Day 3: Song

April 3, 2020April 3, 20202 Comments

I’ve lost count of the number of emails I’ve had from my church today regarding Palm Sunday and Holy Week. When you’re stuck at home, regardless of why, the days tend to run into each other like paint, the colors bleeding and swirling together till you can’t tell one from another and it’s all a big mess. I had forgotten that Palm Sunday was this weekend till I received an email from my church about deliveries of blessed palms.

One of the things that I love most about the Easter season (and the Christmas season, of course) is the music. So as I sat here pondering today’s prompt and the flood of emails that arrived in my inbox this morning, I couldn’t help thinking about some of the hymns we sang in church growing up. Lenten music isn’t exactly upbeat, nor should it be. Lent is a time of penance and self-denial in preparation for the celebration of Easter. But Easter music is triumphant, and there is no better word to describe the songs that popped into my head today as I considered this prompt.

“I Serve a Risen Savior” has a lovely, bouncy rhythm that just makes you feel good as you listen. It’s a song of hope, and I feel like hope is something we all desperately need right now. The other song I thought of was “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today,” which is equally triumphant. If you’ve ever heard the Mormon Tabernacle Choir sing this particular hymn, you’ll know what I mean. It’s big, it’s bold, it’s regal…it’s a fanfare fit for a king. In a similar vein, I also found myself humming “Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee” because no one tugs at emotions in quite the same way as Beethoven. Whether he wanted his listeners to feel soaring joy or abject sorrow, he was a master at using music to evoke those feelings.

And now that I’ve thumbed through half a hymnal, I think I’ll dust off my trusty flute and play a few tunes. What are some of your favorite songs and why?

Day 2: Open

April 2, 2020April 3, 2020Leave a comment

They say that love is an open door, but it’s not right now. Right now, love is a closed door. Right now, love means having to say you’re sorry, but you’ll have to cancel that birthday party, that game night, that concert. Fish fries, first communion, Easter, confirmation, prom, graduation. All the things that people so look forward to in the springtime—gone.

Right now, love is an open heart. An open mind. Right now, love means doing your best to stay healthy when so many others are ill. But right now, sometimes, health is hard to come by.

When I had Bubbles, I wanted nothing more than…

Day 1: Joke

April 1, 2020April 3, 202011 Comments

I like bad jokes and I cannot lie. But for some reason, I’m having trouble coming up with any jokes to share today, good, bad, or otherwise. Maybe it’s because I had the stomach flu yesterday and am still not quite myself yet. Maybe it’s because I’ve spent the better part of the last 36-ish hours trying to make up for all the sleep I didn’t get Monday night because I was too busy trying to talk my stomach into a better mood. Or maybe it’s because life right now feels like the worst possible kind of joke.

I think I’m gonna go with that last one.

While it is nice to be able to spend more time at home with my kids, I still miss getting out of the house. I’m fortunate to live in a rural area, so if I want to go for a walk, I have plenty of space in which to do so without having to worry about running into anyone else. I’m fortunate that no one in my family has been afflicted with COVID-19. I’m fortunate for a lot of reasons.

I am not, however, fortunate enough to be a good teacher, and that bothers me now more than ever. Trying to work from home and keep my kids up-to-date with schoolwork is a Herculean task, and schoolwork has largely fallen by the wayside. I worry that when school eventually resumes, they’ll be behind on things.

All I can really do is hope that when we all come out on the other side of this, that we won’t be much worse for wear. And in the meantime, at least I have plenty of poems to write (it’s NaPoWriMo!) and we have plenty of Star Trek to watch.

How are you staying sane during this period of isolation?

Adventures in the kitchen, part 2

March 22, 2020March 21, 20201 Comment

In addition to French onion soup, I spent a little time in the kitchen last weekend trying to make a strawberry rhubarb pie, which is a family favorite. But I depleted my stash of frozen rhubarb a couple summers ago and I’m not sure I’ll be able to harvest any this year, since we transplanted our rhubarb over the summer and I’m just hoping it’ll come back.

But then one day as I was wandering the aisles of my local grocery store, I happened upon a can of strawberry rhubarb pie filling. I’d never seen such a thing before! Naturally, I had to buy a can to find out what it was like.

I dug a box of pie crust out of my deep freeze and set it on the counter to thaw while I got dinner going. Once the dinner dishes were done, I set out to make my pie, with a little help from Bubbles.

Apparently, though, I should have…

Adventures in the kitchen

March 21, 2020March 21, 20202 Comments

So what do you do when you can’t go out and do the normal things you would do on a Friday night? Well I don’t know about all of you, but I tried out a new recipe, and boy, are my feet sore!

