garden dreams & new digs for the girls

it's here.  the weird in-between time of late february/early march.  yes, it's still winter.  it is.  but there are days that are almost short sleeve days and so naturally (and just on time, really) I'm getting that garden itch.  I spent an hour on the fedco website (though their catalog is a most beautiful thing to behold as well) the other night.  I told myself we really only needed new onion, pea, bean, and tomato seeds, but you know how that goes.  I tallied up my cart full of 20ish items and now wait excitedly for the package to come.

we are revamping our raised beds, planning out other beds, at least one with a small hoop house over it, and reorganizing our seed starting/gardening/chickening/beekeeping (and now sugaring!) supplies all into our back shed.  for a while it was storage, and then it sat for a long time while we (I) debated turning it into a chicken coop or a playhouse for Claire.  I know, I know.... and I love my daughter more than the chickens, I do.  I really, really do.  but.  a gardening/chickening/etc'ing shack it has become.  there is a small 'room' in the back corner (I say 'room' only because it has a door separating it, it is almost a closet, really, but with shelves and a window. we think the building was once used as a little cabin of sorts and that was the bathroom) that is now the hens' new nighttime digs.  or, it will be once they grow accustomed to it and actually start going in there at night instead of in their chicken tractor.  Rose laid an egg in there already though, so we're getting there.  just yesterday (a warm and sunshiney day that was much needed following the previous day) we cleaned out the area behind the back shed (which will have to acquire a new and more snappy and fitting name in all of it's newfound glory), moved some fencing around, and moved the chicken tractor (a bit heavy to call a tractor, really, but portable all the same) into the back corner.  the compost piles had to be moved in order to make all of that work, but everything fits more nicely now and the changes free up more of the yard for playing and gardening.  maybe some more fruit trees.  or an aquaponics setup if papa gets his way.

we watched as the bees buzzed about, bringing in baskets of butter-yellow pollen.  I am giddy thinking about splitting the hive back into two once the time is right and maybe actually harvesting some honey this year. (finally!)  add that to our stash of maple syrup (holding somewhat steady at a bit over 2 gallons now after some eating and sharing and gifting), and we are on our way to producing our own sweeteners.  the liquid kinds, anyway.

this year we finally have a dedicated gardening/homestead-type-things notebook.  much nicer and generally more useful year to year, I'm guessing, than the stray pages floating around with previous years' garden sketches.  though the sketch of our garden from last year is still safely secured on our bulletin board for planning purposes for this year.  so far several pages of the notebook have been filled with the details and lessons learned from our inaugural sugaring season.  to that I will soon (very very soon) add our seed starting dates and details.

so, yesterday~  lots of sunshine and moving and shaking in the yard.  and today~ well, today started off with a massage followed by breakfast and tea, popcorn by the fire, snow gently (very gently, almost a mist of snow) falling outside and the promise of a fun dinner out after work this afternoon.  we (the three of us, because that's how we tend to roll) will be taking part in the asheville small plate crawl,  tasting bites from here and there and ending, I'm sure, at the french broad chocolate lounge for dessert.  we'll be bringing someone's pjs and toothbrush along and crossing our fingers that dreamland will find her on the way home.

february funk

Old man winter and I have kept things pretty chummy this year.  I've managed to keep my eye on the silver linings of sap boiling, fire stoking, book reading, food eating and tea drinking, and not dwell much on the darkness and cold and bitterness.

But.

It seems a case of that nagging late february funk has been trying hard (haaaarrrd) to creep in on me these past few days.

