Miscellaneous

As I typed the title of this post, I couldn't help but think of a mentor from my college days. Wanda was a professor and archivist at my alma mater, Wilson. She was also my boss, and eventually a dear friend. I consider my time in the "dungeon" of the Wilson Archives a major part of my education. Wanda can read, write, and/or speak just about any known language, especially the ancient ones. She can also swear in all of them. Because of Wanda, I now know what the Ides of March is (and actually that there is "ides" in several months, but March is the most notorious). I also know what's on the west pediment of the Temple of Zeus (http://www.odysseyadventures.ca/articles/greektemple/figure14_pediment.htm). And I now tell my children that they have the house looking like the wreck of the Hesperas and know what the Hesperas was. And because Wanda mentioned in a conversation that "They all did it! It was the Orient Express!" I read my first Agatha Christie novel and have since begun a love affair with the inimitable Hercule Poirot. But I digress. When I went for my interview at the archives, I was a nervous freshman who had never had a job before. I was immediately in awe of this learned woman. Incredibily, I got the job as archivist assistant and began helping to date photographs, catalogue artwork, and help with displays. Wanda gave me the briefest of instructions, allowing me to work independently most of the time. But the one emphatic directive that she gave (it may even have been an ultimatum!) was that I was never. EVER. EVER. to label a box "miscellaneous." I never did. She said that she didn't care if the decription of contents took up the entire front of the box. Just don't ever. EVER. EVER. label it "miscellaneous." And that's probably why, instead of labeling my children's clothes storage boxes simply "girl fall/winter clothes 9-12 months," it looks more like "girl fall/winter clothes 9-12 months. Includes pink cowboy boots, size 4.5, buntings, winter capes, 2 coats." I'm only slightly exaggerating. It's not a bad habit...

But it's MY blog, so, with loving apologies to Wanda, "miscellaneous" it is.

In which I took 1,293 pictures to get one good one:

Am I the only one who thinks a baby's bedhead is almost edible?

Of course, the front of the bedhead is pretty cute too.

We've been taking the littles to Cacapon to hike. It was a beautful day, but we were suprised at how hazy it was when we got to the top of Cacapon Mountain.

We hiked until I saw a snake. I don't thinkBenj believed me, but we left anyway.

There's a playground right on the lake that the children love:

And with that, we took our two tired tuttles, as Benj calls them* and headed home.

**From Dr. Seuss' ABC book: "Ten tired turtles in a tuttle tuttle tree."

In other news, our children continue to break the mold when it comes to normal firsts. When Mercy was learing animal sounds, her first sounds were not a dog (and we even have a dog) or a kitty. Not Mercy. Her first sound was a tiger, and she would growl ominously at anyone who would listen. Judah is following suit. His first animal sound was the donkey. I know. Really. A donkey. The other day we were at the beach with friends, and my friend asked her son if he wanted his donkey inflatable ring blown up. Judah was nursing, and without even blinking, went "hee-haw," when he heard "donkey." He also has an impressive snort for a pig .

We had another first here as well. I can't remember what I was doing, but Judah escaped me and ran into the master bathroom. I don't keep any harmful chemicals in the bathroom, and he usually just opens the vanity doors and unloads hairbrushes and other inoccuous things. I was just going to check on him when I heard a vigorous splashing. You can guess where this is going, I'm sure. There was my little man splashing away in the toilet. Blech. I've been reading Dr. Dobson's Bringing Up Boys, and he says that mothers have to watch their sons 24/7 to keep them from killing themselves. I think he's right.

Lots more pics coming soon...

Upcoming Events

August is a full month for us. We have three birthdays to celebrate, but most noteworthy this particular August is our ten-year wedding anniversary. We had planned to renew our vows and do something really special, but we didn't know we'd have two nursing babes. So to celebrate in a small way, every week during the month of August, I'm going to post wedding pictures or pics from our courtship and 17 years together. Staye tuned!

