The hard and the easy

Have a nice day.  :-)

At any single point in time, there is a lot wrong with the world.   We might be swept away by pervasive problems, like policies that don't take into account the big picture, companies that value profit at all costs, or world hunger.  There is a lot that needs to be improved in our individual lives, too.  It is easy to get bogged down by the difficulty of a marriage that isn't going smoothly, a career that is draining, or children that present daily, repetitive challenges.  Add to that the daily stresses and annoyances of trying to cross items off of our 'To do' lists, manage our finances, and just generally get along with others (who are maybe not always so easy to get along with), and there is a lot to complain about in this mortal life.

The temptation to do just that, to complain, or rant on Facebook, or just generally feel sorry for ourselves, is strong.  Somehow, it seems like it will make us feel better.  To revel in the wrongness, to have people agree, to give an 'Amen!' to our succinct and oh-so-right perspective on just how bad things are, and especially how at fault other people are.  We can walk away feeling smug, secure in our rightness, and thinking, if only more people would wake up and do things the way we know they ought to be done.

I am choosing not to do that here, in this blog.

Don't get me wrong.  I am not saying other people can't do that.  I mean, some people live for it.  Live for the bad news, the next snippet of horribleness from their most hated politician or manager or mother-in-law that they can announce, more evidence proving how awful that person really is.  I know a lot about those people, because it comes very naturally to me to be one of those people.  But being one of those people has never made me happy.

It has, on the other, done a bang up job of making me feel a host of other things.  Entitled.  Superior.  Anxious.  Depressed.

A quote that I came across in Gretchen Rubin's The Happiness Project really resonated with me:

"It is easy to be heavy; hard to be light." ~G. K. Chesterton

It is hard to look on the bright side.  People can treat you like you must not be very smart, must not understand how wrong things are.  Or they can be nasty and jealous.  There is a sort of social pressure that says, "How dare you talk about your wonderful life when so many people have it worse?  Don't you care about how bad you will make them feel?"  But I think that what really brings people down is hearing about all the hopeless and dreary things.  People are drawn to hope and beauty and happy things.  You don't see a lot of disaster photos being pinned to Pinterest.

The way I see it, any blog is just a collection of thoughts and ideas, memories and musings, expressed in words and illustration.  I want to be mindful about what I will be collecting here.  I want it to be the good stuff.  The things I want to remember, the things I am most proud of, the things that smack of the life I want to cultivate for myself, and my family. 

Good stuff.

There are crummy things and bad days in my life, just like there are in yours.  But they aren't the most deserving of my energy and reflection.  The good things are.  And they will be celebrated.

To everything, a season

Nik's joyfully 'flying' with a playsilk cape on.

 We dabble in a little Waldorf goodness here at our house.  And by 'we dabble' I mean I pin things to Pinterest like crazy, and occasionally actually follow through with something in real life.

We have a few Waldorf dolls and some lovely wooden doll furniture.  We have a really beautiful wooden rainbow stacking puzzle.  We have a set of three lovely playsilks.

But the place in our home that seems the most Waldorf inspired is the seasonal display we keep on the dresser in the kids' bedroom.  We have kept it for a year now, and have grown into it.  At first, I was the only one in our house who was interested in it, but as time went by, and as we spent more time outdoors in the summer months, Nik was often heard saying, "Oh!  I should bring this back for the nature table, Mom!"   My parents even got in on the collecting, bringing a giant leaf, and a bag full of acorns back from their fall holiday in Mississippi.

Nik's bike basket filled with pine cones for the nature table.

If you are thinking of creating a nature corner for your own home, I really encourage you to just go for it.  Make sure and find a permanent space that will not be in the way, because it takes time for the nature table to become a normal part of your family culture.  If it is in an inconvenient spot, and your kids don't really seem 'into it', it will be tempting to scrap the whole thing.  But Waldorf is different from the flashy stuff generally vying for our kids' attention.  It is quiet, and needs time to be discovered.  Provide that time.

The other main piece of advice I would give about setting up your own nature table is to not worry about it not being waldorfy enough.  This advice that I read at 'Here We Are Together' was a comfort and encouragement to me as I began, and again every time that I would venture in to change the table with the season.  Blogger Miri says, "This is a place for you and your little ones to bring a little bit of the outside world inside. There is no right or wrong way to set up a Nature Table, and as long as you enjoy building it and adding to it then it is perfect."  Sing it, sister.

We have kept our nature table for nearly one year now.  When we started, it was certainly nothing to write home about.  Just a tray, with a green playsilk representing grass, a couple pinecones (which are now a staple on our table) and various hodge podge of Easter things I had lying around the house.

The tray turned out to be a brilliant beginning, and we have kept that up.  I actually later read in 'Style At Home' magazine that items grouped on a tray automatically look more pulled together, almost like they are framed.  I had no idea I was so fashion forward.  (Hidden benefit of the tray: It keeps little bits from rolling off of the silk, onto the floor and under the dresser.  Yay!)

After Easter, I took the Easter-related items off of the tray, and added anything I could find that seemed like Spring to me.  I ended up borrowing liberally from the Little People bin, adding Maggie in her raincoat, two bunnies, and a arbor swing decked out in florals.  Again, I had to rely on Miri's words to build my confidence: "Don’t worry if it doesn’t look waldorfy enough or your only seasonal things are made of plastic." 

After we got started, each transition got easier.  Isn't that true of so many things?  I started to keep my eyes out for things made of a variety of materials, and we added driftwood, seashells (found at the thrift store), and a pottery bird in the coming weeks.

When fall arrived, it was really fun to make the dramatic change of switching out the green playsilk for our fiery orange one.  Nik added more and more pine cones, and rocks that he sifted out of our sandbox.  I also bought a lovely hand-painted wooden goose from an artisan at the farmer's market to add to our 'stream'.

And then came the seasons of Christmas and winter, and we changed up the display again.  Blue silk and fibrefill 'snow' made for a fun base to build on.   Lots of underloved Christmas decorations found their way on the to nature table, and into the supply box for seasons to come.

 

The nature corner changes have been a quiet little reminder to us of the rhythms of the natural world.  Nik took an interest in the summer, and now even Alexa, at nearly age 2, has started to play with some of the items in this touchable display.  But both are very respectful of this space.  Even when Nik has a meltdown and throws things around his room in anger, the nature table is spared.  Children seem to have an understanding of what is sacred.