Everyday Life for Four Seasons

Thrilled to go away, and more than happy to be back home now. Isn't that just how it should be?


I learned a few things about myself these past few days and I have been pleasantly surprised by what I've found. For starters, ever since we gave up meat and dairy a couple of months ago (on April 27, to be exact), we've pretty much stuck to our plan with one exception when we ate dinner out. Considering how much I have always loved cheese and butter, it's amazing that I've been able to walk away from it so easily. It's a testament to how great I feel now that I'm not eating it.

Mom suggested we eat lobster for dinner one night. LOBSTER. With BUTTER. Would it be good? Would we like it? Heck, we always used to! So we said yes, and waited to see how we would feel while (and after) we ate it. And of course we wanted to go down to the beach and see how many clams we could dig up to have as an appetizer.


So how did we feel? Was the lobster worth it? As much as I hate to say it, because it's such an expensive treat and because I always loved it so much, I don't think it was. Jeff didn't think so either. And that came as a complete surprise to me. It's one thing to say we're giving up certain foods, and then not eat them, but it's an entirely different thing to eat them again and not feel it was worth doing.


Something else that caught me off guard was seeing how firm my personal boundaries have become. I haven't done any conscious "work" on them, but here they are, clearer than they've ever been. I'm at a point in my life where my issues are my issues, and I don't want anyone else working on them for me (or with me). Ultimately, no one else can do it. It's up to me. I'm on a journey of personal responsibility that I have to take by myself.

Likewise, I'm not interested in crossing into someone else's "issue space". This is a change for me. My mother was telling me that she's in the midst of switching doctors because her doctor left the practice and now she's got to find a new one. And while this search is happening, she happens to have a medical issue that she's concerned about. And I'm concerned about it too. She knows she has to see a doctor but she's not running to the phone to make an appointment. Normally, I would be worried about her, and I would think about her and hope she's okay... obsessively, for a few weeks, or until she had seen the new doctor. This weekend I did worry, and I did hope she was okay, but only for a minute. Then I realized that it's not my body, not my search for a new doctor, not my phone call. I have my own health to think about, and my mother is an adult, a former nurse, and she's completely capable of taking care of her own health. So I'm letting her. I'm not going to try to get into her personal space and take over her issues. They're hers, not mine.


I guess you could say that I'm maturing. Geez, I thought that was something you did when you were young and learned to load the dishwasher without help... or something that happened when you were older and had seen more in life. It never really occurred to me that it would happen now, when I play with little kids all day and the last thing I think about are issues of maturity.


This is what Justine said we'll get from the farm tomorrow:

Cucumbers, Carrots, Lettuce, Parsley, Beets, Mesclun, Swiss Chard or Kale, and one additional vegetable not yet determined.

She said that many crops were destroyed by the hail last week.

I can't wait to check our little backyard garden tomorrow!

We're on the Cape and we brought the sun with us. It's welcomed by all of these New Englanders who haven't seen it in a while, and frankly, we're not surprised it followed us here. It followed us to Rhode Island last weekend and we're starting to think it just follows us wherever we go.


Choices. We all make them everyday, and most often you don't see what would have happened if you had picked a different option, you just trust that you're making the best choice you can.

On the way to the Cape yesterday there was heavy traffic as we neared the bridges. For most of my life, I've gone over the Sagamore Bridge, but these past few years I've been going over the Bourne. The traffic reports indicated that there was a 5 mile back up for the Bourne and a 3 mile back up for the Sagamore. Jeff looked at the alternate routes and wondered if we should cut over to the Sagamore, and I said I didn't think so. The alternate route would have taken just as long. We went back and forth on it, wondering what to do. We stuck with the Bourne bridge. At the last minute, there's a turn off for the Sagamore and we chose to stay on our course and not take it.

