Comments on: Oyster bed life

By: Anne Bogel

Anne Bogel — Wed, 24 Feb 2016 15:12:08 +0000

As a fellow mother of four I find this perspective illuminating and a little bit scary. Because as they’re getting older (I think my oldest is a few years ahead of yours) the balloon effect is amplified. It’s kind of nice, like you say. It’s definitely unruly. 🙂

By: Anne

Anne — Wed, 24 Feb 2016 02:15:31 +0000

I’m reading the Little Book of Talent from the MMD list you mentioned. So far, so good.
Big fan of Sam Edelman booties. I own 2 pairs in 2 different colors and they’ve lasted well through several winters.

By: Cloud

Cloud — Tue, 23 Feb 2016 18:51:33 +0000

In reply to lauravanderkam. I should perhaps re-read the book!

By: lauravanderkam

lauravanderkam — Tue, 23 Feb 2016 16:00:08 +0000

In reply to Sarah K.

@Sarah – apparently it can! Or at least in the hands of master professional gardeners it can. We have some plants at home that I have seen flowering elsewhere but have never flowered like that for me…

By: Sarah K

Sarah K — Tue, 23 Feb 2016 15:23:09 +0000

I love the image of the web/oyster bed! Also I had to comment on your photo — I have that plant in my office but I never realized it could flower! Now I need to investigate how to make it happy enough to sprout those pretty blossoms.

By: lauravanderkam

lauravanderkam — Tue, 23 Feb 2016 13:21:07 +0000

In reply to Zenmoo.

@zenmoo – I really do hope my kids will grow up to have a close relationship. The friend overlap has been fun to watch. When one has a playdate that child is not always thrilled about the others playing too, but often it is all good, and so each child will increase the friend network for the others. Plus they all have each other to play with too. A normal Monday evening can be a giant playdate.

I am on the hunt for good boots!

By: Zenmoo

Zenmoo — Tue, 23 Feb 2016 11:36:57 +0000

I’m one of 4 kids (and my husband is one of 6) so I know what you mean about having a huge web of social connections around siblings. One friend of mine from university actually independently knew all of my siblings as well (he was in the same year at school as one sister, met another sister when he was a bus driver for a night club and was a senior in the boarding house when my brother started)

Really though, if I want to find something out, my first port of call is the siblings. One of them will have a friend or a friend of a friend who is a landscaper or a graphic designer or a web site developer or a lawyer …

I do feel sad that infertility meant we’ve only had two kids, because I love the relationship we’ve all got (my husbands siblings are all really tight too) but I hope that their cousins pick up that kind of gap.

And I didn’t comment on the previous post, but the dresses looked great and skinny jeans + boots is such an easy combo. That plus a down jacket is the “Christchurch uniform” for winter.

By: lauravanderkam

lauravanderkam — Tue, 23 Feb 2016 00:09:10 +0000

In reply to Cloud.

@Cloud – I don’t recall a whole lot of sacrifice talk in the book. Maybe that’s a different work? Gifts from the Sea happens while she’s taking a 2 week vacation from her family, which sounds…um…nice at times 🙂

And argh, Digg. Will keep looking.

By: Cloud

Cloud — Mon, 22 Feb 2016 21:38:52 +0000

You’re still not showing up in my Digg reader, unfortunately.

But I can remember to check in! I read Gifts from the Sea pre-kids and remember being a bit “meh” about it and its approach to marriage. I wonder if I would like it better now that I have kids? I never felt like marriage should be a sacrifice (and I remember her saying that sometimes it is- but am perhaps not remembering correctly…. it was a long time ago), but parenting is definitely a sacrifice sometimes. And maybe, having decided to be a parent with someone, maybe I can see the point about sometimes you make sacrifices in a marriage in support of the greater good.

There is maybe a general point in that ramble, too… for books like this, sometimes it really matters *when* you come across them. There is wisdom that you are sometimes not ready to hear.

By: Ana

Ana — Mon, 22 Feb 2016 21:05:39 +0000

In reply to lauravanderkam. Yes I was surprised to see "11 new posts" in feedly on a sunday, but they were all yours from the past 2 weeks! Interesting concept in this post.