This morning, after waking up (much later than I'd intended, after going to bed at a fairly decent time with the goal to rise a while before my little lass and hence get a big fat dose of mama time) to a power outage and icy cold bitterness, I found myself wallowing more than a bit and in need of rescue from succumbing to the blues.  The power came back on after a while, but I sort of cruised along on autopilot for most of the morning, trying to be cheerful with Claire, trying to stay warm (I wasn't motivated enough to go scrounge for dry kindling with which to start a fire and I'm too stubborn to turn on the heat, because we haven't so far this year and I don't want to break that), trying to think of fun things to do with her, trying to keep her newly-three-year-old mood swings at bay while staring mine down as well.  I called Mike for some cheering up, and it helped a bit.  I mean, it's not really his thing, talking on the phone and playing cheerleader.  Probably like it isn't a lot of guys' thing.  But he put in a good effort and that alone, the intention, along with hearing his voice, helped.  I made a very big cup of tea.  I got dressed (at about, um, 1:45 in the afternoon) and made an effort to make an effort.  A cute skirt with tights, fuzzy warm boots, fuzzy warm sweater, earrings and a colorful scarf.  Leg warmers, even.  For real.  It wasn't just jeans and a long sleeved t shirt, anyway, and that was the point.  And then of course just getting out of the house and going to work was helpful too.  After work I decided to swing by the library and then Claire and I walked around town a bit, stomping fallen icicles at the park and then stopping for an enormous mug of hot cocoa at one of our local coffee shops.  Complete with whipped cream, cocoa, and mini chocolate chips.  Very, very good.  Claire decided that we should drink it there and really, that was a good call.  It turned our outing into more of an adventure and I needed that.  We lingered over the yummy treat and she exclaimed (quite loudly) several times "oh this is goooood!".   And then we walked some more before crunching icicles again and heading back home.

February can be hard.  Cabin fever.  Winter blues.  Today, I had it, whatever you want to call it.  I felt tired and cranky and unmotivated and like I was just some lazy being sitting around in my pjs every day reading books and making lists of things I want to do but not actually doing any of them.  I was snappy over the littlest, silliest things.  I was way down in that "everything feels monotonous and stagnant" mindset and it wasn't pretty.

So the morning was horrid and the afternoon got better after I made an attempt to pull myself out of funkytown.  And sometimes all it takes is that attempt.  Willing yourself (by which I mean myself) to exert just a little bit of energy.  Go outside.  Go for a walk.  Do something.  And the reminder to myself that within hours my outlook will likely be rosier and things will indeed seem brighter.  My life, it turns out, is not really stagnant and monotonous (well, at times it is monotonous, but usually pleasantly so and besides, I kind of signed up for that with the whole parenthood thing).  And I am not really just a lazy bag of bones who never gets out of my pjs and does nothing more than make lists of things I can't ever hope to attain.

I am way more than that.  I often even cross things off those pesky lists.  While not snapping at loved ones and fully dressed in non-pajamas, I'll have you know.



(if I had photos to add to this post, there would be one of the amazingly therapeutic and quite beautiful hot cocoa and one of my leg warmers,  but I have none to share)

weekending: just us girls

papa is away for the weekend, working 2 1/2 shifts in a row at the fire department.  that's about 60 hours.  Claire and I have been holding the fort down with waffles, tea, visits with friends, some painting, plenty of fire tending, a library trip, and a little bit of movie watching.

in addition to that I placed a seed order and stared at the christmas tree that is still on our front porch.  I also stared at the piles of outgoing stuff on the porch.  the staring did not do much in terms of removing either the tree or the piles.  but it's a start.

and now I'm off to prepare my part of a little going away brunch that we (our neighborhood) is having for our next door neighbors in a few hours.  and to sweep my floors and such for the occasion.

this afternoon she and I may go visit some friends (friends whose papa/husband also happens to be working a double at the FD this weekend) who have recently acquired both a pony and a sailboat (yes, for real). because does anything sound like more fun than taking kids on pony rides and drinking a beer on a sailboat that's parked in someone's yard in the mountains?  all while catching up and watching chickens and goats run around the yard?  probably hard to top in our quiet little world, I think.



weekending with amanda

deep thoughts in the grocery (and other) aisles

It can be a heavy burden sometimes, making a concerted effort to shop conscientiously.  I mean, I know in comparison to many of the loads and burdens carried by many others the world over, it's laughable.  I have food, shelter, water, medicine if I need it.  So I have the 'luxury' of spending my time and energy worrying about other things.  Taking them on as though it's my job to keep all the crap out of my little world.  Maybe it is.  It kind of is, isn't it?  But anyway...... here are some of the things that have weighed me down while shopping lately.  I know I'm not alone.

Palm oil and orangutans.  I am a big fan of great apes and of humans not driving them to extinction.  Orangutans have very little habitat left in the wild and palms for palm oil are dwindling that at an alarming rate.  We don't want hydrogenated oil.  Enter palm oil taking over in lots of packaged goods.  Well great, there go those pesky, nasty trans-fats.  But..... we do want orangutans, right?

