knitternall

A knitting problem?

2012-01-09T10:31:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, someone introduced me then explained, "you'll know her because she's ALWAYS knitting."

True. Very true. I love the peace, calm, and meditative aspects of knitting. And I loathe waiting, long meetings, consensus-building discussions, adult team-making games, and intermissions. So I knit.

I also knit to keep my mouth shut. Somehow knitting squelches the urge to interrupt or opine needlessly.

I have edited some of the places where I used to knit. No more restaurants. Or carpool. Or the church pew. Though if my family keeps focusing on smart phones rather than conversation, I may have to revert to that previously embarrassing-to-them public behavior.

I am a knitter ... much more relaxed than anyone around me regardless the tedium or tumult.

10-10-10

2012-01-06T09:03:00.001-05:00

Now I know how to read a bag of fertilizer. (Experienced gardeners, go ahead and snicker.) The vastness of my ignorance was the catalyst for applying to the DeKalb County Extension Office's Master Gardener program. My yard and vegetable garden are testament to the trial and error approach that has resulted in more errors than I can count.

One class and I decided:

1. I need a tiller. Because unless I'm going to landscape the yard in raised beds the whole thing needs churning and turning.

2. Learning soil science in two and a half hours is like drinking from a fire hose.

3. Pressure cookers have come a long way since my grandmother's day when explosions were a real threat. (I got that gem from a lifetime canner/preserver who lives on a family farm. She could TEACH the master gardener program but thought she still has much to learn so she signed up.)

During class, I ignored the edict to turn off my cell phone (it's never off since my kids have to be able to reach me in an emergency) and instead silenced it and set it next to my iPad.

While we have lost much of the intrinsic lore related to self-reliant vegetable gardening (my grandparents KNEW when to plant, where to plant, when to harvest, how to can/preserve, and how to enrich soil without chemicals ...) we have gained amazing tools giving us access to a plethora of knowledge via the internet.

When the Soil Science Master opined on chemicals to balance alkalinity and acidity for various plants, I consulted an organic gardening website to see the alternative methods available because I prefer a more "natural" approach. I snapped photos of graphs and data I couldn't transcribe quickly or neatly enough with note-taking or the Penultimate app. I looked up a gardening book recommended by another intern and ordered it with my one-click account on Amazon. And I used one of the breaks to review flash card apps I'll utilize to master the vocabulary and concepts I need to know to pass the final exam (it's a certification program).

The only thing my electronic tools couldn't do was prevent the mid-afternoon sleepy slump that unfortunately coincided with the basic botany lesson. Note to self: extra Diet Coke in the lunch bag for that post-prandial lull.

My bucket list has a new check for "Learn something new every year." The Master Gardener class is intellectually stimulating, evocative, and physically challenging (thanks to the 50 required volunteer service hours in the field), so it's a great foundation for 2012.

When your college student comes home ...

2011-12-20T10:17:00.000-05:00

I've heard many, many stories about the give and take required to live peacefully during winter and summer breaks with college students more accustomed to making their own decisions than following their parents' lead.

I get it. Fortunately for me, and in spite of my overachieving ways, my son is too innately kind and tolerant to remind me that he's already demonstrated the ability to take care of himself, thank you very much.

College Guy stumbled downstairs this morning to let the dog out and get some breakfast. I've been up for awhile and am in full "morning person" mode. He's bleary-eyed, appalled at rising before noon during a break from school, and absolutely not tuned in.

Me: "Good morning! We're going to Stone Mountain today. Want to come? Did you bring your dirty clothes downstairs? Because I have a load going into the washing machine shortly and you can add yours if you want. Did that computer science class open up yet? I'm trying to decide about dinner tonight so let me know if you have a preference."

College Guy: "Wait ......................... What?"

Poor guy. Even as a toddler, he was slow to get going in the mornings. The difference was that I could just pick him up, toss him into the car seat, and head out while he stared vacantly out the window.

I have no idea how he gets himself up at school ... I'm just glad he does. He kept up with his medicine and his appointments, managed not to lose too much weight because he didn't want to bother going to the dining hall or grocery store, didn't lose his laptop or his cell phone, discovered that drying his beloved cargo pants takes twice as long as any other load, caught up after missing a week of school when he was hospitalized with an intestinal blockage, ate nothing but junk food and the occasional pear, went hiking at midnight with roommates "just because," celebrated his birthday with campus friends, saw first-hand what "stupid drunk" really means, and kept his grades up.

Yay for that critical first Freshman semester DONE.

For College Guy's birthday, I shipped a box full of party gear, including moustaches, a crown, pin the tail on the donkey game, party hats and blowers, glow in the dark necklaces, and candy. Goofy stuff. We had pizza delivered to his dorm, timed for the end of finals for the day. Evidently the moustaches were a particular hit with the girls, all of whom wore one for the duration.

Raking in the fall.

2011-11-12T10:35:00.000-05:00

I love fall weather. I love the glorious blue skies, crispness in the air, swirling leaves, and disappearance of gnats, mosquitoes, and flies.

Raking those swirling leaves, however, brings out my inner procrastinator. While my neighbors industriously rake those leaves onto tarps and bag them into 30+ brown sacks each week or landscape crews make quick work of the chore with their major-league blowers, I stare gloomily at the rising tide and think of lots of other things I need to do instead.

I'm not alone. Evidently, a lot of people try to come up with ways to make the chore easier, or at least more interesting.

I have wide rakes and hand rakes; bag-hold-em-openers and a wet vac that supposedly will suck up leaves (not); High School Girl, College Guy (occasionally), and Campaign Guy to join me in the "fun" and an electric blower to help move the mass onto huge tarps.

I sure miss the weekly leaf pick-up where we lived in North Carolina - you just blew and raked everything to the curb and a single truck would vacuum everything up.

A human-powered alternative to those smelly, loud gas-powered backpack blowers blaring across Dunwoody throughout the fall.

No matter what I try, I'm still raking leaves every week through Christmas. When I order pine straw from DHS' Cross Country team, it's knowing I'll have to store it until all the leaves are off the trees. The Troop 764 Boy Scout pine straw sale falls nicely in the spring to cover the comingled leaves and pine straw left after winter storms drive the remaining leaves down from the trees.

Okay, enough whining about the leaves. The yard is well covered and needs raking.

After I do the grocery shopping, laundry, and carpool duties. Is it going to rain? I need to wait until the leaves are dry. Wait, I need to bake for the Marching Band end of season cookout. So maybe I should wait until next week.

Yes, you can knit. It's easy. Really.

2011-10-31T07:29:00.000-04:00

I highly recommend this video for those who want to learn to knit:

"We're not making mistakes. We're making experiences."

"Come on, man. Just buy a scarf."

Sublimely hilarious.

What about the schools?

2011-10-19T09:31:00.002-04:00

One of the most critical considerations for anyone moving with a family from one community to another is the quality of the schools. Dunwoody is blessed with great schools that thrive in spite of lackluster central office leadership, strangled budgets, self-protective personnel policies, and education pedagogy that change with the whims of state and county administrations.

All those woes are well documented in DeKalb County School Watch, a blog that serves as watchdog and gadfly for our local system. If you're a parent, you should read it. Knowledge is power.

For awhile, there was a grassroots effort underway to consider turning Dunwoody High School and all its feeder schools into a single Charter Cluster. I don't know if the steam has run out of that effort, if the folks engaged in the foundational work have turned to other issues, or where things stand today, but I hope the concept finds new energy in the near future. Fulton County Schools are considering charter status, one of many school systems and clusters willing to tackle the massive documentation, research, and development work required to satisfy the state's evolving requirements.

DeKalb Schools has a new superintendent. Maybe she's a rainmaker and something good will finally come out of that dysfunctional nexus. We have an outstanding School Board representative in Nancy Jester, who is often the lone voice of pragmatism in a group of people who seem to add to our problems rather than solve them. Georgia is requesting a waiver from the illogical No Child Left Behind paradigm and trying on yet another measurement tool that ignores the realities of student capabilities and inconsistent parent support. Our state level elected representatives would have to change state regulations and budget limitations that prevent Dunwoody from having greater control over our schools. There are lots of obstacles (costs are #1) to having our own school system. But there are many, many positives to having our cluster go charter.

By the time the education juggernaut changes direction, my kids will likely no longer be in Dunwoody's public schools. But I'll still be a taxpayer, homeowner, and passionate booster of this community.

Schools are relevant now and for the future.

Sure is early.

2011-09-20T07:12:00.000-04:00

It's nearly 7:00 am and the Knitternall family's morning has been underway over an hour. We rise and stumble at 5:30 so High School Girl can catch her bus to the Fernbank Science Tools & Technology program. No complaints from her ... all that science is nirvana to her rationalist soul. (Oh, the philosophical and faithful discussions we have had ...)

Once the fog of sleepwalking in the dark lifts, I'm glad I'm up so early. I'm at my most productive during those brisk hours before mid-afternoon, after which I slide into a stuporous, slow blinking half attention for late afternoon and evening meetings and deadlines (fair warning). One of my clients is at full charge around the time I head to bed, which means she's texting me at a time I can't think straight. We've worked out a system where she sends stuff to me well past midnight, then I tackle them a few hours later. Deadlines met.

Good morning, Dunwoody.

Hello, Mr. Smith, the preternaturally alert and cautious school bus driver who rises at 3 am, makes his rounds in Dunwoody, then delivers his teen-aged passengers safely to Decatur each day.

See you tonight, Campaign Guy, as he leaves for another busy day bridging work and Dunwoody visits. We'll meet again over dinner.

Have a great day, neighbors leaving the house with one hand on the wheel and the other flexing a coffee cup to lips in the dark of the pre-dawn work day.

Sssshhh, lawn care companies starting power mowers and blowers before 9 (actually, at 7:15 one recent morning). I know you have a long day ahead, but please don't break the morning peace so abruptly.

That's enough, Fox News, CNN, and other cable news shows relying way too much yelling at each other rather than the calmer BBC method of simply reporting the news.

I'm on it, much valued client texting a desperate "can you get this by 10 am today" plea for writerly attention.

Just a minute, hyperactive Scooter the Wonder Dog. You don't really need to go to the bathroom - it's that chipmunk family under the front steps you're really keen to check on.

Have a great day!

Volunteers do it for free.

2011-09-04T20:01:00.000-04:00

What makes Dunwoody truly great is the limitless capacity of friends and neighbors to volunteer their time and talent for causes near and dear to their hearts.

In the past few weeks, I've had the privilege of working with volunteers at Dunwoody High School, Dunwoody Nature Center, Campaign Guy's energetic yard sign brigade, the DeKalb Master Gardener program, and St. Luke's Presbyterian Church. As I've shopped, carpooled, and run errands, I've also encountered volunteers like the firefighters collecting for Muscular Dystrophy, a sweet woman staffing the gift shop at Scottish Rite, parents loading and unloading instruments for the Friday night Marching Band performance, a young mom carrying a bag and picking up trash as she walked her child to Austin Elementary School, bloggers spreading the news about community events to Dunwoody's virtual neighborhood, the Young Professionals of Dunwoody planning a spectacular block party benefiting the DHS Band program, and .... well, frankly, seeing volunteers isn't just an occasional thing in Dunwoody. It's a don't-blink-or-you'll-miss-'em, integral part of life in this It's a Wonderful Life town.

John F. Kennedy gave us all an echoing call to volunteerism, asking us to give, not receive; to look for opportunities to serve, not to benefit. The Peace Corps, Habitat for Humanity, and other world-changing volunteer organizations are a legacy of my childhood, that era when a passion to change the world preempted practical considerations like retirement funds and keeping up with the Joneses. Dunwoody is well represented by volunteer service organizations like the National Charity League, Dunwoody Woman's Club, Rotary and Kiwanis, faith groups, medical-focused charities, and others.

As this economy makes all of us look over our shoulders and fret over savings and expenditures, volunteers are even more critical to the quality of life we enjoy. According to The Nonprofit Times,

"(t)he total estimated value of volunteer service in 2010 reached $173 billion with the proportion of volunteers serving more than 100 hours increasing from 33.2 percent in 2009 to 33.8 percent in 2010."

My unsubstantiated guess is that the percentage of Dunwoody volunteers serving that 100+ hour mark is even higher.

As the 10th anniversary of 9/11 draws near, remember. And do something. Honor our men and women in uniform by using the freedoms they fight so hard to defend. Including volunteering your time and talent to enrich our community. Check with Dunwoody's own Pebbletossers, Hands on Atlanta, and the City's volunteer opportunities board. Grab a trash bag and talk a walk around town - there's always windblown trash in natural areas and rights-of-way.

Volunteers do it for free .... and from the heart.

Tough enough.

2011-08-20T09:48:00.000-04:00

My morning routine (while waiting for High School Girl to catch her 6:15 am bus) includes reading the AJC online, scanning emails to prioritize my day (deadlines change by the hour), and checking into Ravelry, my favorite knitting virtual world.

This morning, I saw this: Tough Gals: Do They Still Exist?

Women are girly. Again.

Don't believe me? The proof is in the blogosphere: Women who blog about cupcakes! Women who blog (okay, rant) about gardening, Hello Kitty, and knitting! Even BUST magazine is sponsoring a Craft Fair in NYC. Women who blog about cats! And then there are cats who blog, but let's not get into that just now. Don't get me wrong, these are all lovely blogs, smart and entertaining. And some blogs, like the wonderful Jezebel, keep us on our toes pointing out what a long way we haven't come, baby (like in this piece on how female superheroes are sexualized). But.. seriously... cupcakes?"

Oh, bless her heart. This one-dimensional thinker has mistaken women's hard-won choices for copping out. She implies that the things men do are preferable to "girly" activities such as running a cupcake business, knitting for relaxation between working all day/tending to family needs, and wearing high fashion as we wage business wars.

So women can only be feminists if we act like men, work like men, look like men, and do "manly" things?

Ridiculous.

One commenter said,

"Perhaps women are girly again because finally we can be, without being thought weak. The hard work of a generation of feminists who felt they needed to be ball busters in order to be taken seriously has yielded this fruit: women who are not afraid to show their creative side, women who have been able to turn passionate hobbies into successful careers, women who are REAL."

There are trace elements of men who still patronize women in the workplace. Women have learned to deal with them deftly, moving around them or bowling over them when necessary. But bloggers like this, someone I believe is a young woman, are simply unfathomable in their snide superiority and complete lack of understanding that the success of the women's equal rights movement isn't a manly paradigm ... it's the opportunity to be women, in all the wide diversity of the gender.

As for the knitter the Huffington Post blogger "dissed," the Yarn Harlot has garnered over $1 million in donations to Doctors Without Borders. While knitting. And talking about knitting.

I am knitter. Hear me roar.

Les Mis

2011-08-12T06:57:00.000-04:00

When Campaign Guy and I honeymooned in London, we saw two theatrical productions. Somehow, we chose Andrew Lloyd Weber's Starlight Express rather than Les Miserables, which had opened at the Barbican and was still in full production while we were there.

Seriously. Starlight Express. Actors singing disco while wearing roller skates.

Through the years, I shrugged off the thought that the French Revolution could be interesting enough to warrant theater tickets. And, because I'm somewhat plebian when it comes to live theater, I couldn't reconcile the high cost of the tickets.

I was wrong.

I have enjoyed the PBS' airings of the 25th anniversary celebration of Les Miserables in Concert at the 02 ... repeatedly. Fortunately, it's the darling of the fundraising campaigns, so I've been able to catch it four different times. Since I'm rarely sitting long enough to see an entire movie, let alone the multi-hour Les Mis, that means I've now seen it from start to finish. Alfie Boe is mesmerizing as Valjean, Nick Jonas surprisingly effective as Marius (it's sweet the way Katie Hall, the actress playing Cosette, keeps patting him on the arm reassuringly after one of their duets). And I love Norm Lewis as Javert.

I wonder if the Fox version next April will be as good? There's a lot to be said for being close enough to see the actors' expressions ... the Knitternall budget-friendly cheap seats in the Fox provide a panoramic view of the stage, but not the nuances of the emotions within the songs.

The lovely, silver lining to my late discovery of Les Miserables is that it's a fresh experience that I can appreciate much better now than when we were honeymooning. Thanks to advancements in filming, staging, sound, and today's digital media, I get to enjoy it at home ... repeatedly.

If you haven't seen it, catch it next time PBS airs it during a fundraising campaign. It's a splendid incentive to support the arts via public television.

Technology keeps outsmarting me.

2011-08-11T08:36:00.000-04:00

In the past two weeks alone, I've had to wrangle with internet-based phishiness, Facebook phonebook shenanigans, and a new round robin of urban legends.

I completely understand why some people just opt out of the whole social media/online world/electronic communications schtick.

1. Facebook's Phonebook Fiasco: Facebook is "enriching" our social lives by grabbing ALL cell numbers from our smart phones and posting them on our Friends page. I saw something about this yesterday, then friends have begun posting alerts and instructions on how to remove those details from our pages.

Go to the top right of the screen, click on Account, click on Edit Friends, go left on the screen and click on Contacts. All phone numbers from your phone (FB friends or not) are published. Click "visit this page" under Phone book Contacts on the right side of the page - then choose "remove contacts".

Now, why does Facebook want this personal information on MY page, visible to anyone allowed to see it? Because they want to "help me" get more Friends, more viewings, more feelings of connection to the world.

I suppose that I'll start getting all kinds of telemarketing and inappropriate calls on my cell phone now. Joy.

2. We had two charges show up on our checking account after someone phished my PayPal account. No, I did not respond to one of those ridiculous emails asking me for passwords and personal info. Someone else did. And because they allowed a hacker to see THEIR PayPal account, somehow that person was also able to get into MY account and request money. Turns out this is well known by my very responsive bank and "find the right FAQ if you can" PayPal, which promptly refunded the money. My bank said they get calls like this ALL DAY. I've changed passwords, my financial connections with PayPal, and continue to monitor our transactions daily.

Which is pretty darned irritating, when you think about it. Having to go into checking and credit card accounts that often is time-consuming. But it's the only way to prevent fraud as it's happening. My quick actions meant the two fradulent transactions were the ONLY two ... my bank says often numerous transactions hit long before account holders notice.

