Alina's Adventures

Cleaning our rooms.

Suebee and Pops are coming to stay for the weekend, which always inspires us to try and tidy the house a bit. This morning, Max directed the cleaning efforts for this kids' room.

Milla insisted on wearing her gladiator sandals with her black wool tights today because, in her words, "Bah. Bah umph baaaah. Beh?"

A shy little bumblebee dropped by to help us make the beds. Although bumblebees are notorious for stings (or, at least, the possibility of stings), I found myself kissing this one before she buzzed away.

What is place-based education and why does it matter?

Green Teacher's seasonal magazine.

Tonight, there will be a free webinar from 6:30-7:30 (CT) on “Exploring Place-based Education – What, Why, and How” for educators and interested folks. The host, Clifford Knapp, is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Teaching and Learning at Northern Illinois University. Since his retirement, he has stayed active in the field of outdoor teaching and learning by reading, writing, traveling, and teaching in the United States and abroad.  He runs nature workshops through WonderEarth. Knapp has been in the forefront of experiential learning and place-based pedagogy throughout the world. 

This webinar will delve into some big ideas about place-based education and the importance of teaching in and about local surroundings. this emerging field and attempt to shed more light on the topic. According to the Green Teacher website, which hosts an ongoing series of related webinars: 

For the first 25 minutes, Dr. Knapp will present some important concepts and raise some questions to ponder. These will include some definitions, guiding principles, and characteristics of place-based education. Other topics will include: Living Well in Place, Place Attachment, Displacement, Ecoliteracy, Bioregionalism, Pedagogy of Place, Identity, Powerful Places, and Reading the Landscape. These big ideas will be referenced so that webinar participants can follow up with additional reading. The last 35 minutes of the program will consist of a question and answer session that will likely include mention of additional resources for teaching more about your place. Come prepared to dig deeper into your locale.

Registration is free, though you might have to move a few blocks around in your family dinner hour to attend. Webinars are a wonderful way for educators and parents to learn more about how kids absorb knowledge and ideas. Take advantage of it if you can. If your schedule doesn't permit free time this evening, then explore the Green Teacher seminar archive when the moment presents itself. 

David Rovics' new album for little people.

I love David Rovics. His folk songs are all over my making-dinner playlist. So it comes as a pleasant surprise to know we can listen to David's most recent album, Ballad of A Dung Beetle, crafted with small folks in mind. A little visit to the lyrics cavern would make even the fussiest person smile. Share, enjoy, and diy fingerplay the day away.

A concert at the Coryell Castle.

The tickets sold out to the stuffed animals who took over the couch. Max arranged them carefully for the folk rock concert. The sheep acted like sheep and stuck together.

From there, things functioned in a sort of reverse mode- the band went wild while the audience behaved as if they were attending a symphony performance.

Micah played her new guitar, Sweet Baby Cougar, as Max bally-hooed and tinkled away on the triangle.

Meanwhile, Milla whooped it up on the harmonica. The girl is not afraid to go solo.

Then the time came for the mouth harp jam session. 

The animals were loving it. And they weren't the only ones....

Milla was so happy to hear her own music emerging from the harmonica.

And so the day whittled itself away, my valentine-card-making plans pushed to a corner and all the details unfurling into a tapestry of imaginative play.

A good man is hard to find.

Micah strums her new guitar.

This is the story of how this guitar came into her beautiful, tender little hands.

So I try not to take him for granted, though taking things for granted seems to be part of married life perhaps hidden in the "baggage" we bring along. Really, this is a post about sleeping- and Patrick's gifts as a father. We have an open bed policy in our home- if someone is scared or has a nightmare, they come into our bed until they fall asleep again (and we move them quietly back to their own beds). None of our children used cribs- we coslept with a bed rail until they were ready to ventue out into their own beds.

Max proved to be a smooth transition- he falls asleep quickly and easily without particular preferences for a bedtime routine. Micah, on the other hand, had trouble sleeping since she was 2 weeks old and crying took up a better part of her day. She is what Dr. Sears would call our "high needs child"- going to sleep requires a story, a cup of milk warmed just right, my hair in her fist, a cover, and so on. Usually, she falls asleep in our bed and then Patrick moves her to her bed in the kids room (our kids all share a room). 

