Forest of Feelings and Blog-a-lot

Remember Care-a-lot, where the Care Bears lived? Remember how I said songs get stuck in my head for days and weeks at a time?

Here's my latest:

Forest of Feelings, Care-a-lot, and Earth
Aren't far apart
They differ is some ways in some ways not

Cause home is in your heart
Home is in your heart
Home is in your heart...

We've been watching my brother's Care Bears VHS tapes, saved by my mom. (He didn't even remember they were his.) And dang, has it brought back memories. Does anyone else remember the song above?

Things are good; I'm at my parents'. My brother's wedding is this coming weekend. My legs have been waxed (where I spent much time looking like a bullfrog and gulping for air, peppered with squeaks and full-body shudders). Thanks Muver!

And now, this post will be cut short while I stop my curious 3 year old from ransacking my sister's room. Wahhhhh!!!!

News involving weddings and waxings

• I will be a groomswoman in my brother's wedding this month.
• That means I will be the fanciest and nicest-smelling I've been in, literally, years.
• It also means that I will be waxing the leg and pit hairs that I've so lovingly grown for, well, years (yet again). I haven't shaved my pits since Diego was a baby. I gave up shaving the old legs during my first pregnancy; but before that it was only once a week during in the summer. [It gives me a pseudo-tan. LOL]
  
• My mom is going to do the deed: the waxing.
  
• She's enthusiastically looking forward to it - mostly, it seems, because the hair is so long that it is perfect for a home-brew of wax-o-rama. She's been dropping hints for awhile now.
  
• Maybe she'll wax my eyebrows too.
• I tried once, but burnt the crap out of my skin with my too-hot home-brew.
• Muver?
• Speaking of weddings, I will be married 8 years on Tuesday.
• 4 years this autumn with children [including pregnancy] -
  
• 4 years without.
• Almost 4 years together pre-nuptial.
• 4 + 4 + 4 = 12

Snarf City

• Red Swan beans, steamed
• Butter
• Grated Parmesan

Whoa, baby. Delicious.

Tea, anyone?

I found this 1982 vintage Fisher-Price tea set at the thrift store last week. Diego was absolutely thrilled and plays with it several times throughout each day. He even insists that I fill his "tea" [aka water] from the kettle, not sink. While I am a little wary of him drinking water out of these surely BPA-laden plastic cups, it was just too cute to pass up. [I am making sure to change the water out regularly - and nothing warm or hot.]

Isn't the yellow just too-too? So cute.

Homebirth Insurance Coverage

I keep on forgetting to post on the victorious end-result of getting our homebirth covered by insurance. Yes, it's true!!! Our prenatal care, provided by our Certified Professional Midwife (CPM), plus the labor and delivery at home was covered by our insurance. I couldn't be more pleased.

Our CPM charged us $1,500 - plus gas at each prenatal appointment and any vitamins and/or supplements I purchased through her. Our grand total came to somewhere between $1,600-1,700. [NOTE: $1,500 is exactly half of what the CPM in Minneapolis I met with charged. I believe this is because our SD midwife works in an area where the cost of living is much lower, though she may also charge less than she should - I'm not sure.]

I called our insurance provider, Blue Cross Blue Shield (BCBS), sometime at the end of October or beginning of November to inquire whether they covered a homebirth with a midwife. They said they covered homebirths with a Certified Nurse-Midwife (CNM) but didn't see anything about CPMs. The difference between the two being: CNMs are Registered Nurses in addition to a Midwifery degree, certified by the ACNM, while CPMs gain their accreditation via a lengthy apprenticeship culminating in an 8 hour exam and skills assessment test, certified by NARM. So there is a difference (especially in the eyes of an insurance provider). CNMs most often work in correlation with OBs in hospitals, though not always. CPMs are generally the midwives who do homebirths, working with friendly OBs as back-ups.

The woman at BCBS told me to submit a claim, basically saying, "What's the diff?!" between CNMs and CPMs. While I have already established that there is a difference, I didn't get too technical with her. I complied and submitted the claim, hoping for the best. This was sometime in November 2007 - I sent in all the paperwork and attached an official Bill of Service from my CPM. Pumpkin was born October 2007.

We didn't hear anything for months and months. I finally called in to check the status on my claim sometime in February or March, but got the run-around. Every dept. I was transferred to claimed that they weren't the ones processing it, and after several hours on the phone I gave up. This was quite distressing, and I called my midwife the next day to explain the circumstances and ask advice. Unbelievably, she had gotten something in the mail from the insurance company requesting more information. A few weeks later, I got a request for more information as well - so at least we knew someone, somewhere in the behemoth that is BCBS, was processing it. This time I made copies of everything they sent me (as well as what I sent back). I wanted PROOF that I was in process, in case I had to call in again.

More waiting, more waiting.

Then, out of the clear blue sky, in MAY 2008, they sent us an Explanation of Benefit Payments and a check for $720. Unbelievable! One month later in June 2008, they sent us another Explanation of Benefit Payments and a check for $161.60. We'll take it! That is $881.60 - covered by our insurance company - for the prenatal and postnatal care, plus the labor and delivery provided by our CERTIFIED PROFESSIONAL MIDWIFE, in the comfort of our own home. Our total cost was somewhere in the vicinity of $600-700. Diego's hospital birth on the midwife unit - for just the birth, mind you - was a co-pay of $800-something. Victory!

Spread the word, ladies. It can be done. It might have taken forever and a day, but it can be done. We did it - hooray!!

Quirk – noun: a peculiarity of action, behavior, or personality; mannerism

Nutmegg[mama] tagged me. I enjoyed reading her Quirks so much that I've decided to do my own. I tag anyone who is interested in completing their own - leave a comment so I can come and look at your list. It is actually a lot of fun, to consider little tidbits about oneself that others might not know.

Six Unspectacular Quirks:

Quirk #1:
My mother still buys my underwear. I am 30 years old, the mother of two, and have been married for almost 8 years; but aside from my pregnancy underwear, the only ones I've ever worn [and worn out, I might add] have come from my mother. I can't find comfortable underwear on my own. I've tried! My friends have tried!! It is impossible. Thanks Muver.

Quirk #2:
I don't feel completely clean unless I've brushed my teeth during a shower. I started brushing my teeth in the shower during my teenage years and have never looked back.

Quirk #3:
While reading to Diego, I often find myself wistfully wishing that children's books were, in fact, reality. The world is so beautiful, all the problems are resolved, and something interesting is always happening. I wish I could blur the lines between reality and children's fiction.

Quirk #4:
I can't watch too many compilations of music videos and/or live footage of certain bands without developing a major crush on one of them. Examples: The Cure - Robert Smith, The Beatles - Paul McCartney, Depeche Mode - Martin L. Gore, Led Zeppelin - Robert Plant, David Bowie, Spinal Tap - Nigel Tufnel. Oh dear.

Quirk #5:
I often just sit and stare at the books on our bookshelves, thinking mostly about their spines, pages, the feel of the paper, and how pretty they look in a line. I'll think about whether I've read them or not as well, but mostly just get a thrill out of their composition. I also get dreamy planning on either reading or re-reading them.