3. Great news! U. S. companies operating call centers overseas must transfer you to a U. S.-based rep upon request! I've had several people tell me this with great glee, saying "I know this works!" Actually, it doesn't. Wish it did, because that would mean more U. S. jobs AND fewer scripts ("have you rebooted the computer, ma'am?"). You can ask, but likely you'll just get the person sitting next to the first person you talked to. In India. Or wherever.

Those are the current aggravations. There are many, many more, including the one just waiting to pounce tomorrow. Or the next day.

Progress is outpacing intelligence and caution. At the same time various levels of government, from school systems to Congress, move at a snail's pace, technology is racing ahead with the next cool thing.

There has to be a better way.

Master the garden

2011-08-10T09:02:00.000-04:00

A lapse in posting = a busy summer with freelancing assignments, Campaign Guy's communications and strategy needs, getting College Guy ready to move on campus, and prepping High School Girl for her first year in high school.

At long last, I'm applying for DeKalb County's Master Gardener Program through its Extension Service. I hope that I transition from killing plants to nurturing beautiful gardens filled with edibles and ornamentals.

Interested? Here are the details:

Dear Gardener,

Thank you for your interest in the 2012 training for Georgia Master Gardeners in DeKalb.

The Master Gardener program provides community-minded gardeners with practical horticultural training that prepares them to be volunteers for their county’s Cooperative Extension. The DeKalb Cooperative Extension is a joint program of DeKalb County and the University of Georgia . Through the program, homeowners are provided with unbiased, research-oriented horticultural and gardening information.

Master Gardener training and information is provided by the horticulture, entomology, pathology, and crop and soil sciences departments of UGA’s College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences. Master Gardener volunteers answer horticulture inquiries via telephone, email, and in person at the Extension Service office. They also speak to civic groups, design and install beautification projects, and participate in a variety of community service projects.

To receive an application for the program you will need to attend one of the three available information sessions in September. Because we want to be certain that all applicants are aware of the responsibilities – and possibilities! – of the Master Gardener Program, applications are available only at the information sessions.

Please plan to attend any one of the following:

Friday, Sept. 2, 10:00 am – noon at the Cooperative Extension Main Office, 4380 Memorial Drive , Decatur (Demonstration Kitchen)

Wednesday, Sept. 7, 10:00 am – noon at the Cooperative Extension Main Office, 4380 Memorial Drive , Decatur (Demonstration Kitchen)

Thursday, Sept. 8, 10:00 a.m. - noon at the Cooperative Extension Main Office, 4380 Memorial Drive , Decatur (Demonstration Kitchen)

At the information session, we will review the Master Gardener program with you, we will answer any questions you may have about the Master Gardener program, and you will pick up a training application. Deadline for submitting applications (with your deposit) is Friday, Oct. 7, 5:00 PM. Late or incomplete applications will not be considered.

Classes will begin Wednesday, January 4, 2012, and run through Wednesday, March 28. Classes meet on Wednesdays only, 9:30 - 12:00 noon, and 1:00 p.m. - 3:30 p.m., with a one hour lunch break. An orientation for DeKalb Master Gardener trainees will be held Wednesday, April 4. Attendance at all classes and the orientation session is mandatory. To become a Certified Master Gardener you must successfully complete the training and 50 hours of volunteer time in the following twelve months.

Cost of the classes is $140. This covers all materials, including the extensive Georgia Master Gardener Handbook.

Space is limited. Students are accepted on the basis of their commitment to volunteer activity that satisfies a gardening interest and meets county needs. Note that you must be a DeKalb County resident to apply through this office. If you are a resident of another county, you must apply through the Extension Service office in that county. To reach your nearest county Extension office call 1-800-ASK-UGA1.

For more information about Georgia Master Gardeners in DeKalb contact Gary Peiffer or Averil Bonsall at 404-298-4080, or email Averil at abonsall@dekalbcountyga.gov

We look forward to meeting you at a future Cooperative Extension Program. We hope that you will take this opportunity to join our dedicated group of gardeners, and share your talents and enthusiasm!

Sincerely,

Gary Peiffer Averil Bonsall
DeKalb County Agent Master Gardener Coordinator for DeKalb

Maybe, when I'm finished, I'll fit in with this savvy gang, the Master Gardeners tending to the native plantings at Dunwoody Nature Center.

Have you noticed this sign as you enter Dunwoody Nature Center? Just a small reminder that the beautiful plantings are the result of hard work by dedicated volunteers.

Would you rather ...

2011-07-10T10:45:00.002-04:00

High School Girl has a game she plays with her friends when they're so bored that board games are the only stopgap in the long, bleak moments stretching between activities in their go-go-go summer. It's called "Would You Rather" and it poses two equally terrible options that the player must choose and offer reasons why.

WOULD YOU RATHER have five bottles stuck on the fingers of one hand for a year -OR- a bucket stuck on your foot for a year? "Neither" is not an option here!

The fascinating part of this game for a parent is hearing their reasons, which are ultimately based on value systems they're only vaguely aware they are developing.

Adults live in WOULD YOU RATHER land every day. We have to make difficult choices, resorting to the "lesser of two evils" without always being fully aware of the consequences. We're given misinformation, insufficient information, and downright incorrect information, and must formulate intelligent decisions based on factors out of our control.

Do I take that high-paying job with all its risks and unknowns when my present job, while boring and stressful, is at least stable? Will my kid thrive in the new neighborhood and schools when we chose them based on a realtor's recommendation and a few Google searches? Should I invest in the higher cost health plan with its lower deductibles and extensive coverage or the low cost plan that assumes my family will stay healthy?

I have a few suggestions for the game:

WOULD YOU RATHER go into bankruptcy-inducing debt to pay for your kid's college OR take a great job you love that has no healthcare benefits?

WOULD YOU RATHER be sentenced to watch Nancy Grace 24 hours a day for a year OR to go back to Middle School for three years?

WOULD YOU RATHER everyone knows where you are thanks to smart phones OR no one care where you are?

WOULD YOU RATHER have 1,000+ friends on Facebook OR a few really good, lifelong friends?

WOULD YOU RATHER pay higher property taxes because your home value is stable OR pay lower taxes because your home value is declining?

WOULD YOU RATHER own a large flat screen TV with no cable service OR a clunky old TV with free, extended cable service?

Despite the game's rules, sometimes the real-world answer is both. Or neither.

Have fun with that ...

I love a parade.

2011-07-05T09:36:00.000-04:00

This year, the Knitternall family enjoyed Dunwoody's 4th of July parade from quite a different perspective. While we've marched alongside Troop 764, St. Luke's Presbyterian Church, swim team, and Dunwoody Nature Center entries in the past, this year, we did this:

We're having a blast supporting Terry in his bid for City Council. And discovering even more reasons to love Dunwoody.

For example:

Kids say "thank you" when you give them candy. (Even the loudly assertive "We want candy!" contingent said "thanks.")
In one morning, we got to say hello to more friends and neighbors than we normally see in a week.
Dunwoody Police Officers on Segways - fun!
Boy Scouts serving barbecue - the logistics are impressive and food quite good.
Even as they melted into a sweaty puddle of overheated, flushed red exhaustion, parade participants and watchers wished each other a "Happy 4th!"
The Dunwoody Homeowners Association and their volunteers ... just wow. Until you've been IN the parade, you can't fully appreciate all the work that goes into staging the state's largest 4th of July event.
I bet the MJCC's Clifford the Big Red Dog bus could do a brisk business just giving rides to small ones. Loved the balloon ears.
Hint to Italian food aficionados - Dunwoody's Carrabba's Italian Grill is not only a great place to eat, but the manager is a really nice guy and the restaurant is very generous in supporting the community.
Master Gardeners ... the secret behind Dunwoody Nature Center's native plantings. Their parade entry was accompanied by Junior Counselors, a cadre of volunteer teens who support the environmental education center's summer camp.
Dunwoody High School ... band, football players, cheerleaders, lacrosse team, principal - our home town school does us proud every year.
Peachtree race runners, who arrive to cheer on the parade after their early morning exertions (and celebrations).
Unabashed patriotism, from Army and Marine bands to small children in special July 4th ensembles. Gotta love it.
Instant gratification - getting to see all the parade entries we missed thanks to Dunwoody Patch.

We look forward to next year's parade. Rain or shine, it's the anchor of our family's July 4th celebrations.

Suddenly, grass.

2011-06-27T10:44:00.000-04:00

We're still adjusting to life without the tri-maple that came down in our front yard. Brighter sunlight outlines every spider web and dirt appearing on windows and trim. (So I'm washing the outside more often.) The hydrangeas are frying in the heat and direct light. (When they go dormant this winter, I'll move them to a shadier spot.) Tomatoes are greedily soaking up the sun's energy, producing a gracious bounty for BLT's and salsa. (I'll relocate the raised bed as well this winter, creating a decorative border in its new spot in the front yard.)

And grass is popping up everywhere.

Long dormant grass seed is finally getting much-needed moisture now that the maple's roots aren't soaking up every drop. We may actually have a lawn by next summer.

It'll be serendipity if we do, because I am not Lawn Woman. I don't love grass the way my dad did. Cutting the grass is simply a way to make the yard look tidy rather than part of an all-out assault on weeds and bare patches. I love the smell of newly cut grass, and appreciate the green. But weeds are green, too. And they all blend together when they're cut, into one green canvas over the hard-packed clay.

(I also view grass cutting as exercise, mowing at a near run to see how quickly I can finish the front and back. I bet my neighbors get a kick out of the sight.)

Found this ... Looks way more fun than my cranky lawn beast.

Long distance booking.

2011-06-21T10:29:00.000-04:00

When I drove my mother home to North Carolina Sunday, we listened to Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer, an absorbing and wrenching "read by ear" about a hapless kid who did a Jack London and didn't live to tell the tale.

Chris McCandless took off after graduating from Emory University with honors. He gave away and burned inheritance and cash, and cut bonds completely with his parents and siblings. For more than two years, he lived off the land as a modern day explorer, stopping briefly here and there without staying long enough to forge any real emotional bonds. He was fearless and self-indulgent, brilliant and disconnected, hard working and quick to move on, careful and careless.
Fascinating story, zigging around McCandless' odyssey with rich details gathered by a biographer who connected the tenuous dots of McCandless' life on the road. He wraps up McCandless' story in the epilogue, as the boy's parents fly by helicopter to see where he starved to death in the Denali wilderness. Abandoned by their child, scorned by him for reasons he never explained to them, and absolutely flattened by his life and death, they were seeking answers that simply were not there.

The book ended as I approached Greenville, South Carolina on the return trip. I turned off the audio and drove in silence back to Atlanta.

By all accounts from people he met, as well as the self-portraits McCandless took, he was happy. He loved the life he chose. That's what a parent hopes for a child. But the price for McCandless' parents ... not knowing where their child was for more than two years, not understanding why he cut all bonds with them: too dear.

Quite compelling. I'm very glad I listened to the book.

But I do NOT want to see the movie.

The first time your kid takes himself to the dentist ...

2011-06-20T14:53:00.000-04:00

... is rather surreal. Suddenly, your kid is College Guy, perfectly capable of handling his own appointments, thank you very much.

He's handling haircuts, shopping for clothes and toiletries, picking up his prescriptions and supplements (which are legion), and living more and more of each day on his own terms.

I couldn't be happier. Or more bemused. At the same time.

Mothers remember those last few weeks of a pregnancy that seems to go on forever, to the point that all you can think about is "when is this baby going to come out!!!!" It's the same feeling with an 18 year old. You've done all the loving and tending and admonishing and nurturing until you're just plain tired of repeating yourself. At which point, it's time for that kid to get out ... already!!!!

Okay, that's an exaggeration. I like having College Guy around because he's really a nice person. Scrupulously honest. Quite funny. And very caring.

On the other hand, he's also messy, prone to staying up all night and sleeping past noon, and impervious to smells wafting from dirty clothes kicked into the corners of his bedroom. His response to "clean your room" is kicking through the clutter to blaze a path from the door to the bed.

He may be fairly typical for his age and gender., but he's my oldest - the practice kid. (Teen Girl has had a much more relaxed mother than College Guy has ever enjoyed.) So perhaps I overreact. From time to time.

I have a feeling that I'll miss that messy room when he's living on his own - even the smells.

Both of my kids loved this book ... were they just preparing me for the teen years?

Big things are happening in the Knitternall family.

2011-06-18T17:39:00.000-04:00

College guy is heading to North Georgia, teen girl is moving up to Dunwoody High School, I'm writing for several new freelance clients, and Terry is stepping forth to serve the town that means so much to the Knitternall family.

Sneak peek here.

We hosted a large campaign committee brunch this morning, getting input from a wide range of supporters as we begin to develop logos, positioning statements, July 4th Parade essentials, and strategies. I am simply humbled by the enthusiasm and energy of neighbors and friends - so many great ideas came out of the meeting.

The campaign website will have all the details, while I continue to chronicle our slice of life in Dunwoody here on this blog.

Fall 2011 will be especially memorable for all of us.

Things to do when you're not thinking.

2011-06-07T08:04:00.000-04:00

Saw this headline in the AJC: Jumping from bridges into lakes risky. Um, seriously?

How about Forest Park votes to drop age limit on public breast-feeding. Micromanaging much? Pretty sure that was a no-winner for the council.

And a gem: Weiner admits photo, won't quit.

Too much information featuring boneheaded moments in the lives of the average (and high profile) citizen. Add cable news' screaming diatribes by so-called experts and I'm just numb.

I'm more interested in the local news ... really, really local news ... for today. Such as

College Guy Returns Home from Freshman Orientation.

High School Girl Cleaned Her Room and It's Still Clean Two Days Later.

Milk, Bread, and Dog Food Nearly Out.

Husband On Business Trip, Needs to Get Home to Kill The Huge Roach That Just Sped Through the Front Door.

Preschool Phonics Classes Nearly Full For Fall 2011.

Scooter the Wonder Dog Still Hasn't Caught the Chipmunks Living Under the Front Porch.

Swamplandia Finally Ready for Pick-Up at Dunwoody Library.

Now that's news I can use.

Sure is hot out there.

2011-06-04T12:30:00.000-04:00

The greeting du jour, moaned by sweaty folks in grocery stores and pharmacies, office parking decks and swimming pools, dry cleaners and pet clinics, post office lines and playgrounds around Dunwoody. We're melting in this early summer heat wave, with a week or more to go before there's any relief.

Might as well have fun with it.

Never let them see you sweat.

It's wicked hot.

Alternative cooling system.

Stress sweat.

So, if we're sweating like a pig, we're actually cool and dry, right?

Don't sweat the details.

All that sweat equity we've put into our homes ... so not funny.

Don't sweat the small stuff. Or the behemoth SUV parking right against your passenger door.

Sweat lodge. Unairconditioned transportation for our kids when they head back to school in mid August.

Just because ...

2011-06-03T11:39:00.000-04:00

Just because the federal government proclaims that no child should be left behind doesn't mean every child is capable of going to college.

One of my favorite cranky bloggers, The Other Dunwoody, today blasts education academia for its emphasis on pedagogy over content. I agree just a bit ... I've encountered one too many teachers in the public school system who regurgitate the same tired lesson plans year after year because they fit the bureaucracy's paper trail and formulations. (Bless the teachers who figure out how to write to the form and then proceed to teach with professionalism and excellence far beyond the understanding of their administrative superiors ... and they've been the rule, not the exception, in Dunwoody schools.) A critical piece of legislation may finally get through the Georgia state morass allowing principals to fire incompetent and lackluster teachers on the basis of poor classroom skills and judgment rather than wade through years of documentation and supplication to highers up. Shuffling them to another school so they can be someone else's problem is currently the only solution available.

I also disagree, for one simple reason: the emphasis on college prep as the end all and be all of high school education leaves too many children behind, in remediation the moment they step into college, in debt because they can't keep that almighty Hope B average, and feeling less than stellar about a vocational track when they have every reason to be proud of those skills.

That isn't a teacher issue. It's another intrusive legislation from the Federal level down.

I believe in multiple tracks: college, technical, arts, so-called career, and more. If we are truly preparing every child for a life of financial independence and self-reliance, then we need to give them the tools to excel with whatever talent or passion they possess. Public (and private) education is failing the carpenters and electricians, early childhood educators and auto mechanics, multi-media electronic technicians and small business entrepreneurs, chefs and store owners, learning disabled and emotionally delayed who don't need a four-year college degree as much as they need the opportunity to explore basic skills that prepare them for a job or technical school, and then forge productive, well paying careers.

No B. A. or B. S. required.

Hot times.

2011-06-01T07:53:00.000-04:00

It's hot.

Really hot.

Superheated, humid, heavy air presses down on us, straining air conditioning systems and gardens. Summer has shifted from February cold to August hot in just a few weeks.

Weather forecasters predict more hurricanes than usual. A price war on seedless watermelons has broken out among Publix, Fresh Market, Wal Mart and Trader Joe's (though it's a bit surreal that $3.98 is a really low price for a watermelon). Normally cold pool water is sun-warming much more quickly so early morning swim team practice actually feels refreshing. Pony tails stuffed through a visor have become the style du jour as hair volume wilts in the heat. Hot tempered travelers are touchier than ever (a fight just broke out on an overseas flight when one passenger fully reclined his seat). And HVAC companies can't keep up with the frantic calls from people whose A/C has broken down in the unexpected heat wave ("Your wait time to talk to a representative is .... twenty minutes.")

Summer is a Southerner's tough love season.

Particularly when it begins a month early.

What's next?

2011-05-29T13:11:00.001-04:00

My daughter and I share the "what's next" gene. We collect experiences, grazing through crafts, volunteer work, books, travel, and ideas. Some experiences stay with us; others get checked off and tucked away in memory. Experiences are so much more engaging than things.

Yet I think there comes a point when it's easy to get overwhelmed with all the opportunities for learning. Which is better ... master a few things or a little skill in a lot of things? Our multimedia-driven culture exposes us every day to new-new-new. We worry that we won't keep up and that, by not staying on top of the next technologically-driven social media trend/workplace IT tool/graduate degree/cultural phenomenon, we'll fall behind socially, professionally, and personally.

Catalog the things you've learned to do, from the mundane to the career-mandated. In just one generation, our expectations and experiences have taken a quantum leap from the need-to-know and want-to-know of our grandparents' era.

