Write, Mama. Write.

His mama must sew

What?  Don't all kids insist on a spool in each hand when they head out for a stroll?

Happy Friday!

Aim

These are our latest #4 efforts, welcoming my favorite season.

We have some fantastic photos of the boy ducking down, arms waving as if tangled in spider webs.  He's going for the dot-dot ball deep in a soccer net, retrieving his first goal of thousands.  The three of us were run-run-running in the grass and he moved in for that first big kick, taking determined aim in the vastness of the target (it is vast when you're almost two and inside the actual goal).  I tried to get some pictures and T said I should go behind the goal... Of course.  You get the tangle, the drama from the net's perspective. 

I think, when I look back at the pictures, of how many firsts have come, gone and how many more there are in our future.  I think of taking aim when you're tiny and when the goals are big-big, of how sometimes you don't realize you reached a goal until everyone around you claps and cheers and takes photos.  Then, too, it's still like that sometimes: we hone in, gear up for our intentions, appreciate a little validation and, more often than not, we end up accomplishing something.  We look at it from the net's perspective and see the tangle and joy of taking determined aim in the vastness of hopes, reality, goals, intention, possibility. 

I started a birthday crown yesterday for the boy.  Little felt pieces and pinking shears and buttons surrounded me during nap time.  After snuggling with my sleepy guy while he woke we tried on the crown.  He looked at himself in the mirror beaming with primary color satisfaction on his head.  I looked at him and somehow I slipped behind the goal.  I thought: this is a mama moment of everyone clapping and cheering and taking photos.  He's happy, smart and silly.  He's confident.  He feels safe and loved and proud.  Sometimes I spin as I take aim with the job of parenting but there are these bright moments when I know I'm accomplishing something big-big.

Mama Says Om

Mood changers for toddler days

1. Create a grouping of noise-makers.  You can use traditional instruments (i.e. kids' instruments you might have in the house) or look for things that make unique noises in your house (pan "drums," etc.).  Turn on marching music and march around the house.  Go under and over unusual things as you march (i.e. under the desk/chair/table, over a big pillow, etc.).

2. Pull up a chair, don aprons and make these easy muffins together.  Eat them outside or in a fort or on the floor... Somewhere different.

3. Draw a big bubble bath at an unexpected time of the day.  Dump in loads of plastic containers from your Tupperware/re-use drawer and see what the play brings.

4. Find seasonal items, string them together on yarn and create a fantastic, nature mobile.

5. Make oobleck.

6. Create some activity centers together (start with one, make a new one the next day... pretty soon you'll be set!)

7. Collect art supplies (paint, crayons, paper, index cards etc.) and let go of everything you had planned.  Mail this artistic bounty off the next day to grandparents and the like.

8. Grab a snack you don't often have (i.e. here it's graham crackers and juice) or stop by the bakery for a cookie.  Go to a park, sit on a blanket and eat, then play a bit in a different space. 

9. Depending on the weather: water plants outside, fill a spray bottle with water and experiment with different sprays, run in the sprinkler, etc.  Is it raining?  Dress appropriately and go out any way.  See if you can stomp in twenty puddles.  Watch how different objects splash in different ways (rock vs. leaf vs. pine cone, etc.).  Do #3 when you return, if necessary!

10. Use chalk to draw a huge train track or road system all around your house, leading to your front door.  Walk or ride all along it, draw lots of trains/cars or bring out your own small vehicles to enjoy the new pathways.

11. Crank up the music (stuff you like too) and dance, boogy, shake, wiggle.  If you need a little wiggle guidance the tried and true preschool Greg & Steve CDs are favorites for many young kids (check them out from your library-- a little scary, but a worthy sacrifice to improve the direction of your day together).

12. Grab a big tote and visit the library.  Find lots and lots and lots of books.  Return home to cuddle and read on the couch (or on the grass outside as weather permits!).

13. Create a fort or pop up a tent in the middle of your living room.  Stock it with snacks, water, books, stuffed animal friends... 

14. Make colored pasta noodles (step one, step two) together.

15. Make play dough together and then smush, build, roll, squeeze... create.

16. Wander through your yard or neighborhood and create a seasonal display.

17. Scroll through the Kids Craft Weekly newsletters for a topic you both enjoy.  Find an activity and just do it!

18. Fill the kitchen sink (or a big, plastic tub) with dish soap and warm water.  Collect small creatures (we like Little People, our Schleich animals, etc.) and a washcloth and scrub everyone clean (any water play requires you to be very close, but you knew that).