Quinoa and the native Peruvians for whom it has long (way long) been an extremely important and nutritive part of their diet but who can no longer afford it because it's all being exported so that we can eat this 'ancient grain' and feel good.  Except for that part about stealing this food from it's original growers and consumers.

How about chocolate malts?  I love them.  So much.  We sometimes get ovaltine but guess who makes it?  Nestle.  (of course)  I don't want to give them my money.  I don't like the idea of a company 'donating' a shit ton of expired infant formula to third world nations for a tax right off, only to get the mamas and babes there somewhat dependent on their product and guess what?  they (those mamas who are lead to believe that this stuff is better for their babes than what they've got right there, for free) can't afford to keep buying it and so they have no choice but to water it down.  Way down.  With really friggin' dirty water, by the way.  I hear there are some good malted milk brands available online.  I'm going to find one.  One that doesn't give me a bad taste in my mouth by making me picture starving babies as I drink it.

Are clothes made in china and other sweatshop-heavy countries acceptable when purchased secondhand?  I feel like yes, yes they are..... like the damage is already done.  But I don't consider it much longer than the time it takes to think just that.  And I spend no time thinking about how that very same reasoning just doesn't hold for me in most other circumstances.

Then there's gas from Exxon- which I pretty much haven't bought in the last decade and a half except if it's literally all that's there and I'm way below E.  But they are all just as bad, I'm sure.  But I see an Exxon station and think, if you spill a bunch of oil in a beautiful (or any) place and then do a crap job of cleaning it up and mistreat and underpay the natives of that region to do the dirty work for you, and the whole world knows about it.... how do you still get to be such a big rich company?  Where's the justice in that? (I know, there is none- and it is naive to think that oil companies care about such trivial things as justice)

Mattress shopping.  Ugh.  I worried myself into headaches for weeks with fears that I was poisoning Claire by not spending three thousand dollars on an all organic mattress for her.   She spends no less than half of her life sleeping (at this point) after all.  In the end I did not in fact spend several months pay from teaching art classes part time on her sleeping surface.  Nope.  I got a regular mattress from the furniture store in town and then aired it out on the porch for over a month and covered it with a pvc/phthalate/vinyl-free mattress pad and called it a day.  But obviously I still think about it.

And body care? please..... I try sometimes to be like "oh I'll just get this or that and it's fine, really..." but then I read the dang ingredient list and consider the fact that you can rub garlic on your feet and then taste it in your mouth a little while later and that kind of makes me think about how my skin = a giant sponge, and do I want my skin or Claire's skin eating ingredients like antifreeze (which is basically what a bunch of that crap is), triclosan, urea, etc?  Nope.  I don't.  I really, really don't.

I remember hearing a few months ago about how we weren't supposed to let our kids play with the slippery cash register receipts.  Okay, check.  And then I recently read that it's because they are coated with a fine layer of powdered BPA.  For real?  So now I don't want to touch them either.  So out with the water bottles, out with canned foods.... out with receipts?  Good grief.

And I don't want saccharin sweetening anything either, if you please.  And don't get me started on GMOs sneaking into our food supply and making us all sick while we look the other way, often unbeknownst to us.  And about CFL bulbs really truly just being gross and nasty and dangerous even if they do save electricity.  (but at what cost?)


Sometimes I want to just go live in a little hole somewhere.  Not usually.  Not really.  But man, shopping in a way that I feel good about seems to get more difficult on a daily basis.

So there.  A little ranting.

cabin number six

I did it.  Or rather, we did it, Mike and Claire and I.  My first night away since she came into our lives a bit over three years ago.  This past weekend saw me driving up to Hot Springs with a dear friend, watching the flurries falling and catching up on each other's lives in the way we have very rarely been able to do at birthday parties and at each other's houses as the kids run around screaming.  You know how it is.  We landed at cabin number six in the Hot Springs Campground on the French Broad river.  While we waited for the third member of our mamas' weekend away party to arrive, we sat on the floor eating popcorn and dark chocolate, the game of Set spread out before us but largely ignored.  Because of the catching up and all.

