I dreamed about my Dad last night. It was this sweet little surprise gift given to me by no one, but appreciated all the same. Somehow, I ended up teaching at a new school. New to me, but very old - with the brick walls half way up, white plaster walls and shiny asbestos floors. All new students to get to know. We were in charge of 7th graders - another female teacher and 3 male teachers. 

 Of course, the classes were overcrowded and we had a challenge on our hands. School had already started, but it seemed to be at the beginning of a new school year. Students were in the hallways - the sound was buzzing in a good way with conversation between friends. 

 One of the male teachers was very short and dressed in a Chinese costume with a pointy straw that had elastic under his chin to keep it in place. He was standing in the shadows and hard to see. I walked up to him and shook his hand. "I am Mrs. Reed. What's up"? My voice was loud and clear ad confident. He confided that he was upset because he was told that it was up to him "to make PE happen" and he was totally taken by surprise by it, thinking history was going to be his only assignment, like in previous years. Now he had history and PE. 

 He was so upset, he was standing back in the shadows and had the costume on, so no one could see his face. I took pity and said, maybe I could help with the girls, if he could share the curriculum and I was allowed a period for it. 

 Then it happened. The big tall double doors opened and in walked Bert. He was handsome and young and I was proud to introduce him. He said he needed to bring me something. But did we need him to help at all? "Just put me where you need me". Then I woke up! The dream was one of those that seemed very real, not at all dreamlike. It was wonderful to see him healthy and hear his voice again.

PAX and PAX, Journey Home

By Sara Pennypacker

Wonderful Quotes from PAX:

• Oneness is always growing in the world.  Two but not two.  It's always there, connecting its roots, humming...You can vibrate with its heartbeat.  You may be on your own,  but you won't be alone. 

• How hard can it be, to figure out who you are? The plain truth can be the hardest thing to see when it's about yourself.  If you don't want to know the truth, you'll do anything to disguise it.

• Sometimes the apple falls very far from the tree

• But distrust is no match for kindness administered consistently  and unmeasured, especially in creatures new to the world. 

• There is a disease that strikes foxes sometimes. It causes them to abandon their ways, to attack strangers.  War is a human sickness like that.  The men who were war sick spilled their chaos over everything in their path.  Everything was ruined.  The rivers are dammed.  The earth is scorched bare; not even briars will grow.  Rabbits and snakes, pheasants and mice...all creatures killed.

• People should tell the truth about what war costs.

•  I see a broken shell and I remind myself that something might have needed setting free.  Broken things always have a story.

PAX : Book Synopsis

     Pax is only about 2 weeks old, when Peter finds him in the woods.  The baby fox is  the only living kit left of his family.  For the next 5 years  the fox and "his boy" grow so close they are "two but not two".  They need each other.  They understand how the other feels.

  Pax comforts 12-year-old Peter, after his mother dies in a car wreck.  At the same time, a war is brewing and his father decides to go and "fight on the right side".    It is because of that that Peter's father makes him leave the fox in the woods and go live with his grandfather who lives 300 miles away.    

   As the chapters unfold, we come to understand what determination looks like, in both a human being and an animal.  The book demonstrates their independent struggles to return to one another against all odds. 

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Wonderful Quotes from PAX Journey Home:

• Memories were so treacherous, always lurking under the surface ready to bush whack you with a blade to the heart when you weren't careful.

• Human war-sick have come.  Where the war-sick were, the earth could blow without warning, the air itself could shatter.  Foxes could lose legs.  Foxes could be killed.  

•  Fill your cup whenever you can.   This time he'd understood that she wasn't talking about water and his eyes had stung.

•   It seemed a shocking insight - that a single act could be viewed in different ways.       Actually, it still seemed kind of a magic trick.   

• Nobody to care about and nobody caring about you, right?  ....... Good luck with that.  Someone will get in.  A little sliver of caring.  The tiniest crack in your shell is all it takes.  You won't even see it coming.         

• How do you know human's intent?   
• Human intent is expressed in their faces, their scents, their voices, their gestures.  Like foxes?    Yes, like foxes.  But they can be false acting.  How do you know which humans can be trusted?   Watch them carefully, for a long time.  They will show you.

I felt such a love of the characters of Pax and Peter when reading this book.    The story touched me because it told the truth, but in fiction form. 

• that life is not easy  
• that war should never be idealized 
• that family isn't everything you want it to be
• that we need each other.

Pincushion Carry Station

4 inches by 2.75!

This pincushion is weighted down with crushed walnut shells and has multiple pockets all around