My personal inventory: technical writing, basic sewing, needlepoint, cooking, knitting, vegetable gardening, refinishing furniture, housebreaking a dog, how to pack up and move a household in just a week, scrapbooking, managing websites with DreamWeaver, Vacation Bible School management, copywriting, strategic message communications, volunteer recruitment, Girl Scout troop leadership, the full continuum of child rearing, PowerPoint presentations, video scripting, how to pitch a tent, Microsoft Word/Excel/Publisher, Odyssey of the Mind coaching, painting walls and trim, how furniture is made from the moment the tree hits the ground, teaching phonics to preschoolers, change a tire, speechwriting, blogging, iPhone, English instruction for high school, running a nonprofit organization, Facebook, how to document a disability for public education accommodations, rudimentary PhotoShop, how to write an annual report for nonprofits and financial industries, search engines, political campaign marketing, door hardware installation, bicycle chain repair, Constant Contact email communications, streaming movies, earthy Japanese curse words (a remnant of my teen years in Okinawa), troubleshoot internet connections, charter school development, carpet manufacturing, hospital wayfinding design, SEO, online library reservations ...

Okay, that's enough.

But it can't be. To stay competitive as a freelance writer, I have to stay connected at all times with my clients' industries, demographic research for disparate audiences, cultural trends, and what's going on both locally and internationally. We don't live or work in a bubble anymore, limited by budget and travel modes to the wider world. Instead, the internet brings the world to our desktops and laptops in a constant cacophony of information.

Mental rest comes in doing things my grandparents considered necessities: home crafts, gardening, making do. I hope to take the Master Gardener program through the DeKalb Extension Service. The next series begins January 2012. (There are information sessions in September for anyone who's interested. See the end of this post.)

What's next? It's always something.

It’s time to start recruiting for next year’s Master Gardener classes!!

Encourage your friends, neighbors, colleagues to send in their contact information to be added to the mailing list. Letters (or emails) will be sent out in August with details of our September information sessions, and anyone who wants to apply must come to one of those sessions. The dates are Sept. 2, Sept. 7, and Sept.8, all from 10:00 a.m. - 12:00 noon in the Training Kitchen at the main Extension Office.

Details of the program can be found on our website www.ugaextension.com/dekalb/ and I will be happy to talk to anyone who wants to know more - Averil - 404-298-4071

Stationery card

2011-05-25T17:33:00.001-04:00

Tassel Frame Gold Graduation Announcement

Browse our exclusive collection of graduation announcements.

View the entire collection of cards.

Curbing the appeal

2011-05-25T07:24:00.000-04:00

Before ...

And after ...

The moment of truth came when the tree crew reached the trunk: a spongy center through the center limb and the beginnings of rot in the trunk. So it truly had to come down. I miss that tree and the way it sheltered our home. And now I have an entirely different micro-climate in the front yard. We'll install plant new perennials and shrubs along the foundation and a tree next fall and winter. The hydrangeas will move to the side yard, which is still shady. And we'll close the wood shutters quite a bit this summer to offset the increased heat from the sun.

Oh, well.

Oh, baby!

2011-05-24T10:23:00.000-04:00

Knitting continues to happen all around Dunwoody. From the Atlanta Knitting Guild that meets monthly at St. Patrick's Episcopal Church on North Peachtree and my favorite knitting circle at St. Luke's Presbyterian Church to knit-ins at Starbucks and Barnes & Noble, a sometimes surprising (to others) cross-section of knitters gathers to enjoy their craft. Some of my favorite knits come from twenty-somethings who consider knitting part and parcel of the whole self reliance/sustainable movement. (One posted on her blog that she refuses to wear anything she hasn't sewn or knitted herself. Her clothing creations are unbelievably beautiful and detailed ... fashionistas would be very, very envious.)

I've been knitting for babies lately ... organic cotton frocks, richly hued hats and sweaters in all-season cotton, soft blankets, and felted jester boots. It's fun to play with color and texture in creating these gifts and custom orders. I prefer natural fibers for most of my knitting, though sometimes I have to compromise with cotton. By itself, cotton has a tendency to stretch and sag; with a little manmade fiber or wool twisted into the yarn, it can stand up to wear and tear. I've found some amazing organic cotton yarns that hold their own, so I'm busily acquiring hanks of the yarn whenever I find them.

Felted jester booties for a toddler ... when I knit these with wool yarn, they're twice as large as they are when they come out of the hot water felting bath.

Organic cotton ... I love this pattern so much I'm making several more in various combinations of natural beige, cream, and tan

Those little leaves at the waist continue around the back.

A round blanket to wrap around a darling baby. Soft cotton yarn will be easy to wash.

I love Elizabeth Zimmerman's magical Baby Surprise Jacket pattern. I'm pleasantly surprised every time I knit one and love how it fits on babies and toddlers.

I'd still like to knit a custom lace shawl for a follower ... it may take awhile, but when that 100th follower signs up, I'll choose a winner at random, let them choose a color, and knit like crazy to create a lovely shawl.

Dunwoody knitting continues ...

Yee-hah

2011-05-21T10:49:00.000-04:00

I wish I had a picture from last night's Dunwoody High School Senior Blast: our son riding the mechanical bull.

We stepped back, giving our son room to go solo, driving himself at midnight to the DHS annual event and back home again at 6 am. A trial run for the parents, who probably have hovered a bit too much thanks to the never-far-from-mind challenges of Crohn's.

He's fine. And ready for college.

We couldn't be happier.

He had a great time last night, thanks to a huge cadre of parent volunteers who organized and staffed an event filled with music, casino games (strictly for fun), hypnotist, prizes, and more.

I really want a picture of him on that mechanical bull.

Adam and Anna Grace on the lawn after the ceremony. Graduating high school senior and incoming high school freshman.

Our favorite graduation photo. This is quintessential Adam ... reserved, checking out the scene, relaxed now that the "have to" part is over.

The Dunwoody Stipple

2011-05-20T10:48:00.000-04:00

What were they thinking?

Our home was built in the early 1970's, in a somewhat straightforward Williamsburg/Federal four-over-four-and-a-center-door style with lots of dark paneling, dentil moulding, slate floor entry, and shaggy carpet. We know that because it was still in that condition when we bought it ten+ years ago. We've done quite a bit of updating, but one thing remains ... the stippled ceilings. The sheetrock crews evidently loved stipples, swacking a mop-like gadget up against the ceilings, creating this floral-like textured effect.

Better than popcorn ceilings. But not nearly as nice as SMOOTH ceilings.

We had a leak in an upstairs bathroom, which flowed through to the kitchen ceiling. The plumber had to cut a hole in the ceiling to fix the problem. Which lead to another necessary repair, to the sheetrock.
Not so simple. Oh, the sheetrock and mud were pretty straightforward. The challenge? The blasted stippled ceiling. We got estimates from a series of handy-people who said, with great honesty, they weren't sure they could match the stipple, but would try.

Our handy-dandy contractor is hard at work right now, cutting sheetrock, screwing it into place, mudding the seams, and preparing his hand-made stipple tool.

Keeping my fingers crossed that the results will look somewhat seamless. So to speak.

Tree down.

2011-05-14T12:06:00.000-04:00

That large red maple in the front yard? The beautiful, massive, overarching canopy that shades our home and accents our front yard?

The one whose shallow roots soak up moisture and prevent any kind of grass growth?

It's doomed.

Last year, I treated an emerging hole in the trunk after carpenter ants got inside.

This year, they're crunching so much that sawdust puddles around the base of the tree. And the carpenter ants now have a well-worn highway not only to that hole but a large wound in an upper branch, the remnant of the limb that fell and hit our house ten years ago.

I've consulted with two arborists and six tree companies. All say the same: it's going to fall down, and it can't be saved. (Only one told us want we wanted to hear, that they could TRY, that they might, possibly, perhaps save the main part of the tree - but couldn't promise that it would work and that I'd probably end up having to spend the same amount of money again to take it down.)

The bids on removing that tree are spectacularly wide-ranging, and all are big-gulp expensive.

I'll have to transplant all the recently planted hellebores and rethink the foundation plants chosen for their shade-loving traits. Pressure wash the house (now nicely screened by the canopy). And wait six months to a year before we can plant another tree.

Darn it. The house is going to look naked without our beautiful maple tree.

A small hole with a huge rotted area in the trunk. We treated it last year, killing the carpenter ants and filling the hole with expanding foam, to no avail.

The original culprit: when the massive limb fell and hit our house, it caused an ugly wound in the center limb. Now it's twice as large and filled with rot and insects.

The evidence: I washed away the sawdust a week ago and another pile is quickly forming.

An American Town

2011-05-14T11:25:00.000-04:00

May in Dunwoody comes with a flurry of endings and beginnings, each tinged with an old-fashioned red-white-and-blue aura of small town life. Final exams, awards and honors programs, neighborhood block parties, festivals, season-ending games, Mother's Day, planting vegetables, yearbooks, spring cleaning, college acceptances, vacation planning, fundraisers, school dances, Scout crossover ceremonies, high school graduation, concerts .... May is the busiest month of the year.

It's exhilarating. And exhausting.

Of all the celebrations, perhaps one of the most heartwarming was our neighborhood block party, held to celebrate the end of a long and hard fought battle against a detrimental rezoning decision. Our wonderful neighbors surprised Terry with warm words and a gift, neither of which he expected. We lingered late into the evening, enjoying catching up, sharing news, and sampling an amazing array of foods.

The stressful, stunningly expensive effort - more than $20,000 shared by neighbors and community supporters to fight a large daycare playground behind our homes - has become a template for other groups and communities facing similar decisions. We learned much about our city and legal system as well as just how complex our relationships can be.

Life lessons:

Friends, neighbors, colleagues, and fellow volunteers will sometimes find themselves on opposing sides of critical issues. How we deal with each other has far-reaching consequences. I choose civility, setting aside disagreements for the sake of congeniality and progress in other arenas.
NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) is a term used with scorn by folks who are not directly impacted by eminent domain, rezoning decisions, and misdirected development. Take care. You may need those same neighbors someday when it's your NIMBY concern.
The City's code of ordinance should not force citizens to expensive court actions rather than an intermediary Council veto. I don't know how much our City had to spend on the legal action, but it was wholly unnecessary. Even if the Council was aware that its rezoning committee's decision was deeply flawed, its own code of ordinances prevented it from taking action or intervening.
Placing volunteers in powerful and influential committees such as Rezoning and Community Development without training and oversight is disingenuous and dangerous.

There are life lessons to be gained in every experience, particularly the hard ones. Mine is that you can love a town and want to help it thrive even when sometimes it lets you down. I value the gadflies, those people who stand at the public speaker microphone, write letters to the editor, blog, and send emails because they are active, engaged, and concerned enough to speak up. I am grateful for volunteers who are willing to take on overwhelming and sometimes thankless roles in policy-making. And I appreciate community leaders like John Heneghan, who listen to diatribes and disagreements with courtesy and respect.

It isn't easy, but it's quintessentially American to be a community of individuals, not head-nodding sheep.

And now, a few highlights from the Knitternall family album as May builds to a crescendo of activities before it bows to more leisurely summer pace.


Going to the Renaissance Faire means pulling an ensemble together from the family costume stash.

The PCMS Band's Spring Concert drew a huge crowd; it included a fundraiser for the American Cancer Society in memory of beloved teacher Keith Davis, who passed away this Spring. Both of our kids had Mr. Davis for 7th Grade Language Arts.

Dunwoody High School recognizes its college-bound students ... so many, they circled the gym nearly twice.

Peachtree Charter Middle School recognized its top students in academics, music, character, drama, and more.

There's a chipmunk in the hellebores.

2011-03-25T08:45:00.001-04:00

I fell in love with hellebores while working at Dunwoody Nature Center. There's a spot at the rear of the main building where they thrive in purple, pink, and pearly white beauty, spreading assertively toward the pollinators' garden.

During last year's Spring Plant Sale, the master gardeners divided a few of the larger sections as passalongs. I bought one to see how hellebores would do in the Knitternall yard, despite its tremendous liabilities (huge water-hogging maple tree, shallow dirt thanks to said maple tree's root system).

It LOVED my sad front yard. So this year, I sent an all-call to the master gardeners, asking if they would mind dividing their own collections for the passalong sale (benefitting Dunwoody Nature Center). One darling gardener immediately brought me three large transplants, which I promptly installed beneath the maple tree's massive canopy. This morning, a tiny chipmunk peeked from beneath one of the hellebore's large leaves, looking skyward for passing hawks before it scampered beneath our front porch. (And that's another story. Chipmunks and their tunnel systems are NOT good things for plant roots and foundations.)

When I left the park yesterday, I saw about a dozen hellebores sitting in pots, ready for passalong sales.

Dibs!

Dunwoody Nature Center's Spring Plant Sale

2011-03-23T19:53:00.001-04:00

I'm ordering quite a few treasures through the Dunwoody Nature Center's Spring Native Plant Sale. At least I know they'll LIKE the crazy Georgia climate. My yard is nothing if not challenge-burdened:

a trifecta maple tree that sucks all the moisture out of the front yard
a back yard with looming hardwoods, meaning little to no sunshine
an east-facing house
side yards with little to no chance of more than 3 hours of sunlight

Nonetheless, the curbside vegetable garden is bustling as peas cast creeping tendrils toward the trellis, romaine lettuce is sending shoots sunward, and radishes are thrilled by the early spring warmth.

I kill more plants than finally thrive, which makes the survivors even more dear.

Order some plants from Dunwoody Nature Center and support their worthy mission: to give everyone some blissful greenspace in our increasingly urban community.

We want your telephone number.

2011-03-22T07:40:00.000-04:00

The Girl Scouts want my social security number to verify I'm safe around my daughter and her friends during GS activities. Google wants my telephone number in case my blog gets hijacked or I lose my password. The library wants to see my driver's license every now and then to make sure it's really me checking out the latest bestseller. The United States government wants to see my in my altogether before I can board a plane. Every website I visit wants to leave a few unsavory cookies on my computer to track my interests.

I am not comfortable with mandatory identity-proving procedures, the loss of privacy, and the increased demand by governmental and commercial entities for personal information. I am more comfortable with anonymity. (I know, that seems a bit perverse considering the very public nature of this blog.)

It's insidious. Gradually, over time, I've grown accustomed to the relentless demand for personal information everywhere I go, from the grocery store to my kids' schools. I am asked to share my address, telephone number, and social security number for a background check, my socioeconomic status and interests "for marketing purposes," and proof of medical insurance and liability waiver to have my cholesterol checked.

I am pragmatic about the reasons for these intrusions. I recognize that our culture and way of life are in flux, wrestling with the transition from everybody-is-the-same to an uneasy imbalance among government, commercial, and personal interests.

Another morning is dawning. I'm packing school lunches, Preschool Phonics gear, and freelance paperwork for several projects due today while I hold down the fort at Dunwoody Nature Center as interim director.

I'm also making sure I have my driver's license, insurance card, frequent customer card for the grocery store, checking account card, credit card, smart phone with contact information, remote log in for my desktop, personal hotspot, and memorized passwords and user names for the many accounts I work on each day ... without which, I could not function at all and all of which reveal so much about my personal life to strangers around the world.

Kinda creepy, isn't it?

Graduation Manners

2011-02-19T11:06:00.001-05:00

Recently, we received the official Dunwoody High School graduation schedule, filled with bold-faced print, exclamation marks, and underlines.

Reading through this missive, I figured out the following:

There have been some very badly behaved parents and guests attending graduation, who evidently are prone to shouting, blowing air horns, cursing, carrying large televisions and coolers, bearing helium baloons and confetti, smoking, eating, spraying graffiti and vandalizing the premises, having a nip from a flask, selling Amway or magazine subscriptions, taking up way more seats than are issued, and arriving late.

Students apparently do not understand that graduation is a special occasion, so arrive in flip flops, revealing tops, baggy pants, huge earrings, open toed sandals, and colorful shirts and ties rather than modest colors.

Someone does not believe public schools should have a Baccalaureate ceremony. Hence, it is now called the "Pre-Commencement Ceremony."

In other words, high school graduation has become a rowdy "that's my kid!" celebration for the parent rather than the student.

There is always a segment of parents and guests who can't tell the difference between a sporting event and a formal ceremony. But you can't legislate behavior ... unless you're actually willing to follow through on promises of corrective measures. In my experience, rules and regulations are just paper tigers. They have no teeth. Too many laws get on the books because someone, somewhere, did something bad, so they made a law just in case anyone else was thinking about doing the same thing. Problem is, writing more laws doesn't result in better behavior.

There are scores of Dunwoody High School parent and student volunteers, teachers, and administrators who are working hard to make graduation a truly special event. They are unbelievably generous with their time and dedication to the students who will graduate on May 20. Yet, I have no doubt that all the boldfacing and underscoring in the world won't reach the guests who will still do their best to celebrate without regard to those trying to enjoy the ceremony. And students who will make one grand gesture as they cross the stage.

It's all about them.

Our oldest kid is graduating. And we'll get through it with him, just as we've made it through the past thirteen years ... with the support of the unparalleled Dunwoody public school community: students, parents, teachers, administrators, and businesses.

Now, where did I put my air horn?

Bridging the gap.

2011-02-17T08:22:00.000-05:00

I'm baaaaack. Delightedly so.

The Board of Directors of Dunwoody Nature Center paid me quite a compliment. They asked me to return and serve as the Interim Executive Director while they complete their search for a successor to Claire Hayes, who retires next week. Of course I said yes. While my freelance writing continues, and they understand the juggling I'll do over the two months (or less) of the interim period, we're all confident that it'll work out very nicely. (I'm nothing if not hyper organized and multi-task oriented.) My goal is to create a solid operational foundation for the new Executive Director.

This is a crucial and exciting turning point for the Nature Center, as it stands on the threshold of truly remarkable changes that will have far-reaching benefits for our community. A new strategic plan that clarifies their mission and goals, a new City parks department led by the savvy and responsive Brent Walker, a dynamic parks and greenspace planning process that supports a public/private partnership as the Board begins the process of planning a new education center, new programs for adults and children, and new and long-time donors recognizing the value of environmental education and supporting the Nature Center with their financial support.

If you haven't been to Dunwoody Park ... oh, my. This brief February warmth is a gift that can only be enjoyed outdoors. Walk the trails, listen to the birds, hunt for those first green shoots emerging from the ground and the tips of trees, and breathe deeply.

See you at Dunwoody Nature Center!

