Joe hasn’t changed much since we first started dancing to this band in 1987 at South Main Cafe in Blacksburg when he was 25!
It’s our KIND of get down hoedown!
And dancing at the Pine Tavern, which was our only local dance venue for many years, was like old home week. My friend Jayn agrees! HERE’S a post from last year’s celebration, and HERE is a video Doug Thompson made of this year in which I can be spotted dancing.
1. When my Asheville Potter son Josh called on Christmas Eve day, I asked him when he’d arrive in Floyd to celebrate. “I’m leaving soon. I just have a few more things to wrap up,” he told me. “Oh, you mean like literally, as in wrapping presents?” I asked
2. Funny how the word mustache could be pronounced “must ache.”
3. Josh informed me that he didn’t wrap presents or make beds because he wasn’t good at folding corners. “Nowadays you can pull up a comforter and use a gift bag,” I answered.
4. Whether red or green our one county stoplight over the holidays seemed to say Merry Christmas. See HERE.
5. It felt like we fell into a Christmas wormhole, coming out of the theater after watching the nearly three-hour Science Fiction film, Interstellar, on Christmas evening. I stumbled out of the theater in a surreal haze and saw a crescent dish of a moon hanging low on the horizon, just over a Best buy sign. At the Hotel Roanoke we sipped Irish stout (Josh), Muscat wine (me) and amaretto (Joe) and talked about plot loop holes, black
holes, other dimensions and time travel. I’m as much a fan of Christmas lights as I am of Science Fiction, and so was happy to see the Hotel’s festival of trees on display. Photos HERE.
6. Is the glass half empty or half full? Is my son Josh leaving 2014 behind or walking into 2015?
7. Listening to my iphone playlist and hearing two songs that make me stop and feel the bittersweet depth of life, like I did when I first heard them, made me realize that I was just as drawn to sadness as a teenager as I am today and made me think of John Mellencamp’s song Hurt So Good, which isn’t on my playlist, but Your Life is Now is.
8. Somehow the words NATAL and FATAL seem like the rhyming bookends of life.
9. A New Year’s resolution is something that goes in one year and out the other. ~Author Unknown
10. I’m working on a story on Floyd’s Woolly Jumpers Yarn Shop, which got me looking into the word woolly and how it can have one L or two, and made me think of THIS song.
11. Sometimes it feels like my energy hangs by a thread, and if it gets pulled too hard the whole thing can unravel. And isn’t it funny that a yarn can be a story or strands for weaving but you spin both of them?
I drink coffee; my poet persona drinks tea. - Billy Collins
____________Thirteen Thursday
- The following first appeared in the December 24, 2014 issue of The Floyd Press with a larger selection of photos and captions.
Winterfest, the Jacksonville Center for the Arts’ longest running event, added a new feature to their 20th annual weekend festival of local arts and crafts.
More than 40 local businesses decorated trees for a Festival of Trees. Uniquely trimmed with Floyd themes, the trees lit up the art center’s newly renovated classroom.
“Everybody’s a winner,” said Jax board member Sally Rugaber on Saturday (December 6th). She explained how festival-goers bid on their favorite trees with the highest bidders taking home their chosen trees at the close of the festival on Sunday. Bidding proceeds will go to support the center’s art programs, Rugaber said.
Participating local businesses stepped up for the event and showed off their creativity. The Hotel Floyd tree was decorated by guests with items found around the hotel and included a gift certificate for one night’s stay at the hotel, said Kamala Bauers, co-owner of the hotel.
The Floyd Country Store tree was topped with an old-fashioned lollipop. An oversized knitted star was the highlight topper of the Wooly Jumpers Yarn tree.
The Farmers Supply tree was adorned with eye-catching red fishing bobbers and was topped with a miniature pitchfork. Miniature wooden doll furniture hung from the Mainly Mattresses & Furniture Store tree, and Joanne Bell’s beveled glass suncatchers were featured in the Bell Gallery tree.
Winterfest 2014 also featured the arts and crafts of 34 local artisans, visits with Santa, creative activities for kids and the Jax Café.
Organizers and attendees commented that this year’s festival turnout was the best they could remember and that the Festival of Trees was a highlight attraction and a fun way to support the center.
