting away from it gives you a lot of perspective. Back in Florida if I were taking a trip to the grocery store for instance, I would probably turn on the local commercial radio station, pass billboards advertising all sorts of things, many inappropriate for children to see, pass commercially owned shopping malls, big box stores, and of course a multitude of people in sports cars and designer clothes looking to see and be seen. The kids down the street would play violent video games, carry cell phones, and talk incessantly about tv idols. We just don't have that here and are so blessed for it to be quite honest. The way I see it my kids have plenty of time to become adults, get out there and decide for themselves if they think their time is best spent watching American Idol or shopping at the mall, but during their most tender and impressionable years they are much better off without it.

All of this is great but will we have the luxury to actually stay in the country? I just don't know. Job probabilities are obviously better in a larger city with Riki's engineering background although there still wasn't anything when we were traveling a year ago. He would be an asset to any restaurant if they would give him a chance but this place is tight knit, sometimes hard to crack into without the right connections. So I don't know what will happen. I'm stubborn so I'll wait and see. One of our friends said something that I think is the sentiment of a lot of folks who live out here. "I'd rather struggle out here than go back to the city."

Where spiritual paths converge

2011-03-09T08:18:00.001-07:00

These past several years have certainly involved a lot of major life changes, many not so fun and a lot of living in a sort of survivalist mode. I believe that when these things occur we naturally look to the heavens for some sort of spiritual guidance because when all material things we are comforted by fall away we have nothing left to turn to. Maybe this is a blessing in disguise. It shows us how when we do have the material comforts that they either cause more complicated problems or we just aren't grateful for them anyway. Now that doesn't mean I have turned away from all material comforts, haha. That is so much easier said than done my friends. I can at least see where such wordly dependences lead though.

So where am I going with all of this? Well, first let me give a brief history of my own spiritual paths in this adult life. I spent my pre childbearing years as a self proclaimed pagan/hardcore feminist sort in earth based traditions. To be as brief as possible, after having children running around doing things like love spells or rituals for prosperity seemed a bit silly in the face of more important life complexities so for years this sort of fell by the wayside. Dozens and dozens of pagan/wiccan books along with tarot cards just sat on the bookshelf collecting dust. I called myself pagan friendly. Things went this way for years and when our life was turned upside down by the layoff/dramatic downsizing of living standards I was seeking once more when I found the local Buddhist center. I was at a point in my life where I had reached a dead end in terms of being content with earthly pleasures like food, drink, and material things and I had in fact realized that these things cause all sorts of problems, problems I still grapple with on a daily basis. Eastern zen/buddhism really got to the heart of these matters and we had a dear monk teacher at our center. They even had a kids' dharma class so the whole family could go simultaneously. Then of course we had to leave Florida.

I had high hopes for Buddhist centers out west. After all, I came from the south and this part of the country was full of free thinkers, right? Finding a sangha (Buddhist community) wasn't as easy as I thought it would be. On our travels I visited some places that left me feeling empty. Lay people would give teachings which seemed to me only to appeal to those living the western 9-5 corporate life. Where were the monastics? Once we settled into Taos I quickly discovered that the meditation centers here only had hours catering to the same 9-5 folks and of course no kids' classes. With Riki working nights and no babysitter there is no way I could expect my kids to sit zazen for an hour in silence. I started finding that western Buddhism wasn't fitting in with my expectations at all. At best it appeared to be watered down. It seemed that taking $1000 retreats was the best way to contact great teachers or to go on some pilgrimage to India to sit at the feet of gurus. This is sort of like the rich boy syndrome of all the 1960's bohemians and celebrities who flocked to India after finding that wealth was not the way to enlightenment. Well, since I'm not a rich boy or girl for that matter, where the heck do I fit in?

So I found myself recently drawn to Eastern Orthodox Christianity. We have been studying Old Testament this year for Ellery's curriculum and I saw how he has absolutely thrived on these stories, even more than when we studied Siddhartha last year. I've been listening to a lot of Rudolf Steiner's lectures about a more esoteric form of Christianity and things started to click in my head, how he talked about the evolution of world religions from Atlantis to Zarathustra to Buddhism to Judaism, and a culmination at the crucifixion. I started visiting a local Orthodox chapel and was enthralled by the divine liturgy service. It was as if all of my paths had converged at once. The ritual aspect with the smell of frankincense, the beeswax candles, and beautiful icons reminded me of my pagan years. The emphasis on eastern tradition and ascetics/saints reminded me fondly of my Buddhist studies, and the talk the priest did on the particular saint for that day reminded me of our waldorf homeschooling studies. It all clicked and there it was.

I've been super hesitant to talk about this. It seems now that I have purposefully moved away from the conservative south to hippie land that I am now a leper for even mere mention of Christianity. My friends, I have been there. I have spent years with very anti Christian baggage because I grew up believing that this religion meant that I should hate everybody who was different. Now I believe this is a hugely vast misinterpretation of the ancient Christian traditions because humanity has a difficult time grasping something that is ultimately, well, otherwordly. At any rate I have found waldorf education itself to be a crucial part of my healing process and seeking out different ideas about spiritual traditions I already had fixed ideas about.

So for the first time ever I started the practice of Great Lent this week. It will be forty days of fasting which is essentially a vegan diet. Once again I see how all of the great ancient religions of the east have used fasting as a way of spiritual discipline so it is something that automatically feels meaningful. You know, I've been feeling a bit like an outcast lately over all of this which shouldn't be anything new really. I've always joked about how I was too normal for the weird people and too weird for the normal people. That never changes. Well, yesterday I went next door to our sweet neighbors to unload my leftover dairy so I wouldn't be tempted and told them this was for Lent. Samara was curious and asked if I was raised in this and I just laughed and told her this was absolutely new for me. Then she complimented my cross necklace and talked about how inspired she was herself by orthodox services....finally, somebody who didn't have baggage and could at least respect this path. That is really all I am seeking these days but even that seems hard to find. Even Riki is being as supportive as he can but understandably troubled as well as bewildered by this whole transition, being a full fledged atheist that he is.

The light in this story I believe would be Ellery. This is a child who has grown up with no religious baggage. He has never been to church, read a bible, or been told to believe in any particular religion. Nothing has been taught as dogma. He has been to pagan bonfires, meditated at Buddhist centers, and now he has his own icon corner with prayer book. He went to his first liturgy last week and he was just in absolute awe. He had never been to church or seen anything like it. He is able to come to all of this with a sort of innocence many of us never had growing up because of the way things seemed forced or told to us in a finger pointing way. For that, my friends, I am truly blessed, and inspired to see where this journey takes us.

Signs of spring

2011-03-03T19:48:00.000-07:00

It really did feel like spring here today. The warm sun was more inviting than the cold indoors so we opened the front door to let some of it in. The kids were super excited when we got out the laundry washtubs deciding that the weather was finally mild enough to dunk our hands in cold water without freezing. Now I know we really must be adjusting to the different climate because the kids dashed out of the house in tshirts deciding that the upper 40 temps in the morning were that warm. We saw some lizards and even heard the chirping of little birds in the air. We can only hope that this means warmer weather to come, or more specifically I might add, that I can get my spring/summer wardrobe out to put on sandals and sundresses...okay, maybe not quite yet, but the promise of not having to wear leggings, thermals, or bulky sweaters sounds inviting. Even my initial excitement over wearing knitted items is beginning to wane.

I've spent most of the day alternating between cursing and praising this lovely spinning wheel I'm still getting accustomed to. I finally found my groove this afternoon and figured out how to draft while spinning at the same time instead of having to predraft everything. I'm real impatient to ply these two bobbins of plain white wool so I can move on to something a little more colorful. I got the most beautiful handpainted wool top at the local yarn shop called parrot wing. I've promised myself that once I get through this first "practice" skein I will start working on that. Then the real fun will begin.

Is it goodbye winter?

2011-03-01T20:07:00.000-07:00

This is a picture I had taken from inside the front door a couple of weeks ago. The snow has since melted and we haven't seen any extreme temperatures since. This was our first winter here so I wasn't sure what to really expect but it seems to be over. The highs are nearing 60 and it feels nearly like winter in Florida, lol. Well, it was magical while it lasted but I sure won't miss the energy costs, that's for sure.

Where to pick up after leaving off for so long

2011-02-24T15:32:00.000-07:00

The more time that goes by I have had a real hard time getting back to posting on the blog. I've been confused about which direction I wanted to go in with it. I've discovered some really pretty blog designs which seem to reflect more of who we are but then figured out that I would have to pay somebody hundreds of dollars to replicate said type of blog. The only reason this was something worth pursuing is because I understand the importance of a nice blog which generates a lot of traffic IF you are planning some kind of crafty business which needs said traffic. Then I got freaked out about all of it. I shrink from competition which I don't know is always a good trait. Having to do anything for the purpose of trying to make money just sucks the fun out of it for me and I know I've got to get over it at some point.

I also see all of these pretty blogs which seem to have little substance. There is this trend now for posts like "ten things I love" with pictures of clothes or jewelry or furniture people want. I have a weakness for these things myself but I don't want a blog completely focused on materialism. Sometimes I walk a fine line myself between what is art and what is wasteful consumption. Nevertheless, I would like to post pictures of cool thrift store finds or redecorating or a cool dress I bought on etsy for instance. I just wouldn't want it to shadow posts of real substance. And let's face it, not all of us mothers want to constantly post about our kids or homeschooling adventures. Sure, those things have an honorable place too but I do have interests outside just being a parent and I like to express that as well.

So here I am, kind of stuck with a plain blog design I'm not real fond of but not wanting to pay somebody else to fix it up for me...and the fact of the matter is I am nowhere near where I had hoped in starting any kind of handmade goods business anyway. Life gets in the way. Homeschooling gets in the way and I just don't have any product to sell as of yet. I just got a wheel which is super exciting but I've got to figure out how to use the darn thing first from learning on a drop spindle. The bottom line is that I had high hopes for the new year and that I was just going to get out there and start this business and be an artist. I think the enthusiasm was fine but I've still got so much trouble shooting to do. Aside from the evil voices in my head which tell me I'm not good enough to sell anything anyway, I have skills to improve upon like dyeing and spinning and figuring out my own patterns. Until I'm comfortable with all of those things I have no business putting product up for sale. In the end I guess I've been shying from the blog because I'm a little embarrassed that I haven't been able to make all of these things happen in the time frame I had hoped.

making valentines

February nature table

cute valentine gnomes

Winter hit us native Floridians much harder in the pocketbook than it did in terms of weather, which we weren't expecting. Business at the restaurant is starting to pick up a bit and I like to think that spring is a light at the end of a tunnel we are quickly approaching. For now I leave a few pictures of Valentine festivities and homeschool related stuff.

Developing the will

2011-01-06T13:23:00.001-07:00

The holiday season officially ended for us when Riki got his first day off in two weeks after a string of doubles, woo hoo! I played being single mom there for awhile so it was refreshing to actually have the whole family together. I never knew that having a husband working in the restaurant industry could make me so miserable about the holidays. Every single holiday event in town meant that he had to work so that everybody else could enjoy their family time out doing those things while ours was split apart. No doubt about it, being a server is a humbling position to say the least. I'm no scrooge. I just would have liked our family to go do some of the things around town that everybody else could or at the very least spend the time together at home.

So here we are, back to regular work schedule (thank goodness) with enthusiasm about the new year. I am diving headfirst into fiber dyeing experimentation as I had planned. I have to keep reminding myself that this is a slow learning process. I will try not to curse every time I realized I ruined a perfectly good skein of yarn I paid for....and other fiber artists will remind me that I can always dye it again (ugh). I do love the alchemy of it all....the surprise of not quite knowing how the colors will turn out in the end. I know that patience is important here and I'm reminding myself that it is okay if it takes a year to get really confident with this...maybe even some more workshops at the wool festival. It is okay if I don't burst into the new year selling handmade goods. If I am working on it, that is the most important thing and a great will developing skill.

Those who are in the waldorf community hear a lot about the developing the will. I am a firm believer in this, especially for children. When we haven't tamed our wills anything goes. We flit from one project to the next without finishing, give up easily, abandon any sort of routine to our lives, and forget to uphold ourselves to any sort of moral standards. I start to see patterns of this with Ellery and remember on my own childhood education. I had no will development whatsoever. We hardly had art or music anyway but when we did I gave up on projects very quickly when they didn't meet my high standards and of course no teacher taught me anything different. It is no surprise that as an adult I had no real talents or hobbies or skills because I couldn't follow through with anything. It has taken years...even into my thirties to remedy that.

So I know that I don't want this for my child. I want him to take pride in finishing something, even if he struggles with it. There is nothing admirable about growing up and never having to finish something or persevere with things that are challenging. Whether applying that sort of unruly will to careers or personal artistic endeavors it doesn't have positive results.

Fiber arts are a perfect way of developing the will. That is why waldorf schools usually start first graders with knitting. It requires patience to see it through to completion and it can also be very calming for children. Ellery decided to my dismay of course that he absolutely detests knitting. Since he has been doing it for several years at school and finished a couple of projects I decided to let it go so he could delve into other handwork related will developing skills.

So we are working on both of our wills....all the time through my own fiber arts goals and his learning through school. In fact, I am proud to say that he has been able to see the process through from sheep's wool to spinning it into yarn, dyeing it, and now he can choose what he wants to make it into (although I am told very specifically that he is NOT knitting it, lol). I look forward to seeing both of us carry more projects into completion as we discover who we are and what our life purposes can hold.

Camera very soon so I can take pictures!

A year in pictures

2010-12-31T13:29:00.000-07:00

Jetty Park, Fl

Brigid bread in the rv

New Orleans with new friends

disco party rv park style

Guadalupe National Park TX

Ruidoso, NM

Great Sand Dunes National Park CO

Taos sunset from our house

Taos mountain music festival (yes, that's me, the token girl)

Halloween Taos style

first snow

Christmas morning

A warm welcome to 2011!

2010-12-31T10:54:00.000-07:00

I'm ready to leave behind the ickiness of the last part of 2010. I'm also ready to get my butt in gear with some creative projects. I think that "resolutions" can have a negative impact on us. As westerners we are so caught up in this ego trip of being self critical so it seems like our plans for the new year always involve the cessation of some habit or something we dislike about ourselves. I know for me that can make the new year feel a bit like drudgery or going back to school after being off all summer.

So instead I like to think of these resolutions as being positive goals instead of self induced finger pointing. I am hoping to have another vegetable garden and get a spinning wheel! I am looking to overcome my fears and get on with being creative and making some kind of business out of it, even if I don't make a dime! Instead of berating myself for all of my weird hypocritic dichotomies I'm looking to develop more bodhichitta and to embrace the humanity of this diversity within, to not be ashamed of being human and imperfect or not fitting into the right mold for this or that group of people.

I am also ready to put 2010's knitting behind me. I confess to this terrible thing that happened around the holidays. I was determined to have hand knitted ornaments on my tree this year. Every year knit picks sells these cute ornament kits so this year around November I ordered one and started knitting. Oh, the ornaments are adorable itty bitty sweaters just as sweet as they can be. The thing of it is that I have loathed every moment of knitting the darn things. I should have known better. I am the anti sock knitter. I don't enjoy knitting on teeny tiny needles with teeny tiny yarn and itty bitty tedious details. No way. Give me a sweater with big bulky yarn or a hat and I'm fine. So basically I have spent the holidays knitting these things and not enjoying one minute of it. Sure, I enjoy the way they look on the tree but I would have rather not knitted them myself. Soooo.....I ended up only cranking out four of these things because I never wanted to pick up the project. I'm sitting in my nightgown right now determined to at least finish the last one I started before the new year. I can't wait to clear my end table off which is full of sad half finished knitting I haven't enjoyed. I am ready to start the new year with a fun project, something I WANT to knit that may not even be something I need or of practicality.

Last but not least I am getting my own little camera, a pink one at that. I'm so excited! The reason there are hardly any pictures on the blog is because Riki works so much and just doesn't have the time. It was a little hard convincing him as family photographer that I should start taking more pictures for the blog but it will be nice to be able to just snap a picture of the kids or the weather or something I knitted without waiting to ask him to do it and need it to be all perfect with photoshop (him being photographer and all). So look forward to more pictures in the new year! I think I'll even have Ellery start practicing too so I can be in some pictures.

So have a happy new year! When I get around to getting dressed I'll be setting up to ring in the new year with my own bottle of champagne by myself...kind of like Christmas. Oh well, what can you do, haha?

On the threshold of a new year

2010-12-29T14:55:00.000-07:00

I'm normally not too much into the new year. It is just the turning of a calendar really. This year however holds so much promise now that the holidays are behind us. I have so many plans for this year if we can make due with the economical situation and most of them have to do with sustainability to offset the financial strain. It couldn't be better timing to get several seed catalogs on a snowy day. It gave me fond memories of growing vegetables in Florida. Our beginner efforts in pots and in the city far exceeded any of our expectations. We had so many tomatoes, proliferating spinach, cherry tomatoes, sweet bell peppers, and more. One of the most satisfying experiences for me has to be picking my lunch out of my own yard at no expense.

So it has made me sad that we had to let go of that in pursuit of a new life somewhere else. Now there are new challenges since we live in a completely different climate with a different growing season. There is hope though. We have lots of sunshine with little shade (shade being our biggest enemy in Florida) and lots of large outdoor boxes waiting for planting. I'm already compiling my wishlist for what looks like it may grow here although I may be waiting until May to actually be able to plant. The seeds also represent the seeds within us all as we start a new year fresh with new beginnings.

As I complete end of the year homeschooling plans I also contemplate what our large building project will be for the third grade curriculum. We are considering a chicken coop or a rabbit hutch since I'm contemplating angora rabbits for fiber. We just have to wait and see what our permanency here looks like.

I can't think of a better afternoon spent than poring over seed catalogs with snow pouring outside and dreams of spring to come, not just the literal spring but the spring of our rebirth.

Winter days around the fire pit

2010-12-28T10:16:00.000-07:00

Hard to believe this child is already nine years old!

Willow with her super chic sunglasses, haha, and me with my glass of Fat Tire

Ah yes, the view from said fire pit

Rosemary Hill

2010-12-27T19:38:00.001-07:00

Christmas was as lovely as it could have been considering the circumstances of being alone with the children all day while Riki has worked nonstop doubles since Christmas eve. I was very grateful for the phone calls with various family members that day so I didn't feel so lonely. I'm not going to post warm fuzzy pictures for Christmas trees or the kids opening gifts. That's just not where I've been at this year. I'm actually a bit relieved for all of it to be over. Like many, I think that I always yearn for something more in the spirit of this season past all of the pretty decorations and frenzied materialism...

so here I look forward to the twelve holy nights....a different meditation and contemplation for each evening. I was just listening to a song that I was smitten with a year ago when my friend Darla loaned it to me to burn onto the ipod. It is a simple song called "Rosemary Hill." It has a sixties commune sort of feel about this beautiful place where everything seems just right. I remember sitting in the rv at Riki's mom's before we started our journey in the rv listening to that song and thinking about how my own "Rosemary Hill" was waiting out there...somewhere, if I could just get to it. I guess I imagined this as some sort of hippie shangri la place with women in white dresses with garlands of flowers in their hair, maybe some unicorns galloping around, lol, you get the idea. I sit here a year later listening to the same song and reminiscing about sitting in that rv with some cozy knitting, looking out on the lake on their property, and I find it almost laughable that as I sat there dreaming of faraway places I now sit here in faraway places dreaming of where I once was in an odd sort of way. So it occurred to me that "Rosemary Hill" is a state of mind more than a place. You can be in a very beautiful place and still be discontent as this past month or two has proven. There will always, always be discontent. You will always be searching, going after the next mirage, only to discover that it disappears just as soon as you get to it. That certainly doesn't mean I have warm fuzzy feelings about going back to live in toxic cities with sprawling development either. It just means that sometimes a state of mind is more important than an actual location, no matter where you are.

