ten months

Isaac is ten months old today, a milestone which he celebrated by carefully removing the child-proof cover from the kitchen outlet after breakfast.  Hmm.

He still crawls backward (I honestly wouldn't be surprised if he never goes forward!) and is starting to pull up on furniture. I gave him his third haircut yesterday (which makes me sad every time I do it). Books are his favorite toys right now; he'd rather eat pears than just about anything else in the world.  In fact, if you walk past him holding a pear, he will start smiling, then dissolve into tears when the pear passes him by.  And of course, he's still the cuddly smiley happy bundle of giggles that he's been since birth.  I honestly think he's the most adorable baby in the entire world.

Foodie Friday: roasted garlic soup

As you know (from my bewailing the fate of our poor tomatoes) we've had quite a few cool, windy days here.  Lots of rain.  Lots of drizzle and gray.

This roasted-garlic soup is the perfect antidote to one of those days.  Light enough for spring, but warming enough to combat the drizzle. Plus, it smells absolutely divine while the vegetables are roasting. Pair it with some crusty artisan bread and a green salad for a perfect meal.  As a bonus, this is one of the very few meals that all three of my children will eat eagerly--it is, in fact, my picky eater's favorite.  Even if you're not a garlic lover, roasting the cloves mellows them out into a velvety base that bears no hint of sharpness or tang.

Go here for the recipe.


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garden week

We spent four hours yesterday digging in the muddy morass that's currently masquerading as our garden.  By the end, all of us were exhausted and filthy (I had mud up to my hips).  We planted twenty tomato plants (still 3 to go), rosemary, okra, brussels sprouts, and impatiens. 

Left to plant this week:

• green onions
• radishes
• chard/kale (maybe a little more lettuce?)
• bush beans
• pole beans
• summer squash
• pumpkins
• winter squash
• corn
• cucumbers
• possibly another round of beets and turnips

We also need to begin hardening off the eggplant and peppers to plant in another week or two.  And for some reason the watermelon and cantalope seeds that we started inside never came up, so we need to decide if we want to replant or just not worry about it, since our original garden plan was larger (stupid electrical lines running right down the middle of our yard!)

I woke up this morning exhausted and aching.  It was a looooong day yesterday...beginning with a 5 mile run at 6 am that I don't think I would have done with such enthusiasm had I realized the mud-shoveling that lay in store that evening.  Plus our house was a mess afterwards because of all the mud that got tracked in, despite our best efforts (the kids ended up eating dinner in their underwear).

I think this post might console those of you who aren't gardening this year...at least you don't find your ten-month-old son licking mud off trowels (it gave him a mud mustache). 

Really, I usually love working in the garden--I just dislike the mud.  It makes everything so much harder!  But those tomatoes pretty much HAD to get planted.  I am really really hoping (and praying) that they grow--I'm worried enough over this that I'm having trouble sleeping at night (is that dorky or what?)

savoring the moment

Yesterday I paused for a moment as I was setting the table for dinner.  I looked around at my world.

Isaac sat on the floor in a square of sunlight, babbling to himself and looking through a pile of books. 

Abigail crouched on the grass outside, her face intent under the brim of her sunhat, hands busily digging a hole with the help of a trowel.  She's been digging "bunny traps" lately all over our yard, holes that she roofs with grass so any rabbits with an eye to our lettuces will fall in (she came up with this on her own).  The rope she made in Nauvoo lay next to her to aid in escorting any errant rabbits from the yard.

Juliet twirled gently in a swing next to Abigail, singing softly to herself.  As I do every day, I thought how grateful I was for Neil's efforts in fencing the yard and building the swingset.

My kitchen was full of the yeasty smell of rising dough.  Rosemary and carrots sizzled together on the stove, garlic roasted in the oven.  A tomato-scented breeze blew past the plants on the patio and in through the screen on the sliding glass doors. John Denver sang "Rocky Mountain High" from the stereo in the living room. 



It was a perfect moment. I stood there for a moment holding a sheaf of napkins in my hands, savoring the fact that this is my life.

