resolutions

New Year's Day is a time for making resolutions. Resolutions to improve life, get healthier, choose happiness.  I've never been one to really make resolutions.  I tend to make changes when and how I want to do them not at a particular time to follow societal expectations. I do tend to reflect on my life and the direction I see it heading at this particular time of year though.  This time 2 years ago I was on the cusp of a big leap. I left the business world and decided to stay home with my littles full time. This time last year, I was homeschooling Finn with the expectation that Elizabeth would be homeschooling this year for middle school. (You can read more about why that didn't happen here.) And now, there are no huge changes on the horizon, no expectations that this year will be much different than the last.

Although I have no grand resolutions to share right now, one thought has been on my mind over the last few weeks. The thought that I'd like to bring more poetry into our, particularly the children's, lives.  I mentioned this to Paul before Christmas, and he gifted me with a fabulous children's poetry book for Christmas: A Journey Through Time in Verse and Rhyme. So maybe that qualifies as a bit of a resolution after all.

I also think it might be nice to share a bit of verse every now and then that the kids or I find particularly enjoyable or moving.  Here is the current favorite of the house (that I had to read 3 times over lunch today):

I Knew A Gnome

Trevor Smith Westgarth

I knew a gnome

Who had his home

Right in the middle of an oak tree.

He wore a hat

And breeches that

Were all of the colour of the oak tree.

Two squirrels lived above his head,

Some rabbits burrowed beneath his bed,

"I keep them warm and safe," he said,

"All in the middle of my oak tree."

A wise old owl

She found a hole

High in the trunk of the oak tree.

And come what may

She slept all day

High in the trunk of the oak tree.

But when at last she took her flight,

Hooting in the pale moonlight,

The gnome rode on her back all night,

Swooping all around about his oak tree.