The third litter

Hajas has done it again! This time there are 7 chicklets.

There were 11 eggs at the beginning. And one was added, without our knowing, later on - this, of course, went crap. 2 proved to be infertile, so there were 3 craps. Two of the babies died. Oh, the horror. Let me explain.

On Sunday morning we found Hajas behaving oddly. She was just sitting and panting, barely opening her eyes. Was it exhaustion? Heat? Some illness?

We thought the eggs would all die if she went ill.

Well, we tried to subsitute Hajas with Lepke, an old hen in the hope that she would sit just for one or two more days on the eggs.

The result? She broke one of the eggs. The underdeveloped chiclet died, of course. Plus, the no-so-good-at-subsituting-the-real-mother Lepke defecated on all the eggs. So, I tried to clean them and... broke one egg again. The underdeveloped white Turken baby died. Whew.

In our last hopes, we put Hajas back on the eggs and tried to make her feel better - by cleaning the house, by giving more ventillation: leaving the door ajar through the night. My husband slept outside, beside the house to repel predators from entering the hen house. Some of you might remember 18 December... Well, we did, and that's why he slept in a sleeping bag in the crunchy lawn.

And today, on Tuesday, here's what we saw:

All the 7 are here in one photo. There is one Turken (at the far left. S/he's turning her head back to adjust the feathers. and below is Hajas with one of the babies.

Well done.

- the photo above is just the way I was able to manage to change 'my photo'. From a blurred photo of a forest road I have now this one of a tree on the edge of a forest :)

How hawt would you wish to be?

Don't think that THIS much hot, let me tell you right away.
This past Saturday we went for a small biking tour with my husband. This was a surprise treat, a reward for our hard work in the house-project and for I kept bragging about never being alone, just the two of us, never going AWAY, for something challenging, nice and romantic... His mother slept over for the occassion at our house so that we could start off early. And by early we were to start at 5 or 6 AM, the latest. Fact: Got up at 6 AM. Had breakfast, managed chicken and did some other chores around the house (why, oh why on the morning of a great trip I ask?).

Well, we started at 8 AM, so we decided to have a shorter trip and headed for a nearby lake. It was a 45 minutes' cycling away. On arriving I was repelled by the high entrance fee and by how a small and quiet lake is destroyed by painful attempts at making it look like a 'beach' (Some common sense is clearly lacking here!!)

If you have a quiet lake in a soft-curved valley, why not enjoy it as it is? Beaches are for seashores, aren't they? Mountain rivers should be mountain rivers and should not be converted into underground caves. Likewise with peaceful lakes. Beach? Something they are clearly not. I hope I can get my message through.

I was pissed off by the lame decorations and just about everything about this beach project.

So, we decided to go back home, but instead of cycling on the dangerous side of a motorway we wanted to cut through fields and forests.

Which is quite a romantic idea and is a feasible one, too. My husband has done this tour. The area is quite familiar for both of us, too.

The way from the lake (I refuse to call it a beach) was quite uphill but nice. See the horses? At one point, we were looking at another valley below. The town we live in is to the left, hidden behind another set of smaller hills. The tower at about 9 o'clock is on the far side of the town.
Here's the shortest way - we decided to get home as quick as possible because of the heat. As some of you might have heard we have a horrible weather these days. Theoretically, Hungary's average temperature is 11 degrees celsius, meaning that in the summer it is an average of 25 degrees. Now these numbers must surely be fixed for when I was a kid and a teen, 30 was considered abnormally hot. Now, these days we're experiencing 40. The grass in our garden is crunchy under our feet. Most of the plants just simply wilt. The chicken keep their mouth open all the time to get some ventillation and a false promise of fresh air.

So, this is the way we should have done:

But instead, we went:

It involved going up and down again, places with quicksand so hot that a beaten-up egg would probably have been boiled within, and so quick that we had to get off and push our way. Most of the time the path was out of the forest (meaning no shadows) and quiet of wind (no refreshing breeze).

Actually, we got lost and ended up in another village near to our hometown. When making our way between the two settlements, we ran into two dead ends - and although in the latter we found a short-cut to a good road, the junction road proved to be just a small path among trees and bushes and I tripped over my bike and fell into the dirt. During the day we met two menacing dogs, none of them made real harm to us, fortunately.

By the time I got home I felt my brain throbbing out of my ears. The back of my palms were glowing with sweat. And I am not that type of person who has fat on her hands.

I spent some considerable time under the shower... It did take me minutes to take away my hotness from me.

Now, laugh at my romantic excursion. My reward trip. My escape - switched into survival mode.

take a really close look - a QUIZ

I had a little photo quiz here, some time ago.