19. Move some toys around.  Never underestimate the power of toys in a new location (i.e. the play kitchen in the middle of the living room, toys from the closet front and center for an afternoon, etc.).

20. Play dress-up!  If you don't have specific dress up clothes, dress up like Mama or Daddy or Grandma...  Find winter hats and gloves in the summer.  Dig deep for crazy shoes.  Be silly.

21. Make colorful maraca shakers (scroll down to #2).

22. Turn some old socks into puppets.  You can draw on them with markers, or get fancy and sew on button eyes.  Glue yarn for hair.  A curtain rod in a doorway can become a magical puppet theater with a few cuts of an old sheet, or even just with draped fabric.  Use a hot glue gun to create a pocket in the fabric for the rod, if you don't want to sew, or you can even just pin it in place.  Just make sure you can open and close the theater curtains (that's the only really important part!).

23. Throw a reading party for all of your stuffed animal friends (and dolls and anyone else who wants to join in the fun).  Place them all around the living room, give them each a book and then read a few yourselves.  When everyone's done you can all take a nap (requiring a blanket for each) or give them all a drink (imaginary, of course) of water (requiring a cup for each).  Multiples.  It's more fun than you'd think.

24. Call someone to play with you.  They likely won't care if the house is a mess.  If it's too bad, go outside to play or meet at a playground.  Just adding other people to the mix can change a mood (throw in a snack or two and you're set).

25. Make a life-size body outline and color it in.  Hang it on the wall. 

26. Clean out the refrigerator together.  Exhausting.  Distracting.

27. Cut (or tear) out fun pics from old magazines.

28. Create glue art (lots o' Elmer's, cotton balls, cake sprinkles, etc.).

29. If you have a peanut-friendly house (as in, everyone's already tried it and is not allergic), collect pine cones, tie string around them and smear with peanut butter for the birds.  Hang outside.

30. Head outside to putter with a camera.  The adult focuses on getting fantastic pics of the child without interrupting play, and the kid gets to explore.  It's interesting for both (parallel play).

31. Print some kid pics and staple them (or tie through hole punches) together to make a mini-book.  Talk about what the child is doing in each picture and write a simple sentence below.  Read it together.

32. Sort through buttons together.  Categorize in different ways. Look for special things.  Count holes.  Talk about big, small, bright, bumpy, smooth...

33. Use paint and make apple prints on paper (or try other fruits and veggies... Star fruit is fun!).

34. Just find a way to get out of the house.  Find a shopping cart and browse.  This is when you're really desperate.  Get coffee while you're at it.

35. Take everything out of a closet, from under a bed, etc. and sort through it together.

36. Paint hands and make hand prints.  You can later add details to turn these into flowers (stem and leaves), turkeys, etc. (seasonal fun).

37. Create an obstacle course in the house or yard (with pillows, small stools, etc.).

38. Go through the house or yard or neighborhood and collect items to make a texture book/wall/gallery (focusing on touch...).

39. Make crowns for the family out of paper, newsprint, felt and/or tin foil.

40. Decorate the dinner table together to make an ordinary meal special.  Streamers, flowers from the garden, maybe a tablecloth or special place mats, fold the napkins in a fancy way... Do it all together to make something routine special.

41. Play hide and seek.  Start with stuffed animals and find them together, then work up to each other.

42. String fruity-o cereal (or the pasta from #14) together to make necklaces (always keep a close eye on little kids with necklaces, but you knew that).

43. Finger (or foot) paint.

44. Make a terrarium (you can keep it super-easy with moss, sticks and a figure).  If you use fancy plants make sure they're safe.

45. Try stacking different types of objects.  See how high you can go with blocks, books, thread spools, magazines, pillows, etc.

46. Plant some bean seeds in clear, plastic cups or glass baby food jars.  Avocado seeds are fun too.

47. Make popsicles, a snack food in an ice cube tray and/or jello jigglers together.

48. Glue a favorite magazine picture onto cardboard, then punch holes (use an office-style three hole punch for bigger pieces, and randomly place holes).  Use a child's plastic needle with yarn (or tape the end to make it firm) and practice lacing. 

49. Make your own matching game with photos.  The best photos for this have only one, clear, well-loved person/object in them.  Print out two of each (for maybe a total of six to eight to start?) and lay them out, face up to start out.  It's early "Memory."