Late bloomer

2011-02-15T08:02:00.000-05:00

Have you seen the commercial where the kinda creepy guy in the carpool gets a text on his smart phone, laughs ... then, wait for it, everyone else in the carpool finally gets it, too? (The point is that his smart phone service is better than their smart phone service.)

I'm the rest of the folks in the carpool. A late bloomer, if you will. I wait to jump into the latest technology because I don't want to pay top dollar, know there are bugs to work out, and figure it's better to let everyone else do the trial and error bit before I join in.

My handy dandy new smart phone is quite a treat, a miniature computer in my hands and ready to tell me where to go, how to get there, and why I want to be there in the first place. But my gee-whiz reactions get a mental eye-roll from friends who've been sending me emails and texts "from my XYZ totally cool smart phone" for YEARS.

Ah well, better late than never.

At the moment, the smart phone is out-smarting me on several fronts ... quickly draining battery life, cumbersome wireless pass-keys, icons I don't want and can't delete, and jiggly photos (including an unexpected photo of myself - so THAT's what that little icon does). I'm checking user forums and getting up to speed, so the learning curve isn't bad. Well, mostly.

Fun! And much more relaxing than yesterday's heavy labor.

26 or so bags of leaves and sticks from the front yard. My aching back.

The raised bed vegetable garden is now in the front yard. Needs more peat moss, compost, and vermiculite. Scat, cats! Off, dogs!

Today, it's all about copywriting and Preschool Phonics. So the next wave of yard prep will wait until later in the week, when it's supposed to be tantalizing warm and clear.

Get ready, back yard. Your loser days are nearly OVER.

It's gardening weather.

2011-02-14T15:20:00.001-05:00

I had no idea so much time had passed since my last post. Let's see ... finished my tenure at Dunwoody Nature Center, had a birthday, enjoyed the resolution of our long rezoning headache, demolitioned some sad-looking plants in the yard, re-enlisted at DNC to serve an interim role during the transition from retiring Executive Director Claire Hayes until her successor is named, moved the garden box to the front yard (where there's actually sun most of the day), watched our son compete in his last Mock Trial competition for Dunwoody High School, sent several more checks to North Georgia College & State University for our rising Freshman, enjoyed the Student Showcase at Peachtree Charter Middle School, and wrote lots and lots and LOTS of copy for my wonderful clients.

Love writing. Love gardening. Love this beautiful, warm February week.

And now for a public service message.

Dear neighbors passing our home on the way to and from the path to Dunwoody Village:

PLEASE don't let your darlin' dog PIDDLE on my soon-to-be-planted bed of lettuces, radishes, and early peas. Yes, it's right at the edge of our yard, in tempting leash distance from your sniffing-for-a-good-spot pooch. But it's the only sunny spot in our entire yard. And I have high hopes for spring and summer crops. So please aVOID the temptation to let your dog ELIMINATE on our vegetable garden.

A Farmers Market bike - what a great birthday gift.
Thank you very much.

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood. Take a walk. Ride bikes. Explore the trails at Dunwoody Nature Center and Brook Run. Get outside and breathe. Just breathe.

Aaaaahhhhh.

Out with the new, in with the old.

2011-01-22T09:05:00.000-05:00

Georgia's state school superintendent had a press conference late Thursday where he announced his opinion that school districts should have the option of going back to traditional math. Now we wait to see if the state board concurs.

Hoo-rah.

The clunky, spiraling, grazing new math program does NOT work. Students barely grasp a new concept before they spiral away to something else. They return to that concept in another year, by which time they've forgotten how, what, and why. We've had to resort to private tutoring for our daughter, who has been a strong math student. But the spiral has caught up to her this year.

For example, her teacher spent a scant two days on intersecting slope equations. Then spent a a few more days on parallel and perpendicular equations.That's it. Time to move on. If students don't understand, it's up to them to "figure it out for yourself."

We have seen a troubling trend of poor retention of basics such as figuring percentages, remembering how to simplify fractions in multiplication and division, complete lack of understanding of negative integers, and others.

Something ain't right.

Please, please, PLEASE DeKalb Schools. Why wait for the state? Other school systems have already figured out how to dump Kathy Cox's pet math project and get back to the basics colleges expect on that almighty high school transcript. Put traditional math back into the curriculum. Read your own scores, trending quickly downward just as they are across the state. Schedule our rising Freshmen for Algebra in 9th grade, not Math 1-2-3-4-Button-My-Shoe-Close-the-Door on mastery. Imagine the challenges facing next year's graduating class, the first in a long line of guinea pigs for this experiment, who will have to explain to out of state colleges what the heck Georgia's math program means. Understand that while you're shuffling students from one facility to another, your business is education in the classroom, a fact that I fear will get lost in that shuffle.

Do it now, while high schools are building schedules for next year, so the staff doesn't have to redo those schedules again over the summer because your timing isn't reasonable.

It's broken. Fix it.

Back to school.

2011-01-18T07:43:00.000-05:00

My kids are headed back to school.

I'm glad. And sad.

Glad they can be with their friends again.

Sad to get back into the constant bombardment of school news and needs.

Glad we came through the snow uninjured and with a surprisingly clean homestead.

Sad to face the less-than-wonderful school issues that are still waiting in the wings.

Glad that middle school is nearly behind us. Very, very, VERY glad.

Sad to face the ebbs and tides of homework and project deadlines once again.

Glad the Dunwoody High School renovations are on schedule and looking really, really good for my rising freshman.

There. I ended the Glad Game on the positive side.

Rise and shine!

We DID have to stay home.

2011-01-17T17:45:00.000-05:00

A while back, I pondered "What if we had to stay home?" My thoughts elicited quite a few discussions, both virtually and personally. The recent snow storm that basically "closed" Dunwoody for a week reminded me once again how very much we are dependent upon mobility - across town/the country/the world via gas-hungry transportation, upwardly via financial American dream-weaving, and personally via I-hope-hope-hope-I-don't-slip-and-break-something.

Keeping power was a major blessing. Having unexpected time together as a family was, surprisingly, a treat. (Imagine that - my teens were quite pleasant and we enjoyed each other very much.) And keeping work on schedule via the internet was pretty darned significant to the Knitternall family budget.

I want chickens. There. I said it again. (Hello, City Council?)

Farmers feel a deep, abiding connection to land that is hard for city dwellers to understand. My ancestors came to America from Ireland after their land let them down catastrophically, during the infamous potato famine of the late 1800's. Here, they couldn't afford to purchase new land, so sank their roots into shrimp fishing and subsistence vegetable gardens in small bungalows tucked into the outskirts of whatever city they could find work in.

I'm relocating my garden to the front yard ... maybe this year, it'll have enough sunlight to look this good.

That land memory calls to me constantly. It's why I want to dig in the dirt, raise food, have chickens, do things myself, and stay home.

I saw a photo in this Sunday's New York Times Magazine insert for some luxury property on the Hudson River "just 2 hours from New York City." That estate called to me, more because of its location on the river and beautiful grounds than for the rather ridiculous size of the house (8 bedrooms and 5 baths - yikes.)

We had to stay home last week.
What a rare gift.

North Georgia College sees its share of snow - yet another reason our son is glad he's heading "north" for college.

Change is good.

2011-01-12T11:30:00.000-05:00

January 28 will be my last day at Dunwoody Nature Center.

Difficult decision. Right thing to do.

I have been blessed in so many ways during my five+-year tenure, manning the administration desk at this vibrant, essential environmental education centerpiece in Dunwoody. The executive director and board gave me free reign to develop new systems and procedures and every day brought encounters with visitors and friends coming to Dunwoody Park for hiking, walking their dogs, bringing their children to classes and camps, and volunteering. What a great job! Where else can you go to work in shorts and jeans, take a walk in the woods while you work out a solution to something, play with young children eager to explore the great outdoors, and help preserve a precious bit of greenspace in our increasingly urban community?

As the organization finalizes its strategic plan and begins some dynamic new changes, I decided it was time to turn the reins to someone else, who can be a part of those changes and help Dunwoody Nature Center evolve into something even more wonderful.

In the short term, I'll focus on freelance writing (quite a full docket for the near future) and Preschool Phonics. I'll also watch for the next opportunity, whether more freelance clients or .... who knows?

Change is good.

Top Ten Ways to Spend the First (of Many) Snow Days At Home.

2011-01-10T18:33:00.000-05:00

1. Compel son to complete scholarship applications, pleas for recommendation letters, and list of medical forms required for some of the scholarships.
2. Make daughter wear ski bibs to play in snow (glare), snow boots ("they're clunky!"), snow hat ("it's too big!"), and multiple layers underneath ("it's too hot!") everything before heading out to sled.
3. Collect wet coats, gloves, hats, undergarments and dry; repeat five times during day while teens play in snow.
4. Simmer pot of Sandy's Chowder all day and eat when hungry.
5. Prep for next five weeks of Preschool Phonics.
6. Take dog out half a dozen times to "do his business," which he keeps holding because there has to be a spot of summer natural area SOMEWHERE in the snow-covered landscape and he ISN'T GOING until he finds that nice, crunchy, aromatic magic spot.
7. Watch the guy who spun his BMW's tires so hard he caught his car on fire .... on the local news AND national news. "I couldn't figure out why they kept spinnin'." Maybe the ICE?
8. Work on an organic cotton sweater for next year's Holiday Markets.
9. Compulsively wash small loads dishes and clothes because the power is bound to go off any moment now.
10. Make pancakes and bacon for supper because it's a SNOW DAY!

A moral dilemma.

2011-01-08T09:26:00.001-05:00

You win. Someone else loses.

It's scholarship time in the Knitternall home, and each application has become a moral dilemma for our graduating senior.

"Why do you deserve this scholarship?" He looks at that question and thinks, "yeah, why do I?" Why is he more worthy than every other graduating senior who needs the money?

Our son does not have a competitive nature. He doesn't try to edge out everyone around him in pursuit of a shared objective. Instead, he worries that someone might want/need something more than he does.

In particular, the Crohn's scholarship has been a difficult one for him. "Everybody who has Crohn's deserves a scholarship," he said. "If I get it, that means someone else doesn't. And they may have worse symptoms, or their parents may not have health insurance, or they could be homeless."

We reminded him that scholarship committees see all of the applicants and their personal situations, then decide who gets how much. "It's a kind of gamesmanship - you're playing to the audience. The selection of the recipients is out of your hands." But that doesn't help. He worries, to the point that he doesn't want to apply at all. So I told him the scholarship is as much for us as him ... scholarship money is much needed in a family where medical expenses are overwhelming.

Our debate led to own moral dilemma. Why should our son be burdened by the financial cost of his disease in addition to the physical and emotional challenges he will take with him to college? Who is the beneficiary of these scholarships - our son or us? Do we ask him to be someone he isn't? And does that mean we're pushing him into ethical gray areas for our own financial benefit?

Well, yes we are. Scholarships specifically benefit the individual paying for college, whether a self-funding student like I was or the family trying to squeeze tuition out of a carefully mapped budget that unexpectedly has to include medical expenditures.

After an evening of internal debate, I told our son to be true to himself. But that we would appreciate it if he would at least find a way to ask for the scholarship without crossing his moral standards.

Yesterday, our son wrote his personal essay for the Crohn's scholarship, in his own way. He wrote that he doesn't deserve the scholarship any more than any other graduating senior. He said good grades, a full plate of extracurricular and volunteer work, and good character don't differentiate him from most of the other applicants. And he wished all the families paying for Crohn's care could benefit because all of them, including his own parents, needed the help.

He didn't pontificate, exaggerate his accomplishments, brag about his honors, or try to make himself stand out in any way.

His essay likely won't result in winning the scholarship.

But he made me feel very humble ... and proud.

Redistricting inside the lines.

2011-01-06T08:14:00.000-05:00

Consultants are everywhere. Before making a difficult (politically risky) decision, governing bodies bring in the objective expert, who researches and opines, then presents well supported recommendations that said governing bodies can then hold like a shield before constituents.

1. Consultants put together the smart-%$$ Dunwoody branding that it appears we'll have to live with until all parties feel they've gotten their money's worth.

2. Consultants have been guiding long-range planning for development of key city areas. Anyone who has been part of the sounding boards or surveys quickly figured out certain preferences by the consultants would make it into the recommendations, no matter what the survey responses might be. For example, residents said "no" to multi-storied multi-family residential development in the Dunwoody Village area. Behold, the mixed use concept advocated by the consultants in the concept stage looks like a done deal in the final recommendations. (My favorite argument: that residences should be part of the "city center." The city center is surrounded by residential neighborhoods.)

3. Consultants have told the DeKalb School Board that redistricting should include carving some neighborhoods within the city limits of Dunwoody and sending those children to schools in Chamblee. While the expected fire storm rages among elementary school parents who care much more about their children's K-5 experience than the high school that is FAR more important, this particular recommendation is just wrong. Hopefully, the Dunwoody Cluster Charter Schools effort will bring those neighborhoods back into the fold.

Strategic planning is an exhausting, somewhat surreal, and often ineffective process. Wading through everyone's opinions, trying to find consensus, putting a human face on statistics, denying facts because they don't fit someone's goals, trying to discern longrange implications of each decision, and often dismissing the resulting plan because a key decision maker decides it isn't the right direction: if you've ever been part of a strategic planning committee, you know how deeply frustrating the work can be. So I have a lot of empathy for the Dunwoody City Council, the DeKalb School Board, the Dunwoody Charter Cluster committee, and all the civic organizations I've served through the years.

There are so many strategic plans in the air right now it's hard to focus on the essentials, but focusing is imperative. Do we want multi-storied buildings looming over residential neighborhoods? Should parts of Dunwoody see their kids traveling to Chamblee for school? Will local schools actually use the freedoms and opportunities of a charter document or bow to the neverending pressure of the county administration to use its preferred curricula, textbooks, class structure, etc.? Can we get rid of Georgia's failing New Math curriculum like Fulton County and other school systems have already done? Which college (or this?) will my son choose and will he finish all of his scholarship applications in time? (Okay, that's a Knitternall family strategic plan.) How effective is a plan if there's no money to make it happen? And on and on and on.

I am grateful for people who tirelessly dig into the strategic planning process because it is an essential step in preparing for change of any kind. And I've worked with consultants who have been highly effective in guiding committees from free-for-all brainstorming to solid, well grounded goals and strategies.

Ten years from now, the political, commercial, residential, educational, and social landscape in Dunwoody will be dramatically different from what it is today. All this strategic pain will be a memory, and new residents will have no clue how much work went into the quality of life we all enjoy.

At least, that's what I hope.

Knitting mistakes.

2011-01-05T18:07:00.000-05:00

I love knitting. Really. Truly. By now, most people know I knit because I never stop knitting. In public. In the pew. In the car.

My craft has its share of knitwear that's truly visionary as well as stuff that looks like it exploded out of the acrylic yarn aisle at a long-ago-closed five-and-dime store.

And then there are the sublimely hilarious knitting projects. The ones that make me giggle. And remind me that knitting and insanity are indelibly intertwined.

Enjoy.

That's just bull.

The knitter's response to "Mom, I have to make a diorama for school."

That isn't photoshopped. Is it?

Tanks a lot.

iDesperate to own an iPhone?

Actually, it's that round metal part at the end that's cold ... not the part that's wearing a sweater.

Honey, your grandmother knitted it just for you. We'll just get a quick picture, send it to her, then hide it.

The bride's mother is a knitter. And this is the wedding of her dreams.

Nature is calling.

2011-01-02T08:02:00.000-05:00

Dunwoody Patch, a new online news source for our community, has a charming slide show in today's edition featuring Dunwoody Nature Center. (I think we need to do some refurbishing of the cap art.) It's a timely reminder that outdoor fun and learning isn't confined to warm weather. As a matter of fact, there's a new Lunch & Learn series starting this week, nature classes for little ones begin shortly, a great family event about maple trees and maple syrup weekend after next, two school groups are coming to the park this month for field trips, a brigade of volunteers will work on trail maintenance and invasives over the coming weeks, and summer camp registration begins February 1 for members. In other words, nature doesn't live by warm temperatures alone. It's alive and dynamic every month of the year. And it's free.

The best cure for cabin fever is getting outdoors, in rain gear or heavy coats if needed. I walked over to Dunwoody Park this weekend with Scooter the Wonder Dog, who found a splendid array of scents to puzzle over and a few free-ranging dogs to check out (leashes, please!). While I enjoy our urban ambles, the park is a much quieter place to exercise, so I try to include it in most of my loops. (And since I just typed the word "walk," and Scooter is somewhat psychic about the prospect of an outing, I need to go get the leash.)

Come on, Scooter. Walk!

Resolution, schmesolution

2011-01-01T14:19:00.000-05:00

I resolve not to make resolutions.

They're somewhat pointless (I'm going to do what I'm going to do, despite good intentions.)

They smack of "I don't like what/where I've been, so I'm going to do better." (I embrace the good and the bad because ... well, who's perfect?)

The ones that aren't narcississtic are too global to hold on to day by day. (Get more exercise, get organized, live more simply, finish the NY Times crossword without Google, rely less on food grown far away, do my part to help the homeless/improve living conditions in Haiti/change the local-national political scene).

So I'm not going to do it.

Instead, I welcome another year of opportunities to explore, fail, change, browse, overreact, forget, make peace, make trouble, nurture, guide, learn, laugh, love, and live.

Life comes one day at a time.

Happy New Day.

A Mother's Charge to the New Eagle Scout

2010-12-15T07:53:00.000-05:00

Adam and his Troop 764 Scoutmasters: Brian LaRose (current), Phil Cohen, Steve Barton, and Bob Smallwood (the troop's founding Scoutmaster)

Adam and his dad, both Eagle Scouts.

Our son's Eagle Court of Honor was this past weekend, held in the Chapel of St. Luke's Presbyterian Church. We were humbled by the many friends and family who traveled long distances and shared their busy weekends with us.

Adam asked me to close the ceremony with the Mother's Charge, which traditionally means poetry and tears. As an inherent stoic, I really couldn't decide what I'd say, right up to the night before the event. But, during chats with visiting friends, I finally figured it out.

And here it is ...

Seventy miles.

The Boy Scout Hiking Merit Badge requires five hikes of 10 continuous miles each.

Plus one hike of 20 continuous miles.

You had to choose hiking trails close to Atlanta. No high adventure because they’re too remote. Crohn’s meant staying close to help if needed.