We have a winner, Em, who guessed that it was a jawbone. Thanks for all who competed and congratulations for Em for guessing it right.

And here's the proof. It's a head we found in the nearby forest. It was a no-brainer to take it home. Update: it is a head of a female deer. And... here's the SECOND QUIZ in this series.

The question again, is: What do you see?

hard workers

These days we have been working hard on making the house-building project move forward a bit. Quite a bit, I'd say.

My husband was putting isolation panels on the surface of the walls from the outside. This is the part of our house that was built during the fall of 2005, by those two precious hands of him.
I was giving protection treatment to the windows yet to be installed. Photographed is one of the smallest windows. These are untreated, with raw plain wood windows, although the glass is double, with an airless space in between the 4mm-thick glasses.

We give the wood the traditional treatment: first comes the copper-sulphate, which is against fungal infection. This gives a nice blue-ish color to the wood. Unfortunately, said sulphate is in a solution of ammonia. Coughs, anyone? This material goes right into your eyes and seems to go out through your ears. Arrgh. Yet, I liked it - for the change it made to the wood. It emphasizes the veins and gives an overall '50yo-looking' feeling to it. In this picture, I start the process at the down right corner of the window. Notice the brush's tip. The second part of wood protection (NOT pictured) is the flax-seed oil. This phase is much easier, though less beautiful.

Home-schooling

This one goes out to Leigh. And to whoever else is interested in the homeschooling of my son. Also included: my rough notes on modern-day medicine.

Leigh asked me why I had to home-school my son.

My son has quite a history. At the middle of his fourth year he was in his fourth class, which, considering we never moved anywhere in these four years, is a bit too much for an average children. Which he is, of course, not.

He's alert, almost all the time in seek of something to occupy his mind. He's bright and when he's interested, he gathers information quickly. When he's not, nothing seems to be able to move him. That is what I see the core of problems.

Some say he's got AD/HDD (attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder) - no professional proof of that. We did not let him undergo tests to either prove or disprove this condition. Basically b/c I did not see any advantage of him being labelled as such. In Hungary, it is almost impossible to find a special school for these kids and at 'normal' schools labelled kids have misfortunate lives. Although the school he's now in advertises to provide a special treatment for ad/hdd kids, which involves a therapy with an expert, I have never seen the evidence of actual treatments, or rather put it this way, therapeutic sessions.

The second reason I rejected him having labelled is the pressure towards medication.

While many of my readers, residing anywhere in the world, may find taking medications just as easy and mundane as taking out the garbage bin or doing the laundry, for us, this is not the case. By 'us', I referred to my family. We do not take painkillers, I am not on the contraceptive pill as well. I have a firm belief that there are other, more natural ways to find remedy when it is needed.

Some of my son's classmates are on constant medication - be it Ritalin or anything else... I shrug at the mere idea of giving a drug to my son that ALTERS, INFLUENCES him.

I wish to solve the problem, if there is a problem at all, without artificial things.

I refrain from telling my opinion about modern day medicine - I bet you guess it must be somewhere between low and very-very low.

Schooling Story.

He started his first year in School 1.

Soon after starting school he was bullied, which he endured for a while, but broke out and became aggressive after a while. Soon he showed signs of aggressivity even when he was not hurted. He lost his interest in studying and became obsessed with kids being aggressive against him. His failed to perform up to his capacities. His drawings consisted of war, bloodshed, violence. Deep precipices, falling, aggression, death. Please note that we do not have a tv so he was unable to get those motifs from the films! A kid, especially a boy might draw things like that. But not all the time. This was not normal, we had to step in.

School 2.

The local Waldorf School.

The amount of acceptance he was given here healed our son. His drawings, ta-da, became normal again. He became a peaceful, loving kid.

For a while.

After that, he was bored. If you have been to a lesson in a Waldorf school you know what I'm talking about. I also was asked to sit through some of his lessions to check his behaviour. I was more than bored to tears myself.

No wonder he was bored. The teacher, although she was a loving creature herself, rejected the idea of giving my son some extra duties, some things he can work his mind on.

We parted School 2 with love, we still have the friendships we made there, the connections are alive.

School 3.

The local school, which is the nearest to our home.

We took our son here at the middle of the 3rd grade, when he was out from the Waldorf school. After a lengthy and interesting talk with his new teacher we decided not to introduce him in the middle of a school year - so he was homeschooled for the rest of the 3rd grade.

