Can't Stop Reading

Littletree is so engrossed in reading lately, she's chewing through books faster than we can get more from the library!

I can't even get her to stop reading when we're walking around...

I tried telling her to go and spend some time outside in the sunshine...

I told her to go play and climb trees...

Even when she's supposed to be practising her cartwheels for circus class, she manages to do them one-handed and keeps reading!

People keep telling me that kids who are allowed to structure their own time and have unrestricted access to a computer will spend all their time in front of a video game and never do anything academic or go outdoors... I'm sure that will kick in any day now.

The Next Step

The Hallowe’en preparations continue – in the last post I shared Littletree’s costume designs, which she is working on avidly.

So the next step was a big one – one I had to think long and hard about. Littletree wanted to dye her hair black.

Yikes.

We considered black hair spray, because it just rinses out, but Littletree didn’t want the hairspray effect with stiff hair. We ruled out a permanent dye, because I wasn’t willing to let her have those chemicals on her head, nor she deal with the growing-out process…

So we settled on doing a rinse-out dye, of the kind that only last a few washes, but don’t do dramatic changes in colour. Littletree, being a redhead, her hair did come out a LOT darker, but the red still shines through

Still, it looks good, and she’s really happy with it – we did it two weeks in advance so we’d have time to do allergy tests (Littletree has had mild reactions to several ingredients in body lotions), and to fix it if it turned out a disaster. Luckily, neither were a problem.

I think it makes her look more grown-up and sophisticated. In any case, it will soon wash out.

The next next step is to find her some fangs.

Tiramisu Divine

Littletree and I decided to make a surprise for Aquacat’s 44 1/4 birthday – Tiramisu with fresh organic whipped raw cream and my home made coffee and orange liqueurs.

First squeeze 1/2 cup of orange juice... well, squeeze all the oranges, and take out 1/2 cup for the tiramisu, and serve the rest to Aquacat while she’s having a lie-in.

 

Then brew 2 cups of strong coffee and mix with the OJ, set aside to cool.

Slightly whip 300ml cream (well, slightly less than 300ml cream, because the container wasn't completely full).

Separate 3 eggs, beat the yolks together with 1/3 cup caster sugar till it's pale and thick, then whip in the cream and 250g Mascarpone cheese. (Yes, I use an original 1967 SwiftWhip hand beater for this, because I'm just that cool)

Whisk the egg whites till they are forming soft peaks, and then gently fold into the cream mixture.

Now take out the coffee and OJ - pour in a healthy shot of coffee liqueur and orange liqueur (about 1/4 cup of each). Quality control is important here, make sure the liqueurs are good all the way to the bottom of the bottle (adult supervision is vital for this step; kidlets aren’t allowed).

Then soak in Savoiardi sponge biscuits - let them soak up loads of the liquid and then line the base of a serving bowl or deep tray with them.

Then you layer - a layer of soaked savoiardi; a layer of cream mixture. rinse repeat. Well, don't actually rinse. You should get three layers, finishing off with cream mixture.

I grate chocolate slivers onto the top, but you could top with anything - a dusting of cocoa, chocolate-coated coffee beans... or just dunk your face right into it.

Cover and leave to set in the fridge for a couple of hours, and then...

NOM!

Aquacat was ecstatic

And the taste… mmmmmmmmmm

Guess who came to dinner

Littletree’s grandma, my mother, came up for a visit this week.

We haven’t seen her in a long time, so Littletree was totally ecstatic to spend some time with her grandma.

We hung out, caught up, and just spent some quality time together. Mum was very impressed with Littletree’s current projects, and spent some time with Littletree doing some reading and writing.

We went around visiting the local area, including exploring the incredible dragon gardens at a local castle

Littletree especially loved the gardens – like being a princess and a dragon-whisperer all in one.

And most of all, it was great to spend some time with my family

At the heart of science

Since Littletree’s recent foray into dissecting brains was such a success, we decided to get to the heart of the matter, and dissect some hearts.

***again: graphic pics warning, don’t scroll down if you’re squeamish, instead, peruse this old post which includes a very cute picture of Littletree***

So back to the butcher for lamb’s hearts, and out with the science lab equipment!

Littletree was really excited to see all the different chambers in the heart, and how the bigger blood vessels feed in and out of the chambers. We learned about how the valves work and how the muscle pumps.

We got out some medical books and learned about the heart in humans and various genetic disorders, and the whole circulatory system.

And as always, Littletree got out her microscope and made up some slides to look at heart tissue.

Apparently I now need to source bovine eyeballs for dissection. I swear this wasn’t in the brochure when I signed up for parenting.

