Sing a song of thanksgiving

Yesterday we had a special celebration
having Keith and Kristyn Getty to lead
worship all day at our church. Then a
concert. They brought the joy of their
hymns with a Celtic fiddle and
a piper who played an Irish bagpipe and
a wooden flute. I was lifted up to a place
of joy, filled with some sort of supernatural
energy. If you didn't want to dance unto
the Lord, you must have been deaf! I know
a family who does Irish dancing and I
should have been up in the balcony with
them..........they were doing jigs in the aisle!
Amen and a heart of thanksgiving this
Multitude Monday for an awesome day
of worship. I'm sure it pleased the Lord.

I did ask them if they had met Seamus
Heaney, that great Irish poet. Yes, Keith
had taken Kristyn on a date to hear a
reading of Beowulf at Queens College,
where she had attended. She told me her
favorite poem is Digging.
Mine is St. Kevin and the Blackbird.
I beamed with that conversation.

It came in at the library....Bon Appetit

Cover of Volume 1, original 1961 edition

There were 83 HOLDS in the
computer system for Julia Child's
cookbook when I added mine in
August after seeing the movie,
Just in time for Thanksgiving!
One of my sons wants to cook
that duck! Well, not for Thanks-
giving. No quacks, just a gobble!

A Letter from Port Royal

My husband
said I got a
letter from
Port Royal,
VA.........
that man.




Well, it was from Port Royal,
Kentucky.
I had written to Mr. Wendell
Berry a Van Gogh card of a landscape
of a farm and told him a funny story ,
well, several. I knew he would
write back at least to affirm the arrival of my
letter. He is of a generation who answered letters.
And he is a writer. Writers write. He had two
sentences that were typed thanking me and he
was glad I am using his work. Signed
Wendell Berry.

Rainy, one of those days

Alice in Wonderland, due out March 2010


A running sort of day in the rain
today. Thankfully the driving tonight
is done by one of my sons. I found that
if I had found 5 more minutes , I would
not have been late. BUT when I arrived
where a son needed to be picked up,
he was 5 minutes later. Then when I took
my daughter to piano 5 minutes late
because the son was late out of his class,
her teacher was on the phone! So sometimes
it all works out.

Summer......on this Fall Monday

Gratitude this Monday:

~ For a really good weekend
with a full house of sons and
girlfriends and our newlyweds.
Good conversations, good food,
and laughter. Even some book
shopping at a used bookstore
with two of them. Even good
coffee time!

~The day seemed like summer.
So warm.
Good for my small Fall Garden
to keep growing and producing.

~Good curriculum . Amen to that
for when you see a child's mind
be nourished, it is something to
be so thankful for.

~I don't have to hem Emma's choir
dress. That I am thankful for. AND
we found flat black shoes that are so
cute to wear with the dress for
the concert this Thursday.
Those details , you Moms know,
are much to be thankful for!


~

~

Imagine this kind of old house

From the NY Times:
Grand old house in N. H.

Separating Curds and Whey, City Life and Country Farm

On the third floor is a children’s haven, complete with a kitchen and a giant rumpus room with a river view. Downstairs, French period pieces from Ms. Cabot’s maternal grandmother mingle graciously and eclectically with early American antiques in the front parlors. A clutter of iPods and computers sits beside photos of Cabots cavorting through the centuries.

Ms. Cabot stenciled the Latin phrase “Quod cupio mecum est” on the wall behind a velvet sofa in the living room. “ ‘What I want, I already have,’ that’s the translation,” she said. “I read it somewhere, and I thought it a good maxim and nice reminder.” (On a kitchen wall, opposite a portrait of a bison that is original to the house, she has stenciled “Rejoice.” Mr. Lovell-Smith said he had retired his wife’s stencils before she got too carried away.

Friday ....looking to the weekend

Listening to Stacey Kent's CD
Breakfast on the Morning Tram
with the song I love: The Ice Hotel
The rest of the songs are really good.
They have made us smile today.
They have made us want to sing.
Indeed what good music should do
especially on a Friday and a rainy
week.

The house will fill up this weekend with
a son comes home with his girlfriend
who we adore. Another may have his with him
also. The Newlyweds will come over
also..............and Thanksgiving Feast on
Sunday night at our church. Can you
imagine serving 700 +?! It's an amazing
thing! Now to the store to get sweet potatoes
and have that ready with all the rest this
weekend. I did find this recipe of Tyler Florence
that I want to try : Roasted Sweet Potatoes
with Honey Butter.