traveling south

that's the freedom tower poking above the new jersey wetlands. we headed south today by train to visit my uncle, cousin and her husband in maryland. it's been a beautiful warm day and we even went for a swim in their pool. my uncle is doing well, though slowing down from kidney disease. it's really good to see him and we had a fun time looking through old wedding photographs and admiring how well dressed and coiffed all the ladies looked in the late 1940's!

monday pictures and michaelmas

there was such a beautiful sunset this evening . . 

i went to the citibank today on la guardia place, and passed fiorello . . who was mayor of nyc from 1934 to 1945.

i think he was quite a character as mayor. he had a deep love for music and would supposedly spontaneously conduct student and professional orchestras. he helped create la guardia high school which became famous in the movie fame . . and which is still today a prestigious school to attend for acting, dancing and music.

chanda worked on her map of the iroquois nation.

and put in a load of her laundry on the way to a violin lesson and modern dance class.

and in our courtyard are blooming beautiful michaelmas daisies . . it has been very warm all weekend. humid and 82 degrees. i did feel a hint of autumn in the air when a breeze blew in from the river along charles street as i was walking home . .

michael nam buadh, michael the victorious
(patron saint of the seas and of the maritime lands, of boats and boatmen, of horses and horsemen . . long ago farmers would take the new wheat during the last days of harvesting and make a loaf to be presented to the church - a custom which ended when henry viii broke from the church in rome) (a piece of information read from the margate handbook).

thou michael the victorious,
i make my circuit under thy shield.
thou michael of the white steed
and of the bright brilliant blade,
conqueror of the dragon,
be thou at my back.
thou ranger of the heavens,
thou warrior of the king of all,
thou michael the victorious,
my pride and my guide,
thou michael the vicotorious,
the glory of mine eye.
(from our book festivals, family and food).

we'll make our harvest loaf when we return from visiting my cousin and uncle in annapolis on thursday.

sewing slippers and a ballet audition

 chanda sewed her slippers today before going off to a dance rehearsal at new york live arts . .

she has bloch shoes in leather and canvas. her feet have gotten very wide this past year, and all her shoes have started pinching her toes. she's experimenting to see if the leather and canvas will shape to her foot in the same way.

she has new pointe shoes too . . a different brand this time because the chacott store was out of the handmade ones she normally gets.

in the afternoon i had tea with two moms from chanda's ballet school at a new gluten free coffee shop/restaurant on sixth avenue, while the girls had a nutcracker audition. we don't understand why they had to do an audition when each class in the ballet school will be doing a specific dance . . one will be gingerbread, one will be flowers, etc . . sometimes i feel like i'm living in the theatre of the absurd.

cleaning windows and ballet shoe shopping

 today greg and i cleaned windows. to do this he takes out the bottom section and i clean it in the hallway. then i clean the screen in the bathtub . . while he squeegees the top section.

when it's window cleaning day, i'm glad we only have four of them.

 then greg went off to watch his florida state football game, and i went with chanda to get her new ballet slippers at onstage dance on madison avenue.

 adding it all up . . (i don't look anymore . . i just sign).

 the light was beautiful on the way home . . 

 the new new school building at fifth avenue and thirteenth street . . 

 in front of parsons school of design. . 

and dinner . . fresh bread, cream of mushroom soup and spinach/kale salad.

studying, baking and cleaning . . and ice cream

 korrina went off to her school's library today to research saffron. she had a choice between that and black pepper . . she asked chanda and i which one she should choose. we both said . . saffron (and i usually do sing the donovan song in my head).

 chanda and i made "wonder" bread from a recipe a friend gave me a few years ago. i have no idea what book it's from, but it's very good.

 the dough was very gloopy . . but it baked well . . (it rose really high).

 greg and i worked hard all day in the back bedroom . . sorting items to go to salvation army, items to go to fiber recycling, and items to go into the trash. we still have some work to do, but we did make a big dent in the piles of stuff that had accumulated. soooooo . . afterwards, we visited minerva to feed and water her (and i locked the keys inside the apartment!), and then we went to a new restaurant in the neighborhood . . hamilton's. it's like an old ice cream shop. greg was offered a free second milk shake! we have no idea why. i guess they just made some extras to hand out. maybe someone new was training.

 chanda met us after ballet class . . she had a chocolate ice cream soda with vanilla ice cream . . 

 i had the same thing but with chocolate ice cream . . 

 chanda liked the sidewalk graffiti . . 

 we're a little apprehensive about this place lasting . . the rents are very high in our neighborhood and we don't see how they can keep up if people are just buying ice cream . . but maybe they get a big breakfast crowd. i wonder, also, because i know the owner of a restaurant that used to be in this same location. she had to leave because the rent went up too high . . she had an italian place . . we still miss having her here.

spring again

it was so warm today that it felt like spring. i also heard a mockingbird out in the courtyard, blithefully singing away. after hearing nothing but blue jays for the past two weeks, it was especially lovely. this little fellow was out and about yesterday in abingdon park. someone had been feeding millet to him and his friends.

