Everyday Life for Four Seasons

More strawberries. More jam. More strawberries for breakfast, lunch, dinner and happy hour.


I continue to feel just awful about the destruction of the Gulf of Mexico. The only answer is to reduce our oil addiction, and by doing so we have to cut down on purchasing and consuming, cut down on driving, cut down on eating meat and produce that is grown using oil-based fertilizers and pesticides, cut down on using so much energy to heat, cool and light our businesses and homes.

This article voices my thoughts exactly.


I took out the garbage Tuesday night and was surprised to see that our household used one-half of a 13 gallon garbage bag during the entire week. Half of a bag! That's it! We don't produce a lot of garbage overall, but this was a first for us. A wonderful first.

I made this granola recipe yesterday (without the nuts because 'A' eats it) and although it was a tad salty, it's pretty good. It's sticky and clumpy and sweet. Yum!

Jeff finally found a bike on Craigslist for a decent price, and he's looking forward to riding it around the neighborhood this weekend. I'm looking forward to a quick trip to the New England coastline to see my father and my sister. I'll see you back here sometime soon.

Hi there,
If you feel like you're seeing a lot of strawberry photos lately, it's because you are! We went picking again today. I drove to the organic place and found that it was closed for the day (I should have called in advance, right?). Jeff said that there was another pick-your-own place down the road, but he didn't know if they sprayed with chemicals. I went over there and asked, and found out that they sprayed a fungicide last fall, but nothing since. I was faced with a dilemma. Pick the sprayed strawberries today, or go home and not pick again this week, and possibly miss the rest of strawberry season? I decided to pick, since the fruit wasn't sprayed directly. And here we are, sitting on another six quarts of fresh strawberries.

Today the girls and I ate them during all three meals: granola, coconut milk yogurt (I have to learn how to make that at home - it's expensive to buy), and strawberries in a big bowl for breakfast; sliced strawberries during lunch; and with dinner, the girls has them sliced while Jeff and I enjoyed a salad made with fresh mesculin mix from our garden, sliced strawberries, and toasted pecans with a red wine vinegar-honey dressing. Mmmmmm!

I have to say that the coconut milk yogurt is delicious, but I wonder where it comes from. It's obviously not a local food. Is it grown in the United States? Are the communities that produce it economically stable? Does the farming process hurt the planet? I have a lot to learn about it.


I have so many library books on my bookshelf just waiting for some attention from me. I finally dove into Wendell Berry's "Bringing it to the Table: On Farming and Food." Berry writes about farming and sustainable agriculture, and his writing is brilliant. There's a piece in the book about what our country would look like if we moved toward a local food economy, with each town and city dotted with diverse farms that would supply meat, vegetables, grains and dairy products. Not only would the number of farms increase, the number of businesses that support the farms would rise, the amount of fossil fuel used to transport food would fall; the soil erosion would decrease, and the quality of water in the streams and rivers would improve. All of this is possible, he says. The thing that's questionable is the human factor. Are humans willing to choose this lifestyle? Are they willing to give up convenience and year-round fruit options?


I'm willing to support the local food economy. Strawberry season has once again reminded me of all the reasons I love eating locally. It's easy to love local food when it's good and plentiful. But the real reason I love local eating is because of the "hungry months" of March and April. The months when we don't seem to have that much variety. Going without makes me so much more thankful for these times when we have more than we can eat and enjoy. There are very real seasons in nature and we're tied to them whether we try to be or not. Eating in season is an easy way to get in touch with the cyclical nature of... nature.

What do you think of the new layout?

'A' had her final dance performance of the season yesterday. She's come so far in the past few months in terms of performing in front of a group. She was happy and at ease, which is a dramatic change from the first time she stood in front of a group of adults and danced.

Pretty much all of our structured activities are winding down - dance class, gymnastics and swimming. So many of the other things we do every day will continue to keep us happily busy all summer long, like playing with friends and poking around in our garden. I'm happy that the classes are coming to an end. The girls are at the age where we're getting to be very busy, and with the busyness comes a bit more exhaustion for all of us. I would like to think that these next few months will be a welcome break. But summer never is as lazy and relaxing as I want it to be...


I've come to a new stage of dealing with my grief over the oil catastrophe in the Gulf. I think I'm accepting that it's all really happening, and although I'm not willing to accept the fact that life with even more polluted water is the new reality, I realize that I have to. I'm not happy to sit back and do nothing about this though. This is a journey for me and for all of us to realize just how dependent we are on oil and to find ways to break the cycle. It's a journey where we can begin to learn about alternative sources of fuel, alternative materials to use in our daily life, and alternative ways of living and looking at our lives so that we don't rely so much on oil, plastic and other synthetic materials. Here's a link to a list of things that we may use everyday that are made from oil: http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/classroom/wwo/petroleum.pdf.