Skipping stone moon
in a tide of evening sky
incoming clouds ripple by
________Colleen Redman / Imaginary Garden with Real Toads
It felt like we fell into a Christmas wormhole, coming out of the theater after watching the nearly three-hour Science Fiction film, Interstellar, on Christmas evening.
I stumbled out of the theater in a surreal haze and saw a crescent dish of a moon hanging low on the horizon, just over a Best Buy sign.
We needed to get grounded and decided to take advantage of being in Roanoke and enjoy a little nightlife.
At the Hotel Roanoke we sipped Irish stout (Josh), Muscat wine (me) and amaretto (Joe) and talked about plot loop holes, black holes, other dimensions and time travel.
I’m as much a fan of Christmas lights as I am of Science Fiction and was happy to see the Hotel’s festival of trees on display.
The last time we saw the Trees Bryce was two and he cried because an over-sized Mickey Mouse next to one of the trees scared him.
This time I took my time like an explorer on a mission documenting the new worlds created in each tree.
The lights sparkled like stars and the bulbs looked like shiny planets.
Look for a post on Floyd’s own Festival of Trees at Winterfest in an upcoming entry. In the meantime, enjoy the show.______Shadow Shot Sunday / Our World Tuesday
Aka: Day in the Life of a Christmas Present
We packed up Josh’s new Camry and brought our Christmas to Dylan’s house this year.
Because kids make Christmastime all the more fun.
And Liam and Bryce sure know how to open a present.
I’m not sure if they were wrestling with each other or the wrapping.
But they went at it with gusto.
Funny how with all those presents, the paper becomes the game (clip HERE.)
Other things
happened too.
And everyone enjoyed the Christmas dinner we brought, complete with a portable table tree.
Merry Christmas from the gang! Read about our Christmas Eve Neighborhood Yankee Swap HERE.
Our Christmas Eve Neighborhood Yankee Swap made some records this year. First, it was the smallest attended party that we’ve had since we started doing it, about 20 years ago.
Secondly, although there were only nine of us, I had five different presents throughout the swap!
There were three first-timers, a plate of No Pipeline/Skull and Crossbones cookies and Sufjan Stevens playing “That was the Worst Christmas Ever” on the stereo.
Besides the loose tea, pottery mug and chocolates from the Chocolate Lounge in Asheville, the highlight of evening was a painting that Mara referred to as Phallic Folk Fake Art. I thought of it more in the tradition of a Bill Murray Lounge act.
The painting was the first present I opened. Believe it or not, I didn’t have it long because it was such a hit that it got stolen!
There were some first class presents, like this flute that was handmade by our friend Chris, who also brought his baked Christmas specialty that went well with my Kahlua and cream: cranberry bread.
Re-gifting is encouraged in the swap. Chris got a 2015 calendar that had a few dates written on it. (He joked that he would remind me when it was time to get my hair cut).
Josh got a ceramic sculpture from Jayn who forgot where she got it. It turned out that the artist was in the room!
There was an abundance of good laughs, conversation and merriment.
Then Santa Joe got to work filling stockings for Christmas day!
1. “I meant to go downstairs but came upstairs instead,” I said to Joe Sunday morning. Seems these winter days teeter between tending the woodstove in the cellar and working at the computer in the office upstairs. And sometimes I get spun around.
2. Later that day, I posted THIS poem about Winter Solstice and got a comment from a reader that read, “What a brilliant conceit you’ve built here, Colleen!” so I had to look up “conceit,” because I was only familiar with the more common meaning of the word: “excessive pride in oneself.” I learned that the second meaning is “a fanciful expression in writing or speech; an elaborate metaphor.” 
3. After participating in a Facebook thread about how Compact Fluorescent Light bulbs contain mercury and LED light bulbs contain lead and arsenic, a joke starting forming that began: “How many hazmat workers does it take to change a light bulb?”
4. You know social media has a hold on your life when you see something cool and find yourself looking for a “like” button.