Counting our blessings

2010-12-23T17:29:00.000-07:00

I'm not going to lie. This past month has been rough. I haven't been posting much because I felt like I didn't have much of anything positive to say. Sure, the positive is always there if you can dig deep enough but when your immediate attention seems surrounded by fear it can be hard to dig far enough to find it. Since this has been our first holiday ever away from family it has been a bit more emotional. Granted, I didn't expect it to be so difficult but the financial constraints have compounded it all.

Thanks to the lovely woman at the health food store who helped me find a good St. John's Wort with Lemon Balm supplement inexpensively and to our family and friends, near and far, I am finding myself in better spirits. There are the cards and gifts that have trickled in from Florida. The tree is full of gifts for the kids from afar. There are the little things like the handmade candles my mom sent me and even better, the fed ex package I got from my friend Darla of all the candlemaking supplies I left behind. Then there are the two trees lovingly donated by locals and friends....the homemade pie, meat, and herbs our cagefree family friends brought over today along with their kind invitation to pick us up and take us to their house on Christmas day. Riki will be working a string of doubles the entire weekend so it will do us some good to get out of the house.

I would like to leave it on that note. Tomorrow night the kids and I will be watching the Grinch from netflix with some yummy organic eggnog topped with homemade whipped cream (mine with rum of course), and a candy cane on the side. Then they will each open the one gift a piece from us before the barrage of gifts from santa and family on Christmas morning. Riki will be here briefly in the morning before having to leave for work and we will spend the rest of the weekend celebrating with our new friends here in Taos.

How do we embrace beauty in our culture?

2010-12-14T11:06:00.001-07:00

I've come to realize that there is a huge backlash against beauty in today's society...and understandably so with the gross magnification of outward beauty that is especially pressed upon women. I know that I don't like being told by anybody how I should look or that I have to wear heels every day or be a certain weight or that if I don't laser/wax half of my body that I am not well groomed enough. Well, nobody likes being told how to look or what makes them acceptable in the eye's of a mainstream culture. That just isn't any fun...

but that's not what I'm talking about. When did those of us who identify with countercultures decide that beauty in general is bad? I've struggled with this for awhile because I'm a weird anomaly of sorts. I suppose I would fit into a fairly crunchy hippie type of category but the austerity of many folks who embrace a simple life is well, it's just not me. Ever since I can remember being a child I loved to dress up. I eschewed baby dolls for barbie dolls at an early age, not because I was reading fashion magazines when I was five, lol, but just because I preferred pretty dress up dolls over babies. I don't know of any teenage girl who isn't bombarded by images of impossible celebrity beautydom and like anyone else I was surely influenced by those things as I grew into that tender age of trying to figure out who I was as a person...

but I feel pretty confident as I am now in my thirties that no matter how hard I try I still have a need to surround myself with beautiful things. I am always particular about the objects I surround myself with and having some sense of artistic value there when possible. I still love to dress up and it only saddens me that my simple life doesn't offer me more opportunities to do that. The thing of it is that I don't feel some great pressure from society to wear makeup or high heels or certain clothes. I just find it to be fun....and I guess as a culture we have let obscene exaggerations of beauty make us believe that expressing yourself or your home in a way that is beautiful is wrong. Minimalism gone wild if you will. It is pretty clear that I'm not all that interested in most beauty standards because I refuse to shave and I have pretty messy dreadlocks but I still like to do my nails and wear makeup and my Chanel no.5. I am discovering that no matter how far I get from metropolitan areas where there is no necessity or pressure to look a certain way that I am still drawn to beauty.

As a spiritual path I have embraced the middle way. It seems the most peaceful existence really and renunciation can be a bit like giving more power to something as being inherently bad that only has as much influence on you as you allow it to in your own mind. Renunication is a valid path for some but I don't live in a monastery so it just seems silly. I'm working toward living in harmony with things that are considered "bad" and instead changing my mindset about them as neither good or bad but that they just are. I think beauty can be one of these things.
I know that we are all striving to be so eco conscious about these things, the chemicals in our makeup, hair dyes, and nail polish.....trying to simplify and buy clothes that are secondhand or at least fair trade. I myself shudder to think of the conditions in China where many expensive luxury goods are made...but that is a discussion for another day. There is a great book called "When Luxury Lost its Luster" for those interested in how luxury goods are manufactured and the few companies who use ethical practices.

The thing of it is that you can take away all the designer labels from the magazines and the celebrities. It is invigorating to see how Etsy for instance has created a huge following for indie recycled fashion. Beauty and fashion doesn't have to be what you see in magazines or on tv. It can be whatever you want that makes you feel good. Maybe that means dyeing your hair purple or doing your makeup a certain way. Maybe you don't like makeup but you love hippie vintage clothing like I do. I just don't think I will ever be sucked into this super minimalist jeans, tshirt, and no makeup thing, even out here surrounded by mountains. I've made changes. I no longer bleach my hair because of the chemicals. I try to use henna or other natural dyes. There are a lot of cosmetic companies making great strides to offer makeup with natural ingredients. It isn't perfect but there has been a lot of progress and I try to support those companies when I can.

I can see as well as many others how unreal beauty standards have been detrimental as a society. I personally get excited when I see photos or movies of women in the 60's 70's who had natural breasts and no bikini waxes, lol. I don't think that means however that we have to go to an unhealthy extreme in the reverse direction, unless of course that is who we are and what we find beautiful about expressing ourselves. As for me, my Chanel will forever remain steadfast right next to the patchouli oil in my bathroom.

Blog under construction

2010-12-10T07:00:00.000-07:00

Don't be alarmed by the weird changes that pop up on the blog throughout the month. If we had a huge chunk of time to just get it done I would do it but it looks like we'll be working on it in small increments to get the new look ready by the beginning of the year. Just so you know!

A local jaunt - Taos Pueblo

2010-12-09T01:05:00.000-07:00

As part of Ellery's homeschooling, that day's study was about Native Americans. Mind you the internet was down for over a week and as usual, a late posting of the visit. It's hard to believe that we have been in Taos since June-ish and had yet to see this historic place. So much history here dating back a thousand years and it was here all along for us to enjoy and ponder

Words of wisdom

2010-12-07T07:39:00.001-07:00

"Those trappings that make you feel guilty, let go of them."

This morning I sat down to a short meditation before everyone else got up at the usual crack of dawn. I was particularly looking for guidance on how to deal with our current shortfall of income and how to cope with it more gracefully since it is likely to snowball with rent being late and looming energy costs at hand. After all, I've been a rather miserable person to be around lately and then miserable for being miserable and feeling guilty about it, lol. So the above quote is what came to me this morning during meditation. It makes a lot of sense and gives me some solace. This holiday season does present itself with many trappings on all sorts of levels, doesn't it? It is easy to forget that we live in one corner of the world and that many other places do not celebrate Christmas at all. In fact, we have been lighting our candles for Hanukah and remembering that even Jewish people do not celebrate Christmas....so why get caught up in all the bad feelings? Of course it is much easier to succumb to the guilt with kids. It is as if you have a big red guilty button already in place just waiting to be pushed.

So I started thinking about these "trappings" that are keeping me in a rotten mood. I'm beginning to see how this is all unfolding. I had a certain image or plan in my head for how my old fashioned Christmas was going to look like. It seemed awfully simple to me but there were nevertheless certain requirements such as having a Christmas tree in the house by now, being able to buy some real dishes so we could have a holiday meal on something other than plastic camp dishes, and being able to do lots of crafty Christmas projects as well as baking. These seem like a far cry from an over commercialized holiday but I didn't consider the fact that they still require considerable amounts of money, lol. It all seems so simple in Little House on the Prairie but I guess it is easy to forget that they didn't have to pay rent or energy costs. They didn't have to buy a tree. They just went out and chopped one down. They grew most of their own food as well. Yeah, it's a bummer sometimes still being tied into this dependency on utility companies, grocery stores, and landlords. The kicker is that we can't just go claim our land for free like they did back then and well, I don't have the cash to buy a nice parcel of land....soooo....dependency on modern times it is. Acceptance is key. We can't obviously go back in time or make things happen that aren't possible, can we?

So I like the idea of focusing on the trappings. They didn't seem much like trappings before in my simple old fashioned Christmas fantasy but when you put modern society into perspective compared to how things were back then, even a simple holiday isn't quite so simple anymore.

So today I will focus on not worrying about when we can actually buy a tree, whether I can get all those baked goods made and sent out in time as I had planned, whether or not we can make all of these beautiful waldorf inspired Christmas decorations for our nature table and home, not paying attention to all of the extraordinary sales from my favorite online companies flooding my inbox that I still can't take advantage of, and accepting the fact that those nice gift cards for discounts from said companies will indeed expire before I can actually use them. Whew. Just getting those things off my back helps. It isn't the end of the world. My kids won't be deprived as long as we have food in the house....oh, that reminds me of the last one too...not feeling like the worst mom in the world because I have to buy the cheapest canned foods instead of fresh organic foods and forego those multivitamins for awhile. Seriously. These seem like such horrible parenting offenses but if we can keep a global perspective and realize how many people in the world over don't have access to such luxuries, we can calm our minds a little and have compassion.

I had high hopes of warm fuzzy feelings about this holiday season and it stinks that it hasn't turned out that way so far but I realize that perhaps I have far more important lessons to learn this year so that I can carve out something more meaningful next time around. At least I can look at it this way. Last time this year I was living somewhere with constant sirens, neighbors yelling obscenities with each other on a regular basis, and a view of nothing but house after house sandwiched together. This year I've got panoramic mountain views I can enjoy from my built in outdoor fire pit with no sidewalks, no sirens, and no crime. It isn't all bad.

The art of being present

2010-12-04T09:40:00.000-07:00

There is never a more difficult time of year to remain present than right now close to the holidays. After all, there seems to be so much planning involved...what to buy people, when you will have the money to buy it, when to ship if that is necessary, what sort of entertaining you will do and planning that, the list goes on and on.....that combined with the financial downs of the past month have pushed me full force into that trap once again. Over the course of my adulthood I have suffered many insomnia issues. Getting to sleep is usually not a problem but staying asleep is. I would get caught in the endless storyline of my past, present, and future.....all the what ifs, all the fears, feelings of scarcity, worthlessness, etc. After reading some Pema Chodron last year I started to find ways to cope with this. Instead of getting caught in the storyline I would simply name the emotion and focus on that. It was much easier to get back to sleep when there wasn't a constant inner monologue in my head. Then if I had the bouts of anxiety with heart palpitations or whatnot instead of letting it spiral into all sorts of fear based assumptions of what was happening I would simply focus on exactly what was happening as a fact, nothing more. I suppose this is a bit like cognitive therapy which I've always supported more than the pharmaceutical route.

At any rate, I've found myself slipping into old patterns lately, same storylines dominating waking and sleeping hours. So my practice right now is going to be focusing on the present. Sure, it is hard. I have to do some sort of planning but I cannot dwell on it with all sorts of emotions and I most definitely cannot let it come into my sleeping hours. I had the pleasure yesterday of picking up a local cult classic at the bookshop called "Be Here Now" by Ram Dass. I've heard of it for quite some time, even knew the story. There is a great documentary on instant play at Netflix btw called "Fierce Grace" about Ram Dass. I would highly recommend it for anyone struggling with issues surrounding chronic illness, aging ,or death. At any rate, reading this book which was written several decades ago about his luxurious upbringing, prestigious Harvard professorship, and then gradually his quest for spiritual enlightenment which started with psychedelics and eventually led him to India where he found many answers. "Be Here Now" reminded me of all the ego trappings and how my neurotic side has eclipsed all other common sense lately. Last night I had the most peaceful night sleep I have had in a long time because I gave no power to the storyline or inner monologues. I just breathed into the present, a time set aside for solitude and sleep with no other requirement but to rest. Being in the present moment, the sound of nothingness, the black night, the faint buzz of the space heater in the background. This being in the present is so ridiculously simple and yet so elusive in the business of modern day culture.

I've been disappointed with how I've been handling stress and life circumstances lately but I've also realized what is missing. Back in Florida we had found the perfect sangha which basically means Buddhist community at a dharma center. We had a great spiritual teacher there and it was a lot like church for other faiths, even on Sundays like a traditional church with a kids' dharma program like Sunday school. I was really finding my groove and it was one of the few things I was sad to leave behind in Florida. Somehow I thought I would find something similar here though. I'm sure there are more Buddhist centers out here than in Florida. Nothing has lined up though. The local Buddhist centers all gather in the evenings when Riki is working and I have no way to get there...and even if I did none of them offer kid programs. It is just unrealistic to expect small children to sit in a quiet meditate session for a period of around an hour. So there it is. I still haven't found a community/teacher to help keep me on a spiritual path. I'm certainly not implying that this is the only way to be on a path but for me I can see where just being around the energy of the people and teachers helped keep me going until next week's event.

So I'm doing the best I can solo with no community support and I'm having to offer a little compassion for myself in realizing that is all I have....myself and a few books I come across and actually have time to read every once in awhile...and trying to make that enough.

Goodbye November, welcome December

2010-12-01T06:47:00.001-07:00

November sure went out with a bang for us and not in a celebratory way. I spent Thanksgiving day in the ER thanks to this "New Mexican flu" as I've dubbed it that I got from Ellery. All of my life I have never had a stomach flu which included pains that were akin to childbirth. On the second day of my said pain as I sat rocking and moaning just as I did when I was in labor with Willow we decided that there was no choice but to go to the hospital....again. Bear in mind that we still had no running car until this past weekend so we had to wait on a ride to take us there...and come pick us up late that night. It embarrasses me to say that we have been to various hospitals more times in this past year of leaving Florida than we have in the nine years since Ellery was born. It is also ironic to consider that I have never had to go to the ER during any of the long stints when I actually had health insurance....only when we haven't had it. I usually pride myself on being that person who never goes to the doctor or the hospital. This year it has just happened. Debilitating pain and bloody injuries (when Willow fell off her bike in Carlsbad) are sort of necessary ER visits in my opinion.

So it has been interesting to think about how my perspective on things has changed since we settled and moved out of the rv. I'm starting to believe that living on the road is a way of almost cheating the inertia of day to day living and of course fostering an ability to live in the present. When you are always moving, even if it is only a month at a time, there is no attachment to anything there. You only have open road ahead of you. It is easy to let go of the past, anticipate a completely unknown future, and live fully in the present. The real trick is to have this same mindset when you are setting still and I am experiencing that now. Some of the optimism and promise we had when we first got here is starting to fall into drudgery again, the same mood I sensed from people immediately when we removed ourselves from rv parks where there is a certain lightness you can't find amongst working class folks.

So we are looking forward to an inner light for the month of December to outshine the dreariness of a tourist dependent economy that isn't so great right now but is what we rely on to pay the bills. What was once paycheck to paycheck in the corporate world is day to day now. We start celebrating Hanukah today as part of our third grade curriculum. We are taking it easy with school this month so that we can fully enjoy the spirit of the season, baking, crafts, and some of the winter festivals. I am liking the idea of celebrating all of these Victorian inspired mini events of the season instead of just one big bang at Christmas as our culture is accustomed to. Reclaiming holiday traditions which also focus more on inner work than materialism is something absolutely worth reviving in modern society.

The sun rises over the mountains and I'm hoping we can wash away the ugliness of November as we try to capture the magic of December.

Trying to de stress and don't buy from toysrus

2010-11-22T10:33:00.000-07:00

I really look forward to a more lighthearted post. I'm sure it is coming. I just don't know when. The wheel is always turning, isn't it? Sometimes you are at the top and sometimes at the bottom. Right now it just so happens that we are at the bottom I suppose. Brokedown car with no way to get to the store....certainly can't walk to one, this nasty virus that hit Ellery first so bad that he had to go to the ER and now I've been blessed with the same gut wrenching stomach pains for several days...and the only person who is there at your disposable to help isn't the best influence to be around either. And now Toysrus....

For quite a number of years now I have tried to do my best to support local and/or handmade type of toys and businesses. There are many reasons for that and this is one of them. Riki's mom generously sent us some money for the kids' birthdays which of course, are a week apart. There aren't a whole lot of places in Taos to buy toys so mail order really is the best option. Since there were some things Ellery wanted at Toysrus and they offered free shipping I decided to order grandma's gifts from there so that she could kind of pick out in her local store what I would buy. For whatever reason Toysrus puts my single order into two different packages and although their website says they will be shipped UPS, one is shipped ground and another a different UPS service. Well, we have a weird shipping situation here because we cannot receive physical mail at our address. We can receive UPS or fed ex directly to the house but we need a PO Box for anything shipped through the postal service. So I received the package from Toysrus with Ellery's gift but not the one with Willow's. I find out that the package was delivered by UPS to the post office and thus sent back to Toysrus because for some ridiculous reason it was sent a different tier of shipping than the one I received, all ordered the same day at the same time.

Soooo....I call Toysrus with my dilemma. You see, by the time they receive the package back Willow's birthday will be past since it is Monday. Their customer service is appalling. First off, all of the people working at the call center are new. They will not allow me to talk to a physical supervisor because they are all supposedly busy and I must wait 24 hours for a phone call. The best they can offer me is a credit which will take 5-7 days to process, after her birthday is over. Why can't they simply send me another package with the items I ordered and expedite the shipping to get here by the weekend? They have evidence through tracking that the items are on their way back to them. Is Toysrus as a huge corporation so short on profit that they cannot accommodate me or my little girl whose birthday is coming up until my package is received?? This is just bogus. They suggested I reorder now and when they receive it they will issue a refund and I explained that I don't have the money lying around to do that, not to mention that they will never receive my business again. So they cannot offer me money in my bank account or physical goods until after her birthday is passed....and I ordered almost two weeks ago to be sure they would get here in time.

I am just so livid right now and exasperated. We have no car. Riki is bumming rides to work. Since he is working Thanksgiving I need to buy stuff by tomorrow at the latest so that I can start preparing on Wednesday so that we can have dinner early in the day before he gets to work....and now I have to figure out Willow's birthday since I can't just go out and buy new gifts until I have the money to do it, not to mention that I can't replace the same items because nobody here carries them. And on top of that I'm sick.

I keep thinking in the back of my mind that I have all the knowledge to cope with all of these things at once. Be calm. Realize that life is everchanging and you can't control it. That things could be a lot worse. I'm trying. I really am. I told both customer service people at Toysrus that I realize this isn't their fault. I just can't seem to muster anything better than that right now. I'm just waiting for that wheel to turn again.

Time to buckle down with grace and humility

2010-11-19T21:38:00.000-07:00

Money hasn't been so good at the restaurant this past week. Former $100 a day tips have now dwindled to around $30 a day. We were told that the season would slow down which means that anyone making money from tourism will suffer some kind of loss. Ski season kicks off next week which is said to bring more people into town. Right now it is just too cold and not enough going on to entice people to visit. Locals who work in this economy year round are prepared for this. They know it is coming so I suppose that they set back money when it's real good in the summer as a cushion for the winter. Unfortunately for us and the timing of Riki getting this job we didn't have that knowledge or opportunity early enough so here we are....right before the holidays no less and remember how I promised to not be stressed out this year? Well, luckily I did go ahead and buy things for the kids already so I have that burden off my back. It is what it is. Our monthly expenses are minimal. It just means that we have to be very mindful of where any extra money goes...no more eating out or shopping exclusively at the local health food store either. I am determined to go through this gracefully and to be humbled by it. We found out last week that Riki has to work Thanksgiving and at first I thought I would feel sorry for myself because we are not used to a job where you have to work holidays....but then I thought about all of the people in retail who work holidays. I realized that there is nothing any more special about us than anybody else working those hours. You just suck it up and do it. I really appreciate the idea that suffering is universal. At first this sounds like an awful thing to say but there is a real sense of connection to humanity when you realize that your plight isn't unique or more important than anybody else's. It just is. Sure, the timing is awful. I was hoping to have some money to introduce us all to winter sports and that just may not happen. In some ways I like the challenge in the same way I like the challenge of trying to conserve energy and see just how far we can go with it or without it I should say.

