Saturday, March 15, 2025

Slice of Life 2025 - Out and About

Photo of people at tables. At the front of the room is a banner that says Ramadan Mubarak. To the right is a projected slide showing the months of the Islamic calendar.

This weekend started off with my first community Iftar. It was a wonderful event with many people I knew and others who were new to me. I saw a family from one of my schools and colleagues from our school district. We learned a lot about Ramadan and I was able to listen to and try playing some middle eastern instruments. Speaking of which, two of the drums are in this really cool video of Ahmed Alshaiba doing a cover of Perfect by Ed Sheeran. 


I watched the video this afternoon while reading Fledgling by S.K. Ali (a character in the book plays this song on the oud) as I was relaxing after a morning full of activity.

First, I went to a professional development class out at a nature conservancy. We were learning about the Wintun/Patwin Homeland and the plant and animal relatives from this area. We learned about the California pipevine swallowtail butterfly and the plant it needs to eat which is a specific kind of pipevine. 

A vine is climbining a small piece of wood. From the vine a flower in the shape of a pipe is hanging.

A fun moment was when I ran back to the barn to grab my tea, I saw a student from one of my schools. whose mom happens to work there. It was a fun moment. We were both happily surprised.

When I left, I hit a few stores to get materials for school and then stopped by to see a cool mural at a middle school. 

A large mural with a sun in the center and a yellow orange sky. The ground and things slightly above the ground are in blue like shadows. There are cattails and people and trees. There is a large bird in the center flying above with images. On the left is a person with a shell necklace, an instrument in their mouth, accessories from their head with feathers on the end. There's also a beaded headdress that goes around the head and keeps their eyes from view. The image on the right is a read headdress above a red dress or other clothing, but the body of the person is not there.

This side wall is blue and has a very large red hand. Within the hand are many other handprints that are various shades of red or yellow or brown.

The school has a Native resource center that I would love to see some day, but I knew I could at least see the mural. I'll have to go back sometime when I can see the resources and how the center is organized.

Next I stopped by the public library and visited the book sale. I made a huge pile of books and then the person in charge found out I was taking them to a school library and let me have them for free!! So awesome.

Now I need to run and get ready to go to one of my school's yearly dinner and auction. More fun and more people. I wish you a great weekend!

1 comment:

  1. That is a VERY cool mural. And I love that the person in charge gave you the books for free. Excellent all around.

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