someone told me...

..it's all happening at the zoo.

i do believe it.

i do believe it's true.

fava beans

an exciting new post about fava beans over at

http://onedeepdrawer.wordpress.com/

bet you can't wait!

independence

happy fourth of july!

there's a new post over at http://onedeepdrawer.wordpress.com/

see you there!

thirty

i didn't expect the end of the month so soon. i've still got posts waiting to be written. i guess that's a good sign. there were certainly days when the posts here were a bit slim. so i'm not an advocate of posting for habit's sake. if there is something to say, then by all means pound it out. but there's no harm in sitting quiet for a few days either.

M has inherited a play structure from our neighbors. (i tried all day to upload a video of her going down the slide with no luck.) i really can't imagine a more perfect gift at the beginning of this season. she is ripe for it! it's plastic. but not bright and awful. earth colors with moss growing on it. the climbing walls are a bit too big for her (next year!), but the stairs and slide were getting a workout at 7:30 this morning.

i can't tell you how nice it is to have a green place to sit. our new fence keeps the girl in, but she's got plenty of room to roam. the garden, the pool, the play structure. and we have a baby scrub jay too. she hops along behind her mama, crying out little calls. her gray head gives her away. and the plaintive way she opens her mouth when she calls. such richness. what were you doing this morning?

strawberries

our strawberry patch in the front yard is producing so much fruit. we eat alot, share alot with our neighbors, let the scrub jays eat their share. and still our fridge is full of berries.

so i smashed a couple cups, mixed it with cream and sugar and an egg, and gave it a couple of turns in the ice cream maker.


home made strawberry ice cream. so good. look how fast the girl can get a taste! i'm going to whip up a little cream to eat with this morning's berries and watch tennis. strawberries and cream...breakfast at Wimbledon. it sort of counts as church!

twenty nine

so it happened. i didn't make it to the computer yesterday. my streak is broken. i did not blog every day. oh well. i did think of it as the little one was nursing herself back to sleep. it was 11:54 pm. and i could have popped in. but i stayed in bed and rested my bones. the right choice i think.

twenty seven

this is just amazing. you can read a bit about these two beauties on the video's Youtube site. there is also video of her birth.

it's no surprise that M is already learning the differences between mammals and other animals. she knows that whales live in the water like fish, but give their babies milk to drink. and that's one of the first questions she asks about new animals. she cradles an imaginary baby to her breast and asks, milk? do these mamas feed their babies milk?

i was very newly pregnant with M when we went to the Lighthouse in San Diego to watch the whales migrating down to Baja to birth their babies. that's when i first learned how baby whales drink milk, that the milk is the consistency of cottage cheese and the mama squirts it into the water! this is a crazy, amazing world we live in!

twenty six

word on the street is i'm thinking of moving this blog over to Wordpress. i know, i know! big news. i've never really liked Blogger. just the name sounds silly to me. i hated the address: onedeepdrawer.blogspot.com. those two short "o" sounds right next to each other. yuck! Wordpress sounds much more dignified to my ears.

so the plan is to stay here through the end of the month, and then move here.

and another link for those who don't like change:

http://onedeepdrawer.wordpress.com/

it's not that big of a deal is it? if it is, just let me know. nothing's final. and i might find that Blogger really is more my speed. we'll see.

twenty five

ladies and gentlemen, may i direct your attention to our Flickr page. many, many pictures have been uploaded in the last few days, so let me get you up to speed on our comings and goings...

1. our trip to Yakima...i can't decide if going down the water slide was the most fun part of the trip or eating shave ice. my favorite was green apple with a squirt of sour zinger. yum! and don't you just love the sense of style that Jess has? by the by, the pictures from Hood River are from the trip home. we stopped for a Big Dinger Dog and Cokes. more yum!
   
2. swim lessons...i've already mentioned those, but here are a few more pictures. Maisy Layton has almost the exact same suit as our Mamie.
   
