Cooper's Hawk

We have been seeing the Cooper's hawk more and more of late. I'm not conversant enough with the habits of hawks to know why he's suddenly showing up so much, but he has started landing on a certain branch in the neighbouring Garry Oak. The same spot on the same branch - every time.

Here is the section on Cooper's hawks from our bird book (one of the superlative Kaufman guides). These are great books, if you are looking for a bird or insect guide. Very good photographs. Anyhow, what we see is the adult male Cooper's hawk. In flight they are dramatic birds - with a strikingly beautiful underwing.

And here he is, sitting in his spot. See him there, perched at the top, sort of in the middle? That's our boy, minus dead starling.

English Ivy

The twins started a series of classes down at the local nature sanctuary this week, which meant that Max and I were at moderately loose ends for a couple of hours during these classes. What to do? Do we go for a long walk around Bird Lake? Do we go home and work one something together? Do we watch Sheila get groceries/drink a relaxing coffee/check her email? I confess I spent more than a few minutes wrestling with the options and my conscience, I'll have you know. I love having kid-free time and I don't get nearly enough of it. Which is why, even though it did occur to me to ask Max what he might like to do, I polled myself more than once or twice before I could bring myself to ask Max.

When the kids are at activities I have no trouble finding ways to occupy myself, mostly because the stretches of time afforded me are so short. I shouldn't even call them stretches. They are gasps of time. In-breaths, even. They remain a novel moment in my day, if they occur at all. Sometimes, if we are close enough, I whip home and read the distressingly long list of unread email I am accumulating. Other times I meet friends for coffee, catch up on reading, or wander through garden centres. Now that we have a house we're likely to stay in for a few years, and a house with a big yard to boot, the last option is the most popular lately. I'm even developing plant obsessions.

But this time I had Max along for the ride, and I knew it would be hard to wander through a garden center with a mildly resentful 11 year old rolling his eyes at my "Max, look! LEWISIAS! What incredible luck!" no matter how much humour I would be able to buttress his replies with.

Fortunately I didn't have to wrestle too fiercely with my conscience, because something came up in the meantime. Max's Cub troupe. Or rather, Max's Cub troupe leader. She emailed and asked when Max was thinking of finishing with his Purple Star requirements. Not really knowing what she was talking about, I asked Max. He was unable to give me a very distinct answer. He didn't seem terribly interested either. I considered Max. I considered his leader, a very nice woman but totally lacking in irony. I didn't think I would be able to joke about Max's interest levels with her. I considered my 2 hours of free time and saw it dwindling away into the distance. I think I might have sighed, too. Then I sat down with Max. After some discussion, it hit me that Max didn't know how to finish the requirements. I think he was hoping they might magically finish themselves. So we got out the Cub book and I helped him itemize them a bit. The Purple Star, for those of you unfamiliar with Cub activities, is a category that requires a Cub to investigate their native country in various ways: faith, citizenship, culture, technology, etc. To complete his Purple Star, he would have to be able to tick off eleven items from the list in the book. And before you go all "Well, how can that be hard?" on me, let me give you the piece de resistance in this farce chez Greenridge: Canadian history/culture/citizenship is an area in our homeschooling venture that, if it were a plant, would be sitting brown, dusty and dry on some long-neglected shelf. We just don't do it. Okay, now you can tssk tssk at me.

Luckily I saw the volunteer section in the requirements. Max has done a fair bit of volunteer work in his time, and this managed to get through off a surprisingly large portion of the list. It was then that I saw a category with his name all over it: "Participate in a community service project not listed above."And it was then that I had the brilliant idea to volunteer us to do something useful at the nature centre while the twins were in their class. Well, I thought it was a brilliant idea; Max sighed a little but refrained from commenting too extensively. I don't know if he was merely being diplomatic or if he felt the situation was beyond redemption. Poor kid, caught between puberty, a Cub leader, and an enthusiastic mother.

Thus it was that Max called the grounds keeper at the nature centre, explained who he was and what he needed to do, and arranged to meet him while the twins were in their class. So last week, once we'd had breakfast, some of us collected our heavy-duty gardening gloves, some of us collected our backpacks with a snack and a drink, all of us pulled on our rubber boots and all of us trudged off to the nature sanctuary, which is pretty much across the street from our house. It was a beautiful day: not too wet with promises of clearing. Masses of birds flitted after us as we stumped through the trails. The air smelled good. We wended our way over the bridges, the footpaths, and the puddles to the nature house. The twins were chattering with excitement. Max, in the rear, looked thoughtful. It took maybe ten minutes. Willie, the groundskeeper, met us in the nature hut. We settled the twins in their class and Willie showed us around the area we would be working in. Our task for the day: remove ivy. English ivy. An invasive European species, introduced when the Englishmen showed up here with their nostalgia for thatched cottages, holly, and clipped hedgerows. He showed Max what it looked like when it really started to strangle the undergrowth, demonstrated how to remove the roots, and left us to it.