Take this journey with me.


Last night Jeff and I made strawberry jam and today we're heading to the Hyde Collection for a sneak peek of the new Andrew Wyeth exhibit. Add some garden work and later, an evening spent listening to great music with wonderful people, and you end up with a really nice weekend.


The pie was delicious, by the way. The recipe came straight from the Joy of Cooking. You can't go wrong if you have that book handy on your shelf.

Our day in pictures: baking and weeding. A dance performance by 'A' and a strawberry jam-making session for me and Jeff are still to come.

Our day in words: For the three of us, pleasant and easy. And for just me, very sad, as the oiltastrophy in the Gulf of Mexico continues to grow.

We finally found an organic pick-your-own strawberry patch and I took the girls yesterday. The prices were more than reasonable - $3.50 per quart - and we picked 6 quarts. I see a strawberry-rhubarb pie and some jam making in our future, don't you?


Strawberries are one of the dirty dozen, so it's important to me that they're grown without the use of chemicals. It's important for our health and the health of our planet. I'm starting to see that the oil gusher catastrophe is becoming a turning point for me. I may have been sensitive to environmental issues in the past, but now I feel myself taking it all much more seriously.


'A' was a super picker yesterday - she probably picked at least half of what we took home, and each of her berries was redder, bigger and sweeter than the next. Which is a good thing, because some of them started out on the yellow side! Check out her bonnet. She's gobbling up everything she can that relates to the Little House on the Prairie stories and she wanted to wear it while she was in the field to sheild her eyes. I love her. And yes, that is a sling she's wearing, with her baby in it.


Later that afternoon, we headed out to the farm to pick up our vegetables. It rained all afternoon, rained last night, and is supposed to rain again today. I'm not sure my vegetable garden wants all this rain. Oh well, what can I do?

At our home, we have a yard with a lawn, and in our neighborhood, it's appropriate to have a lawn. We like ours to be green (who doesn't?), and we use all-natural ways to keep it looking as green as possible. Today I noticed that there's a section of the lawn that's not so green anymore, and I love it. We've begun to wear a footpath from the back door to the gardens. To me, it says, "We live here. We visit this wonderful space every day. We walk this path with purpose." I love our garden footpath.

Hi there. I'm tired. Super-duper tired. Regular life combined with lots and lots of gardening and lots and lots of socializing these past few weeks has left me utterly exhausted. It's not over. Tomorrow I've got 3 and a half yards of mulch coming and I'll be spreading it over all of the beds this week. I've got basil that was screaming to be harvested yesterday waiting in a glass on the counter. I'll make pesto tomorrow.

The oil "leak" weighs heavily on my mind. I wish that my fellow Americans would take this moment in history to rally together and vow to decrease our national dependence on oil. Sure, oil fuels our cars, but that's only one piece of the puzzle. So much of what we come across everyday comes from oil. Making better choices on a case by case basis is the only way to reduce our dependency. Each household has to do it in the way that works best for the family. Here, straight from End Oil's site is a starter list of products that are made from oil. Check out their site - it's informative, a great place to get new ideas for reducing oil dependency.

Examples of products we use (or encounter) every day that contain petroleum are:

GASOLINE Gasoline is used primarily in light- and medium-duty cars and trucks. 45% of all oil used in the U.S. goes to gasoline, which means we consume in excess of 180 million gallons of gasoline a day.

DIESEL FUEL Diesel, unless it is “biodiesel”, is made from refining crude oil. It is generally used in medium- and heavy-duty vehicles requiring a great deal of power and torque, like garbage trucks, road equipment, buses, and trains.

HEATING OIL Heating oil is a petroleum product used to fuel furnaces or boilers. In the U.S., most heating oil is consumed in the northeast.

JET FUEL The standard type of jet fuel, Jet A, is a petroleum product with a number of additives to prevent sparking, gumming, corrosion, and icing.

BUNKER FUEL Bunker fuel, which is also know as heavy oil, is used to power ships. It typically contains a high number of pollutants and contaminants. Use is increasing with the shipping associated with global commerce.

PLASTICS All plastic, unless it is “bioplastic”, is made from petrochemicals. Every product made from or containing plastic is a product that exists only through the distillation of petroleum.