50. Set up various pouring activities in an OK-to-be-messy place. Collect various pitchers, cups, bowls and measuring spoon sets and use either water, lentils, beans or rice (or combinations).  A smaller plastic tub set inside a bigger plastic tub can contain some of the spillage.

OK.  Those are some of the things we try when new molars, colds and inclement weather try to bring us down.  Nothing terribly new or fascinating, but we have fun.  Do you have other things to add?  I wanted a list of 100 to print out as a reminder.  These are all super-friendly for the just turning two set.

Finding magic in the every day

We walk by this space all the time, and I never noticed the embedded treasures.  Raindrops add just one more element of surprise... joy.  Orange and green shoes with fall sweaters top it all off nicely.

Well, it doesn't look terrible

I'm getting there.  Does anyone know how to eliminate the spacing (added by Typepad)  between graphics on the sidebars?   All of those links are supposed to be closer together.  Thanks so much, Melanie!  I still need to go through, recategorize and also, um, vastly improve the second-layer pages here.  Maybe things will look different every day this week?  It's much like the current state of our relationship with the house (this week): improving, decluttering, making it fit better and also not quite there.  Could be a life state, now that I think of it. 

A little maintenance

Doing a little blog shuffle tonight so if Bloglines freaks out or you visit and it's a disaster, that's why.  Hopefully we'll start out fresh and pretty tomorrow morning (well, the blog for certain...).

(Feels like) Fall wanderings

As the stands erupt with cheers for JV players, my boy takes to his own field of long shadows.  Rocks in hand, high-stepping abandon leads us into the setting sun and home again.

Colds. Drat. Bah. But things are still very, very good.

This is the sort of quaint home drama we've been experiencing of late: I start a giganto batch of bread late in the evening, needed for breakfast and lunch the next day.  I find, after the first sixty minute rise period lapses, that I've killed the yeast.  Or perhaps it was dead to begin with.  I collapse in teary heap on the couch with keys in hand for an 11 p.m. grocery run.  Convinced by empathetic, diplomatic, level-headed husband to just go to sleep I make Annie's Mac & Cheese in the early morning dark for said nice husband's lunch.  Trip to the store for new yeast.  Oops.  Trip again for sugar.  Email today: the mac & cheese had a SPIDER in it?!  Two days have passed (and lots of "wasted! resources!," I remember sobbing on the couch) and round two of the bread is currently on the rise here it is all oddly-shaped but yummy. 

We've been sick.  Bah.  This is most likely the underlying source of any drama around here, bread- or otherwise-related.  This week we have Super-American Tourist Boy in the house.  He just gets louder and louder and louder with every moment of misunderstanding 'til he's shouting at me.  I suppose for all I know sometimes he could be asking for "THE BEST ROUTE TO THE NEAREST SHOPPING LOCALE" or "SOME LOCAL DESSERT SPECIALTY."  We're both really trying hard.  The American tourist thing is cinched when he wears our sandals over white athletic socks with pajama shorts.

Over in the corner my sewing machine is gathering dust, with projects I so want to do piled around it.  I ponder on a beautiful cover to keep the dust at bay but that would be another project to pile right now.  Then I go to sleep.

So very little crafty/excellent has happened around here but we've sipped chicken noodle soup and snuggled under blankets with baskets (and bags and assorting tipping piles) of books.  From my vantage point at the computer I see the library basket, the current favorites basket, the heading-back-to-the- library bag, the just sorted "baby" books for boxing, the seasonal books (pumpkins! leaves! apples! fall...), the heading-to-the-car-box pile, not to mention the stray books all over from our morning's reads (remember, I can almost see our entire house from my seat-- it's tiny).  We're on the mend.  We've twirled numerous times to Turn! Turn! Turn!...  tucked in together, heads spinning and laughter dancing out of us.  Even with mini mama failures and fall colds toddler life can be pretty wonderful.

Photos for a week or so here, I think.  I crave the routine of daily musings and then, when we take a step or two back for colds or whatnot, the blog can start to oppress ever so slightly.  I wonder if that makes any sense at all?  If I start to ever feel like I should craft or write or sew for the blog, something's amiss.  I very much want this space to reflect the life we're living in the day to day.  The leaves are falling and the boy and I have a very determined plan (not to be thwarted by threat of rain) to walk and look for leaves after nap.