I also realize how much better off we are in a small space with cheap rent in these circumstances. Ever since we've moved here I've been pining away for that earthship next door. I swear that it almost taunts me just to sit there, as if to say, "haha, you are living in that crummy little house when you could be living here." Oh, it is beautiful. It has plenty of space, the lovely fireplace, clawfoot bathtub, you name it... but the rent is over double what we pay now. Then I imagine how much more dire our finances could be if we were stuck in a house that was that much a month. I've never been big into the house poor thing. As much as I love a beautiful house like the next person I don't like the idea of being trapped in it, never able to go out to eat, travel, or spend a dime on anything else just so I can live in it. When I remind myself that I'm not a victim of circumstance and that I've made certain choices for a reason these weaknesses don't bother me as much.

I was also reminded of simplicity when we visited the Pueblo today. This was a field trip as a part of Ellery's Native American lesson block we are wrapping up. The Pueblo is unique in the fact that it is the only southwestern Pueblo structure that is still a working community where people actually live there and it is much like it was when built in the 1300's. It wasn't crowded due to the season and the cold but that made it even more enjoyable to visit with the people there. You can't actually go inside of any homes but many former ones were made into shops where you can get an idea of the scale of these living spaces. They really are small with low ceilings and small windows (to protect from early spanish invaders). They have two rooms....one for living/sleeping and another for cooking. All of the little converted shops had their cozy fires inside with the intoxicating smell of pinon burning of course. Walls are falling apart here and there. Furniture is old and weathered. There is no electricity, only propane. We talked to one shop owner who showed us his lunch, beans in a can. Nevertheless, there is so much art and culture there. The people are friendly. It reminds me that we will all get by no matter what. We may not have our little luxuries but look at all of the beauty that surrounds us out here.

The Pueblo also has a Christmas eve event I would love to start as a new family tradition. There are bonfires, a huge procession where they carry the Virgin Mary (they are mostly converted to Catholicism with some of the old earth based symbolism), and it is said to be much like such a celebration hundreds of years ago here. That is just incredible to me coming from cities with crowded parades and holiday events which all center around shopping. In fact I was amazed to open the paper the other day and find that all of the black Friday sales here are craft fairs, lol. How cool is that?!

So maybe that is the lesson to learn from this. I said that I wanted simple, quiet, old fashioned holidays this year. Sometimes you get what you ask for.The challenge is of course how to maintain all of the frugality and simplicity in a predominantly commercialized culture. At least I can say that I can't think of a better "non commercial" environment to weather out the slow season and figure out how to manage it all. It will be a true test to the values I espouse but don't always entirely live up to, that's for sure.

Our first snow

2010-11-16T13:31:00.000-07:00

Well, it was coming down yesterday. But unfortunately, we had to take Ellery to the ER for his stomach ache that got worse and worse. It appears he's okay and that it is some sort of intenstinal infection that should run it's course. But he missed the snow falling. Alas, he enjoyed the morning after along with Willow.

Enjoy!

Rik

New year brings long awaited endeavors

2010-11-13T17:40:00.000-07:00

I haven't talked much about this but I think I've finally got the guts to move forward with starting a handmade business. Living in a place where there are constant craft fairs and fiber arts enthusiasts makes it almost ridiculous to not make something of it. Everybody is an artist here it seems and it is actually acceptable. Taking some spinning and dyeing workshops at the wool festival has really given me a boost and some much needed incentive to move forward. I think the money was well spent although I wasn't so sure at the time, haha.

I just want to say more than anything that reading blogs from fellow aspiring artists has been my biggest inspiration and not in the way you might think. Some people get all inspired by reading others accomplishments and while I'm not saying this is untrue for me, it is actually being able to relate to feelings of insecurity that helps motivate me. When I read blogs from you wonderful artists who are mothers and homeschoolers and sharing your feelings of insecurity I realize that there isn't anything inherently wrong with me or my craft. I'm just human. If other women making beautiful art can have these same feelings of inadequacy and comparing to others only to feel not good enough then we are very alike after all and I shouldn't feel that I'm not good enough. That has been my biggest obstacle for a long time now and I'm so immensely relieved to discover that everybody else has the same feelings I do! Now I can begin to move forward.

So what exactly am I planning to do? I feel like I've been running in place for awhile because I've been too focused on money, not even that I need/want to make a lot of it. Heck if I could sell one thing that would be awesome. It is more like I have stressed out over trying to decide what sort of things to make that people want to buy and how to structure a business from a "make money" perspective. I've been reading from inspirational writers like Wayne Dyer to throw this stuff out the window but I didn't listen and it just kept stressing me out. So now I'm finally doing it. I'm not going to worry about the money part at all. Sure, I'm going to be as business savvy as I can in terms of marketing. I will have to sign up for facebook (sigh, I know, I'm like the only person alive aside from my friend Darla from back in Florida who doesn't have an account), twitter, buy a website, revamp the blog, etc. However, I'm just going to make what I enjoy creating without getting caught up in what styles most people are into, what colors of yarn will sell better, etc. Sure, these things have a place but not so much that I should be discouraged from doing anything from the get go.

So I have a plan. I've got to come up with a business name, fairly settled on one but not announcing it until I'm absolutely certain. I need business cards, labels, a website, and luckily I have a husband who can photograph everything without having to pay anybody else to do it. I've got to consider myself lucky on that one, right? So what exactly am I going to sell anyway?

I've been thinking about this one for awhile. I think I would be bored doing the same thing over and over, not to mention there is benefit to diversifying. So for now I am going to start with a combination of handspun art yarn, handpainted yarn with natural dye extracts, and some small knitted items like slouchy hats. It is a lot like Riki putting his photography in the gallery. Maybe it is a huge risk and nothing will sell. You never know but you will always wonder what if you did try. Moving out of Florida is sort of our experiment in seeing if we can be our own entrepreneurs at a grassroots level in a place where art is a way of life. I've read so many inspiring stories of local people doing just that. Sometimes it takes years but you've got to start somewhere.

I suspect the blog will be evolving with this as well. It doesn't mean I'm going to turn this into a marketing tool only. I'm still the kind of person who will get personal and down and dirty about pretty much everything in life. I will just be turning the focus a bit more toward my fiber arts and supporting other crafters. I'm all about the karma of uplifting others in similar ventures to see that positive energy come back.

People really don't see pictures of that stuff. I can't tell you how long since I've updated ravelry either. It is just that friends/family would typically rather see pictures of the kids than a skein of yarn I handpainted, lol, and I completely understand that...really I do.

So I just want to give a heads up...and again thank all of those fellow crafters (especially other mothers juggling so many things at once) who have inspired me to get off my butt and really follow my bliss.

pictures!

2010-11-11T14:39:00.001-07:00

making our martinmas lanterns

the kids with their new "cat hats" I knitted

awesome hat I bought from an online friend's etsy shop, mousiemasala

cozy sweater I made

more hand knitted goodness

Martinmas

2010-11-10T19:25:00.001-07:00

One of my favorite waldorf festivals is Martinmas. The story goes that a frenchman was returning from war when he saw a half naked man huddling under a bridge in the cold. He tore his jacket in half and gave a piece to the man. Upon returning home he had a dream that the man under the bridge was actually Christ. Then he gave up his sword and spent the rest of his life helping the poor. Thus he became St. Martin. Of course there are many variations but that is the general idea. When Ellery was still in school we would go to a lantern walk every year where the children would walk with little handmade lanterns and tealights. Naturally we wanted to continue this tradition. We made our lanterns and had our own walk in the back area at dusk while we sang "My Lantern" from the wynstone series. We also learned this song on flute as well. Then we came back to eat some rosemary lentil soup waiting on the stove and followed it up with some homemade hot cocoa. Willow had such a great time since this was her first lantern walk and she was so excited. I also adopted a new tradition of knitting something for the kids to present for the holiday. I spent the last two days knitting mittens and staying up way too late doing it I might add. I've never knitted mittens being from Florida and all so the thumbs were a huge pain in the you know what and didn't turn out very well but the kids are delighted with them anyway....thank goodness. It is wool and warm...that is all that matters right? I just love these winter festivals and the whole theme of light in the darkness.

There is a certain magic in the air anyway as we all anticipate the first snowfall. We know it is coming but just don't know when. Yesterday we had a few snow flurries in the morning. Ellery came inside saying "it's snowing outside!!" Well, not quite. You could see some of it in the air but by the time it reached the ground it was just water along with the rest of the rain.

After three days of straight knitting I'm taking a break tonight, lol, only to start a new project tomorrow I'm sure. This is that time of year. I just don't have the time to knit everything I want to for the holidays and for gifts. One thing for sure though is that this year I am going to knit some tree ornaments and stockings. I decided that those items are on the top of my priority list this season.

Early bedtime tonight and perhaps snow in the morning. Who knows...these forecasts aren't always accurate, are they? It will come eventually. We can all feel it in the air, very cold air these days I might add, haha. Yes, I've been wrapping myself in hand knitted bliss when I go out. I still haven't determined what is the maximum number of knitted items one can fashionably pull off wearing at once, especially when they don't match.

Here's to a good night sleep with no dreams of mitten thumbs...oh, and a few pictures tomorrow. I promise.

Looking back

2010-11-04T11:14:00.000-06:00

For the first time since the pay cuts, the layoffs, and the gradual downsizing of our lifestyle I went through and looked at some of our family pictures from the last several years. I really didn't think much of it but when I started going through I realized just how far we've come from where we were. I don't necessarily mean that in a warm, fuzzy way either. I realized last night that when things went down and what I mean by that is that when it became evident that Riki's career was at imminent threat, I just started walking forward. I didn't wallow in the present. I didn't look back. It would be too painful. I didn't give myself a chance to process those emotions. Instead it was kind of like survival mode and figuring out what to do next while keeping our chin up so to speak. I looked for the positive in everything. Moving into a much smaller house meant cheaper rent and utility bills, even if it wasn't exactly what we wanted. Getting rid of everything and moving into the rv meant new adventures and standing by a much lost value of minimalism in our society. Nevertheless I have to admit that I'm human. Sometimes I know what is right but that doesn't mean I always feel good about it or that I don't long for certain luxuries. So it sort of blindsided me when I went through these pictures and felt a tremendous sense of loss. I saw pictures of beautiful homes we lived in, nothing extravagant mind you...it isn't like we were ever in any upper class, but just places that were cozy, stylish, and had a lot of character. I remember having a warm fireplace to sit at in the evenings, a bright bathroom with many luxurious bubble baths, a large bedroom where I could retreat to read a book or a magazine with a glass of wine. I was much thinner and didn't look like I walked out of a barn. I had a stylish wardrobe. There were many music festivals and weekends at the beach. Ellery went to school and I had a quite taken for granted luxury of many hours in a day when I was child free, nevermind homeschooling.

I realize all of this sounds contradictory to the sort of values I am usually talking about. However, I also think it is important to show that we are all human with flaws, with insecurities, indecision, and sometimes we do miss luxuries, even if we know we don't need them or in some cases they may be at the exploit of another group of people. I'm no exception. Here is the kicker though, the moral of the story if there ever was one. I never, ever during any of those moments felt privileged or content or actually appreciated any of the things I had. None of it. Not for one second. We still complained about not having enough money, not having a house as nice as somebody else's, or another car, etc. In some ways it is as if a cruel joke of karma has been played upon me...or has it? Before I play the victim card which was super easy for me to do in past years I want to consider the choices I have made to get where I am now.

I once remember my brother asking me why we drove around beat up cars all the time? I mean, how disgraceful, right? How deplorable and unworthy of me as a human being to lower myself to not have a new car. I simply explained that this was not a priority of mine. Life is about choices and tradeoffs. The fact that I didn't have a car payment enabled me to use that money in other ways, like traveling or buying clothes if I wanted to. I told him that in a perfect world I would like to have it all, just like anybody else, but that I made a conscious choice that I was not willing to play the game needed to have those things. I always joke that while most people are striving to make as much money to have as many things as possible that I have a reverse mentality. What is the least amount of money I can make to get by and not be rushing around all the time so I can have quality family time? I guess that is my "game." Sometimes I'm not enthusiastic about it either. That doesn't mean I'm less stressed out I suppose. I'm just stressed out about different things.

So naturally as I sit here looking back at old photos I'm going to feel some pangs of loss. I never envisioned having a bathroom the size of a closet with no bathtub or an itty bitty electric "fireplace" instead of a real hearth or painted concrete floors instead of shiny wood floors. Tradeoff. I no longer live in a beautiful indoor space but have an amazingly breathtaking outdoor space I could never have had in that past. Sometimes it is hard to figure out what we really want. Sometimes in my case you know what the right choice is but you don't necessarily feel good about it. That sort of self discipline has ruled my life in the past year. As much as I miss my gorgeous shiny bleached blonde hair I know that the chemicals are too awful to justify such vanity. I have a hard time accepting that I can no longer pound beers and wine much less martinis without being physically ill for an entire day. I know that big houses and fireplaces and bathtubs don't ultimately make people happy. After all, I wasn't when I had them...but there is that human craving. So that's where I'm at, acknowledging that craving and trying to figure out how to overcome it sometimes.

You must understand that I've long joked about having one foot in Little House in the Prairie and one in Sex and the City. There has always been a duality there that is hard to deny. Integrating the two peacefully and maintaining your set of personal morals and values is tricky. I'm not perfect and I know a lot of folks have a much better iron will than I do when it comes to setting personal boundaries about lifestyle choices.

Homeschooling can be draining when you look at other blogs and feel inadequate or your kids fight all day or you just feel like you are constantly planning. However, I'm not willing to subject my kids to public school and I can't afford private school anymore so this is the choice I've made. I think it's okay to admit that it isn't always rosy and easy.

So for those who read my article on the other blog and felt it was a little too optimistic, here is the honesty of the inner struggles I deal with from time to time. Riki asked me last night if I felt unhappy with our current situation and I said "no, it's just a different set of tradeoffs. It's a matter of which set of tradeoffs you choose and then working with what you got." That's all you can do in life anyway....live in the present...and deal with what cards are dealt to you, the good and bad. Sometimes it's bliss and enlightenment. Sometimes it's suffering and guilt and craving. That's just how it goes in this earthly form and we try to learn what we are supposed to while we are here I suppose.

Read all about it!

2010-11-02T07:26:00.002-06:00

Our story is being featured this morning on The Middle Finger Project for the fear exposed series. Go on and check it out....

http://www.themiddlefingerproject.org/

2010-10-27T14:18:00.000-06:00

snow capped mountains

Solomon's Temple

ark in progress

lesson block on shelters

autumn nature table

Magic of the fall season continues

2010-10-25T21:29:00.001-06:00

Each morning this past week we wake up to find the mountains covered in mists. Then we all wait patiently for the mists to part and reveal which part of the mountaintops are covered in snow. However, the past few days the weather has been so cloudy that the mountains have not obliged us with a peek through the veils. It reminds me of Mists of Avalon when the priestesses would part the mists to reveal the magical land of Avalon. It is like magic.

Driving to town has been a feast for the eyes lately. The winding country roads are covered in trees with the most brilliant yellows and oranges. As we go downhill we get this sweeping view of the valley down below in all of its autumn glory. It is amazing to drive by and watch the yellow leaves blowing everywhere. Then of course there is the backdrop of the mountains. I understand that many of those trees will lose their leaves completely in the next week or so.

We visited our cagefree family friends up in the canyon yesterday. It is generally about ten degrees cooler than it is here. I got a real taste of the cold to come when I got out of the car and the bitter wind whipped my shawl nearly off of my body. Luckily we were then greeted by a warm fire inside. Oh, how I miss having a hearth, a real one....and how nice it would be to have one in a climate where it truly does get cold. I'm not going to spend the whole season complaining when there are so many things to be thankful for but I can assure you that the two things I will be pining for all season are a hearth and a bathtub.

As usual I am a bit nutty over energy efficiency. Why else would I spend most nights sitting in almost darkness with candles and oil lamps lit? I'm sure it makes little difference compared to CFL lighting but I'm weird like that....so now my mind is trying to figure out the most efficient way to heat this place. I have a fancy looking fake fireplace that so far seems pretty crappy on the heat output. We have a small ceramic space heater that has been a lifesaver, especially in the rv. That thing puts out a lot of heat. We put it on upstairs last night and I woke up thinking I was in a furnace I was so hot. Then we have this huge monster of a propane heater that I'm a little afraid of. So I'm trying to figure out which heating methods are going to be cheapest and most energy efficient. Electric? Propane? I'm not really sure. What I do like about the propane is that it seems to have a thermostat setting whereas the heater will simply run constantly. It is hard to say at this point. I'm used to paying highest energy costs in summers with AC but it is a switch here with using more energy in the cooler months. The cloudiness has really kept it cooler in the house than usual. As long as there is sun it really heats things up with the huge windows. New Mexico seems to have plenty of sunny days. I would almost gather to say more than Florida so I'm thinking this cloudy weather will be in the minority. I hope.

There is a true wildness about the weather here today. Looking outside there are homes dotting the landscape but still so much untouched nature to experience. The winds are ferocious. I think I am beginning to get used to them...that or they don't phase me anymore because I remember being so petrified when the winds would rock the rv. Winds outside don't bother me anymore when I'm in a house, especially such a solid structure as this. It has been howling most of the day and night though, rain on and off....and mists completely shrouding the mountains in the distance. Supposedly there could be snow showers tonight. I don't really know what that means...if there could actually be snow on the ground or not. One thing for sure is that this week has indoctrinated me rather quickly into some bitter cold temperatures.

Florida in January

2010-10-21T11:44:00.000-06:00

No, we didn't move back to Florida but this weather is what I call Florida in January....which makes me a bit nervous about what weather here in January might actually be like, hehe. This morning the snow is covering the tops of the mountains and I hear the countdown to ski season is quickly upon us. Nevertheless I have been in sheer hand knitted bliss this past week or so. I get to wear cowls and pick which of the ten hats I knitted but never get to wear I'm going to choose today. Then there are fingerless gloves and scarves. I'm knitting the ever popular Bella mittens right now (no, I'm not a Twilight fan but I love the cable pattern!).

The holidays are creeping up and I'm determined to be prepared this year. Work is really slowing down for Riki which means less tips. It is a bit scary but I feel like the universe always provides what you need, even if it may not be exactly what you want. Ideally I would love to get all of my shopping/ordering for the kids done so that I can actually enjoy the spirit of the holidays this year without that impending knot in my stomach feeling for needing to do so many things.

I'm particularly disgruntled about toy prices this year. We really strive to buy toys that are made of mostly natural materials and not mass produced in China. Boys aren't too terribly difficult in this area and neither are babies/toddlers because they play with such small, simple things but boy they got you over a barrel with girls. Willow is all about fairies and princesses and all that typical girl stuff. There is just no way that I can afford to pay $300 for a fairy or dollhouse in one of these waldorf catalogs. I don't even know how you can justify that kind of cost. Then it doesn't even include the dolls or furniture. $18 for one tiny doll. One! I'm talking about something half the size of a barbie doll here. I realize that it costs more money to buy quality handmade items but these are also somewhat mass produced pieces in popular catalogs. I don't care if they come from Germany. It is sad to think that on a tight budget one may have no choice but to buy cheap plastic crap from China from Walmart. It tends to sicken me how the whole waldorf lifestyle only caters to the elite. Then it is no wonder that half of the people involved have no idea what Steiner was actually talking about in terms of education because they are so caught up in the materialism of all of these things.

The kicker is that the kids have virtually no toys. We had to leave a lot of stuff behind when we moved into the rv. They basically fight over one set of wooden blocks they have had for years or role play with stuffed animals. I'm not saying this is a bad thing. I believe strongly in open ended creative play. However when your kids are constantly fighting over the few things they do have I think they deserve a few nice playthings. It is just hard to shell out a bunch of money for stuff when there are perfectly good toys sitting in Florida that I already paid for. Many of them like the wooden kitchen are just too big or heavy to ship. Ah well. Ellery is desperate for legos and I think he is a great age for them now so I sure hope I can splurge on some of those for him.

I know a lot of moms who make their own toys but gosh, I'm already spread so thin. Do I bake gifts to send out to family or do I make my kids toys? Plus I really need to work on my spinning and dyeing if I ever want to get some sort of handmade business off the ground. You really have to choose middle ground sometimes. Making everything from food to housewares to toys from scratch is ideal but that in addition to homeschooling means that sometimes I've got to compromise. If my kids had enough toys I would be tempted to knit them a scarf for Christmas and that would be it but right now I would say they are closer to deprived of playthings than anything else.