Quirk #6:
I get stuck on jags where I sing the same song everyday, all day. Sometime they can change from day-to-day, other times I will be singing them for a week. I sing them so much that Diego starts singing them with me. Recent examples: Wade in the Water, She'll be Coming 'Round the Mountain, Carefully - Carefully - CAREFUL, L-Y, and Oranges Smoranges.

Third Birthday

September 2005

July 2008

Kraftwerk for robot-crazed tots

Diego's current favorite song: We are zee rrrrro-bots!

More on Wee Fang

My poor little Pumpkin was so tired this afternoon that he fell asleep mid-twist during a diaper change. Right before sleep took him over, he was very calm and staring off into space so I took the opportunity to examine his mouth thoroughly - a first! My sweet little Wee Fang, so protective of his tiny hurtin' gums.

He is teething FOUR teeth. Both Cuspids are bulgy and white, but haven't broken through the gums yet. What has broken through, however, are his Lateral Incisors. We're going to have a Front-Toothless Double-Whammy Wee Fang! His Central Incisors look rounder than they have in the past, but I wouldn't describe them as bulging. Wow. That is going to look we-ird.

Learning the signs

Yesterday, Diego was standing at his Play Table. I was nursing the baby when I hear some loud juicy farts clapping from his direction. He instantly stopped what he was doing, laughed and said, "I'd better go poopy!" and made a bee-line to his potty chair.

Yes, my boy. Run!! That is called a Pre-Poo.

On a side note, he is really getting into building: for a couple of weeks now, he has been building "houses" with both his Duplo blocks and the wooden set I snagged for him at the thrift store. They are getting quite high and somewhat complex, comparatively. It is fun to see!

Wee Fang, wolf-baby

Seriously.

Pumpkin has been in the throes of teething his canines. Besides days-on-end of clinging, crying, and fever (poor thing), the only kink in what seems to be a normal, albeit, horrible teething experience, is that he has no other upper teeth. Wee Fang will not be an overly-dramatic nickname for the little fella, because - well, he'll have fangs. [And you know me - I love stuff like this!!]

Wee. Fang.

It started Saturday, when he bawled his little eyes out if I even tried to set him down. This continued into Sunday. Because he already has his two bottom teeth, I kept on looking for bulging gums where the two front teeth should be growing in. Nothing. Strange, because Diego's bulged for weeks before anything popped through. But I kept faithfully looking and feeling, especially once he started refusing to sleep unless I was by his side (that was Monday). AND a fever started. Nary a swollen front toothy. Nothing.

Monday night, he was like a little furnace in bed - hot to the touch and nursing at least every hour, maybe more often than that. His temp that morning was 101.8 - poor thing. It was that afternoon that I started expanding my search, which led to the discovery of bulging canines. The cuspids!! I've read that they are the hardest to teeth [not sure why] so the last few days started making more sense. His fever subsided in the mid-afternoon, allowing him to act almost-normal throughout the evening - but came back again in the middle of the night. Yesterday morning his fever was 102.5, the poor little fiery babe. [I am so thankful for the pacifier-thermometer...what an ingenious device!]

They are just starting to push their way through his gums, so I don't have any photographic evidence to offer. This is aside the fact that I am hard-pressed to even get a good look at them - he will hardly let me lift his lip to see. My poor wolfie.

In happier days

Chicken scenes

Growing pains [for mama]

December 2007

2 months old

Pulling himself to a stand at the play table today

My sweet Pumpkin is almost 9 months old. Crawling, putting himself back to a sitting position from his hands and knees, pulling himself up to his knees, and now, just today, pulling himself up to a standing position (all for the love of T-O-Y-S, of course).

How does this happen?! Weren't you just born? Wasn't it just last week that you were just a sweet lump of newborn? Pumpkin's first year seems to be speeding by so much more quickly that Starbeans'. He'll be standing by himself soon, then walking, then saying his first word, then and then and then and then. Amazing.

He loves cats, his mama [he is obsessed with me], watching his brother's antics, rolling rocks around in his mouth, licking on his brother's freezer pop [all the rage around here this summer, I might add], be-bopping to music, and displaying massively enthusiastic wiggles when Squeeze walks in the door each evening. We lauvf dis baby!

His sweet-ness is my weak-ness

[with due respect to MC Hammer]

Bountiful Harvest

Squeeze and I have an old joke from years back about bountiful harvests: before kids, when we had time, we enjoyed setting up postcard-like shots of autumn scenes in our Minneapolis backyard and title them, "Bountiful Harvest". It always made us laugh (and was lovely and always made me feel very cozy).

But really, this IS a bountiful harvest! We've been eating high off the hog recently: chard egg bake [from Simply in Season], roasts accompanied by buttery beets, salads galore, turnip and beet greens in soup, spinach with butter and salt, and dynamite omelets with basil or spinach. It has been absolutely delicious.

Now, feast your eyes:

5 Color Silver-beet Chard

Chamomile

Gorgeous and delicious:
golden beets, lettuce, peas, red beets, turnips, garlic scapes

Golden beets in butter:
We've been fighting over them!!

The smell of dirt and garden carrots makes me think of him

My rough-and-tumble grandfather died this past weekend. He had been ailing for months, recovering only enough to take another fall or get hit by another UTI or some other bacterial infection. It has been difficult grieving from a distance, only being able to connect with my family via the telephone; but the most difficult part, by far, is knowing the depth of sorrow that my mother and her sisters are feeling.

He was a beautiful lug of a man: strong-jawed, stout, slow-but-steady, and with an undercurrent of wit that you could miss if one didn't slow down to notice. I will always remember his scent: B.O. mixed with cigarette smoke and earth. His death has brought new understanding to the reality of what it means to grieve.

The end was bittersweet: we will miss him dearly, but it is a relief to know he is no longer living in discomfort and misery. My mom and her sisters were able to have him home for the end, surrounded by family. This was very important to them - to all of us. He had been in the hospital but when they realized that he was dying, they made the decision to bring him home. He died on the same piece of land that he was born onto.

I am so proud of his my mom and her sisters' loving diligence in caring for him all these months, and for the of servant-love the provided for both him and my grandmother. They honored his life and love by their selfless caregiving and constant hard work. I look to them with heartfelt admiration.

My mom wrote a beautiful obituary for him.

Here is a fragment:

Lester A. Christiansen, master of the one liner, passed from his earthly body July 6, 2008. He was surrounded by his family in the home he loved. We will miss the humor he brought to our lives.

Lester was born March 29, 1919 in Stanwood to Henry and Laura Christiansen. He spent the beginning and the end of his life on Laura’s family homestead. He enjoyed the hunting and fishing the area offered. He had a favorite dog, his Chesapeake Bay retriever, Pat, that accompanied him on many excursions that ended with a good meal!

Lester served his country during World War II in the 507 parachute infantry, Company H. He joined May 6, 1939 and was honorably discharged in September 1945. He received a Bronze Star for service in Europe and was a Purple Heart recipient for injuries sustained during that time. While on leave before his European deployment, he was introduced to Lea Gundersen by his sister, Hazel. They were married Oct. 8, 1945.

We will miss you, Grandpa. We will miss you.

I can't tell

I am thirty years old, turning thirty-one this fall. As I get a bit older, it seems like my faults and short-comings are amplified. I can't tell if this is because 1) I'm actually getting worse, or 2) I am mature enough to recognize my issues much more quickly. That aside, I still feel like I am floundering in my own short-falls. Creating change is hard; but I suppose recognizing the problem is the first step.