I volunteered to walk those seventy miles with you. As your mom, I needed to watch over you since some of the hikes came between flare-ups.

I also wanted this time together with you, before you decided that time with me wasn’t nearly as fun as time with friends.

So we hiked. On the Big Creek Greenway, over Kennesaw Mountain, around Dunwoody, through Atlanta, and along the Cherokee Trail at Stone Mountain. Sometimes you listened to your ipod. Sometimes we walked together in silence. Most often, we talked.

Because of Crohn’s, you have to work harder to get what you want. It doesn’t matter that you don’t feel good or are weak because of your meds or can’t sleep because of a flare-up. You still have to keep moving.

You decided you wanted to be an Eagle Scout just like your Dad when you were a Tiger Scout. And you followed through, until all that lay between you and beginning your Eagle Project was seventy miles.

You never balked. You put one foot in front of the other and finished what you began.

And now you’ve reached your goal. You’ve taken the road less traveled and achieved something rare and valuable.

Adam, my charge to you is to keep moving. Never balk because something you want is hard. Life is filled with obstacles, both expected and unexpected.

You’re an Eagle Scout. And I am very proud of you.

Mailbox Brigade.

2010-12-05T16:59:00.000-05:00

My neighbors Sara, Allison, Tara, Lisa, and Sue and I put together 29 mailbox swags as part of the Mailbox Brigade benefiting Children's Healthcare of Atlanta. None of us claims to be particularly gifted with floral arrangements. We made up for our lack of expertise with a lot of enthusiasm. A little design 101, bunches of evergreens and holly berries, a huge red or blue bow for each swag, and we had 29 lovely packages to deliver to mailboxes in our neighborhood.


My frigid, messy garage became the work site. At least we were out of the wind.

Mixing fir, magnolia, boxwood, and holly takes its toll on the hands. Note Allison is wearing gloves. I didn't. Guess whose hands AREN'T cut and covered with sap.


Clumps of greens bound together and ready for installation. They don't look like much here, but check out the finished product ...


The Knitternall mailbox looks really nice. The little card says we belong to the Community Friends supporting CHOA.

Happy 18th Birthday, Adam

2010-12-02T07:45:00.002-05:00

Happy Birthday, Adam.

Your life is bookended by your passions.

From Thomas the Tank Engine to afficanado of anime, manga, and video gaming.

From Tiger to Eagle Scout.

From Dark Wing Duck to Mock Trial star.

From smocked john-johns to collector of snarky t-shirts (more than 40 and counting).

I look forward to watching you continue to grow and discover new passions as you step into adulthood.

Love, Mom.

Windfall.

2010-11-30T10:48:00.000-05:00

The Knitternall family celebrated Thanksgiving in our pajamas, slept soundly for five blessed nights, read great books, enjoyed the latest Harry Potter movie, watched schmaltzy Christmas movies on the Hallmark channel, and tackled a few too-long-delayed chores. We left the biggest job until Sunday, not because of procrastination, but because of rain. Our house was surrounded by an ocean of leaves. Maple, oak, poplar, and chestnut leaves covered the ground, sidewalk, driveway, front steps, bench, and shrub.

We filled 25 lawn bags, hauled huge piles on tarps to the back woods at least a dozen times, and finally managed to take care of the windfall.

At one point, my son asked why we couldn't just burn the leaves, which would result in far less effort and provide many opportunities for fire-poking (his favorite camping activity). Informed there's a law against that, he rolled his eyes. "There are way too many laws." Rather than embark on a parental lecture about fire hazards, pollution, and fire safety, I agreed. Because there are. Too many laws. At his age, it's not as easy to differentiate between the "good" laws and the "oh, puh-lease" laws. (Chickens come to mind.)

Actually, I'd love to burn the leaves. I have many childhood memories of my grandfather burning leaves in whichever part of the yard he planned to till for the next season's garden. He swore that the burned leaves, mixed in with the dirt, made a good garden. And since the bounty from that garden fed the entire family through the Depression and long after grandchildren joined the dinner table, it worked.

I loved the smell of burning leaves, the fun of tossing small sticks into the flames, the conversations of the adults who stood around watching it just in case, and the fun of dodging the smoke as the wind changed direction occasionally. Leaf burning was always on a still, windless day - simple common sense.

Ah, well. At least we still have a wood-burning fireplace, having resisted the installation of gas logs over the years. Thanksgiving was too warm for a good fire, but we're finally trending toward consistently cold weather. So we'll smell that cozy, wood-burning warmth very, very soon.

Gifts for the Earth at Dunwoody Nature Center

2010-11-29T17:17:00.000-05:00

Gifts for the Earth

Saturday, December 4

10 am - Noon

FREE

A Family Program Sponsored by Adrian and Brian Bonser and the Gendell Family Foundation

Turnabout is fair play: make something special for the earth that gives us so much. Create natural animal feeders and other gifts for the creatures who call Dunwoody home. Make one for Dunwoody Park and take one home to share with people you love. Walk the trails, explore the wetlands along our boardwalk, and enjoy the fall foliage from our treehouse learning pavilion.

This FREE family program is sponsored by Adrian and Brian Bonser and the Gendell Family Foundation. Marion Gendell and her late husband, Gerald Gendell, established the foundation to make philanthropic contributions supporting Jewish organizations, the arts, education and medical research. Their daughter, Adrian Bonser, continues the family’s support of education, including the environmental education programs of Dunwoody Nature Center. Councilwoman Bonser and her husband Brian chose to sponsor Gifts for the Earth because they believe in the mission of the Center and wanted to make a gift to the City of Dunwoody. As a result, there is no charge for participating in this fun family event.

Dunwoody Nature Center is located on the grounds of Dunwoody Park.

5343 Roberts Drive, Dunwoody

www.dunwoodynature.org

The giving season is here again.

2010-11-21T15:59:00.000-05:00

Light Up Dunwoody is tonight (my daughter is marching with the Peachtree Charter Middle School Band), Thanksgiving is this week, and I've filled the pantry and fridge with yummies from Trader Joe's and Publix. The frenzy of activities and preparations will subside and the Knitternall family will have some much-needed quiet time together over the four-day weekend. Since we're spending the holiday here at home, I opted for a combination of somebody-else-made-it and homemade specialties so my time in the kitchen is more fun than chore.

After many, many hours at the computer working away on my freelance writing assignments, I indulged in a knitting project for a very favorite person. It's finished, and just in time for its newborn recipient. The Upside Down Pansy Hat is definitely an "awwww" - and a very fun project to knit. (I also have a fairly unique assignment: one of the Nature Center volunteers wants an eggplant hat. Yep - eggplant. Seems there's this long tradition of giving a friend all things eggplant through the years. What a hoot.)

Once Thanksgiving concludes, I'll gear up for the following weekend, which will be a special, first-time event at Dunwoody Nature Center:

Gifts for the Earth Saturday, December 4, 10 am - Noon at Dunwoody Nature Center

A free family event sponsored by Adrian and Brian Bonser and the Gendell Family Foundation
Turnabout is fair play: make something special for the earth that gives us so much. Make natural feeders and other gifts for the creatures who call Dunwoody home. Share with people you love as gifts from you to them to the earth.

Vroom, vroom.

2010-11-14T10:10:00.001-05:00

This has been a very eventful week for the Knitternall gang ... all good.

I took Adam to Mock Trial Law Academy at UGA. As an avowed Wolfpacker, red means NC State. Having to take my kid there was downright painful. The things we do as parents ...

As for Law Academy, Adam is having a really good time. Favorite moment: last year, his competition role as Witness lead to an Outstanding Witness award when he devastated the other team's attorney. (Basically, the attorney's job is to impeach the witness; the witness' job is to stay in character, stick to the story, and mess with the cross-examining attorney.) At dinner the first night, he discovered the opposing attorney is at Law Academy, too. "You're that GUY!" As my son said, "kinda surreal, very cool."

I recently took on a new freelance writing client, who has me working 15 hours a week on a 3+ month project. So when I'm not anchoring home base at Dunwoody Nature Center or teaching Preschool Phonics, I'm writing. Whew.

Anna Grace was accepted to MidFest, the state level honor band at UGA. Yes, another kid going to Bulldog territory for a long weekend. But we didn't know she'd been nominated or placed until this week. Her band teacher decided to surprise us. Boy, did he. Big cost, big conflict. The date for the weekend? During Adam's Eagle Ceremony.

Speaking of which, I've been designing the Eagle Ceremony invitations and program and getting things ready for the big day. I need a clone!!!

T is still basking in the completion of a three-year certification (some highly specialized area of private banking equivalent to a master's degree). But, since he hopped immediately into multiple business trips, we've barely had time to celebrate.

This abundance of blessings has me somewhat bemused. The good comes like the bad, often unexpected and certainly not deserved. I'm giving myself the same advice I cling to when we weather storms: rely on faith and pay all grace forward.

Since I was neglecting my blog, I welcomed the high comedy of fellow bloggers. Dunwoody Talk has a stealth link inside an anonymous comment that had me ROTFL (kid speak - seriously, I don't text acronyms). If anyone has been paying attention to the total "fail" of Dunwoody's new branding, visit this link: http://bit.ly/bSFP51. I discovered that a little "d" with an asterisk is now the go-to logo for the city. I'm keeping an open mind. Some people love the abbreviated "insider" look (kind of like those oval beach decals that look like European city license plates - if you know what they mean, you belong). I just keep wincing.

I also got to hear a neighbor tell me one school board candidate is the best choice because the other candidate is a mommy and just doesn't have the time to invest in all the meetings and preparation and analysis needed to serve. Seriously? As a mommy who juggles three jobs, knits an embarrassing amount of yarn, is pretty involved in my kids' schools, manages one kid's chronic illness and neverending medical needs, and volunteers in several different nonprofits ... I have a feeling a mommy can multi-task and understand things just fine.

We're leaving shortly for UGA for the Law Academy's closing ceremonies. Another trip down Highway 316, the most insane drag strip I've ever had the misfortune to navigate. 65 miles per hour through stop lights and cut-throughs.

Vrooom.

The year of custom knits.

2010-11-08T08:04:00.000-05:00

I've indulged in knitting for myself this past year as I've explored some new techniques. As a result, I am well supplied for the near future with cardigans, shawls, and sweater coats.

So now this will be the year of custom knits for others. I'm designing some special things for next year's Little Saints Holiday Market at St. Luke's and knitting favorite patterns for gift-giving and charity auctions.

On my to-create list:

Baby blankets in organic cotton
Baby sweaters knitted from the softest possible cotton and blended yarns - in rich teals, browns, creams, and roses.
Baby hats that look like frogs, flower tops, bunnies, and pandas.
A new line of felted totes and bags, embellished with hand-crafted flowers and geometrics.
Knit and hand-felted elf shoes for little ones.
Shawls - from vintage lacy to edgy geometric forms.
Ruanas knit with vivid colors and textures.

Each will be one of a kind, because I like moving from one technical challenge to another. As my inventory builds, I'll post photos on this blog for inspiration and special orders.

It's winter, the season of wool and angora, soft cotton and cozy blends.

Are you a Knitternall Follower? Don't forget to click "Follow" to the right. When we reach 100, I'll give away a hand-knit lace shawl in your choice of colors!

Knit on!

A yummy reason to support Dunwoody Nature Center

2010-11-02T10:27:00.000-04:00

Join Dunwoody Nature Center Today.

"Grow" a Love of Nature for a Lifetime.

Fall 2010 Membership Drive

Join Dunwoody Nature Center by November 15 and receive a gift certificate for one regular size frozen custard at Village Burger!

The first 100 new and renewed members during our two-week on-line membership drive will receive an e-coupon to Village Burger. Simply go to www.dunwoodynature.org and click on "information on membership and Annual Fund giving" on the right-hand side.

Members Are The Roots of Our Mission

... and Growth.

Your membership benefits include discounts on programs and early camp registration ... as well as the intangible (and priceless) knowledge that you are helping to ensure that this greenspace and these quality programs continue to thrive.

We receive no government funding, other than the City's payment of certain utilities and maintenance services. Your support is critical to keeping the lights on, paying our wonderful environmental educators and continuing to provide excellent community programs.

I'm already a member. How else can I help?

If you are already a member or sponsor, Thank You! Please forward this message to friends and neighbors to help us spread the word about our membership drive.

There are other ways you can help. Volunteer at Dunwoody Nature Center, helping us with park and trail improvements, special events, and our never-ending "to do" list. You can also contribute to the Annual Fund with an online payment. Any amount is much appreciated and well invested.

We cannot accomplish this alone. Members make it possible ... and fun ... to fulfill our mission: "to preserve and manage the natural environment and related facilities of Dunwoody Park and to foster the enjoyment and appreciation of nature through environmental education and outreach programs."

Thanks for your support!

Thanks to Village Burger of Dunwoody for their generous support of our Fall 2010 membership drive.

Dunwoody Nature Center is located on the grounds of Dunwoody Park, 5343 Roberts Drive; Dunwoody, GA 30338. Our mailing address is P. O. Box 88070; Dunwoody, GA 30356. For more information, please contact Claire Waggenspack Hayes, Executive Director, at 770-394-3322 or claire@dunwoodynature.org.

Dunwoody Nature Center is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization.

I hate robo calls.

2010-10-31T19:43:00.000-04:00

Dear Candidate for (Fill in the Blank):

I hate your automated phone calls.

I am not influenced by your friend, party associate, or name-in-the-headlines endorsement of your candidacy.

I decided quite awhile ago whom I would vote for, from our state governor to our local school board representative.

Nonetheless, in the past two weeks, our family has received 52+/- robo calls for various political candidates.

We're on the "do not call" list, but evidently that doesn't prevent this constant bombardment by office wannabes.

For anyone else, this would be a form of cyber-stalking.

But it's political season. So you are allowed to interrupt our homework time, dinner hour, and bedtime rituals with your incessant, loud, insistent pleas to VOTE FOR fill in the blank.

Please go away.

Christmas knitting.

2010-10-28T17:11:00.000-04:00

For the past five years, I've knitted dishcloths for my kids' teachers and presented a set of three with some handmade soap during the holidays.

Why dishcloths?

They're fun to knit.
The cotton yarn makes a sturdy, mildew-resistant, longlasting dishcloth.
I get to play with patterns: Ballband and Chinese Waves, Waffle and Checkerboard, Grandma's Favorite and Tweed, Circles and Lineoleum.
They're gender-neutral - everyone can use a dishcloth (or three).
They're practical AND unique.

The teens have a total of 12 teachers between them. The volume of knitting will go down next year because my oldest heads to college (I don't think college professors are expecting gifts from parents). I'll actually miss the lengthy giving list because that'll be another door closed on my kids' childhood.

I'm nearly finished with the teachers' sets. Next, I want to knit some for hostess gifts and just-in-case giving.

And a few more for myself. My last batch, knitted a few years ago, is finally showing some wear.

Knitternall 100 Giveaway Reminder: When my "followers" total 100, I'll give away a hand knit lace shawl in your choice of colors to one chosen at random! (The pattern is Haruni by Emily Ross.)

Happy knitting!

Holiday Shopping at St. Luke's!

2010-10-25T16:17:00.000-04:00

Knitternall is also Shoppernall during the pre-holiday season. Between knitting gifts and finding special things for dear ones, this is a really fun time of year.

I highly recommend one of my favorite venues: St. Luke's Presbyterian Church Preschool (aka Little Saints) has an annual Shopping Spree that is a high quality, easy to navigate experience.

Stop by:

Wednesday, November 3, 9 am - 1 pm and 5-8pm
Thursday, November 4, 9 am - 1 pm

St. Luke's is located at 1978 Mt. Vernon Road in Dunwoody.

Dunwoody - the Discount City?

2010-10-24T11:33:00.000-04:00

When I saw this yesterday:

I immediately thought of this:

I have worked on many, many branding campaigns, so I fully appreciate the challenge and inherent risks in creating a position from scratch. It's impossible to please everyone and sometimes ideas get watered down in committee because of some mythical concept of consensus or everyone is so darned tired of debating and pontificating that the loudest voice wins.

I love Dunwoody because of the people who are Dunwoody. I want to love the logo because I know a lot of people worked hard on it.

But I can't.

The logo and tagline do not express the dynamic that is Dunwoody.

If we're so smart, why are we so derivative?

Dunwoody Music Festival

2010-10-22T08:38:00.000-04:00

What do John Coltrane, Oscar Peterson, Pat Metheny, and a bunch of middle school students have in common?

Jazz.

Many of today's top jazz musicians played their first notes in school bands and orchestras.

Saturday morning, at 10:00 am on the Brook Run Stage, Peachtree Charter Middle School's Blue Shadow jazz band and percussion ensemble will perform in two separate sets. The kids have been practicing many new pieces, including improv parts by several soloists, and their new shirts look spiffy.

It's going to be another great day in Dunwoody ... and another reason I'm so glad to call this wonderful town "home."

Team of the Week?

2010-10-19T08:24:00.000-04:00

Dunwoody High School is in the running to be Fox 5's Team of the Week. Which means legions of students, parents, and friends in the community are perched on the Fox 5 website, clicking DHS Wildcats and entering the "gotcha" code.

I'm one of them!

When I'm on hold, I'm punching in numbers.

While I wait for the dryer cycle to end, I enter a few more votes.

Just before I head to work ... a few more votes. I had the personal satisfaction of watching the counter click past 19,000 votes this morning. Since each time I vote the counter ratches up a few more notches, I know someone else is doing the same thing.

Come on, Dunwoody ... this is OUR high school. Root, root, root for the home team!

Constant Contact Is Giving Me a Constant Headache.

2010-10-17T12:19:00.000-04:00

I know just enough about email template programs to know that the background html code can be a pain in the watoosie. My current battle with Peachtree Middle School's enews has me pulling my hair and grinding my teeth. The input, preview, and test email all look PERFECT. Then, when it hits the e-waves to the 950 or so school subscribers, the copy is BLUE.

CAROLINA blue!

Constant Contact is a constant pain. The blue copy is just part of it. CC no longer likes my preferred Firefox browser, so I have to use Internet Explorer, and the page jiggles maniacally every time I enter something in the main copy block.

I thought technology was supposed to make us work faster, smarter, better. Not. Instead of technology serving us, we are serving technology. We have to contort our brains and work patterns to fit the paradigm of whatever technology we're using.