3. picking strawberries in the front yard. such bounty. i'm going to make home made ice cream with this morning's pick.
4. Nicki + Kev...are moving to town from Bellingham. M is quite fond of them and the sweet dog Zion.
5. the garden and the girl in the bonnet...what a harvest already.
6. Jude...came for a visit. Marg and Thad went out for her birthday to a yummy dinner. and we got to spend the evening with Jude painting and playing.

that's what's up with us. and you?

twenty four

it's Papa's birthday!

a little cake. a few presents. this is not quite half of AP's presents. looks like it's going to be a good year! he's gone just now doing work stuff. he was supposed to take the day off, but something came up. so he'll be home soon. already this morning we went out to breakfast with our friends, Nicki and Kevin. they'll be moving down from Washington in a few weeks. so we took a look at their new place and ate at Petite Provence. we hadn't been back since last spring when we came for a visit. such yummy pastry. cheese croissant! happy birthday indeed. i don't know what the rest of the day holds for us. it's going to be warmer today. maybe we'll make some homemade strawberry ice cream if we have enough ripe berries. we've been giving so many away! home grown Oregon strawberries make for happy neighbors.

here's to a great year for Andy and our family and many happy returns of the day!

twenty three

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twenty two

we are freshly home from a trip to see our dear friends in the Yakima valley. it's a lovely trip from here through the Gorge and then over the Columbia to Washington. farm land and mountain views, desert and rainforest. for a while the little one was asleep in the back seat and we could quietly enjoy the view. we found surprises along our route too.

like the town of Toppenish. it's the city of murals, the town's history is recorded in beautiful paintings there on the side of the Napa Auto Parts store! i love the different story lines and perspectives all in one piece. we drove without knowing where we were going or what we would see, and it was certainly worth turning off of the highway.

further on toward home we found an orthodox monastery. in the middle of no place at all, 18 women live together. lives devoted to prayer and coffee roasting and pastry making. let me tell you, after a weekend when our girl was out of sorts, grumpy and not really sleeping much, their life is very intriguing.

twenty one

there's a sort of folk wisdom among midwives and families who homebirth that babies born in the water always have an affinity for it. i've been at more than one gathering where there's a kid playing in a fountain and someone will walk by and say, yep! he's a water baby. and our water baby is no different.

we've been doing swim lessons this week. there's an indoor pool quite close to our house and this week was FREE swim lesson week. so last Saturday i woke up early and stood in line to sign us up for a week of Starfish lessons. really it's just an excuse to be in the water with the little one. we sing some splashy songs and play with water toys. Mabel loves it. alot. she wakes up ready to go. she talks about it all the way there (bus! pool! kick kick kick!). last night i think she must have been practicing here swimming in her sleep. i was getting kicked so much i had to take a blanket and go sleep on the couch.

she's always a little disappointed that Uncle Dave and Trev aren't going to be at the pool. the last time she swam was when they came for a visit, so the two are tied in her mind. but on our way to the pool, we do pass a KFC. she's started calling the Colonel "Chicken Papa." and because Dave's always up for some chicken, she talks about eating some chicken with Dave and Trev. and we will in just over a month!

twenty

look what came in the mail today! a neat pen pouch from Amy at the Creative Mom Podcast.

the package came hand stamped...


but the best surprise was the lovely stitching outlining the bird. i just love it! and i've got a new journal. just in time for the first day of summer to begin a season of nature journaling.

nineteen

remembering Edwina Froehlich...

and the simple, but revolutionary, idea that seven women could meet together to talk and support each other in the decision to breastfeed.

only 11% of babies born in our country are breastfed for 6 months. there's still work for La Leche League. so get busy! go to a LLL meeting, smile at a mama breastfeeding in public, pick up your kid and nurse her!

eighteen

a late response to Living More with Less and the chapter called "Nurturing People." thanks again to Mrs. Pivec for keeping the conversation going. even when i'm not writing here, her words are on my mind and that's a nice thing.

this chapter reminded me of two seemingly small decisions that we made early on in our life as Mabel's parents. not big philosophical choices, not hard choices. quiet choices that have made such a difference.

