Friday Finds

5. This amazing slide show of a photographer's last days with his father.  Grab some tissues...

4. This competition to find an illustrator for Julia Donaldson's new book.  We love her work around here and have I mentioned she is the patron for Kev's new organisation???

3.  Two exciting courses.  The first is a course called "Inspired by Nature" hosted by Scottish Natural Heritage.  From the brochure:

How do we find inspiration? Repeated by popular demand, this event ledby Gordon MacLellan (‘Creeping Toad’) will focus on ‘hands on’ creative activities to foster our own excitement and sense of connection as interpreters, educators and workshop leaders. These same activities can be used with groups, offering new ways of inspiring the people we work with and developing different relationships between public, place and ourselves as professional environmentalists.

The best thing about it?  I get to go FOR WORK, get paid,and get to learn amazing things. 

The second course I have signed up for is an e-course called: Unravelling: Ways of Seeing Myself. 

My mum was doing an e-course on journalling and said she really loved it, so I went looking for my own.  I have to say it looks fab and i am very excited.  best thing is, it was paid for from selling a bunch of E-man's old toys...reducing clutter AND learning new things is win-win.

2. This post on living a complex life, by mommycoddle (she is also where I found Days with My Father).  Its just really stuck in my head over the last week.  I am a naturally lazy person and strive for the easiest way, so a lot of what she says rings true about some of the very basic things I struggle with.

She also inspired me to dig back through some of my favourite writers and I borrowed A Sand County Almanac from Kerstin.  I love this quote on spring's arrival:

A cardinal, whistling spring to a thaw but later finding himself mistaken, can retrieve his error by resuming his winter silence. A chipmunk, emerging for a sunbath but finding a blizzard, has only to go back to bed. But a migrating goose, staking two hundred miles of black night on the chance of finding a hole in the lake, has no easy chance for retreat. His arrival carries the conviction of a prophet who has burned his bridges.

1.  Ellis.  Ok, I know its cheating. as I didn't find him this week, but man oh man, is he something else.  How did I get so lucky to get the busiest, craziest, funniest, most lovely person to spend my life with?  Just when I think we've got him sussed, I discover something new about him and he finds a new way to push a limit, climb something or be just a bit more vibrant.  This week's escapades, included:

- Running around with the sewing machine cover on his head, bumping into things and saying "Stuck. Stuck." but refusing to let me help him.

- Opening the front door and running out of the house, down the street and around the corner, where I found him perched on a wall waiting for me.

- Trying to tickle every car, truck, door and tree on our way home from nursery.

-Falling asleep on his own, in his own room, with no crying, no fussing, not even an objection for the first time ever!

I think we'll keep him!