Need to pay the government a quarterly tax? Maybe QuickBooks will be right. Or maybe you'll pay a penalty to the IRS because the report QuickBooks prepared and you sent with your check is a few dollars off, despite faithfully downloading and reviewing every update.

Want to work on an Excel spreadsheet after MicroSoft's latest update? Good luck finding all the drop-downs you had memorized over the past couple of years since the last update.

Trying to copy and paste some text from an email into a web page? Don't forget to use that handy-dandy eraser icon for deleting the formatting because there's a lot of hidden stuff that's going to blow things up as soon as you upload your website.

Prompted to change a password? The security protocol says you have to use a number, symbol, upper and lower case letters, and snap your fingers in quarter time to hit the magic "strong" marker.

This is why some people get to the point of saying "Stop. I am no longer going to be a hostage to the ever-changing whims and quick-click developments of the technology trend du jour. I am tired of doing tutorials that don't actually tutor. I am frustrated by user forums that are more snark than smart. I am going to stick with what works." Except that, a few Internet Explorer updates later, your computer no longer speaks to the internet.

I'm a writer, not an IT guru. But the virtual workplace forces me to get just enough expertise to navigate clients' websites, eLance's complicated workroom set-up, DreamWeaver and PhotoShop for the Nature Center, as well as the entire MicroSoft Office suite of headaches.

I am not at peace with my technology. I need to dig in the dirt. And do some baking. And sew the aprons I'm making for Christmas gifts. In other words, I need to use the hand skills God gave us to survive and thrive.

Thank you for reading this rant. Now go outside and enjoy this splendid day!

Knitternall in the Park in the Dark

2010-10-16T11:51:00.000-04:00

I'm shepherding Dunwoody Nature Center's Whooooo's in the Park after Dark? Chattahoochee Nature Center is bringing two raptors, we'll have some fun crafts for the kiddies and hot chocolate for everyone. Come on ... and bring your flashlight!

Whooooooooooo's
in the Park in the Dark?
Saturday, October 16
6:30 - 8:30 PM

DNC Members $3; General Public $5

Spend an evening in the park as darkness falls and the sounds of night-time nature abound. Enjoy animal presentations of birds of prey and a hike to listen for owls calling. Which owl says "Who cooks for you?" Which little owl makes a tiny whistling noise? Make some crafts, see the world through owl eyes, and dissect owl pellets. Stay for refreshments as the stars come out! Fees are per person. Cash only; no will call available for this event.

Don't forget the Knitternall 100 Giveaway: When my "followers" total 100, I'll give away a hand knit lace shawl in your choice of colors to one chosen at random! (The pattern is Haruni by Emily Ross.) I'll cast on as soon as I contact the winner and we discuss the options.

Phonics Phunnies.

2010-10-12T16:42:00.000-04:00

My Preschool Phonics classes are well underway. The children are settled into class routines, I've figured out each one's learning style and quirks, and we've jumped gleefully into blending sounds into words.

I begin each year believing that, having taught this program for more than six years, I've seen and heard everything.

Like do I live at Dunwoody Nature Center? (Feels that way sometimes.) Are my children actually Phonics Friends who decided to stay with me because they love, love, love Phonics? (I said yes.) And the fact that there's one child, every single year, who likes to put EVERYTHING in his mouth (I've had to retrieve letter magnets, pencil erasers, puzzle pieces, notes to parents, and a hot dot pen from various little mouths through the years.)

Turns out I can still be surprised.

I did not think that a lanyard holding a name tag could become a chew toy. I have some powerful chewers this year.

"Can I use the bathroom outside? Did you know you can pee on a tree?" Well, yes I did. But I encouraged the little scholar to use the regular bathroom instead. (I also noted that /pee/ and /tree/ rhyme. I never miss a teachable moment.)

"Look!" I looked. At the same time one of my students was successfully matching rhyming word pictures, his "free" hand was stuck firmly up his nose. "Honey, let's not pick noses in class. And you need to wash your hands." "Why?"

I taught the children the Little Red Wagon chant (You can't ride in my little red wagon! The front wheel's broken and the axle's draggin! Chugga, chugga, chugga chugga chugga!) It's a great wiggle-soother. I forgot that preschoolers can't say "axle" very well. So, loud and clear across Dunwoody Park came one little darlin's rendition: "The front seat's broken and the a (double s) is draggin!" I am proud of myself for not falling apart in giggles right in the middle of the lesson.

"Mrs. Nall, we're late because the back-berry kept talking." Mom blushed and I chuckled. "My phone does that too, sometimes."

Keep 'em coming, kids!

The Knitternall 100 Giveaway

2010-10-10T10:14:00.001-04:00

Musings during a splendid Sunday morning in Dunwoody ...

My friend Kathie at A Few Good Pieces had a great idea: a giveaway to mark the 200th follower of her blog. I forgot to add the "follower button" in the early years, mainly because I was still a bit tentative about exploring this virtual community. I am grateful for the more than 170,000 (and counting) hits my blog has received in the past few years. Now I'd like to pay homage to my regular visitors. When my "followers" total 100, I'll give away a hand knit lace shawl in your choice of colors to one chosen at random! (The pattern is Haruni by Emily Ross.) I'll cast on as soon as I contact the winner and we discuss the options.

While this began as purely a knitting blog, my postings have evolved into a "slice of Knitternall life" in Dunwoody. I am blessed to live in this town, among caring friends, a dynamic church family, and with people who give so generously and selflessly of their time to make Dunwoody truly special.

Knitting is still what I do. All the time, according to friends and family. But that can't be true since I'm usually juggling the parent thing, myriad writing assignments, volunteer jobs, and the Nature Center. Yet, when I count how much I've knitted this year, I'm either knitting in my sleep or way more produtive than I thought.

Village Burger has become our go-to place for a quick, tasty bite or just some dessert. It's in walking distance of the Knitternall house. My favorite time there is in the evening, while fall is cooling the breeze and scores of friends and friendly faces are lining up for their House Burgers, Char Dogs, and Concrete Cones. It's becoming a barometer for when things end ... plays, games, schools closed because of a water shortage: drive by VB and watch the crowd surge.

"Celebrate all you have achieved." That's what the studio portrait package says. We have to order our son's senior portraits TODAY or miss the deadline for yearbook. I've dithered because the cost is unbelievable. The studio has rigged the packages so that, in order to get just an 11x14 and a few extras for friends and family, you'll spend close to $350. For another hundred dollars, you can get 107 prints (count 'em) plus a CD so you can print out even more. Really? Sticker shock is putting it mildly. And this comes right after hefty checks for yearbooks, "required school fees and supplies," two major car repairs, and just before oldest teen sends in his college applications (and we anticipate that first tuition bill.) Do I put my philosophical foot down, say "enough," and order a la carte just the 6 prints I want (one of his formal senior portrait and three black and white casual photos)? for $200 (wince)? Or do we buy into the insanity?

My yard died. The long summer heat won. Back to the shovel and rake over the next four weeks as I plant optimism for next spring.

Blessings to everyone who visits here. Your comments and insights are always welcome!

Write stuff.

2010-10-06T16:23:00.000-04:00

I just returned from a teacher conference. Conference subject: writing. Not the mechanics ... the content. It's a big leap from writing a paragraph on some random topic to writing with depth and focus. My daughter is a very strong student who loves to learn. Now, hopefully, she understands the difference between narrative and expository writing.

My kids have watched me write their entire lives. From the day each came home from the hospital, I've freelanced, writing copy around Mother's Morning Out and nap time, before and after ballet recitals and band concerts, and long after they've gone to bed. Now that they're older, my writing time is more seamless and focused. I can actually write for hours at a time, without interruption. Bliss.

I don't know if they got the writing gene from me or if it's a bit of osmosis, but they're both really strong writers. Their "voices" are idiosyncratic and very much different from mine. I love reading their work and take great care not to offer an opinion beyond a few pointers about mechanics and transitions.

Today, I'm starting a long-term project for one of my favorite clients (we've been together "virtually" for more than a decade) and a one-off video voiceover for an organic grocery in New York that DELIVERS ORGANIC FOOD AND GOODS TO YOUR DOOR. Since I am still mourning the demise of WebVan, this assignment compounds my longing for home delivery.

My freelance cup runneth over.

I love writing. One day it's framing products and a speech for Miss Virginia, the next it's furniture and organics. How cool is that? The range of topics and media keeps me on my toes and writer's block at bay. (Writing for Dunwoody Nature Center is a little bit of pay-it-forward I always enjoy.)

The only downside for my family is that I go completely into the writing zone when I'm working. I don't hear, see, or talk coherently until I finish for the day. Or night. So they can stand right beside my chair, tell me something very, very important, and I have absolutely no clue what they said. Or that they're even there. I think the ability to tune out distractions is a gift. My family calls it annoying.

Ah, well.

Back to work.

Snakes Alive!

2010-10-04T11:13:00.001-04:00

Snakes Alive!

Saturday, October 9

11:00 - 4:00 PM

DNC Members $8; General Public $10

Drop by to visit reptile expert Connie Haynes of Nature Corners to discuss the amazing characteristics of snakes. Examine artifacts and exhibits of live snakes and see a snake up close as it moves on the ground. Explore the habits of snakes, their eating patterns, and natural history. Native and exotic snakes will be available to observe and touch. (Venomous snakes will not be present, though will be discussed. All of Connie's animals are rescued or rehabilitated.) Purchase tickets for will call or pay cash during the event.

Dunwoody Nature Center is located on the grounds of Dunwoody Park, 5343 Roberts Drive in Dunwoody. The nonprofit organization's mission is to preserve and manage the natural environment and related facilities of Dunwoody Park and to foster the enjoyment and appreciation of nature through environmental education and outreach programs.

The things we do for our kids.

2010-09-30T08:03:00.000-04:00

The older I get, the more I can cross off my "been there, done that" bucket list.

Married with kids. Check.

Navigated the subway system and enjoyed New York like a native. Check.

Explored the backroads of England and enjoyed some real pub food. Check.

Published in a wide range of media, including magazines and websites. Check.

Conquered lace knitting. Check.

Check. Check. Check.

There's another list. The one that itemizes all the things I sincerely do not enjoy, but do anyway because my family needs me to do them.

Camped. I hate tent camping. I hate platform tent camping. I loathe "under the stars" camping.

Slept in a bunk bed. For a week. In 90 degree heat (at night) and using a bathhouse that stunk worse than the open sewer ditches on Okinawa (there's a memory).

Hiked a total of 70 miles with my son during one of his merit badge challenges.

Dressed up for countless office parties. (I hate to dress up.)

Waded into countless battles with teachers. Usually the same teachers. (I'm a teacher. Most of my kids' teachers are superlative. But the few who are disorganized and cranky with kids are high-maintenance challenges.)

Coached and served as team parent for countless sports, academic, and competition teams. There's just not enough time in the day most weeks.

Did the chores: cleaning, laundry, dishes. I like a clean house, but I hate cleaning it. Quite a paradox.

Check. And doublecheck.

Thing is, there isn't a single thing on the second list that I regret having to do. Because it's a privilege to be with my family and a blessing to serve their needs.

Uh, oh. Both of my kids just signed up for something new.

What am I in for now?

Bad bunny.

2010-09-29T07:54:00.000-04:00

I'm researching rabbit prevention.

Not for the cute little bunnies that hop along Dunwoody Park's woods each spring.

Nor the big ones that streak across the road early in the morning as I wind my way through Wytercreek and Roberts Drive.

The ones that eat the garden. Blast it.

My perspective on Peter Rabbit has changed completely. Now I understand how very frustrated the farmer must have been. Every single vegetable we plant at the Nature Center becomes a feast for roving bunnies. I caught them at it one day, so there's no doubt they're the prime culprit.

I'm determined to turn things around next spring with a low cost, easy to shift enclosure for the garden. I want to use materials we already have in hand because that's our way (reuse and recycle).

There are lots of ideas in virtual gardener land. But I'd love to hear what works here in Dunwoody.

Ideas very much welcome.

Hello, Dali.

2010-09-25T08:20:00.000-04:00

The girls are heading to the High Museum. We'll lunch at Village Burger (our first visit!), grab Marta to the Arts Center Station, and enjoy the Dali exhibit together. This special Saturday comes courtesy of Aha! Connection, which alerted me to the free museum tickets available through the Smithsonian. I love a deal, I enjoy the High ... voila!

I admit that surrealism is not my artistic cup of tea. And Dali's self-indulgent and highly expressive mustache is distracting. Perhaps the High's instructive dialogue accompanying the exhibit will illuminate the art and help me appreciate it beyond the visual chaos.

Bookending our day is a stop by a Girl Scout garage sale fundraiser and my daughter's highly anticipated opportunity to play with the Dunwoody High School marching band at tonight's football game. (She had to recruit her brother to take a babysitting assignment she'd already committed to before the band gig came along. He's quite a good sport - he said he'd cover for her. The parents said yes, and all's well in her world.)

The house is clean, the laundry's put away, the guys have their own stuff todo today, and it's time to head out.

Hello, Dali!

I am not married to Karl Rove.

2010-09-23T07:38:00.000-04:00

Despite appearances to the contrary, I am not married to Karl Rove.

In the past five years, T has been offered a first class seat ("hey, I know you - you shouldn't sit back there! let's trade seats!"), asked how it is to ride on Air Force One while watching it land ("Ma'am, if I were who you think I am, I'd be on that plane, not standing here."), given countless handshakes ("You're doing a great job!"), had some fairly priceless doubletakes (to the point of folks nearly tripping and falling) ... because he looks a whole lot like Karl Rove.

You decide.

Life In Dunwoody.

2010-09-22T08:04:00.000-04:00

For a town of 30,000+ people, this sure is a small world. I was chatting with several parents at Monday evening's Dunwoody High School PTSO meeting and one mentioned that, in one week's time, she interacted with me as a Scout parent, Dunwoody Nature Center staffer, DHS parent, and blogger. Other than the DHS parent thing, each contact was an "a ha!" moment. "Where are you NOT?"

It isn't that I'm omnipresent (though I like my kids to think so). It's just that so much is interconnected in Dunwoody. Church friends, knitting friends, fellow volunteers in the schools, volleyball parents, Preschool Phonics families, weekly breakfast diners at Hickory House, dog owners at the Bark Park, thrift store treasure hunters, fellow walkers, Scout parents, visitors to Dunwoody Nature Center ... the Venn diagrams of our relationships are constantly overlapping and rerouting. (T has even run into Dunwoody connections on flights throughout the country.)

And that's what makes life in Dunwoody so very special. We get to enjoy a small town sensibility, yet can drive just a few more miles away to get a big city perspective. Lunch at Village Burger in town can preceed a visit to the High Museum in downtown Atlanta (which is what my daughter and I will do Saturday, thanks to the Smithsonian's free museum weekend).

Life (in Dunwoody) Is Good.

Watch your tone.

2010-09-18T10:24:00.001-04:00

The rich inflections added to any statement can change everything. A simple "yes" becomes condescending, sarcastic, funny, desolate, worried, elated ... it's all in the tone.

I've been called to task a few times about the "tone" of my emails. I'm always juggling multiple projects at work as well as family needs, so I get to the point, pretty much writing the way I speak. The problem is, an email doesn't transmit inflections. So while I'm thinking, "how are we doing?," as I email "what's the status of xx, xx, and xx?" the reader may "hear" a patronizing, "Are you doing your job?"

It's all very frustrating. Then I either have to send a placating email (you're doing fine, I just wanted to know how we're doing) or pick up the phone to offer a verbal mea culpa. I have to remember to add warm fuzzies to emails for those who need them, and stick to the facts for those who just want to get down to business. Confuse the two and you get equally emotional responses. ("Don't be so short!" "Don't waste my time!") Worse, chronicly touchy people slow down projects and add so much complexity to what are often already difficult parameters.

Maybe I should start using those yucky emoticons.

A telephone call is better in delicate situations because you can control the tone and delivery of your message. But that's not how we communicate these days. Phone calls are time-consuming. Send an email, move on to something else, and come back when you get an answer. Voila!

Blackberries and Iphones are notorious for bluntness. You can only thumb-key so many letters and symbols on those tiny devices. I don't own either, but lots of people email me that way. I'm fine with it - I love the brevity of a keyed "yes" or "approved" to a straightforward question. But I also know that some people hate the terse emails, particularly when they don't include the text of the email they're responding to.

The nature of my work, both paid and volunteer, is coaxing disparate personalities to work together, guiding them without leading them and staying on schedule rather than veering off into emotional turbulence. I also have to read and send close to a hundred emails each day. It isn't easy.

So I'll watch my tone.

Okay, I'll try to watch my tone.

Nah - I'll probably do it again.

Will a pre-emptive mea culpa in my signature work?

Sigh. Probably not.

Respite.

2010-09-15T08:44:00.000-04:00

When the phones are ringing nonstop, when doing many things at one time means nothing is getting done completely, when I need a few moments to unwind ... I take a few minutes "off" from work with a walk through the park and into the treehouse over the wetlands.

Fresh air, soothing sounds, and glimpses of nature at work: the best cure for a hectic day is time spent outdoors.

All better now.

"My dad is an Eagle Scout. I want to be an Eagle Scout, too."

2010-09-13T19:51:00.002-04:00

"Never, never, never give up!"

~ Winston Churchill

From eleven-year-old first-year Boy Scout to Eagle Scout ...

Adam, Chris B, Jeremy C, and Jeffrey H

Adam presents his Eagle Project to Children's Healthcare of Atlanta/Scottish Rite - 26 handheld game systems and more than a hundred games for bed-bound pediatric patients.

With the blessing of the National Boy Scout Council, this chapter will close and another will open.

I'm very, very proud of you, Adam.

Love, Mom.

Radio wars.

2010-09-12T09:42:00.000-04:00

I have always enjoyed music. From Led Zeppelin and Nickleback to Norah Jones and Nat King Cole, my taste is eclectic, mood-oriented, and, thanks to iTunes, always available. I like to plug in my iPod to the computer speakers, turn up the volume, and rock away while I do chores, cook dinner, or work on a project. (An iHome is on my Christmas wish list.)

Yet, now as I do the mom thing and drive my daughter from one thing to another, she and I are fighting over the Odyssey's radio. She wants to listen to pop music, flipping back and forth among her favorite three stations; I want to leave it tuned to public radio. (If I hear about daisy dukes and a bikini top one more time, I'll scream.) My daughter thinks it's hilarious; I'm wincing inside because I sound just like the cliched old mom. Sometimes, I let her choose. Most of the time, I say, "my car, my station."

