Riot 4 Austerity

Becca — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 18:10:18 +0000

Iris was so excited when I picked her up from preschool yesterday - she'd had her first day of doing "kindergarten work". This turns out to mean that they take the older kids aside and do worksheets for a while right after circle time. Gah. She's three.

Neil is playing with Duplo legos. He loves blocks, and I'm really surprised and impressed by how well he can put the legos together and stack wooden blocks. Iris wasn't doing that until she was closer to 2. She still plays with legos in a "girly" way - she'll make a long chain of blocks and a shorter one and then play mommy and baby snakes. Or make mommy and baby bats, frogs, bees, etc. (We've talked about how baby frogs are actually tadpoles, so baby frogs look a lot like baby snakes.) It's just weird to me, because I've never identified very strongly as female, and I just assumed that my daughter would be a tomboy, rather than a girly-girl. But I seem to have a daughter who wants to wear dresses, pretend to cook and take care of her babies, and who asks me to do her hair in "pinktails" and paint her toenails. (That's new - until a few weeks ago, she'd been unaware that some people paint their nails.)

Zinnia hasn't been walking, but she sure loves to climb.

Night-weaning was a total bust. I'm too tired at night to figure out which baby is which (in the dark) some of the time. And, thus, I just nurse whichever one has crawled over and latched on.

We're having salads from the garden with dinner almost every night. This is the first year I've managed to grow enough salad greens to do that. We're also getting lots of green beans, zucchini, tomatoes (finally!), a few cucumbers, and there's some pak choi, chard, and kale that's about ready to eat and a couple of artichokes coming along. I'm going to try and get some more fruit stuff (an apple? tree and some berry vines) planted this fall.

Doll Making

brooklinemama — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 16:18:42 +0000

Amie is getting very excited about entering Kindergarten – she has an orientation on the 7th and school starts (only!) on the 10th. But she is also getting a little apprehensive. She remembers how she was comforted by a little seal doll during her first days at her preschool, and requested a new doll that is small enough to take to school in her gigantic backpack. Thhaam obliged.

Some conversation during the project.

A: What’s that?

T: The navel.

A: The nipple?

T: No, not nipple. Navel. Belly-button.

A: And what is this?

T: Those are the buttocks.

A (smiling crazily): Yuck! Buttocks!

Oops: the hair was put on backwards!

T: Thank goodness you have two grandmothers who like stitching.

A: Oma likes stitching too?

T: Yes, she’s very good at stitching.

A: So if you die, then I’ll still have Oma… But what if you die at the same time, what will I do then?

Me: By then you’ll be able to stitch it yourself – for lack of a better answer.

Amie’s model for the face

T: She has a bit of a bald spot. Is that okay?

A: Yes, that’s what makes her so beautiful!

Meet Anya, the school doll.

A: Thhaam, this is the most beautifullest doll ever made!

Riot for Austerity – Month 22

brooklinemama — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 19:52:30 +0000

This month our household was even more in flux than in July (see this entry for all the coming and goings). In August we averaged 6 people. Last year’s averages (calculated here) are mentioned as a baseline. I use this calculator. Don’t ask me how it works, all I know is it keeps me honest.

Gasoline. The biggest expenditure here is that we drove from Boston to Cape Cod with two cars, packed to the brim with people and dogs. DH had to drive into work because the shuttle doesn’t go in Summer. And with so many people around it was tough to consolidate drives, like I usually do, and our sundry crises also necessitated more driving than we usually do. So though I am dividing by 6, our mileage was still quite high.

12.625 gallons per person (pp) in 2 carsi

31 % of the US National Average

(Last year’s yearly average: 24.8%)

Electricity. Even though we had more people in the house, we used less electricity than last month (489 KWh). The calculator reckons per household, not per person.

417 KWH (all wind).

12 % of the US National Average

(Last year’s early average: 18.2%)

Heating Oil and Warm Water. It’s just our warm water. As there were more of us – more showers – it is up a bit, because this is calculated for the entire household, not per person.

11.05 gallons of oil.

18 % of the US National Average

(Last year’s yearly average: 77%)

Trash. After recycling and composting this usually comes down to mainly food wrappers.We had a huge potluck but used compostable plates and bowls (let’s see if they really do decompose in my hot pile!).

10 lbs. per person

7% of the US National Average

(Last year’s yearly average: 7.3%)

Water. It was pretty dry all month and we had to resort to the tap for a couple of waterings. At the end of the month we had four days of incessant rain, so the garden and barrels were topped off.

647 gallons of water pp.

22 % of the US National Average

(Last year’s yearly average: 16.5%)

garden update: end of August

Deb G — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 02:16:00 +0000

This brings my total harvest of tomatoes to 10...that's from 8 plants. The worst tomato harvest I've ever had. Oh but I am proud of that pale yellow one on the far left. That would be the first tomato grown from a seed that I saved from another tomato and that I then planted. The pale yellow tomatoes on the right are the same variety, a bit riper, from a plant my mother started from seed she bought.