In a way it reminded me of tree-planting: trudging through wet woody growth scrabbling in the ground with soggy gloves and bulky clothing, feeling the distinct need to pee. Not the most fortuitous of tree-planting memories, but they were definitely there, in between the nice bits, when the sun shone through the trees in streamers of glimmering misty light, when the ground smelt damp and sweet, and when the sounds of the hummingbirds buzzing and Canada geese honking reached our ears. I don't know what it reminded Max of, but he teetered between finding it amusing (flinging strings of ivy at me) and boring ("how long do we have to do this?"). And so we spent two hours.

We've been back twice now. I have to confess that the last time I really wanted to ditch it, because it was cold and rainy and I could think of a zillion other things I'd rather be doing, but I felt as though I had to Set An Example (ooh, I can hear my mum fainting) and show Max that we had to honour our agreements, even if they were rather lacking in the Creature Comforts or Desperately Thrilling departments. I might have thrown in a few Well, it's not like I'M getting a Purple Star's but for the most part I tried to manifest a dignified fortitude. Max was more colourful, throwing out a few Ugh's and Yucks and This SUCKS whenever he slipped or got tangled up with the blackberries, but he surprised me by doing it with way less complaint than I expected. I even had a couple of "seems like yesterday that he was 4 and playing with trains and now he's 11 and growing up and when did he get so tall?" moments, as I stared across the pile of ivy at him. Is this what growing up is for us parents? Brief glimpses of the past and the present in one go. They slip away so fast.

Oops, I'm getting all sentimental on me.

Poetry Friday

Here is an oh-so-polite welcome to March, a month of unpredictable weather here in the Pacific Northwest, by the oh-so-polite Emily Dickinson.

March

by Emily Dickinson

Dear March, come in!
How glad I am!
I looked for you before.
Put down your hat-
You must have walked-
How out of breath you are!
Dear March, how are you?
And the rest?
Did you leave Nature well?
Oh, March, come right upstairs with me,
I have so much to tell.


This next one is by the eminent RLS, and I include it because of the wind we've been having. If you want to see a five year old friend of mine recite it, keep scrolling.

Windy Nights
Robert Louis Stevenson

Whenever the moon and stars are set,
Whenever the wind is high,
All night long in the dark and wet,
A man goes riding by.
Late in the night when the fires are out
Why does he gallop and gallop about?

Whenever the trees are crying aloud,
And ships are tossed at sea,
By on the highway low and loud,
By at the gallop goes he,
By at the gallop he goes and then,
By he come back at the gallop again.







Poetry Friday is hosted today over at The Simple and the Ordinary. Happy Reading!

Little Volunteers on the Prairie Farm

We started volunteering at the local Petting Zoo a couple of weeks ago, ostensibly so that Max can finish up his Purple Star in Cubs, but also (ever so stealthily) so that he can get the experience of doing something for someone else for no obvious reimbursement. This is a trait I have long admired when reading the Little House series to my kids: the Ingalls family works very hard at getting along and getting along well, even when they don't feel like it. Even when they almost starve to death during a horrifically cold winter they keep it together socially. (this book has taken root in my brain, hasn't it)

The idea first came about when we were visiting the Zoo a while back. We love animals, and this place has a lot of them. Even better, most of them are of the pygmy variety, so the twins don't feel intimidated. We were first drawn into the guinea pig room, partly because we have our own guinea pig (named Henry) and partly because they had little baby guinea pigs the twins were desperate to see up close. We stood there gazing at the sheer size of the enclosure, and at all the happy little pigs (well, okay, maybe I AM projecting a bit), and we were all struck by the same thought: Henry's cage was nothing like this. I think Max and I might even have shared a look of mild shame. Afterwards we went home and mollified our guilty consciences: Max scrubbed out his cage, I trimmed Henry's nails and the twins took turns brushing his long hairy coat.