I feel I can't let that orange thing stand alone up there without explanation: We just barely conquered IKEA the other day for some special present shopping.  These huge placemats were in six packs for 25 cents and the toddler amongst us was so excited by their beautiful ORANGE! color.  We just had to toss them in the cart.  He loves them and I'm sold.  If I was teaching I'd so go buy a ton of these to use as mats for messy art projects.  They're super-handy.

Very funny

I was crying from laughter last night, too late.  T insisted it was the too hungry, too late, too much after midnight work, too sick combo (we've all got rotten colds) but I just think this was hilarious.  The end of it.  This American Life, Episode 192 (originally aired in 2001 so maybe you heard it then).  David Rakoff spends the last eleven minutes talking about craft flow, visiting Martha's craft department and searching out what really happens after you give crafty gifts.  The end is hilarious, to me anyhow.  Totally, completely spot-on with my crafty giving.  I'm chuckling now even though I've since had a little sleep.

Kid records galore = good times

Ohmyohmyohmy... This is the sort-of thing I get excited about.  The joy of the internet, brought to our collective attention by my grandma.  If you have (youngish) kids you must immediately visit Kiddie Records Weekly (even if you don't, you must).  I had so many of these when I was little, and remember placing them on the record player very, very carefully.  The Carrot Seed (Week 30) instantly took me back a couple+ decades: Mothers know a lot of things... Na na it won't come up, na na it won't come up.  You can download (free), live stream (free) and you can also order all of the records on CDs for a really reasonable cost.  We'll still break out the kid record player in a few months, but this is so great.  Good work, Grandma. 

Cleaning up the crafty bookmarks

Fabric:
The little guy is way into elephants, you know, and my fantastic sister bought us some elephant fabric.  I still don't get why people order fabric from Etsy or eBay when there are lovely, reliable and reasonable shops like Sew, Mama, Sew but if you specifically want a specialty, only-available-from-Japan fabric fix this might be the cost-effective way to go (i.e. a third the cost of some other options in the US): shop found here via Aunty Cookie post (careful, put your wallet in the back of your freezer or something).

Fabric sewn together:
I'm still planning out the boy's quilt and think I know what I'm going for.  In Flickr the other day I looked at the few photos I've "favorited," and think it's funny how similar they really are.  I'm don't want to pop someone else's photo up here so, if you're interested, look here, here, here, here and here  (I've linked to a few of these before).  While trying to brainstorm Christmas presents I came up with this great idea to do an all-white log cabin pattern lap quilt.  The next morning, for some other reason entirely, I stumbled upon this quilt.  I absolutely love it (and enjoy the artist's associated blog).

Also randomly enjoy (includes fabric):
How to save money on groceries, all of the scarves popping up from the tutorial like this darling one (scroll down in the post), Joanna working with Michael Miller (updated baby shoe pattern!), DoctorMama's effort to turn me (and you?) into a runner, make your own fabric labels, this playlist (let's try to hold on tight to summer, shall we?), disappearing nine patch tutorial, Scandinavian blog tour, 99 good movies, photos: life mimics art mimics knitting, 72 ideas to simplify your life, the non-planner datebook (that's me: a non-planner planner), these booties (right sidebar, free pattern),  and a post on stuff (found via someone, of course, though I can't remember who right now-- I like the idea of thinking about the cost of an item in your life, rather than just the money part).

If you give a mama a topic... Ambivalence

Most of my ambivalence as a mama is feigned.  Having a little guy has made me more raw to the real and potential "awful" in the world, just as there is more clear beauty and color and magic now in my reality.  There's less "wishy-washy" and more "go for it."  The illusion of ambivalence is my filter when I lack trust, a smokescreen of casualness masking moments of fear, embarrassment or doubt.  If I shrug and act like it doesn't matter, chances are it might matter down into my core. 

Everything matters when you're a mama.  Examples of subjects from yesterday's feigned ambivalence include, but are not limited to: earthquakes, my little guy's language development, upcoming birthdays, a bottom that still doesn't fit back into 2001 pants, my husband's allergic reaction to bee stings and lost opportunities.  All of those things are really important on some level or another, all have implications.

