Miss Beccaboo and I are learning how to knit. My friend Anna Maria is giving us lessons and last nightwe all lined up on her sofa, balls of yarn rolling about at our feet, needles poking and jabbing most dangerously.

If Anna Maria was caught off-guard by my stunningly high levels of ignorance, she did not let on. (AM, First you need to do a slipknot. Me, Come again?) She patiently coached us through the tricky casting on, and then got us started on our rows. In between saving us from our mistakes, coaching her own daughters, and petting the dog, she knitted away while regaling us with tales of how women knitted in the olden days.

They knitted while they walked, she said, demonstrating. They put their balls of yarn in special pouches they wore at their belts, and while they walked—because everyone had to walk everywhere back then—they knitted gorgeous stockings with intricate patterns for the wealthy.

Miss Beccaboo was knitting and chatting with her friends, so I wasn’t sure she heard everything Anna Maria said.

But I was wrong.

This morning, she stuffed her ball of yarn into a shoulder bag and then walked around the house while she knitted, just like the ladies of yesteryear.

She also patiently allowed her little brother to try his hand at knitting.

She is much more confident than I am. When she makes a mistake, she just flips the needles over and works backwards, or something like that. I have no idea if she’s doing it right, but it looks like it’s coming together just fine, so I let her go. Not that I could help her if she needed me to, of course.

I, on the other hand, knit slowly and methodically, constantly terrified that I’m going to drop a stitch. I don’t understand how the threads do the things they’re doing, so I memorize how my hands should move and then hold my breath and hope for the best.

I am pleasantly surprised by how much fun I’m having. Knitting is peaceful and addictive, relaxing, yet productive. And, unlike my other interests (such as writing, cooking, visiting), it allows me to be fully present to the children. I can’t look up and supervise, but I can listen and talk. (Well, mostly just listen, at this stage of the game—I am so uncoordinated.) The kids sense that I’m available and cluster around, watching my needles eat yarn and chattering away about all manner of things.

Inspired by our knitting, the littles got out some sewing boards I forgot I had.

And Yo-Yo went to work on a rubber band ball.

I can’t wait to learn more stitches and techniques, or whatever you call knitting skills. (Sweetsie has already put in orders for a hat and mittens and dress—dream on, baby.) There aren’t that many more days left of winter, so I gotta move fast. (Watch out, Amanda Soule! Here I come!)

This same time, years previous: chai-spiced hot chocolate, I don’t like chocolate biscotti, my me-me list, hauling wood

One of my favorite things to do after the kids are in bed at night is to flop down on the sofa in front of the fire and start reading. An hour spent soaking up words, and I feel luxuriously rich and much invigorated.

I’ve read two great books, as of late. It’s rare that I have a succession of lovely reads (usually there’s a dud, or a dry, heavy tome, thrown in the mix to slow me down), so it’s been quite the treat. (And now I’m [re-]reading a third, my mom’s.)

The first hit read was a book called The Dirty Life: On Farming, Food, and Love by Kristin Kimball. The particular copy I read came from Lee, a friend from church. The book is making the rounds—Lee, Marj, me, my husband, Sam, etc). Everyone wants to get their hands on this gem of a book which recounts how city-slicker Kristin met her radical-farmer husband and how they acquired a farm and started their business. It’s a fast read, full of entertaining stories that involve subjects such as blood sausage, used dental floss, and rats (not all in the same tale, though).

Most back-to-the-earth stories that I’ve read (this one, for example) ring hollow, like the authors are living the life just so they have something to write about. Not this one, though. This story is hardcore. There is nothing idealized about their life. Words are not minced. There is blood, poop, and extreme exhaustion, with nary a stab at romanticizing it. (Not like you really could romanticize poop…)

It made me feel downright lazy—’cause I take my dirty life with hefty slice of cheesecake—but it did motivate me to finally make up my seed order.

The second book is the highly-controversial Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua.

Folks, I loved this book! It’s funny, honest, crazy, challenging, and inspiring. I find it fascinating that this book has raised such an extreme level of ire in so many people. (Just read the reviews on Amazon.) Clearly, it strikes a nerve.

This is what the book says on the cover…

(it’s a confessional, people! the woman eats a lot of crow!), but I’ll not say much more. Read it for yourself, okay?