In the end it looks like I will be giving a lot of my money to handcrafters on etsy again this year. I found an adorable wooden stackable mushroom house (like the ones the catalogs sell for $50) for only $25. Then I got some adorable girly gnome dolls with mushroom furniture from the same seller. I have my eye on some beautiful dolls too...some with candy colored dread like yarn hair...too cute! All these fancy catalogs can kiss my you know what this year. I'd rather support small crafters anyway if I can't make it myself.

This cold weather has me in the mood for candles...the sweet, spicy autumn scented ones. Another thing I left behind was my candle making stuff or else I would be making lots of batches of soy candles right now. We don't have a hearth and the electric one still has a fake feeling to it. I'm craving that light of the divine in the midst of the cold and dark that approaches.

Fall is officially here!

2010-10-13T16:06:00.000-06:00

Last week one morning Ellery woke up shrieking in excitement that there was snow on top of the mountains. You would think the snow was right in our backyard with the way he carried on but it was just barely visible in the distance after a morning shower. The temps are lows in the 30's and highs in the 60's. I can finally break out my knitted sweaters and hats. It isn't quite mitten, glove, or scarf weather yet but I'm sure it isn't too far away. What fascinates me most about the weather is how well insulated this house is. It finally dawned on me last week that despite overnight temps in the low thirities that we were keeping a pretty steady indoor temp of around 66 without using any kind of heat whatsoever. In any house I've lived in I would keep the heater thermostat between 63 and 66. If the temps outside were that low the heater would be coming on fairly regularly just to maintain that temperature. Now I'm under no illusion that when it gets colder we won't be a slave to the propane but it's great that we haven't had to use any heating energy so far. I really believe that the large passive solar windows upstairs help to keep the house warm, even into the night hours. Downstairs is underground so of course it is cooler but still no need for overnight heating yet. Okay, so I have occasionally put on our fakey electric fireplace but more for ambience than heat, haha.

As the holidays loom ever closer we are looking forward to simple, old fashioned style Thanksgiving and Christmas. This will be our first Christmas away from home and we will miss our friends and family. At the same time though I am so excited that we won't have to get up early in the morning to rush around and see various families all day long in a mad frenzy. Top that off with the likelihood that we will experience our first "white Christmas" and I couldn't be any more excited. You have to understand too that I tend to tear up during those Little House On the Prairie style Christmas shows on movies where the family has a big meal and everyone gets one special handmade gift, usually knitted of course. There is so much more meaning there that is lost in today's commercialized spectacle that remains now. So I'm hoping we can capture some of that essence ourselves.

We have recovered from our recent canning rush and have been enjoying a lot of quiet time here. School has been going great with little distraction. We are wrapping up our first Old Testament block now and have really enjoyed it. Yesterday we made lentils with unleavened bread for dinner to go with our story of Jacob and Esau. We have made some beautiful crayon drawings inspired by the Live Ed curriculum as well as paintings. Ellery is learning to spin on a drop spindle and having a good time with it which relieves me since he was really not happy knitting. Cursive is coming along nicely. We've made a wool tree hanging out of branches and roving with a little basic weaving and some needle felted pumpkins for our nature table. I know, I know, pictures, right? Riki may be bigshot photographer but I'm considering getting a small camera of my own so that I can snap pictures of things we do without having to ask or wait for him to do it.

Every day I look out the window and think about how amazing our beautiful view is of the mountains and how incredibly healing this place is.

What a crazy freaking week!

2010-10-02T20:40:00.000-06:00

I am sure hoping that October brings us some more quiet downtime for relaxation and reflection. Despite being away from the city and in a healing place things have been rather topsy turvy lately. Riki and I joke that we have had more company and drama than we did living in the middle of the city when we couldn't pay people to come hang out with us, lol. I guess that's a good thing, right? I have really had to learn to create boundaries. This is hard for me because I like to take this sort of go with the flow zen approach to life but it doesn't always work out. I am finding out that people will run you over and take advantage if you allow them to. Although I am trying to be a compassionate person I don't suppose that Buddha was suggesting that we allow ourselves to be manipulated in this way. I'm still figuring out how to handle this sort of thing without causing suffering to others and myself. It is quite the balancing act I'm afraid, but nevertheless a lesson that I suppose has been well overdue. A part of me thinks that we are so used to not really having friends that we don't know how that relationship is supposed to work. Pretty sad, huh? I guess we just never fit in with too many people in Florida. What made us the wacky flaming liberals in Florida has actually turned out to make us pretty normal and sometimes, gasp, more conservative in these parts.

So we have spent the last week canning 100lbs of tomatoes. This was sort of a last minute decision so I wasn't all that prepared to can. Granted, this is something I have wanted to do for YEARS but had plenty of excuses not to, especially not having a garden surplus of my own to can. I had a monstrosity of a book for it but in hindsight I see that it had too much information and was rather daunting. This time around all I needed was some youtube videos and some online recipes to get going. It is very time and energy consuming, I will say that. Considering that the bed of our rv was filled with flats of tomatoes, half of which were going to our cagefree family friends as well, we had to work quickly to avoid spoiled tomatoes. Unfortunately for Riki this was also the week of the wool festival. So while I spent all of Wednesday in a dyeing workshop he was canning. I think we have less than two flats left that we are finishing off tomorrow. We have made pasta sauce, stewed tomatoes (the easiest and quickest), and salsa. It is comforting to know that we will have delicious heirloom organic tomatoes in the dead of winter.

Ah, the wool festival....this is super exciting for me. Coming from Florida I have never been to such an event before. I signed up for dyeing and spinning workshops well in advance. The park was packed today. I've never seen so many varieties of fiber arts in my life.....candy colored rovings, handspun artisan yarns, looms, spinning wheels, sculptures, even organic cooked lamb vendors. Riki was quickly bored and said that he didn't see the big deal because every booth was just more yarn, lol. Obviously he just doesn't get it, right? Ellery had a great time and for a mere $5 bought himself a beginner spindle kit. I sure hope I learn something from this workshop tomorrow so I can teach this kid how to spin because I've had a heck of a time learning with a spindle myself. He absolutely hates knitting at this point so I'm told but he wants to spin and dye yarn that he can give to me. What else can a mother ask for, right?

Homeschooling has taken a backseat this past week. Michaelmas went by completely uncelebrated. Canning before tomatoes went rotten was more important. I know we all see these wonderful homeschooling blogs but sometimes I think it is nice to show that things don't always go as planned. I have no lovely pictures of baking dragon bread or singing songs. It just didn't happen this year. Sometimes that is the way it goes. We all had to recover (including colds) from a weekend of late nights and unsolicited drama.

As we go into the next week of October I hope to get back on track with some lovely pumpkin chalkboard drawings, making Halloween decorations, and looking forward to these weather changes I've heard so much about but have yet to see yet. Right now it's still just plain hot.

Aspen are a changing

2010-09-29T15:18:00.000-06:00

Taos Ski Valley.

Thank you all for the photo compliments, I appreciate them very much!

Rik

Taos living and the sights of a changing season

2010-09-27T14:12:00.001-06:00

This past weekend we were invited by the members of the Taos Artist Co-Op to attend a ski mountain lawn party by one of the members of the Op. The property was beautiful. The stream ran through the properties and many painters working on the changes of the leaves in the mountain. Even the kids had their own paper and paints creating their own art. Of course, I had my own medium.

Ski Valley Lift we road.

We found a Tarantula in the driveway

My wall at the Taos Artist Co-Op

The lawn party stream. I couldn't help taking several photos of the colors of the rocks that reminded me of 'Fall'.

The tree colors are changing in the mountain.

Sorry, Willow's ballet class (for the Grandparents).

Again I love the colors of the rocks below the water. Fall is upon us even in the waterways.

Do enjoy....Rik!

2010-09-20T14:23:00.000-06:00

We started our school year almost two weeks ago now. This year Ellery is in 3rd grade so we are studying Old Testament and Jewish traditions as part of our curriculum. This year I decided to purchase the Live Ed curriculum. Those of you doing waldorf know that it is a pure waldorf currriculum but unfortunately the most expensive out there. I did manage to get mine secondhand so I saved some money. So far I'm really happy with it. We started by painting the days of creation with facing summaries. We both really enjoyed starting the school year this way. The curriculum does have the potential to be overwhelming but you just have to realize that there are different ideas and that you don't have to do them all. I'm very appreciative of the paintings and drawings that are in the books. It helps give you something to go by instead of coming up with it out of your head.

Rosh Hashanah was the first week of school as well. Ellery helped to make challah, a sweet and sour salmon, and apple slices dipped in honey. He is extremely interested in food preparation and anything to do with the kitchen lately. This is wonderful for me because I'm not a big fan of kitchen things. He offered to start doing the dishes after dinner since Riki is gone in the evenings now. He is also learning so much about measurements just from reading recipes. This week we are going to start some fermenting and canning/preserving which is new to me as well. Our friends have told us that the cost of produce here skyrockets in the winter time because of how far it has to be shipped. They have negotiated a deal with the local farmer's market for 200lbs of tomatoes so we are going to split that and start canning this weekend. The price per pound ends up being around $1.

The leaves are starting to change in the mountains. We were so excited this morning when we went to town and could confirm that the orange patches we are seeing on the mountains from a distance are indeed leaves changing. According to weather forecasts I think fall will officially be here by the end of the week with lows in the 30's and highs in the 60's. So much excitement in the air!

Adam and Eve in paradise

autumn nature table

Our days of creation book

What is your perception of reality?

2010-09-10T19:42:00.000-06:00

The other night I was listening to one of my favorite radio programs when the dj had a discussion with listeners about reality. The consensus from one listener was that reality is a very subjective and relative state of perception. I am beginning to think that my whole life is some sort of experiment in this. It can be really disheartening and challenging to always be in the minority about pretty much all aspects of your lifestyle from parenting to nutrition to health to spirituality to well, just about everything. Then there are those who believe that this must be some intentional sort of thing to be different, to just want to be contrary, weird, or not like everyone else. Sure, I think we all go through something like that in our teen years when we are trying to carve out our own identity. However, I can honestly say that I have spent many days wishing that I was like everyone else, that I could just get my college degree, put my kids in daycare so I could keep working to buy that brand new house, car, and all of the new toys/gadgets on the market. Man, I would sure have a lot more friends that way. If only I could believe that wealth and success and getting some high five/backslaps were the way to bliss how much easier life would be. There have been some times where I experimented with even trying to look like everybody else so that maybe I wouldn't draw attention or that people would think I was like them and give me a chance before finding out how crazy I was. Of course that never lasted long either.

So I look out the window. I see my kids playing with their new friends. All I see in the background is desert grass and mountains. They all have smiles on their faces. It is all good. Maybe this generation will be different. Maybe they will be able to find their own true happiness without being influenced by what they just blindly think they have to do to survive in this world because it is what they see on tv or some other fear based information forced upon them.

Since Riki has started his job he is constantly asked what in the heck he is doing as a server with his experience and qualifications in engineering. Aside from the rather obvious fact that he would be doing just that if he had not tried for nearly two years already to get another job in his field, I want to ask does it really matter? Does it make him less of a person? Not successful enough? Not rich enough? Not cool enough? Not responsible enough? I'm sure I could go on and on. There are times when I wonder if we are really just one of the most unlucky families in terms of being hit hard by the recession. I really don't personally know one other person whose field of expertise was nearly wiped out by all of this leaving them at ground zero. So naturally people tend to think it is your fault, that you did something wrong because it hasn't happened to them and they must be doing everything right, right?

So are we really all that unlucky? How relative is the experience of reality? I ask because as I sit here in the peace and quiet watching how happy the kids are, thinking about how healing this place is....I don't know if we are unlucky at all. Maybe we are lucky in all actuality.....lucky that a layoff was able to jolt us into doing things we might never had done otherwise. At the same time I know so many people who would be miserable where we are right now.....going from middle class to falling on the poverty level scale. How shameful. How awful. Living in a small guest house , only having one car, no more 401K. I could go on and on. Nothing is perfect. I have plenty of days when I wonder if we are on the right path, if I haven't completely screwed up my life and if I won't have lots of regrets to come. That is what unites us as humanity because no matter what our station in life is, we all have this suffering, these worries. This is normal.

Really, does it all matter that much? Should anything matter more than the happiness of children and being able to slow down and watch the sunset over the mountains.....regardless of what assets or wealth you have amassed?

Yes, indeed we live in another state of reality perception because as many times as I turn the situation on its sides I can't see anything inherently bad about it. We have adequate shelter, nutritious food, plenty of time for play and being creative. What more do we all really need in this world? This is my nature of reality and I'm getting pretty confident with it in recent years. I see so many people out there striving to just have a little bit more....if I can just get another degree with a better job, maybe I will be happier. If I just save up long enough maybe I can have the perfect house. All of my woes will be over. If I can scrimp and save every dime until retirement I will spend the rest of my life completely content. It is an illusion. If you can't find a way to be happy now you won't be happy then and the bottom line is that human beings will never be happy 100% of the time no matter what....and as for being a good person....those who are at the top of my list are those who didn't seek occupations or success...they devoted their lives to helping others instead.

Here's to hoping that our future generations will realize that happiness doesn't lie in astronomical college/mortgage debt or doing everything your family told you to do just because it is what they believed was the right thing. It is time to forge a new path, one that acknowledges creativity and service and charity as bringing one closer to their divine path more than just driving to church once a week in fancy clothes and new cars. A reality where people are respected for more than a career path. Maybe one day.

Taos Mountain Music Festival - Taos Ski Valley Photos

2010-09-09T14:16:00.000-06:00

Arrived at the condo and headed out to the Taos Ski Valley Plaza

View from our balcony

Downstairs living and kitchen area

It was pretty cool in the valley so a fire was necessary seeing that we were right above the stage area and left the door open to hear the music as plain as day.

Amy and I on the balcony listening to the music

View from the festival area looking up at the condo (behind the trees) and the lift

And here the band we really wanted to see, Yonder Mountain String Band!

Kids playing, hooping, 'rocking out' with rock candy and a pretty new ring.

And a few hoopers that insisted I take their picture.

Enjoy!

Rik

Following our bliss

2010-09-07T21:41:00.000-06:00

We kicked off labor day weekend by heading to ski valley for the Taos mountain music festival. We had intended on bringing the rv but because of rig size limitations for the festival we said what the heck, and got a room for the weekend. Of course now I'm completely spoiled since it is our first time doing a music festival where the stage was right below our balcony and we weren't camping in a tent, lol. Mind you, we had beautiful majestic pine trees and aspens sort of blocking our view but if you looked between the branches you could see the crowd, and the best part was that I could sit in the room right in front of the crackling fireplace while listening to some mellow live blues. It doesn't get any better than that. I got to take a bath for the first time in about six months. The kids were beside themselves with excitement because they could take a bubble bath. Unfortunately our current rental has a shower not much bigger than the rv, no bathtub.

It truly was the most beautiful venue I've been to for a music festival, surrounded by some of the largest mountains I think we've seen. I told Ellery that we could just pick our Christmas tree right from the balcony window. I can only imagine how beautiful these trees are topped with glistening snow in the winter from your room...and believe me, I do emphasize imagine because these rooms cost a mint during ski season.

Before we went home we had to take a ride on the ski lift. I have to say it was one of the most terrifying experiences of my life, lol. You have to understand that I have a fear of heights. I've never been on a ferris wheel. The thing is that I have this crazy goal to go snowboarding and well, I have to be able to go on one of these lifts. It totally freaked me out. I was gripping the hand rail for dear life as we cruised up the mountain. They would stop the lift to let people off and it would rock ever so gently. Luckily Ellery distracted me by pointing out the color changes of the aspens. This helped calm me down since I didn't want to freak out in front of everybody else. Then I saw these two kids Ellery's age on a lift by themselves holding their hands in the air with the guard rail up like it was some kind of a ride. I couldn't believe it. Then Riki reminded me that they were probably from France or the swiss alps or some place like that and been doing this all their lives, haha. What can I say? I made it and it was beautiful, even if I did feel like I was gonna die. I kept reassuring myself that this was a highly irrational fear and that only my human state was afraid to be sort of floating in the sky like this. It helped a little. I just hope I can handle it in the snow with a snowboard strapped to my feet.

Riki is doing okay with his new job. Tips aren't bad...not the best place to work for in town though apparently. It seems that this is the sort of restaurant to get your feet wet and move on because of the owners and the way things are run. After some risky investing, Riki's pictures are officially in the gallery now. We'll cross our fingers that we at least break even on that one. I think it is vital that he continues to embrace his creative side while also paying the bills.

We started school today and things went rather smoothly although busy trying to keep a three year old occupied while teaching an eight year old. Sometimes that is pretty tricky. Ellery is really looking forward to a lot of new material we are covering this year, especially our block on Native Americans. We are celebrating Jewish festivals as part of our Old Testament material so we are getting ready for Rosh Hashanah now. We painted our first day of creation today from the story. I feel the need to stress for those unfamiliar with waldorf education that I am not teaching creationism. In fact I prefaced our story with "every culture has different creation stories" kind of disclaimer....but the idea is to feed their souls with spiritual sustenance. I wasn't entirely digging the vibe of the original Old Testament, at least not as something to teach to children so I'm very happy that I found an anthroposophical/esoteric version written on a children's level. Oh, and we are reading the stories in the concrete pyramid Michael Reynolds built near our house. How cool is that?!

This education has been very healing for me as well as nourishing for the kids. Ever since we left the way things were before moving into the rv I see synchronicity all the time, maybe not so much now that we aren't on the road but it is still there. I'm still screwed up in certain ways like everybody else but I have figured out some things I will never go back on. I firmly believe that artistic experiences are a sort of gateway to the spirit world, that these are the sort of things we were meant to do in this lifetime....whether that is music, painting, fiber arts, photography, etc. Unfortunately we get so caught up in the money/success game that we lose sight of that and always feel a sort of void. It is amazing how simply educating your child can open your eyes to this in a new light.

Perhaps it is all coming together because of where we are now, surrounded by beautiful vistas in quiet desert and yet in a very modest house. I see that what is in my house or what we own is not what nourishes us so much as the beauty and peace that surrounds us. When we can feel that inside of ourselves we then find the freedom to let go of all of the trappings of this toxic culture we live in and experience art/creativity which is in essence a sort of channeling of the divine. Hey, I'm not all the way there yet, not even close, but I can see the path more clearly.

Mesa winds and visions of fall

2010-08-26T18:40:00.000-06:00

Riki has a job at an upscale restaurant in town and he starts tonight. We're a little ambivalent about it yet. We have a friend who works there and says it is slow, not good money. She works lunch and he is working night shift though so we are hoping it is better. He is hoping to at least get his foot in the door somewhere so that when he wants to apply to another place it won't be so hard to get the job. Plus, he is weary of getting unemployment at this point. It's always a guessing game to know when or if you will get another extension anyway. We'll hope for the best. I think it will be good for him to get out of the house every day after all this time of being out of work.

The winds are a changing! Okay, maybe not dramatically but we did have a slight cold front with heavy wind gusts the other day....oh nothing big, just equivalent to tropical storm force winds, lol. We all get more excited about the change of seasons as the days go by. We hear that we should see some snow before Halloween. Our new friend Stacy is going to take us to ski valley and I'm gonna try snowboarding.

I've been on an ebay ordering frenzy for winter clothes. It is hard to outfit an entirely family for snowy weather with basically no winter clothing whatsoever. I did get some great deals on ebay though, especially some used Hanna Andersson stuff. Let's see. The kids now have thermal underwear, snow bibs, snow boots, snow jackets, down vests, and waterproof gloves. My closet of usual sundresses and hippie skirts is being slowly transformed into fair isle sweaters....too bad I can't knit those yet. It may seem early to buy these things but I feel prepared. I'm ready...it was like Christmas today when we had like six packages from different places with all this stuff. The thrift stores here don't have anything good and otherwise there isn't anywhere nearby to buy affordable winter clothing, unless you count a Walmart and super high end ski shops.