I don't know if becoming a mama has made me more decisive, or if there's just an enhanced understanding of the importance of what really matters.  True ambivalence doesn't pop up much these days.  Don't get me wrong: I doubt, I hesitate, wait, watch, worry, I wonder and I do believe uncertainty and conflicting desires are a norm with people in general.  If I waited too long though, going back and forth with true nonchalance for it all to settle, nothing good would happen.  I wouldn't be the mama I want to be.  I wouldn't greet the future with hope.  Things aren't more black or white since the boy, I just don't want to waste time.  I want to act on what matters, letting what truly doesn't slide into my yesterdays.

MamaSaysOm

How long has it been since I've had a writing prompt?  I decided to try this... Love the idea of Mama Says Om.  The photo is apropos of... nothing.  If you're familiar with Numeroff and Bond you'll get why our moose ate a muffin for twelve hours today (well, he's still eating).  We busted up about twenty times just thinking about our moose and his muffin.  It was like Conan was hanging out on our kitchen table.

Photography with a little more sprinkled in

Aah, the camera.  Really everything I learned about my camera over vacation was that I needed a better camera, or so I figured.  Then I found this link via Blue Yonder (while collecting Boys' Clothing Tutorials).  I like thinking about how many of the greatest photographs in history were created with more primitive equipment than that offered by my little dinky camera's technology.  I say/write "dinky" in a truly affectionate way because I felt like we should have had little goblins help us cart bags of gold to the counter when we purchased this little silver point and shoot.  Technology purchases are always like that for me.  I wince in disbelief and then, a couple of months later say to T, "You mean it doesn't do XYZ?  What?"  T says, "Well, if we spent what we'd spent a couple of months ago today, you'd be able to do XYZ plus A-F."  Anyhow, our little camera does a little A and a little B but I like the idea of reducing the number of variables (still focusing on number 5 here).  I'm not limited, I'm just opening myself up to a more masterful relationship with my little camera.  That seduction he writes about (number 5 again) is such an important life lesson, don't you think?  Don't be seduced by the idea that better craft necessarily lies in a better sewing machine, for example, or a better life in a new house, etc.  I know that the right tool can really make a difference, but it's all good to think about.

I've been trying to just click away, altering more variables than I've done in the past.  There's absolutely nothing special about these photos from around the house other than the freedom I'm allowing myself and the (bad) lighting vs. (visible) results.  There's the minor detail of my familial tremors (which are not quakes of family strife!).  I have an inherited condition that makes my hands shake, worse when I'm under stress, have been using them lots or when I need to keep them still.  It's not usually a life problem since I'm not a surgeon (though can be annoying when giving speeches because people can assume I'm nervous even if I'm not), but it can interfere with photography.  I think I'll just try a little more tripod action, and photos of my little guy need super-lightening-quick exposure anyway because he's always, always on the move.  Flickr's an amazing place to get lost in photography but I avoid it just because of that.  I don't really have time to get lost in one more thing right now. 

I love this post with quick photography tips.  I love Megan's clear, bright photography and the way Sweet|Salty utilizes light in her photos.  I also really enjoy this post about doing what you love (one of my favorite blog sites, for certain) which I remembered after Megan's recent post; I add it here because I think it's good to read in conjunction with the 21 ways to improve your photography.  While you're at it, thinking about big art and life lessons (weren't we just focusing on photography here a moment ago?), enjoy 10 Things I've Learned from Milton Glaser.  Read all three with a glass of wine and the right mood and you'll feel ready to run up and greet the world with your art and life.  Hello, World.  I'm something.

What'd I miss?  Which photo-related sites should I be hounding as someone who once took ten pictures every two years and now enjoys walking around with a camera?

Good-time, calm chaos

Every time we paint things are good, happy... messy.  Toddler life at its best. 

I love index cards for various reasons, one being how easy it is to jot a note on the back of an inspiring little masterpiece and then pop it in the mail for loved ones.  I like having a good stack of these paintings around! 

I hesitate to add this because almost all of our painting is 100% free-for-all, good-time, calm chaos.  But if you want some toddler art for a specific project (say, Christmas wrap) and are going for certain color combinations, I learned this trick after my first year of teaching (it's one of those, "Oh... of course"-type things where I'm probably the last one to know, but still): break up your painting into two sessions.  For example, if you were going for green and red, have at it with the red.  Let it completely dry ('til the next day you have painting time set aside) and then have a go with the green on the same paper.  The colors stay bright and clear.  Like I said, 99% of the time the muddy mix of toddler discovery is where it's at, but occasionally I interfere just a titch.

