Finally tiling, but needed a break

Dear diary... (I think I'm mostly writing to and for myself here, so others should feel free to skip it for sure.)

Tiling isn't like riding a bicycle, I guess. Maybe safer (Ray M. had a fall yesterday; Karl F. last year). But I've forgotten my "technique." And I don't remember what I used for a mixing tray the last time, and when I found the directions for my tile saw, they had caustic, noxious, bubbly by-product of some paint that had escaped the bottom of its can. (I love the internet, and printed out a new manual for the wet saw, but the internet can't tile the shower.)

I know it's not going to be a fast job. I have a half-futzy plan, and have been collecting found and broken tiles and bits of pottery I've dug up in the yard, and a few other hard-as-glass (some are glass) things for a stripe of crazy-quiltish mosaic), and I have a plan. And there's going to be a lot of cutting and piecing around the bottom where the new tile meets the old tiled pan (a custom job done with concrete and an offset drainhole, so I'm leaving that all there).

This is one of those activities that causes me to think about my interests and personality. I WANT to do tile. This will be the fifth tile job in my life, so I do it about every ten years. Twice I made the tile myself, too. That was really fun. Those were counters for bathroom sinks, though, and not a big old shower (little old shower, actually, this one is). I can think it and I can (eventually) figure out more efficient ways to do this and that, and I can enjoy the progress, but I don't like working by myself. And I get restless and want to go and do something else.

I'm using Thinking Sticks for spacers. (Kind of. I'm using the blanks I use to make the fancy colored and sparkly ones.) I'm using a "sawed off" plastic milk gallon for a water bowl. A plastic coffee "can" for mixing bucket. Paper food trays for a tray. That part's not right. I should go look for a paint roller tray. Yeah. That would be better.

Okay, I'm fortified and off to do it again.

Gratuitous photo completely unrelated:

First logo art for Unschooling Symposium

I'll add to this as more images come in.



Click here for The shirt Holly colored, to give away, and links to art to use (electronic coloring is no problem!).

Delicious, malicious nachos

Last night I played a game called Wise and Otherwise with *all* my kids and their friend Zack, and a "not your" (nacho) cheese joke came along.

This morning on twitter there were two similar stories by two different friends:

bonnyglen Melissa Wiley
4yo, singing: "I'm delicious, mean, and scary." 12yo: "Um, sweetie, you mean MALICIOUS."

hahamommy diana Jenner
Hee hee, random 20 year old memory: the Deaf kid who signed Macho Man as Nacho Man for talent show :D

and also from Diana:
hahamommy diana Jenner
Making Na'chos for the Boy. Spell it like that because my brain signs "Not Yours" every.time.

So there. Proves nothing except I know interesting people and that I am merrily and easily amused.
I need a photo to go with this. Just any photo.

Kids in a good mood

I've got mail!

Today I got a charge card in the mail, from Australia. MY charge card.

Several weeks ago, I knew I had misplaced one of my two charge cards. I looked all in and around my desk, and the floor, and the shelves near enough for me to have possibly flipped it into. Didn't find it.

I asked Keith to check the charge card records online, to see if it had been used since the online purchase I had made that caused it to be out on the desk. Nope. Checked again in a few days. Nope. So it wasn't worth cancelling it. I figured it was either under the desk or I had accidentally knocked it in the trash.

It came wrapped in pink construction paper, in a greeting-card kind of envelope, with a beautiful stamp of Cape Tribulation, Queensland. No return address, no note.

I must have packed it with a book someone ordered. I could check that charge card record again, and see who ordered a book that day from Australia, but as the person chose anonymity, I'll leave it at that. The person also chose generosity and honesty. THANKS!!! Thank you very, very much.

Gratuitous, unrelated photograph. A monkey I did not see in India, but Brenna McBroom did! (Blake Boles took the photo.)

Twenty-seventh Anniversary (and a lizard)

First, the lizard. Holly was showing Keith a yoga stance she had learned, and while she was looking at the carpeting upside down, she came face to face with this guy. He did not run away, but hadn't been there long as he was still... lifelike in many ways. I won't say "warm," he being a reptile and all, but we didn't do CPR.

Keith and I were able to celebrate our 27th anniversary dinner with Kirby (visiting from Austin), Marty and his girlfriend Ashlee, and the lovely Miss Holly Dodd.



There is no one great photo, but everyone looked good in at least a couple of them.

Interesting review of my book :-)

This is a good sort of review, from a mom named Heather:

Austin and I went to the zoo the other day. We ran into several parents ignoring children as they walked behind them crying or saying things like, "Hurry up! Or I'm going to leave you!" Austin was getting very frustrated and feeling really sad for these kids. He said to me, "Mom I really think when we leave the house you should have a backpack full of Sandra Dodd's book and when people are being mean to their kids you should hand them one."

I wanted to share this story with you and say thanks for the impact you have made on me. I've changed and Austin sees that and wants it for other people.

Oh! Eight minutes after posting this, I saw a comment on an Edinburgh home ed site:

Sandra's Big Book of Unschooling changed our family life in so many positive ways I'm really looking forward to hearing her speak in person.

(I'll be speaking there May 21. ***)


Holly and Ljuba in the not-very-wilds of New Mexico, looking at tumbleweeds and prairie dogs.

Note for future photography: To take a photograph of someone holding a single tumbleweed, avoid having 180 tumbleweeds in the background. (No, I didn't count them.)