(Oh yeah. The tiger mother book made me feel lazy, too.)

What books are you reading?

This same time, years previous: corn and wild rice soup with smoked sausage

Usually, it’s the parents who are proud of their kids. Parents get to be proud of all manner of glorious things: that Little Tot stayed seated on his bottom for a whole entire meal, that Bonnie learned to read, that Shy Girl read scripture in front of church, that Duddly made a phone call and said please and thank you, that Joey blew his nose instead of picking it. Et cetera. There’s bigger things, too, like being proud when the kids donate blood, give a speech at graduation, and refrain from snapping off Aunt Ida’s irksome head.

But sometimes kids get to be proud of their parents, too. I’m not talking about the ordinary “respect your elders” deal. I’m talking about the beaming-pride feeling, the feeling where if you were sewed together with needle and thread, the stitches would actually pop.

That’s how I feel about you and your novel. ‘Cause writing a novel is a pretty big deal. You did it, Mom, so you should know.

I’m writing this letter even though I haven’t actually seen the book yet. It’s due to arrive at my doorstep any minute. I’m jittery with excitement and am starting to do the swivel-head thing, swiveling my head to look out the window whenever a car goes by.

It doesn’t seem quite right that I’ll get to see the book before you do, does it? But you said no when I offered to wait to open the package till you’d received yours. I’ll wait to publish this post until it gets here, though—I want to take a picture of it—and I’ll call you right away and give you a play-by-play.

I know you think it’s in bad taste to be publicly prideful of your offsprings’ strong suits, and I have to say I agree. But I think it’s different when a kid gushes over a parent. I didn’t raise you, after all, so your successes are not a direct result of anything I did. Down here, looking up, I can gloat with abandon.

Though I still try to play it cool. The other week when you and Dad came to our place to scout out a property (I can’t wait till you guys move close), you, up to your eyeballs in last minute edits, brought along your computer and stayed focused amidst the general chaos that rocks my home. And when The Baby Nickel came down with some bug, you happily offered to stay home from church to watch him. I told my Sunday school class about my crazy mother, at home hunched over her computer, ignoring all of us. I rolled my eyes and sighed theatrically, but I don’t think I fooled anyone. They could all see I was pleased as punch.

You’ve written other books before, but this is your very first novel. Novels are scary. They’re huge. They can almost eat you alive, but you whipped that little (big) booger into shape, yes you did. (Don’t worry, I won’t let slip how long it took.) You worried that you wouldn’t ever get it done, but it didn’t really stand a chance against you.

“Yeah, right,” I can hear you mutter. (But you’re smiling through your mutterings. I can hear that, too.)

“It’s pure torture,” you liked to moan, as you wallowed sluggishly through each paragraph, each sentence, each syllable, hunched and vacant-eyed. But I could tell (though you’ll probably deny it up one side of today and down the other) that you liked it. You weren’t having fun exactly, but you were doing what you wanted to do. There’s a lot of pleasure to be found in doing something hard—trite, but true, don’t knock it.

For your first (!) novel, you tackled one heck of a topic, too. Salvation, oh good heavens! It’s no small matter, but the issues—craftily paired with rhapsodic accounts of luscious berry pies and jars of home canned garden goodness—offer much food for thought. Of course, seeing as I was raised by you, I’m partial towards your view points. However, I think we might be in the minority. But that’s okay. It’s an invigorating place to be.

I like your website, too. It’s barebones simple (the Balding Brother did a good job on it), but cozy, too, chock-full of your exquisite writing and spiked with provocative ideas. I spent a couple days reading through all the bonus essays you posted. For some of them, I whooped out loud. (I don’t remember you making us memorize “Happy are you when people hate you, reject you . . .” when Dad got fired, but I wouldn’t put it passed you. Did you think that was a witty joke back then? Your way of making a funny during those anxious, angry days?)

And just this morning, I discovered the wonders of StumbleUpon (kind of a dumb thing to do when I’m already frittering away too much time on the internet) and I “liked” your site. An official little page popped up and told me to wait while it verified your site and then a new sign popped, “Yay! You’re the first to discover this site!” Let the fun begin!

Love,
Your Seam-Bustingly Proud Daughter

The book
The website

This same time, years previous: potatoes with roasted garlic vinaigrette