I want to highly recommend that everybody watch "Garbage Warrior", a documentary about Michael Reynolds, the guy who designed all the earthships around here. He built our house and the others in this neighborhood which is actually in the movie. It had to have been filmed from our yard as a matter of fact. There are also beautiful shots of the mountains here in Taos and some really funny stuff where Michael Reynolds goes up against the state legislation. He is quite a character.

School is coming up, seasons are changing, and we are all excited to discover new things to do in this mountain oasis when winter comes.

Readjusting to sitting still

2010-08-18T04:50:00.000-06:00

I apologize for the delay in posting but there have been computer issues in terms of getting the right adaptor to move the computer from the rv into the house. We have been in our cabin for almost three weeks now...hard to believe it has been that long. It is very beautiful out here on the mesa. There are 360 degree mountain views, wonderful weather (for now, hehe), peace and quiet. The only thing that hasn't been peaceful has been our minds lately. Settling into the house has definitely brought up some emotional turmoil. It's funny because when you live on the road or in an rv park you are constantly surrounded by very laid back and happy people. They are retired after all! Or perhaps veterans or disabled or on vacation or some single person who has just found their niche on how to live nomadic on a minimal transient income, a juggling act which has been a challenge for this family of four.

So you move back into a house and suddenly your neighbors and interactions with people change. They too are caught up in the drudgery of work or trying to support a family and your social dynamics change. When you are passing through life is so carefree but when you stand still suddenly you are answering all of these questions to others or just your own inner dialogue. I let it get the best of me when we first got here...that sense of panic of oh crap, what did we do? Did we make the right choice? The job thing has been very ugly lately. As soon as we settled Riki really started beating the pavement and things haven't been promising so far. Companies in his engineering expertise say that he has the best resume' they have ever seen but of course due to the economy they aren't hiring. We both got real down when he interviewed for a cashier job at the local health food store...and they hired somebody else. Right now a hospitality job is probably the most promising and we do have some leads on that. We'll see. Rent is cheap. Cost of living is minimal so it isn't terrible but it is always worrisome to be out of work for so long. It has chipped away at his self esteem...reading the news articles (I tell him to stay away from) about how these people need to get a job instead of extending unemployment. That's really hard to hear when you've been trying for over a year and your field is dried up. Let's be honest. There are some places hiring. Do I want to move my family to D.C and live in a crime filled city just to have a good paying job? No. We keep reminding ourselves that we have made certain choices in life for a reason. We both agree that there is no way in heck we will ever move back to the city and toxicity we left behind, to pay even more rent than we are paying now in a beautiful quiet place. If I've got nothing else from this experience, that would be number 1.

It is all about that impermanence thing which can be so hard to accept. The ego wants to know what will happen in the future which of course is impossible. The ego wants a nice home that one can stay in indefinitely without a worry about money, a place where one can raise chickens and have a garden. The art is to let go of that...as I've heard some say "let go and let god". Meditation helps. Adequate sleep helps. Realizing that all others, even those with stable jobs in happy houses are suffering helps.

So the good news is that by the end of the month Riki will have wall space at the local co-op gallery. He is preparing his pieces now and has met with the owner. She says they are planning lots of promotions to get the ski valley folks to buy their art when winter comes. Perhaps this is the time for him to focus on his creative endeavors. It can be hard to truly appreciate what a luxury that is when you are worried about money but I'm thinking that is what he is meant to do right now. This is an opportunity that would not be possible where we are from or even remotely viable with an area already saturated with wannabe photographers. This is where the truly moneyed people come to buy art. I will keep my fingers crossed.

Getting ready to start the homeschooling at the beginning of the month...a lot more preparation for third grade. There is a cool pyramid Michael Reynolds build that I told Ellery we can read our Old Testament stories in with a lantern. Then to my amazement there is an already built lean to behind our property that will be perfect for our sukkot this fall. For those of you who are clueless we are studying Old Testament and Jewish festivals this year as part of our curriculum.

So we wait and see what happens. We are gearing up for cooler weather...I've got the long underwear and our fake fireplace heater to supplement the propane. I'm anxious to start up the school year so the kids will be back on a schedule and I will be a bit more busy....and lots of knitting, oh yes, lots and lots of knitting.

Update and new home in Taos, New Mexico

2010-08-17T19:39:00.000-06:00

Well, between moving in to the new homestead if you will, some Willow ballet classes while were are here. Twirl is a great place for the kids. The classes are CHEAP and even for a two dollar donation, the kids have run of the place or on site playground. Those photos later but here we go.

For the grand parents.

Ballet Class

Little dancer

Move in Day...A small shower gave us a rainbow view from the house.

Looking south and seeing the "Pyramid" built by Micheal Reynolds and one of his first Earthship constructions to the right.

Again the infamous Pyramid.

View looking east from the house towards I believe the Taos Ski Mountain area.

Everything out of the RV and in the new house. Believe it or not, there is a whole level under the grade for the down stairs. It is two story.

Again, I can't get enough of the Pyramid. It actually has a loft area above someone has or still uses as a meditation area complete with sitting rug, books of guidance and candles of various religious nature.

Enjoy

Rik

Speaking of National Parks - The Great Sand Dunes

2010-07-28T15:06:00.000-06:00

Though the early morning light was 'fine' for photos, and later in the day, our hike was hurried due to the oncoming rain storm...still a spectacular sight the dunes. Again, I'm always disappointed that the scale of the dunes are nothing in the photos compared to actually visiting them in person.

Sorry but I prefered this shot in black and white. The color version is below.

Entry to the park. Note to self; don't forget the tripod or least ye be left out of the photo.

A shot just past the entry monument. The dunes are great as to how in my view, they compete with the massive height of the mountains in the background.

Taking a break and as usual, Ellery filling out his Junior Ranger program for this park. This was before the sand started to get 'hot'.

Willow complained of sand in her shoes, yet it did not stop her from literally 'rolling' in it.

Behind us, opposite the Dunes.

The color version I spoke of earlier.

Along one of the trails we took from the visitor center. You can tell I like root systems.

The storm started to roll in. Actually, we hurried our hike on the aforementioned trail due to the rain. This is just before the storm hit; a view from the visitor center.

It was a pleasant drive from New Mexico to Colorado, though we really didn't see much difference in terrain during the two hour drive. A Mesa is a Mesa I suppose. But still the mountains are grand. I wish I had a chance on the way back from the Great Sand Dunes NP to capture one peak, El Blanco I think which is the fourth most largest in Colorado. The rain poured and poured on our exit. I'm sure one day we'll go back.

Enjoy

Rik

National Parks

2010-07-28T07:50:00.000-06:00

We have been going through a bit of a national park obsession lately. There is a documentary that was aired on PBS which of course I never saw called "National Parks, America's Best Idea". You can buy the six dvd set at the parks for like $100 so of course I've been stalking out netflix to see if they might carry it. Imagine my delight when I finally saw it come up on my recommendations. It is now available for instant play which is even better, so if you are interested in seeing this (as I highly recommend), watch it before it goes away. I know that their instant play choices change quite frequently;).

There is so much to the history of national parks that I never knew about and it is quite fascinating. I'll admit I had never given it deep thought before but now I can really appreciate the concept. People like John Muir and other truly democratic politicians saw the national parks as a way for all Americans regardless of class or income to enjoy pristine and untouched pieces of raw land as it was since the beginning of time. Now that is something I can appreciate. Of course this didn't truly happen until the automobile was invented because only the wealthy could travel by train. There are all sorts of interesting people talked about in the documentary from politicians to wealthy philanthropists to eccentric bohemian sorts. Their stories are rather endearing and shows over time the potential of humanity to do great things. I am truly inspired by all of it...and I still have three parts left to watch, haha.

Of course watching the documentary made me reflect on our own experiences and of course regrets at not being able to see many of these parks as I had anticipated this summer. Believe me, if we were a family of unlimited resources we would just go ahead and do it...but some sort of prudence in our already crazy spontaneous kind of living is necessary.

I have also convinced myself after the handful we have been through that the age of the children, Willow in particular, has really kept us from enjoying the parks to the fullest as they were intended. If we were childless or maybe even with just Ellery, we would be camping in the middle of the wilderness like John Muir and spending several days exploring the backcountry. You see, my only issue with the national parks is that unlike the sweeping views from the documentaries, much of the natural beauty is drowned out by lots of other people. It is sort of like a small scale Disney World experience. So if you are smart and up for a challenge you go ahead and take the least common trails in the parks away from all of the other tourists. However, our only issue with that is that those trails are not very 3 year old friendly. I am torn between hearing Ellery complaining about why we can't take the trail that ascends to the peak of a mountain (which even he doesn't realize is out of his capability) and Willow crying that walking a .5 mile loop over rocky, slightly hilly terrain is too hard and she wants to go home and watch a princess movie. We outfitted them both with excellent shoes but at least for her, that hasn't helped much. So I am trying to make myself feel better about the fact that at their present age we can't experience the parks to their fullest beauty without being inundated with other loud people who also have limitations to taking the trail less traveled so to speak.

I will say this though. I am delighted that we are in a rather close proximity to many of the parks right now. I do believe that Grand Canyon, Mesa Verde, and some others are easily half day trips from where we are now. So these could easily serve as mini vacations, or heck, as we decided to do yesterday, quick day trips! Since it had been awhile and we are moving into a house in less than a week, we decided to take a car trip over to Great Sand Dunes NP. We had yet to see any of Colorado anyway and it was only a two hours drive. It wasn't my favorite park, except to look at, lol. Walking through the sand was really brutal. Ellery wanted to climb to the top of the dunes of course but Willow was done and crying after the first hill. We enjoyed one of the more shaded woodsy trails until it started to rain and Riki complained about his camera so we had to hurry back and finish one of the most difficult junior ranger booklets Ellery has had to date. At least we got our bellies full of more untainted nature, higher mountain peaks in the clouds, and Riki got some gorgeous pictures which I promise to pester him all day to post. I warn you though...more landscapes and less kids;)

Humanity where you least expect it

2010-07-23T06:26:00.000-06:00

As this road trip comes to a close I want to reflect on some of our seemingly insignificant experiences, some realizations I've had from putting ourselves out there at the mercy of unknown places. I would like to talk about full timers...not the respectable full timers..not the ones traveling the country at a breakneck pace with luxury coaches...the ones nobody wants to talk about in rv culture. I've seen the reviews of rv parks. They say something like "okay park, but a lot of full time residents", as if this were some kind of deplorable thing. They live in old trailers that look like they would never make it down the road another time.Well, I'm here to tell you that some of the most generous, laid back, and peaceful folks happen to be those full time residents. Now you may not know this if you don't stop long enough to stretch out your legs and enjoy your surroundings...or if every day is filled with sightseeing itineraries, but if you do stay for more than a couple of nights like we have, you may get to know some of these friendly people.

Many of them are retired naturally but many of them are not. I think these are the sort we as a society find particularly unrespectable. We have found that these people have either suffered some sort of family tragedy, are possibly disabled to some degree, or believe it or not, many of them do go to work. You can hear the cars leaving early in the morning from rv parks in the same way that you might hear traffic in your old neighborhood, just on a smaller scale.

Our very first experience in Florida after we left was being sandwiched between a couple of full time residents at a rustic rv park. I remember watching the couple next to us in the airstream and noting how content they seemed to be. They would get up every morning to sit outside at the bench over coffee for conversation, just very friendly people without a care in the world. They have an old tiny airstream trailer from the sixties but I remember thinking that if this was how carefree life could be outside of the city and rat race, sign me up.

On the other side of us was Roy, a retired vet in his fifth wheel. He gave us free food from his freezer before we left.

There was the woman next to us in Austin who played cards with Ellery and taught him Sudoku.

We have met the most interesting people however in New Mexico. How could we forget Steve and Jackie's family in Carlsbad? They were a riot. They had three daughters and an aunt all traveling in an old class C much shorter than ours. They invited us to their barbecue and helped out with Ellery when we had to take Willow to the ER. They had the craziest setup at the state park. They had a mattress on top of their rv which they set out under the shaded pavilion with their tv outside. They just lounged back outside on the mattress watching American Idol...tv's not my thing but they sure were happy with their modest living arrangements. They talked us into stopping through Ruidoso which we had never heard of on the way to Albuquerque and we're sure glad they did because there we met another nice full time resident...

We pulled in to Ruidoso next to a younger guy, probably close to my age in an old seventies trailer. He helped us pull in and stood outside talking to Riki for the longest time. He walked us through the back trails which led us straight to midtown. The next morning he got out his toolbox and offered to work on the transmission while we were gone for no reason other than just to be nice. He found out Ellery was into coin collecting so he gave him some coins and a couple of books from his trailer. We're sorry we only stayed a couple of nights there but we sure appreciated his generosity.

When we stayed in Tijeras for a month we got to talk to a good number of full timers.Of course there was the little boy's grandfather Ellery played with who gave Ellery some walking sticks and took him out to lunch with his grandson. There was another guy who worked for the park and also for an organization that helps Native Americans. He set up a scavenger hunt in the woods with little trinkets the kids could collect and then turn it to him for grab bag toys he had bought from the thrift store.

Since we've arrived at this park in Taos we have met many interesting characters and full timers. There is the man who hand carves the most beautiful wooden animals and sells them to the tourists down at the Gorge. Not long after we arrived he bestowed a couple of animals to the kids. The guy across from us gave Ellery some turquoise and told him how to find it in the campground. Heck, I know we are in New Mexico but I didn't even know you could still dig up turquoise.

And then there is the father of another girl Ellery had met here before she went back to stay with her mom. We have had some real good conversations with him about the state of the world. He actually owns a ranch and has dreams of starting an intentional community but not enough capital to do it. He is the one who graciously offered to let us borrow any of his furniture in storage here.

We have had other encounters but these are the ones that stick out in my mind. It's funny because I had a preconceived idea in my head of the sort of people we would be hanging out with on this trip. You know, they would be our age and very progressive free thinking types. Funny thing is that some of these people that we did meet were not all that friendly or down to earth as we had imagined. It always seemed to be the older folks, especially the full time residents who were/are the most easy going. Just yesterday Riki had a long conversation with the maintenance guy here.

I wanted to bring it up because it kind of reminds me of Sun magazine.We used to have a subscription and enjoyed the articles about regular people with regular problems. In our world of overachieving and being successful it is a shame that good old fashioned humanity from people who don't or can't meld in with mainstream society doesn't get highlighted more often. In fact, after this trip I tend to believe that these people are as agreeable as they are because they live lives with less stress. They don't have much in terms of material wealth but that is what seems to set them free from the chains that bring so many others down. It is a counter culture I think I'm going to miss and could even see going back to.

I was surprised to not find more fellowship among our peers but I think our generation is still kind of stuck in the middle between consumer driven and free thinking. We are still needing our Starbucks, our yoga classes, and our expensive organic clothing. We are still keeping up with the Joneses but they are a different kind of Joneses....the kind who never shops at Walmart, buys only fair trade coffee, and claims to be tolerant of all types of people despite actually living in predominantly white mid to upper class cities. If anybody thinks I'm poking fun at them I'm not because I'm guilty of many of the above myself...and they aren't all such terrible things. I'm just thinking that it may be harder to connect with similar people our age on the road because they are still so caught up in all of these things/rules...even if they may seem to be contributing to the betterment of society. We could all take some lessons from these old timer full timers and just let go a little bit..not be so uptight about our parenting and place in society. In the end none of it really matters anyway.

Tijeras to Taos - Photo catch up - Part III

2010-07-20T08:56:00.000-06:00

After arriving we of course stayed with the Cage Free Family. Willow and Ellery having a ball with their two children close to their age, and of course adult conversation with like minds.

"Is this for real?"

2010-07-19T14:04:00.001-06:00

It's funny because the title to this post is something Riki and I keep sort of saying or just exchanging knowing glances about. They are little things but they all add up to something big in terms of the culture here. We went to the farmer's market the other day which was definitely a "wow" experience. I was confused at first because it seemed like everybody was selling small quantities of the same produce. I was wondering where the tomatoes were...and the variety of fruit. It suddenly dawned on me. All of this stuff is local, lol. No wonder they are selling the same things. That is what grows here this time of year. Duh! This may sound silly but I'm seriously used to so called "farmer's markets" where there are a couple of huge produce vendors with produce shipped all over the world much like a supermarket.

So then I'm looking at the signs...all of them small farms, biodynamic organic...I'm thinking this is like heaven. Then there were several grass fed beef vendors, raw honey, goat cheese, farm fresh eggs, breads. We could literally buy almost all of our groceries here every week if we had a proper list ahead of time. I apologize if all of this sounds strange to many of you but I'm just not used to farmer's markets from Florida with organic or local goods for the most part.

The next day we went to a free music and arts festival in the park. Just pure bliss. We were entertained by an authentic African dance/drumming troupe from Guinea. They were sheer delight to watch and I felt the positive energy all around that place. Then we watched some interpretive dance, a gypsy jazz/bluegrass/old timey band, and listened to a poetry slam. I am so grateful for the kids to be able to have these kind of experiences I never had growing up...and all for free! It is hard to be at such an event without being inspired and feeling your creative juices flow. I hope that rubs off on the kids as well so that they will always trust their inner creativity.

So then we've been getting emails from our new landlady. She already brought a bunch of furniture to the house we could use. She is a schoolteacher and emailed to tell us that she made special packages for Ellery and Willow and left them in the house with their names on them. She and her husband collect rocks for a living. We told her how much Ellery loves rocks and she told us they would take him on a dig with them sometime. Again, Riki looks at me and is like "Is this for real?" She says she knows how expensive electric deposits are so she keeps it in her name so we don't have to pay it. It is just so crazy laid back here. Then one of our rv neighbors has offered up any of his furniture in Taos storage that we can borrow.

Here are some things I am looking forward to about moving into the house. Bulk groceries! I have been eternally frustrated with the cost of buying smaller, convenience size foods. Plus, I'm super excited about trying some pickling and preserving, not to mention making some cultured dairy products on my own as well as kombucha. I am so behind on learning to do these things and the time is now.

Having a large enough area to separate the kids! The more we sit still in the rv it is rough to keep the fighting to a minimum. Willow has now figured out that Ellery has a "bunk" and she doesn't so there have been problems with that. Granted, the kids won't have their own rooms in this house but the upstairs is large enough to separate into fairly large personal spaces. They just aren't closed off by doors or walls so to speak. Some of our biggest homeschooling challenges were trying to give Ellery a quiet space without Willow interrupting so that will be much easier in a two story cabin.

We have been grateful to be spending some time with the cage free family since we've been here. Our children are the same ages so it works out well. Having built in friends in a new place sure helps to feel settled and to point us in the direction of things we may not know about in town.

I kid you not, there is a wood carving rally at this rv park right now. Ellery has been spending his days with the old folks in the special carving pavillion, lol. He even has his own wood carving kit now. I tell you, some of the experiences he has had on this trip in terms of learning have really been priceless, things that could never be learned by being stuck in a classroom all day.

As the road trip portion of our journey comes to a close I feel incredibly blessed to have had this experience. We had considered it several years ago and I let the naysayers talk me out of it. We should have done it long ago to be quite honest. Being at the mercy of the universe can be a very freeing experience with limited savings, goals, and well made plans that fall apart. I'm not here to tell people what to do or what is going to make them happy. I can only relate my own personal realizations if you will. I will tell you this. This trip has convinced me even more than before that happiness does not lie in the so called American dream so many are chasing. I firmly believe it is an illusion, a babylon as some would call it. It is a trick. I have been mentally practicing a lot lately to envision myself as a part of the universe, instead of separate from it. This also has helped me to expand my thinking on a much more universal level than just what goes on in my little corner of the world. There are people all over the world who live in all kinds of different ways than we do. I am unable to grasp any logical reason at this point as to why we are all supposedly entitled to mortgages, new cars, overscheduled childrens' activities, and the latest state of the art electronics. Entitlement is commonly used to refer to welfare or free handouts but I'm not talking about that context. I'm talking about how each and every child is raised to believe that those things are essential to a happy adult life. It is no wonder creative endeavors are so quickly squashed when the goal becomes a success/monetary one instead of investing in what brings one joy. We are led to believe that these things will bring us joy..but what happens after we get them? Do we continue to work a job we despise to keep those things? Is that really the life we desire? If it is I think one should absolutely pursue it but I'm going to guess that most people who have all of those trappings are still not very happy. It is a lie I don't believe anymore...and it really is the most enlightening realization of my life so far. I suspected it to be true for a long time but now I know in my heart that it is the truth. For me. I am not going to tell anybody else how they should live their life or find happiness.