Last night, my handsome husband offered Micah an alternative. As Micah perched in his lap, detailing her day, Patrick interrupted:j

"Hey Micah, I have an idea. Why don't you try to fall asleep in your own bed tonight?"

Micah scowled and refused.

"Why not? If it is because you are scared, you can call us and we'll come to kiss you. We don't have to turn out lights or shut the door. I think you might be ready for the adventure of sleeping in your own bed.... Let's pretend you did decide to put yourself to sleep in your own bed tonight, how would it make you feel to know you can do that?"

Micah thought hard and scrunched up her forehead.

"It would make me feel big... like Max. Cause I would be all grown up. But I think I would need to have a necklace."

Pat jumped in immediately:

"You mean a necklace for girls who fall asleep in their own beds? A special necklace to show who you are and how you're growing and changing? I think that's a great idea! You wanna try it?"

Surprisingly, Micah decided she wanted to try. We explained that she was welcome to come to our bed if she changed her mind, but she seemed pretty determined. After much fluffing of pillows and dolls and blankets and books, she laid her little head down and watched us walk away. We settled in the living room to chat and then, suddenly, Patrick suggested that Micah was probably asleep. Sure enough, sweet Micah fell asleep and woke up in her own bed to much ballyhooing and celebrating.

Today, we took a field trip with Tino to the thrift store to select her special necklace. She wanted Milla and Max to get a necklace as well in honor of her accomplishment, so everyone left with a necklace. I also couldn't resist forking out an extra $3 for her first guitar because I admire and respect her determination and Micah-ness.

It soothes this mother's heart to know Micah's transition to falling asleep in her bed will not involce coercion, crying, ignoring, or sadness- that Micah can take credit for taking the bigger steps which might seem daunting but are nonetheless her own. She deserves that feeling of accomplishment, that first taste of courage. On a different yet interlaced note, there is nothing sexier than a man who keeps his thumb on the pulse of his children's hearts. A man like Patrick. A man who respects my intuitions as a mother although they are not trending or popular or even acceptable in some circles. 

In honor of Micah and Patrick, both of whom have the propensity to rock, here's a little guitar riff to shake, rattle, and roll. Because I'm just that happy.

GALLOWS POLE by Led Zeppelin (mp3)

What I painted on the kids bathroom door.

Does anyone recognize the reference offhand? If not, a little bird points here. The kids seem to love it, and I am always partial to pretention and poetry and sardonic asides to create ambiance while you pee. The photo is awful, of course, as my iPhone has been playing in the mud lately, but you get the picture.

Participating in the Little Red Farm's cultural exchange.

And we couldn't be more excited. This is our first Cultural Exchange, and I'm already having trouble keeping the kids from mailing the moon to five different families across the world.

Look at the countries that have been represented thus far in this particular exchange. We will be representing Romania, and we will be recieving exchanges from:

California

Colorado

Australia

Phillippines

Japan

Thank you Little Red Farm for letting us add some fairy dust to the mix. 

A beautiful gift from Guatemala.

Tino's parents sent a lovely package to our family and my mom was sweet enough to let us keep the placemats while she uses the coasters. Mrs. Diaz-Duran is a woman after my own heart- and not just for loving Tino into life. Nothing could match our home and family better.

Each little doll on the napkin holders is original enough to deserve a name. So we set out to name them. Here is what the kids came up with...

Micah named this lady "Petra". We all agreed it suits her perfectly.

Max named these three ladies "Narcissa", "Coryella", and "Dapplevida". Lyrical, this boy.

Then Micah named this lady "Runnatell", which seemed a little more exotic and perhaps difficult to explain.

Finger puppet play.

Finger puppets have so many things to talk about at the Coryell Castle.

I don't think the subject of getting blood drawn has come up yet, though it is on the menu for today.