Reviews, Books and Otherwise

Because you're all dying to hear my opinions, I decided to do reviews about a new book I'm reading as well as my new laundry soap. Now before you stop reading, let me explain about the soap. I consider myself unusually well-read when it comes to green living. We started the "great chemical shift" (which, like the "great vowel shift," also resulted in a new language, in OUR household anyway) back when we were puzzled and discouraged by our inability to conceive and/or carry a child. I researched everything I could get my hands on about infertility, from the mainstream and popular, to the left-leaning naturopathics, to the downright weird. One of the things that kept cropping up in my research was the correlation between the skyrocketing chemical usage in foods and households in the last hundred years and the spiraling fertility rates in our country. We decided to get rid of as many chemicals in our life as possible. Believe me, as big of an undertaking as that seems, it was much easier than the fertility diet I had undertaken ( misnomer, if ever there was one) that included consuming massive amounts of African yams, among other nearly impossible culinary feats. Do you know how hard it is to find true African yams, or how far I had to drive to get them? Anyway, I digress. I'm sure I don't have to mention that eating entirely organic is quite expensive, which is why I've taken on many labor- intensive aspects, such as sprouting my own grains, grinding my own flour, and making my own fermented/sprouted breads, fermented dairy products such as yoghurt (my mom makes my kefir for me) and even whey and cream cheese. Because of this, our monthly food budget is actually less than the national average. Way less. On top of the expense of food, I found that natural cleaning products are obscenely expensive. And to be honest, they don't always work exceptionally well. I was able to find a company relatively local to us, Sun and Earth, that uses earth-friendly, chemical-free, non-toxic formulas, and I was pleased to find that I could buy all their products, from dish and laundry soap, to cleaning products, in gallon jugs and have it delivered to my door for free. The prices were very reasonable when purchasing the products this way. I did this for several years and even got a number of friends and family members hooked as well (I should have been given a commission!). As time passed, the prices kept going up, and the shipping was no longer free. I started looking for other options. I now use some combination of vinegar/baking soda/peroxide/rubbing alcohol/essential oils for all my cleaning as it's less expensive and works just as well as the pricey cleaning products. The only thing I was still buying, either from Sun and Earth or Seventh Generation, was laundry and dish soap. I came across more options on another homemaking blog, and one of them was, drumroll please, SOAPNUTS. I was instantly intrigued. Nuts right off a tree that contain natural saponins. Can't get much more natural than that. I did some research and found that they can be used for laundry, dishes, shampoo, cleaning, just about anything that requires soap. And to top it off, the price was economical. Naturoli brand was recommended, and I found them on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw_0_8?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=naturoli+soap+nuts&sprefix=naturoli . I bought a 5-pound bag. I chose pieces rather than whole nuts, as the pieces were even less than the whole nuts. A 5- pound bag washes about 800 loads of laundry, which makes it about 8 cents per load. I had a $25 certificate for Amazon, which put the price down to 4 cents per load, and I won't have to buy more for about 4 years.

I've been using the soapnuts for a few weeks now. I'm in love. As much as one can be in love with laundry soap. The smell of freshly-washed sheets on my bed...now THAT's a love affair. The soapnuts are simple to use. I put 4 or 5 nuts in a little muslin bag (included with the nuts) and throw the bag in the wash. Please remember to take it out after you finish the load rather than throwing it in the dryer, like I did. The heat is rather hard on the nuts. After the load is finished, just open the bag to dry, with the nuts in it, and use the nuts for up to 5 loads of laundry, more if you have soft water. The soapnuts even took untreated baby stains out. The nuts have a faint vinegary smell, but the sheets came out smelling heavenly fresh. And soft. And no static. That's another savings since you don't have to buy fabric softener or dryer sheets. Oh, that does my cheap, er, frugal heart good.

I finally got around to trying the nuts for dish soap as well. A little warning flag went up when I read that the soapnuts don't treat greasy stains on laundry, since one of dish soap's main jobs is cutting grease. I tried it anyway. They did not work for dishes. My dishes came out feeling greasy. And besides, dish water without bubbles is just plain gross. The soapnuts worked for dishes kinda like regular laundry detergent works for doing dishes. Ask me how I know that. So in that sense, the soapnuts were too good to be true. I still have to buy dish soap. But I'm completely happy with them as a laundry soap. Check them out.

And since this post ended up being so long, I no longer feel like talking about a new book I'm reading, which, regretably, is entitled Bonk. More on that next time.

Foodie Friday

In case you think I've hit my head and become disoriented as to day and time, I did actually start this post on Friday. Like many things in my life right now, I just didn't finish it the same day I started it.

