Dad's Facebook

Elizabeth's Gig- Raising funds for her gap year in Bangladesh and the UK

We visited Deene Park

Roger and Helen (I put this in so they would look at my blog.)

Mum week I

Mum and the girls (week II)  Kirby Muxloe Castle.

Margaret contemplating Stoneywell

The girls in further contemplation

James and Lis (contemplation)

Fruit de Mer at The Olive Branch, Clipston

Lis all at sea

Alex (James's sister)- a fine composition,

Family Therapy in brief

The 'story' provides the map from which the
territory can be explored.

But the map is always an approximation.
It can never match reality for accuracy.

What can you see from where you are.  The real thing is
better than the map.  But is it?  I can only see 'one' view.

Who am I listening to?

So what’s the story?  (Who owns that story?)  Any other stories?  You've got amendments to the stories?  Where does that story come from? (Who’s line is it anyway?)

"Good Question!"

Good questions unlock doors…– or are they just stiff-  or have never been opened before?  –Perhaps it’s already open? As a father once said to me

     “Push where the door is”

Circulate questions and Reflexive question

“Questions that make you get out of your seat and move around.”

Linear- constructive-direct with single answers.    Circular- liberating-open, with many answers.

Strategic- constraining ‘on the spot.’      Reflexive- generating- ‘reflecting on.’

Goals and Outcomes

We are interested in what the family wants.

–How much is the this the same?  Different?

–How will we know when we’re arriving?

–Like a destination on a map.  We won’t know until we get there.

Know Yourself

Self-Reflexivity - That’s me!  That’s you… That’s both of us..

Flexible Thinking

Stories… repeated often…hardening…becoming fact.

A consensuses builds up about the story.  It becomes part of our fabric.  Like the road we walk on.  We are in danger of stopping ending our need to think

    about it.

What about Jim Wilson (2007) The Performance of Practice

Scale One

–Systemic Humility vs Passionate Conviction  

Scale Two 

–Spontaneity vs Forward Planning                   

Scale Three 

–Simplicity and Complexity                             

Scale Four  

–Seriousness vs Playfulness                               

Scale Five 

–Emotional Closeness vs Distance                      

Scale Six 

              -Advocacy vs Curiosity      

Fingers pointing

Here are some thoughts on 'words' inspired by Norio Saasaki coach of the Japanese women's football team, 'Start the week, Radio 4 chat show, and my last lecture at Leeds University.

Not just men...
Words, with one foot in sea, one on the shore,
Fingers pointing, "Over there, a bit."

I assume you see what I see.  I try to help you see.
Similar?  Different?  How different?

Your language holds up a familiar well worn loved object.
I scrabble around in my bag and produce my match.
We ponder them both, examining, turning them over.

Never a deliberate deception.


Norio Saasaki said in a pre-semi final interview that the English team played 'simple football'. Lost in translation?  It was felt that he is such a respectful man, the word he used was unlikely to have meant 'simple'.

Start the week discussed the translation of Ofan Parmuk's books, Maureen Freely and the approximations made in the art of translation http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0607w1g .  Likes finger pointing.  words were such deceivers.

Marie, our course lead spoke about how stories in families get repeated so often that they move from a position of 'conjecture' into 'fact'. (They become like sedimentary rock.) Their position becomes unquestionable.  The also begin to loose their potency as the fade into ritual, and observance.  They cease to be thought about because they are part of the scenery.

Father's Day

My girls gave me their father's day card with..."I know you'll put them on your blog."  Yes, let's share them with the whole world (or to be exact, my few Russian followers, trying to improve their English.) (Well that's what Google Stats tell me.)

Who's Art?

Joanna's art

Elizabeth's art

God's art. (End of School Ball)

Dwi's visit and Sunday Afternoon walk in the country

 Dwi introduced us to his wonderful family.  Marcella and Allegra, his daughter.  Also his father and mother-in-law, over from Indonesia.

Our farewell to Dwi's in-laws after the church service.

The Starr Family (Thanks Elizabeth

 Our Sunday walk from Rolleston to Goadby, and then over to Tugby, and back to Goadby.

Tiny church for the Hamlet of Rolleston

Inside Rolleston Church

Another wee church for Goadby

The First National Trust House in Leicestershire

On May the 2nd the Starrs, Buttons, Evie and Marion visited Stoneywell.  We easily penetrated the staff  silence over why no one is allowed to walk to the house.  We discovered that the anti-social neighbours became worried that their rural idyll may have been disrupted and launched a planning protest.  The compromise was that visitors are to meet in a distant hidden car park, place paper bags over their heads, and are whisked onto the property through an electronically operated gate.

Helen And Andrew with
Tea Room in the background

Elizabeth, Evie and Joanna

Tucked into the hillside...

Evie in her niche

Gimson's fun design for his brother