Category: Observe and Interact

First Steps

Catch and Store Energy, Choose Small and Slow Solutions, Create Vision and Respond to Change, Inner Permaculture, Integrate, Maximize the Edges, Observe and Interact, Obtain a Yield, People Care, Permaculture Ethics, Permaculture for Children, Permaculture Principles, Self-Regulate and Accept Feedback, Use and Value Gifts from Nature

My littlest has started walking.  Gone are the days where she must be carried, but then again, gone are the days that she must be carried!  Change always means I am leaving something behind.  Sometimes I am happy to move on and release what no longer serves me.  But at other times, change leaves me […]

July 30, 2015

Child’s Play

Cultivate Diversity, Life Choices, Maximize the Edges, Observe and Interact, Parenting, People Care, Permaculture Ethics, Permaculture for Children, Permaculture Principles

We went to the park this morning to meet the children’s grandmother and great-grandmother.  It was a beautiful summer morning made better by being together with four generations of people we love!  The playground was bustling with children running feverishly from activity to activity.  My children participated wholeheartedly in the slides, monkey bars, and teeter […]

July 28, 2015

Lessons from a Toad

Catch and Store Energy, Choose Small and Slow Solutions, Create Vision and Respond to Change, Inner Permaculture, Make No Waste, Observe and Interact, Permaculture Principles, Self-Regulate and Accept Feedback, Use and Value Gifts from Nature

I spent a few hours with a toad this week.  I sat with it in the garden, watching its movements and observing they way it lives.  I have had a fear of toads (and frogs and snakes too) since childhood, when I spiked a high fever involving hallucinations of amphibians and reptiles crawling out through […]

July 22, 2015

Defining Character

Choose Small and Slow Solutions, Create Vision and Respond to Change, From Pattern to Details, Inner Permaculture, Observe and Interact, Parenting, People Care, Permaculture Ethics, Permaculture Principles, Self-Regulate and Accept Feedback

There have been several occasions when people have made comments to me about how the personalities of my children are related to the order in which they were born into our family.  I resisted this idea, thinking that the stereotypes and reductionism of this approach are not helpful.  Not only that but I have a […]

July 14, 2015

To the well meaning man at the library…

Choose Small and Slow Solutions, Cultivate Diversity, Don't Segregate, Inner Permaculture, Integrate, Life Choices, Maximize the Edges, Observe and Interact, Obtain a Yield, Parenting, People Care, Permaculture Ethics, Self-Regulate and Accept Feedback

Dear Sir, Thank you for taking the time to stop me to address your concern for young children using computers.  You took the time to engage with our family even though your sentiment wasn’t clear when you were lurking around the children’s computers glancing at my children then around the library while I was trying […]

July 9, 2015

Top 10 Permaculture Parenting Tips

Catch and Store Energy, Choose Small and Slow Solutions, Create Vision and Respond to Change, Cultivate Diversity, Earth Care, Fair Share, Food, From Pattern to Details, Inner Permaculture, Life Choices, Make No Waste, Maximize the Edges, Observe and Interact, Obtain a Yield, Parenting, People Care, Permaculture Ethics, Permaculture for Children, Permaculture Principles, Self-Regulate and Accept Feedback, Use and Value Gifts from Nature

When I think about what it means to me to be a ‘Permaculture Parent’ I feel that it really is defined by my approach to life.  Looking for ways to live more in line with the Permaculture principles is a way of approaching life.  When I change, those around me change.  When I learn, those […]

June 29, 2015

Enabling Reacting

Choose Small and Slow Solutions, Inner Permaculture, Maximize the Edges, Observe and Interact, People Care, Permaculture Ethics, Permaculture Principles, Self-Regulate and Accept Feedback

I have received a few big news events via email over the past couple of weeks.  I wanted to fire off an email immediately to participate in the conversation and share my initial reactions to these pieces of news, but stopped myself.  If I hastily send something, I often regret what I did or didn’t […]

June 24, 2015

Missing Out

Consumerism, Cultivate Diversity, From Pattern to Details, Inner Permaculture, Life Choices, Maximize the Edges, Observe and Interact, Parenting, People Care, Permaculture for Children, Permaculture Principles, Self-Regulate and Accept Feedback, Unschooling, Use and Value Gifts from Nature

The downside of a digitized culture is that it makes it so easy to feel like we’re ‘missing out’ on things.  Here I find another place where I’m unlearning what has been bestowed upon me.  I will on occasion experience feelings of loss because of the choices we’re making as a family to diverge from […]

June 19, 2015

Manifesto of Possibility

Create Vision and Respond to Change, Earth Care, Fair Share, From Pattern to Details, Observe and Interact, People Care, Permaculture Ethics, Permaculture Principles, Self-Regulate and Accept Feedback, Use and Value Gifts from Nature

Beneath the greatest of mountains there is the same structure of matter.  All matter being comprised of the same basic elements.  How amazing to be able to look around and witness the diversity and abundance made possible by the tiniest of particles.  What whispers of truth ride on a spark?  Or hints of purpose rest […]

June 17, 2015

Having Patience in Desperate Times

Choose Small and Slow Solutions, Create Vision and Respond to Change, Inner Permaculture, Observe and Interact, Obtain a Yield, Parenting, People Care, Permaculture Ethics, Permaculture Principles

I often get so impatient with the amount of time it takes to change.  I often feel the need to have things already ‘just so.’  Our culture strives for and cultivates illusions of perfection; something people can never attain.  What this elusive striving leaves me with is a sense that I’m not already doing great […]

June 10, 2015