Popple-de-Polly makes me laugh

Little Popple-de-Polly
Said, See my new dolly!
With her beautiful, pop-open eyes.

But I can't make her speak,
Though I've tried for a week;
And whever I hug her, she cries.

Ba-looming

Brassavola nodosa 'Little Stars';

nestled with our sprouting seed potatoes.

This little sucker becomes fragrant at night, and

fills an entire room with an intense, spicy-sweet scent.

The boys enjoy inspecting and sniffing it every evening.

(We have divisions for interested parties.)

Epiphyllum (hybrid unknown)

Squeeze calls it Epiphyllum 'Don', named for

the former co-worker that gave it to him.

[When I met the old duffer, he was wearing

his t-shirt backwards. What a dude.]

The color of this "orchid cactus" bloom is so vibrant,

that looking straight into it tickles my brain.

Why???

How is this possible?

• The baby is sleeping.
• The 3 year old has been looking at books or playing quietly by himself for an HOUR AND A HALF. He has checked in with me a couple of times to say, "I love you".
• I have been casually doing my own thing, with a child awake, for an HOUR AND A HALF.
• This is almost-complete freedom of mind and movement, with a child awake.
• This has never happened before.
• The sun is shining, the day is warm.
• It is a beautiful, sweet-smelling day.

And...the kicker:

• I feel guilty about it.

Argh, matey - me toe hooks!

For those unaware, Diego has been obsessed with Peter Pan for some time now. Most of our afternoon "Special Time" play-time follows a Peter Pan-esque storyline starring Peter, the Lost Boys, Tink, Captain Hook, and the Crocodile.

Today, while Captain Hook (as played by Diego) was sitting on the edge of the Jolly Roger and contemplating a fall off the side of the ship, he muttered to himself --

"Hmmmm.... If I did fall off, the crocodile would eat my toes and then I would have toe hooks. Hmmmmm...."

Bear with me a moment, please

There is something about chilled air - drizzly rain - the smell and feel of sticky sap from fir or spruce - and the sight of split level entry houses circa 1981 that remind me of my youth and fill me with nostalgia.

I have stumbled upon all these things within the last couple of days and it makes me feel like I'm 11 again. I guess I miss...the suburbs of Western WA...?

No...but memories flutter in my mind and fill me with, as my husband has described so well, "sweet melancholy".

She flows, and knows

Since recommencing menstruation, I have been charting using Taking Charge of Your Fertility as a tool. It is the most amazing thing - to be totally aware of what is happening "down there". There is no more mystery; I know what is happening, and why; I understand my own anatomy better; I feel more awe for the system and design of the female body.

I am amazed, and pleased.

It also makes me so mad that I didn't discover the Fertility Awareness Method (FAM) earlier. When we were married, the intense desire to NOT get pregnant trumped any interest in learning about other methods of birth control. I didn't care - and I didn't know any better.

[For the record, my mom did warn me about oral contraceptives, but I didn't listen...and what a bummer that was.]

So instead of letting my body "be", I submitted myself to a steady stream of hormones which tricked my system into thinking it was pregnant month after month. It was only after having my first baby, taking the progesterone-only pill (POP) that I started wondering, "What is this stuff anyway?!" I had no idea what I was putting in my body.

And, worse, after ovulating this past weekend, I was saddened to realize that I have only ovulated perhaps 4 times in the past decade. I can hardly believe that, looking back. It's disgusting. I missed out on so much! [and I'm not talking sex here...get your minds out of the gutter...I'm talking knowledge and understanding and appreciation.]

It is especially blindingly pitiful with the knowledge I have gained in just one cycle. Things could have been so much different. I take comfort in the fact that things can be different going forward; knowing what is happening with my body and being in control of my own fertility feels very good. No more "what if...?" or "I don't know...!" I'm in charge. I know what is going on. I am not a victim to circumstance. I can appreciate the design and amazing machine that my body is.

That being said, thanks to charting and practicing awareness, I am realizing that my body is like an old car, a cold engine turning over, trying to get warmed up and ready to roll. She's trying to get back into the swing of it, ladies! Things have been very strange, like the first flow that was more like spotting, a 23 day cycle, and then bleeding again 2 days after ovulation, etc., but I am aware. It is so nice to have the shades off my mind's eye.