Milla learns by imitating everything that Micah undertakes. On that note, Micah is a better teacher for Milla than I imagined.

Playing with concrete poetry.

Concrete poetry can be slightly intimidating until you are comfortable enough to play around with it and experiment. To introduce Max to concrete poetry, I showed him how words can be manipulated to form shapes- and how those shapes lend meaning to words, which, in turn, add new meaning to the words.

Enter Tagxedo (go to "Creator"), which allows you to make pictures from words.We played around with Tagxedo for a while this morning, observing how shapes lend impact to words and make them more powerful. A few of our creations:

For our first experiment, Max chose the "swallow" shape from the menu and then we added a link to a poem by Wendell Berry to the url space.

Then I showed him how I used this to make a portrait of Tino last night by linking to one of Tino's websites and uploading an image of him. Max liked this a lot and wanted to make his own portrait of himself.

For this one, Max created a list of his favorite words, things, foods, and objects and then selected a photo of himself to provide the lining for the portrait.

Then I made my own portrait of Patrick from our gardening lesson with Neal Hargle the other day.

Now we're off to experiment with concrete poems on paper. Poetry just rocks our world.

Flower pruning workshop next week.

The Tuscaloosa County Extension Office will host a flower pruning workshop with demonstrations by Jason Powell from Petals from the Past Nursery.  The workshop will take place on the grounds of the Jemison Van de Graff Mansion, Thursday, February 16th from 10:00 a.m. -12:00 noon.

 Cost of the workshop is $10.00.  If you are interested in attending or have any questions please call the extension office at 349-4630 to sign up. Hmmmm.... I wonder how they feel about children- not the idea of children, mind you, but the real deal, children in the flesh, eager to learn. If I'm feeling especially brave, we'll find out.

A poem which came to mind while talking to Tino.

TO DAVID, ABOUT HIS EDUCATION 

BY HOWARD NEMEROV

The world is full of mostly invisible things,

And there is no way but putting the mind’s eye,

Or its nose, in a book, to find them out,

Things like the square root of Everest

Or how many times Byron goes into Texas,

Or whether the law of the excluded middle

Applies west of the Rockies. For these

And the like reasons, you have to go to school

And study books and listen to what you are told,

And sometimes try to remember. Though I don’t know

What you will do with the mean annual rainfall

On Plato’s Republic, or the calorie content

Of the Diet of Worms, such things are said to be

Good for you, and you will have to learn them

In order to become one of the grown-ups

Who sees invisible things neither steadily nor whole,

But keeps gravely the grand confusion of the world

Under his hat, which is where it belongs,

And teaches small children to do this in their turn.

10 things I want to do this week.

1. Make geocaching wooden nickels with the Coryell Castle logo on them. 

2. Valentines for family members.

3. Cut, sand, paint, and mount a sign for our community garden plot.

4. Sew a ruffled tshirt bag.

5. Finish painting the ladies who lunch on our bathroom door.

6. Explore watercolor texture techniques.

7. Watch the munchkins wrap some bottles with yarn and string. The vase season is beginning.

8. Make crochet hooks from wooden sticks.

9. Draft and begin collecting wood for a handmade willow arbor.

10. Make our own funky colored windchime.

Journal prompt about plant life cycles.

Seeding cantaloupes and bell peppers.

Yesterday, we seeded the cantaloupes and the heirloom bell peppers given to us by Sarah. Max found the perfect potting soil in our front yard- a dark, rich, loamy mix driven into our driveway by the week's rains. Like all good, natural soil, it required a little sifting.

Max, Micah, Milla, and I spent time removing twigs and pebbles which might stand in the way of tiny roots. Granted, Max got a little distracted by his annoyance with Milla's continuous stirring of the pot.

Each little spot of soil required the carving of a little nest for the seed.

Then little hands put the seeds in their nest and made a loving wish that each might grow.

Then little hands (and big helping hands) covered the seeds with soil.

As proof our soil's yumminess, Max discovered two worms. The munchkins marveled over the worm's "inner life".

On the sidelines of the Stupor Bowl.

Patrick said:

"Do you know how much these ads cost?!"