5. I think this qualifies as Yogi Berra Zen: “In times like these you have to speak and act. But if every time you speak and act, you make matters worse, you better shut up.” – Pema Chodron
6. THIS penguin makes me happy.
7. And THIS blind painter inspires me.
8. When it’s winter and I say something is “cool” I always think it’s a pun.
9. Along with a link to a story titled “Sales of ‘any old shit’ expected to treble as men start Christmas shopping” a friend on Facebook wrote: “I just bought my kids some sardines for their stocking. To be fair, they love them.”
10. Joe fills everyone stockings with buffalo jerky and tangerines and never gets a complaint. This year Josh wanted a load of gravel for his property, so I filled a gift bag with gravel (as close to getting coal as he’s gotten) and hid some money in it.
11. Joe Cocker passed away Tuesday, which reminded me of when my sister Sherry and I saw him at the Boston Tea Party in 1968 before he was well known. At the time, we thought he was very brave and were convinced that he had cerebral palsy because of the way he contorted himself when he sang.
12. Coming from the North Pole, Santa knows how to chill, but THIS is going too far.
13. Is it too late to put THESE on my “All I Want for Christmas” list?
Mary’s halo
Oh holy night
A wiseman’s moon
of guiding light
____________Our World Tuesday / Real Toads / I Heart Macro
The light trickles back
through the skinny-waisted squeeze
of winter’s hourglass grip
________Colleen Redman____dVerse Poets Pub / Imaginary Gardens with Real Toads
The dishes are from wild clay dug up and wood fired by my Asheville Potter Son. __________Shadow Shot Sunday
Virginia’s Blue Ridge Music Festival recently gave a Holiday Party to thank donors and sponsors of the Floyd-based festival, which brings classical music mentors and academy students together for ensemble and symphony performances each spring.
Hosted in the mountaintop home of Lorrie and Doug Mann, the celebration included a spread of holiday refreshments, drinks and classical music performances in a festive setting.
Board member Randall Wells gave a report to the guests in song, and was accompanied by the whistling of renowned classical whistler Zachary Groff, who also accompanied other performers, playing on the Mann’s rare red Steinway piano. Wells sang the regrets of the festival artistic director, Maestro David Wiley, and board president, Jay Durner, who were not present because they were busy conducting concerts.
The festival’s new executive director, Ursula Ceballos (pictured on the right with board member/secretary Mary Wiley) was introduced at the party. She was described by one board member to be “diligently working with the board to raise funds to support the professional musician mentors who will be working side-by-side with festival fellows.”
VBRMF Vice President Barbara von Claparede presented a certificate of appreciation to David Wiley Sr. in gratitude for his work with the festival. The recognition was in the form of a scholarship for an academy fellow in Wiley’s name. Wiley Sr. was not in attendance due to illness.
The 2015 Music Festival is scheduled for May 27 through June 7 and will include major symphonic works, chamber music, and informal events throughout the community – presented by a full symphony of professional musicians and highly talented pre-professional fellows.
The above first appeared in The Floyd Press on December 18, 2014. Read about and see photos VBRMF’s 2013 inaugural 12 day festival HERE. And HERE is a story on last year’s weekend festival.
Note: For more information about VBRMF visit virginiasblueridgemusicfestival.org, or email ursula.ceballos.vbrmf@gmail.com.
1. Only in the country: Some estate homes have lions at either side of the entrance. Here at our humble home, we currently have two hanging deer that Joe just hunted.
2. On Saturday we woke up and asked Siri, “What are the names of Santa’s reindeer?”
3. Then we looked up the Glass-Steagall Act that was passed after the Great Depression’s run on banks and prohibited commercial banks from the investment banking business and which we learned about from watching the HBO series The Newsroom. The Glass-Steagall Act was repealed in 1999 by legislation that was co-sponsored by three Republicans and signed into law by President Clinton, setting the stage for the banking crisis and bailouts of 2008.