I have the most beautiful winter squash plants I've ever grown (as a result of my lovely homemade chicken manure compost), but it's just starting to set fruit and we've started having near record lows at night. Maybe next year....

What's done the best this year: garlic, potatoes, and sour cherries. Peas would have been good too if the dogs hadn't eaten them.

Mindful eating - revisited

Theresa — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 18:34:00 +0000

I have struggled for a long time with my eating habits.

I have gone from whining in my head (and sometimes outloud) about 'how come other people can eat whatever they want?' to blaming western society in general for unrealistic body expectations, to saying, 'what the heck' and eating whatever I want, whenever I want, and then getting angry and belittling myself for not having the will power to eat less and exercise more. I've also found it maddening that I've been able to cut back consumption in other areas of my life, but not in the food area. I've blogged about that frustration before.

I've tried to be more 'mindful' while eating, and to not do anything other than eat when I'm eating. That worked for about five minutes and then I go back to doing what I've always done, which is chowing down while watching TV or reading. In short, nothing has worked (notice the disconnection here - it leaves me out of the equation entirely)...until now. Well, until about nine weeks ago. That's when (through the magic of facebook,) I noticed my sister doing an awesome job of losing weight, with the help of a website called myfitnesspal.com .

Don't worry, I'm not going to use my nice, non-commercial blog to talk up some product or service. In fact there is no product or service to talk up, really - it turns out it's all about that whole connection/disconnection thing again. By that I mean that I was completely disconnected from the facts about how many calories I was burning compared to how many I was taking in. And I was delusional in a sense, because I seemed to have the idea that just because I felt guilty about what I ate, and really wanted to exercise but was too [insert excuse here] to get up and move, that the laws of biology and physics would change for me and I would lose weight merely because I wished I could so badly. It was the calorie counting tools at MFP that stripped me of those delusions and reconnected me with the truth of "doing the math." There was no way I could balance my input of calories with my output of energy until I knew how much of each I was consuming/expending. And so now, nine weeks later, the number on the scale is heading nicely downwards. :) It's another example of joyful moderation that I am glad to incorporate into my life.

So, at last, I am at eating and moving mindfully. Not in the sense that I am doing only that and nothing else at the time, but with an over-arching yet basic awareness of the connection between what I eat and what I do. And I really think that it is this kind of fundamental awareness between consumption and its consequences that we as a species have to get connected with, and soon. I'm glad that I can do this myself in an everyday way now, and witness the results!

P.S. - If anyone is using MFP, my username is themyriadthings, and I'd be happy to be your MFP friend :)

No Child Left Inside

Jennie — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 16:58:00 +0000

A break in temperatures has increased our outside time this past week. (yay!)
We have a flurry of camping trips to round out the year, one last weekend to celebrate my birthday and my Dad's birthday. Much fun was had by all. Bubbles and camping! That's his cousin Izzy helping out in the bubble department.Another camping trip planned for this long weekend to see Dave's family. Then for 4 days next week to hang out in our old stomping grounds with friends for a big hippy wedding.
Needless to say, I'm desperately trying to get the last of the tomatoes safely canned, and do something productive with the apples that are pouring in. As I know anything we leave behind on Friday is just going to rot over the week we'll be out and about camping.
Rowen loves helping with the tomatoes, he is quite serious about tomato transportation from garden to kitchen door and only drops a few. :-D This was our BIG tomato for the year, turned on it's side so you can't see where it split when it got dropped a little bit. :-D
Then, of course, if Mommy is stirring stuff in a big pot, he *has* to have a big pot to stir himself. Right in the middle of the kitchen. Complete with Quart jar and lid rings. He knows what to do! lol

The end of summer rush is definitely on though, with cooler nights hinting at the frost that's sure to come. Tomatoes and basil and peppers begging to be put up safely.
Cucumbers and squashes getting in one last push of goodness.
Apples everywhere.
Seed that is quite dry now, but still uncleaned. (Let's be honest, it's not getting done until winter.) :-D

Inadvertent Farmer asks how we've promoted children in the garden. Besides encouraging the local kids to help themselves to the cherry tomatoes, (planted right up against the sidewalk where they zoom past on their bikes.) I helped over the summer with a school garden, for some 3rd graders. I didn't do much, but it was nice to know I helped even a little. The No Child Left Inside campaign is really encouraging. Of course, out here in rural Iowa, it's not too hard to find a nice bit of dirt to plant some lettuce and beans for a group of school kids. And that's not a bad thing.

Not too shabby

Jennie — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 13:26:00 +0000

In spite of the challenges, I've been pretty happy with garden harvests this year. Here's a recap of some of the bounty.
Kale, scrawny softneck garlic that was planted in the wrong season, but was still garlicky and tasty, and the first of the green beans and tomatoes and potatoes.

The first of the potato harvest, all Yukon Gold tastiness. Canned green beans and tomatoes with homemade prunes on the far right.