Has anyone else noticed this?

He should get into the naming business

Starbeans named one of our friendly Dominique cockerels "Chicken Coop" yesterday.

Kitchen update: mostly complete, kind of

Our BIL, who works in decorative concrete, completed Phase Two (or is that Three?) of our Kitchen Remodel. He did the counter tops, backsplash, and the floor. It has been very nice - we have really enjoyed having an interesting and attractive kitchen set-up rather than interesting and hideous-beyond-words. Really. It was that bad. Shoddy carpet in half of the kitchen; wheel-chair accessible counter tops and cupboards; general yucky-ness and a kitchen sink that was 6 inches deep.

We were able to choose the colors, so we went with a sand-ish tone for the counter tops as the starter. The backsplash is sand, slate, white, and green - marbley-like. The floor is sand, slate, and white. Because the floor is concrete, my BIL used giant mats to press the lines in; he then went through, by hand, and cut each line a bit deeper. The lines are a little hard to see in these shots, but we had them done in different sizes - big, small, long, short. We are pleased with the results. All in all, a much more pleasant room.

My favorite part of the kitchen is the earthy feel and look of the counter tops

Finally! Rid of that dratted microwave, now and forever

We still have to stain and varnish the new woodwork, nail trim along the baseline of the floor, put up new trim on the walls opposite of this shot, finish off the wallpaper, prime and paint, and raise the front door. It makes my palms get clammy just thinking about it. It seems like it will never end - but mostly that we'll just never have enough time to do it, especially with a toddler and baby underfoot. I'll keep you posted [meaning, you'll hear about it Summer 2009 - when we are finally done].

New fave: Beirut

Postcards from Italy

Domesticating

• I made a fantastic rhubarb sauce sweetened only with chopped raisins. The original recipe [from my favorite cookbook, How to Cook Everything by Mark Bittman] called for dates, but raisins can be used as an alternate. It was delicious! We've been eating it on our pancakes. I love rhubarb, but h-a-t-e refined sugar. I'm always looking for ways to get around it in conventional recipes.
• I love hanging laundry on our clothesline. It isn't a chore, it is a pleasure. I've hung our diapers out to dry since Starbeans was born and tried to hang as much as I could from fencepost to fencepost in our backyard in Minneapolis, but now that I have a pair of sky-blue clothesline poles behind our garage under a towering ash tree, I am in hog's heaven. The breeze - the shade - hearing the leaves rustle above me - hanging the damp articles with Wilburn's wooden clothespins. It feels so good.
• I rendered lard last week. Yes, I did! My in-laws bought a pig from a local farmer and when I found out, I begged them to save the lard for me. They did, very obligingly, and now I have 3 shiny quarts of snowy-white lard (and more to come). I followed directions from a blog I found on my google search called An Obsession with Food & Wine. It was easy. I made refried beans with it for our bean-and-cheese quesadillas last night and it dyn-o-mite! There is a reason why - other than necessity and using what they had - that Grandma and Great-Grandma and Great-Great Grandma used lard in their cooking. It is fan-tabulous. Besides, who doesn't want to use a good saturated fat vs. these freaky man-made fats that have dominated us for the past 30-40 years?
• I've been re-re-reading Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon recently, which has spurred me into soaking and fermenting grains before consuming them. I have already been soaking and sprouting the beans I cook with (I highly recommend this - not only does it heighten their nutritional value, but they cook up in a snap). This week, I've eaten amaranth porridge for breakfast - it has the consistency of Cream of Wheat and smells like roasting corn as it is cooking. I eat it with cinnamon honey, butter and/or yogurt, and walnuts. Delicious. Starbeans, however, prefers his oatmeal.
• Speaking of cinnamon honey, I finally met our neighbor - the beekeeper. Her name is Walentyna: she is 81 years old, Polish, and as fit as a fiddle. She eats whole foods: the woman makes her own butter and bread and who-knows-what-else. She told me of her elderly mother visiting her here in the Rolling Prairies from Poland who shook her head and said, "America - a country so rich, that eats garbage food." While we were at her house, she introduced me to cinnamon honey: 1 tablespoon of ground cinnamon in 1 cup honey. Simply amazing. I've always loved cinnamon toast, but that dratted white sugar has kept me away from it all these years; I don't know how I could have forgotten about our friend the honey bee. Now I can have my toast and eat it too.

My lard, before the final step of melting it down

Snugglin' brothers

Diego at almost 3 - Truen at 8 months

My sweet little ones

Tiny flamingos, all lined up

Gasteria [unknown]

It's official

Our little Pumpkin can clap [as of yesterday] and he is mobile in a forward-direction, not just backwards or turning in circles. As of today. It wasn't crawling, per say, but he was inching forward - pushing with his fat little feet and pulling commando-style with his arms.

Sweet Little One.

He is also crazed about rattles, cats, slapping things with his little hand, his big brother, sucking on dandelions, and catapulting himself to his belly from a sitting position. What a big boy!

A scattered tale of our baby chicks

I was just walking down our long driveway yesterday, after visiting with my neighbor across the road; and I thought, "I live here? Really?! I live here???" It will be a year at the beginning of July. A year ago Monday is the exact date that we closed on our house in Minneapolis. It can still be such a strange thing to contemplate.

Our baby chicks are doing well - like any babies, they are growing and changing right before our very eyes. It is amazing. They are quickly outgrowing their enormous hot-water heater box; it looked so big when we first put them in it two weeks ago. My in-laws are building a transitional coop for the chicks as a birthday gift to Squeeze. [Isn't that a great 31st birthday present?! ...Oh my goodness...I'll be 31 this year...!!] It is in a stall of one of the outbuildings. Squeeze's mom called it a "stye" yesterday. Meaning, a literal pig stye, not just mess (although it is a total mess as well). I'm not sure what it is, but the space is going to work so well for us.

It has a concrete floor, three sides of the building are steel walls, the roof is insulated, and it is right next to a grassy area between it and one of the dairy barns, which will be perfect for the chicken yard. They are building a wall along the 4th side with a human-sized door for us and the chicken-sized door for them. There will be chicken wire along the upper part of the wall, so there will be plenty of air movement in there for them. It is perfect. Perfect! The only downside is that it doesn't have a window and from what I've read, chickens need that; the morning light tells them when to wake up in the morning. We may be able to cut a window for them - we'll see.

Pecking at spinach and grass

Here they are! The buff chicks are Buff Orpingtons, the one light brown one is an Ameraucana (they lay blue/green eggs), the chicks with the black and white flecks (and white spot on their heads) are the Dominiques, and the ones with the black and white coloring, faces included, are the Silver Laced Wyandottes. The Black Australorps are black with a white belly, but it doesn't look like they appear in either picture.

A relaxed Dominique

The Dominique chicks are extremely friendly. Out of all of the chicks, they come running to you instead away. They are very curious, always pecking at my rings, pulling on the hair-ties on my wrist, or climbing onto my hand, as you see in this picture. I am so pleased, because there are ten Dominique chicks and five each of the others. I scored on the friendly ones and didn't even know it! Yesssss. I chose them because I read that they were an American Heritage bird and I like their barred feathering. I definitely like them the best out of the whole crew - I have a feeling we're going to be great buddies.