Then, a few weeks ago Max was trying to find ways to to work through the Community Service section, and it occurred to me that this would be a natural way to work through it AND have some fun, although Max's response ("What? We shovel poo for free? Yuck.") wasn't quite what I had hoped for. Luckily the twins are still in the excitable stages of their lives, and they were delighted with the idea, so, studiously avoiding Max's glower, I signed us up. Fortunately Max has warmed to the idea and he actually enjoys cleaning out the cages. Wonders will never cease.



There are an inordinate number of peacocks here, and they wander freely about like cats, although they are a good deal more ungainly. They hop onto fences, hop off, raise their tails periodically in that fabulous fan, and follow us around the place, hoping for dropped food pellets. I find it hard not to stare at them, because they are such an arresting colour, and, well, because of those tails. Those tails. They launch a thousand ships for me every time.









Here are some baby pygmy goats we saw today. Cute, eh? Two days old! They frisked about on unsteady legs while we cleaned out their stall, and their incredibly sociable mother nuzzled Dominic's pockets for snacks, butting him gently when none were proffered.

FDPG was so thrilled with them that she momentarily forgot about going to groom the pony and the donkey.



(You can click on any of these shots for a close-up)







Sorry, but I have to give you another peacock shot. I love these birds. These birds have it all for me: colour, weird personality, an ever weirder call (I put their call up there with the loon for Calls One Never Forgets), and the sort of mildly aloof nature that makes me fall head over heels in love with them. Be glad I'm only inflicting 2 shots on you, because I took 20.

War Cries

More handiwork from FDPG's history pages. We were all reading about Ashurbanipal and his, err, methodology as both king and army captain when I came across this translation. It was carved into a wall relief and was supposedly something his armies were taught to shout as they neared the enemy. Judging from his war record it was quite effective.

"We are like an evil rain that washes its enemies away! We are like a net that tangles the feet of those who fight against us!"

More Garden Work

Here is the Lozenge Bed, after a wash and set edge and lime. Don't ask me why we call it the Lozenge Bed, because the story is way too long (and totally uninteresting unless you know the quirks of my kids), but I will tell you that it had a lot to do with complicated but amusing in-jokes.

I mulched the perennials around this bed heavily last fall, mostly because they were newly planted and I was worried about them surviving, and when I hauled off all the leaves I was struck by how healthy they all looked. Now I am remembering all those little pots I bought (mostly on impulse): Astrantia Major, Sidalcea, Polemonium, Lobelia Tupa, Nettle-Leaved Mullein, Persian Coneflower, Scabiosa, Monarda (the shockingly gorgeous "Marshall's Delight"), "Princess Victoria Louise" oriental poppies, Belamcanda chinensis, Hakonechloa macha, and, last but not least, some of my favourite Lysimachia (a goose-necked variety called "Snow Candle").

See the rocks on the path crossing it? Not the slate, the rocks. Those rocks were originally hauled off a beach up Island with the intent to form an ever-so-lovely hearth floor for the living room fireplace. Unfortunately, we later discovered that we'd need to reinforce the sub-floor more than we'd care to in order to make this happen, so all those lovely flat rocks been co-opted by the Lozenge Bed Pathway (and yes, I am using the royal we here).


Here is the new asparagus bed we put in today. Richard the Handy Man often saws and screws together the structures for my projects (mostly because he makes them sturdier than I ever would) and this box was no exception. I think he is becoming resigned to it, actually, because I hardly had to do any arm-twisting bribing wheedling to get him out there building me a box of sorts. It might be hard to tell from this angle, but the site is rather sloping, so the box needed but front and sides. We used scrap cedar and a sod back wall. I'm getting good at skimming sod and building walls now. Must be all that Little House on the Prairie I've been reading. It measures about 5' by 6'. And into that bed went 2 massive bags of chicken manure, a load of compost, a giant bag of peat moss, and 10 Jersey Giant asparagus root bunches.


A parting shot for all you who like the humble iris reticulata. The iris has it all for me, almost: colour, form, fortitude. They are all there. All it lacks is a spicy scent of some kind. Who knows, maybe there is a scented miniature iris out there somewhere and I just don't know about it...

Thou errant hedge-born joithead!

Sorry if anyone is getting multiple copies of yesterday's Poetry Friday post, but for some reason the embedded YouTube video caused an enormous amount of confusion with the blog's appearance. I wish I knew why, but I don't. All I know is that it looked perfectly normal when viewed using Safari, and horribly distressingly odd when viewed using Firefox.

Oh for a computer literate brain!

(But if you want an amusing Shakespearean Insulter like the one I used in my title, click here)