4. The Newsroom (which I checked out of the library) isn’t the only show I love and learn from. I’m a huge fan of the PBS show Finding Your Roots, whose host and producer, Henry Louis Gates (the famed Harvard professor of African studies) discovered through genetic analysis and genealogy research that he was more white (Irish) than black, and that the further you go back the more researchers are finding how related we all really are. The series revealed that 35% of black men in the U.S. wouldn’t be able to trace their male DNA back to Africa, but to a white man who impregnated their female ancestor during slavery. Matt Damon and Ben Affleck are distantly related and so are Kevin Bacon and his wife Kyra Sedgwick. Sally Fields shares a common Mayflower ancestor with two of my friends here in Floyd. Ken Burns discovered that a Southern ancestor kept slaves and that he is also a descendent of Abraham Lincoln. Some of Tina Fey’s and David Sedaris’s Greek ancestors were slaughtered in a battle with Turks, but they both also had Turkish DNA. – Check out the profiles and amazing stories revealed at the Discover Your Roots website HERE. 
5. After I read Joe my story on my version of living a successful, happy life, which I was asked to write for a local book, and which included the line: “If everyone gets a deck of 52 cards of energy a day, I only get 30 on my best days, and I have to use them wisely” is one way I’ve described living with CFS,” Joe responded, “You lived the hand that was dealt you and you lived it with fun.” Later he took me out to celebrate the story’s completion.
6. If you google-image the word portal, you might get THIS.
7. On Friday we heard the best ever rendition of Rudolph. It was performed by our six-year-old grandson Bryce, who had sung it the night before at PTA program. It was his performance (front and center in the photo above) that made us want to learn the reindeer names.
8. It’s been a season of firsts: Not only did I wait 30 years before finally getting to see The Nutcracker, the day after that, I watched my first cakewalk. See HERE.
9. Lately, every time I type “Dogtown,” Roadhouse, I end up typing “Doghouse” and then just get the feeling that it doesn’t look right.
10. My sister Kathy is very creative. I told her she should charge people admission to see her tree (on the left) this year.
11. Just so you know: I blog a bit of everything I go to and if it’s newsworthy I might submit it to the local paper.
12. Blogging is like taking a matchbook souvenir from each of the places I’ve been and putting them in the scrapbook journal of my life.
13. Read about how blogging cured me of shopping HERE.
________Thirteen Thursday
Shop Local Post Notes: 1. Grateful Bread Bakery 2. Jeanie O’Neill’s Boutique 3. Finders Keepers 4. Grateful Bread 5. New Mountain Mercantile 6. Farmers Supply. _________Wordless Wednesday
Aka: This is how you do it, Floyd.
Look for story and pictures of the Gingerbread Ball, a fundraiser at Dogtown Roadhouse for the Rising Sun Community School, in an upcoming issue of The Floyd Press.
I waited 30 years to see my first performance of The Nutcracker ballet. I saw it with my 4 year old grandson Liam, whose attention was good (although his enthusiasm was above a whisper). He stayed engaged at least until intermission.
We were very proud that a member of Floyd’s Springhouse Community School (a project-based school for teens where my husband is an adviser) was dancing as a junior member of the Southwest Virginia Ballet, the company that put on the show (for the 18th holiday season). A group from the school made the hour long drive down the mountain to take in the performance that, on this day, was geared to school aged children. I was already in Roanoke, babysitting.
Toys come to life. Snow falls on stage. A giant Christmas tree grows to giant proportions under the spell of a magician. There were sugar plum fairies, toy soldiers fighting mice and even a giant dragon. The beautiful music, gorgeous sets, elaborately detailed costumes and graceful dancing made the show worth the 30 year wait. I’m already looking forward to next year.
As far as I can tell today is the last day for the performance at the Berglund Performing Center (Civic Center) at 3:00. Check out the webpage of Southwest Virginia Ballet, which is celebrating its 25 season HERE. Note: No lights were displayed or flashed and no animals harmed in the taking of the above pictures.
_________Our World Tuesday
- The following first appeared in The Floyd Press on November 26, 2014
Education is a natural process carried out by the child and is not acquired by listening to words but by experience in the environment. – Maria Montessori
Every Wednesday, elementary students at the Rising Sun Community School (RSCS) prepare a hot lunch and eat together. Like a scene from a Thanksgiving feast, tables are lined-up family style. Place settings are set with care by the children and the seasonal menu is primarily locally grown.