The Ameraucanas, on the other hand, cower in the corner whenever I put my hand down into the brooder, poor things. Once they are used to my presence, they carry on with their chicken-like behavior: pecking, scratching, giving themselves dust-baths in the wood chips. But they never come up to me. The other three are neither overly-friendly or over-frightened. Some come up, some cower, others totally ignore me.

They were downy soft babies just a few weeks ago. They came in a fairly small box, with breathing hole all around. Squeeze brought the frantically peeping box of babies into the house and as we opened it, they were piling up in a corner squishing the unfortunate ones on the inside and peep-peep-peeping. Poor things. We took them out, one by one, and put their beaks in water. Once each of them drank (by lifting up their heads, swallowing, and smacking their beak together - it is so cute), we put them in their little boxes under the heat lamps - 15 in each. I bet they would be too small for even five or six birds now.

They were downy and round - so tiny. I've noticed that they started feathering out within days, the Buff Orpingtons first. It starts on the end of their wings with the cutest little tips of feathers you can imagine, then it spreads up until all their wings are feathered. Then their tail feathers start to grown, then their backs. They look really gawky and awkward once this starts to happen. Not unlike big-toothed greasy pre-teens with wide spaces between each of their teeth. Just weird.

Now they sleep snuggled together at different points of the day and as soon as it gets dark; but that first week, they slept anytime, anywhere. I watched them fall asleep eating, drinking, and even walking. All of a sudden, their eyes and heads and wings would start drooping, and there they'd drop - whatever they were doing. Literally! The second week, the those that were awake would walk on the ones who were sleeping, causing them to peep in protest and have to re-settle themselves. They are such babies. Even with their natural instincts, they have so much to learn. They are simply adorable.

Photographic miscellany

Have you ever heard of peak dandelion season? Yeah, me neither. But it exists. The soil in these sections of the farm site is extremely poor: so rocky that only dandelions and other raggedy weeds can live. The farmer must have laid gravel down at some point many years ago; and, as my grandma likes to say, it has "gone back to nature" and turned into a sea of dandelions. [If you can believe it, this had been mowed just the day before.] I took these pictures last week and the sea is now all but gone: thus, the peak season hypothesis.



The baby chicks. We moved the brooder from an upstairs bedroom (safe from cats) into a large box in the garage (safe from cats). This picture was taken at the beginning of this week and I can hardly believe how much they've already changed! They are in the process of feathering out and really, they look more like gawky teenagers than sweet downy babies now. I plan to do an entire post on them, once I get better pictures and more time.


A slice of our garden. In this shot, you have the heirloom lettuce sampler in the foreground. Isn't it beautiful?? The next row is badly grown-in kale and spinach next to that. The row after that is turnips, peas, and...I can't remember. Good thing we made a garden map! The row after that is potatoes. We laid down newspaper and straw in all the walking rows to choke out the weeds. Garden items consumed thus far: lettuce, radish, rhubarb, spinach, asparagus. As my FIL was once known to say, it has been "Nummy-nummy good-good."

Personal feasibility

• Stop eating and buying all processed food.
• Veto soda.
  
• No fast food (obviously) or slow fast food, like Fridays or Chili's (maybe not so obvious).
• Learn how to cook.
• Eat as seasonal and local as possible.
  
• Patronize local Farmers' Markets.
• Join a CSA.
• Patronize local co-ops, or join a buying club.
• Grow whatever you can; if tomatoes, peppers, or herbs in a patio pot is all you can do, that is enough.
• Buy a big freezer.
• Know that change is a process: it takes time.
  

Barbara Kingsolver made several great points in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: buy whatever you can locally and only what is in season; then create a system for food storage - freezing, drying, canning, root cellaring, etc. While we may not all be able to grow our own food to hold us over the winter, we all can buy it from local farmers: to eat both in and out of peak season. This is my plan for this coming winter. Whatever we can't grow ourselves, I want to buy from the area growers. It isn't limited to produce: buy a quarter of a cow, or a half a pig. Whatever! The options are limitless with a nice big freezer.

Whether you live urban, suburban, or rurally - there are options. In higher density populations, there are co-ops, buying clubs, and CSAs at close hand. In smaller towns and the country, more than likely there will be small farms at hand - and, I'm learning, buying clubs. It is a matter of changing your perspective in food consumption: from processed, boxed, and available year-round to local, seasonal, and strategic. There may or may not be a cost difference, depending on what you are eating. It is a long process, but once you make the switch you'll never go back.

Change is possible, but it starts with each individual who realizes our way of eating - though it may be all we know - is not normal, then going forward to change the way they eat and shop. My hunch is that the change will (and has) begun with the affluent: well-read people who can afford the time and energy it takes to begin pulling up roots and make the switch. Society-wide, I'm not sure if an over-all change is possible unless our lives are shaken up radically. However, that does not mean that we cannot change or that we should not change.

Please reference this post for my recommended reading.

Mammothicity, that is: big, big problems

I brainstormed the other night while our computer was in the shop, based on the research I've done over the past year. The following list are the reasons I could identify why, as a nation, our Factory Farming and current agricultural practices must change.

As you may begin to tell, feeding lambs corn is just the teensy tip of the iceberg of the mammoth issue of health and happiness for all: man, land, and animal combined.


Effed, enumerated:

• Food safety - tainted meat (i.e. fecal matter), sick animals, antibiotics, genetically-modified commodity crops.
  
• We are what we eat - walking corn chips.
  
• Non-sustainable farming practices - we only have one earth and it is being raped by our current practices.
  
• High cost of cheap food - ecologically, but also physiologically.
  
• Non-nourishing food - processed C-R-A-P aside, most food is less nutrient dense from being grown in a mono-culture or "finished" in a feedlot on corn - not to mention being bred for heavy travel and a long shelf life instead of taste.
  
• Obesity - we aren't eating REAL food.
  
• Anti-nutrients - eating food-like substances instead of the aforementioned REAL food.
  
• Loss of cooking knowledge - unless you count heating something up as cooking, which I hereby proclaim it is not.
  
• Marketing reigns: the public as victim - swept up with fortified C-R-A-P (aka processed foods) as an answer to "healthy eating", so much so that we don't even know what is normal.
  
• Dignity for domestic animals, both in life and death.
• The nation's food supply - dependent on a limited number of mono-cultures.
  
• Reliance on fossil fuels - farm machinery, pesticides & fertilizers, shipping distance.
• Agribusiness vs. Small Farmer - trampled.
  
• Excessive waste - vast.
  
• Loss of farming knowledge and tradition - sad beyond measure, not to mention completely frightening. This is our food, people! What happens if/when we can't depend on the manufacturers to get us our frozen, boxed, canned food-like substances?
  

Recommended Reading:

There are many more books that can be read on this subject, but these are the ones I've read thus far - and in the order I read them. It has been a very illuminating year, indeed.

• Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World - Greg Critser
• Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal - Eric Schlosser
• Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life - Barbara Kingsolver
• The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals - Michael Pollan
• In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto - Michael Pollan

Anything by Wendell Berry is important as well. Most, if not all, of these authors reference him in their work.