Then an arrival, and a bit more snacking and chatting followed by a nice little hike on the AT on the other side of the river.  Very cold.  Very windy.  Beautiful bluish-greenish-greyish river far below our perch atop 'lover's leap'.  We returned just before it started getting dark to start dinner and a fire and open up the wine.

A late hot tub soak, way more wine than I'm accustomed to these days, (truly, I'm typically a one or two beer kind of girl) and up way past my bedtime.  I woke Sunday morning and, unable to get back to sleep even though I so wanted to, I read in my bunk for an hour, working my way through the second half of Gone Girl.  A book that I really wanted to love but found to be a little too predictable in parts and perhaps just so far away from my typical read that I just couldn't quite embrace it.  Not that I don't occasionally like to add some variety to my reading list, but I am definitely anxiously awaiting my turn to get Flight Behavior from the library.

So anyway~ this mama now has a weekend (or, nearly 24 hours anyway) away under her belt and a whole new world of possibilities has opened up.  And she (Claire) did fine.  Of course she did.  She woke in the middle of the night crying for me to come home right now!  Mike had her 'call' me on her phone to tell me she missed me and wanted me home, and then he brought her in our bed for stories until she fell back asleep.  When I got home around noon on Sunday I found her on the couch under many blankets, looking through a colored toilet paper roll (her telescope) and declaring herself to be a pirate.

Yep, just fine.

in the morning

the light dances around while breakfast and tea are made.  we are slowly becoming a bit more early to bed early to rise around here.  slowly.  us girls, anyway~ papa is already there.  it's a good thing.  I'm usually in bed with a book not too long after getting her down and that is quite nice.  I've also realized that nights I have trouble getting to sleep are best remedied by crawling into bed with her.  and then she and I both sleep all night.  so I guess, after all, it's mutual.

all tapped out

                       
starting out, we had no idea what to expect.  not in terms of length of sap season here in north carolina, or of how much sap to expect to collect, how long it'd take to boil it down, or how much syrup we'd end up with.

we tapped the trees on january 18th, boiled a total of nine days (last on the 8th), and just today I pulled the taps and collected the buckets, leaving jars of syrup on doorsteps for the kind folks who gave us permission to tap their trees.

we learned a lot.  we learned that you really cannot use dryer vent pipe in lieu of actual stove pipe.  that in order to keep the sap boiling when adding wood we needed to add it just to the front half of the stove.  that kiln-dried scraps of various hardwoods from a local furniture maker were excellent additions to the fire (I admit to keeping a small stash of them to use for something because they are just so pretty), that warm milk mixed with hot sap-syrup is delicious, that cheesecloth alone isn't enough for filtering.  that next year we really have to arrange the boiling off area so that we can tuck a few chairs in there behind the windscreen (because you end up spending a lot of time out there, standing by the fire, watching sap boil...).  we learned that even though the 55 gallon peppered pickle barrel we were using to store sap still smelled faintly of peppers after several scrubs, it didn't affect the taste of the end product (much as I worried it might).  we discovered that four trees probably is our maximum given our little back yard evaporator set up.  and mike got so good at estimating when the sap was nearly done that the last time we boiled it took only minutes to finish it off inside because it was already so close to being syrup.

in the end, we estimated that we produced about (some was slurped here and there, of course) 306 ounces.  so, a bit over 2 3/4 gallons.  some has been shared and gifted, most of the rest will be squirreled away for us to use over the next year.  we spent some money on supplies, but I bet it wasn't more than 2 3/4 gallons of syrup would cost.  I am all about doing it again in years to come, and I'm quite sure we're all on board for that.  I find it deeply satisfying to be able to say "we made all of the maple syrup we'll use over the next year".  and maybe even more.

what sweet, sticky, time consuming fun.

weekending

my mama came for a saturday morning pre-birthday brunch
cucumber sandwiches and vegetable soup were her requests
and I made flan, because it's her favorite (but next time I'm leaving the lemon out of the caramel)

it was her birthday and she shows up with valentine's day gifts for all of us
this is how she is
I strive to be as generous

little miss has been giving the stink eye quite freely all weekend
(she must have heard all these people telling me three is tricky, doesn't want to disappoint)

she had a birthday party to attend
we found the chickens' new hiding spot for their eggs and
today Mike started on the "new" coop
(we are retrofitting our back shed, so to speak- exciting stuff.  photos to come)

we called it quits on sugaring season
the trees are still drip-dripping just a bit, but it isn't really much at all and it's getting darker
we are pleased with how it went
more than pleased
nearly three gallons (!)