“It’s great, especially because I helped make it,” said eight year old Ruby Dowd about Wednesday’s lunch of quiche and salad. She spoke about whisking farm-fresh eggs and adding vegetables – chard, kale and garden onions – to the mixture. 
Eight year old Unika Stallings explained how she helped make salad with vegetables picked from the school garden, while another student offered guidance to a four-year old that was reluctant to try quiche. “Just take three bites,” she suggested.
At a recent open house, Susan Saunders, a certified Montessori Primary teacher and the school’s founder, explained why Montessori classrooms include a wide range and mix of ages. The Primary classroom serves children from 2 1/2 to 6, while Elementary students are 6 to 12. Older children help younger children with work that they have already mastered. The younger ones absorb learning simply by being near the older children, Saunders said.
Saunders showed open house visitors the math and language curriculum areas in one of the Primary classrooms, saying, “Math is as simple as numeration, all the way up to operations and decimal placement and place value.” As for language skills, she pointed to materials and areas designed for self-directed work, saying, “We believe children write to read by putting their own words into sounds first. We also teach cursive.”
“We have a huge focus on cultural studies, not only physical geography but our place as citizens of the universe,” Saunders continued while pulling out a collection of map puzzles along a wall decorated with flags from all over the world. “We also have a 
strong focus on conflict resolution and peace studies. It happens at this age. When they have trouble, there are always tools for them to use and a quiet spot for them to go to.”
“This is the world of the three year old,” Primary classroom assistant Stacy Dowd said, as she showed off shelves of enticing Montessori materials for sorting, pouring and washing. She explained the Montessori focus on practical life skills, activities like mom and dad do at home that develop a young child’s fine motor skills, concentration, sense of order, task completion and self-esteem.
“It’s a prepared environment. Everything is set up from left to right to train the eye to read,” said Dowd, demonstrating how a child might balance and carry a tray of materials to the table. Practical life skills might include napkin folding or using dressing frames to master buttoning. Watering plants and polishing is a “big lesson,” Dowd said. At the snack corner, children match serving size count to a prompt card and wash their own dish after eating. Putting materials back in their place is part of the Montessori curriculum, and courtesy lessons are modeled by teachers.
In one of the two Elementary classrooms, teacher Alison Dragoui showed visitors her
student’s curriculum areas. The language study area includes grammar boxes, word study and handwriting materials, dictionaries and poetry. “The majority of our language work is incorporated into the curriculum of biology, cultural studies and science. We do a lot of report writing,” she said.
Dragoui, who is soon to complete her Montessori Elementary teacher certification, showed a 3D topical map of Central America that her students made with clay, sand and watercolors as part of their culture and geography studies. “Everyday we do memorization of math. There 
are math operations and big math work for students that are ready.” A second elementary classroom serves as space for self-directed science work. Art, movement and peace areas are always open.
At one of the school’s several peace areas during the open house, 3 year-old primary student Nora Howell was engrossed in a sand tray Zen garden. Her mother, Jessi Howell, said she recently enrolled Nora’s 5 year-old brother, who likes science and math, saying, “I feel like it will be a concrete foundation for his future.” Programs at the school are designed to fit each family’s needs, schedules and budgets, Saunders said.
Before hot lunch on Wednesday, children worked individually or in small groups. They transitioned from activity to activity with ease on their own or under the guidance of teachers. Some were absorbed in work that they did on floor rugs, others showed their work to their teachers. Toddlers are also part of the school community and are integrated into the primary classroom for part of the day. There was group time, lesson time, free choice and outdoor play.
Located in a large farmhouse on Bethlehem Church Road, the school uses a holistic approach to education, as outlined by its founder Maria Montessori. “We care about the whole child and the family as an extension,” Saunders said. She referred to school parents as a “committed group” and spoke about how much fun it’s been to watch a grassroots effort grow from eight students in 2012 to as many as 30 today. “We want to serve the community. We want to teach children to be good citizens of the world,” she said.
Note and Update: For more information on RSCS call 745-2229 or visit the school’s website at risingsunfloyd.com. Watch a video of RSCS storytime HERE. Search “rising sun community school” on youtube.com for a video clip of group time at RSCS. The school will be moving to their new location at the JacksonvilleCenter for the Arts in January.