Behold the pie! I have a terrible time coming up with gifts for my dad and FIL for holidays like Father's Day. And birthdays. And Christmas. And...you get the idea. Usually the gifts end up being some sort of culinary delight. This past week, my in-laws came for a visit, and I attempted to make a pie for FIL's belated Father's Day gift, as pie is arguably one of his all-time favorite desserts. Or maybe I shouldn't qualify it. It's arguably one of his favorite FOODS. Now, you have to know that, skilled baker and cook who doesn't tremble at sprouted grains, grinding my own grains, or soaking/fermenting foods, that I am, I don't. Do. Pie. Pastry crusts are one of the few things that get the better of me and leave me wanting to scream and throw dough across the kitchen. So this was an act of love. Pure and simple. That, and the fact that I didn't have any other ideas. Being the overachiever that I also am ("What?" my three readers gasp, "not Lisa!"), I wasn't content to make any old apple pie. No. It had to be a bag apple pie like the one we ate at a certain Amish restaraunt in Berlin, Ohio. I've read that the pie isn't baked in a brown bag any longer, and that the real secret to it's deliciousness is the sugar cookie crust. Suffice it to say, it must REALLY be a secret, because I had a hideous time finding a promising recipe. I ended up patching together (an unfortunate term in speaking of a pie) several recipes. The results were spectacular. And unlike the recipe, I didn't have to patch the pie. Well, not much anyway. I'm not even a pie person, and I admit that to sufficiently describe the taste and beauty, I would have to descend to carnal terms. Without further ado, though I should probably copyright it first, here is my final recipe for this divine pie. You're very welcome.

Lisa's Apple Pie with Sugar Cookie Crust

Sugar Cookie Crust:
2/3 c. sugar
1 c. butter, room temperature
2 1/2 c. all purpose flour
1/2 t. salt
4 T whole milk
2 t. vanilla

Apple Filling:
About 10 medium baking apples (Granny Smith, Golden Delicious)
1 c. sugar
1 t. cinnamon
1/4 t. nutmeg
3 T. flour
pinch salt
2 T butter

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Cream butter and sugar. Beat in remaining ingredients until dough is moistened and crumbly. Pour half the dough into a 9 inch pie plate and press into bottom and up the sides, making sure it is an even thickness throughout. Bake about 20-25 minutes. It is not necessary to prick the crust as there are no leavening agents (eggs, baking powder) and it won't puff or shrink. Meanwhile, pour remainder of dough between two sheets of parchment. Pat out into a circle.

For apples, peel and slice into very thin slices. Toss gently with all filling ingredients except butter.

Pour filling into prepared crust. Dot with butter. Place top dough circle onto filling. I vented the top, but I don't think it was necessary, surprisingly. The holes closed, and the juice didn't bake out, but vent it if you want.

Bake at 400 degrees for about 30 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 and bake about another 30 minutes. If the crust browns too much before the pie is done, lay a piece of aluminum foil loosely over the top.

In other food frontiers...pizza. It's no secret that I love pizza. With a passion. I am a traitor to my sex, but I love pizza better than organic gourmet chocolate truffles or Godiva. I love it more than just about any other food. In fact, I love it almost as much as...**cough, cough** What am I saying?!? (Insert dope smack.) Really. Not quite that much.

Moving right along.

So I love pizza, but it's really not a very friendly food to consume when I'm trying to get rid of my baby baby weight. Even my homemade organic crusts are super carb heavy. To my delight, in one of my organic foodie magazines, I saw pizzas made on portobello mushrooms. Depending on the source, these fabulous fungi have only 1-3 grams of carbs per serving. I found organic portobellos and got busy making my own little low-carb pizzas. Well, first, I had to google "portobello mushroom prep" and watch a couple Youtube videos, as I didn't have much any experience with portobellos.

Here's what you do. Clean the mushrooms (the mushroom experts say to just wipe them off, but I washed them. I'm very paranoid about parasites and, well, dirt.) Then you turn them gill side up and gently pop out the stem. Some instructions say to use a spoon and carefully scrape out the gills. Some just leave them. I scraped them out because they looked like compost, and scraping them out gives you more of a cup to hold the toppings anyway.After preparing the mushroom, place tomato sauce, shredded cheese, and any other toppings you like. I added finely sliced onion, a dash of garlic, sweet basil, and thyme to mine. Bake at 350 until cheese is melted. A word about the time in the oven:The first time I made a portobello pizza, I baked it for probably 30-40 minutes. The mushroom was completely soft, but it lost its cup shape, thus allowing the cheese and sauce to spread all over the baking sheet. It was delicious, just ugly. Today, I baked the pizzas for 20 minutes. The cheese was melted, and it looked great, but the mushroom was still rather firm, and I didn't think it tasted quite as wonderful. So you can use those times and decide which way you prefer.