After we got across, we took a road that had us driving right under the Sagamore Bridge. "Wow," we said, "that traffic is at a standstill." Then we saw the car that had flipped over and was leaning against the side of the bridge. People were just getting out of their cars and were looking dazed. It had just happened. A car (the one that was flipped) drove into 2 lanes of oncoming traffic on the bridge. And you know what? If we had chosen to take the Sagamore, we could have been at that spot, or we could have been stuck in the traffic behind the accident for hours.

We made the right choice. Thank goodness everyone in that accident walked away.


We got here in time to play in the sand, spend time with Grandma and Grandpa, and try to catch the fireworks before sending the girls off to bed. The fireworks were at Rock Harbor and if it had been low tide, we could have walked out on the flats and seen the fireworks very well. But it was high tide and we were confined to the beach, and we could just barely make out some of the bigger ones as they cleared the tree line. We didn't see much of the big public display, but the neighbors didn't disappoint us. On both sides they were shooting off smaller ones that were LOUD and neat to watch.


Today we went to the 4th of July parade in town and after the girls wake up from naptime, it'll be time to hit the beach! Veggie burgers and Cape Cod Potato Chips for dinner tonight (is there any dinner better than that????) and more playtime after that.

You know how much I love to be here. It satisfies my soul.

I did take some time to turn the cucumbers into pickles today. I sterilized everything and made 2 jars of refrigerator pickles. I liked the recipe because it called for turmeric, and I like turmeric in pickles. Who knows how they'll come out. I've never actually pickled anything (except for those times I've gotten myself in a pickle!) so I'm wondering what they will taste like.

At least the cucumbers aren't going to get spongy in my refrigerator drawer this week!

I'm packing up for a vacation at my mother's house at the Cape. I'm happy to be going. I miss the Cape and now that my children are a little older and need less physical care from me (the holding-nursing-holding routine is far behind me, thank goodness!) I look forward to vacations a little more. It seems like it might actually be a vacation now that I'm not physically attached to someone else. And you know, I'm the first to admit that I don't care for babies AT ALL and I do really enjoy young children, so you could say that right now I'm at the apex of my parenting journey, with a 2 and 4 year old.

Two things that are total bummers with my kids:
We served noodles with peanut sauce to 'A' last night for dinner and she got hives on her face - not a good sign. This was one of her first exposures to peanuts. I'm going to take her in for a full nut test to see what exactly I can serve for dinner and what I can't. It's a bummer because peanut butter is so yummy - way better than soy nut butter, and much easier to find. I wish we could switch her over.

'H' continues to fall and cry so hard that she holds her breath and passes out. This is pretty much an every other day occurrence at this point. It's making me crazy! I now shout out "lollipop! marshmallow! candy!" whenever she starts up, trying to distract her and make her take a breath before she faints. I'm so sick of this game. Why did it just start out of nowhere? When will it end?

Rain today. Some might say "torrential downpour." If I didn't have to go to the farm today to pick up our share, I wouldn't have. It wasn't raining at our house when I left, but by the time I got to Mechanicville, the NWS was issuing a flash-flood advisory for exactly the spot I was in! There was quite a bit of water on the streets and I held my breath until we were heading back home on high ground.

The "S" vegetable was squash. And we got 6 cucumbers. SIX. If I don't pickle them, which I won't because I won't have time before I leave for the weekend, what will I do with them? Tonight we made this cucumber salad and it was delightful.

Sesame Cucumber Salad (from Cooking Light)

Ingredients
1 3/4 cups (2-inch) julienne-cut English cucumber (about 1 large)
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup red bell pepper strips
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
2 teaspoons grated peeled fresh ginger
2 teaspoons dark sesame oil
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
Preparation
Place cucumber in a colander; sprinkle with salt. Toss well. Drain for 20 minutes. Combine cucumber and bell pepper in a medium bowl.

Combine vinegar, ginger, and oil, stirring with a whisk. Pour over cucumber mixture; toss gently to coat. Stir in crushed red pepper and black pepper.

Hello there - I'm enjoying a few precious moments of "me time." Every night after dinner I give Jeff the option of either giving the girls a bath or cleaning up the dinner dishes. I've learned that it's best if he chooses.

