Are We There Yet?

Yep, we are moving to a new house.

But the point of this post is to let all of you that read this blog, which I post to very infrequently, that I am trying to consolidate my blogs.

I am moving everything (albeit slowly) to one place.

The Daily Goon

Here's one from our backyard.

Clearing the ivy from the woods has allowed many other plants to grow. I did not plant these lilies; they just appeared. Last fall I cleared the area in shich they grew, and I was so excited to see them appear this spring!

The girls got these flowers from their granmda after their dance performance the other night.

It's been a few days since I've posted. I spent the weekend in Chicago with some friends to see Ralph play his adult stuff. It was a fantastic weekend!

It is a wonderful time of year for taking photos of flowers. I'm caught up finally, but headed out for another weekend away, so I'll likely fall behind again on posting photos.

I took this one at the Cincinnati Zoo.

It's been a few days since I've posted. We went off to Cincinnati to see Ralph's World perform (yet again)! It was great fun, even if it was broiling hot.

It's been a few days since I posted. We've started some summer things, but haven't finished up spring things, so there's some double-duty going on here. I hope that I won't have to skip daily photos again....but this weekend we'll be on the road, so ...

I need to get one of these herb garden-in-a-pots!

This morning, I took the girls to a birthday party and then we drove to the cabin. Minutes after we had gotten settled in, it started to rain and then hail. I managed to sneak out in a small break of the storms to catch a couple photos, but nothing turned out very well.

Evey year around this time, when we can spend long hours outside, I get the urge to read my Provencal and Tuscan books and to cook meals I imagine we would eat if we were there. The girls cut flowers for our table and trimmed some of our rosemary for me to use in the sauce for our pasta tonight.

A beautiful iris that we spotted today.

The following is excerpted from the AJC article on the recent attempt by parent Laura Mallory to ban the Harry Potter books from the library in her child's Gwinnett County public school.

Bray "strongly" recommended the books stay. Here are her 10 reasons:

1. Mallory hasn't read any Harry Potter book in its entirety.
2. The books are popular, highly praised and encourage kids to read.
3. The books depict good vs. evil, and good wins.
4. The book's characters don't endorse the Wicca religion.
5. Kids who read the books are old enough to understand the difference between reality and fantasy.
6. Some of Mallory's objections take parts of the books out of context.
7. There's no reason to assume children become abnormal just because they read the books.
8. Removing the books would set a precedent because two other school system media review panels have ruled the series should stay.
9. Teachers never required Mallory's children to read the stories.
10. To remove the series based on Mallory's objections "would open this very fine school system to ridicule by many of its citizens as well as citizens of the nation."

As much as I agree that the Harry Potter books should remain in the school library, I don't agree with presiding officer Su Ellen Bray's reasons. Where are the "rights" in this? I really think she was trying to fill a list of ten reasons. For me, the tenth reason on her list is not a reasonable one by any means. Are the children in those schools learning that they should not take a stand for something that they believe in, even if it means being ridiculed? Moreover, is it not okay for kids to read books in which evil wins? And would it really matter if the books DID endorse the Wicca religion?

To me, the following excerpt from kidSPEAK outlines the most compeling reason for keeping Harry Potter in the library:

In late April, a federal judge ruled that the school board had violated its students' First Amendment rights by restricting the Harry Potter books because they believed the books promoted witchcraft. The judge said that "regardless of the personal distaste with which these individuals regard 'witchcraft,' it is not properly within their power and authority as members of defendant's school board to prevent the students at Cedarville from reading about it."

Do you blog? Will you share your favorite blog hosters with me? Would you send me your blog URL so that I can keep up with your ramblings?

Do you photoblog? Have you found a photoblog hoster that you really like? I've tried Flikr. I've tested Fotix. Now I've set up a photo blog here on blogspirit:
http://gob-photos.blogspirit.com/

Do you read some blogs on a regular basis? What are your favorites? Do you use an RSS feed reader?

Do you want to blog but don't konw how to get started? Send me a mail and I'll help out.

I'm just curious if there's new, cool stuff out there that I'm missing.

While I was working on the computer downstairs, something ran past me near the floor. I assumed it was a cat, but Chloe said "There's a chipmunk in the house!" I turned and saw it run across the room. We kept open all the doors downstairs all day, but it didn't leave. We kept seeing it run here and there. Finally, at 7:30 this evening, Wilma and Betty chased the little rodent out and up the tree. I did not get the camera fast enough to get a photo of our visitor. We hope that he makes it back home safely. How he got in we don't know. Maybe one of the cats caught him and brought him in...

I decided today to do some spring cleaning of my various websites and computers. While I was at it, I took down the older entries from this blog. I don't need this blog to be a record of where I've been! I don't think anything I've written was profound enough to be missed.

Photography fills my idle time. When I'm alone with Camille, we can both stay busy with her homeschooling work or by reading, but when I'm alone with Chloe, I take on the role of photographer to avoid being cast in the role of jungle gym.

As usual, we went to Toddler Tuesday at the art museum today. The girls spent quite a while looking at the art of Nellie Mae Rowe before heading down to do the art project. Chloe did a great job tracing her hands (like in Rowe's piece called Peace). Camille decorated her painting then started to splatter it, a la Jackson Pollock. I think the piece turned out very well!

The art teacher seemed a little concerned that the girls were working outside the scope of the outlined project. While I think it is important that the girls learn the benefits of the different media, I also think that free expression in art is extremely important. Forcing the girls to stick to the outlined lesson is stifling.

Peace by Nellie Mae Rowe

Red Banana? Well, Ralph hadn't until after he wrote "Red Banana", which is on the Ralph's World "Green Gorilla, Monster and Me" CD. Now he's seen a Green Gorilla at the car wash here in Atlanta. And we bought red bananas at the farmers' market this week. Maybe next week we'll find some blue tomatoes.

Lyrics to "Red Banana" are here on the Ralph's World website.

More Ralph's World fun was had today at The Red Light Cafe. Ralph, You rock!