I'm a changed omnivore. After eating one of Gillen's turkeys and two of his ducks for Thanksgiving dinner, I now intend to only meat occasionally, and only from our farm or from farmers we know.
I didn't even take part in the duck and turkey slaughter. I just watched a few minutes of the plucking and some of the guts removal (which I also smelled) and I saw the pictures that our adventurous, young, wise, vegetarian friend
Persephone bravely took of the event. I took the clean path of Japanese dinner preparation in my newly orderly kitchen. But something shifted inside of me. Maybe it was having known this dinner as ducklings and poults, or maybe it was that smell. Or maybe I have just woken up to just how much we gloss over the slaughter of the animals we eat by wrapping it all up in cellophane and placing it in massive, even stacks in grocer's coolers. In Europe, the feet and heads are left attached. I like that.
As Persephone's boyfriend, meat-eating Chopper, said this week - if we had to go through this process every time I think we would eat meat only on special occasions. That's my new plan. We'll see how the family adapts.
I'm not out to recruit anyone to this way of thinking. So I'll show only appetizing pictures of the birds and none of the main event. Just these:
Those ducks that were
not facing their last day at our farm were chased away from the scene of the slaughter by Gillen and his friend Aaron.
Chopper helped Nicolas with every step, including thanking the birds.
Washing them after they have been de-gutted.
Chopper fried the turkey outside so that we would have room in the oven for the many gourmet sides that Persephone helped me prepare and for the two ducks:
Almost the entire meal was local, including green beans I'd frozen this summer, sweet potatoes, yukon gold potatoes, escarole, radichio, raw milk and cheese. Next year, maybe we can use all local ingredients.
The exceptions were the pumpkin, cherry and pecan pies. Will you look at Persephone's pies:
Look what that girl can do with pastry.
And they tasted as good as they looked.
She also spent hours helping me prepare a Japanese dinner while the guys finished plucking and gutting the birds. I had to prepare Japanese for the joy of using all of my Japanese plates, bowls, sake cups and of course, these:
Persephone worked so hard that when I prepared local beef (this is pre-Thanksgiving revelations) one day, the smell drove her to eat half a burger, for the first time in decades:
And Chopper also got to act out of character, playing wii and W.O.W. for the first time and spending hours on the trampoline, rediscovering his boyhood, and a B-B gun (they're aiming at coconuts on the compost pile) with Gillen and Jesse:
What a week. It was full and deep.
Another highlight was going to see
Manheim Steamroller with some of our favorite unschooling friends, at the Fox Theater. Gillen and Jesse
loved it. Jesse was inspired by it to want to play the violin. I admit, I wish it had been the keyboard. I now officially have some spirit and we are very ready for my Montana and Australian family to arrive.
These next two show Zoe opening up the gift that Bhu and I made for her. It is a box of ten board books. We included an alphabet book, a numbers book, colors, shapes, and then more family oriented ones, like "Uncle Nicolas' Vegetables" and "We Love" with pictures of her smile and her walk and her eyes, etc. on each page.. They were so much fun to make and are being thoroughly enjoyed by their enthusiastic recipient. Duct tape may be the answer.
The most exciting part has of course been seeing Zoe - now fifteen months old and an incredibly sweet and happy little girl. 
Being pulled in the cooler wagon by her 
The lady in waiting, and princess Zoe's mum found time to also make two beautiful pies. I am so loving the visiting pie makers of this winter. Who's next? 
We will all thank the ducks when they provide our Christmas feast. 
In addition we are making some constructive changes to this old house. I am liking the idea of staying in one home long enough to mark our kids' growth up the side of the wall until they are taller than we are. I moved twenty times before I was twenty-four. 
I also have to show you a set of cloth gift bags sewn by Helen for my birthday last week. Aren't they festive, and so much better to reuse than paper? She has an etsy shop.
Another big change - Fracas has moved inside. She has learned to use the litter box and has found a new favorite spot in our bedroom.
And finally, we replaced all of the many scary torn parts of our trampoline so the kids have been making that their home. Even in the rain :
Those ducks that were not facing their last day at our farm were chased away from the scene of the slaughter by Gillen and his friend Aaron.
Chopper helped Nicolas with every step, including thanking the birds.
Washing them after they have been de-gutted.
Chopper fried the turkey outside so that we would have room in the oven for the many gourmet sides that Persephone helped me prepare and for the two ducks:
Almost the entire meal was local, including green beans I'd frozen this summer, sweet potatoes, yukon gold potatoes, escarole, radichio, raw milk and cheese. Next year, maybe we can use all local ingredients.
Look what that girl can do with pastry.
And they tasted as good as they looked.
She also spent hours helping me prepare a Japanese dinner while the guys finished plucking and gutting the birds. I had to prepare Japanese for the joy of using all of my Japanese plates, bowls, sake cups and of course, these:
Persephone worked so hard that when I prepared local beef (this is pre-Thanksgiving revelations) one day, the smell drove her to eat half a burger, for the first time in decades:
And Chopper also got to act out of character, playing wii and W.O.W. for the first time and spending hours on the trampoline, rediscovering his boyhood, and a B-B gun (they're aiming at coconuts on the compost pile) with Gillen and Jesse:
What a week. It was full and deep.
The kids and I (with some local friends, the Wilsons) ate Japanese food yesterday at an unschoolers' Japanese festival hosted by Beth. It was great to reconnect with the Atlanta unschooling families.
Above is Katie, holding Lucinda, who is named after the sweet girl below (Lucy for short), holding Violet.
There were swings, and football,
a fierce yu-gi-oh tournament to make Jesse's day, despite coming in second to Max:
Origami, good conversation, and examples of cool crochet projects - Kimba's leg warmer for Lucy
that, on top the other project that I saw the day before at a more local gathering of friends:
could possibly pull me away from more sock knitting. This beautiful blanket was whipped up in no time by Helen. 
I had to add the second picture so that I could commemorate the squirrel on the shelf behind her head, which was killed and stuffed by that day's wonderful host's husband (and Gillen's hunting hero) Allen. I have never seen this squirrel when we were there, ever. I had heard tales of him while on the phone with Allen's wife, Claudia, when she interrupted her talk of sweet tea to exclaim, "There's a squirrel in our fridge!"
In French, "mon petit chou" is an endearment. "Chou" means cabbage. I hear Nicolas' mom and his siblings say "chou-chou" often. Here's my big Chou with a bodacious head (of cabbage).
The farm has about a thousand pounds of watermelon radish right now.
They are much prettier opened up. We love them in salad.
Above are our newly repainted kitchen shelves, to hold the beautiful glasses and china that were being lost in the dirt streaked white.
My mothers' crystal, the Brenna mug I bought at the Live and Learn conference, the mug from our recent trip to Belgium, the dark blue glazed goblet from Ann Ohman, the mug from a Joffrey Ballet concert years ago called Billboards, the hearts mug from Nicolas last Valentine's day, the big pink tumbler that is Mindy's, the yen store cups from Japan, my mother's small Mexican mugs that I treasure so much that I painted a bathroom with the same colors, the egg cups from our wedding...
And I'm thinking of knitting a very washable blanket that will completely cover the new furniture. Because really, what were we thinking.