Oh Baby!

And speaking of food...

Couldn't you just eat them up with a spoon?

Beach Bums

A WHITEhouse, Actually

We went berry picking this past week. So far, we've picked around 40 pounds of blueberries to freeze, although I think at least 10 pounds made a detour into Mercy and Judah's bellies.

The children look deceptively calm in these pics. Mercy looks downright peaceful as she rests her head on Daggy's back. Trust me, it's all a sham for the camera. They were wild children. Mercy swiped as many blueberries as she could reach and shoved them in her mouth. Judah shoved the leaves in his mouth. Oh, and the whining! I don't know how frontier women did it, before the age of Ergo or Moby carriers.

The first day we picked, we had almost finished, and Judah was shrieking. I plucked Mercy off Benj's back and set her on my hip, with Judah on my back. I carried a gallon bucket of blueberries in one hand, and set off for the house to have the berries weighed and let Benj finish picking in peace. Somewhere between telling me that "two beebees are TOW HUBBY" (two babies are so heavy) and chattering about the "eemals" (animals), Mercy said "Dat, Mamma?" I said, "That's a greenhouse, baby." (Insert huffing, puffing, and sweating here as I haul two kids and blueberries). Puzzled, Mercy said "BITE house." I didn't understand at first, then realized she was saying that it was white, not green. Indeed, the greenhouse was covered in white/clear plastic. She couldn't understand why I was calling it a GREEN house, when it was clearly WHITE. I had to chuckle. How do you explain why a white house is called a greenhouse? I told her it was white, but it was called a greenhouse because green plants are grown in it. That, fortunately, seemed to satisfy her.

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to http://www.mycharmingkids.net">her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

On our five-hour trip home from Grandma and Grandpa's, I did not turn around and snag all of the discarded crackers that Mercy had licked the cheese off and proceed to eat them myself. (Hey, they were organic and expensive...wouldn't want them to go to waste.)

And I CERTAINLY did not allow my 11 month old son to four wheel it through the woods wearing nothing but a diaper and crocs. And since he was NOT naked, he did NOT fall and cut his knee open, as it was protected by appropriate outerwear. And I further did not say "You're okay, buddy. Get up." without going to check on him when his knee was bloody since I was playing with Mercy in the sandbox. Not me!

And of course, I didn't pretend not to notice when Judah was chewing on the dog's toy. Or the vacuum panel that he had pulled off. Or the 5-pound weight that could break his foot if he had dropped it. Not me. I'm far too attentive for that.

When making a batch of zucchini chocolate muffins and dumping pecans in the batter, I did not begin frantically picking out huge chunks of pecan shells. And after my hands were coverd in batter and I had collected a huge pile of shells, thinking that I certainly would not be able to let Mercy eat the muffins, I did NOT notice that the shells were chocolate pieces. Nope. Not me.

I was busy not doing alot of things this week. How about you?

Waldkindergarten

I first read about Waldkindergarten http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_kindergarten in Mothering magazine a few months ago. The idea intrigued me, both because our kinder love being outdoors, and also because it appeals to the hippy heart of me. I love the lack of structure and serendipity of being outside, whether it's at the beach, in a meadow, or in a forest. Obviously, as we are forest dwellers, most of our outside time is spent in, or very near to, the forest. The research is impressive: children who spend large blocks of time outdoors tend to have lower stress hormones, less illness, and fewer accidents. After reading about these forest kindergartens, I determined to spend much more time outside with the littles, no matter what the weather. To that end, after fortifying ourselves with a breakfast of a scary number of eggs (I fixed 6 eggs for myself and two toddlers the other night because there was nothing else in the house to eat because they're so good for little brains, and I definitely got the short end of THAT deal), zucchini chocolate pecan coconut (you get the idea) muffins, fresh milk right from the cow, and fresh-picked blueberries, we embarked on a day of play. We first spent some time in our very own woods and playing on the swings, and in the sand and water table.