I highly, highly recommend reading on this subject. We truly are what we eat - this issue is a beast that will not be calmed. At one point or another, we [Americans] will have to deal with the way we eat, whether it be on a personal or societal level.

It is a problem, once learned about, that necessitates change. Indeed, it may be impossible NOT to change. It is an issue that can be ignored only out of ignorance.

Doh!!

You haven't heard from me recently because we have been without a computer for the last 5-6 days. I brought it in to have more memory added, because this sucker was sloooooooowing down. It was well worth the time away, because now its back and better than ever!

I plan to post on corn soon. Very soon.

His sweetness is my weakness

Starbeans has been taking care of various babies he's adopted recently: stuffed animals, Mr. Potato Head, dolls, and most strangely of all (and his perennial favorite), an air pump. Some of them are imaginary, so I have to be careful because I can unknowingly place our real baby on top of them. "Watch out!" he says, "My baby is sitting there!"

Yesterday morning he was taking care of three babies - it was naptime and he was covering them up tenderly with blankets [he even set the monitor up when he was finished]. The air pump kept on hitting its head and crying, but he was diligent in comforting it.

Once the baby was quiet and asleep, he turned to me and said, "I a good mama." Awwww, sweet babe: yes, you are.

Keeping it real

It was 11:11 when I got on the computer this evening. A coincidence? Never!

I have been prepping for a big blow-out post on corn, the way this country eats, and the gargantuan ramifications involved; but it will have to wait, for I am too vexed on an entirely different subject [though becoming friends with Anna on Facebook cheered me a bit - so glad you found me]. What is bugging me is something irritating enough to make me blow a nut, and that is: parenting an almost-3 year old.

I mean really - could things be any more difficult? How many times in a row do I have to tell the kid to stop, or quit, or show me, or put your underwear back on, or please stop wiggling while I'm brushing your teeth, or put that stick down, or please get off of me, or get that out of my face, or stop hitting-kicking-rolling on-bumping into your baby brother before I get some action? How many times??? I swear, that kid has been in time-out more than he has been in time-in. My patience is wearing very thin; in fact, I'm not sure I have any left.

I've read (and noticed) that 2-3 year olds seem to have streaks of excellent behavior mixed with streaks of testy behavior. I've also thought that the times when I want to check out (like today) or when I'm pretty much expecting him to be naughty, he kicks it up a notch - either living up to my expectations, or, I presume, doing anything he possibly can to get my attention. I noticed myself trying to distance myself from him this afternoon - innocently enough: I wasn't reading or online, but simply sitting with the baby. And trying to remain calm. He had to be right next to me (in between me and Pumpkin) or ON me. It was enough to make me want to send him into another dimension - a vortex where he would be completely harmless and outta my face.

I guess this is what several days of on-again, off-again napping does - mixed with both children napping in succession on the days that he does sleep. Add that to the mess our house is in from the kitchen remodel last week. Ack! Everything has to be pulled out of our cupboards and cleaned [we are about 3/4 of the way done]. These ingredients brew a potion of angst and insanity for me, where I often wonder if I'm cut out to be a mother. Of course, I am being completely over-dramatic when I write that - but the helpless fury is there.

I need to go to bed ASAP - I've noted that days/weeks like these get worse when I'm over-tired. But dang - can't a girl get any down time? I just need to suck it up and stop sniveling. Talking about it (whether verbally or blogging) makes me feel so much better: it is like working poison out of my system.

Tender love for baby pancakes

Me: Do you want the Baby Pancake?
[Holding the littlest pancake up to show Starbeans]

Starbeans: Yeah!

Me: Okay, do you want syrup on it?

Starbeans: Noooooo! That might hurt it!

Me: Hurt it...?

Starbeans: Don't cut it up! That might hurt the Baby Pancake too.

Me: Okay...but how are you going to eat it...?

Starbeans: I just gonna bite it.

Me: Ohhhhh...okay.
[Big smile, happy heart]

Starbeans: Mwararararsmacksmackguuuuulp!
[Wolfing it down like a little puppy]

Effed.

Ok, seriously. If you haven't read The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan, you really have to. Have to! It is blowing my mind, day by day. Folks may have noticed by now, but at this point in my life I am absolutely obsessed with our [America's] food and where it comes from. This book, like no other book - I swear it - makes me feel like getting radical. Like, let's get heinous on somebody's anus, because things are really really screwy.

It is interesting - once you start delving into food, where it comes from and/or how it was made, it is like the domino effect: one game piece collides into another and all of a sudden you have a full-out kaleidoscope of things to change and/or adjust. Going Green falls into a similar vein. You can't just change one thing. I like it, though it is sometimes hard to remember that it is a long-term project. I want change NOW.

Anyhow...I have distressed myself. Seriously, I have lost sleep over this. One of the big things that Pollan talks about in The Omnivore's Dilemma is corn, and how it has left the status of food and become a commodity. This concept fascinated me: I, too, saw it piled high in the streets of Small Town, Minnesota last fall. Kernels of corn, as high as a house. Nobody cares to keep it clean, because it will be processed to the point of no longer recognizing it as corn. Pollan says that Americans might as well be walking corn chips, with how much of it we consume.

Think of that 20 oz soda that most of cubeland drinks each day: 100% corn. Any kind of processed food: corn. CAFO beef: corn. CAFO chickens: corn. And now...CAFO salmon: corn?! That's what Pollan says. I've always heard, peripherally, the term, "corn-fed", like it is a good thing - but never paused to considered the implications. Like...feeding animals corn that were not designed to eat corn. Yikes. That is like us ingesting grass or twigs for a meal. Not good.

But here I am bumping into this again [and have realized that I will be stumbling upon this regularly, given the our current location]: our lovely neighbors, who are wonderful, generous, and kind, keep sheep. They have 50 or so ewes and 3 rams and sell the lambs for meat each June. This is our first spring here - the lambs were gone by the time we arrived last July, so we never got to see them. They are born in January and sold by late June, "when the market for lamb is hot".

We will be taking care of the sheep next week while our neighbors are on vacation. I went over there this weekend to receive our instructions. Water, check. Hay, check. But the lambs...what do you think these little baby lambs eat? Corn. "Is it hard on their system?" I asked with some hesitation. "Yes," he replied forthrightly, "they have to build up to it." And why? Because as ruminants, they are designed to eat G-R-A-S-S. Their poor little tummies!

Something is majorly effed up here, folks. What on EARTH are we doing?! Sometimes I feel strong, like I can take things on and make some kind of a difference; but other times, particularly when contemplating the magnitude of the problem, I want to curl up and go hide under a rock. What can I do? What can any of us do? Agribusiness and the High Cost of Cheap Food is flattening us like a steamroller.

But for now, I will take a shower and go to bed. Lambs eating corn, people. Lambs. eating. corn.

When it rains, it pours

• Kitchen torn up (5 days, going on 6)
• Kitchen and bathroom inaccessible for the weekend
• This includes locking up the cats while the floor dries
• and probably pooping in buckets
• Our car just got out of the shop yesterday
• Ignition switch replacement - gone since last Thursday
• Lawn mower petered out last week [but after some tinkering, our neighbor's help, and an oil change - we're back!]
• Feeding/watering neighboring sheep herd next week
• Finish garden planting
• Thirty baby chicks arrived safe and well this morning, peeping their little lungs out
• They're all hunkered down under heat lamps, making contented musical peeping noises and napping like the sweet little babies they are

Like my paternal grandparents said when we hatched this hair brained idea to prep and sell our house, move to the country, and have a baby all in the same year: "Good thing you're young!"