Many women use FAM, but for those who don't, it involves 1) taking your waking temperature every morning, 2) observing cervical fluid, and 3) observing cervical position. With these three keys, you can unlock the mystery of natural birth control (or, as it were, pregnancy achievement).

I definitely recommend reading Taking Charge of Your Fertility - I have been referencing it every day for a month. It is fabulous. What a resource!

[Incidentally, I ordered this book for our local library and it hasn't been on the shelf since it arrived. Yesssss. High demand.]

And finally - looking back, I dearly wish I would have known all this information as a teenager. Everything would have made so much more sense! I wish I would have known about The Keeper then, too. But, like my Mom says, "What's done is done." All I can do is move forward and be thankful I discovered FAM at age 31 and not 41, with another decade of confusion under my belt.

Song for the day

Au fond du temple saint with David Byrne and Rufus Wainwright

What 3 year olds do with glitter glue

Thanks Grandma O. --

he loved it!!!

Waltzing through memory

I am now going through my daybooks from early marriage; and sweet william! it is so enjoyable to peruse our lives through my written word. So much that would have been forgotten is right there, to remember. Our lives...unfolding...all over again...

It is beautiful.

There were several weddings near-and-dear to my heart the summer of 2002, this being the first:

Most of the crew --
This was taken at the reception the night before

Of this group of beautiful youngsters, we have just one wedding left - this July. (The second-to-the-last was just this last October.) Don't we all look so fresh?!

From the 7/6/02 daybook entry:
"Katy looked beautiful and Luke looked very handsome and they both looked like they were extremely happy. It was such a beautiful and wonderful, fun and exciting wedding."

Also recounted was the ape man/siezure dance that Squeeze did in the middle of the dance circle (people were stopping to gape); petting sharks in the estuary pool; three sting rays and two green eels; Sam's conversion van blowing up in Blue Earth on the way to the wedding and as a result, missing the entire thing; dancing the two-step with Runyan to "you and I go dancing in the dark"; a faux-dramatic interlude with RC during the song "Lady in Red"; a waltz with DT; Squeeze and RC napping in the air conditioning of our duplex that afternoon; and finishing off the weekend celebration by going to the lake with RC and Squeeze (I was the only one who swam).

Robins three

I laid in bed this morning with the warm glow of the sunrise shyly peaking through my window, hearing birds twittering in the trees for the first time this season. I then recalled the previous evening, seeing three fat robins hopping about the yard at dusk. It feels so good to have them back.

Spring is verrrrrrrry slow in MN, but what a relief it is.

Lovesick

Our emotional vacation continues, though now it has morphed into a more intense and long-lasting reconnection - a meeting of mind and spirit.

I haven't felt lovesick in years. Years. But here I am, right back in the thick of it: feeling the feelings of longing and intrigue that I remember so well from days-gone-by. A sense of connectedness; my time away from Squeeze spent with a twinge in my heart, wishing we were together. I remember this so well from our dating years and early marriage; feeling like I couldn't get enough of him; feeling like he was the best of everything; waking up and watching him sleep and feeling awe of his presence in my life; drinking him in.

I think this connection was put on the shelf after the birth of our first child, and probably months before that, with the slowing of my pregnant body and mind. My connection was now with my baby and as a mother, that intensity was in him and through him. He (my baby) was the person I longed to be with. Squeeze was on the outside of that connection: I remember reading aloud a passage of a parenting book, which stated that fathers often feel like outsiders to the passionate inner-circle, or connectedness, of mother and baby. It resonated strongly with Squeeze at the time. I remember feeling pity for him, but with no desire to remove myself from it.

That baby-entwined intensity has faded through time, and very naturally I think. I am well aware that I did not have this obsessed relationship with my secondborn. Not that I love him any less, but...that...it is different; and my feelings towards my firstborn are different even from that first lovestruck year of babyhood. I was smitten, and consumed.

But now, and I write this with a drowsy smile on my face, I feel as if I have come back full circle, back to, dare I say it so publicly; my lover.