Alina replied:

"Honey, you say this every year..."

Patrick:

"I know. Isn't it crazy?"

Alina shrugged:

"It's totally wacky, dude. It blows my mind. Can't wait to get in a stupor..."

The only good to come of the Stupor Bowl this evening began with a salata de beouf and culminated in a beautiful moon dripping gold which we were able to observe after being removed from the house by the Stupor Bowl watchers (also known as "Stuporheads"). 

The salata de boeuf made by Bunica and decorated by Max and Micah.

Lady Moon Corner shares a spot-on recipe for salata de boeuf, a traditional Romanian dish, if you are interested in giving it a shot.

A short journey inside the mind of Max.

Max brings Bob Dylan songs to mind.

A detail from a painting on our wall.

Romanian naive art, remarkable for its celebration of village and Danube life, as opposed to its precise representation of individuals and perspective. There's something jolly, almost good-natured, about naive painting. I love it and think it encourages young people to draw the world as they percieve it, as opposed to how older men and women drinking tea at a country club might see it. 

Convalescing in the sunshine.

Max and Micah listen to the birds as they try not to scratch the coxsackie blisters on their face, hands, and feet. Max's high fever prevented him from wanting to paint.

Coxsackie by Micah Coryell, 2011. Painted en plein air.

The insidious and alarming influence of G. Stanley Hall on our educational models.

Clarence Karier's book is a thoughtful and idea-laden survey of the American educational system, its institutional evolution and its influences. Encountering Granville Stanley Hall, the first man in the US to recieve a PHD in psychology and a prominent influence on parenting and teaching practices in this country, has been the scariest epidsode thus far. Hall spent some time studying in Germany, and was inspired by the German conceptions of man as a primitive beast who must be "civilized" through the process of education. 

For Hall, reasoning with a child was useless. Instead, the application of dressur (a German word for a method of animal training which develops unflinching obedience) provided the proper key to child rearing and training. Since parents might find this difficult due to their affections for children, a teacher lacking personal attachments to individuals kids would be more effective at dressur. On Hall's view:

The child must be led to fear God, love country, and develop a strong body. As the child burns out the vestiges of evil inherent in his nature, he needs a good share of authoritarian discipline, including corporal punishment, in order to develop his will. The child at this stage also needs and craves myths and superstitions to help him relive and thus burn out some of his primitivistic past. Church and state, fully integrated, could be used to furnish the appropriate myths.... With charismatic teachers in control, the high school would take as its chief goals patriotism, body culture, military discipline, love of authority, awe of nature, and devotion to the state.

Does any of this sound familiar? Critical thinking skills could only detract from Hall's educational mission to create a unified society. Is it a coincidence that the Pledge of Allegiance was developed and inculcated in the same historical period? A bell trains a child to march to the next class, and the child who wonders why exactly he has to do this might earn the lovely label of "truant". Students learn to love authority through hierarchal relations with coaches, teachers, and administrators who have the power to "rate" their success at proper submission to authority. 

In The Pedagogical Seminary, Hall wrote:

For most of us, the best education is that which makes us the best and most obedient servants. This is the way of peace and the way of nature, for even if we seriously try to keep up a private conscience at all.... the difficulties are so great that most hasten, more or less consciously and voluntarily, to put themselves under authority again, reserving only the smallest margin of independence in material interests, tastes, choice of masters, etc.

Is this how it works? Eventually, we learn that it is futile to be heartbroken over wars in farflung lands and the hearts of the young men whom we train to kill mercilessly. That pang of conscience is subsumed by the need for coordinating curtains. We are defined more by our personal material preferences than our commitments to conscience.

We are obedient servants indeed. But we are not obedient servants of God- we are obedient servants of the state, the reigning powers, and whatever piece of fabric symbolizes them.

Sometimes I wonder if we truly believe that putting aside Christ's teaching in the name of Caesar is acceptable in ANY way, shape, or form. We have been trained to recite Bible verses in service of the government or the majority or slavery or homophobia. We have been trained through coercion to practice coercion and worship coercion and celebrate the chains by which we bind others. Can anyone seriously wonder why a person's conscience might lead him or her to educate at home? Someone take this book away from me before I start to cry.