I will say this though. If this blog gives somebody the kick in the pants they need to do something radical, then so be it. I'm not important...we are just a mediocre low income family trying to find our path in the world like every other human being. Hopefully some of our experiences will inspire someone to take that risk they have been sitting on for a long time to follow their own bliss. I know I wish somebody had given me that kick in the pants many years ago!

One journey ends...and another begins

2010-07-15T09:58:00.000-06:00

Well folks, it is now official. We will be moving out of the rv and into a rental house as of August 1st. We had already recently decided that we want to stay here and try to make some money. Riki has a fantastic opportunity to hang his photography in a co op gallery and we've heard nothing but satisfaction from others who sell in the galleries. Even in the winter they do pretty well with the ski tourists.

So why move out of the rv? Well..we can't stay in it through the winter here because it would be too harsh. We could have waited until the winter to actually move into a house but I decided that if an opportunity presented itself sooner that we would go with that. Plus, with the cost of gas and camping the monthly rent of $550 isn't much more than we would be already paying. This goes with my whole "seeing what the universe brings our way" kind of thing. We've met a lot of people and made some contacts. Some have panned out, some haven't but this one seemed to be drawing us in.

We couldn't ask for a more unique area to live in. It is on a hill in the flatland/mesa surrounded by mountain views. It is a little passive solar two story cabin guesthouse next to an earthship with lots of open land around it. In our area there are lots of interesting houses from yurts to domes to unusual earthship creations. This is the sort of place we only dreamed of in Florida. The landlord didn't even ask us to fill out an application and she was okay with having a garden and chickens if we wanted. This is soooo different from where I come from. I'm still in culture shock..but this place is constantly like culture shock for us.

Why do we like it here in Taos so much? You know, I used to say that I wanted to live someplace in the country or mountains where I wasn't too far from town and I could take the kids to the library, park, or go out to eat without sacrificing a rural life. People laughed at me. Family said it was impossible, that I was living in fairytale land. Well, I'm here to tell you all that places like this do exist and this is one of them. Our new house will be about 15-20 minutes from town...and I emphasize town, not city. I have always been torn between city and country because there ARE things in the city that I enjoy like coffee shops, kitschy restaurants, health food stores, and activities for kids. The great thing about Taos is that it has all of those things without being a "city". Cities have lots of traffic, big box stores, pollution, and a fast paced lifestyle. Taos has all of the perks I enjoy in a city without it actually being a city, and without being pretentious about it I might add.

There are things about this place I still can't get over. Regular diners feature organic beef. They have nurseries here that are specifically for organic gardening. There is no Home Depot, no Lowe's, no Barnes and Noble, Starbucks, Best Buy, and the list goes on. There is one Walmart and an adobe McDonald's, haha. Otherwise you have all local businesses.

They have an awesome shangri la type of playspace here called Twirl. They have a website. It is hard to explain because I had never seen anything like it. It is a gated play area with everything from enclosed padded jungle gyms to a "pond" with waterfall the kids can splash in, a treehouse, along with table and chairs for parents to sit back and relax. Oh, and it's donation only! Wait, there's more though. There is an attached toystore with the best quality open ended imaginative toys and they have classes in the moroccan style building. Willow has been taking ballet (I say this very loosely because it is more of a creative dance class) for only $6 a class. Ellery was able to take an African drumming class the other day from a nice man from Mexico. They have hoop dancing classes...the list goes on...and all for very reasonable prices.

Oh, and did I mention that I started taking yoga for $6 a class as well? This isn't your economy ymca yoga either, but a beautiful large studio space with bamboo floors, natural lighting, and hindu statues. This is just the tip of the iceberg. This weekend we are going to a free family friendly music festival in the park.

So that dream place everybody said doesn't exist does...and I'm sure there are others like it although it is hard to find them without going on the road like we did.

I anticipate many reflective posts to come. Despite how much I like it here I still wonder if we are making the right decision instead of moving along. The thing is that we have limited resources at this point so we have the choice of either draining them on the road or trying to settle somewhere and find work. It is a hard choice. If the winter makes us so miserable we can't stand it our lease is up in January and I keep joking that I will be ready to go down to Baja if I hate it that much...

but like I was just telling my mom in an email. There are always tradeoffs. Will the winter suck? Yes, I'm sure it will but sometimes wonderful places mean that you have to put up with a crappy weather. In Florida the weather may be beautiful but there is nothing there for us. It is not the land of opportunity for our family in many ways. So at this point I'm willing to suffer some harsh weather to integrate our family into a place that better mirrors our values...and this is it for now.

The longer we sit still the kids fight over their personal spaces which are obviously limited in the rv. Ellery is a great age for this kind of lifestyle but I must say that it has been a challenge with Willow at the age of three. I will post more about that later. With the school year approaching I do look forward to a space where I can do some planning, Ellery can do some building (maybe a chicken coop), gardening, and we can better integrate those type of experiences into this year's curriculum.

That doesn't mean I don't feel a sadness though. I do. It doesn't have to be over. We will park the rv and wait and see. Wow. What an experience though. I can't wait to post about how much this has influenced my view of how people measure success, accumulate things, and place so much value/fear on monetary wealth. We are absolutely living a life outside of the mainstream, in a bubble if you will..and I am 100% happy with that.

Tijeras to Taos - Photo catch up - Part II

2010-07-07T19:21:00.002-06:00

Then we had apurchased items which one, was the solar oven. We did buy two 123W solar panels including the regulator, an inverter and the wiring needed. BUT...I need to find out the best possible routing of the wiring; our Class C only has one house battery. I really want to remove the microwave to make way for the wiring through the oven vent and remove the generator which has not worked for oh since we got the RV. I can place two 6 volt batts there and have plenty of amphours even running them down to 50% for DC power. Well that is another installation story as far as upgrades and repairs so here are some additional catch up photos for all.

Last day in Tijeras

Dinner ready yet???

Through a child's eyes; the last silk fort here.

And some people where their skull on their sleeve ;p

Enjoy

Rik

Tijeras to Taos - Photo catch up - Part I

2010-07-07T12:08:00.000-06:00

Petroglyph National Park - This first few was our trek up one of the three sisters, extinct volcanos west of the Park. Sorry, no petroglyphs here but still a fun hike. The later photos we hit the other side of the Park and finally found quite a few petroglyphs along the trails. Ellery is seen doing his junior Ranger exercise to draw his favorite one.

The first and only sister we hiked up that day.

New hiking 'shoes'.

Almost to the top and look at the town in the valley.

At the top of one 'sister', with the other in the background.

We found a friend who was keeping the flies at bay. Here Lizard lizard!

NOW we're talking, this is where there are an abundant amount of petroglyphs.

I would like to think the alien on the left is trying to find his parked craft to the right to get home.

At the top of the hike.

Ellery finalizing his Junior Ranger program.

Enjoy

Rik

More breakdowns, still in Taos..

2010-06-29T15:23:00.000-06:00

Oh boy, where do I start? We left behind in Tijeras a charming little boy Ellery played with while we were there and a nearly teary eyed grandfather at our prospect of leaving. We really were fond of that area and rv park. We headed out to Taos passing through more breathtaking mountain areas on the turquoise trail. We didn't stop in Santa Fe. Judging by the very city like feel with an overabundance of commercial adobe structures I don't feel like we missed much. As we approached Taos we broke down and ran into a guy leaving the woods in his bus who was from Taos and part of the rainbow community. This was the first of many coincidences we have ecountered since we've got here...decided we didn't want to wait three hours for a tow truck, drove a little further figuring out we were somehow overheating, broke down again, lather, rinse, and repeat, until finally that night we coasted in to the closest rv park.

We were ten miles away from our friends, the cagefree family, who graciously offered their land to us, so in the next few days we drove up that mountain white knuckled and thankfully made it without any problems. I can't tell you how beautiful it is up there. The lush, green mountainside which borders the carson national forest is dotted with the most beautiful rustic cabins along a meandering stream. Our blog friends' property didn't disappoint and we found our rv right next to said stream and the forest. I wavered between wanting to shake fists at the sky for not being able to afford living in such a storybook location and trying to be thankful that we were able to just be here, even for a short while. Both of our families have kids the same age so they were constantly entertained. I hope it helped to take the strain off of our friends who are in the process of trying to move out of the house and back into their rv, regretfully for reasons beyond their control and we sure do wish them the best in their endeavors. It sounds like they have a lot of opportunities awaiting them.

The rv still isn't fixed. The closest mobile mechanic is in Albuquerque and charges a hefty amount to come look. You have to understand that Taos is a very small town so mechanics/auto shops are not in abundance. I can see where its charm is infectious and we have enjoyed seeing all of the small local businesses instead of big chains and shopping malls. This town's economy is based upon art and creative endeavors. There isn't much money to be made in other ways without all of the big business and quite frankly, they like it that way.

We have run into all sorts of interesting people in shops which seem to be pointing us in the direction of staying here for awhile. There is a quite controversial area here on the mesa where you can buy land cheap. A lot of artists live there. We drove out there, saw the earthship community, and even watched some ecofriendly housing in the process of being owner built. Very exciting stuff! Of course like every place else we are finding there is no water. The earthship community and other use cisterns and other water catchment systems. We are considering it. Many shop owners we have run into have lived on the mesa or know others who do. We even met a woman at solarfest who gave us her number to see about housesitting her place out there for awhile. Ironically enough she is also a photographer with a studio in town so that could be a great connection for Riki.

I went into the yarn shop with intentions of yarn dyeing and found myself walking out with roving and a spindle. I think for whatever reason I'm meant to start spinning and several people said that selling that sort of thing is a way to thrive here. They have craft fairs somewhere like every weekend. Seriously. Another coincidence...the yarn shop owner was from the same area in Florida we are. She said she has never regretted moving here and doesn't miss it in the least.

So we've been making all sorts of connections which seem to be pointing us in the direction to look into staying. Riki and I have argued. I don't want the trip to be over. I still want to go to the huge national parks and try to make it to Oregon. He is weary of breakdowns and bigger mountains and the fact of the matter is we have a limited income which is dwindling the more we travel. It is a hard decision. I am just going to see what pans out with our contacts here. If they point us in the direction of staying, we'll stay. If they don't pan out I hope we'll try to move on until we find something that does. Maybe Tara will call us about this place they are staying in Oregon (hint, hint).

We went to Solarfest this past weekend in town to see Michael Franti perform. It was a wonderful night and so great to finally make a festival on our travels. Ellery hooped up a storm. He is getting pretty good and we had to fight over the hoop, lol! I did have some homesickness for the first time though. Riki and I were very disappointed to be segregated to the beer cage as I call it. Although they sold beer, there is a designated drinking tent area and you are not allowed to carry your beer outside to the stages. The kicker was that they wouldn't allow the kids in the beer area so we had to take turns downing our beers in this tent. That put a downer on the festival and such a thing is just unheard of in my experience. I have found since medical marijuana is pretty prominent in this area that it seems to be favored over us contemptible beer drinkers. Granted, I'm all for marijuana legalization but last time I checked, alcohol was legal too so I'm not sure if I understand treating us as subordinates of some sort.

Last but not least we saw this awesome bluegrass band, Cherryholmes, while we were there. They are an entire family of musicians from parents to teenage kids and they have several grammy nominations. I was just thrilled to see some bluegrass but looking around I just didn't see a lot of other people getting it like we do from the south. I guess you could say I miss Suwannee and the music festivals there most definitely. I don't miss anyplace south of there though, lol, other than our dear friends and family of course.

So here we are at another nearby rv park to catch up on mail for a week or so before we move on to the unknown. That will either be someplace here to try to network and find a creative way to make some kind of living or on to Colorado and the beautiful national parks. I will wait for the universe to point us in the right direction and go from there.

Our time here is almost to an end

2010-06-16T11:06:00.000-06:00

We have really enjoyed staying here on the outskirts of Albuquerque and seeing all of the little surrounding mountain towns. We have truly had the best of both worlds where we could go enjoy the city and then retreat to our little rustic rv park in the mountains. This is probably our favorite park so far because of location and its laid back vibe. It has started to feel a lot like home but alas we must move on and find even better things I'm sure!

I've been busy working. Yes, working I tell you. We have determined that if we ever want some kind of rural land we are going to have to figure out a way to make money from home. I've been working my fingers to the bone on knittting projects, trying to come up with some cool dread tams, headbands, and such. I'm certainly not expecting to make a real living but you have to understand that I'm the kind of person who never follows through with anything. I talk myself out of it for aforementioned reasons and ego talk gets in the way. This time I've got to focus and follow through, even if I only sell one hat on etsy. We have talked about maybe doing a combo vending setup with small knitted items and other wholesale stuff that is small enough to take in the rv like incense, perfume oils, etc. I have to at least TRY to do this. I know other people have been able to make it work. If I could get some kind of business off the ground and Riki could start selling some of the beautiful landscape photography he has taken here, maybe we could make it work. Who knows.

Then I keep going back to the doula thing which would definitely be a more guaranteed income. The problem is I don't know how well that would work in a more rural setting. At this point I don't even have a car. So I don't know. I'm not completely setting that aside as an option but for now I want to focus on my knitting and hope that by the cooler months I can see some kind of side income there. Thanks to Tara from the Follow That Bus crew for giving me that little push I needed:) I was always knitting something and she would be like "hey, you should sell that", with all kinds of marketing ideas because she is just like that, lol. I enjoy being creative but I'm not so good at putting it into a business perspective like she is so I really needed her influence and encouragement. I think that sometimes we meet people on our journey who are soulmates of sorts that we are supposed to meet at that point in time for various reasons. I've been seeing that a lot on this trip and she is a prime example.

Heck, if we even had some old fashioned skill that would be marketable to an intentional community that might be beneficial as well. So I feel that delving into that is something I need to do right now and call it work...even though I might not be getting paid for it yet.

In a couple of days we are headed to Taos to stay with some gracious blog friends who shall remain anonymous since I don't know if they want me to mention them or not. In the meantime we have a couple of solar panels to install (yes, we got some solar panels!) and I've got a sun oven coming in the mail today.

Tinkertown and beyond

2010-06-12T16:48:00.007-06:00

And Ellery with his new found friend Brian, along with Willow and Molly enjoying the outdoors of the campground

Enjoy

Rik

Land in New Mexico can be cheap....water is not

2010-06-09T18:50:00.000-06:00

What a busy somewhat stressful week this has been! We decided that since we have been enjoying New Mexico so much that we should at least make a stab at looking for some cheap land. We knew we wouldn't be lucky enough to find anything super close to Albuquerque, not even any of the quaint nearby small mountain towns we have been loving so much. We did however find a lot of rural land about an hour from here right where we broke down no less for $1000 an acre. In fact the picture Riki took from our breakdown spot was of the area where the land is located. Uncanny, right? Well, we didn't get our hopes up because we know all too well how these things can not work out or be too good to be true, etc. We drove out there and the land was picturesque enough, in the prairie with beautiful mountain backdrops as long as you didn't count the other lots with beat up trailers and junk in the yard. I told Riki there was no way in heck that code enforcement could care what we built or put on the land. That was a win win. Nevertheless we reconsidered when we found out it would cost about 16K to drill a complete well, half that to drill and put our own hand pump on it. That 1K piece of land turned out to be much more than that. Plus it freaks me out a little bit that New Mexico has a real water crisis with rumors of running out in ten years or so. I know the whole world is dealing with water shortages of some kind but that scared me a little.

In a way we are a bit relieved. We've spent the past few days going over scenarios for rural off grid living, housing choices, what we could afford, how we would transition, find work, start a home business etc. Many of these topics aren't new to us but they always stress us out to talk about. I did get a little hopeful that this might finally be the time when we would get that piece of land and live sustainably with a little yurt and have some chickens. Once again though, it just isn't the right time I suppose. We just keep on moving and say maybe one day...

It isn't that I dislike being on the road or even small spaces. I would just like to be a bit more self sufficient in terms of being able to grow our own food like we started to do before, not paying ""rent" so to speak, and finding a community to get involved with. Then again, the minute you stop you have all these permanent living conditions to stress about. So I've let it go and let the universe decide when the time is right.

It is a little depressing to see land so expensive and even intentional communities. I can't believe people are selling earthships studios in Taos for 300K. You can't even get your foot in the door of an ecovillage without paying thousands of dollars to lease a postage stamp plot of land. This could be another one of my green vents where being green has become popular, trendy, and therefore expensive, even in those communities. It seems ironic to me that the very income bracket of people who could benefit most from earth sheltered housing and sustainable living are the ones shut out of it due to the cost of these communities and areas where apprenticeships/workshops are held. We may still get to Oregon and do a cob house workshop. I don't know yet.

All I know is that since we've been to New Mexico I've never seen so many locally owned businesses in my life. Sure, you still have your fast food joints, Walmarts, etc. but the independently owned almost eclipse those entirely. I don't think we have been to one franchise place to eat or shop since we've been in Albuquerque with the exception of REI. It is amazing and sad to see what has happened to Florida where we are from. You see this and it just looks like Florida laid down and let everybody run them right over in terms of development.

Next week we leave for Taos and I am so excited to say that we discovered they are having a solarfest with
Michael Franti while we are there so we'll definitely be catching that. I haven't seen any festivals or jambands since we've been on the road yet...seriously. I think my foot will be healed enough for some hooping too.

Allergies still keeping me down...don't know what it's from. I've taken two homeopathic remedies with barely any relief so that is a real bummer. I carry tissues with me constantly. Either my nose is bothering me or my eyes are burning like they are on fire. It sucks.

Still loving it there though, the smelll of the pinon (desert pine) on the little backwoods trail that leads to the office....getting around with less of a limp and hoping to get some good hiking in real soon.

Old Town in Albuquerque

2010-06-04T13:13:00.000-06:00

Yesterday we continued our ongoing love affair with New Mexico by visiting Old Town. It is a quaint little village of historic adobes housing art galleries, restaurants, and shops, bricked courtyards with fountains, and other architectural loveliness. We had lunch in an old 1700's adobe and were serenaded by a flamenco guitar player near our table. Riki is trying to enjoy authentic southwestern food but is beginning to think he just prefers the non authentic Florida kind with more seasoning and spice. I discovered how smooth and superior agave is to traditional tequila, not that I've ever been a huge tequila fan anyway.

I love the adobe structures because they reinforce my dream of building a cob house. I love the hand sculpted look and how benches and shelves are carved out of the adobe itself....then decorated with colorful southwestern pillows and rugs. That reminds me that we need to look into the cob building workshops when we get to Oregon.

I had my first Trader Joe's experience in the city as well. I couldn't believe they had organic bread for $2 a loaf! We managed to buy a good amount of groceries with some splurges for around $50. I sure hope we see plenty more of those stores in our travels. Downtown appears to have a plethora of locally owned businesses from clothing boutiques to cafe's to music stores. It is really refreshing to see instead of the usual franchise strip malls. It is similar to Austin but has a lot more culture on the outskirts of town.

We are finding that we really enjoy the balance of staying a bit outside of the city where we can enjoy a quiet rustic atmosphere but to be able to drive where we can buy healthy food or eat at a restaurant. We are starting to think this would be the ideal living situation for us as well to live just outside of the city and have the best of both worlds.

Riki and I both agree that we could totally see ourselves settling down here. We just get a good vibe from New Mexico in general. We may even price some cheap land while we are here. Then we are off to Santa Fe/Taos before we make our way to Colorado.