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

March 31 Snowfall

Seeds and cellars

We ordered our vegetable seeds through Seed Savers Exchange this weekend. Looking through the pictures and imagining the bounty is a mouth-watering experience. And the colors! So beautiful. Even the names thrill me:

• Grandpa Admire's lettuce
• Webb's Wonderful lettuce
• Delice de Table melon
• Galeux d'Eysines squash
• Long Island Cheese squash
• Calypso bean
• Empress bean
• Jacob's Cattle Gold bean
• Green Arrow pea

We ordered a transplants of both peppers and tomatoes - 6 of each. We also have several flats of heirloom tomato seeds started; as well as leeks, onions, eggplants and cabbages.

Also under the grow lights is a little experiment: salad greens. We missed fresh greens terribly this past winter; and so, after Squeeze planted one pot of arugula for me - it was so unbelievably delicious, in addition to growing well - we realized that we need to expand our operations.

Root Cellar update:

Our root cellar is now completely barren. Apples, carrots, and potatoes all peetered out this past month. The ghastly remains of the celery was used for one last chicken stock last week, and the tomatoes were gone by mid-November. Onions were eaten by December and the cabbages and the last of the squash departed from our company by the end of January. And we only have one of the twelve quarts of applesauce left (mostly used on pancakes...yummm).

As far as frozen foods, we have eaten two of the three quarts of strawberries from last summer, one of the two quarts of raspberries, and only a couple of quarts of frozen spinach, chard, and lettuce from last summer's garden remain. I've been using the frozen greens in creamy chicken soups and stews, and my - it has been a nice addition. I also froze approx. 15 quarts of tomatoes, of which none are left. I suppose we finished those in February sometime.

Next summer, in addition to freezing greens and berries, I want to can salsa and tomato sauce. We use a lot of these tomato products during the winter months and I'm ready to take on the challenge of putting my own up instead of buying jar upon jar from the grocery store.

We have learned a lot and taken copious notes. It is going to be so much fun to take on the challenge of the new growing season. I can't wait!

Bright spots in gray days

Walking Iris aka Apostle Plant

aka Neomarica

I love having tropical houseplants. They usually bloom when the soul and mind need it most - the dreary winter and spring months when everything outside is varying shades of brown.

The Walking Iris blooms over a number of weeks and is lightly fragrant (putting your nose right into the flower is heavenly). New flowers come from the same flower stalk, and eventually produces a new little plantlet. Each bloom lasts only a day, popping open in the morning and shriveled by the evening hours. I love the purple/yellow color combination.

(Email me if you want a division!)

I don't think he gets it

In a tearful response to an impassioned rebuke from his mother this afternoon, for poking his little brother in the face with a pointy toy, Diego replied remorsefully, "Okay... I will do different naughty things."

Doh!

A few observations from 12 years in the future

Or present, as it were.

After stampeding through my college daybooks, I decided to review my high school journals as well. What an interesting thing it is - to know yourself in those pages - but with the experience and maturity that a decade brings.

A few observations:

• I use the word "mass" with alarming frequency. Like, "I laughed mass hard."
• I was obsessed with boys, or, as I referred to them, "guys".
• I was always very concerned about the fact that I never had a boyfriend, though peppered through the text is many admonitions of feeling glad that I didn't.
• I've realized that I remembered the events through my feelings at the time - which were not necessarily reality. i.e. "No boys ever like me", but recorded in meticulous detail are many stories of getting pushed, jostled, patted, stared at, paper thrown at, attacked, etc., all by teenage boys. Ah-ha! Au contraire.
• From the way I wrote, I think I had a better sense of myself and a higher self-esteem than I remember. I was able to identify things about myself that are still true today, though I may not have seen the larger picture.
• I felt very connected to my female friends; my best friend in particular, whose personality and general presence strangely resembles Squeeze in many ways.
• I was always very concerned about being too loud and too wild. (But not enough to ever reign myself in.)

She flows

The sloughing of my uterine wall has recommenced. I could tell that things were changing, but I wasn't exactly sure what was going on until yesterday when "she flowed". I was strangely pleased to see it, as if that portion of my powers had returned to me.