Stop-motion animation for planting seeds.

Planting seeds just wouldn't be the same with Tino to teach us how to create stop-motion animation. What a great way to learn how movies are made. Here is the result of Tino's and Max's little experiment which endeavored to show how a tomato seed finds its way into soil. Tino told Max to choose music, fonts, and much of the later staging. The artists would love your opinion.

Love letter #47: Cristian Bassa photographs of life.

Cristian Bassa is a Romanian photographer with a sense of humor and an eye for the poetry of everyday life.

A lady in a Sibiu window.

One from the time after time series.

Bassa captures his grandmother in her milieu, as patterned by age, sharpened by time, and worn by love.

Bassa describes learning from artist-professor Micrea Tocaci in the sculptor's quest to discover what lies within a stone:

when we arrive on site i followed Mircea around in his quest picking the right stone. he is looking for the right type stone composition, pattern and texture. not any stone will do, as i found out later while happily holding in my hand a small semitransparent stone, apparently not usable. for me, all the stones looked the same yet Mircea carefully baptizes them with water to remove their first mask, the dirt mask, revealing a little of their true selves.

Mircea pulling back layers from the stone.

The Weeping Lady

When she emerges from the stone, Bassa considers how many more possibilities lie beneath the masks of the ordinary and mundane:

what is there left to say? that maybe we are surrounded by beauty and we don't even realize? maybe we all have beauty within us and we need someone to come and shatter away our masks? maybe we are too afraid to take them off ourselves to reveal our inner light?everything is all so silent. again.

Peasant love songs.

Bardezi by Ovidiu Balaban

PEASANT LOVE SONGS

by George Cosbuc, translated by Maurice Aisen

I.
    He
In the garden of my sweetheart
Sing two birds beautifully,
And the sun proudly shines,
And my darling sits and dreams.
Near the garden of my sweetheart
Runs a river clear and crystal
Where my darling sits and weeps.
    She
When you are here, little man,
I dress all the time like a bride,
Wearing flowers and pearls
So you will like them.
Since you have gone away, little man,
The red belt and the tulip have vanished—
It is so sad.
Green leaf of the citron:
My little man has gone to the army;
He is gone and does not write to me,
Neither on the leaves, nor on the river,
Nor on the wings of the wind.

Inequality by Ovidiu Tutunaru

II.
Bad, O mother, is fever,
But far, far worse is love.
For fever you can eat and drink,
But for love there is naught but pain.
From fever my mother can cure me,
But love is far from her care;
From fever the priest can pray me,
But not from the evil of love.
All of us learn this evil,
As did I a year from last spring.
The longing is slowly killing me—
Yes, love is an evil thing.

Photo taken by Paul Pop.

III.
If you did not love me, little man,
God shall curse you for it.
You should marry nine times,
And you should have nine boys.
You should have a girl too—
She shall bring you water in prison,
Because when you left me
You broke my heart and my love.

IV.
Little man, tell me, is it true?
Be honest and tell me, please—
Do you love me or not?
If you like me only a little,
Take any road that you wish,
But never the one that leads to my house.

Cristian Bassa photographed the making of Doamna Care Plange.

V.
Goodbye, darling, good luck!
Remain beautiful as a violet
In a glass on the table.

VI.
Beautiful girl with blonde hair,
When I see you I begin to lean
Like the leaves in the acacia
When the wind is blowing through them.
Like the leaves of the oak tree I lean
When the breeze is blowing through them.

VII.
I had a beautiful neighbor,
And a path to her garden;
But she went and got married
And said not a word to me.
I would have taken her myself!
If she had married three villages away,
It wouldn’t have hurt me so.
But she married a man down our street,
The third door from my mother’s home!
When I am in, I hear her voice;
When I go out, I see her face:
It makes my heart burn like fire.

You can find a PDF version of this poem online at the archives of Poetry magazine. Aisen wrote translated this poem as part of his "Roumainian Poems" series by Romanian poet George Cosbuc.

