It’s vacation time in the wild gooseberry patch!
My sweet husband and I are soon to be off to visit Prince Edward Island, Canada. Ever since I read “Anne of Green Gables”, I have dreamed of going. Then the DVDs by Kevin Sullivan came out, and I wanted to go visit even more. I used to dream of traveling the red roads, picking the last of the Queen Anne’s lace, and walking the white sands by the sea.
Finally, after 23 years of dreaming, it’s finally coming true. My parents are giving us a beautiful gift of this trip, and we have finished our reservations and accomodations. Soon, we will be flying away to the land of the maple leaf, and my first time ever outside the United States. Dear friends in Quebec are planning on visiting us on the island while we are there. What a lovely reunion of old friends it will be.
Wish us well on our journey, and I will have much to share when we return.
Hello, dear hearts! Our computer is feeling better, but I’ve been incredibly busy the last few weeks. Last week, it was driving, driving, driving to Savannah every.day. to take the eldest of my Nanny children to a choir summer camp. That being over, I was looking forward to an easier week. ha! Turned out, the family I nanny for have friends who had a family emergency. So, the mama of my Nanny family brought the older two of that family’s children home with her, so the family could focus on the situation they were dealing with. In essence, I had two sets of twins this week, two 3 year olds and two 5 year olds. We’ve done well this week, but I’m ready for the weekend. Actually, I might have Friday off! So, I will be able to return here and I have plans for an even better wild gooseberry garden.
Just wanted you to know what was going on. I will be back and soon!
Our wonderful computer really is not feeling well. It lasted about all it’s going to until we get it fixed. So…this really will be the last post from the wild gooseberry until our Magic Window (also known as Bessie, our Gateway computer) is out of the computer hospital.
For now, know that I am happy and well and I wish the same for you.
I’ll leave you with another image, or two, of beautiful Tybee Island…
If you are a scrapbooker or someone who loves cute, homey illustrations, then you must have come across Mary Engelbreit and her adorable drawings. They are on everything from stationery to aprons, stickers to fabric. Her cozy, welcoming world has been a place of solace during dark times for many people, including myself.
Imagine my delight when I saw this flyer at my usual bookstore in Savannah!
Usually, people this famous go straight to Atlanta and don’t take the time to come down to Savannah too often. We are not a big metro city, which is fine, but there is a lot of stuff that only Atlanta gets which I do miss out on. So, I decided to go and meet her and ask her to sign the books I planned on buying. She was mostly there to promote her newest book…
When I arrived at the bookstore, I was surprised to find that I was only one of three in line to meet her! They didn’t advertise her being there, I found out later, because it was rather a spur-of-the-moment decision for her to visit. I was able to talk with her a bit, and she was very friendly, which I was expecting…yet was still relieved to find it to be true.
She signed my books, I shook her hand and was able to even talk with her for a little while. When I was leaving the store, there was a large line, so it was one of those rare moments when I was at the right place, at the right time.
Just to let my dear and patient readers know that I haven’t forgotten you. Our computer has been ill and while still not feeling the best, is allowing me to finally be able to post a new article (pictures included.) Between working and a computer under the weather, it’s been a little difficult being able to put up new stories of the life and times of the Wild Gooseberry. Please do not think this little site and you are easily forgotten. You and it are not and finally I can get back here to let you know.
I’ve written about my grandmother’s amaryllis bulb before on this little site. I acquired it a few years ago from my mother and she and my cousin each had a bulb as well. Mama’s and my cousin’s bulbs didn’t make it…so mine is the last of Grandma’s amaryllis. I’ve tried and tried to get this precious bulb to bloom, but perhaps I’ve tried a little too hard.
Amaryllis bulbs do need some neglect to bloom. After finally just giving up for a little while and almost forgetting about it, it decided to surprise me. First, a small, little leaf started up (it’s had leaves before, plenty of leaves, but that’s about all it’s had.) Instead of instantly watering it and putting it outside, I left it alone, and didn’t even talk to it. A few days later, two more leaves joined the first. I still left it alone, and still didn’t even give it the time of day. After about a week and a half, I finally took it outside and gave it a little drink. A couple of days later, something different happened. A tiny stalk sprouted up and at the end of it, a pod. I knew exactly what it was, but didn’t dare think it would really happen.
Weeks went by and the stalk and pod grew…into two pods.