Amy

Well, after all the TIRE-ing drama from last night and today, some levity and nature

2010-06-02T18:25:00.000-06:00

Well I am just beat from these past few hours and though, we have seen the sights of Ruidoso (though short lived) to the loooooong wait along I-25 and of course admiring the wildlife of the Walmart (ONE cotton tail rabbit) here are my photo updates.

But first, I must say, Ruidoso is BEAUTIFUL. I didn't bring my camera due to showeres either present or to come on both days we were there. I will say it DID kinda remind me of Pigeon Forge in TN. Very quaint, very friendly and very COOL.

I want to say again thank you to our camp Host with the most Justin or helping with the transmission, his insight of the area and information as well as just being great company shooting the poo outside the RV. He was so thoughtful of the kids and bless his heart, all of us. I'm so glad that from Brantely Park, to Roswell to Ruidoso, we have met very nice and informative people; we and I thank you.

Then the tire blew 50 miles outside of ALB. Might as well take some pics. The tire in the background of the 181 Mile marker was not ours. After close inspection along the side of the road, many others have blown their tires at this point. There were shreads of tire everywhere.

We finally arrived at our site the next day.

Thank GAWD. Though the Walmart was inviting, I couldn't wait to get the heck out to our reservation. I will say this, Kudos to Circle J tires and Gina for hooking us up with our new back tires and prompt service.

Enjoy and happy travels

Rik

In Albuquerque but not without breakdown drama

2010-06-01T11:15:00.000-06:00

We left an adorable little ski mountain town called Ruidoso yesterday on our way to Albuquerque. We sure wish we could have stayed longer than two nights but it was one of those pricier tourist areas. Although our rv park wasn't much to brag about, our kind neighbor showed us a great trail from the back of the park to midtown. It meandered through those lovely vacation cabins you see in the mountains and followed a bubbling river. Then all of a sudden you found yourself in the middle of this quaint downtown strip with shops, places to eat, and my favorite part...an outdoor patio place with live music and local brew! We had a great time and sometimes after doing the whole rustic away from town thing for a couple of weeks it is nice to do a little shopping, eating out, and being around civilization for awhile.

When we left in the afternoon we drove through another smaller mountain town, Capitan which I would have liked to stop and check out. I love places like this. They have all this beautiful landscape and yet you can easily walk/bike to kitschy places to eat or shop. It's like the best of both worlds without being too citified.

Then our day went downhill. We encountered our first "warning, dust storms and high winds ahead" sign. That made me nervous enough and then when the wind starting rocking the rv from the west side I was petrified, gripping my chair for dear life. I'm sure some are laughing but we have zero experience with this. I cannot imagine what our ancestors did in those covered wagons. I think I would just feel better with two feet on the ground in a high wind instead of up in a top heavy rv.

Then about 50 miles from Albuquerque we blew a tire. Yep. This shouldn't have been such a big ordeal but oh boy...it was memorial day. AAA said they didn't have anybody to come change the tire and Riki couldn't change it because it was one of the inside tires and he couldn't get to it....so they sent us a tow truck about two hours later. It took an hour to get the rv up on the flatbed because of the tire while the kids and I sat in the car. They towed us to a Walmart where they said the tire center could fix it in the morning. By the time we got here it was 11 p.m and we all went to sleep. This morning Riki goes to the tire center and they tell him that no, they don't do rv tires after all so we're stuck again. We call AAA again, they say they will send another tow truck out in 30 minutes to take us to Camping World where we already have an 8:30 appt for other maintenance. We wait another hour, then call AAA back to find out there were computer glitches and they never got our order out for the tow truck. We ended up finding a mobile tire place to just come out and replace several tires, which they are doing as we speak. Whew. What a mess. Let's just say this is our second time dealing with AAA and we aren't very impressed with their rv roadside assistance. I think they are great for cars but we are going to change to somebody like Good Sam that specializes in rvs next time around.

We'll all be glad to finally get to our campground sometime this afternoon outside of Albuquerque. I'm hoping this isn't another Austin scenario all over again, lol. Riki and I agree that we end up not having a very good time when we go through big cities. We need to stay a couple weeks though to catch up on way behind mail and things that need to be ordered.

We are all looking forward to a restful night with hookups, lol. It was no fun sitting for hours in that 95 degree heat yesterday afternoon...oh, and today too.

Amy

Catching up Carlsbad and beyond - Guatalupe NP and Sitting Bull Falls

2010-05-29T22:14:00.000-06:00

Now, I TOTALLY forgot to bring my camera for GNP, so I snapped a few pics off of Amy's cell phone but I will say, pictures NEVER can do this park any justice. The range was totally breathtaking and I'm sorry, it is beyond words. Ellery received another Junior Ranger Badge and we stopped by the ruins of an old stage coach depot. Now again, Sitting Bull Falls...not much run off of water cascading down due to low rainfall but just a simple DELIGHT to find an oasis of fresh, cool water in such a very remote area of the mountains.

Our GEO had more Smokey Mountain flashbacks as well as I going up, over and around these mountains.

Sitting Bull Falls

Enjoy. Now again, thanks again to the Whites for helping us out and suggesting Ruidoso which we are currently in. The mountain drive was fantastic and the town is oh so quaint. Amy I am sure will be relating to that tomorrow.

It's not every RV park you pull in and park you seek FIVE deer right by your site.

Rik.

Catching up Carlsbad and beyond - Brantley Lake State Park

2010-05-29T21:57:00.000-06:00

What better way on a rainy day to just play around a bit in the RV. Brantley Lake was very nice indeed. We hiked and really had alot of solitude there. We met a wonderful family the White's while we were there. They were most helpful when Willow had to go to the ER for her staple in her head and definitely helpful in us eventually taking a scenic route to Ruidoso, NM. I can't wait to get some pics of this place. But for now, and for catching purposes, Brantley Lake and sitting around the RV. We were quite removed from town but no biggie. My last photo tells all of how bored I was....NOT!

Our "backyard"

Oh and the Pecos River

Where there is no Iffy Wifi, there is Blackberry.

The stars oh my god soo many. They were just starting to appear.

Yes, I like to play near the bushes.

Enjoy

Rik

Catching up Carlsbad and beyond - Living Desert Zoo

2010-05-29T21:41:00.000-06:00

You know how zoos go...Animals were mostly sleeping. BUT the kids did love the scenery and the view from where we were.

We have alot of catching up to do since we have been without decent Wifi for nearly two weeks. I do hope someone can share what type of mobile internet they have so we don't have to rely on the iffy wifi from parks and if we boon dock, we can still have access.

Enjoy and sorry I rushed through these pics but there is so much to update on limited wifi connections.

Enjoy

Rik

Fond farewell to Carlsbad

2010-05-26T22:06:00.001-06:00

I forgot I could post from my phone, lol. We were supposed to be leaving Carlsbad by now but Willow fell off her bike and she got a staple in her head at the ER. I know, Iknow, we are inadvertently touring the ER's of America, right? So we can't leave until she gets it removed.

We are enjoying our postcard view of the desert from the state park right now. We have just loved our extended stay. We were able to visit Guadalupe national park and went to sittin bull falls today. It is this unbelievable waterfall oasis in the lincoln national forest. I thought I had been transported to Aztec ruins or Disney World one. Seriously, where I'm from you only see stuff like this recreated in theme parks.

Being injured for so long has really helped me to appreciate being more physically active and judging by the size of my rear lately lord knows I need it. So the whole family is unanimous in outfitting ourselves with better day hiking gear and hitting as many trails as we can. Ellery was upset that I couldn't hike all the way to the top of the mountain today but in time...

We can't say enough great things about this place. The only bummer is all of the oil rigs, poisonous gas signs, and toxic smells that line some of the most beautiful mountain roads. What a shame that is indeed.

We met a real fun family here in a tiny older class C with three girls and an aunt. They were so down to earth and gave us some pointers for our travels. We are going to spend a couple of nights in Ruidoso and then head to Albuquerque to catch up on mail and get some rv maintenance done.

Pictures to come in a few days..can't do that with a phone I'm afraid.

Amy

Having a blast ie.frugal sightseeing

2010-05-17T13:23:00.000-06:00

We are really having a fabulous time here in Carlsbad. Life is full of inhalations and exhalations. While we were in Austin after my litle accident it seemed like there was a lot of inhalation....reading inner work books, knitting, planning, arguing, readjusting to limited finances. There wasn't a lot of play or just enjoying ourselves. Now that we are here the exhalation has finally happened. I am reminded that this is the reason we decided to go on the road...the national parks. It is hard to believe that it has taken this long from Florida to see a worthy national park. This is part of why I've been in a bit of a funk, feeling stagnant, and like we weren't really doing much of anything. It has been the journey to get out west. The west is and has always been our destination and now we are here.

Let me tell you why national parks are so great. First of all, you just can't beat the price. The kids were free at Carlsbad Caverns so I think we got in for around ten bucks. Ellery's souvenir was his free junior ranger badge and Willow got a pressed coin for around 50 cents. I did get my passport for $10 which Riki already had but once you buy that you can get it stamped at each national park for free and a pretty sticker for each location for around $1. Now those are some cheap souvenirs! I' m digging it.

And then there is the value of enjoying the raw beauty of nature as it's meant to be. There is a lot to teach our children about respecting the planet in taking them to places like this vs. an amusement park or some other consumer focused tourist trap. We went to the Living Desert Zoo and Botanical Gardens this morning....another $13 for all four of us to get in. I come from where it costs at least $30-40 for a family of four to go to a zoo....and this one was so much more beautiful. Although many animals were sleeping to our disappointment the botanical gardens were just beautiful. We were able to see all of the native species to the chihuahuan desert. The prickly pear cactus with its yellow blooms are my favorite. I enjoyed reading about the medicinal values of the various cacti and plants. It is amazing that we go to a store now to buy medicines when plants which can heal us are everywhere!

Riki will be posting a last round of pictures tonight. We did see an awesome rv park he had mentioned right at the entrance of the park but that was out of our budget. We are spending our last night at a passport america park and then we are off to Brantley State Park a bit further north for about a week....so we won't have internet there. After that Roswell, and then we are predicting a longer stay in Albuquerque where we can get mail and packages again (hint hint to those who have packages to send).

For now, I'm enjoying our little indoor cactus we bought for $5 and fantasizing about xeriscaping with blooming cacti in a front yard.

Today's adventure - Carlsbad Caverns!

2010-05-16T21:07:00.001-06:00

Boy the kids, looking at the brochures, could not wait to get there this morning. We found another RV park in White City (??) that was only 30 dollars a night with discount and right smack on the road to the entrance of the caverns.

The drive up was rather um...hilly. I haven't driven in 'mountains' in some time, but I suppose it wasn't that bad and good practice to gear up for the travels to come. Get it? Gear up? Okay bad. I had a heck of a time picking which photos to post so bear with my over post-ness of pics, but I went literally wild with photos here, then there....

Ellery passed his Junior Ranger 'test' and received his first badge (one of the photos you see him going through the questionaire and games). Unfortunately my battery in my camera gave way.

We did not hike the whole cavern trail one, due to Amy's feet and two, Willow was a bit freaked out by the time we hit the 0.75 mile mark. But still it IS quite a sight to see.

May 17, 2010 - Correction we did not stay at the $30.00 a night park. If we would have known of this place, we would have stayed at least one night to be right down the road from the national park entrance.

R

I could have posted more Cavern Coolness but there were too many to choose from.

Enjoy

Rik

We are in New Mexico!

2010-05-15T13:46:00.000-06:00

This was a big day for me as I knew that we would be leaving Texas and entering one of the places I have wanted to see for a long time. New Mexico! Even the day before yesterday when we were driving through the backroads of west Texas I got excited because things started to look "deserty" as I put it. The mountains had sparser greenery on them, the trees started turning to more brush, and we started to see orange dirt. I can imagine how funny this probably sounds to some people but hello, I've lived in Florida all my life. I've never seen stuff like this, haha. So today I buckled in looking forward to a beautiful change in landscape on the way to Carlsbad. I was a bit disappointed at first because we ended up on a very industrial stretch of road, quite the contrast from the country backroads we had the other day. Then we endured the visual pollution (as I like to call it) of oil rigs everywhere. Yuck. They look like dinosaurs which I think is an amusing metaphor for what they really are anyway. We also saw our first wind turbines, very exciting moment of us all as well, looming behind the oil rigs ironically enough.

Once we entered the "land of enchantment" as they call it here, the oil rigs started to be less prevalent and we enjoyed a beautiful stretching land of brush, sand, rocks, and some lovely orange/yellow wildflowers along the roadside. They looked almost like bouquets I could just pick out of the ground. I knew we had arrived for sure when Riders on the Storm from The Doors came on the radio right around the time we entered Carlsbad.

We are weather cursed

2010-05-14T14:18:00.000-06:00

We arrived this morning at the Whip In RV park in Big Spring, TX (you'll see why I added the name for your google map viewing).

We are currently watching the local news with 'unbelievable' storm activity. We are currently seeing a severe thunderstorm AND tornado warning for the next 45 minutes. We are awaiting winds up to 60 mph, hail the size of golf balls and circulation in the system heading our way.

Come on Little House On Wheels...we can hold!

We originally planned on heading to Andrews, TX but I'm glad we changed our minds; the highway there is underwater and was literally pelted with rain, hail and had a few funnels.

Rik

Are we green, crunchy, or just a bunch of snobs?

2010-05-14T07:13:00.002-06:00

Every once in awhile I have to make my obligatory post about my disdain toward the whole direction the green movement has taken. Like a lot of people I was thrilled when so many years ago eating healthier and being environmentally friendly starting getting more media attention. I mean, I remember when people thought I was weird for drinking smoothies and nobody knew what organic was. Now it is everywhere and I'm glad but I'm seeing a twisted sort of perversion of the movement that I don't like to be associated with and is counterproductive to its general cause. I guess that would be snobbery. It seems to be under the guise of being green or crunchy so to speak. For those not in the know crunchy seems to have come from associating hippies with eating granola which is funny because crunchy has become so much more sophisticated than eating granola, lol. It seems that if you aren't eating raw and spending $15 for a bag of goji berries you just aren't crunchy enough. You see where I'm going with this.

I feel like a lot of virtues have been hijacked. After all, the real being green is simply having less. When I was laid up with my foot injury Riki bought me a popular fashion magazine. As I flipped through it I couldn't believe how many products were labeled as "green" on nearly every page. "Buy this $500 reclaimed wooden necklace." Buy this $300 face cream made from rare botanicals." Is this what we've become? I'm actually starting to understand why we are such a target of the right wing movement jokes and labeled as snobs.

And now in the blogosphere I see a lot of proselytizing about it. At first I couldn't figure it out. I thought why in the heck do certain blogs make me feel all ick when these people have the same interests I do? Then I realized what it was. It was the gloating. The lists of "all the ways we are green", the posts of why homeschooling/unschooling is superior with a bunch of links and statistics to why, the holier than thou raw diets, fitness gurus, etc. I'm not saying that any of these things are inherently wrong and I agree with many of the posts. I just don't know how much we are achieving by wagging our finger at others or getting caught up in the consumerist side of things. A lot of people in the world can only dream of having the money to buy half the things we do.

Fact of the matter is that you can't package and sell reducing your standard of living or downsizing. You don't see glossy ads telling you that instead of buying brand new energy star rated appliances that maybe you could do without some of them or try a non electric version that isn't sold by a huge corporation. So we all run around eating our expensive healthy food and buying our $300 silk fair trade duvet covers while wondering why everybody else thinks we are a bunch of snobs.

Food is dicey. I put it into my body and well, I have to eat it to survive so I will admit to spending more than most families do on organic food, sans goji berries, lol. Having said that I don't buy into lots of trendy or ethnic diets. We eat mostly traditional foods, just with whole organic ingredients as much as possible. I don't think our ancestors had to worry about stuff like so many pesticides and GMO crops but these days we do....so a package of white flour just isn't as good as whole wheat....but see, I'm proselytizing now, haha!

Nothing has hit home so much though as being on a limited income on the road. As much as I hate it I can't always afford healthy food. It was astonishing to me yesterday that we spent $15 at Subway for four healthy sandwiches...no kids meals and that we got a greasy pizza for $5 at the Flying J's. What are you gonna do? Sometimes you can't cook meals from scratch or you are low on groceries and waiting for that next check to come in. Sometimes I drink expensive Sierra Nevada beer and sometimes I drink PBR or Bud Light. I like to follow it up the next day with Emergen C or some Kombucha and how hypocritical is that? It gives us all a little humanity to talk about our weaknesses every once in awhile.

I guess where I'm getting at with all of this is that I think us green or crunchy or however we want to label ourselves folks would get more respect if we would keep it real. I'm human and I like to think I adopt a lot of "green" practices in my own mind but I'm not embarrassed to say that I ate some greasy pizza or that sometimes all you can get is 49 cent hamburger day at McDonald's.

Maybe on blogs we could all talk a little more about being human and our struggles instead of always bragging about yoga classes, our organic handmade clothing, how superior we are because we homeschool/unschool and drink fair trade coffee instead of Starbucks. And when it gets right down to it, paying money on any of those things does not make us crunchy. I think the Amish with their austerity and simplicity have something over on all of us...and they probably don't even believe in global warming, lol. Yet they along with authentic homesteaders past and present (no, I'm not talking about celebrities who grace the covers of Mother Earth News) are the true green pioneers making a difference and living by values of authenticity. In the end I think the rest of us can only aspire to be that great in our endeavors....because we all know that simply using CFLs, buying hybrid cars, and outfitting large homes with expensive solar is not the change which is really going to change the direction our planet is in right now.

So seriously, let's all keep it a little more real with fewer statistics of why this or that practice is so much superior to another and remember that none of us are any better than anybody else. We are all spiritual beings traveling in a human body with struggles and on different stages of the path. I don't think my drinking one more bottle of Kombucha (no matter how darn good it tastes and how good I think it is for me) is getting me any closer to enlightenment.

Owl Creek-the good, the bad, and the ugly

2010-05-13T16:18:00.000-06:00

We went to a place called Owl Creek on the corp of engineer lands near Belton, Tx for our first boondocking experience. It was interesting to say the least. Our first disappointment was with the fact that this place really doesn't accommodate rvs. Although there is a beautiful open campground available to the public the entire perimeter is enclosed by a little two foot high fence....great for tent camping but not so great if you have an rv....so...it just so happened that the only rv spot available was almost right off the water with the exception of a nearby concrete parking lot. Since we arrived on a Saturday this place was packed with locals camping for the weekend. We suspected that they would all leave on Sunday so we could get the one rv spot near the lake. We camped in the parking lot and sure enough, they all packed up and left the next day so we pulled right on in.

I will say this. The place is beautiful. It is a rather mountainous area in Texas and lots of fishermen come out for boating. The first think that shocked us when the weekenders left was the amount of garbage they left behind. It was rather disgusting and we had to clean the camping area ourselves before we could relax. Then if you thought that couldn't get disgusting enough we figured out that the rv that left before us dumped out his pee all on the ground. Yep. Pretty disgusting. We had to cover that up with some old ashes. Yuck.

Beautiful as the place was it was a bit spoiled by the less than desireable characters who showed up. This is more of a place that people come to get into trouble it seems where they aren't under the watchful eye of the law....lots of loud cursing right around the kids, underage drinking, general partying. I'm not a prude by any stretch of the imagination but this company was definitely too crass for us.

My allergies worsened and the wind was brutal so I spent most of the days cooped up inside. Then as a last hurrah we had what I considered hurricane force winds last night rocking the rv back and forth like we were out at sea in a storm. I was absolutely petrified! I'm from Florida and being in a house in hurricanes was nothing like this. I could hear the wind howling over the roof and around the windows and I thought the worst was going to happen. It was like this for hours and we were in the middle of nowhere so I was quite panicked. Then the house battery was dying and the propane gas alarm kept going off in the middle of the night until Riki started the engine. It was craziness. I guess we can assume that five days is the maximum we can boondock without any extra batteries or solar....and that is bare minimum, no lights at night, nothing.

So here we are tonight at the Flying J's and I'm extremely exhausted. Between allergies, obnoxious campers, and wind gusts rocking the rv I don't think I've had a good night sleep in days. It's funny but somehow I think this crowded Flying J without all the flora and fauna around will give me the slumber I desperately need to recharge my batteries.

