the reader

may i share something with you? although my minds eye will never forget it i would like to document it just the same...

elle is seven, elle has just begun to read this year. her last visit in february she would read signs on the street mostly just one or two words at a time. that has changed now. i could not tell you how incredible it is to witness a little girl wanting to read, asking if she can go read. while vacationing we hit a book fair and we picked a few books for her. as we camped she would quietly go into the car retrieve the book grab her blanket and curl up in a chair by the fire, so quiet that i would forget she was there. i even found myself saying " elle use a head lamp you are going to hurt your eyes" she was reading really reading! i even found myself testing her one day when she said that she had finished a sixty page book ( child 60 page) i asked her what it was about and in detail she told me. it was clear to me that she truly had read it in it's entirety.

the other night i was reading a book in bed deep into it, when i had finally decided to put the book down and turn off the light i noticed elle, her pillow on the floor next to our bed, she was wrapped in her blanket reading a book she startled me! i said " elle what are you doing up it is three in the morning" her reply " i want to read i can't sleep..can you not turn of the light just yet" i have to tell you that my heart was fuller then it had been in a year, i was witnessing her new found love i have not stopped thinking of it since that night. i was not like her, although i read two or three books a week now it was not the case when i was her age. it was only when forced by my english teacher who even though i had aced my exam had accused me of not reading the book and she was right made me read it in class and till this day it has remained my favorite book( chrysalides) but it also begun my love for reading the second book was anna karinina and 14. it is truly a gift for my soul and eyes to see elle read.

* elle has correcting me as she read my post i was six when i started!

be still

it was probably our fifth hour in the car, starting to get restless. the sun was beginning to think of setting when we drove by this scene, i held my breath knowing that there was no way i could ask k. to stop we had still aways to go. i must have held my breath for a while because soon i felt k take my hand as he turned the car around so that i can capture what we where seeing. we all jumped out and pointed to different things it was k. who was at awe at how deep and dark the reflections where. i could not get over the stillness. it was at this moment i think we felt our vacation had begun.

good to be back!

It is good to be home! Yup! i never tend to say that after a vacation infact k. and i would always squeeze another few days or so when we could but as i unlocked the front door of our house and open it it was good to see none dirt floors, clean white couch and electricity! It is odd but for the first time the house felt like home and even though we will be leaving it in a few weeks for a new adventure on the farm it is good to have had this moment at peace with the house!

Okay where to begin? our vacation we spend most of it on the kenebec river in maine primitive camping with no one around nothing except what we bring and what nature offers us and it was wonderful. the river was higher and more severe then ever before we love it! and the full moon kept us company every-night! we did some hiking and seen beautiful waterfalls and had great fires, we learned more about each other and ourselves that was good too! then we headed to lake winnapawsaukee where we camped again but this time in a very quiet camp ground and took our first hot shower in days. we drove through gorgeous farm lands that made me jolt down some wants! we swam on the lake with ducks at the foot of the gorgeous white mountains and spent much time in the town of wolfboro at an old time fair.

these pictures are of our hiking to the moxie falls! pictures are comming out blury not sure why!

the internet (weakness)

We are still camping in maine by the river but since we have absolutely no cell phone reception we( had to) find an outdoor outfitter that had internet. a quick hello to family and friends. the moose are hiding good, but the bugs not so good;) the joke is on them because all we have to do is jump in the river and swim, make a smokey fire and laugh to forget there even there and that is not hard to do in this beautiful place!

it is beautiful here! thinking of you!

see you soon!

shutting down to open up

Dear friends,

It is the heat of the summer, humidity, fruit-flies and smelly dogs but it is also pretty dresses, cold showers, blooming gardens and ice cream. it is time for us to turn our cell phones off, shutdown our laptops, put the thule on the roof of the car and head to maine where we will be setting up camp by the river and hiking, swimming, canoeing, grilling, reading, roasting marshmallows all while we laugh, sing and look for moose.

just a few weeks ago i felt stuck, real stuck, i looked out the window and did not see passed today and now i see our trip to maine, our new farm house, montreal and so much more. I know that my life is made possible with the love i have been given by my husband and to know that the next week will be spent with him, the kids and the dogs in a place that brings us such peace has filled me with kid like giddiness!

Please do it, that thing you promised yourself you would do this summer!
with kindness,
nadia

* ps the photo is of the maron bells, and o ther peaks in colorado, i was reminded of our time there by deb. enjoy!

what we learn

i can easily regret all the things i did not learn when i was young, the baking techniques of my grandmother and how she would make our whites really white. my mums love of painting and her perfect petit point and all the languages that both of them spoke. i do have little of it, do to what i observed, what they had time to teach me but now it is my turn to try to pass on some of the things even though i might be learning some of those things myself.

elle takes to things very quickly i have noticed in many of the things we do. like teaching her crewel, perhaps i should teach her the basic of sewing first but instead we jumped into it and she is great at it. i just hope i teach her the right way. dylan is the same way the other day he asked me if i had games on my mac, i said i had a comic program but i had never used it, he said he would figure it out. an hour later he was on his fourth page and it was so great, clever and funny.

I think my fear is i will say “later” “tomorrow” one to many times, that somehow the patience i once had which in the last few years has dwindled will cost them.so even though i am saying it, writing it what i am really trying to say is stop whether it is for your kids or others or for yourself and don’t let tomorrow be too late.

tell me what you wish you would have learned as a child....

when it looks like this

Today we went to pick up my nephew Guylan (yes kid nation) it was hot but i could not rush home, i needed to stop along the way and take a walk so i, we did. thank goodness for when the mind calls for a time out, because it looks like this!

* the green algae took my breath away my pictures do not do it justice. i can picture floating in it, i know crazy but i can:) there was a million shade of green!

these brings me calm

have a wonderful day everybody!

two farm houses

the first farm house would be shared living with another couple, i loved the landscape it was beautiful, peaceful. chicken, horses, streams and pond. ( sharing makes us nervous since we tend to be very private- well in real life anyways:)elle's favorite!






this is the second a farm, it would be all ours, it has vast land, old barns, a cow name isabel and a horse named mike. pond, streams.. we would have to work hard to make it feel like a small farm opposed to the large dairy farm it used to be! dylan's favorite!