The regularity of certain tasks allows your mind to drift while you're doing them and that can be a good thing. But it does mean that when that regularity is slightly disrupted, your automatic pilot flounders. You have to suddenly pay attention. And even so, you can veer off course.
This morning, our farmette guest is still with us as we try to figure out where to place this poor soul who is suddenly, understandably I suppose, quite unpopular with his landlords. (Hey, haven't you ever left a burner on inadvertently? And gone off to work, Wiener Schnitzel in hand, fire slowly causing havoc in the premises you left behind?)
Well, I was so distracted with the slightly different breakfast preparation (table set for three), that I did not remember to snap a photo of this very important beginning to our day. Just think yesterday's photo, only everyone's eating oatmeal and fruit instead of farmhouse eggs prepared to a 7 minute boil for one and 10 for another.
I can show you what the view was like for us -- this, looking out the kitchen window. Our Viennese guest had never seen a crabapple before and he was quite enchanted with ours. (It is indeed true that although the cultivated apple was brought over to North America by European settlers -- who in turn picked it up from its native Kazakhstan --the crabapple is the only apple tree that is native to this country. I'd never seen one in Poland either.)
Then, I continued to be thrown off by my adjusted Wednesday schedule. I had an hour to write and I did, forgetting to keep track of time, arriving, therefore, five minutes late at Snowdrop's home -- something no baby sitter should ever do to working parents. Everyone was very forgiving, including Snowdrop, who assured me she was just getting up.
Bath time then! And as I set her down and put away the various washing paraphernalia, she migrated over to a favorite spot in the kitchen -- her mommy's cook books, which is actually quite funny because her mommy, when she was that age, had a thing about cook books. She studied them obsessively for the first two or three years of her life.
And then Snowdrop sat down and gave me that "what now, grandma?" look.
Since this evening (not on my watch), the little girl has music class, I thought we should get in the mood and so I turned on the songs she'll be hearing in her music group. And we danced. There was a lot of arm waving (at least on my part!). [The photos are on a timed release, so you never know what you're going to get in the end.]
... But then I stood back and let her take the stage, because, really, she is much more fun and interesting to observe.
By the way, our color coordinated clothes? A total coincidence. I'm going out tonight with my monthly law school group so I paid a little more attention to what I put on this morning. Snowdrop -- she'd look good in a burlap sack, but happened to also don gray and red today.
Life is quirky that way.
In the afternoon, after her nap (where her hair got a little wild!) and some healthy, happy eating...
There was time for indoor play...
... and, too, we had a brief window in which to take a neighborhood walk. Storms are barreling up toward us and I hoped we'd manage to come back without being drenched and luck was with us, thank goodness!
Inside, it got a little intense toward evening. There are three cats in the house and not one is willing to put up with even a gentle petting session. And Snowdrop never stops trying. She'll climb all those steps trying to reach Virgil...
And reach for the sky wanting just a moment with Lucas...
But it's no use. They always escape her little hand.
Guess whose side I'm on in this?!
I come home late, after my retired-law-school-group dinner. Lightening flashes and gusts of rain pound on my windshield. Our farmette guest is working with machines in the sheep shed. Ed goes off to play volley ball. I settle in to write.
This morning, our farmette guest is still with us as we try to figure out where to place this poor soul who is suddenly, understandably I suppose, quite unpopular with his landlords. (Hey, haven't you ever left a burner on inadvertently? And gone off to work, Wiener Schnitzel in hand, fire slowly causing havoc in the premises you left behind?)
Well, I was so distracted with the slightly different breakfast preparation (table set for three), that I did not remember to snap a photo of this very important beginning to our day. Just think yesterday's photo, only everyone's eating oatmeal and fruit instead of farmhouse eggs prepared to a 7 minute boil for one and 10 for another.
I can show you what the view was like for us -- this, looking out the kitchen window. Our Viennese guest had never seen a crabapple before and he was quite enchanted with ours. (It is indeed true that although the cultivated apple was brought over to North America by European settlers -- who in turn picked it up from its native Kazakhstan --the crabapple is the only apple tree that is native to this country. I'd never seen one in Poland either.)
Then, I continued to be thrown off by my adjusted Wednesday schedule. I had an hour to write and I did, forgetting to keep track of time, arriving, therefore, five minutes late at Snowdrop's home -- something no baby sitter should ever do to working parents. Everyone was very forgiving, including Snowdrop, who assured me she was just getting up.
Bath time then! And as I set her down and put away the various washing paraphernalia, she migrated over to a favorite spot in the kitchen -- her mommy's cook books, which is actually quite funny because her mommy, when she was that age, had a thing about cook books. She studied them obsessively for the first two or three years of her life.
And then Snowdrop sat down and gave me that "what now, grandma?" look.
Since this evening (not on my watch), the little girl has music class, I thought we should get in the mood and so I turned on the songs she'll be hearing in her music group. And we danced. There was a lot of arm waving (at least on my part!). [The photos are on a timed release, so you never know what you're going to get in the end.]
... But then I stood back and let her take the stage, because, really, she is much more fun and interesting to observe.
By the way, our color coordinated clothes? A total coincidence. I'm going out tonight with my monthly law school group so I paid a little more attention to what I put on this morning. Snowdrop -- she'd look good in a burlap sack, but happened to also don gray and red today.
Life is quirky that way.
In the afternoon, after her nap (where her hair got a little wild!) and some healthy, happy eating...
There was time for indoor play...
... and, too, we had a brief window in which to take a neighborhood walk. Storms are barreling up toward us and I hoped we'd manage to come back without being drenched and luck was with us, thank goodness!
Inside, it got a little intense toward evening. There are three cats in the house and not one is willing to put up with even a gentle petting session. And Snowdrop never stops trying. She'll climb all those steps trying to reach Virgil...
And reach for the sky wanting just a moment with Lucas...
But it's no use. They always escape her little hand.
Guess whose side I'm on in this?!
I come home late, after my retired-law-school-group dinner. Lightening flashes and gusts of rain pound on my windshield. Our farmette guest is working with machines in the sheep shed. Ed goes off to play volley ball. I settle in to write.