Plants v Zombies IRL

We’ve been getting into playing Plants v. Zombies lately, of course, zombies are all the rage.

So when Littletree was having a moment of feeling frustrated about something, I came up with an idea so inspired I can’t even take credit for it – must have been a muse: Plants versus Zombies In Real Life.

The premise is simple: I pretend to be a zombie and walk up the length of the garden while Littletree puts obstacles in my path (flowerpots, bricks, sticks, rocks), and rips weeds out of the garden and throws them at me, which is a double bonus, because the garden gets weeded at the same time!

It was great fun, especially pretending to be zombies, and even more especially being out in the winter sun. And most of all – somehow getting Littletree to weed the garden!

Then she got so excited about it, she decided we should make it into a movie… here’s the intro:

Littletree doing the intro to our Plants v Zombies game

Epic!

Breaking Point

Littletree was having a moment of overwhelm today – she lost the tiny magic key that she found in the forest, and it was just the last straw for her in an overwhelming situation.

She got really angry, and really frustrated, and said she wanted to scream and hit something. She chose to go into her bedroom and scream into a pillow and punch the mattress. I went into her room to offer her some support, and she told me she just really wants to break something.

I suggested she just feel into that, but that physically breaking something might not be productive. Then she got inspired, and asked if she could break sticks – the skewers we use for kebabs.

So I got her the packet of kebab skewers out of the kitchen and lay in bed with her while she snapped them. Half a dozen skewers later, she started talking about writing a program that would function like a to-do list, but with time stamps and check boxes, and with features like alarms and reminders.

Within five minutes we were out of the room, and talking about all sorts of stuff, happy again… and all it took was a few wooden skewers.

Giant Perspective

I was just putting Littletree to bed and giving her a snuggle, and she said "Mama, can we talk about Stereotypes?"

"Okay", I said.

"Well, I think it's really mean that so many people make stereotypes. Like they say that Giants are mean and nasty. But Giants are people just like everyone else, except that they're really big. Like, really, really big. But they're nice, and kind. It's so insulting to stereotype them! I just don't understand why people keep making mean stereotypes about all different kinds of people."

When I thought about it, I realised that to a child, everyone is a giant. It's all about perspective.

Hangin’ with the girls

Life has been a little crazy hectic lately, since Purple came back from Israel and we’re dealing with the re-shuffling of our lives and living arrangements. Our friendship has been a little strained, and the plan to stay sharing the house together… well, it’s not always flowing gracefully.

I’ve been living downstairs in the basement-converted-flat, and staying with my girlfriend a lot, while Purple has been in a deep jet-lagged funk.

But still, we’re doing our best to make things work for Littletree, making sure she gets to her social engagements, Spanish group, Homeschool group, tutoring session, Circus class, Dance class, the library, the beach…

I’ve been making extra effort to spend time with her, just hanging out, working on her Altered Book, various craft and science projects. And of course, her favourite activity: hanging out down at the village pub for dinner with friends.

The best part being, of course, enjoying the cool night air in the beer garden and pretending that the ground is lava while jumping from table to table and along the garden wall. The even better best part is salad-eating contests!

Because who cares for calamari and chips when there’s a salad?!

Holy Cows

Our friend and neighbour, Elf, who takes Littletree every week to help her with reading and writing, also takes care of a cow who birthed a calf recently.

Littletree just loves the calf to bits, and the calf seems to like Littletree just as much.

It’s just the sweetest thing. Awwwww

Meet May

The newest member to join the majikfaerie family – May. She’s a home-schooled girl, also eight years old, just like Littletree. May came to live with us for a while because her parents are on a three-month long seminar cruise in Hawaii, which is really boring for kids.

May and Littletree are getting on great. May’s parents are incredibly rich, so she doesn’t know much about living in a normal house, but we’ve been showing her how everything in the kitchen works, and how to do things like sweeping the floor and getting the fire started.

May is exactly the same size as Littletree, which is great, because May’s luggage didn’t arrive yet, so they’re sharing clothes and accessories. Littletree is totally ecstatic to have a kid her age staying with us; the two of them are getting along so well, making up songs and dances together, playing games, trying on clothes, building cubby houses… it’s loads of fun!

Yay for new best friends!

Ear piercing

Littletree got her ears pierced. She’s been *begging* to have it done for a verrrry long time. Being as she’s Brazilian, this probably means she’s finally a “real” girl. In Brazil, pretty much every baby girl has her ears pierced in the first day or two after birth, often before even coming home from the hospital. I was constantly complimented on my beautiful baby boy, and on correcting people, they insisted she can’t be a girl, because she didn’t have earrings. After all; how else can one tell boys from girls?!