Not today though.  Today yellow and blue make green and all of the colors make brown. Good, happy, messy... beautiful.

Upupupup, nounounounoun

Do you ever stop to look at your child and think he's the most beautiful, amazing thing in the world, renewing your faith in humanity and giving you a peaceful sense of trust in the rhythm and promise of life?  Then, within five minutes, the dishes, laundry, imminent need for creative cooking, a yelling and unhappy child, lack of sleep and time for simple personal hygiene efforts like brushing your hair, ringing phones and bills in the mail, piles closing in and the promise of free time so far away you can't see it for the five minutes you're drowning in work together to...? Well, you get the idea.  We've got lots of counting to a certain number (me, inside my head) moments going on around here.  The beauty is everywhere; this little guy is growing and changing by the minute, the blue skies and crisp air make this the most amazing season we experience in our area and as I grab a handful of dried apples and head to the sewing machine I think life is pretty good (up, up, up!).  Then deadlines come and go, our little dictator rears his monstrous, people-squashing side, plans fall through or others need a little too much and, flop, we're back to desperation (down, down, down).  Is this flip-flop normal, I wonder, or am I hopelessly useless at the mama gig?  There are lovely days when we hang out in our pajamas just the right amount of time, eat homemade muffins we bake together, wander in the sun and laugh at the same things, spontaneously hugging and running and blowing bubbles and...  It's (up!) bliss.  Then there are days when, well, do you ever have really crappy days at home with the kids?  Moods clash?  Life conspires to bring you down a few notches?  You can't go home and complain about your coworkers because they're right there demanding dinner and milk, no: water, no: a smoothie, no, it's always, always been milk and (heading down here) why can't you ever get things right... And, he adds with just a casual glance, Did you really think I would eat this?

Usually the lovely parts float to the top and I float right off with them to a new morning and new chances, but when things aren't balanced enough I sink right on down with the detritus of the day.  A good reminder, I suppose, for time alone to sit and write.  For sewing up little coats, for a glass of wine and for moments of quiet conversation with the elusive thing we like to call an "adult."  Five minutes or an hour to remind me about that peace and rhythm and trust in what can be, and in the wonder of that little boy (whether People Squasher or Happy Go Lucky Guy).  He loves to hold his arm out at attention, not unlike one of the most infamous of dictators, and he says "Upupupupupupup, Nounounounounoun" while moving his arm (yep, you got it) up and down.  It's the cutest thing ever.  Whether our days are upupupup or nounounounoun they're still better than my best days in any other thing I've done.  But some days really do me in.

I think Rhino's popped in here before.  He shows up peeking around the shower curtain in the bathroom or poking his horn towards me from on top the coffee pot in the morning.  Sometimes I think he just gets it, without me having to explain all about the ups and downs.  Probably another sign of a need for the aforementioned five minutes.

Living the good life

I keep plopping down to the computer and then another day has passed and I haven't written a thing.  It's not for lack of ideas or inspiration.  I finished a fantastic book this past week, Living the Good Life.  I can't remember where I first heard of it (blog? local bookstore?) but I have a sneaking suspicion Amazon thought I might like it after I looked up Animal, Vegetable..., The 100-Mile Diet and Plenty.  Not a big stretch, but it still bugs me when Amazon is right (the anti-big-biz-taking-over-commerce-knowing-all bit of me shining through).  The library shared this book (of the four) with me first.  Anyhow, I keep wanting to just talk to people about this book and my thoughts come out all jumbled and gobbledegookish.  People leave (my husband included) going: OK so it's about an experiment in domestic sustainability?... You're ready to buy a solar hot water heater and a self-composting toilet?... You want to make your own... everything?  I go: Well, no... It's just that I'm so inspired and slightly overwhelmed by the ideas of it all.  People shrug and head off thinking: There she goes again. 