Then Juliet fell off the swing, landed in Abigail's rabbit trap, and things were back to normal.  :-)

progression: a post about Isaac

this boy amazes us with his food skills every.single.night (ps--for the tofu lasagna recipe, four servings of which were consumed/used as hair goo by Isaac, go here.  this is a big hit with our family--I leave out the soy parmesan, the olives, and ramp up the vegetables--layering in roasted vegetables is a great use of leftovers!  and as you can see, we're also big fans of guacamole, or "rock-a-molly," as Abigail calls it.  ps--she thinks her dog with the printed collar that says "Coco" is really named "Couscous."  preschool reading skills meet global cuisine, apparently.)

monday morning garden

This is what our garden looks like this morning (except all the root vegetables, which are going strong but look kind of boring in a photo.  It looks like lettuce for dinner tonight!  I've been rereading Barbara Kingsolver's Animal Vegetable Miracle, which is one of my all-time favorites, and I'm getting giddy about the garden all over again.

I am REALLY hoping it warms up soon here--I was hoping to get those tomatoes into the ground over the weekend, but it got down to 38 degrees with 20-mph winds.  As you can see, they're starting to get a little droopy...I'm crossing my fingers that we don't end up going to the greenhouse for smaller plants because ours just got too big before we could plant them (any advice?)  It would also be nice to get some warmer weather for weeding purposes--I didn't weed at all last week because it was so cold that I wimped out (although I did still go running at 6:30 am when it was even colder.  Go figure, you can tell which one I thought was really important...)

We've got all kinds of little squash plants ready to go too, plus eggplant and peppers.  We just need warmth!!  Our last frost date is May 15th, so I'm hopeful...

Foodie Friday: artisanal-style pizza

Pizza is kind of a universal favorite.  But there's a real difference between what you get at Pizza Hut and what you can craft in your own kitchen.  Problem is, all too often homemade pizza is chewy, thick, and kind of blah.  No longer!

This pizza dough is perfect.  Blistered, crisp crust, perfect crumb, toppings that elevate this from a last-minute "I'm tired so let's call for pizza" dinner to an eagerly-anticipated mouthwatering extravaganza (best part:  you can make the dough ahead of time and refrigerate or even freeze for later use!)

Go on over to get the how-to. 

ps--I'd love to hear whether you're trying some of these recipes or whether you're getting bored--any requests?

things I wish I'd known earlier

Some things I thought of while I was cleaning up after lunch today.  Mostly things that I am learning/have learned are important in making my life as a mother smoother and more joyful. 

• Get up before everyone else.  There just isn't any other way to ensure a smooth start to your day.
• Clean the bathroom while the kids are in the tub.
• Good or bad stage, chances are that it will be over as soon as you a) fully appreciate it or b) figure out how to discipline it.
• Two kids are always easier than one—the exception is at the grocery store.  Or anywhere that you’d like them to be well-behaved.
• Wear an apron.
• Sometimes it's more important for you to take a time-out than to send your kids there.
• Exercise is imperative, for everyone—we all need a chance to blow off steam (or metabolize stress hormones, if you want to get technical).
• Good food is worth the effort.
• Read together every day.  There is no better opportunity to cuddle your children while you’re building their brains and your relationship.
• 
  
  Don't mistake things that are urgent for things that are important.
• Drink lots of water.
• Lunchtime is a great time to prep ingredients for dinner—this gives you something to do besides say, “Please hurry up!”
• Communicate love.

What would you add?

thursday

This man loves babies.  And I love him.

Some links that I love so much that I have to share them...really, take a minute to read these.

Sourcing food locally

Listening so kids will talk

Practical mothering tips

I don't have anything brilliant or funny or witty to say today, other than I am really enjoying life these days.  I love spring--the sense of renewal, the fact that my garden is really starting to do things (we had a rhubarb and strawberry crisp yesterday that I made on the spur of the moment--so nice to just stroll out and cut myself a big bunch of rhubarb--we're also eating fresh radishes and salads of beet, turnip, and radish top thinnings, which were actually really good, plus I've got lettuces and spinach ready for munching).  I love the fact that our schedules are all freeing up and we're free to explore and make and create.  One thing I'm really enjoying lately is watching the girls want to learn about EVERYTHING--Abigail's current fascination is volcanoes and tornadoes (I've learned a lot of very interesting things lately about both, and we're planning to create our own versions.  Hurray for homemade experiments!)