typing and skyping

 chanda practices typing from a free online program five mornings a week now (typingclub.com) (morgana found it a year or so ago after giving up on the mavis beacon i had bought!). she does italian duolingo immediately after and it's nice to see her getting quicker at it, and not hunting and pecking . . practicing consistently has really helped.

 we skyped with morgana today! we haven't spoken with her since a month ago in paris and it was great to see how she's doing and to get caught up on life in austria. she says they explored an ice cave and that it was one of the most exciting things she's ever done, and that at night it's wonderfully dark and she can count the number of lights coming from the village below. how different it is from the city where there is too much light!

we learned about the family she is living with; that they have chickens, a dog and a bunny and it seems they heat their home with a wood burning stove in a very energy efficient way (i think it also has a lot to do with how the house is built - it maintains the heat very well).

i asked for some pictures of the little ones and these are the ones that she sent from her phone . . i find them rather amusing . . 

 this is the littlest one . . three year old lotta . .

 the five year old, ilvie (i've been corrected, it's ylvi), who is always careful to speak with her in high deutsch . . 

the clock that calls out the hours . . when the cat meows it's time for the little ones to go to bed.

wednesday goings on

 korrina slipped in from school late last night . . i was half asleep but i think i asked her what they had worked on and she said more knife skills and that they were late in cleaning up (cleaning up all the diced onions, carrots, celery, peppers . . fingers?) . . 

 this morning chanda was practically bouncing up and down in her chair, aching to tell me all about korrina's latest school news. korrina is one of the quickest in her class with her knife skills, and she is also right up there with the biggest cuts. when she slips, if she slips, it's a doozy. her chef sent her to the clinic across the street (how convenient!!) where the nurse on duty was happy to have some action and to sew up her finger with five stitches. when korrina was leaving to return to school, she said another student was coming in . . she also said that the clinic gets a lot of workers coming in from eataly . . !

 reviewing angles . . 

 still working on my scarf . . 

chicken pot pie for dinner . . it was good!

aequus nox and the first day of autumn

the aequus nox was last night at 10:29 pm. the north and south hemispheres are receiving the sun's rays equally and day and night are approximately equal lengths. the tilt of the earth's axis and earth's orbit around the sun combine in such a way that the axis is inclined neither away from nor toward the sun (from the earthsky website). this photo was taken at 6:42 pm this evening, and i've noticed the sky brightening around 6:30 am. now is a good time to take note at sunrise or sunset at where the sun is on the horizon in relation to familiar landmarks. as the sunrise and sunset points dip southward through the oncoming months, you can use those landmarks to keep track of the cardinal directions.

monday morning bike ride with a surprise visit . .

 it was time to begin our monday morning bike rides.

 we went along the river, past penny park and the water taxi, to the main harbor at the wintergarden theatre. we wanted to end up at duane park patisserie, so we took a path to the right of the wintergarden hoping to get back on the bike path to chambers street. however . . there was so much construction!! instead we had to cross west street and we ended up . . 

 where? do you know what she is standing in front of? take a guess . . it's just south of the french fry (ahem) freedom tower . . for thirteen years it's been behind boards and chain link fencing . .

 the *($&@$&!# 9/11 memorial. pardon my french, but this place has been off limits and shrouded in controversy for so long that the jaded and sardonic new yorker in me can't help but gasp a little with sheer incredulity. i can't believe that it's finally open and accessible to the public again. and i can't believe that i've actually seen it. honestly, i never would have purposely come here, so it amuses me to no end that we stumbled upon it. of course it is easy to stumble upon . . i mean it's right there off of west street, not far below the tribeca neighborhood we like visiting . . it's just that it's been gone for so long . . lost in the twilight zone . . and now it has reappeared . .

 two big footprints of the world trade towers . . 

 we were asked to move our bikes so i sat down and stared at my phone as i am wont when stuck with nothing to do . . and read an email from morgana that she had passed the german exam with the highest marks.

 ta da!!! very exciting news!!!

 contemplating once again the missing towers . . 

 i don't know how i feel about the fountains. they're certainly very impressive and appropriately brought back the horror of the day . . one really stares into the abyss . .

 the freedom tower rears up from the ashes . . 

i don't know. maybe it's just too much of a statement for me.

the important part is remembering who was lost . . walking through and reading the names is very moving.

 we finally made it to our destination after walking past many tourists on their way to the memorial, and walking past three more blocks of construction work (these days there is so much construction going on in this city) . . duane park patisserie where we knitted a little, ate pastries, and read nicholas nickleby.

 on the ride back home we passed a big rat in front of the richard meier buildings . . tsk tsk . . 

 i stopped for a picture of the river and chanda couldn't resist climbing the old pinyon pine climbing tree . . 

it was a beautiful morning and i'm glad we ran into the memorial. it was a nice surprise to see, because it would have been another thirteen years before i purposely ever got there!