Tonight I did a Super Job of cleaning up most of the dishes before dinner hit the table, so after dinner, I wanted the clean up job (which included rounding up the garbage from the kitchen and bathrooms and taking it out to the curb). I told him to have fun giving the girls a bath - something he rarely does now that he's living with a herniated disk and has trouble sitting still. So here I am, dishes done, garbage out, and I get to look at my photos from the past weekend while he gets the girls ready for bed.


We visited my dad and Marilyn over the weekend in Rhode Island, where they live year round. They're in a beach community, and they live on an inlet but have access to a private beach on the ocean. When the weather is nice, which it was over the weekend, we pack up our snacks and entertainment and sit on the beach and play.


Good things in our life:

:: Many of our tomatoes have borne fruit: Super Sweet 100's (3 fruits); Yellow Pear (3 fruits); Speckled Roma (2 fruits); Brandywine (2 fruits). No fruit yet from Amish Paste, Zebra, or Cherokee, but lots of flowers, so fruit will hopefully come soon.

:: Our CSA pickup at the farm is tomorrow and this is what Justine said we're most likely getting:

"Fennel, Lettuce, Cilantro, Cucumbers, Spinach, Mesclun, Scallions, and a surprise (I hope) that begins with “S” – sorry, it is not strawberries."

What do you think the "S" is? Soybeans?

:: I cleaned out my email and it's *sparkling" clean! I unsubscribed from a bunch of newsletters, deleted all of my junk that was mixed into my inbox, and just spent some time tidying everything up. Nice!

:: Tomorrow we're going to the library to sign 'A' up for the summer reading program. I think she's old enough this year to really get it. Talking with the librarian and the book buddies will be good practice for her.


Today at the playground I pushed a girl on the swing for a while and later, when 'A' wanted to be pushed, the girl's grandma pushed 'A' a for a bit. The grandma then told me that 'A' had spoken very nicely to her and told the grandma her name and when she was born, in addition to some other tidbits. It's nice to watch her grow and learn to speak with adults.

Speaking of growing, I counted 'H's teeth today for fun and saw that her final molars came in without me knowing! It's not that I didn't know at all -- a few weeks ago when she wouldn't sleep at all I did tell Jeff that I thought she was teething, but for me to not have peeked in earlier and take time to recognize this milestone makes me sad.


And speaking of grandmas, here's mine: The Infamous Grandma Millicent. If you met her, you won't forget her, and if you haven't, you have missed out.

Love!

"Give me a toothy grin!" I said, and this is what I got, followed by peels of laughter.

And this is our first daylily blossom of the season. It opened up as the sun rose this morning. It introduced us to our day.


A quick update on animal news -

Remember the mama and papa house finch who built a nest outside of our garage? We waited and waited for those little babies to leave the nest and we actually got to see it happen with our own eyes one evening. It happened about a month ago. I stumbled upon it without realizing I was witnessing a magical dance. The mother bird hopped out of the nest and sang and danced, then flew away and kept coming back to repeat the routine. Finally one of the birds popped up to the edge of the nest and waited for a few minutes, listening to it's mother, and then it went! Back came the mother bird to dance and sing next to the nest. Up came another bird... I wanted to sit and watch but my goodness, do you know how long it takes one bird to get the courage to pop up and fly? A long time! I was trying to cook dinner and I didn't have the time to sit and watch. Seeing one go was enough - barely enough - for me.

Fast forward to this week. I woke up recently and thought, "I should see if that bird nest is clean enough to salvage and keep in our home." When I went to check on it, I saw that someone had added a fresh green layer to the nest! Then I saw them - the mama and papa again. They're back! I've been picking 'A' up every day to peer in and give a report. Today she said that there are two eggs in the nest. Magic! I'm excited to watch it all unfold again. And this time around, as a second time bird grandmother, I'm a little more relaxed about the process. I know what to expect, and I know that my cats won't be eating the babies. Whew!