Coming from a Waldorf school I had no idea of what to teach him - but the teachers at this 3rd school were helpful with that. My son had to pass an exam at the end of the year to proove that he's elilgible to enter Grade 4 and I trained him to the exams. For your interest: there are not such exams in our school systems. It is especially for those who are home-schooled.

I taught him every day, covering Mathematics, Geography of Hungary, Hungarian Grammar, Hungarian Reading and Biology. I taught him for what was expected him at the exams. Each time his interest grew beyond, I followed him of course.

This is how his 3rd grade ended and at the 4th grade, he started as a 'normal' student.

School 3, Class 'b'.

He started as a normal student, but he was put into the class with all the 'problem kids'. Some of them are aggressive, some of them are the underachieving type (let me not say morons or idiots, but....) And yes, some of them are medicated. He soon developed conflicts with the kids and began disturbing the work of the class again. Nevertheless, his mates were not the accepting type, either. He just did not fit in. They rejected him, he rejected them.

I guess he had enough of the whole school thing by now.

From time to time he had to spend days or weeks at home, homeschooled. The teacher, with whome we developed a friendly relationship, showed me what lessons are to taught and I taught my son. He wrote exams at the end of all the home periods. He wrote them relatively well. He did have some hard times though, for example at the Waldorf school there are no lessons for home, but which is an everyday task in a normal school. My son have not developed a sense of duty to prepare homework, but that trait is a must in schools. That was tough.

School 3, Class 'a'.

At the middle of the 4th grade teachers and the director of the school decided to put my son into the parallel class. Here, most of the kids are 'normal', I mean, some of them are great, some of them are not-so-much, but nothing special. Except one or two, but that is okay.

He started doing much better here, but every now and then there are days when the teacher asks me to let him have at home, instead of sending him to school.

The reasons?

Lack of sense of duty, signs of boredom, etc.

He does not behave well, nor writes his homework and for these things he receives the worst marks. In Hungarian schools, school performance is measured by marks from 1 to 5, being the worst.

My son, according to his teachers, would perform at a level 5, or occasionally at a 'strong' 4 - but, due to his behaviour and lack of diligence, lack of homework, his marks are bordering 4 and are rather 3s.

The reason?

Lack of motivation.

There we are now, at the end of the 4th grade.

We, parents are looking forward into the 5th grade not without some fears - we pray not to show fear towards him, instead we try to encourage him and awake his sense of duty and 'normal sense'.

So, when we chose home schooling, we had no other option. The teachers were helpful and suggested me even ways of teaching and organizing a home-school day. I bet they were happier not to have my son around. Although most of the teachers seemed to have liked my son, they felt it was easier for them without him. Which is quite a shame. They chose the no-challenge option instead of the more difficult one. At the same time I know teaching my son is not easy. I know because I tried it.

The first photo was made by me, at River Tisza on 7th July, 2007. The second was by my son on 8th July, 2007.

Two haiku for one day

below, these are my / first attempts at writing a / haiku. Or two.

photos: the first: 10 July, 2007, by me in the garden, the second: 4 July, 2006, by a colleague of my husband, during work.

Haiku # 1.

Sunflowers, red beans

Summer colors' galore of

our divine painter.

*******

Haiku # 2.

Wheat carries fat seeds

Yellow meadows pant with heat

No sign of rain, yet.

a lengthy post about a short weekend PART ONE

This weekend started at 6PM Friday evening and ended at 5PM Sunday. Was not really short, or shotrer than a weekend normally is, but for us, it was short. Because we thought we would have been able to spend twice the amount of time where we were.

Location: Tiszafüred, Eastern Hungary, besides Lake Tisza. Lake Tisza is a natural formation of River Tisza. I think it should be called a backwater.

This time the village of Tiszafüred hosted the Annual 'Fish Days', which event attracts hundreds of people. This is a recurring event at every second weekend of July. There are amusement parks, sales of all kinds and various performances for the children and for the adults as well.

We spent another weekend here, more than a year ago in 2006. That visit was entirely different. At that time there weren't really much people on the beach. Now it was noisy and crowded. I had to concentrate really hard to lock out the loud music, all sorts of, coming simultenously from the various locations of supposed entertainment, and the amount of people out of my mind.

Photo 1. Friday night. Children are children. We had to, just had to pay them for a ride.

Photo 2. Saturday, early morning at the Tisza. This is the view I adored a year ago and had wished to see more of this year, too - but had not really the chance.

Photo 3. Saturday morning. We are heading for the beach. The kids ran ahead of the parents in anticipation of the events. You bet they were waiting for some artificial fun, rather than seeking the mighty river... They will learn later on what the real values are...