we chose not to get the popular baby carseat that snaps out and becomes a carrier. mostly it was an aesthetic decision--people look so silly all bent over to balance the weight of the poorly designed carrier. but that meant when we were out, we had to hold Mabel. there was no place to put her. we couldn't put her down and get on with dinner or whatever else was calling for our attention. we had to make space for her too. we had to keep her in mind. we had to care for her. so we held her in our arms or she slept snuggled in a sling. and just being mindful of her and her needs, her rightful place in our family life, opened me up. from the beginning she wasn't an intrusion on my better plans. she was a part of us.

the other choice was to not use a pacifier. partly because i was breastfeeding and wanted her to breast as often as possible in the early days to establish my milk supply. but again, pacifiers just look silly. then we read something about babies finding comfort through nursing or sucking on a little finger instead of a pacifier, in part because we want our children to find comfort in people, not things. and that resounded so deeply with me. it was a way to hold a larger intention for the kind of person i want to be, the kind of child i want to raise in this world, in the midst of my mundane life with a small baby. it reminded me of what was important.

seventeen

last night she found the lopsided, coming-full moon in the late evening sky.

she said, Egg! Crack, crack!

ah, a poet.

keep your eyes open.

sixteen

it's (almost) summer. and that means it's time for the summer reading program! are your little ones signed up yet? we were at the library on the first day. and we weren't the only ones either! i've done summer reading with Jordan and Morgan and Taylor, with Garrett and Gracie, and now with Trev and Mabel. i just love it.

as the librarian was explaining the rules to us, she said that any time with a book counted for a child Mabel's age--she mentioned chewing on the book or scooting it around on the floor. M has been known to chew her some book, but she also spends considerable time on her own looking at pictures, turning pages, telling herself the story. we found her a few nights ago laying on her belly with her chin in her hand, reading. she looked just like what a kid is supposed to look like! we have books around and we read a fair amount ourselves, but she has a love for books that is her own.

of course, the summer reading program, with its trips to Disneyland and free school supplies, raises the whole issue of rewarding children for doing things that really are rewards in themselves. reading easily falls into that category. but i really don't think that the rewards are going to stop up her own drive to read. i think it's a fun little extra. it's an external way for me to see just how much time we're spending in the books. it spurs me on to be more conscious about sharing books with the little. last year i remember some long summer afternoons spent reading with Trevor and Mabel expressly because we were trying to finish up a level on their reading logs. but it was a good way to spend time none the less. (on a somewhat related parenting note...how old does a child need to be before she is on the computer? how much screen time should a child have? what's your experience?)

libraries are such wonderful places to share with our children. i hope that this summer is full of memorable books for each of you. i for one could use a good novel!

fifteen

these two!

last week i told Mabel that we would be celebrating Father's Day soon and we needed to get AP a surprise. all week long at odd times she's been saying, Papa? prise? and then she'll get a big smile on her face as we talk about Father's Day again.

this man is amazing.

he is gentle and silly. when she requests Bird (Little Bird) or Spider (Itsy Bitsy Spider) he plays the same songs over and over on the guitar. he tends our garden and fills our yard debris bin with so many weeds. he teaches kids who are right on the verge of success or failure. he's a steady, reliable influence in their lives, a man of integrity.

he held me in his arms as i birthed Mabel. when she was still connected to me, he reached around and rubbed her back and whispered hello. as i was getting stitched up, he held Mabel. and i knew that she was safe, she was right where she needed to be.

i am so honored to be walking the path of parenting with Andy. he makes me a better mama just by being himself.

happy father's day!

fourteen

the internet is a crazy place.

a note showed up in my flickr mail a few weeks ago about using one of my pictures for an online guide to the Northwest. sure, be my guest. the picture of Kelley Point that they wanted wasn't my most inspired shot, but there you go. i think you'll have to scroll down to find the Kelley Point entry.

the funny thing is that the local paper just published an article about how much gay men love Kelley Point! oh my! there was no one but us there on the very cold day in January when the picture was taken.