The other thing to tell you about is Erma's progress. Erma is our sixteen year old cat and I took her to the holistic vet recently because I wanted her to have some relief from what I thought was arthritis. She's now on a higher quality diet and she takes a few vitamins and supplements every day. She likes it. At the second appointment, the doctor and I agreed that her limp hadn't gone away so she did some acupuncture on Erma. I really don't know much about acupuncture. What I do know is that it WORKED for Erma. Wow, what a difference. She's not only not limping anymore, I swear she's getting younger every day. This whole experience has opened my eyes to a new form of medicine.


May you be blessed with good health today.

Today was wonderful. 'A' has been going through one of her "things" lately. Every time she's ready to hit a new developmental level, she gets super whiny and really out of sorts for a week or so beforehand. We've come to recognize it, and it makes the whining a lot easier to understand. This past week has been whine, whine, whine from the time she wakes up until she goes to bed, with a hefty dose of independent bossiness & sassiness thrown in. Whatever. She doesn't scare me.

Today she woke up a new person. She was much better at communicating - speaking, listening and thinking. She let me put braids in her hair to keep it out of her eyes (this is major!); she asked me if she could talk to the woman at the store who was wearing a shirt she liked, and when she spoke to the woman, she looked into her eyes and gave her compliment clearly and loudly; she wanted to go in the bouncy house at the preschool picnic even though she wanted to get out almost immediately after going in (see the post-bouncy house photo below).

She did a lot of things today and everything was just wonderful. She was wonderful. We were wonderful.


We spent the afternoon playing in the pool and the sprinkler. We all got to enjoy a glass of lemonade too - my special summer afternoon treat.

Hope you had a great day too.

I asked Jeff last night if he would ever like to switch places with me - I can work and he can take care of our girls. I'm not sure I got a straight answer out of him. Taking care of kids involves a lot of physical labor, a lot of patience, a lot of spontaneity, and a willingness to let go of control during moments that aren't of my choosing. It has been a huge growing up experience for me. And I'm well aware that this parenting journey has only just begun.

And even though I wonder if I'll ever be more than a chef or a waitress for my kids, I still love the way I spend my days.

Today I found time to look at the sky...


And I found a dry, sunny moment to dead head my petunias...


And I found time to talk to the tomatoes. I have no real experience growing vegetables and I don't think I'll have faith in my ability to shepherd the process until the season is over and I can look at what worked and what didn't. Just because there are flowers on those tomato plants doesn't mean I'll get tasty fruit. I won't believe it until I see (and eat) it.


And best of all, 'A' found time to make Cinderella a wedding bouquet...

Happy Father's Day!

Father's Day for us was supposed to go like this:

Let Jeff sleep late while the girls and I quietly make waffles and tofu scramble; have breakfast ready and waiting for him when he finally awoke, refreshed and bright-eyed... yadda yadda yadda.

What actually happened was that both girls woke up at the crack of dawn, I swear, and I tried really hard to keep them quiet but for some reason it just didn't happen, and I tried really hard to make the waffles but since Jeff is the one who usually makes them in our house, I didn't know what I was doing... you can imagine the rest. Soon enough he was out of bed, making his own special waffles and stirring the tofu scramble. At least he has a good attitude about it.


His gifts were sweet and simple except for the massage package. His back (his herniated disk, to be precise) is giving him a lot of trouble and he's been talking about needing a massage for a while. I got him 2 one-hour sessions and the first one was booked for today. We dropped him off after a nice church service (it was a celebration of the summer solstice, something the Unitarian Universalists do well). Then the girls and I stayed out of the rain by going to have lunch at the grocery store. I know it doesn't sound very glamourous, but the grocery store is my favorite place to take the girls for lunch because I buy a container of hummus and crackers, some sliced fruit, and a few seaweed salad sushi rolls for me and 'H'. Everyone's happy and it fits our budget quite well. (and I love hearing, "More shuushi peaze Mommy.")