SYNTHETIC RUBBER Synthetic rubber is used for car tires and rubber soles on shoes. The demand for synthetic rubber is four times greater than that for natural rubber.

FERTILIZERS/PESTICIDES All major commercial fertilizers are ammonia based, made from natural gas, and most commercial pesticides come from oil.

PAINT Plastic and oil based paints, as well as paint additives, are manufactured from petrochemicals.

DETERGENT All soapless detergents used to wash clothes and dishes are derived from the petrochemical glycerin.

PHOTOGRAPHIC FILM Photographic film is a product of the petrochemical ethylene.

PLASTICS All plastic is made from petrochemicals. Every product made from or containing plastic is a product that exists only through the distillation of petroleum.

FOOD ADDITIVES (canned food) Food additives, derived from petrochemicals, help to increase the shelf life of canned food.

MEDICINE (pill bottles) Acetylsalicylic acid (ASA), the active ingredient in many pain reliever medicines, is manufactured from petrochemicals.

SYNTHETIC FIBERS (such as clothes, curtains, and carpets) Polyester, nylon, acrylic are all derived from petrochemicals. They are used for curtains, carpets, rope and even the clothes you wear.

MAKE-UP Make-up, containing oils, perfumes, waxes and color, are derived from petrochemicals.

DYES The majority of dyes we use, ranging anywhere from pens to hair dye, come from petrochemicals.

CANDLES Wax is a raw petroleum product.


In the meantime, my plants soothe me. Our summer squash has fruit, and that's not all - so do our peppers and tomatoes! Our lettuce multiplies daily, which is a bit scary. If you don't like eating enormous salads twice a day, don't come here! Soon we'll have more peas than we can count. It's a wonderful harvest already, and the season hasn't even begun. We are so lucky. So, so lucky.


Check out our upside down tomato: this is a new thing for us. We'll see if the chatter is right, that you see larger yields from the upside down plants.

Yesterday I asked the girls to take a nap in the afternoon so that we could go to a special concert at night and stay up late. They did nap, for a looonnnggg time. In the evening we headed out to SPAC for the Dave Matthews concert and sat on the lawn outside the gates (translation: free, but with no view of the stage, and the music is not so loud). We brought chairs, refreshments and lawn games and had a good time.


During their nap I had a chance to work on 'A's new sundress. She outgrew her favorite sundress from last summer, one that has ice cream cones printed all over it. She was so upset when I told her she can't wear it anymore, and to cheer her up I suggested we go to the fabric store and she can pick out the fabric for a new dress. She made a good choice, I think, and I'll post some photos as soon as I can.

Today we're going to work on mixing some manure into a new little flower plot for the girls, then we'll plant a sunflower "house" with a clover carpet, and to make it all look beautiful, we'll put in the 49 flower plants 'A' picked out yesterday as part of her birthday present. We're excited!

Wow, this granola is going fast and I just made it! I'm getting really tired of purchasing thing that come in plastic bags, so for a while I stopped buying cereal. When it comes to children, cereal can be an easy and delicious option for a morning meal. I missed it, and so did the girls. Last night I finally took the oatmeal I have on hand (I buy it in bulk, and use my own bags to pack it up) and made some granola. I used this recipe and omitted the nuts ('A' is allergic to most nuts) and the result was pretty tasty! I look forward to trying out new recipes as we continue on our homemade granola journey. Do you have any yummy granola recipes to share with me?


Our CSA and our garden is starting to give us more produce than we can manage - or more than I can easily keep track of, anyway. A few days ago I wrote out a list of all that's available to us in our garden and in the fridge and I'm *hoping* this will keep me organized in the kitchen. One can hope, right?

Today we're having a few trees cut down in the backyard (one is super-dead and just about ready to fall, ouch). While they cut, the girls and I are heading to the fabric store to figure out what dress to make for 'A'. Her favorite dress - one that's covered with ice cream cones - is too small for her this summer and as a way to make her feel better about her "getting bigger issue," I promised to make her a new dress out of fabric that she loves.

In between all of this, I have a million little things to do. Things to plan, things to research, things to reflect on, and things to do.

Our garden continues to grow well.


Today I took the girls to a homeschool art class in town and after hearing a story about ancient Egypt, they painted their names in hieroglyphs - on papyrus, no less!



In the afternoon, we made our first trip of the season to the farm where we pick up our weekly share of fresh organic vegetables. How happy I was to go back! This week we received:

Chinese Cabbage
Garlic Scapes
Radishes
Green Leaf Lettuce
Mesculin Greens
Strawberries
Scallions

The girls loved the goats and the creek. We're back.