Jumping in now (no going back) I was a little in awe of the idea.  Rather than state a big paragraph or two every time they wanted to explain their "experiment" it was easier for them to say they were going to try to go six months without spending a dollar.  They went from two parents working long hours (with fast food wrappers junking up the car) and their son in daycare, to one full-time income, a goat, chickens, a fantastic garden, lots of solar power and green solutions (i.e. an electric bike).  The journey is fantastic but what I really loved was the author's voice.  You feel like you're on the do-not-spend adventure with them.  When it won't rain, rains to much, when Possum (the goat) is a pill, when they buy goodies and their son quits and they clean the self-composting toilet and whip up a bakery's worth of goods to best utilize the oven's heat... Well, you just feel like you're doing it with them.  And when it was over I wanted to move to temperate Tasmania and build a sustainable, low embodied energy, chemical free strawbale home with them (Adventure #2).  Sprinkled throughout the "journal-type" sections of the book are the hard environmental facts (much of it geared specifically towards Australia and New Zealand but all broad enough to be informative and interesting to me in the US).  The author gives great recipes (everything from ginger beer to laundry gel) and the whole book is full of humor.  They are honest about what was easy, hard and impossible throughout their adventure. 

The family was able to reduce almost all of their consumption (water, energy, transport, etc.) to roughly 5% of their national average.  It's fascinating to see how they react to the end of their experiment and what happens after that.  For a sneak peek while you wait for your turn in the queue at the library, visit their website here.  They do this all on a regular city block (2180 square meters).

No food shots around here, so you get a leaf.  But somewhere wrapped up in the curled edges of this leaf are all sorts of my thoughts on living the good life.  If we hadn't started our own adventure in domestic sustainability when I was pregnant (albeit a very different version) I wouldn't be wandering around while my boy naps, snapping pictures of fall settling in.  As I read the book I thought a lot about how much our life has changed since we became utterly terrified about the financial implications of me staying home.  I'm thinking about how we use energy and resources and how we can be smarter and, to be quite honest, I've been thinking a lot about food (which is a lot of what this book was about too): how we eat, what I make, how gosh-darn expensive groceries are right now (Molly and others are thinking about it too-- check out the comments), organic vs. cost, needs vs. wants...  Last week I also joined our coop.  It all strikes me as exactly the state of mind the family would want me to be in right now.  So more jumble and gobbledegook (might as well copy and paste that sucker) to come but it's been a really good reflection for me, probably tied up with the changing season and settling into the realization that my little guy is turning two (which seems like some big "he's not a baby, you should be into some new distinct phase in your life"-type step, but probably really just means he's getting older). 

I suppose the bigger picture is about how you make meaningful changes (so they stick) and reflecting on changes we've already made that have altered our view of things.  Very interesting to think about as you wander around taking photos.  What do you think?  Are you living the good life?  And what does that mean?

Patchwork scarf tutorial

Here's what the elephant turned into.  I did a simple, "talk you through it" tutorial for an easy patchwork scarf on the Sew, Mama, Sew blog.  We're kicking Kids' Clothes Month off with a sew-along.  Ready to make one?  Let me know so I can see it!

Can't you just imagine...

...Soups, pastas and more in the winter? 
There are apple slices in the dehydrator now.

I don't know...

A bit more "thank you for our vacation" crafting for people with new stables (perhaps for the tack room?).  I thought the Heather Ross fabric would be good for lovers of horses and really, when you have little money to spare and you need a gift for someone who can get anything they want and need?...  I think you go with what you know, throw in a little effort and hope it doesn't end up thrifted in a week!  It's not what I'd choose for myself, but I think it ended up fine.  I slipcovered the pillows (canvas-like fabric on the back with "equestrian" ties) and then whipped up a little tote with the rest of the yard.  The fabric needed a little something so I tried a fancy stitch for the first time in my life and I loved the texture.  Not too hokey, just a little puckered.  Good.  I realized I can now make a tote in fifteen minutes.

We spent Labor Day doing absolutely no labor.  I did dry tons of herbs this weekend and made successful, delicious homemade bread with my mom's recipe.  I haven't been happy with our bread machine bread, but I hate spending $3.50-$4.50/loaf for bread with some nutritional content and fewer preservatives.  Enter Mom's bread secrets, a little Canadian flour and three very full people.  I added butter, cinnamon and sugar to some extra dough for yummy cinnamon rolls.  We are stuffed.  The plan is to do one big batch every two weeks.

I cannot believe September is upon us and still have to update the calendar (and blog).  We're officially entering my favorite season.  I have an urge to make cider, break out the sweaters and sip tea by the fire (though it was at least in the high 70's here today and now we're experiencing a fantastically slap-dash loud and thrilling thunderstorm).  There's only a little, teeny part of me missing a classroom of new kids tomorrow but we have plans to head to the library, swing a bit, make muffins, do laundry and a make progress on a little coat.