papa found a craigslist ad for free firewood
he's been hard at work adding to next year's pile

and now I'm off to pick up takeout
(happy Chinese new year!)
and hopefully get her in bed earlier (late nights around here, lately)
so we can settle in to watch what I now freely call a soap opera
(yep, I'm talking about Downton Abbey)




linking up with amanda at habit of being

touchstones

A few hours ago I reserved a hot tub in Hot Springs (NC) for myself and two lovely ladies next Saturday night.  We're staying in a little cabin on the river for the night, the three of us each taking of our mama hats for the evening.  For me, it will be for the first time.

Claire just turned three a week and a bit ago.  So, I kind of think I'm due.  I feel like I've been waiting for this for so long and yet, now that it's imminent, I'm just a bit, well..... hmmmm.  Don't know what I am.

Excited for hiking and hot tubs and a campfire and wine and good food and good conversation with some awesome ladies?   Heck yeah.

But then there's that little something else whispering ever so softly in my ear.  So softly, actually, that I have no clue what it's actually saying.  I'm not worried about her.  She'll be fine.  Pizza and a movie with papa, probably.  A bit of a drawn out bedtime, I bet.  But she'll be alright.  We'll all be alright, of course.  I'll be better than alright more likely than not.  A mama weekend will no doubt be a dose of good medicine for me and feed my soul.

And yet there's this:  As much as I feel like it sometimes takes way too long, I like singing her to sleep and watching her drift off, and I love her warm body next to mine when she comes into our room in the middle of the night and crawls under the covers with us.  Love hearing that breath and even her snuffly little snores.

It seems that while I wasn't looking, these things have become some of my touchstones.  Fancy that.

Though I remember very vividly threatening to leave and stay at a hotel on some of our worst nights when she was younger and seemed to never, never ever, sleep... now that we're past that (incredibly long and mind numbing) hump, well, hey, I'm alright after all.  And I've got a sense of the not-lasting-forever-ness of these kinds of things.


Mostly, I think it just feels big.  And that's what that indiscernible voice is whispering.


But, there will be hot tubs.  And wine.  I think I might just be alright.

home

my definition of home has always been a bit fluid, and influenced by a handful of things
as I get older, and most certainly since becoming a parent, I am starting to find it
easier to pinpoint
often, (almost always) it is people
often, (almost always) it is a place
always, it is a feeling

of course it's best when all three are involved, and they usually are
naturally

right now, well into winter, I find it easiest to define home.
whereas spring and summer are about flinging open the doors and windows and happily spreading out into the world- the yard, the neighborhood, the surrounding mountains and streams.... even further if we are lucky....
this time of year is all about drawing back in
into ourselves, and into our homes

we watch as the piles in the woodshed dwindle.... and this year, finally, we find deep satisfaction in heating our home exclusively with wood

for now, home is the crackling of the fire
the always dusty hearth covered with bits and pieces of sticks and whatnot
the smell of woodsmoke as you enter our house

always, it is the
sleeping, noisy breath of a newly three year old
it is that comfortable feeling, that relief, in being where I am most myself
it is where I wake up to (on good days) giggles and snorts and
(on trickier days) a grumpy but still somehow charming little voice

as the cold creeps in and stays for extended visits,
home is slippers and robes
sleeping in socks
pajamas well into the day
it is tea, all day long
and bread, rising again on the counter, the table, in front of the wood stove
it is the chasing after of newly three year old toes

it is the once again growing dependence on the library stack
a stack that teeters taller as the mercury drops
it is baking with mama
it is the train (and the highway, a mile and a half away)
sounding closer than it did months ago
it is the night sounds shifting from crickets and barking dogs
to screech owls and whirling winds

there is still the chasing of chickens and sunbeams around the yard
though basking in those beams is now a rare treat and carries a slight sense of urgency,
like this is important stuff here
soak it in, soak it in
store it away for the cold days still to come

as I've gotten older I've come to embrace winter so much more
come to even look forward to the longer nights
there is more talking, more interaction between the grownups
games by the fire and discussions about what ifs and maybes...
something I am hungry for and welcome wholeheartedly

there is more time to reflect on and bask in what it is
that we call home

the days have of course started growing slightly longer,
and bulbs peek their heads up as if to see if all is clear
blueberry bushes and apple trees think about sending tender leaf buds into the cold world
(not yet, not yet, wait a little longer!)