Anyway, I insisted that we do the piercing with a proper piercing needle, rather than taking her to a shop where they use a piercing gun. I think the main reason people prefer to have piercing done with a gun is they get scared by the word “needle” (which we’re all sure is going to hurt), and for the most part, people don’t know any better. But talk to piercers and it’s fairly unanimous.

The gun is more painful, and less safe. You’re basically looking at the difference between the gun, which uses force to push a blunt stud through the earlobe, essentially ripping a hole in the flesh. Ouch! This means poorer healing, more pain and more chance of infection. It’s also very likely the piercing will create hard scar tissue and can create skin tags, lead to abscesses and other nasties. What’s more, the piercing gun can’t be properly sterilised between customers.

Piercing with a proper needle is quick and relatively painless. The needle is surgically sharp and hollow, just slides right through. If you’ve ever had an IV line put in, imagine having that done, and then imagine comparing it to putting the line in not with a sharp needle, but just punching in a blunt stud. Yikes! Proper piercing equipment is either sterilised (usually with an autoclave) or disposed of immediately. Healing is faster and cleaner.

Personally, I’ve had a lot of piercings done, my early ear piercings were all done with the gun by shop assistants in malls. Those ones, even 20 years on, and some of them that haven’t had any jewellery in them for 12 years, still have hard lumps in them that have a tendency to get infecty. The ones I’ve had done with a needle were significantly less painful, and all healed nicely – barely a sign of them now, years after I’ve taken them out.

Anyway, there’s a strong movement amongst serious piercers to have the gun banned, but that’s enough of a rant from me.

Littletree is very happy with the result; she looks so grown up now!

Trust

Littletree has gone on a self-imposed screen-free and sugar-free break, she asked me to hide her computer for a week and to put away her pocket-money so she can’t get sweets and asked me to get extra fruit and veggies.

All this came about while Purple was away in San Francisco for a couple of weeks earlier in the month. I think she just missed him a lot, and turned to spending a lot of time watching DVDs and eating “junk” food to fill in time. After about a week of watching rather a lot of movies, she announced that her head wasn’t feeling good and she was having trouble sleeping, and not feeling good in her body. She identified that it was because of spending too much time in front of a screen, and not eating well enough, and set about making a plan to get better.

Well, it’s been three weeks now, Purple is back, but Littletree is still avoiding sweets, and goes days at a time without turning her computer on. Today was the first time in ages she bought herself chocolates and sat down to watch a DVD.  Then she begged me to make a hearty veggie soup for dinner, with extra kale and garlic.

I’m so impressed with the way Littletree makes healthy choices for herself. She knows her body and is able to recognise what she needs, on her own. I firmly believe this is because she has a 100% unhindered, self-regulated diet. And most of all, because she is trusted.

Without going into the details of how it works, what it comes down to is having an intrinsic trust of the child. It's sub-consciously saying to the child: ‘Of course you'll make healthy choices and I absolutely trust you to do so’. From that, the child gets the message that she is trusted, and therefore trustworthy, and thus, can trust in herself to make the right choices - as all children will, given the right support.

I’ve been talking about this kind of trust all week, and struggling to really define it – it’s a kind of trust that’s bigger than ‘trust’; it’s something so intrinsic and whole-spirit. Then someone sent me this quote from Dr Jeremy Hayward:

"In order to communicate very openly with the world, you need to develop fundamental trust. This kind of trust is not trusting “in” something, but simply trusting. It is very much like your breath. You do not consciously hold on to your breath, or trust in your breath, yet breathing is your very nature. In the same way, to be trusting is your very nature. To be trusting means you are fundamentally free from doubt about your goodness and about the goodness of others."

While the prevailing cultural belief in our society is that children are inherently bad; that they won’t behave “properly” and that if given the slightest chance, they’ll only get up to no good, be spoiled, or worse. Children are treated based on the notion that they need to be trained, restricted and restrained to ensure that they can’t act on their inherent “badness”. Any parent or educator who isn’t constantly vigilant to reign in the inherent unruliness of children will be seen as negligent.

Trusting in children is about coming from an intrinsic belief that children are inherently good. And they *are*. Children truly are good, and they will behave in the manner they are expected to – not necessarily in the way we tell them to with words, but in they way we show them they are supposed to act. For the most part, we show them that they’re bad and going to get up to mischief. We show them that they are going to fall and hurt themselves, that they will eat nothing but sweets and junk if given half the chance.