“So,” I said to it “you’ve decided, after all this time, to surprise me!”
I think it smiled at me.
Here is what it eventually did…
I have a book from my childhood called “Leo, the Late Bloomer”. It’s about a little tiger who couldn’t do what his friends did, such as draw, eat neatly, write his name, and speak. His father kept watching, for signs of “blooming”. His mother said he would bloom, but “a watched bloomer doesn’t bloom.” So, his father tried not to watch, but Leo still didn’t bloom. And then, one day, in his own good time, Leo bloomed! He could do all that his friends could do…and he spoke. And it wasn’t just one word, it was a whole sentence… I made it.
There is a house in Savannah called The Gingerbread House. I have seen postcards of it, have heard about it, but could never figure out where it was. Then, last week as my sweet husband and I were taking my mother for a visiting tour of Savannah, we came upon it! It’s on Bull Street, which is a major street, but I’ve never been down that part of it. After finding a parking space, we were treated to a most beautiful time admiring the unique architecture that is famous the world over. After doing a little research, I found that it was built in 1899 and was originally called the Asendorf House. It is one of the most beautiful and intact examples of “Steamboat Gothic Gingerbread Carpentry” in America and has been featured in magazine articles and movies. I was so happy finally to find my way to the beautiful Gingerbread House.
Well, not exactly, but it did in fact snow here last night.
It also snowed in Savannah just across the river from us.
This will make front page news most likely.
The last time I was in Savannah, a few azaleas were peeking out and roses were still blooming. It takes some doing for it to freeze in Savannah, but it snowed last night. Not for long, only about an hour and a half and not for much, it melted almost as fast as it fell. It did snow though…and it was lovely.
Children down the street were playing and shouting and neighbors ran back and forth between the houses. I could see the snaps of camera flash as folks were proving to their friends that it was actually snowing in South Georgia. I took some, too.
I was so bedazzled, I wrote the wrong date.
It was actually the 12th of February, not the 11th.
Still…the month and year are right!
A little dash of wild gooseberry-ness is needed here…
That’s better.
It took Hildegard a few seconds and then it was like “I remember this stuff!” from when we were stationed in Colorado.
She showed our little houndy dog, Georgia Rose, the fun snow could be (even this little bit). I apologize for the slight fuzziness of this picture. They were running and I have a new camera (more about that in another post, though!) I’m still trying to figure it out.
She was mystified…
Since we were out, Desperado wanted to be with us.
As soon as his kitty feet hit the snow, it all came back to him…the reason he truly became a housecat in Colorado.
I stayed out, going back and forth between the warm coziness of the house and the icy beauty of outside. I called my parents, the brother who was home from work and a dear friend to share in the wonder of this beautiful dusting of sparkly snow. A little side note…my brother told me that he heard on the news that 49 out of the 50 states had snow somewhere in each one. We laughed about traveling to Hawaii and tossing snow on the beach to make it all 50. I thought that was really amazing and I’m glad he shared it with me.
As far as this snow went, it was slight, it was short-lived and it wasn’t even sticking one speck in the back of the house (too close to the lake.)
The more I find out about the cosmos, the more I am in awe of the Creator who designed it all. There seems to be an ongoing debate (and hate) between religious and more science-minded folks. It seems that one has to be either one or the other. I say, God is the ultimate Scientist, Physicist, Biologist and Astronomer. Who could be more so than the Creator of it all?
I found this to go along with the video I posted yesterday. It makes me weep for the beauty of it.
I do love science and the sky…especially in the desert one can see into forever in the night sky. This video just gives me wild gooseberry bumps. hee hee.
Enjoy A Glorious Dawn…
[Sagan]
If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch
You must first invent the universe
Space is filled with a network of wormholes
You might emerge somewhere else in space
Some when-else in time
The sky calls to us
If we do not destroy ourselves
We will one day venture to the stars
A still more glorious dawn awaits
Not a sunrise, but a galaxy rise
A morning filled with 400 billion suns
The rising of the milky way
The Cosmos is full beyond measure of elegant truths
Of exquisite interrelationships
Of the awesome machinery of nature
I believe our future depends powerfully
On how well we understand this cosmos
In which we float like a mote of dust
In the morning sky
But the brain does much more than just recollect
It inter-compares, it synthesizes, it analyzes
it generates abstractions
The simplest thought like the concept of the number one
Has an elaborate logical underpinning
The brain has it’s own language
For testing the structure and consistency of the world
[Hawking]
For thousands of years
People have wondered about the universe
Did it stretch out forever
Or was there a limit
From the big bang to black holes
From dark matter to a possible big crunch
Our image of the universe today
Is full of strange sounding ideas
[Sagan]
How lucky we are to live in this time
The first moment in human history
When we are in fact visiting other worlds
The surface of the earth is the shore of the cosmic ocean
Recently we’ve waded a little way out
And the water seems inviting
Source: John Boswell (musician who created this video) john@symphonyofscience.com
Learn more about the artist here.