spring is sweet and highly anticipated, but I sit here and think
you can hang around a bit, winter~
you've got your selling points
your allure

I am good with coziness and warm socks and tea and fireside chats

following her

It had been a while (a while) since I'd switched out any of the works in her little 'classroom' corner in the office.  I don't have a schedule for doing 'school' work with her, and I don't aim to do certain things on any kind of a regular basis.  You know, because she just turned three, and because academics just isn't what I think little ones need to focus on most.  It's the play and the exploration and the connection and the down-and-dirty fun that are really crucial during this time, right?  But.  She loves it.  She asks so many questions and seems to crave the process of sitting down and more formally(ish) receiving information (of all kinds) and comes away from it deeply satisfied.  So it's here for her.  And we're here to do the works with her, when she wishes.  Which is often.  Or rather was often, until I kind of let the works get all old and boring by way of not freshening things up for her.  So, out with the old and in with the new.  She was so over button sorting and bead stringing, lid/bottle matching, napkin folding, etc.

Now there are some sequencing cards, new puzzles, a color wheel (and color mixing), table washing, new dominos (with shapes and patterns), some simple body part identification and preposition recognition (little pictures where she points out in which ones the subject is over, under, up, down, inside, outside, etc), a continent puzzle map, some newly made sound cylinders and smelling cylinders, and wood polishing (with this recipe).  And soon, hopefully, (if I get making) some pin-poking,  color tablets and number rods.  Her favorites are the sandpaper letters with sound object boxes, the cylinders, and art.  Always, always art.

I found these clear tubes and filled them with rice, mung beans, and chickpeas (for sound cylinders), and vanilla beans, cinnamon sticks, and cotton soaked with wintergreen oil (for smell cylinders), then covered the outsides of the tubes with tape to hide the contents.  She chooses a sound cylinder and shakes it, then goes through the others, one at a time, until she finds the match.  She loves it.  For the smell cylinders, I blindfold her and sit with her, opening different tubes and asking her to let me know when she smells two that are the same.  Those are a little trickier, but she digs them as well.

I love the way this 'school' naturally evolves as she grows and her interests and needs shift.  I remind myself to not push her into one thing or another, to always have it be her choice, to focus on the process, to keep it fun, and of course, to follow her.

0, 1, 2..... and now, 3

three years (and two days) ago on a cold, cold, snowy january morning.....

*

two years (and two days) ago, on another cold january day....

*

one year (and two days) ago, playing on the red caboose in town....

*

two days ago.  she turned three in the early morning and we greeted her (in the not quite as early morning) by singing happy birthday.  she listened with eyes squeezed tight, and a huge grin spread across her little face.  

first things first, we directed her attention to the mass under a blanket on the couch.  she approached cautiously and, when the whole thing moved, stepped away a bit scared.  I helped her uncover what was hiding.... 25 balloons.  we are still having balloon fun around here. 

and then it was time to get down to the business of breakfast.  she'd requested blueberry muffins.  thankfully, something that was totally doable.  she and papa were on it.

as the muffins baked, she opened her gifts.  a new drawing pad and pencil, some tea, a cash register, flowers.... pretty simple

 and then it was time to eat.  and drink.  hot cocoa for her, in the santa mug of course.  I think she is under the impression that hot cocoa must be enjoyed out of a santa mug, and nothing else.  I am okay with that.

candles lit, songs sung.  and hello, three.

the day continued in a somewhat typical lazy fashion.  there were surprise guests bearing gifts, cards to open, dinner out.  ice cream included.  now I just need to get my letter written (one each year on her birthday and mother's day) and add it to the growing pile in her little box.  happy happy birthday sweet one.