Fact is, I don't think much of current music. There are a few here and there I like, but the preponderence of sexual and violent innuendo and cultural language just leaves me cold. Give me a hard-driving guitar riff or delicate cello concerto any time.

Yeah, the generation thing has happened. I'm old school, my kid has her finger on the next hot song.

Let the peace negotiations begin.

Afraid of the outdoors.

2010-09-08T07:16:00.000-04:00

It happens nearly every time a class comes to Dunwoody Nature Center: there are children afraid of bees and yellow jackets, worried that snakes lurk everywhere, startled by the wind, and anxious about all the open space. They're afraid of the outdoors.

In the past five years, we've cut the time we spend outdoors in half. More and more children are more comfortable indoors, with their electronic games and wired entertainment. Adults move from temperature-controlled home to car to work and back again. Every moment of the day is scheduled, structured, and stressful.

What are we doing to ourselves?

Teach one child to love nature and you nurture a life of self-sufficiency and creativity. Teach a class to appreciate the natural beauty around them and you develop a generation that enjoys and appreciates the outdoors.

Dunwoody Nature Center is beginning its Fall Annual Campaign. Its environmental education programs are funded entirely by memberships, generous donors, and program fees.

If you haven't visited Dunwoody Nature Center lately (or ever), take a walk in the park. Enjoy the splashing creek. Perch along the railing of the treehouse pavilion for a tree-high view of what's happening in the wetlands. Share a picnic in the fresh open air.

And consider supporting this Dunwoody gem with a contribution to the Annual Fund. You can do it easily: just visit www.dunwoodynature.org and click "Donate Now." Every dollar helps ensure that one more child discovers the joy of playing outside.

Will it be your child?

We're going to be alarmed.

2010-09-01T07:50:00.000-04:00

One of my favorite brit-coms, Keeping Up Appearances, has a by-now classic episode where Richard forgets Hyacinth's birthday and covers by telling her he's having an alarm system installed to protect her hand-painted china and knick-knacks. Hyacinth swoons in pleasure. At last, the world will know that she is a person of importance. "Elizabeth," she proclaims to her neighbor. "We're going to be alarmed!"

Lovely double entendre.

Anticipation and worry go hand in hand. Does he like me? Will that present contain the single most important thing on the wish list? Will a long-awaited job promotion (and raise) happen this year? Will my child get into the college he wants? Will there be a cure? Will she win?

When we really, really, really want something, our desire can be all-consuming. Then, if we attain that desire, we're worried that it won't be what we expected, or that we'll lose it, or that it won't last.

Maybe that's why there are so many platitudes and sermons about wishes for fishes and sour grapes and you don't always get what you want and be careful what you ask for.

Take college. On one hand, we're delighted that our son has risen to the ranks of high school seniors, a loooooonnnnng school odyssey that culminates in the almighty college acceptance letter (oh, we do hope). On the other hand, we worry about the costs, the belief that there isn't an alarm clock in the world he can hear, and the extraordinary challenges he will face in handling his medical disabilities without us around.

We're going to be alarmed.

A surplus of crowding.

2010-08-30T07:43:00.000-04:00

DeKalb schools report $40 million surplus in construction funds

How about renovating or rebuilding the Shallowford School location to ease the overcrowded classrooms in Dunwoody?

Just sayin'.

Squirrel!

2010-08-29T08:44:00.001-04:00

Scooter the Wonder Dog is a connosieur of squirrels. He sniffs their trails, observes and reports their presence with loud joy, and demonstrates a variety of track and capture techniques ... so far in vain.

He's also the Forrest Gump of dogs. Stupid is as stupid does.

The guys were in the sunroom this morning, enjoying breakfast and Dick Williams' Sunday morning news show. Suddenly, a squirrel appeared on the railing just outside the window. "Scooter! Squirrel!"

Scooter ran to the sunroom, having heard "food" instead of "squirrel." He sat at attention, staring at their plates.

"No, Scooter. Squirrel!" They pointed. His focus on their plates never wavered.

"Mom! There's a squirrel outside and Scooter can't see it."

So, wanting to give the dog an opportunity to bark insanely, I picked up Scooter, turned him to face the blasted squirrel, and said, "Squirrel!"

He looked lovingly up at my face.

"Squirrel! (blasted dog) You love squirrels!"

He squirmed.

I put him down, he ran toward the window outside which the now laughing squirrel perched, did a quick 180, and returned to his post facing the guys and their plates. At this point, the squirrel fell off the railing, in hysterics and eager to post Scooter's embarrassing lack of canine instinct on Squirrel-tube.

Stupid dog.

Lesson: your dog may be madly, passionately, over the top obsessed with squirrels.

But food always comes first.

Are you reading this?

2010-08-28T08:38:00.000-04:00

This year, after stepping down from Peachtree Charter Middle School's executive council, I am preparing and sending the school's weekly enews. It's amazing how much the enews has improved communications for parents. Now we don't have to rely on flyers stuffed at the bottom of backpacks, garbled translations of something heard on the PA system, and same-day "oh, yeah, I have a project/test/teacher's note to meet you today."

Interesting fact: there are approximately 962 subscribers to the PCMS E-news. Each week, I get a report that approximately 423 have opened their emails.

Perhaps some are using their email preview screen to scroll down, so their reading doesn't register as an open.

But that's a very high percentage of families who subscribe, but don't read the news.

I've been thinking about some of the enews that are in my inbox right now:

Dunwoody High School's e-news.
St. Luke's Highlights, our church's weekly news.
Atlanta Knitting Guild's monthly newsletter
Daily update from eLance, for freelance copywriting assignments
Jim Walls' Breaking News
Aha! Connection
Groupon offerings
Spruill Center art classes
Chattahoochee Handweavers Guild classes and news

Will I read each of them fully? Okay, likely not. I just don't have the time (or desire) to sit at my computer monitor the time it would take to read everything.

Just as television news has resorted to the "bits and pieces" approach because the audience is overwhelmed by a cacophony of messages, I believe we'll see an evolution of enews as well.

If I have to scroll past the preview window, I have to be invested in the sender. If there are repeated messages, news about something too far out to worry about at the moment, I'm likely to be more dismissive.

So as an originator of electronic news and a reader, I'm of two minds about that statistic for PCMS' readership.

What can we do to make the news important enough for families to read it?

Are we giving them too much information?

It's a quandary.

What am I missing here?

2010-08-27T07:33:00.000-04:00

I react emotionally to a lot of things. T likes to study, think, and reflect before he reacts. Somehow we arrive on the same page most of the time.

This morning, I saw the following headline on the AJC's web front page:

Child in hospital; mom may be sent home
Barbados woman's visa extension denied; daughter, 7, treated for cancer.

Evidently Mom applied for two extensions to their visas; daughter's was approved, hers was denied. She must return to Barbados, without her daughter, by next Thursday.

Just reading that headline sent shivers down my spine. I cannot imagine leaving a child alone in a hospital, even one as stellar as Scottish Rite. And this child is anxious, ill, and in total isolation while undergoing treatment for neuroblastoma in the AFLAC cancer unit.

Sadly, it happens. When our son was there (multiple times), there were often children crying alone and inconsolable, no loved one in sight. The nurses are caring, but harried, and certainly could not sit bedside for hours, stroking arms, rubbing the restless out of legs, and giving careful hugs around medical lines and gauges.

Further reading of the article reveals puzzlement by the Scottish Rite social worker who helped mom apply for the extension and the Immigration service spokesperson, as well as Mom herself.

Gooding has been separated from a husband and 2-year-old son during the ordeal. She has assured immigration officials she isn't trying stay in the U.S.

"My life is there," she said. "The one thing driving Niamh through this whole treatment is, ‘are we closer to getting back home?'"

Is there a "rest of the story," as T often tells me? Is Mom wanted for something, or has Homeland Security redflagged her for some reason? Will we discover in the next few days that the story was "spun" to tweak our empathy?

I've decided that I don't care. That little girl needs her mom with her.

I pray that common sense rather than red tape prevails here.

Max headroom.

2010-08-26T08:09:00.000-04:00

Duck!

You're doing your day, taking care of the to-do list, and just when you think you have it all under control - whack! Something unexpected hits you.

I've been planning six different special events and discovered that some very critical information was not shared in the beginning. Which means starting over and changing several of the plans. I don't like do-overs. I like to gather facts, plan ahead, anticipate every possible contingency, leave room for changes and mistakes, and finish early. (I overprepare all the time.)

Major segue alert: the blog post title reminded me of something.

Does anyone remember Max Headroom? He had a brief life in the 1980's. Essentially, he offered a cautionary warning about the way television and big corporations could take over our culture ... and our thoughts and our lives. Rather prescient, as it turns out, since what we think too often comes at the speed of the internet and the spin masters.

Okay, back to getting blindsided.

My takeaway from having to re-do something as important as a special event is that I need to factor a do-over in my timelines. But is planning for trouble a self-fulfilling prophecy?

Hmmmm.

As I recall ...

2010-08-25T07:53:00.000-04:00

I don't remember a single time in my childhood when there was a FOOD recall. The one time I got sick was after a meal at McDonald's, when the backdoor word-of-mouth mom network figured out that everyone who'd eaten at there one day had gotten sick, too. (Without the internet, they talked directly to each other, playing a variation of the telephone game until everyone around the block knew the news.)

Now I look at our food with great suspicion. We buy primarily organic vegetables, fruit, and meat, and from providers as close by as possible, so I'm somewhat more comfortable with the safety of what we're eating. Nonetheless, the latest ground beef, egg and deli meat recalls had me opening the refrigerator and checking "just in case." (No problem - all's well.)

Since we have Crohn's in the house, we are vigilant about food quality. There's no way to tell the difference between food poisoning and the beginnings of a perforated digestive tract, so we must treat both with the same urgency. Yet we don't want to be paranoid. We eat out in restaurants, our oldest teen is very fond of bake sales and pizza sold by the slice for fundraisers at school, and our peanut butter comes from the plant in Georgia that had its own recall fairly recently. (At this point, it's likely the safest peanut butter place around.)

I know food quality concerns isn't a new thing. Ever since more of us began living in cities rather than on the farm, food has gone through many hands before landing on our dinner tables. In the early 1900's, particularly in the Lower East Side tenement neighborhoods, not only was milk not pasturized and likely to spoil very quickly, some dairy farmers watered it down, added a white powder to make the resulting liquid look normal, and ended up causing many, many deaths.

Food recalls. It's always something.

Getting around is even better now.

2010-08-24T08:00:00.000-04:00

Progress.

Some of the nicest work crews I've ever encountered are wrapping up the paving of Vernon North Drive. Truck drivers smile and wave, different workers have been available to direct residents around the heavy equipment, huge machines have actually STOPPED to let us pass ... in all, it's been an amazing sight. Allied Paving has made lemonade out of inconvenience, so not only do we get a very nice road, we've also enjoyed a series of pleasant encounters with their crews. (Of course, all that heavy equipment has been sheer heaven for the neighborhood children. I even saw two sitting in lawn chairs perched curbside so they could get the closest possible view of the massive rolling machine moving back and forth over the hot pavement.)

Now that the weather is just a bit more tolerable, AG and I have been walking again. We discovered that the crosswalk on Mt. Vernon Road between Dunwoody Village and what we call "the Chic Fil A shopping center" is now very visibly marked. Cars actually stop! Pedestrians push a button and yellow lights flash on both sides of the road. What a very welcome change to "dodge car." We also walked the block around the library and up Vermack - no overhanging branches and shrubs!

So here's to you, City of Dunwoody. Great choice with Allied Paving and thanks for making walking in Dunwoody even more pleasant.

The (Harry Potter) ties that bind ...

2010-08-23T06:30:00.001-04:00

After a morning of tending to two sick Knitternalls, the afternoon proceeded peacefully through chores, a light supper, responding to a few freelance clients, and knitting time. I posted on Facebook the fact that I was watching the Harry Potter marathon on ABC Family while knitting a sweater (bliss). Immediately, one of my college roommates pinged me back and said "we're watching it, too!" Then another college roommate chimed in.

Talk about the "Suite Life" - we shared a suite at North Carolina State University, where they had a close-up view of my painful transition from sheltered immaturity to dogged determination to not only make the Dean's List but graduate as early as possible (to save at least one semester tuition!). It's amazing the way Facebook has bridged the years.

(Hence my flashback to the Star Wars movies - when The Empire Strikes Back left us cliffhanging for TWO YEARS until we learned the rest of the story.)

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows promises to do the same thing, splitting the last book into two movies separated by painful months of waiting. The only difference is that we know the end of THAT story.

Who knew that Harry James Potter would connect Joni, Meredith, and me this many years later?

A few good pieces ...

2010-08-22T11:55:00.001-04:00

I love, love, love what Kathie Chipman is doing in her little corner of Dunwoody. Her amazing sense of style and can-do spirit has catalyzed the launch of a blog and added much-needed panache to the Knitternall house.

Two vintage-new Kathie C bedside tables and lamps energized our master bedroom.

Blogging is this century's version of the kitchen door. When I was little, friends came and went through the back door, usually without a call ahead, for a cup of coffee and a chat. Our go-go-go lives make those drop-ins a matter of luck and timing, so blogging and facebooking and email keep us connected even as we move from one thing to another.

We can discuss what to wear, where to put something, how to arrange a room, what to do with sibling squabbles, and why my lemonade cake imploded when everyone else's bloomed beautifully.These internet chats don't replace our together-times. They are a welcome bridge, maintaining valued connections until we can be with each other again.

I loved visiting before and after my purchases during Kathie's "garage sale." And I'm so very glad that I get to be with kindred spirits at church.

My photography doesn't do Kathie's turqoise table justice. It's artful and richly hued.

Thanks for a happy day - and many beautiful new additions to our home.

The Kathie C Collection

2010-08-20T18:06:00.000-04:00

One of my very favorite multi-talented women is having what she modestly calls a "garage sale" tomorrow. Kathy C has collected and refinished a delectable assortment of furniture, from chairs and side tables to full-scale china cabinets. She has a deft touch with marrying the right distressed finish to each piece. I really wanted to buy everything in sight, but restrained myself.

I scored a vintage-new table and chairs for our breakfast area for a very modest price. (I covered the chairs in some leftover fabric so they coordinate with a few accessories in the nearby family room.)

I'm going back. A turquoise side table is calling to me.

She opens at 8. I am so there.

(Dunwoody friends - she's in the Kings Point area across from Peachtree Charter Middle School. Follow the signs!)

Coming unraveled.

2010-08-19T07:28:00.001-04:00

Four weeks ago, I saw a knitting pattern that sang to me. It trilled, "beautiful design," "you already have enough yarn in your stash," and "it'll look fabulous on you."

I began knitting.

Indeed, the pattern was a pleasure. There was minimal seaming, the yarn draped beautifully, and the instructions were very easy to follow. I was on gauge, and tried on each section as I went to make sure the fit was correct.

Last weekend I finished it ... put it on ... looked in the mirror ... and winced.

It looked dreadful. The proportion of shoulder to sleeve made me look like a linebacker. Since that was the very last section I knitted, this revelation wasn't apparent until the very end.

So I unraveled it. Four weeks of knitting tinked and wound back into balls. 2300 yards of yarn back into the stash. The yarn is just too darned special to waste on something I don't like.

My daughter was horrified. "Mom, you worked on that HOURS and hours. How could you just take it apart?"

Because as much as I love wellmade knitwear, I enjoy the process of knitting even more. I don't consider the four weeks a waste of time. I now know the yarn will knit into something lovely. And that the shoulder line of the pattern I knit isn't right for me. So I won't choose in the future a pattern with that particular design.

Unraveling a knit project isn't the same as coming unraveled.

I am at peace with my knitting.

Sibling revelry.

2010-08-18T19:05:00.000-04:00

"I just realized something," my daughter told me recently. "Adam and I only fight when you're around. We get along great when you're not there."

Oh. My. Goodness.

I knew it.

Ironing out a few things.

2010-08-17T16:30:00.000-04:00

Once upon a time, when I was the biggest overachiever mom in the universe, I ironed everything. I ironed baby tshirts and onesies, my own t's and denim shorts, starched every button down collar and button placket, and made sure every skirt pleat had a nice sharp edge.

I also kept floors spotless, changed bedlinens every week, and couldn't abide a spot or smear on a window.

At the same time I was channeling June Cleaver, I was billing 40-60 hours a week as a freelance copywriter, in pockets of time between naps and preschool, then in solid chunks from 7 PM bedtime until well past midnight (including weekends).

Sound exhausting? It was heavenly. I had a lot to do and I did it. That sense of accomplishment is pretty darned satisfying.

Ten years later, I'm still ironing ... reluctantly and only when the basket is overflowing with shirts and skirts I'd forgotten my daughter and I owned. Floors get a lick and a promise when they're noticeably dirty. I trained the kids to wash sheets and make their own beds. (Their bedrooms no longer look like a Southern Living photo spread ... they're in charge of keeping those tidy, too.)

While my interest in June Cleaver-isms has decidedly waned, I'm still freelancing. Because I really, really like writing. I'm also putting in mornings at the Nature Center and broadening my folk skills (knitting, gardening, weaving, sewing). Because I also like the idea of sustainability and self-reliance.

This afternoon, as I ironed three dozen napkins, a shirt my daughter will be thrilled to see again, and some cloth prewashed for a sewing project, I was content. There's little room in my overbuilt schedule for complete idleness, but that's by design. I don't like idle. I like doing. So what looks to others like a crazy quilt day filled with work and volunteering and chores and precious time with my family looks like peace to me.

The more I do, the more I get done.

It may be another month before I get the iron out again. Meanwhile, the dryer has a handy-dandy "refresh" button that gives a do-over every time we forget to unload it. Bliss.

Fight, flight, or flow.

2010-08-09T11:32:00.000-04:00

Dunwoody Nature Center's program manager is leaving us to teach at North Georgia College and University. Dr. Bahun will bring profound expertise and a calm demeanor to environmental science education at this wonderful gem in the mountains. (It's on my son's short list of schools.)

She leaves many pearls behind.

"When a job gets that many moving parts it's time for the amoeba to split and create two jobs."

"The fact that you waited until the last minute does not make your problem my emergency."

