Random thoughts...

It has been cold, windy and not so snowy this winter. Usually the children play outside a significant part of the day, but even I don't like cold, wind and bare ground. If it was snow covered they would play out in the snow, but not so much in the dirt. We have school in the mornings and for part of the afternoon. In the evenings we have games or watch TV or read books. There aren't many other children home nearby and my kids are starting to get bored. I finally set the parental controls to limit the amount of time the TV will even turn on. I also have had a rule that everyone must walk at least 1 mile a day on the treadmill. But is this enough?

I have 2 more months of winter, then life will get very busy. But in the meantime, do we just keep relaxing and playing and try not to become slugs? Do I need to just accept the perpetual minature farm behind my piano (I mean really, who invented chicks that are the size of a small bead??) And then there is the line of mittens behind the woodstove, the coats left draped over kitchen chairs, the boots dropped right inside the door, do I just accept this as part of winter life? There is also the soup pot or crock pot kept going daily with the bounty still overfolwing our larder and the time to play games by the woodstove in the afternoon.

I should work on sewing with the older girls and we do plan to make quilts this month, but mostly I just want to knit or read or watch a movie or play on the computer. I just want to rest. I feel like we are in waiting mode. Soon chicks will be arriving, the new chicken house will need built, the fence will need spring maintenance, the barn will need a good cleaning, the garden beds prepared and seeds started, the house will need a good spring cleaning and then the kids will start coming. There will be four deliveries this year at our house, 21 at the neighbors. I am on call for kid pulling in both places. There will be many nights of sleeping fitfully by the phone, dressing at midnight and shivering while soaping up to go in and turn a kid or help a doe in trouble.

Before I know it, summer will be here and gardens will need tended, camp for the kids and putting up produce for winter. I feel so lazy right now but wonder if this rest time is part of God's plan to refresh and renew us before the work of the growing season.

Are we made to be more like the bear and the squirrel, work in the growing time and rest in the winter? Are the seasons a gift, not a curse? My dh keeps saying things like, "If we built a greenhouse and heated it, you could grow food year round." And, "If we planned it right you could have spring and fall kids and milk year round." Or lately, "I should put a grow light in the chicken house so we can get eggs all winter." No, wait I agree with that one! But mostly, I like having set times to plant, to grow, to harvest and to put up and then time to rest and plan.

Perhaps it isn't that I should feel so much like a slug right now but more like a chipmunk, tucked away in my warm barrow waiting for spring and time to flit around my world.

This is learning season, cuddle season, napping time. This next year, I think I will plan to spend time living life in the season, not trying to push myself to be and do the things not natural to that time of year. Would we all be happier if we learned from the wild animals and lived according to the seasons of life?