My New Life: Mormon Message

this is beautiful. I hope it is as thought-provoking and inspiring for you as it was to me this morning.

nearly wordless wednesday: twins

presenting the lunchtime twins, Isaac and Isa-bella (name courtesy of Abigail)

things I love about being a stay-at-home mom...

I can spend two hours at the library with the kids, check out 50 books, promise to spend the entire afternoon doing nothing but reading stories, and know that's 100% possible.  There is nothing else I have to do, because they are my job. 

Can I just say what a blessing that is?  To be home with them?  Because it is.  Today I am really appreciating that.


(and yes that is a birthmark.)

time value of money

pardon the blurry swirl--I cleaned my lens just now, but apparently some grubby hands had been playing with it...

When we bought our house four years ago, it had been sitting empty for almost three.  The house itself was in beautiful condition, but the lawn was a mess. 

The first year we lived here, we worked on the lawn.  We applied fertilizer and weed-killer...at first.  We got much more caught up in the garden and let the lawn sort of fend for itself, since we realized that the weed-filled lawn was less annoying than the treatments.  Besides, Abigail was in LOVE with the dandelions and clover. 

This spring we decided to hire a lawn service, since we'd like the lawn to look really nice when we sell in a couple of years, and we'd rather spend the lawn time on other things (I don't mind mowing and edging, but there are a million things I'd rather do than research fertilizer types and scatter it around the lawn).  This was kind of an against-the-grain decision for us, since we're very do-it-yourself on most things.  But this morning as I watched someone else run through the wet dandelions spreading weed-killer while I ate another leisurely slice of French toast, I turned to Neil and we grinned at each other in complete agreement. 

I've never hired a babysitter (long live the swap!) or paid someone to change my brakes, but boy howdy, I'm all about the lawn service. 

we interrupt our regular programming...

earlier this week I was thinking wistfully about another baby.  isaac is so big.  i want a big(ish) family.  i love being surrounded by my little chickies. 

it's amazing how a good solid case of food poisoning/stomach flu/whatever this awful thing is can knock those dreams right out of your head.  i never realized how much early labor resembles some horrible intestinal ailment.  but it does. 

foodie friday will return next week.  not even going to try today. 

reflecting

Something I realized today as I was accepting my courses for fall:  this will be my seventh year of university teaching.  I taught my own courses at BYU for two years as a graduate student (and was a TA for two years before that).  When we moved here for Neil's doctorate, I casually contacted the English department about the possibility of teaching and was offered the chance to apply for a full-time position.  While I passed on that, they hired me to teach without even an interview, based on my prior teaching experience and grades.  This will be the fifth year I've taught here--at one of the top schools in the country.  The department has been so incredibly accomodating with my desire to maximize my time with the children and has been so supportive of our family.

Little did I know that my humble master's degree would prove so fruitful--when I prayed about graduate school and was directed to English (not law or business, as I had planned all through my undergraduate years), I was so confused, and quite frustrated (make that really upset, actually).  Seven years later, I feel so incredibly blessed by my opportunities.  I know that many women balance part-time law/business practice with stay-at-home motherhood, but this has been so perfect for our family, especially while Neil is in school.  Yet another testament to me that the Lord truly knows what He's doing. 