(Tile floors + thin slippers with no support + a long night = very sore feet.)

I absolutely adore Panera’s French onion soup, and there was recently a recipe for said soup included in one of the New York Times newsletters I receive. I bought most of the ingredients earlier in the week, but I didn’t get a chance to try it out until last night.

The recipe…is behind the cut!

I need ALL the coffee!

March 20, 2020Leave a comment

I think this about sums things up:

I had intended to post this on Monday. It was absolutely fitting after a weekend spent building a bookshelf. I may not have done any of the heavy lifting, but I did spend Sunday cleaning, and for some reason, it wore me out more than normal. Monday morning was rough.

Then I thought I’d post it on Tuesday. That didn’t happen, either. Nor did it happen on Wednesday. Or yesterday. Tuesday we went home early. Yesterday we went home early.

Today we worked from home, but I still didn’t get to sleep in because I had to drive Seymour to work. Today, I needed ALL the coffee.

So I had some. And now I’m sharing this lovely nerdy meme because coffee is the finest organic suspension ever devised (even if I haven’t beaten the Borg with it).

And also because I’m trying a new recipe and something that was supposed to take roughly an hour and a half is proving to be much more labor-intensive than I’d originally thought and now I need more coffee, but it’s getting late and if I have more coffee, I’ll be up all night and that probably wouldn’t be good.

So.

Perhaps tomorrow morning, I’ll indulge in another cup.

How are you all doing? Are you safe? Are you sane? Are you ready for the schools to reopen again? *hugs*

Every time…

March 9, 2020Leave a comment

So this happened…again…

*sigh*

I feel more exhausted today than I did yesterday (and yesterday I was pretty doggone tired). How are you coping with the loss?

What’s up?

February 23, 2020February 23, 20207 Comments

Well, my video diary idea rapidly crashed and burned, and with it, my plan to write a new poem (and blog post) every day.

Whoops.

I guess that’s about par for the course, though. Lately it seems that I plan and God laughs (hysterically). So what have I been up to so far in 2020? Well, let’s see. I’ve been:

Revising The Lokana Chronicles (again);
Writing poetry (but sadly, not every day);
Workshopping my poems (yay feedback!);
Trying to keep up with the kids;
Working;
Getting older;
Saying goodbye to relatives;
Capturing Iowa’s natural beauty with my camera;
Playing a ridiculous amount of Harry Potter Wizards Unite and Harry Potter Hogwarts Mystery;
Stress eating;
Catching up with friends, both old and new; and
Submitting poems for publication (not that it’s gone well).

I suppose that’s actually quite a lot, given that the new year is only just a couple of months old. And January was definitely crazy – almost as crazy as December, if you can believe it (I know I can’t).

Also, show of hands: Who’s ready to be done with winter?

So how about you? What’s new in your world? Have you been able to stick to your New Year’s resolutions?

Ugh, snow

January 3, 2020January 3, 20204 Comments

Look! Look! Something new and different for Iowa!

It’s snowing this afternoon. It’s the first snowfall of the year, and maybe the third one of this winter. I’m kind of happy to see it because I’m tired of looking at dead grass, but I’m really not looking forward to driving home in it. The roads’ll be a nightmare.

It’s wet, heavy snow, and it’s warmish outside, so I don’t think it will last long. It’s supposed to be in the mid to upper 30s for most of the next week. But we’re in a winter weather advisory, so who knows?

All I know is that after last winter, I’m ready for some milder weather. I’m not holding my breath on getting it, though.

What a beautiful morning

January 2, 2020March 9, 20202 Comments

I got today’s video knocked out a bit earlier than yesterday’s. There was a beautiful sunrise this morning, and I couldn’t help shooting it:

Mornings are so pretty in Iowa. But it would be even more peaceful if the boys didn’t argue about every little thing.

Of course, since I’m me, I decided to add to the challenge by writing a poem to go with each day’s video. Yesterday I wrote a haiku about two of my kitties; today I wrote another one about how nice it would be if my kids did’t spend each morning’s wait for the bus in an argument over something. They argue about everything lately.

I’m excited about the poem aspect of this challenge. I’ve gotten back to work on The Lokana Chronicles, but I don’t want my poetry to fall to the wayside, and this will be a great opportunity to keep those poetic muscles in shape.

Well, that and the two poetry groups I’ve joined in the last six months. 😄

What about you – have you set any new year’s resolutions?