Drawing by Tonitza.

The surprise that conquered coxsackie.

Sometimes you get a little package in the mail that fills the room with light. A package lovingly addressed and crafted for no one in the world but you. A package addressed to the "Coryell Castle" and filled with magical moments for the coming week. Such was our sentiment upon opening this little treasure from Sarah (and Matt, who loves Sarah so much that he encourages her to bloom in that way that is essentially hers).

She included marigolds so we can provide natural insect control for our garden. And heirloom seeds, so we don't get tempted by the large, fancy hybrids that don't maintain their taste or flavor over time.

Max has been checking on each little packet this morning, scouring books to see which should be planted when and where. We've decided to grow our little plants from seed on the mantle so we can watch them and encourage them as they take root before their grand introduction to the garden plot soil in March or April. What a special surprises to distract us from the coxsackie blues! And what a nice way to knit our daily doings in with those of Matt and Sarah.

Galoshes, a boardbook currently on "repeat".

Milla hasn't let coxsackie virus slow her down one bit- at least, not when it comes to her preferred reading. When she comes trotting up to me, I half expect to see a copy of Galoshes in her hand, which she then pushes into mine so I can read it to her.

If I'm busy, then Max is her next target. Max has read Galoshes  to Milla "hundreds of times this week", by his estimate. Apparently, this is not enough.

She loves to try to repeat the words and point to the objects in the picture. Especially when the picture involves collecting earthworms in rain puddles, a traditional source of play at the Coryell Castle.

She especially loves saying "soup", which is one of her favorite foods.

Hands-on Natural History Night on February 18th.

Looks like a great activity for local Tuscaloosans who like bones, stones, and other such delicious stuff.

Learning from our local County Extension Agent.

Neal and a sickly Max.

Mr. Neal Hargle, our local County Extension Agent, was kind enough to meet a somewhat diminished Coryell crew at the community garden plot today. The kids are still grappling with coxsackie virus, which left them on the less energetic side. Poor Max even sprouted a fever while we were there.

But Neal delighted us with stories of birds getting intoxicated on hackberry trees and the landscape around us- from the clay-heavy soil of the plots to the way hybrid plants don't breed true over time. We learned soooooo many things, and Neal's eagerness to share his knowledge came through in his vibrant descriptions and enthusiastic appraisals. Not to mention that someone who plays piano, guitar, and harmonica must be very cool.

Max came with a list of questions, but Neal tied his answers into pictures so big that Max soon discovered an abundance of other questions needing answers. A few of the things we learned:

The garden soil would be perfect for making bricks- it has a high clay content and we'll probably need to add some hummus to it before planting.

Watermelons, which Max wants to plant, are annuals and need an 8 foot vine to really prosper. It's better to invest in heirlooms because hybrids tend to lose flavor and cross breed. It would take the entire space of our plot to grow watermelons, so we'll probably try it at home instead.

Corn has to be planted in several rows because it cross-pollinates. Every piece of pollen is a corn kernel. Max guessed that corn was a legume, but Neal explained that it was actually a member of the grass family which relies on wind for fertilization.

Sunflowers, another plant on Max's wish list, would do well in this soil. Sunflower seeds attract doves. Some dove hunters purposefully plants sunflowers to attract doves.

Good Friday is spring planting day in Alabama. 

Dormant trees should be planted between November and February so the roots can grow strong and firm without having to compete with flowers and leaves for energy.

Pomme fruits, like apples, plums, and peaches, require a lot of chilling hours to help the fruit set. A chilling hour is between 45 and 35 degrees F. Usually, pomme trees need at least 1,100 chilling hours to get them going. So far, we've only had 700 chilling hours this planting year, which means our fruits might not be the richest crop this year.

Persimmons and muscadine, on the other hand, do well with fewer chilling hours. As do pomegranates. Pomegranates and figs grow well in Tuscaloosa, and are easy to root. 

We returned to the castle with signs of spring on the bottom of our boots.