After naps, we headed to the state park that's, thankfully, only 10 minutes from our house. Our plan was to swim at the lake, but there were rumbles of thunder. Though it never did rain, the lifegaurds make everyone get out of the water for 15 minutes after hearing thunder, and that's not fun, so we decided on a hike instead. Both of our kids have impressive balance, and it's fun to watch them charging through the woods. The start of our hike was rewarded with a doe and fawn standing a few feet from the truck and watching us. In the full 5 minutes they stood there, I couldn't get the stupid camera to work. Grrr. That's on our list of things to buy this summer. Anyway. We saw several other deer, and Mercy kept demanding "More deers!" She found some water to play in though, and forgot about the "deers."

Inspecting a piece of bark Benj pulled off a shedding tree to show them.

Judah climbing a root ball from a blown-down tree.

Mercy inspecting an acorn.

Judah actually threw himself down while pitching a fit (mean mommy wouldn't let him climb over a rock outcropping without holding his hand) and decided to take a rest. He was inspecting a little branch and leaves.

After our hike, we headed into town and got organic ice cream sandwiches for everyone (except Judah...one more month till your birthday, Buddy). We plan to start hiking more seriously, not just because we want the children to be exposed to nature and survival skills, but because Benj and I truly enjoy it. I've begun the search for toddler hiking gear...obviously they need something a little better than crocs for trolling the woods...and I think we'll be all set before the weather gets cold.

On the subject of educational philosophies, we're looking seriously into a curriculum for Mercy. I can't believe we're already thinking about this as she's not even two and a half yet, but she has known her letter sounds since 21 months, and can now recognize all the letters and say their sounds. I think she'll soon be ready to read, and though I don't want to push her, I want to take advantage of her eagerness to learn, her love for books, and her quick memory for words (I introduced the word "habitat" the other night when were doing a sticker book page with animals in their environments, and she used it appropriately shortly after that). We've settled on Veritas Press http://www.veritaspress.com/ , which is a Christian based classical education. I always thought I would use A Beka, the same thing that I used, as that served me well in training me for college. But as soon as I began reading about the advantages of a classical education, I was hooked. I just got my hands on Veritas' Phonics Museum. I'm so excited! It combines fine art and italic writing with language and phonics. This method also takes advantage of young children's sponge-like memory by using CD's with a number of subjects set to music. We plan to start Mercy on the Westminster Shorter Catechism set to music in the coming weeks. Veritas also takes advantage of young children's ability with languages, and they start on Latin in the second grade.

It seems that a classical education is diametrically opposed to the Waldkindergarten, as it is quite structured, but I think I can resolve the two ideas. Like the Renaissance man/woman, I want my children to have extensive book knowledge and acuity in math, logic, and language, but I also want them to have practical, or common sense knowledge that comes from observing nature, work in the kitchen, building things in the woodshop, etc. Lofty ambitions. I hope I can accomplish half of my goals.

Helpin' Mama

We're heading out to Benjy's parents' house tomorrow for the family campout at the grandparents' home. Cousins from Idaho, the Carolinas, northern Ohio, and PA will be gathering for the holiday weekend. Benjy's mom is in charge of the meal on Saturday evening for around 70 people, so she asked if I could make some cookies or bars for desert. We settled on this Lemon Sandwich Cookie http://www.marthastewart.com/recipe/lemon-sandwich-cookies. They are delicious, but were an absolute pain to make. At any rate, we have eleventy-seven cookies in the freezer to take with us. Mercy loves to help, so I let her stand on a chair and help me cut out the cookies. She kept saying "Help Mama!" over and over while she was breaking off chunks of dough to eat, sticking her finger THROUGH the cookie cutter and putting finger marks in the dough, and generally making a mess. When Benj came into the kitchen, she said earnestly "Help Mama. Fingers icky!" Well, yeah, that happens when you eat handfuls of dough. And sometimes, she really does help, like this morning when we were making coconut flour pancakes. She mixed the oil, eggs, vanilla, and cream without spilling a drop:

But, as it turns out, Baby Girl is a chef after her mama's own heart. It seems that her favorite part of cooking...

....Is eating.

And what was Little Man doing during all this, you might ask? Well, usually something like dragging a rotten onion from the depths of the potato bin in the pantry:

But this time :

That's right, folks. Photographic evidence that the boy does, ocassionally, sleep. Sometimes for as long as 20 minutes.

And yes, I do allow my children to run around naked, except for a diaper because it makes less laundry for me it gets warm in their rooms when the doors are closed for naps and bedtime.