Tomatoes really produced this August, I had yellow beauties from the Moonglow vines, small red from the Stupice, dark red/purple from the Cherokee Purples and large meaty Amish Pastes. My bell peppers did ok, and I got multiple waves from my purple green beans.

More tomato glut, with the first parsnip, dug up to check development. The rest I'll leave in the ground for awhile to size up some more. Basil did great, I dried 3 rounds for tastiness this winter. Carrots in the background, not actually from my garden, they are local grown from the farmers market. :-D
Peaches!! Colorado peaches, made into tasty quarts of peach halves and divine jelly jars full of Vanilla Peach Jam. I finally got a jam to set up!!!! *doin my jam dance* I used a different pot, that has firmly established itself as my new jam making pot, it's got a thicker bottom than the others and is really wide, which helps evaporate more of the water out of the jam. (at least that's my theory) I used real vanilla, right out of the pod and WOW is this jam tasty. I tried to can 7 Quarts of the peach halves, and sadly, one of the jars broke during canning, (my first ever) leaving me with only 6 Quarts of the halves, and 4 pints of jelly. Dave absconded with some of the remaining peach halves to make a hopefully tasty fruit/cream cheese dessert pastry.
Since he was a rockstar and cleaned and pitted A WHOLE LUG of peaches for his adoring wife, I was fine with him taking part of the fruit for his own culinary experiments. 6 Quarts is not enough for peach halves though, and I think I might scour our little town for some good peaches to augment this batch. And finally, the best harvest of all, time at the lake with family. :-) Here's us, eating burgers and looking dorky, but happy to be hanging with my parents and brother and sister.

moving forward with a few beasts

Deb G — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 02:09:00 +0000

I've been feeling like my lion-tiger lily needed to be grounded. While I was playing with some of my great-grandmother's lace, I decided one of the round motifs would make a good "flower." The two little ones I crocheted for a bit more variety.

And then I played with the crayons:

I love how the crayon blended all the edges between the face and the petals.

I also used crayon to create a base for the dragon-cow. She looks much more comfy.

Pain in Its Contexts

brooklinemama — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 00:17:36 +0000

I am growing several sweet as well as hot peppers. One evening I witnessed my Bengali family try the Habanero. Now, these are people used to hot and spicy food. At first they claimed not to be impressed with the pepper, but by some fluke they must have tried a part of it that wasn’t very strong.

Soon the expression on their faces changed, to one of sheer pain. It was like they had an acute and communal tooth ache. Yet their mouths were saying yum and they asked for more. The tiny pepper was cut up into tiny slivers, which were passed around like they were the host. “I am doling out pain,” said DH with a smile, and a tear in his eye. There was wincing and shouting, but it was not appropriate for me to sympathize. Instead I simply said, gratified: “I grew pain.”

Here is one of those Habaneros – still in its green stage (they’ll turn orange soon) – in its first context for tonight’s dinner, a bowl of daal (lentils):

It was kept whole or else the daal would have become inedible for myself. After it had steeped in the daal for a bit, it was transferred, whole again (thank goodness), to the posto bhaja (fried potatoes with roasted poppy seeds):

My dehydrator will be arriving soon – I was gifted an Excalibur for my birthday – and as soon as those peppers ripen, they’ll go in. Don’t worry, I will not have to remind myself to wash and wash and wash my hands after handling them.

Starting Fresh

The Raven — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 13:04:00 +0000

Dear Readers,

This blog started as a knitting blog way back in the day, before the birth of Ravelry. It morphed into a food-and-gardening blog. And I've always talked about books, parenting a homeschooled child, religion and disbelief, and anything else that crossed my mind. For the past two years, I've had mixed feelings about the unfocused approach. I liked being able to write about whatever I was thinking, but I also knew that there were times when a bit more form might create a better blog.

With that in mind, I am putting this blog aside (at least for the time being) and starting anew. Please join me at Lifetime Reading Plan.

http://lifetimereadingplan.blogspot.com/

Recently I've been thinking about all the books I want to read, and all the books that I feel I should have already read. Over at Lifetime Reading Plan, I'll write about books, their contexts, and my reactions--beginning with Gilgamesh and the Ancient Greeks, and heading forward through time, hitting everything from Chaucer to Tolstoy to Proust. I would love to have some reading companions who would like to read some of these books with me!

I'm currently making book lists and checking them twice, although I'm sure the plan will grow and change as time goes by. Although I plan to write up some preliminary information about my project soon, the reading will really get underway on 1/1/11.

In addition, I'll be writing roughly once a week over at Food, Glorious Food. This spot will be primarily a place for me to write out a weekly menu for my family. Occasionally I'll share a home-developed recipe, a picture of our kitchen garden, or a cookbook review. If you're eager to know what we are planning to eat, you're welcome to come on over--but Food, Glorious Food will be primarily an organization device for my family.

I hope to see you all soon. Thanks for all the time here. It has been a wonderful pleasure.