But with true trust, in an environment that models respectful behaviour, children are perfectly wonderful, social beings. They do the right thing. They learn from their mistakes, rather than being protected from making them.

I trust Littletree. I trust her to go exploring in the candy aisle at the supermarket. I trust her to know how high she can safely climb. I trust her to behave like a sane, healthy, respectful human being. And she does.

(Littletree on a climbing wall)

Blue Room

When we arrived home from our recent trip, Littletree went into her room and announced “My room is a total disaster MESS!” I pointed out that her room was relatively tidy, just that she has an awful lot of stuff. Most of which she’s grown out of.

So she set to work, filling up 2 massive bags of junk stuff that was still perfectly good, but that she didn’t want or need any more. Clothes she’d grown out of, toys she doesn’t play with any more, and about a billion pink dresses (she absolutely will not, under any circumstances, wear anything pink or a dress, which is odd, because many wise people assured me that if I allow her to don a pink dress, she will surely grow up to be a brainless airhead hooker, completely oppressed by the dominant male patriarchy.)

She took all this stuff to sell at the village market on the weekend, and being the lazy industrious girl that she is, decided to not actually man her stall, but just leave all her wares lying out with an “honour box”. No one stole anything and she made $15.35 :)

Littletree announced that she doesn’t get to spend enough time with Purple, so she proposed a “daddy-daughter-day”. The premise being that the two of them would spend the whole day together doing fun, cool things.

They played card games, went for a walk together, had lunch at the cafe… and then Littletree decided to do something with her now totally bare room.

I came home to see this

Purple and Littletree making great use of the left over paint from our bathroom.

Littletree wants to re-create something like the kitchen we had when we lived in Tel Aviv – I painted it with a blue sky and sunflower scene

(Littletree aged 2)

And the finished product, a tidy, clean, fresh room!

Now I just have to paint the sunflowers!

Is it okay to get kiss-marks on a cell phone?

Littletree, awesome-saver that she is, has been saving up to get herself an MP3 player. The particular one she wanted was $75, and she’d worked really hard to save enough for it. Then we happened to notice in the Post Office one can get pre-pay cell phones with MP3 players built-in for much cheaper than just buying a simple MP3.

My goodness cell phones are ridonkulously cheap these days! And I discovered that if Littletree has a pre-pay phone on the same network as I’m on, I can transfer credit from my phone to hers in increments as little as $1, so if she’s out and about, I can give her some emergency call money without having to fork out for a whole recharge card (but if she wants to have credit for making calls or texting, she has to buy that herself). Littletree was ecstatic with the idea!

That sealed the deal and we went into the shop to get one! Well, after an evening of Purple and I discussing it – I had this mental block that went something along the lines of “but she’s only 8, that’s far too young for a cell phone. if she has a phone, she’ll look like a spoiled kid, and what does she even need a phone for”. Purple wisely pointed out that if she’s buying it herself with her own saved pocket money, then it’s not spoiling. And she is of an age to start going out with friends around the village; having an emergency phone to use is a wise idea. and it’s cheaper than the MP3 player she was going to buy anyway.

We went back into the Telstra shop to check out all the available models.

So we got a Sony Ericsson Cedar (I thought the model name was entirely appropriate for Littletree). Plusses of this phone were that it takes standard 3.5mm headphone jacks (so Littletree can use any headphones she likes and not have to fork out for specialised ones); it has expandable memory with a MicroSD slot that takes up to 16GB; It’s got great rural coverage (important where we live); a 2MP camera; and it’s partly made from recycled plastic… all for $59, with $10 included credit.

In our local Telstra Dealer they are having a special this week that includes a $30 recharge voucher in addition to the $10 that comes with the phone – since I needed to recharge my phone credit anyway and I usually buy a $30 voucher, that meant I could put the credit on my phone and Littletree could get the phone essentially for $19. Bargain!

So she’s all set up now with her own cell phone. Good Lord Love a Duck! I’ve become one of *those* mothers.

So far, this phone is perfect for a kid’s first phone, or for anyone wanting a cheap phone as a back-up or whatever. The MP3 player works well, the camera is better than I expected it to be. Two-thumbs-up. And Littletree’s literacy is improving now that she’s learning how to text, so it’s educational… right?

Well, she is learning how to use a cell phone, at least. And her first cell-phone-usage-related question?

“Mama, is it bad for my phone if I get spit on it?”

“What??? Why would you spit on your phone?”

“Well, I gave it a kiss, and there’s a kiss-mark on the screen now. Is it okay to kiss the phone?”