Photo 4. The number of free mobile toilets tells us something about the number of visitors expected to the annual Fish Days. Back in 2006, there were none of these available. There is a standard stall of toilets of course at the beach, but no mobile ones. These were put here especially for the occassion.

Photo 5: There were different types of plastic houses. Made of soft plastic, kids can jump, crawl, slide and hide within them. The Hungarians call them 'castles for jumping', but someone might help me out with the proper English term, please? This one in the photo was the cheapest one available, and kids could stay for as long as they wanted. All the other 'jumping houses' were for only 10 minutes. Here there were 3 different types of houses within the same area and there were animators to take care of the kids. They drew and played other paper games as well. The only thing is that it was a promo-house of a candy maker (see the advertisement on the side of the slide? - I don't want to type it here into the text). All the other houses were expensive b/c they did not belong to any advertisement budget of a large company. Our kids spent 2 hours here, got home with some promo material, a packet of said company - a product we never would have bought otherwise, b/c its basically atrificial crap. The problem lies here: our kids took part in the advertisement plan and enjoyed the service of a company we, the parents despise and reject on the grounds of healthy eating. We took advantage of something we otherwise take no notice of. What do you think about the ethics of our decision to send the kids here, instead of a more, much more expensive jumping house, where there are no advertisement?

Photo 6: A boxing machine. You put a coin in, push a button, the sack descends so that you can punch it, you do and your strength is measured. Again - how would you call this machine? Punch-o-meter? Pictured people are not members of my family. They are friends.

Photo 7: Sweet's galore. These were the only normal delicacies (I have not tried them though) the restwas the usual overy sugared, artificially colored and flavoured stuff you find at these places.

Photo 8: Delicious dinner of fried meat and veggies. Our host was the mother of our friend. She invited us all into her weekend house and fed us with various kinds of yummy food.

Photo 9: A show by a famous flyer. People just sat at the bank and watched the show. If you ask me, this is just a huge waste of fuel... But cute aerobatics, nevertheless. And you just should not't ask me.Photo 10: At the fun cars, again. We call it 'dodgem'. And you?

Photo 11: The inevitable bacon on a stick. Some posts ago, some of you promised to try this Hungarian treat at home. How things are going?

That's all for now.

Comment I dare you all.

update on chicken

The first hatch of 2007 are quite a flock by now. They are almost grown-up animals. Here they are in their yard, up on a small tree. With Icecream on the far left, Seed standing upright in the middle, Caramel sitting besides him and Cloud on the far right. And there are 3 other chicken also there.

Below: Close up of Cloud.

Just to compare and to remember: the same Cloud at one week old.

this photo was made when the chicklets were a week old - note the gray ball (that is Cloud) and the creamy one on the far left, that is Icecream. The one at the bottom right must be Seed, but that's just a guess..

Hajas (huh-yush, Hairy) has started sitting on another pack of eggs this Tuesday. Hatching is expected around 23-25 July. This will be the 3rd this year! Wow.

We are going to River Tisza this weekend with friends. Photos will be coming on the way.

our daily bread - take it literally

This is how I make our daily bread. I am sorry for the quality of some of the upcoming photos, as almost all the photos were made by my left hand AND I am a right-handed person.

The first step is: Preparation.

All the ingredients and necessary equipment are put on the kitchen table. Flours, a spoon, scales, a large bowl.

Also needed: some liquid. It can be water. Alternatively, I mix water with some kind of milk - be it sweet or sour, yogurt or kefir. More often than not, we have at least one of these types of milks at home. The liquid is in the pitcher (in the above pic, at 11.) What you see in my hands is the key factor in making a home-made bread. The point is that is NOT yeast. It is very much like dough, as described here. But in my case (and it is the same as bread has been made at home over the thousands of years of human history) actually it is a piece of the last bread I made. I tear it out before baking the bread and it is stored in the fridge - until the next bread is prepared. The first time I made bread I got this piece from a girlfriend. Friendship spreads this way :)

Step 2. Putting the ingredients into bowl. In the first photo, you saw various kinds of flours. I often mix flours to make bread. We have spelt (fine and whole-grain) and winter wheat (fine) and rye (fine) flours at home. All these are organic. Recently I have bought a small package of pumpkin flour (not organic) to give occassionally some special flavour to the bread. Pictured is the making of a ryebread hence are the seeds. As you probably know, ryebread's got its distinctive flavour by the adding of caraway seeds. In the centre, there is the 'dough' - freshly taken out of the fridge. Not visible, but inevitable: salt and oil. Don't forget about them.

