Eastern Europe circa 1910, in colour

This is very cool.  Both the glimpse back in time, and the technology used to do it:

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/08/russia_in_color_a_century_ago.html

Psalm 71:1-6 audio

I'm enjoying memorising Psalm 71 with the ladies at Do Not Depart. This week we'll be aiming for verses 4 & 5. Incidentally, does anybody know how many women are registered? Just curious. 

I can't seem to help turning memory verses into a song of some sort. Here's my version of verses 1-6. It's no musical masterpiece, but it's helping me learn, and I hope that it will help some other people too.

Sorry it's just a vocal line at this stage. I've been having microphone issues with instrumentation. Still working on it.

Are you working on any memory verses at the moment?

Bible Bookcase Puzzle

Whilst googling for a 'books of the bible' graphic for Sunday School, I came upon this game. 

I'm tempted. 

Does anybody have it? Do you think your kids (or adults) would have fun with it, either at home or at church?

Yes, it could happen to you

Click on over to Biscuit magazine & read 'Beating Breast Cancer'. 

I went to school with Sarah & Tarah, who is also a member of our playgroup. Such an awful thing for a young mum to go through. 

Eat more vegies

Our kids are good eaters, but I've been trying to think of ways to incorporate vegies throughout their day (and mine), instead of leaving them all to dinner time. 

So the other day, I served up a bowl of partially defrosted peas for morning tea. 

It was a big hit. I went back to the freezer 3 times for more! 

I suspect the success was partially because we were all eating with our fingers. But also because cold, juicy peas actually taste really good. 

What's the weirdest thing you've eaten this week?

Memorising the Bible

If you're a regular reader and you have a good memory, you may have found yourself wondering, 'whatever happened to Petrina's plan to memorise the whole of 1 Peter last term?' Well, it didn't get all that far. I did pretty well with the first 2 sections, but then reality took over. A whole book, even a short one, in one term was a bit too ambitious for this season of life.

Also, I found that my method of setting the words to hymn tunes, which had worked well for me in the past, wasn't helping me to think about the meaning of the words. Maybe 1 Peter is less lyrical than other books, I don't know.

So my memorising took a bit of a break. Until a friend posted on Facebook about a project that she's joined. Over the next 14 weeks, the ladies at Do Not Depart are helping each other to memorise Psalm 71. A lot more realistic. Count me in!

If you want to join in, you're encouraged to register here. And head to their resources page for easy print outs of the weekly verses (1-2 per week) and other bits & pieces, and to the link up page for other people's thoughts, as well as info on where Psalm 71 fits in the story of the bible. 

I was planning to go tune-less for this one, but it's turning itself into a song in my head already. If it's a decent one that helps with meaning and remembering, I might record it up and post it. But no promises. 

As it turns out, the last memorisation project at Do Not Depart was 1 Peter 1. Which I've just done. How cool is that?

Are you learning any Bible verses at the moment?

Summer Day Play

What's more fun than watering plants? Watering people! 

We sit in the little paddling pool (aka the sandpit lid) and water each other with the watering can. 

Add a towel path from pool to sandpit, a makeshift shade, some pegs, and a 'new' muffin tin for sand cooking. Result: children (& mum) cool and happy on a hot day. 

I think we'll be heading back down after rest time...

I don't cry in sad movies

As Dave has already said, we saw Les Miserables last night. I took a big hanky, and had it at the ready. Then I remembered something. 

I don't cry in sad movies. I cry in happy ones. 

I cried in Stuart Little, when little Stuart powered on through to win the boat race (is that even what happened? It's been a long time since I saw it.)

I was getting teary in last night's preview for 'The Impossible,' a movie about a family caught in the 2004 tsunami. It only takes a couple of bars of swelling 'reunion of loved ones'-type music to get me going. 

Even inspiring blog posts can make me choke up. Like this one from Hands Free Mama, that I read just a few minutes ago. 

Les Mis was amazing. The rawness of the emotion in the soliloquies blew me away. Even though I know the music very, very well, I was discovering the story all over again. 

But it didn't make me cry. 

At the movies...

After about a year of not going out to the movies at all, we've managed to see two movies in the last six days.  Not surprising really, if you know us and know what's new: The Hobbit (part 1/3) and Les Miserables.  A big thanks to my mum for babysitting twice so we could do it!

It's funny the way we process different movies.  We saw the Hobbit first; despite some criticism from some quarters for not sticking to every letter of the book, I thought it was fantastic.  I loved the way it drew on the appendices in the Lord of the Rings to flesh out a lot of the back story and other things that are going on at the same time as Bilbo's adventures.  I was also impressed (hat-tip to my brother Phil for educating me in this to begin with) at how they chose Azog the orc to be the "strong enemy" and the focal point of the orcish antagonism to the dwarves.  And the film certainly gets you in.  Petrina was snuggling up close to me at one point for security, despite knowing full well that if a dwarf and an orc are fighting, it's definitely not real.  We got home afterwards and I wanted to turn around and go see it again straight away.  Good thing for all our sakes that they don't do many midnight showings...

We saw Les Miserables last night.  Again, fantastic.  I don't know the story as well - when I was a teenager the rest of the family quite like listening to it, but I didn't pay much attention, mainly due to being (a) contrarian (how can I like the same thing as my brother? ugh!) and (b) a bit of a puritan (but it's got prostitutes, it can't be good!).

The singing was great, the acting just what you'd expect with Jackman, Hathaway, et al.  This time the emotions were the other way round though.  I teared up a bit when Fantine died; nearly lost it when Javert pinned his medal on Gavroche's corpse, and again during Valjean's death.  And it's got much deeper themes running through it too.  Redemption, forgiveness, justice, mercy.  Javert and Valjean both claim to be right with God, yet Javert has a strong "correctness" approach - people who work hard and obey the law are righteous, and if not you're damned to hell forever, vs Valjean's mercy and sacrifice.  That contrast came out much more strongly than I remember from the CD of the stage show.  One of my first comments coming out afterwards was thankfulness that, for all its problems, we live here and now.  There are a lot of other times and places where basic survival is much more of an issue than it is for us.

The other astounding thing was the price difference.  We were using up a couple of gift cards, so we didn't go to our usual cinema, where it's $8.50 a ticket.  For the Hoyts we went to, $15.50 each, and for the Greater Union, $20.00 each!  I think we'll be back to the regular for whatever's next...

Repurposed

From desk to I-don't-need-this-anymore-should-I-send-it-to-lifeline to bathroom cupboard. 

Insert peaceful sigh here.