Yes, indeed.

Kitchen Remodel - Phase II

My BIL, ripping up the floor - goodbye and good riddance, you nasty thing. The countertops are drying; they look like a dark yellow but eventually after sanding, they will be a polished sand color - it should be very pretty.

We are going for the gold and pulling down the wallpaper while we're at it. I'm borrowing a neighbor's steamer - it is going very well. It is nice not to have to deal with any nasty chemicals. My nieces helped yesterday, and I woke up early this morning and pretty much finished the job. You may already sense this, but I won't miss the atrocious wallpaper either!

My sweet dumpling, Starbeans - he has been having a lot of fun with his cousins. We've discovered that he is quit bossy and demanding with other kids. "Let's PLAY!" he says, as he tugs on their arms.

So beautiful it hurts

My niece gathered wood violets outside yesterday; we made a little bouquet as the centerpiece for our outdoor noon meal. Just looking at this picture warms the cockles of my heart, which is good, because it is a chill 42 degrees outside today. Dah!

Growing pains, in more ways than one

Pumpkin has been particularly fussy and needy this past week, causing me to feel very sorry for myself, wondering why he is making my life so miserable. Excellent mothering skills, don't you think? My baby has been clingy and irritable and instead of feeling sorry for him, I'm coddling myself?! Pathetic.

I finally figured things out yesterday and it made me cry. He's getting his first tooth: the lower left. Hidden within those tears was the guilt of pitying myself instead of my poor sweet babe, whose precious little mouth had been hurting him. While I wasn't expecting it because Starbeans' didn't get his first tooth until he was 9 months old, I had just checked last week - and found nothing, not even a bump. This week, a wee tooth is poking its head through. Pumpkin is 7 months old (or thereabouts).

But first and foremost, it made me cry because I'm going to miss that toothless little grin. My sweet baby is growing and changing and soon he'll be my little toddler instead of my little infant. That is hard for a mama to take. I get teary just thinking about it. I can remember snuggling with Diego [Starbeans] at two months and weeping sad sad tears, imagining him in the future - no longer my precious two month old. Now I can hardly remember him at that age without looking at pictures; I feel the exact same way about him at almost 3, with all his big words and kindled imagination.

The growing pains of mothering!! It gives me a much better idea of how my own mother felt, and feels. I love you, Mom! A lot.

Soothing his wee gums

Back to Pumpkin's tooth, I immediately located the little teething-thingamabob and put an ice cube in it (a gift from EVE, formerly known as EW5). He loves it. With Diego, we tied an ice cube in a baby washcloth and let him chomp - that worked really well too.

I would also like to note that our kitchen remodel will finally be finished next week: my BIL is coming out to do the countertops, backsplash, and floor. He specializes in decorative concrete, so the finished product will be akin to polished stone. I am so pleased to finally get rid of this N-A-S-T-Y kitchen floor. See the carpet?? Gak!! What were they thinking?

Recommended Reading

The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan has been out since 2006, so perhaps many of you have read it. If you haven't, however, I highly recommend it. If this doesn't shake you to your laurels and change your understanding of our country's food processing techniques, I don't know what will.

This book needs to be telekinetically transported into the brains of every American alive. Please read it.

Updates on the Wee Ones

Starbeans:

• Learned how to roll his tongue
• Has started saying, "Watch this!" when he is about to do something amazing
• Shows an interest in dressing himself - he can put his shoes, underwear, and pants on correctly, but has trouble with his shirt
• Totally and completely potty-trained (and has been for awhile) - no accidents, tells us he has to go every time without fail, looks adorable in his undies
• Has started taking toys away from Baby Truen [Pumpkin] - after he snatches them, he just tosses them to the side.
• Very cooperative with Time Outs - he will run to the chair immediately and sit quietly the entire duration. Sometimes he will wail, be very upset by it, and say, "I love you!" while he's sitting there, like he is checking in with me and making sure I feel the same.
• Loves to help me cook - I let him hold eggs, dump ingredients in, stir, salt and pepper, and stand at the step-stool and move things around in the cast iron skillet while they are frying. He is very good; very careful, and really enjoys it.
• Loves monsters, robots, "cars and trucks", wrestling, hitting things with sticks, and lining things up.
• After finding out our neighbors got a puppy, I could tell that he didn't know what that was. I told him, "A puppy is a baby dog" to which he replied, "Ohhhhh....! I want a puppy!"
• Still napping almost every day
• Attempting to brush his own teeth
• Has started saying, "I do it!" and gets mad if I try to help
• Can count to ten
• Says his ABCs, only it is more like "A B C D L M N O P!!"
• Eats beans for a snack - loves apples, pears, and string cheese
• Has been saying, "Let's eat pancakes and oatmeal!" whenever I ask him what he wants to eat.
• Often responds with, "Two hours!" when asked questions that he doesn't know how to answer (often "why" questions)
• Finds comfort in necks: will say, "Mama, I want my paso-pier, snuggle and touch your neck!" when it is time for bed or naps. He has found comfort in the necks of Squeeze, my MIL, Dad, brother, and now...Baby Truen. Yesterday morning he was touching Pumpkin's neck and we laid in bed. I wasn't sure whether he was being agressive (trying to push him away) or not, so I asked him what he was doing: "Touching his neck!" he answered. Adorable.
• Loves the game, "I mama, you Diego!"
• Very affectionate and loving

Pumpkin:

• A total mama's boy - wants me over anyone else, pretty much all of the time
• Sticks his tongue out of his mouth and smiles whenever anyone talks to him
• Starts wiggling and thrashing around when he sees the riding lawn mower - it excites him that much
• Has learned how to SCREAM LOUDLY when he wants to be picked up ASAP
• Lightning-fast reaction at grabbing what he wants
• Loves the sling
• Sits like a champ
• Pre-crawling: reaches out and catapults himself forward when he sees something he wants
• Still growls while nursing himself to sleep; not always, but often (and so strange)
• Loves Diego [Starbeans] - he will grab after him and suck on his face and scream with joy whenever he can get his little hands on him
• Napping regularly, but not scheduled - perhaps 2-4 times a day
• Napping in all different spots: sling, swing, crib, bed
• L-O-V-E-S the cats - will look around until he spots them if/when we say their names and shrieks wildly when he sees them. He also tries to grab their fur/face/ears/tail if either of them dare to come close enough.
• Looks in our direction if/when we call his name
• When seeing people outside our immediate family, he gives them big smiles and them immediately dives into my shoulder and buries his face in my neck.
• Hates having his diaper changed
• Loves to be naked
• Very expressive eyebrows
• Has said, "da, da" a couple of times, but mostly "gooooooo" and things of the like
• Likes picking grass while sitting on the lawn
• More fussy while nursing than Diego - probably because there are much more distractions
• Splashes in the tub and tries to grab the running water
• Loves bath time, but H-A-T-E-S getting out of the tub - we have yet to have post-bath time free of frenzied crying, ever. I can't wait! It is horrible, especially because he loves taking a bath so much. I think he gets a tad cold in the tub-to-towel transfer and then can't get out of the jag.
• Prefers sleeping on his tummy - if he is fussing or irritable in the night, all I have to do is turn him over to his belly and he pretty much goes back to sleep instantly.
• Loves sleeping with mama (and vice-versa)

Harvested

• Asparagus
• Rhubarb
• Nettle

We went a-visitin'

Grandpa, Starbeans, Squeeze

and their 35 year old rhodendendron

Squeeze's maternal grandparents with Pumpkin

Dat naughty fox

Remember the naughty Gingerbread Man, who was able to outrun everyone who wanted to eat him - except for the sly fox? Squeeze's aunt is in the area for a visit and stopped by last night with a vintage copy of The Gingerbread Man for Starbeans. It is the original version, not watered down like The Gingerbread Baby (who gets to live in his gingerbread house when it is all said and done).

