It's all so quiet - shhhh shhhh shhhh

The song from bonkers Icelandic singer Bjork is going round in my head this morning as my house is soooooo quiet.

When you can hear a tick from the pendulum of a clock, the sound of your own steady breathing, every creak of the bed or seat you are sitting on you know you have found quietness.

I just love it. 

I know if I go outside it will not be quite so quiet.  There will be bird song and fluttering leaves as the squirrels go about their business in the woods besides us.  There will be the sounds of people jetting off to foreign climbs.  Children playing in gardens around us.  Car doors opening and closing.

It is so tempting to stay curled up in my indoor cocoon.  The sounds in the outdoors I know will make me want to do something.  Especially when the sun has finally come out after so many months of rain.  Yesterday they talked me into a little gardening, a little pegging of washing on the line.  Today my body is telling me too much. 

Will I ever learn to go be amidst the sounds of life and not be tempted to try and join them?

I remarked to my husband this morning as he took the children off to a church service where they will be playing their instruments, that soon he might start getting the sympathetic looks and offerings of casseroles as people think he is bringing up the children alone.

One thing I can do in this quiet however is go through my daughters final year of primary school life.  Over this week the coffee table has become more and more laden with books, folders, pictures and projects.  I will look at every single one.  I will recall the stories she has told me of things that she did on a particular school day and enjoy seeing what she was describing.

I'm sad that I couldn't make it to her leavers assembly where each child gets presented with a bible.  I'm sad that even if she had wanted me to I couldn't have walked to fetch her on her final day at the school she has been at for the last seven years.  The school that first drew us to come and look at houses in this area.  The school that we noticed was right next to a church, I still remember the day that we pulled up into the school/church car park one Sunday morning.  We heard a trombone playing and there and then felt God calling us to a new home.

But dwelling on that makes me melancholy - too many sad things have happened in these last seven years.

For now I shall go and make myself a cup of tea (at least I can move around reasonably pain free at the moment) and settle down with the books and folders, pictures and projects.

xx

Blessings.

I've been feeling a little low over the weekend and can think of no better way of lifting my spirits than remembering the little things that I have been blessed with this last week:

800. Neighbours dog barking much less.

801. Spending time with friends.

802. News of a couple getting engaged.

803. Generous friends.

804. Having the time to help when we are asked to.

805. Having the time to rest when I need to.

806. Pain relief.

807. Chats on twitter when I am home alone.

808. Being able to make a simple healthy meal that the family devour and enjoy.

809. The sound of the rain in the night when I am tucked up nice and cosy.

Now I must get on with the task of filling in forms for secondary school for my 11 year old daughter.  How fast time has flown, she has her induction day tomorrow and I can see that she is quite nervous about it.  I can't believe that it is only a year since I was feeling the same way about my son moving on!  He is thriving in this new environment and I am so praying that my less academic daughter might do to.

SATS week.

A couple of weeks ago my 11 year old daughter had to endure a week of statutory testing at school.  I have been praying that they would have been abolished in the format they are in by the time she got to them, but it was not to be.  My son thrived doing them last year - he is a very academically able young man.  My daughter on the other hand, is still getting to grips with her dyslexia in my opinion because of the impact of the school not listening to me for too long.

To try and give her something to smile about everyday and to enable me to have something to keep my prayers on her all day I came up with a cunning little plan.  I had started some weeks ago to make a little dolly following this pattern that I found on a lovely blog.  I altered the pattern slightly (I never can stick to instructions!) so that I could make clothing separately for it.  When I started it I was just playing, I had no idea who I was making it for.  Then the weekend before the SATS started, I suddenly had THE idea.

I finished the dolly (she had seen it but I didn't tell her it would be hers), she took it on her self to ask me if she could have it for her SATS week!  I just kept her waiting all weekend saying I hadn't decided what I was going to do with her.

Just in time for Monday morning I had her ready with her first outfit made.  I suppose I really ought to put some photo's in now, here you go:

Here she is in her underwear and necklace!  All the pictures were taken by my daughter in our garden yesterday.

 The first day it was a simple summer outfit, shorts, top and head band.

 This is her little french outfit, dress, shoes, shrug, handbag and beret

 

The next day she wore a little hippy outfit, head band, top, trousers and long jacket.

The final day was party time and so I went to town, dress, shoes, cap and coat.

I got the ideas for many of the clothes from this web site, I think I am going to have a go at making one of this ladies dolls next!  The cap in the final outfit came from here, it is an adult pattern but as I am using fine crochet cotton and a 1.5mm needle it came out just right for my dolly!  I have to say a big thank you to Pinterest at this point, it is only because of this site that I first found any of these little dolly type patterns which stirred my creative, if you would like to find my pins you can do here.

By the way we have named this little star - she is Pixie Less (as opposed to the pop start Pixie Lot!).

My daughter has now come up with the idea of making some of these for teachers gifts for the end of term - I am going to see if I can make some teeny tiny ones.