"I find that there are three ways to handle any situation: fight, flight, or flow. I prefer to flow."

"I understand that our schedule and policies don't fit your preferences. May I suggest some local camps where you might find someone more flexible?" (To a parent who called on a Monday to register her 3- and 6 year-olds in the same camp group.)

"Please don't." (To a man who bicycled over with a copperhead in a bag - he asked if he could release it in Dunwoody Park.)

Best wishes, Carla. You're smart, warm, and funny as heck. Thank you for the many footprints you leave behind.

Trial and error

2010-08-08T12:01:00.001-04:00

For two summers, I've tried to coax vegetables to grow in less than four hours of direct sunlight. The beans were cooperative, the cucumbers did just fine, but everything else winced. So I've put my name on the waitlist for a plot at the Dunwoody Community Garden, where direct sunlight is in abundant supply (as are advice and encouragement by other gardeners).

Dunwoody is hilly, lush with greenery, and quite beautiful through every season. But the downside of all these trees is that gardening is a challenge.

Which reminds me of the history of Dunwoody Park. We have evidence of terraces cut into the hillsides along the creek. In the early settler days, the farmers cleared the land and cut terraces so they could grow crops. Faced with the same conditions as we have today, they maximized the yield of the hilly terrain by leveling as much land as possible and clearing the way for direct sunlight. One family even had a mill on the property - its dam and millstone are still on the grounds.

Urban gardening has so many challenges those early farmers would have thought ridiculous. We can't just do with our land as we see fit. There are tree ordinances, setbacks, residential codes regarding structures visible from the street, and sundry other obstacles to raising food. But creative folks are figuring out ways to be self-reliant.

The good news is that my garden box is mobile. So I'll take it down this winter, keep my fingers crossed that I can move it to Brook Run, and get ready for a new year and a new garden.

Maybe Dunwoody High School Needs a Staging Agent

2010-08-07T09:04:00.000-04:00

In my last post, I lamented the hold of decorating shows and magazines that have homogenized interior styles. You can be as individual as you like while you're living in your home, but the moment it goes on the market, out comes the sage green, black, white, granite, and warm wood furnishings.

Dunwoody High School is undergoing a massive, and quite welcome, renovation ... while school goes on for students and teachers. Anyone who has lived through a home renovation knows the process is messy, deadlines are a moving target, and lots of things change midstream as hidden problems see the light of day. That's most definitely the case at DHS. The contractor has worked furiously all summer, but those gremlins have caused some delays in getting full access to the building's interior. Hence lots of trailers, a ridiculous parking plan that funnels students, faculty, and parents into a single entrance right at the intersection of Womack and Vermack, the football team roughing it in a single trailer (yuck), no access to the building until yesterday, and round-the-clock moving in this weekend. (My son and I are heading there shortly to pitch in with the move-in.)

We're trying to get things as settled as possible for tomorrow's Freshman Bridge, which will be the first time many 9th graders and their parents will step foot inside a high school. As well as for Monday, when everyone else heads to school.

Maybe what we need is a staging specialist. Someone who arrives with a 100+ crew to "makeover" the school by artfully arranging the cafeteria and classrooms and talks a kazillion companies to "brand" our school with new furniture, appliances, and high-tech storage solutions for all the gear and textooks that have been stuck in storage limbo all summer.

Wouldn't that be cool?

Well, we don't have a fancy staging agent, so parents and student volunteers will surge all over the school today and tomorrow to get things ready. I expect to be tired and sore this evening ... and really, really glad to see school start on Monday.

If we can only get to the school on Monday. Now that's a whole 'nother story.

The Curious Case of the Ceiling Fan

2010-07-31T10:40:00.001-04:00

Just about every home decorating show and magazine hates ceiling fans. If an owner wants to sell a house, "get rid of those fans!" When the featured decorator wants to update a room, "that ceiling fan has to go!"

When we bought our house ten years ago, a few of the rooms had ceiling fans. "Obviously, this home needs updating," our realtor sniffed. "It'll be easy to take out those ceiling fans. Or you can make that a requirement in your offer."

We kept the fans.

Over the past two years, we've replaced old fixtures with top of the line ceiling fans in every bedroom. Why? Because it's blasted hot in the South. Since we don't want a four-figure power bill, we keep the air conditioner set at 76 degrees (78 when we're away from home more than a few days). That's pretty comfortable on the main floors, but the upstairs is a different story. (Maybe our bedrooms should be on the terrace level, surrounded on two sides by cool earth.) So rather than lower the thermostat, we use our ceiling fans. We turn them on in June and they stay on until October. Ceiling fans don't make a room cooler, but they do move air and feel fabulous at bedtime.

If by chance we have to move, I know exactly what our realtor will say. "Paint those walls in neutrals and get rid of those ceiling fans!"

I blame HGTV and all those home decorating magazines. They've trained us to purchase homes with catalog-style interiors that need no fixing up and look exactly like what we already have at home. So, as a nation, we're evidently moving from one Pottery Barn/Ballard/Southern Living home straight into another, with furniture and accessories that fit no matter where we live. Apparently, everyone has gray/khaki/sage walls, white trim, leather seating, a mix of black and warm wood tables, granite kitchen countertops, Container Store closets, elaborate laundry/mud rooms, and themed bedrooms with no photos, personal keepsakes, or mussy beds.

Realtors are right there with them. On the advice of her realtor, one of my friends moved completely out of her house and put her family's possessions in storage, painted everything, hired a staging consultant to re-furnish her home, and listened carefully to every bit of advice. "It's a buyer's market. Your house has to look like they can move in tomorrow." "You need a fence off the view of that house back there." "Nice layout, but you should add granite countertops." "You need to lower your price quite a bit."

Really?

Maybe someone could specialize in trading ceiling fans for "neutral" light fixtures, leave a calling card, and return the ceiling fans to the same house as soon as the new owner figures out it's too hot without them.

It's an education, all right.

2010-07-08T09:25:00.001-04:00

Yesterday, I trekked to the Georgia Department of Education's Charter Schools Committee meeting to receive their blessing on Peachtree Middle's charter renewal petition. I sat with several representatives from Peachtree and Kingsley Elementary School, whose charter is also up for renewal (and was approved!).

Behind the scenes, when most folks were busy with lots and lots of other stuff, Peachtree parents were wrestling with, researching, adapting, surveying, and writing a new charter for Peachtree, one with tremendous latitude for curricula, scheduling, staffing, use of designated funding, and waivers from state and county restrictions.

The committee praised Peachtree for its academic rigor and the fact that the innovations in our last charter became standards for the entire county (seven period schedule, daily PE, world languages, et al). Then they questioned us sharply about our AYP (Annual Yearly Progress) scores in science and math with 8th graders (we're suffering the same pangs as the rest of the state thanks to the new curricula), our attendance zone (we accept every student who lives in our district, plus we have a lottery and waitlist for other students - we're too full to open any more spots), where our funding comes from (I think they forgot that as a conversion charter we're funded primarily by DeKalb County - but were really interested in the vitality of our Foundation, which funds teacher training, technology, additional curricula and materials, and capital projects such as new signage and a watering station for the track and field area).

Our 90+ document covered every single question with such clarity that the questioning lasted just a few moments. Then they agreed to submit charter to the State Board of Education. This morning. I'm watching the webcast for that final blessing.

Working on a charter is a keen balancing act between optimistic boosterism and a grounded grasp of reality. I embrace the idea that every student has value and deserves the best possible education. I also believe that Dunwoody must have superlative schools - I demand no less as a parent, a taxpayer, a homeowner, and a volunteer in the schools.

We have made major gains in recent years thanks to savvy Dunwoody parent volunteers, great teachers, and some key school administrators - and in spite of sometimes backbreaking and mindless directives from the county school system.

There is so much more we can do.

It's time to focus on developing a Dunwoody Charter Cluster for our schools. Dan Weber has been working at the grassroots level on this concept (and not just for Dunwoody - Chamblee is discussing the possibility, too.)
This umbrella Charter Cluster would give Dunwoody the kind of local control we need for our schools. I predict that a Charter Cluster would engage our community much the same way becoming a City did, by creating a sense of ownership and empowerment that has been lacking in the one-size-fits-all county administration system. Local businesses will be far more likely to support schools when they see a direct connection between their donations and the results in Dunwoody schools. Parents will get even more involved because their voices would not get lost in the cacophony far across the county. There are resources and talents available in the community that will impact the schools with far-reaching benefits. And accountability will be immediate and dealt with proactively - if something isn't working, it won't take a Titannic-sized tugboat to turn things around.

Yes, we'd still be subject to DCSS for funding, staffing, and transportation. But the recently enhanced Charter Schools Law gives Charter schools tremendous flexibility in spending, scheduling, curricula, obtaining outside resources, and choosing curricula and materials that are far more specific to student needs at the local level.

Just as important, a Charter Cluster allows each school within the cluster to adapt even more locally. The needs of each school, from elementary to high school, are not always the same.

So, some "what if's" for a Dunwoody Charter Cluster:

1. What if we add a career track academy to Dunwoody High so that all students could graduate along the path that best suits their needs, whether college or skilled job placement? (DHS already has Mass Communications and Finance academies.)

2. What if we mandate balanced enrollment in our elementary schools? Convert the 4-5 school to all grades AND renovate the Shallowford School property.

3. What if we rethink the middle school model and offered parents the option of a K-8 school instead?

4. What if we operate on a balanced schedule, ie year round school with three-week breaks between sessions and a five-week summer break?

5. What if we move Dunwoody High's schedule later in the day to embrace the reality that high school students have a different inner sleep clock than the rest of us?

6. What if we establish a Cluster Foundation to pursue the millions of dollars in grants and resources available to schools? This funding would give Dunwoody tremendous flexibility in capital projects, classroom technology and materials, stipends to support teachers and administrators, and so much more.

7. What if we hve a capital campaign to build our own sports facility? (There's space - we just have to be creative in WHERE the stadium is located.)

8. What if there is a direct link between multi-family and high density zoning approval and school capacity?

9. What if parents' mindset inverts from an all-consuming focus on their elementary school to feeling part of a continuum that culminates in Dunwoody High School? The best school districts in the nation are not labeled "XYZ Elementary School" - they're identified by the HIGH SCHOOL.

10. What if each school can spend the funds allocated by the county according to their specific needs? There will be accountability, but there will also be tremendous flexibility (no more America's Choice or Springboard or other canned edu-fluff).

That's just a start.

I realize that my kids likely won't benefit directly from a Charter Cluster (one graduates next year, the other enters High School in 2011), but my family will. Because we're here in Dunwoody for the long run, and it's the right thing for our community.

Dunwoody bits and pieces.

2010-07-04T11:02:00.001-04:00

Dunwoody High School has a new principal. The circumstances of the change in leadership are not wonderful, but I feel optimistic about Mr. Swanson and the very positive impact he can have on the high school. By all accounts (friends with children at DeKalb School of the Arts), he is warm, savvy, flexible, creative in problem solving, firm, and a good communicator.

I spent seven days in Tennessee working with the Mountain T.O.P. project and my gardens pouted. I lost a Cherokee Black tomato plant, two shrubs, all of my basil, and a hosta. This turn of events ruined the work I've been doing for the past year to "get" that I'm NOT indispensible to my family, job, and volunteer committees. I tend to over-extend myself because I worry that no one else will do or volunteer or care about something. Isn't that just a bit self-important? So I left work and family for a week of mission work, only to return to a very neglected garden. Maybe I'm indispensible after all, at least when it comes to watering and weeding.

Dunwoody Nature Center's executive director, Claire Hayes, will retire mid-2011. She will complete 11 years at the helm; a search for her successor will commence this fall. Her tenure has been so long that her personality is ingrained in every facet of the center's programs. At the same time (just about), the City of Dunwoody just took ownership of the parks from DeKalb County. As a Dunwoody resident and a member of the staff, I'm delighted by the change in park management. It'll be interesting to see how the Nature Center evolves over the next few years.

Our neighborhood's ongoing battle with the rezoning of the property behind us has been idling while the court system slowly processes the case; recently, it has kicked back into high gear as the court date looms and the original Goddard franchise petitioners try to figure out yet another way to get the property. I do wonder . . . what is so magical about this specific location that the Goddard franchisees are willing to wait 2+ years and invest so much in the legal morass just to operate their day care behind our houses? There are other properties in the Perimeter area that would be far more accepting of and conducive to day care operations. (We're certainly not the first neighborhood to protest this kind of rezoning . . . )

Our son is beginning his senior year in high school and just completed an intensive three-week college class that required a one-hour commute and lots of homework. He's showing some very welcome signs of independence, initiative, and pleasure in school - quite refreshing.

Dan Weber is exiting his State Senate office; Fran Millar is running for the seat. The two men share a passion for education and tireless work ethic. I know that Dan still has many, many contributions to make on behalf of Dunwoody. I'm delighted that Fran wants to continue serving this community. He has my vote.

I'm visiting the "twin towers" in Atlanta for the first time this week as I attend the State school charter meeting. I'm keeping fingers and toes and eyes crossed that Peachtree's charter will be approved. Now more than ever, we need the flexibility (and accountability) the charter affords to serve Dunwoody's middle school students and to continue to increase the quality of the education our children deserve. Coming changes for PCMS are very exciting and reflect the principal's understanding of and compassion for the middle school student.

I finished Nora's Sweater! It's lovely and I confess, with no small bit of pride, that it was a challenging project start to finish. I still need to block it, and will do so this week. Then I'll wait for cooler weather after October to enjoy it.

Fireworks - and pipes - bursting.

2010-07-03T10:56:00.000-04:00

Our traditional foray to Keswick Park in Chamblee for fireworks may be offset this year by the pipe that just burst in the kitchen ceiling.

I was outside, enjoying the early morning cool and tending to a sadly neglected garden, when T called me in. Right in the middle of the kitchen ceiling, a four-foot area was browned, soaked, and pouring a steady stream of water onto the floor. I grabbed a bucket, he called the plumber, and we turned off the water to the house.

Blast.

So now we're waiting for Zurn Plumbing to ride to the rescue and keeping our fingers crossed that a little cut into the sheetrock, some handy dandy plumber's tape and blow torch work, and we'll be good to go. We sent little A to her friend's house for cleaning and visiting, I headed to Dunwoody Nature Center to wash off the worst of the garden dirt and sweat, and we're all hoping that the water gets turned back on REALLY SOON. Otherwise, those nasty bath houses at Mountain Top will look mighty good in comparison to Chez Nall.

Doesn't it just figure? We just scheduled AG's braces, the 100,000 service on the silver Volvo, and refilling the freon in one of the air conditioning units (stupid thing leaks a trickle a year - this had to be the year it was finally time to do the refill).

Okay. Time to look at things from the blessing side. We caught the pipe burst right as it happened, rather than after a long night of water flowing in the kitchen. We have air conditioning. And AG's lower teeth managed to straighten all by themselves, which means far shorter time in braces.

Whoopee.

Down from the mountain and into the valley below.

2010-06-28T18:08:00.000-04:00

My daughter and I spent the week high in the Cumberland area of the Appalachian mountains. As I drove the behemoth ClifFORD the Big Red Van (15 passengers) up and down twisty, rutty, nearly invisible lanes to pick up and deliver children, I discovered the real meaning of UP and DOWN the road. Not until Friday, when we had a couple of hours to explore, did we find an overlook that revealed just how high up we were.

Mountain T. O. P. (Tennessee Outreach Program) combines a day camp experience and work projects for families living in the most threadbare circumstances. Our group staffed the day camp. Other groups completed construction and repair projects at various homes throughout the county. Most volunteers were between the ages of 13 and 17; two adults accompanied each day camp or work team.

Mountain T.O.P. likes to have a one-to-one ratio of teen volunteers and day campers so each child has the personal attention so many of them crave. I watched sophisticated, "with it" teens just melt as a child grabbed and hung on for dear life. Parting on Friday was very difficult.

My job was to pick up 8 children each morning and return them each afternoon, a 2-hour one-way van route (our team totalled 5 teens and 2 adults, so we filled every seat of that 15-passenger tank.) Children emerged from rusting trailers and small, tired houses excited for a week filled with crafts, games, explorations, service, and hearty lunches. For many, the lunch we served was the only meal they had that day. I empathized with the parents' obvious love for their children - they may do without in creature comforts, but their children were clean, well clothed, and beautifully mannered.

One day we had lunch at the home of one of our daycampers. This was a big deal for the parents who agreed to host us. We provided all of the food and they welcomed us into their homes (or yards, if they preferred). Our child was initially very anxious about having us visit her home. But her mother had stayed up past midnight (after working an afternoon and evening shift) to make us cupcakes and had set a blanket under a shady tree in the yard for us. Our very loud appreciation (sugar!!! shade!!!) eased her into happy pride.

Another day was spent in service - the children discovered that they, too, could serve others in need. We sorted donated clothing for the Appalachian Women's Guild while another team planted shrubs and pulled weeds around the Grundy County Courthouse.

Many, many memories resound . . . Jacqueline, who proclaimed in a rich Tennesse accent that "my daddy says Ford is evil, but it's okay for me to ride in your Ford."

Jacob, whose gravely rendition of "Little Red Wagon" gave me great pain as I tried to control my giggles. (You can't ride in my little red wagon! The front wheel's broken and the axle's draggin'. Chugga, chugga, chugga, chugga, chugga.)

Anna Beth and Emily, two teen volunteers who know the words to every single chant, cheer, song, jump rope rhyme, and more and who repeated them over and over again to the children on demand.

The slimiest, grossest bath house ever - let's just say that Mountain T.O.P. puts its fundraising to work for the families in its community, not in its own camp facilities (as they should).

The inevitable prank, when unknown teens set out two ten-person tables in the middle of the camp's three-acre activity field, complete with plates and silver, water cups, and napkins.

The Greutli-Laager Dairy Barn, bliss at the end of a 2-hour van loop, just before returning to camp.

Outdoor worship services surrounded by trees, lit only by candle and starlight.

The Mountain T. O. P., sung loudly and enthusiastically by the 152 volunteers serving this past week.

That song is stuck in my head.

Now I'm back . . . to air conditioning, a grocery store within 2 miles of my house, a van to take us whenever and wherever we need or want to go, a job, and all the take-for-granted elements of life here in Dunwoody.

Little of which is an option in Grundy County, Tennessee.