I whipped out my Size A(fter) Keeper and put 'er in: plugged. Taken care of. I am glad I had purchased the post-vaginal delivery size this time around, as the Size B(efore) wasn't making the grade last time. And my goodness, ladies, I am reminded of how much I really really really like using The Keeper. I've been using it for the last 6 years (with 4 of them largely menses-free) and my only regret is that I didn't discover it sooner. [Props go to LSJF] If you haven't checked into yet, you should: it saves loads of cash, tons of grief, and is the hands-down environmentally-sound choice. It is a win-win-win decision.

This is the third time I've had my period in four years. !!! It has been a nice break, again; I definitely have extended breastfeeding to thank. The general rule is to nurse every 4 hours during the day and 6 hours at night to prevent ovulation, and my goodness: yes. It feels a lot more frequent than that (growth spurt?). But I can't complain with almost 17 months of free and completely natural worry-free birth control!

If this were Diego/Truen, I would have started cycling again in February - and been pregnant by the end of this month. That doesn't look so appealing to me this time around. I want to wow the crowds at our summer weddings (yeah...) and move around freely in pretty dresses in the warm summer sun instead [of lumbering]. The thought of giving birth in January in the frozen snowy prairies is also slightly daunting.

We shall see... I am going to re-read Taking Charge of Your Fertility by Toni Weschler, start charting morning temps, and keep a keen eye out for signs of fertility. It should be interesting - it will be the first time to use the knowledge I gained from that book. It even has recommendations on how to try for a girl (or a boy), though I haven't read that part yet.

Friends first

I never followed up on the Valentine Spaghetti Meal, our Friends of the Library's first fundraiser. It went well. We had 100 or so people in attendance and made over $500. I was there from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm, the longest I've ever been away from Baby Pumpkin (who is hardly a baby anymore). My boobs were like rocks by the end of the day - it was terrible.

It seemed to go over well with the townspeople. There were also two church brunches that day, so we were doubling-up on options in town. In a town of 700 people with one supper club open on limited evenings, they, or should I say, we, have a captive audience. All the various non-profits in the community make BIG MONEY on their fundraiser breakfasts, lunches, and dinners because there is nowhere else to eat! [Well...big money for rural MN...]

A lot of people stopped in after their brunch and donated money to show their support for the library, which was very nice. Who doesn't love libraries?! And, believe it or not, but there are towns in the area who don't have one. I grow faint at the thought.

We have our second fundraiser on Saturday: the local auction house has a food stand that rotates amongst the area non-profits. We got the slot last minute after another group cancelled. We are serving pulled-pork sandwiches, chips, and a pickle - with donuts and coffee in the morning and what locals call "bars" in the afternoon.

[Has anyone heard of these "bars" before? They're like cookies, but baked in huge jelly roll pans and cut into squares. I don't know if this is a regional thing, or my dislike for desserts... I have heard of "lemon bars" before - but simply "bars"??? Very strange.]

Obsess-much?

Your Long Journey from Raising Sand with Robert Plant and Alison Krauss has shot up to #3 on my iTunes account after a morning binge on endless repeat. I - can't - get - enough!

♥ ♥ ♥

I have been on what we have dubbed an "emotional vacation" for the past two weeks with Squeeze, my main squeeze, my only squeeze, aka - my husband. It has been part time-travel, part detective work, and part passionate revival. Our marriage relationship has always been solid, based on friendship and very happy, but for the last few years we have been operating largely as business partners vs. anything resembling passion. It took a little shaking-up to make us realize this.

It has been the most amazing thing - circumstances triggered by an interface from the past threw us into an intense reviewal of our 3.5 year tumultuous dating relationship. We've been re-reading old journals, daybooks, notes, letters, perusing through pictures, and talking extensively and intensively for almost 2 weeks straight, from the second we see each other in the morning until we go to bed (interrupted by work, of course). We never felt like we had the time to talk before this, but now find ourselves sitting the kids down with a pile of play-doh or little cars or sticks outside and talking and talking and talking. It feels so good.

We have made several discoveries about our past: why our dating years were so up-and-down, what attracted us to each other in the first place, and why things simmered down once we finally decided to go for the gold [get married].

We have told each other things that the other has never heard about until now. We are re-realizing why we are such a perfect pairing: how our idiosyncrasies work together to form a stronger bond, and the great respect and understanding that we have for each other.

It has been just so refreshing: and exactly what we needed.

ENFP + INTJ = ♥