We read it this morning and it left Starbeans visibly upset.

"Dat fox is not good!" he said.

He kept on repeating "Dat fox is not good" over and over when I asked him why, until he finally said, "I gonna kill dat fox. Dat fox is naughty. He ate the strawberry!" The picture we were looking at was the fox licking his lips after eating up the Gingerbread Man. I was confused by the fact that Starbeans thought the fox had eaten a strawberry and slightly distressed that he said he was going to KILL the fox. I mean, I know he doesn't truly understands what it means to kill...but...wow. He'll be three in July!

He's seen Doctor WHO with his daddy, where monsters and robots get taken out; he's watched Ultraman with his daddy, where monsters regularly get their booties kicked - and we've been talking about how Outside Bay (the cat who claimed us as her own) has been killing birds and eating them. Television? Testosterone?

I'm sure this kill talk is...normal...? Say it's so!

Enough to make you go insane

How is it that a demon-spawn of a toddler can take a nap [starting at 4:30 pm, btw - just after our brains have turned to mush] and wake up a fresh-faced and cooperative cherubic little boy just two hours later? For clarification, this happened yesterday. We all cried, many times.

Herbs are a girl's best friend

Herb garden, planted:

• Basil
• Borage
• Cilantro
• Bee Balm
• Lemon Balm
• Chamomille
• Oregano
• Thyme
• Fennel

Let us observe a moment of silence

Despite the paradox of my current position as homemaker while knowing full-well that I would have scoffed at any aspiration of being a homemaker in my younger years,

[heigh-ho, because I knew so much, you know]

I felt a strange sadness when I drove into our small town today and saw that the sign declaring FUTURE HOMEMAKERS OF AMERICA WELCOMES YOU had been ripped out. It had a lovely wooded lake in the background, probably painted on.

I think I'm really going to miss it.

A list of symptoms from the last two weeks

• Fitful sleep
• Sore throat
• Swollen glands
• Sore ears
• Plugged ears
• Congestion
• Coughing
• Sneezing
• No sense of smell
• Little-to-no sense of taste

We are so very, very tired of being sick. After two weeks of dealing with it, slaving after it, and being sick myself, I am fit to be tied.

[We are getting better, though.] I just needed to kvetch.

Checking in

Still sick and caring for sick people.
Squeeze has missed 4 days of work.
I don't have it as bad, thankfully.
The boys are still coughing and congested (but sleeping well).

Bummed.

Farm Fresh News

Our garden is well under way! This weekend, in spite of sickness, we planted:

• Turnips
• Peas
• Kohlrabi
• Chard
• Beets
• Radish
• Parsley
• Spinach
• Kale
• Broccoli
• Lettuce Sampler
• Carrots

Kohlrabi

Our chicks will be coming on May 30. We are getting a straight run (unsexed chicks) of 30 total birds. 50-60% will be male. We will butcher all but 2-3 of the roosters (depending) and keep the remaining 12-15 hens for laying. If everything works out, that is. I feel like such a greenhorn! I mean, really. really. green.

• Black Australorp
• Buff Orpington
• Ameuracana
• Dominique
• Silver Laced Wyandotte

Black Australorp

Garlic Lemonade

We've been battling colds for the past week - first Starbeans, then Pumpkin, and now Squeeze. I feel a strange-something at the back of my nose this morning, so I've done a salt wash and gargled salt water. I felt a little off last week and thought that I had tangoed with the sickness, but now I'm wondering if I'm just now coming down with it. [I've been having a hard time NOT kissing the baby. Drat!!] It seems to be a cold that hangs on stubbonly, complete with aching teeth and sleeping troubles. What a pain.

I've been administering Garlic Lemonade to everyone but the baby, a drink recommended by my girl, Aviva-Jill Romm, in Naturally Healthy Babies and Children. It is an expectorant, tastes good, soothes a sore throat, leaves you feeling much more cozy than where you started, and packs the antiviral and antibacterial power of garlic.

Garlic Lemonade:

• 1 quart boiling water
• 1-4 garlic cloves (I use 3 or 4)
• lemon juice to taste
• honey to taste

Let the garlic cloves steep in the boiling water for 30 minutes. Serve warm, adding honey and lemon juice to taste. Store in quart or pint canning jars and heat as needed.

I seem to have lost a day

Seriously, I thought it was Wednesday for the entire day; only within the last hour did I realize it was Thursday. It is amazing what missing a night of sleep does to one's concept of time passage. I have realized that I count each day by my sleep the night before.

Home again, home again, jiggity-jig

We arrived home at 11:00 am on Tuesday morning. Goodbye Leafy Green - Hello Rolling Prairies!!

• Starbeans' temp was 103 the night we left; it broke on the way to the airport. Thankfully, he did very well - I pushed him around in the stroller and he slept for pretty much the entire flight(s). He had woken up sick that morning and his fever waxed and waned throughout the day.
• It was a tough decision, but with 200-400 dollars in extra charges, plus no guarantee that Pumpkin and I wouldn't be sick the day we rescheduled, we decided to fly as planned. I am so thankful that he did as well as he did.
• I walked what felt like 4 miles at the Minneapolis airport, to Concourse B. In case anyone is wondering, that is where they store all the baggage trucks - pretty much at the far north (or is that east?) end of the airport, right at the entrance. The only other flight leaving from that area was to Flint, Michigan. I didn't even know of that wing's existence!
• Our flight from MSP left late and as I sat on the plane, all I could think about was how we would have been home, clean and in bed if were still living in Minneapolis.
• I rode in a propeller airplane from MSP to FSD (Sioux Falls), with 15-20 other people.
• Propeller planes are LOUD: Squeeze heard us land when he was waiting for us at the airport. That fact alone should also give you a good idea of the size of the airport in Sioux Falls.
• We walked down stairs to get off the airplane - outside, mind you - then walking to the terminal, up the stairs, then down the hall and to the escalator to the baggage claim.
• Baggage claim at FSD was, I kid you not, a total of 6 bags. Two of them were mine.
• My nostrils were greeted with the pervasive scent of fresh-flung manure when we opened the FSD door on our walk to the parking lot. Parking for over an hour was 2 dollars.
• After 10 hours en route, we arrived home. Our flight left at 12:40 am WA time: we arrived home at 11:00 am MN time (9:00 WA time) slept from 12:30 pm-7:00 pm, then again from 10:00 pm-8:30 am, then napped again at 10:30 am. Yeah, we were tired.
• Pumpkin started getting sick last night, and today is his bad day. His temp was elevated, but not as bad as Starbeans' the night we left.