Max drank a little Sprite and climbed into his bed. He is sleeping with the planting guides given to him by Neal. I have a feeling that, as soon as he feels better, we'll be hearing about what we should plant and when and how and why and every fascinating detail.

The wonderful world of tree stumps.

The other day, Max discovered a new ecosystem on a stump in our yard. Today, we revisited a different stump ecosystem- one more comparable to the ruins of Athens than a prefab condo.

A close-up of the holes in the top of the stump.

Max is convinced that the strange little black critters we saw who could carry large loads were none other than termites.

When Max peeled away bark from the side of the stump, he discovered a happy community of ants and their residence. Micah was not happy to know that ants lived in the stump.

Max said:

"Hey mom, the hole in this stump turns into a tunnel at the bottom! It goes sideways into our yard!"

Theories of what and who lived in the stump hole abounded. Micah hypothesized a "Bowzer lives there". Max was convinced some sort of animal lived there- an animal who had a secret tunnel running underneath our entire front yard. Was this the gateway to a whole new world? The closet that leads to Narnia? Suddenly, Max thought of a way to find out.

He placed little twigs over the opening- "If animals live here, they will move the twigs. If gnomes live here, they won't have to." Science with kids is so much fun!

Soon we will know the secret of the stump. Of course, we have also learned a little about the scientific method in action- hypothesizing about who uses the stump and setting up an experiment to test the hypothesis. Conclusions to follow, though they may not be "conclusive".

The enchanting artwork of Nicolae Tonitza.

Our one piece of artwork for today turned into a multitude of artworks by one artist in particular. Blame it on the book we found which captivated us for a few hours because, well, Nicolae Tonitza evokes everything.

I made a collage of four different paintings by Tonitza to compare his depiction of faces.

The way he paints faces always blurs the eyes. Depending on the viewer, this might appear morbid. Max and I both agreed that it made the figures appear innocent and doll-like.  

Mother and Child by Nicolae Tonitza.

The Bread Line by Nicolae Tonitza, 1920.

We found this study for The Bread Line by Nicolae Tonitza in our book. It would make an excellent coloring or watercolor painting page to encourage children to explore shading and layering in paints. I think I'm going to print a copy and let them have a go at it.

Nicolae Tonitza (1886-1940) was a Romanian painter, engraver, lithographer, journalist and art critic. Drawing inspiration from Post-impressionism and Expressionism, he had a major role in introducing modernist guidelines to local art. Like most artists of his day, Tonitza spent the requisite years in Paris and, drawing on a Romanian tradition, spent a few years painting monasteries and churches (an example of one of these church paintings).

Tonitza's health remained precarious after fighting in World War I. As an artist, his compassion for the suffering emerged most clearly in his graphic work, which bordered on the furious. His graphics and sketches were published by numerous contemporary  political magazines, often with a leftish lean. In 1921, Tonitza opened the door to a whole new medium by painting prototypes for a ceramics factory and organizing a ceramics exhibition. A few months later, he moved to Vălenii de Munte, and ended his fliration with journalism and political illustration. His new experiences as a father, husband, and rural dweller contributed to the development of his characteristic style and themes.

In the Red Corner by Nicolae Tonitza.

The tragic effects of World War I on Tonitza and his generation are revealed in this undated painting, Dupa Razboi (or After the War). Tonitza's compassion for the female experience of war is elicited through the harrowing expression on her face and the crosses in the background- every soldier is someone's child or father or husband.

The House in Doborgea by Nicolae Tonitza, currently held by the Museum of Art in Brasov, along with many other beautiful paintings by Romanian artists.

Anyone can make the world a better place.

Today it is your turn. Please donate to the Friends of Hurricane Creek on February 2nd so we can share this natural resource with children, families, and our community. Your generosity is why the world remains a beautiful place. Thank you.

Give now.

The dogwoods are budding.

The business side of leaves.

"On every stem, on every leaf ... and at the root of everything that grew, was a professional specialist in the shape of grub, caterpillar, aphis, or other expert, whose business it was to devour that particular part."

Oliver Wendell Holmes