Just Be...

Every once in a while I write a post about how I get into Keeping Up With The Joneses mode. With so many blogs featuring so many great ideas posted by so many Moms it's easy to feel like you're doing well, nothing. Last week it finally occurred to me (I'm a tad slow on the uptake) that whatever you do, you do. Your activities don't have to match the Jones' activities. Some families take road trips. You don't have to. Some Moms knit beautiful sweaters or create cozy quilts. You don't have to (that's what Etsy is for!). Some Moms maintain the sweetest blogs (with eh hem, regular updates). You don't have to. But last week, we had an fall picnic in our own backyard followed by Pip and Sprout making homemade Halloween decorations in front of a roaring fire. We did that. You don't have to. Life is not really a checklist. Sometimes it's just better to go with the flow.

We are reading a number of page-turners at our house. Green Husband cannot put down Devil in the White City which details "murder and mayhem" during the Chicago World's Fair of 1893. This book came highly recommended from Green Nana, Green Husband's MIL.

Green Husband so kindly and so thoughtfully picked up Donald Hall's Unpacking the Boxes. I am just now realizing that I have quite the large collection of works by Donald Hall and his wife, Jane Kenyon, including their wonderful interview on PBS with Bill Moyers.

For those of you in the mood for an extremely moving and beautiful book meant for the tween and teen set, Sharon Creech's Walk Two Moons is one of my new all time favorites.

Green Tips for Hunkering Down

This morning Green Husband called me from his truck to let me know that a poem by my favorite writer, Donald Hall, was being featured on The Writer's Almanac. Garrison Keillor read The Hunkering, which I would reprint here but for copyright (I am a librarian after all). Notice it's a single sentence.

I am working on 10 Green Tips for Hunkering Down, but I need your help:

Does anyone have any eco-savvy hints for refreshing down comforters and other winter accoutrements that have been hiding out in closets and trunks?