Signs of success

You know you've done something right when your 17 year-old son comes to you for instructions in how to work an alarm clock. He's never needed one before and I'm so glad about this - they were the bane of my life when I was a child. No child should need to know how to work one, in my opinion. People should sleep until they naturally wake up, and go to sleep when they're tired. That's what natural body clocks are for. We should not be slaves to the economy and to our alarm clocks.

Yesterday we had this kind of a day:















- identifying birds and wild flowers. We think we might have some coal tits nesting around here, and we were trying to work out whether we've got fat hen or 'good king henry' growing in the field (about which, more here later, I hope.)

The cows escaped from the top field again and Tom had to fix the wall to try to prevent this - again. He took Lyddie up with him and they sat in the grass, enjoying the view.














Is this real living? It feels real. We get things done, slowly but surely. Sometimes I wonder whether we should be rushing about earning money instead, but life's not just about money, is it? In fact, I suspect it's not even about money.

These were the things that I wanted to teach my children.