Home again, home again, jiggity-jog

Enjoying the Green

Squeeze emailed last night and said that there was a snow and ice storm in the Rolling Prairies of Minnesota last night. Gak!! As my time draws near to go home, I don't know how I am going to go back to that. It is so BLAH to me, after a month of cool breezes - drizzling rain - sunny days - daffodils - tulips - budding trees - and all the glorious greenery. No wonder why every single April comes, and I continue to think: Shouldn't it be spring yet?

I mean, really: a snow and ice storm in April? Beautiful, yes...but so old by this point. Squeeze also said that I have missed the two biggest snow storms we have had since we've been there. In April. I need to continue reminding myself to be thankful for added moisture for our gardens. And who am I kidding?? I've just spent a month away from it. It has been lovely.

Looking out the window, I see a lacy-leafed maple soft-green with its new baby leaves and my parents' plum trees, dappled with light pink blooms and their darker pink leaves. It is so beautiful that I could just stare off in a haze for hours. [It actually took some time to complete that sentence, for all the staring...now I feel glazed-over and dreamy.]

Tiddly-winks and toodles to everyone, everywhere. I have some out-of-doors to soak in!

A First

I met a blogger today in real life.

Hi Jenni!!!

It was good; interesting; strange in the fact that it felt like we had already met. I was also glad to glean from the wisdom of an experienced mama. I asked a billion-and-one questions, weighing what she said carefully.

To quote myself, I said it so amazingly clear today: "It is like, all of a sudden, I don't know how to be a mama." I have come to a point where it feels like I don't know what I'm doing anymore. I mean, seriously? The life and behavioral well-being of this sometimes-disobedient demon toddler is in my hands?? Oh dear, he's not a demon. But he is most certainly sometimes-naughty. And brilliantly manipulative.

[And endlessly adorable, smart, funny, and sweet.]

I'm assuming these feelings are pretty normal, once one's own child hits 2-3 years old. [Mimi, can you relate??] I really appreciated watching a mom of older wee ones in action, to feel encouraged, brainstorm, and begin to germinate the seed of strategy. And to remember that bean and cheese quesadillas make a great lunch for a group of hungry kids. [I've got to write that down.]

Thanks Jenni!! I enjoyed our visit.

A post is a post, right?

Spin
Span
Muskidan

This one is for Laura

For any of you who have been checking in on me, sorry that I've been absent this past week! I am still at my parents' house in Western WA, soaking up daughterhood and trying to spend as much time as possible with my parents and maternal grandparents.

My grandpa, age 89, is recovering in the local nursing home from a bad fall. He broke his sacral bone after a loud crash-landing in his bathroom this past February. Thankfully, my mom was there at the time, so she was able to help him immediately - how horrific if he had been there alone, with only my half-crippled grandma to help him. I remember my mom saying that the loud booming sound of his fall made her blood run cold. Can you imagine? He was hospitalized for a few weeks, then transferred to the nursing home and has been recuperating since, as he was unable to stand or walk. Amazingly, because of the astounding Solid Rock of a Norwegian that he is, even at 89 years of age with prostate problems and emphysema, he is actually making a recovery. He is able to walk with the aid of a walker, and will be going home soon. The physical therapists have been amazed by his strength, even in his weakened condition. It is really unbelievable, because a bone-break after a tumble at that age is usually the beginning of a fairly quick ending.

He will be going home this next Tuesday, as well as my Grandma, who has been staying with my aunt these past two months. I am so glad that I am able to be here, to participate, if only peripherally. I am making chili for them today, a double batch, to freeze in meal-size portions. I can help clean their house, and I've been visiting them as much as possible with the tykes.

It is so interesting, because he continuously goes in and out of reality - including remembering his grandchildren (he always remembers his children and their spouses, thankfully). Just yesterday, in a single half-hour visit, he went from, 1) not remembering me at all, to 2) remembering me as an infant: "You were a good baby," he said, after asking who I was, to 3) knowing who I am. It was crazy. He also asked about his car repeatedly [he hasn't driven in more than a year]; wondered where his bike was; wanted to go home; said, "Laurel and Lea [my aunt and Grandma] went to Canada yesterday and had a really good time"; and asked if his parents were at home. "Do you know how old you are, Dad?" my mom asked, to which he replied without any hesitation, "Seventy!"

He is the master of one-liners, even in his decline. My favorite recent story involving his wit [mixed with confusion] is when my brother and his girlfriend were sitting with my grandparents this past winter, at home in their chairs in their blazing-hot living room. Like most old folks, they keep the heat cranked to unbearable levels. My grandpa was sleeping, of course [he spends 80% of his daytime hours asleep these days], and they were talking with my grandma, going over and over her favorite stories. My grandpa stirred, started looking around his chair, then groggily asked, "Where did I put that darn hammer...?" My brother and his girlfriend searched around obligingly, then inquired, "What hammer, Grandpa?" He surfaced a bit, then said, "That's what I'm trying to figure out!" before drifting off into sleep again.

Oh, Lester. We love you.

When the moon hits your eye, like a big pizza pie...

Well, that's amooooooore. Nutmegg Mama introduced this to me via her blog and I can't - stop - singing.

Oh dear, small airports, and to be a daughter again

I'm in Western WA at my parents' house - we flew in Thursday morning, after getting up at 4:30 a.m. to get to the airport and spending about 9 hours en route. Funny, because in Minneapolis, it was 4-5 hours. We're living out there, baby: and, well, it added quite a bit of time onto any kind of traveling.

It actually went very well; both baby and toddler were even tempered and easy to entertain. It was such a relief, because much of my week [spent dodging carpenters and electricians, btw - the remodel wasn't complete until Friday, the day after I left] was spent dreading it. People's favorite thing to say to me was, "Boy, it looks like you have your hands full!" Yep.

And don't even get me started on the Sioux Falls airport - it looked like a rinky-dink bus depot from the outside. We were late, of course, and I ran up to the security stop panicked, telling them that my flight was leaving in 10 minutes, and I needed to get through. There were 20-30 people in line ahead of me and I fretted that I'd never make it in time. The security officer was quite rude, saying, "Yes, everyone else is too." I was incredulous, and said again, "Excuse me, my flight is leaving in 10 minutes - I don't think I'm going to be able to make it!" And again, she said, "Everyone else is too!" and then ignored me.

And really, everyone else was: just like she said. There was only one flight leaving from the Sioux Falls airport that morning, and that. was. it. Oh, the humiliation. My list grows with every passing month. I'm just not used to the smallness of it all. [Even more humiliating, my flight wasn't actually leaving in 10 minutes; I was somehow confused and we actually had a half-hour before departure. Doh!!]

Oh dear.

I must say, it feels so good to be home; it is nice to be a daughter again. I know that I'm always a daughter, but it feels so good to be home; taken care of; under my parents' roof: a daughter again. And the green-smelling earthy air! I could just faint in the bed of moss under my parents' plum trees and lay there forever, like a sleeping fairy. I'd get wet, of course, but it would be dreamy.