Check out his other site, colorpulsemusic.com,
The first time I ever heard that phrase “We are made of star stuff”, it just blew my mind. The fact that we, our bodies, are made up of the very same elements that make up stars still gives me shivers.
A couple of years ago, I accompanied my family to visit Washington, D.C. to attend my nephew’s graduation from the Air Force Presidential Honor Guard training. While there, we were able to visit parts of the Smithsonian Institute. I wandered, by myself, throughout the Natural Sciences museum. There, in a small corner of the museum, I found a most wonderful thing–a vial, dark blue and mysterious, set under a glass cube. Inside this vial was stardust, brought back from a NASA mission. I looked at this vial, into the dust collected from a star billions of years old and tears streamed down my face. What was in this vial was also what made up me…what makes up all of us. For it to have traveled so far, from so long ago, still gives me shivers.
I believe in Creation, in the idea that we and the universe around began with an intelligent force, a Creator which most folks refer to as God. How that creation came to be, though, is a great mystery. I believe that it all could have started with a word, with a bang, with a tremendous moment in time witnessed only be the Creator. None of us were there and anything we think or believe, including scientific or religious truths about how it all started cannot be totally proven or disproven. However, I cannot, nor would not want to, deny the fact that science has found the answers to many mysteries. To truly be able to tell us what elements we are made of is a great accomplishment. To be able to study what is in the stardust, what makes up the universe, is also a great accomplishment. To be able to tell us that we and the stardust, the universe itself, is made of the same stuff is heart-soaring to me. To have scientific evidence for my long-believed faith that the Creator made us and the physical universe of the same stuff, that we are made of the earth, of the sky, of the stars, is overwhelming.
It is in that light, that shimmering of understanding that while gazing at the stars, we are also gazing at ourselves, that I share with you this video made up of pieces and parts of Carl Sagan’s talks on The Cosmos and other scientific discussions and interviews with Richard Feynman, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and Bill Nye (The Science Guy!) Here is the Symphony of Science, We are All Connected.
[deGrasse Tyson]
We are all connected;
To each other, biologically
To the earth, chemically
To the rest of the universe atomically
[Feynman]
I think nature’s imagination
Is so much greater than man’s
She’s never going to let us relax
[Sagan]
We live in an in-between universe
Where things change all right
But according to patterns, rules,
Or as we call them, laws of nature
[Nye]
I’m this guy standing on a planet
Really I’m just a speck
Compared with a star, the planet is just another speck
To think about all of this
To think about the vast emptiness of space
There’s billions and billions of stars
Billions and billions of specks
[Sagan]
The beauty of a living thing is not the atoms that go into it
But the way those atoms are put together
The cosmos is also within us
We’re made of star stuff
We are a way for the cosmos to know itself
Across the sea of space
The stars are other suns
We have traveled this way before
And there is much to be learned
I find it elevating and exhilarating
To discover that we live in a universe
Which permits the evolution of molecular machines
As intricate and subtle as we
[deGrasse Tyson]
I know that the molecules in my body are traceable
To phenomena in the cosmos
That makes me want to grab people in the street
And say, have you heard this??
(Richard Feynman on hand drums and chanting)
[Feynman]
There’s this tremendous mess
Of waves all over in space
Which is the light bouncing around the room
And going from one thing to the other
And it’s all really there
But you gotta stop and think about it
About the complexity to really get the pleasure
And it’s all really there
The inconceivable nature of nature
Source: John Boswell (musician who created this video) john@symphonyofscience.com
Learn more about the artist here.
Check out his other site, colorpulsemusic.com, )
Thank you to my online friend, Peni, for sharing this with me
in the first place.
Andrea
Brandi
Elena
Leonie