Our last day in Austin - Photo compilation

2010-05-07T22:08:00.000-06:00

Well seeing that we really haven't been out, and taking care of the household since Amy's fall I have been lagging on posting updates for you all. So here is a semi-montage of photos of our remaining weeks here at Austin; though very far and few.

Our anniversary night out and I was SHOCKED at how CHEAP it was. Oh and this was before Amy's big fall :O.

Of course loving the pool.

And here Mommy and all of us got to see some live music and have a time out at Freddy's, they even had a playground for the kids. Ellery wanted no pictures so alas....he'll show up eventually.

May Day Celebration photos

Hat day for the girls

And today, Barton Springs. D.amn that water was cold

We will be signing off for a time since we will be trying our hand at boondocking in Owl Creek (ACOE Lands) for the next week so I am sure we will have plenty more photos and Amy's narrative to go along with our journey. As Amy had stated, I think we are all due a little time in the woods so to speak. Being a long time primitive camper myself, I do miss the quiet and peacefulness of it. I hope the Bass are awaiting our call.

Take care and happy travels to all. Family, our thoughts are with you.

Rik

Almost time to move on

2010-05-04T05:10:00.001-06:00

I think we can all officially say that we've had our belly full of rv parks and resorts. I can see why everybody at these places hole themselves up and watch satellite tv all day. There is nothing else to do and if you do go outside you are so close to your neighbors that you worry that you will disturb them, not to mention your lack of privacy. Even Ellery thought it was curious that most people in the nicest coaches don't even have their awnings out around here. It's because they don't go outside!

It wasn't our intention to stay at these places but like I've said before they are typically cheaper than the state parks where we are from and the way we have had to go to get out west. If we had to "camp" this way all the time I think we would be tired of the lifestyle real quick. I saw that the state parks in New Mexico are like $10-15 a night. Now that's more our speed and half of what they usually are around here....not to mention the boondocking opportunities that are right around the corner...and no, I'm not talking about parking at a Walmart.

The weariness of being laid up for two weeks with nothing to do has reminded me of why we are on this trip after all. We are looking for those beautiful landscapes you see on the rv commercials, the national park experiences, seeing deserts, mountains, and nature in general that looks exotic compared to where we are from. I've been joking about how I can leave the rv now, look around, and if nobody told me any better I would still think I was in Florida. I want to go somewhere that definitely doesn't look like Florida for a change, haha. Otherwise, what's the point of the trip?

So I have to tell myself that if the trip is getting a bit weary it is because we haven't reached any of our destinations yet. This part of the journey has been a means to an end or beginning or however you want to look at it I suppose. I am also realizing that after two weeks of being in one spot I get restless and think too much, just like being in a stick house....so a month is definitely dragging me down in addition to the foot injury. It always seems like as soon as you hit the road with empty highway ahead that all of those problems melt away from your mind for awhile with the anticipation of something new. It is when you stop for too long that they begin to drag you down again.

We are hoping to get to Carlsbad as quickly as possible, which may not be so quick after all with gas expenses. I'm sure hoping we have passed some of the highest camping costs for awhile as we slowly make our way into more boondocking territory. We had initially thought we might go northwest through Texas and then pass the New Mexico border to visit Santa Fe/Taos...but we've since decided the most direct route out of Texas and into New Mexico would be more favorable to us. Just visiting a national park would be pretty darn exciting to us!

We may shoot for Boulder after that because there is a doula conference there and I would like to finally begin my certification process to become a doula. After all, we are going to settle down eventually. We don't have unlimited resources or work on the road like many families who do this indefinitely. I've got to start thinking about transitioning into some kind of income. I haven't worked since Ellery was born eight years ago which is pretty scary but now that Riki's job prospects seem to be zero anywhere we go I've got to scramble up something. My previous work background was all ob/gyn related so being steeped in that so long would make becoming a doula a pretty practical idea.

We feel like such boondock newbs. Riki is frantically searching for BLM maps for Texas and freaking out, asking if there is a phone number he should call to make reservations. I'm thinking that would be a no myself if these are public lands, lol. I told him we should just stop at a visitor center or call a state park if we can't find the place but I know that leaves him feeling very nervous. I mean, how in the heck does he enter it into the GPS on his phone, lol?

Zilker Park Botanical Gardens

2010-05-02T19:35:00.000-06:00

A very large park for sure. The weather seemed a bit on the way side but since Amy was recovering from her injuries, I took the kids to see the Gardens.

The actual window frame of an old house donated to the park, the first part of the gardens we visited and the kids found a dinosaur.

Taking a break along our walk, a water fall out of no where and an old blacksmith shop.

An old Swedish style cottage, the inside and again the blacksmith's shop.

And of course, the butterfly portion of the garden.

Rik

Still mostly laid up

2010-04-28T13:54:00.000-06:00

We finally broke down and went to the ER last Friday for my foot. I can't say a lot of nice things about the hospital here in Austin, except that I was surprised at our lackluster experience considering how big the city is. Anyway, the doctor was nice and that is a rarity where I'm from. X-ray confirmed that my foot wasn't broken, fractured, or destined for deformity as some have feared, lol. It was just a bad sprain. They gave me some crutches, a prescription for very sought after pain medication that blew away from our table in a gust of wind, and some peace of mind.

Since then my feet have turned all sorts of colors. I think we are making baby steps of progress. I still can't really walk on my left foot but when I do bear some weight on it I just wince a little instead of screaming in pain. That's something, right? Poor Riki is feeling like a true stay at home mom without much of my help. He definitely needs a break. It isn't easy doing all the chores, cooking , and discipline. Luckily I'm able to do homeschooling lessons from my bed but we are definitely taking a laid back approach right now. Maybe we needed that anyway.

I've been knitting up a storm...not much else to do and at least I have an excuse to spend as much time on it as I want, right? I'm working on my half serious idea of knitting small items like beer coozies and hats to sell at festivals.

We are still trying to decide which direction to take from here. We are torn between heading to the west coast through NM, AZ, and up the pacific coast or just heading north to the national parks in Utah and Wyoming while Ellery is out of school for the summer. There are a lot of things I would like to attend on the west coast like homeschooling workshops and a very cheap buddhist family retreat but they are mostly in southern cali and I worry with boondocking that it will be too hot and uncomfortable, even if we are used to Florida humidity. It seems more practical to me to go up north for summer and head back down the west coast to the south for fall and winter....even if there aren't a lot of cool things going on that time of year...decisions, decisions.

For now we are looking forward to our first true boondocking experience next week at some BLM lands here in Texas. There is a lake with a meandering stream and it looks beautiful. We are really ready for it after being at an rv park for so long. I know Ellery is chomping at the bit to try some fishing there. Some people think it's crazy that we don't have a generator or solar panels yet but I figure it like this. We have tent camped for years without hookups or air conditioning. What's the difference really?

I am hoping to hobble my way to a couple of places before we leave Austin like maybe Barton Springs next week. That looks promising....and there is a restaurant/outdoor music venue reminiscent of Skipper's back home that even has a playground. How cool is that? I'm hoping to check that out later this week. If I can hobble to a table and just sit there the whole time I should be okay. Plus, I'm dying to know what the redneck mimosa is on their menu, lol.

That's it for now, folks. We do have pictures from being here but bless his heart, Riki just hasn't had much time to really tweak the photos and post them on here. Maybe that will get done by the time we leave here, haha.

Our anniversary will now be known as the day I fell out of a bus

2010-04-21T16:20:00.001-06:00

Well folks, I gotta tell you, I'm convinced at this point that Austin just wasn't meant to be for us. First we needed to lay low because of finances, then there was the entire week of Seattle type of weather in a place that is known for mostly sunny skies. Then there was the night I fell out of the bus. Monday Riki and I decided it might be nice to check out a couple of bars for our anniversary while the Boves watched the kids. Everything started out nice enough. Of course we ventured out on a Monday afternoon where literally a handful of places were open and they were all dead...no people watching, let's put it that way. We made the best of it and after a couple of hours came back to get the kids. That was when I found myself airborne on the way down the steps of the bus. You have to know that I fall out of the rv a lot. Don't ask me why. I can already count on my hand the times I've slipped on our steps and fallen out of the entryway usually to land on my butt and laugh about it before I pick myself up. Well, this time I knew things were different when I hit the ground and felt my feet in excruciating pain. Riki had to practically carry me back to the campsite. It appears that I have one sprained ankle and one severely sprained or possibly broken foot. No, I haven't gone to the doctor or hospital. We don't have insurance and I cringe at the thought of spending $50 for an ace bandage and doctor visit just to have them tell me I have a sprained foot. So for now I am bedridden with my foot elevated, covered in ice, and wrapped in a bandage. It's pretty bad. I can't walk or bear any weight on it. Riki bought me a cane at the pharmacy to help but so far he still has to help me get out of bed. If it doesn't get better or gets worse in a couple days I guess we'll bite the bullet and find some kind of walk in clinic.

So things aren't too exciting right now. At best it looks like a bad sprain could take 2-3 weeks to heal and well, that's around the time we have to leave anyway...so bye bye Austin. Too bad I couldn't see more of you. I'm hoping Riki can take the kids on some little field trips but I don't see myself able to walk alone for days at the very least.

I have had some realizations on this road trip so far. Sometimes it is hard to believe that we are still less than two months into this journey. The further we are from Florida it feels almost like an eternity since we were there but honestly it hasn't been that long. I think we are still finding our niches. I mentioned in the previous post that we would like to do some more rustic camping than we have done so far. Well, I think I have decided that the city turns me into a miserable person. You see, as soon as I get to a city I feel like I need to go do things and of course they all involve spending money. Then I sit around moping about why I can't go buy clothes at the cutesy vintage stores that I don't have room for anyway or eat an expensive meal or see some kind of live music since this is like the live music capital of the country. We were so much more content in BFE Louisiana where there wasn't any pressure to go do anything because there was nothing to do, lol. Sure, we complained about the only horrible grocery store in town but we made due, had our campfire, and went about our daily business.

In some ways I think this was a little bittersweet karma. Now there won't be any argument about going anywhere because I'm an invalid and I can't go anyway, even with all the money in the world. There won't be any live music, clothes, delicious food, or any of that...

and I've decided I'm kind of over it. I would rather be in the middle of nowhere without the temptation. See, there isn't really a lot of nature here so I can't enjoy the outdoors, at least without driving to it and of course my bike is trashed now. So there isn't much to do but go out into the city which costs money.

So there it is...when we leave here we are checking out some of the corp of engineer lands in Belton. We don't have solar panels or batteries or a generator or anything truly worthy of boondocking so we'll see what happens. I figure it isn't a lot different from camping in a tent without being hooked up which we used to do all the time anyway.

So no pictures, nothing to see, nothing to do. Hey, I should look at the bright side. This is like a poor man's private retreat and I have lots of yarn stash for knitting. Woohoo.

2010-04-15T11:23:00.003-06:00

I know it's hard to believe that we are in Austin and I don't have much to report but we have been laying low since we got here a week ago. Sometimes we really have to do this to replenish our finances after paying large chunks of gas to get somewhere, not to mention camping fees, and really, we found that there is no place cheap to camp in or around Austin. If we had not wanted to come here so badly we may have skipped it altogether.

Oh yeah, on the way here my bike was clipped by a semi. The Boves needed a new tire so we stopped at a little tire shop off the interstate. When we were pulling in this trucker was pulling out, turned too wide, and totally clipped my bike. The tire is ruined and who knows what else...we are going to find a bike shop around here but I have a feeling the cost to fix it is probably about what I paid for it which sucks. At least he didn't clip the car. We think the bike rack is ruined too because of it. Bummer.

Last week we went to a super kitschy cool taco stand because I had to have some tex mex. I wish we had brought the camera because this place was so artsy and funky. We'll have to go back before we leave to get some. Then we did take a drive down Congress and Guadalupe yesterday to check out Wheatsville co op for some groceries. I'm glad we did since most of their products are local. The Buddha Brew Kombucha is local and to die for. I haven't seen a health food store since we left Florida so I was sure to stock up. I'm thrilled to be able to support a place like this vs. a chain like Whole Foods although I was desperate to go with that if it was all they had. I also got a chance to see the multitude of funky vintage and thrift stores I can't wait to check out. That is the good thing about staying for a month is that we don't have to rush to do anything.

I can't believe we are in the live music capital and we haven't seen any live music yet! For one thing we couldn't find where the bars and music venues are. I guess they are closer to downtown than we have been. The Boves have offered on multiple occasions to watch the kids. Willow loves Chelsea, their 17 year old daughter so we just may take them up on that one night. I find myself not knowing what to do because there is SO MUCH to choose from. I did make a point to check out the local knitting shop today though;) Yes, I'm a dork because the most important place for me to go to in Austin was the yarn shop, haha.

I do have a couple of field trips up my sleeve though. If the weather is nice enough tomorrow we are going to the wildflower center to see all of these beautiful Texas wildflowers up close in person. They have a kid's area too so that should be fun. There is a wonderful place called pioneer farms that has various 1800 settlements and does a lot of educational stuff with schools so that is another one on our list. Then if we can afford it I would like to take Ellery to the caverns because he has really wanted to do that but so far it is the priciest trip on the list. We'll see.

It hasn't been hard to feel like we are on vacation here at this campground though. There is a wonderful pool. At first I dreaded it because neither of my kids can swim and going to the pool is just not a relaxing thing to me when I have to hold their hands the whole time....but this pool rocks. One part of it is a circular 1 ft wading pool with a tiny fountain which segways into the rest of the pool which is still only 3 ft for a large part of it. That means I can actually just lie out by the pool and rest without having to be in it with them the whole time. And did I mention the hot tub? Friday through Saturday they also have a $1 all you can eat pancake breakfast. You can't beat that. Funny thing is Ellery hates this campground which I said is fine with me considering that this is probably the last place with these kind of amenities we'll be staying at for a long time. It isn't very woodsy of course and there isn't room to roam like the place in Kinder. I kind of miss that place with its country road and wide open spaces.

I am actually surprised and a tad bit disappointed by how few rustic places we have stayed so far. Honestly with the passport america it is cheaper to stay at the rv parks than the state parks or we have found like we did here in Austin that they just don't have any openings for the days we are coming. I'm hoping that will change when we get further out west and that everybody won't be too spoiled by things like wifi, cable tv, and sewer hookups by the time we get there.

I'm sure hoping that the next time I post we can actually show some pictures of this great place. I tell you, it wouldn't be a bad place to live but I did find it is more expensive than where we are from so unless the pay is also right up there, I don't think it would be a candidate....great place to visit though with all kinds of things to do, family and adult wise. Looking at the rental ads had me fantasizing about large concrete loft warehouses with rooftop gardens that overlook downtown...lots of places like that here if you have the money for it. They also have a waldorf school here I was thinking of visiting for their spring faire.

This weekend though, reggae fest is calling both of our families if the weather is nice enough.

We are in Austin!

2010-04-08T17:12:00.000-06:00

We have arrived but I'm a little beat after two days of traveling and my rather lackluster first Walmart overnight experience. I celebrated passing the Texas border yesterday morning by getting a weird tomato, lime, salt, and bud light concoction at the flying J's. It was kind of like a bloody mary, not too bad...then I picked up some Fat Tire amber ale since I've heard so much about it but never could find it locally. It was an alright beer but I've had better. I've definitely enjoyed trying the various local beers we come across. Lazy Magnolia southern pecan brown ale was a good one from a Mississippi brewery.

So we passed through the hellish city of Houston yesterday and ended up in another busy city at the Walmart. I guess it wouldn't have been terrible had it not been for the fact that we were parked right next to the on ramp of I 10. I'm already a light sleeper and I've had quite a few bouts of insomnia lately....so I'm going on two nights with very little sleep. I've heard people say they don't mind staying in the walmart parking lots so maybe this was just a bad experience. I can't say I'm looking forward to it again. I think if I had to choose boondocking in a parking lot or way out in the woods somewhere I would definitely go for the latter.

I gotta say that I thought Texas would be ugly but I've been pleasantly surprised. From the Louisiana border through to Austin I have seen the most amazing wildflowers along the side of the road. I never knew they grew in such vibrant colors like neon orange, purple, yellow, and bright red altogether at once. I wanted so badly to stop and get a closer look or some pictures but we didn't. I told Ellery we should definitely paint a wildflower scene for our schooling next week. I'm also thinking of some knitting projects inspired by the colors we saw.

So wow, now we are here and I want to be excited but I need a good night of rest. I got a chance to look at the local newspaper and I'm in awe of all the stuff to do around here. There is even a place here with raw kombucha on tap! I am so going there. I've never seen a place with so many live music venues. It is pretty overwhelming so I'm glad we have an entire month to take it all in. That gives us plenty of time to relax before we head out toward New Mexico.

Two days left in Louisiana

2010-04-05T17:11:00.000-06:00

Well, the RV is being prepared and packing has begun. A dash of spring cleaning and we will soon be on our way in two days time.

In the mean time, more photos for your enjoyment. I may or may not post Disco Night photos...lol

Willow dressing up for Disco Night. Chelsea hooping to some 70's tune-age.

Willow with her new found bigger sister Chelsea enjoying a movie. After that, some things you find along the way of a long bike ride.

Someone obviously doesn't like 35 as the going speed limit on this road.

Rik

Louisiana Living - We've extended our stay

2010-03-30T13:26:00.001-06:00

...till next week. We will be off to Austin either with or behind the Bove's. Last week began Ellery's homeschooling; sorry Little Man, Spring Break was over.

The kids enjoying an early Easter present from their grandma.

Back to roadschool for Ellery. Willow likes to participate.

The Bove's arrived and it was fire circle time. We all passed the guitar around from myself, Tara and her daugher Chelsea. Much hooping in between live entertainment and of course, Willow cleaning up the dishes.

Then of course, back to roadschool and Ellery's latest assignment.

Ellery and Willow making more laundry detergent.

Rik

Still in Lousiana

2010-03-27T12:46:00.000-06:00

We have been enjoying slow easy days here at the quiet campground in Lousiana. The Bove family came to join us in their bus and we have our own little community going. It has been quite a satisfying experience. It is as if we have our own neighbors and friends at the same time. Nobody is caught up in where we've been or where we are going, just enjoying where we are right now. I don't think any of us would mind living like this indefinitely. We spend our days catching up on laundry, hooping, drinking some beer, and having the kids take turns fishing in the nearby pond.

There is a idyllic country road from the campground. It is wooded on either side in some parts with sprawling pasture, cows, silos, and rundown farm buildings in other parts. It is very peaceful so the girls and I have been taking long walks or bike rides down there while having talks. I've gotta tell you that it's really nice to have fellow women I have a lot in common with and can discuss girl stuff with. This isn't something I get to experience often.

The only scary part is the snakes. Omg! We have seen several dead ones on our walks which keeps us very alert. We all talk about how these are the kind of snakes you see behind glass at a zoo, not the skimpy black racers we used to see in our backyards. Yikes! The men think they might be rattlers.

Tara gave me a wonderful book about raw diets and we are trying a few recipes out of there. I got a mini food processor for cheap at the store. It is so cute and compact. I have no expectations of our family being able to go 100% raw but if we could even get to 50% that would be great. So we're giving it a try. I just made an eggless egg salad today that turned out pretty good. Ellery loved watching the nuts grind up in the food processor.

So it looks like we will be here another week or so before we make the trek to Austin where I can't wait to find a health food store and stock up on some other raw food staples....not to mention grab some bottles of Kombucha. How I miss that stuff.

In the meantime we are just living easy over here without a whole lot of worries. We are so blessed to have such a wonderful family with the same trials and tribulations and interests that we have to relate to. We can all talk freely without feeling self conscious or that we might offend somebody. That is certainly a luxury. We joke about starting our own intentional community type of rally in the desert somewhere, you know, before 2012 comes and the whole world ends....okay, half serious about that part but you never know and we all agree that being self sufficient and living off the land could be pretty darn important in the future.

More pictures to come when Riki finally gets a chance at posting them.