LOL

Homesick

We’re missing home; Littletree especially. She’s complaining pretty regularly that she wants to go home. She misses the food that she’s familiar with, she misses her friends, her own room…

Right now she’s lying on the bed next to me reeling off a list of all the things she misses so much from Australia. Tinned spaghetti, chicken nuggets, the fish and chip shop in Mullumbimby, chocolate-flake cereal, bread and nutella, flan, the porridge the Purple makes, Shakshuka that Purple makes, rice porridge, semolina, wafer biscuits, sausages… the list goes on and on.

I pointed out that most of those things we can get or make here (and funnily enough, most of those are things she rarely has anyway!) but I guess that’s not the point. What she really misses is being at home. She misses the comfort of having familiarity.

Me too. I’m happy to be traveling, and the place where we are staying is wonderful… but it’s not home. Funny, how after all those years of traveling, and not having any stable base or ties to anywhere, I’d find myself not only having a home, but feeling attached to it.

I miss having my own kitchen, and my own space. I miss Ariad and Purple. It’s strange to be queer in a country where homosexuality is illegal. I admit to taking advantage of my privilege of marriage, and being closeted; not mentioning aspects of my life that are very dear to me when we’re in public, or with strangers. It’s strange to be in a country where Israelis are banned. We have to be quiet about that too.

So, what can we do to overcome homesickness? We try to keep up our routine. We practice capoeira every day, we spend lots of time cuddling, Littletree watches her favourite DVDs, we talk with our friends and family on Skype, Littletree plays with the new kittens a lot.

 

And I remembered I have a secret stash of Shkedai Marak (Israeli soup crackers) that Littletree loves. I just pulled them out and she got all excited! Now I just have to make her some soup to go with them.

Tomorrow I’ll go to the big supermarket in the city that’s an hour away and try to get some comfort foods for Littletree, and we’ll plan some more fun activities and outings.

I’m sure we’ll be home before we know it!

Rainbow Adventure

We’ve been out at the Australian Rainbow Gathering on and off for the last week and a half – well, to be more accurate, Purple was there on and off, Littletree was there for the whole time, and I just popped in for a day.

Purple and Littletree went out the weekend before last, just planning to stay two days. They had a great time (while I stayed home waiting on a client due to start her birthing process any day now).

But when it came time to go home, Littletree was having such a great time, she didn’t want to leave. Some very good friends of ours offered to take care of her for a few days till Purple and I could come back the following weekend to pick her up. The site is very conveniently located just a few minutes from a small village with a phone and only 2 hours drive from home, so it was agreed that if there’s any problem someone would call us to come out and get her immediately.

Pretty confronting! I missed my little girl; it was the first time she was without her parents for five days! She did call us twice to say hi and have a chat, both times I asked her if she wanted me to come and get her, both times she insisted she wanted to stay. I knew I could trust the people taking care of her, and there were a lot of parents with unschooled kids out there, as well as several women Littletree knows well from past gatherings and feels connected with, so I surrendered, knowing that she was safe and cared for, following her own path.

As parents, we all know there will come a time when our kids grow up, become more independent and start going out to parties and festivals without us. I knew that day would come… but I didn’t expect it this soon!

Littletree is simply confident and independent. She knows what she needs and can clearly communicate and express herself. I wonder what happened to all those people who said if I breastfeed too long or let her sleep in the bed with me or carry her in a sling all the time she’d end up never learning how to cope on her own and I’d have her clinging to my skirts forever? I guess that will kick in any day now.

In any case, I went out on Friday with Purple to pick her up, and still she wanted to stay, so Purple spent the weekend at rainbow with Littletree, I just spent a day out there and came home.

Twas lovely to see everyone, and feel the energy, however briefly.

And now Littletree is home again, we’re spending lots of time together, just hanging out. :)

Flexibility

Purple and Littletree went to the Australian Rainbow Gathering this weekend… and yes, I’m still at home.

It’s the first time ever either of them have gone to rainbow without me. I have a client due to birth any day now, so I’m staying home. Littletree was so excited to go to rainbow and see her friends, she didn’t really mind that I wasn’t going too.

It’s all about being flexible. On one hand, I so much want to keep my child at my side and protect her from everything, on the other hand, I do trust her, and she needs to know that I support her while at the same time she has her freedom.

Anyway, she’s there with Purple, so I shouldn’t worry! And I am a tad wishing I was at the rainbow too, though to be honest, I’m also glad to be out of the rain and mud and keeping myself healthy.

Before they left, Littletree was doing some acrobatics and showing off her circus skills, and I asked her if she can stand on her head. This was the reply:

 

LOL! She’s always been very flexible from her fingers to her toes