When we picked Jeff up, he was not only rested and happy, but excited because at the spa he was given a certificate for another massage, a gift from his parents. I had hinted to him that I told them to get him shirts for Father's Day, so he had no idea that another massage package was waiting for him.


Oh, and we also hit the playground today. Fun for all!

I am SO ready for summer! Amazingly, the calendar is already full. Or is it amazing? It happens every year, and yet it always catches me off guard. We visit my parents, then Jeff's parents come, then we have some more visitors and visits and before you know it, it's Halloween.


We're hoping to do one thing this summer that is a little different for us: we are hoping to have a child from the "Fresh Air" program come and stay with us. If we can be matched up with a six year old girl, we'll be thrilled. Any older than that might be too old for our kids. If a child that age isn't available, we'll wait for next summer and hope it comes through. I'm asking for a child who is allergic to dairy mostly because I'm all set up for it and as a parent of a child with food allergies, I would be relieved to know that she was going to stay at a home like ours. Also, it'll be easier to feed someone at our house since we don't eat dairy, but I'm happy to bring in the food that will make this child comfortable. We're just happy to be able to provide a time away from the city where a child can be immersed in nature and quiet and privacy. We've lived in cities, in apartments... it's hard when you don't see trees and the sky everyday, when you don't have a backyard of your own, when you don't have a safe place to play outside. We're here to do our part, and I guess this is part of doing our part.


'A' took this one of me. It's just the kind of portrait I like - fuzzy and not much of me.

Have a great night!

This is 'A's last week of preschool. I took some photos of her with her teachers and it's just amazing to see how different she is with each one. This first teacher left very suddenly a few weeks ago because she got the notice that the child she was hoping to adopt had been born and was ready to go home. It was all very sudden and the girls missed her so much after she left! She came back to visit yesterday and brought her baby boy with her. She had quite a fan club, look at all the little girls hanging on her every move!


Finally during this last week of school I've started to put 2 and 2 together. 'A' has been saying for a while now that she doesn't like going to preschool. I ask her why, but I try to ask open-ended questions so that I don't lead her down a different path than she's on, and the questions never really result in much. I get answers like, "I don't like the way the boys play."

Yesterday she told me that she doesn't know what to do sometimes at preschool. "I don't want to do the crafts sometimes and I don't like to play because the boys are always playing too rough in the play area and Miss K won't let me read books unless it's time to read them, and I just want to have some alone time sometimes." Okay, now that is an answer I can understand! That makes perfect sense to me. Two and a half hours in a classroom setting for a kid like 'A', who needs a lot of self-directed activities and a lot of short "alone time" breaks, is tough. When I think about what she does at preschool compared to what she does at home, the two are completely different. Not only does she get to have breaks at home when she needs them, she also gets to run the activities and do what she wants, and our craft time is much different. At home I have blank paper and they get to color whatever they want. 'A' is very "process-oriented" and she likes to color, cut and glue, but after she's happy with a piece of art and considers it "done," she has even more fun cutting it up or gluing even more papers on top of it until it's unrecognizable. At preschool, the kids get the materials out and are given a model that shows what the end result should look like. When she reaches the end result, the teachers take it away from her and she's moved on to the next activity. But really, she's not even close to finished.

No wonder she doesn't want to do the crafts. I can't tell you how many times the rest of the kids are sent home with their craft and I'm told that 'A' did not want to do it.


It's nice to get to know her better and see how she likes to spend her time, and see what will make her feel frustrated, bored, overwhelmed or stifled. She's happiest when she's making her own decisions about how to spend her time. And my, is she busy when she gets to make those choices.

Our garden continues to come to life and I'm just amazed by it. I still have no faith that we'll have a harvest and I'll believe it when I see it. But so far it all looks good!


We made cloud pictures to learn about the different types of clouds this morning and weeded the garden a bit, and now I'm going to make some bread and veggie burgers. We're off to the farm today and we have to pick up a nice plant to put in the hand painted planter we made for 'A's teacher. I'm thinking lavender.