Step 3. Put all unnecessary things away from the table. While your hands are clean :)

Step 4. Working. You add the liquid of your choice in little amounts and swirl around within the flour mixture. The 'dough' becomes larger and larger as you do this. It seems that it takes up the fluid and combines it with the flour. As it grows bigger, you might feel the need to put more and more energy into the making. Below are the first drops of water enter the mixture - the 'dough' is not really bigger than it originally was.

Now the 'dough' has taken up almost all of the fluid. The process of working is nearing its end.

At this time more energy is needed on your part. Depending on the amount of flour, of course.

Some more pushing and pulling - avoid the strap of the camera from getting dirty (in case you're picturing making bread, that is)

This one below is a nice picture. It indicates that the mixture is ready: it comes off of your hands and the bowl is almost clean as well. Note the caraway seeds within.

Step 5. Wash your hands. Put the lid on the bowl, or cover it.

Step 6. Wait. Depending on the temperature, the quality of 'dough' and flours, the amount of bread and on your patience, waiting may take sometime between 2-7 hours. The more the better generally applies, but one can over-rise the bread. This might result in a really fermented, sour and sticky raw bread, which is really hard ot work with in the final phase. During waiting you can do anything. Go work, clean the house, have a rest - you might even go to a night's sleep.

Step 7. Preheat the oven. Prepare the pan by spreading a non-adhesive paper on the bottom.

Step 6. Put a little 'dough' away for the next bread. Inevitable step.

Step 7. Place the bread into the pan. When I make a double amount, that is, two breads: to avoid them from baking into one another, I cleverly put a paper roll, covered with non-adhesive paper all over, between the two raw breads. I'm so clever I invented this! Ok, I know I did not, but for myself, yes, it was a problem I solved.

Unfortunately, this is not in the pictures. I think I put it between them after I made the photo...

Step 8. Slice with a knife so that the air that is produced during baking can leave the bread. Without slices, the gas tends to find its way trhough the raw bread anyway - resulting in a torn apart, ragged appearance of the end product.

Step 9. Place into oven. Don't forget to put in the paper tube - my clever intention!

Step 10. Baking takes about an hour. Depending on the amount of bread, the heat, and the way you like your bread.

Step 11. Enjoy. I suggest putting the hot bread on something that allows airing. Otherwise the hotness results in dampness at the bottom of the fresh bread.

Step 12. Once cooled off, slice the bread to taste. If you have seemed to have made more bread than you directly need, don't hesitate to freeze it. I always do that. The result? One-day 'old' bread, fresh bread all the time...

Next session: what to spread on the bread. If you follow me, you'll see that too.

to a hawk

I hear your calling

you talk to me without words

touch me without hands

look at me without eyes

I feel your presence

you are here without a body

creep inside amd make me

weep without tears

the circles are getting wider

as I draw higher up above

seeing more

wanting more

I am released like a bird from a cage, again

a photo quiz

UPDATE -

The little quiz below has a winner and I will soon post the photo to prove.

We seem to have started another part in building our house. We are covering it with isolation units - to give a house a protection against loosing its heat during the wintertime and getting overheated in the summer. The units are fixed on the walls from the outside with a simple method. My husband does the job and I'm helping him.

The kids are around as usual.

And now about the quiz.

The question is as simple as this:

WHAT'S THIS?

Submit your answers among the comments.

look at the sky

New Moon and her standard companion, planet Venus. Photo made in our garden, on 18 June.

ignis fatuus

the tunnel is covered in smooth velvet walls
dark green as the northern sides of trees within friendly woods
the path is even and easy, welcoming your humble feet
and the end is visible and clear, glowing with shine -
oh my dear, yes it's time you woke up.

Photo by me in September 06, The Netherlands.

how is YOUR blog rated?

According to Mingle2's evaluation....

According to Mingle2: 'This rating was determined based on the presence of the following words:

pain (8x)
dead (3x)
death (1x)'.

Thanks Melly, for the idea!

Midsummer

Have a happy celebration!

I will be away for a while - I'm going on a one-day trip to Lake Balaton on 23 June (I promise there will be some photos), my mother and her husband are coming over between 24 and 27 June, and basically, I need to get some time out.

Those who are careful enough might have noticed that I have started another site in which I wish to monitor my way to creating something of a short story - not that I work much with that... But that's what I aspire to. Although -

Time and kids and husband.

Impede.

Demand.

Too much.

Need to get some time out.

Have fun while I'm away.

Here's U2's One - I liked it when it first came out but started to get the meaning of it a bit later and now I feel it describes my own life and especially my partnership...not that this realization makes me happy at all - I'm rather sorry to see it.