Busy Hands Homestead

"Hugh.  That Heavy!" Sylvan sighs and steps out of my path. He follows me, barely a step behind, from the stack of cinder blocks to the freshly leveled earth underneath the maple tree. "Hugh.  That Heavy!" I grab a second block. "Hugh.  That Heavy!" With each block I lift, he sighs, and walks directly behind me, following my steps. "One More?" "Hugh.  That Heavy." Our house came with piles of stuff - not junk exactly - just stuff: bricks, cinder blocks, landscaping rock, pine boards, steel rods, 5 gallon buckets..... "Hugh.  That Heavy." Adam's birthday is on Friday. I finally thought of a birthday present. Sure, he has a long list of tools he wants/needs, but I don't dare pick those out for him...  not to mention that the tools remaining on his wish list are pricey.  Those purchases can not be clandestine operations. But, he also keeps mentioning that he wishes he had a place to burn his piec...

The day has been creeping. The moment I woke up I wanted to pull the covers back over my shoulders. I am on a string of late nights, and Sylvan is a string of sleepless early morning hours, so while my shelf at the clay studio is crowded with an increasing number of mugs and cups, my body is telling me to just stop and go to bed - I didn't listen and now have a cold. Last night I didn't crawl into bed until 1:30, Sylvan woke up before I managed to fall asleep, and I watched every hour pass on the clock across the room.  I nursed, changed his diaper, Adam got water, I took Sylvan to the bathroom, when he started screaming: "Pee, Pee!" at the top of his lungs.  I considered trying to convince him to go in his diaper, and decided that that would be counter productive to the potty training effort. I dragged myself out of bed, got myself and the kids dressed and staggered down the stairs for a quick breakfast before we drove across the Y to Ivory's Rookie S...

I love mornings. I love my first cup of coffee. I love breathing the dark aroma and sipping the smoothness of cream as I sit and pretend that we have absolutely nothing to do for the rest of the day.  I breath in and pretend that everything is calm and peaceful while in reality the kids are running across the house from kitchen through dining room and into the living room. The pretense of a leisurely moment is furthered by the fact that I am not actively cooking breakfast. We cook breakfast every day, but I have discovered the joys of baked breakfast. We often eat Puff Pancakes , but recently I added baked oatmeal into the rotation of family breakfast.  Just like the Puff Pancakes, the baked oatmeal is a baked dish that allows me to just sit and sip and breath for twenty minutes. Baked Oatmeal 1 cup oatmeal  3 Tablespoons brown sugar 2 Tablespoons coconut flakes 1/2 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/2 cup walnut pie...

Sylvan asleep, the dishes washed, dinner started and I sit down to sew a few buttons onto a cute cardigan Ivory was handed down from a friend.  She impatient, waiting for a friend to arrive and share dinner with us, utters those three words that parents dread: " I am bored." I pour a rainbow of buttons into a cake pan: "Can you find five buttons that are the same and match your red and grey and black sweater?".  Much too soon she gathers a little cluster of grey buttons and stacks of large, medium and small buttons are marching across the table.  Mom: "I am bored."  I stare at the table for a moment, set down the needle and thread, put aside my hopes of quickly fixing this silly cardigan and instead dig through my craft supplies to find that roll of floral wire I know is hiding somewhere in one of my drawers. Success. For an hour she is concentrating, silently stringing her stacks of buttons onto the wires - small, medium and large.  She hands the thr...

When I think about the day in 2003 on which I met my husband, I think guacamole. There are many moments in our lives that I remember by the meals we shared. The last meal he cooked for me before I drove to New York for my summer internship in 2006 was Veal Marsala.  The meal that was waiting, sitting on the table, when I returned was a Spaghetti Squash picked up at the Farmer's market that morning. Even rockiest days of our marriage (so far), I will always fondly remember with side by side concocted candied orange peals and chocolate fudge.  The morning after Ivory was born, we pulled apart monkey bread while we stared across the tiny hospital room at that sleeping bundle.  The day after we came home from the hospital with we walked all over Stillwater, Oklahoma in 90 degree weather.  When we walked out of the door that morning we were full of new parent adrenaline and the fact that I had had virtually no sleep the night before seemed to matter litt...

I finished knitting Adam's present yesterday morning, but didn't manage to tie up all the loose ends until just now.  In between icing the Almond Star Cookies and pulling tonight's pot pie out of the oven, I sat down for a few minutes and now the gift is completely done! FINALLY! I based the hat on a free pattern that I found online. I made a few changes.  The most obvious is that I added the curled edge to the hat to make it more hat like.  I also permanently attached this mustache rather than making a few different exchangeable staches. Well, dinner is ready and Adam just came inside. The pot pie smells fantastic!

As a parent I am often confronted by humbling moments. I like to think that I am somewhat flexible, open minded and maintain healthy set expectations:  hair needs to be brushed.  so do teeth.  it is not okay to lie, but it is okay to keep surprises (Please don't tell Dad about the t-shirt we picked up for his birthday today... ) We navigate a foggy world of boundaries, social norms and appropriate behaviors.  I don't expect to always be right, even when arguing with a four year old.  Sometimes her arguments have a certain kind of logic and once I realize that logic I agree with her, just like I try to help her see my logic and hope she will do what I am asking of her.  But, sometimes, in spite of or maybe because of myself that there comes a moment when I so vastly underestimate what my child really is capable of. I had one of those moments this Monday. We were leaving a friend's house after hanging out for hours, and as I was setting Sylvan in his str...

2 fist sized beets (*roasted) 1 lbs of strawberries 4 (or more) ounces of fetta cheese 1/4 (or more) cup of roasted walnuts arugula dressing: 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar 1/4 cup olive oil 2 tbsp agave nectar garlic salt pepper * To roast the beets, set them in a oven safe dish and fill the bottom inch with water cover and bake for an hour or until the beets can be easily poked with a fork.  Let them cool and rub the skin off of them.  They are ready to be used. Place the walnuts in a dry hot pan and "fry" on the stove until the skins darken and they are wonderfully aromatic.  Remove from heat. Chop the beets and strawberries into equal sized pieces. Put on a bed of arugula. Since arugula is a peppery green, use as much or as little as you like.  Sprinkle with the feta and walnuts. Prepare the dressing. Whisk together the vinegar, oil, agave nectar and add garlic, salt and pepper to taste. Pour the dressing over the salad.  Toss and enjoy. ...