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end-of-April garden

planted out the broccoli last week; it seems to be doing well.  everything outside needs to be weeded and thinned.  transplanted the tomatoes into bigger pots yesterday and planted the next batch of seeds; started hardening off the brussels sprouts and a couple of trays of flowers.  only a couple of weeks left until we can move everything to the garden and finally get the bathtub back!

some thoughts

• Yesterday was one of "those" days--everything combined to make it really rough (question of the year:  will Isaac ever outgrow the need for nebulizer treatments?!).  I was SO glad I had a frozen lasagna to pull out for dinner.  I made 13 freezer meals before Isaac was born and I'm thinking I need to spend a few hours some Saturday morning filling up the freezer again--I love having those backups for crazy days.  I used this recipe for the one we had last night (I also layered in some leftover roasted vegetables--eggplant, mushrooms, carrots, onions, and asparagus).  And I'm not exaggerating when I say that the tofu + nutritional yeast totally tastes like ricotta.
• Neil surprised me with a potted orchid yesterday.  I found a little home for it on my desk, and I love it.  It's the perfect note this room needed to finish it off.
• After my run this morning, I felt so energized that I started looking up marathon dates for the next year.  Too bad I only ran four miles and that's why it felt so good!
• Our bathtub tomatoes are about a foot tall.  I have to transplant them to new containers today--still 3 weeks before they can go outside!
• Speaking of the garden, I love looking out the window and seeing all the green leafy things.  It's gorgeous.
• I think I'm going to do some dandelion painting with the kids today.  We certainly have enough of them...

elsewhere

read me here today on starting your garden!

race day

First of, let me say that I didn't get a photo and I'm pretty bummed about it.  So much so that I may take a picture with our numbers pinned on and our "finisher medals" the next time we go running. 

The forecast today was for thunderstorms and a high of 51 degrees.  Not optimal.  Neil and I drove the course last night, and let me tell you, the race organizer and I apparently have very different opinions about what constitutes a "significant change in elevation."

I could make this a really long post, but I'm exhausted, so I won't (maybe I will later, but not now). 

Long story short:  it was pretty awesome.  I had butterflies in my stomach as we lined up at the starting line.  It was overcast and cloudy, but nary a raindrop did we see all day. 

The first six or seven miles were really fun.  I was running easily, chatting with the people around me, enjoying all the people cheering from the sidelines, and very thankful for the awesome volunteers giving us water every mile and Gu packets every couple of miles.  Around mile eight, we hit a very large hill.   Lots of people were stopping and walking up it.  I kept running all the way up, but I had a little teeny side ache that took me the next mile to get rid of--just enough to be irritating, but not inhibiting.   Miles eight, nine, and ten were running around this lake in an insanely long trail that kept looking like it was going to end and DIDN'T.  (As in you would round a curve and see a big long loop in front of you, instead of the cute little bridge 100 yards away that you thought you were going to use to cross).  When we got back onto the main road at mile 10, I was pretty tired.  I also felt blisters starting (on top of a callus), so every step was like a little fire in the side of my shoe.  Honestly, that bothered me more than anything else the entire race.  That stupid little pinprick of fire in my shoe got pretty agonizing by the end--I was physically tired, but my joints didn't hurt and I wasn't struggling for breath--just that shoe of fire. 

Mile ten was the worst, I think.  It was not close enough to the end that I was running on adrenaline, but it was far enough into the race that I was really tired.  I survived that mile by telling myself "You can do anything for a mile."  Miles 11, 12, and the first half of mile thirteen were on the devil road of sharp pointy rocks sticking up through the asphalt.  One interesting thing I noticed at that point was that while during the first eight miles, everyone around us was pretty chatty and friendly, by the last couple of miles everyone was silent and super-focused (except for when someone on the side of the road said, "You can do it!  Almost there!" and Neil jumped up and clicked his heels together, and then everyone around us started cheering for him.  I was just wondering how he had the energy!)

When we rounded the corner and saw the finish line, I decided that I was going to sprint with 100% of all my remaining energy, since Neil had been running with me all day, and I wanted to let him run all-out at the end, since he wouldn't leave me.  So I ran faster than I've ever run before in my life, Neil said, "Wow!" and started running with me.  I could hear everyone cheering louder and louder when I started sprinting, and then all of a sudden the crowd's noise started to fade, my vision started to go in and out, and I could feel my skin turning icy cold.  Scary!  I tried to slow down a little bit, but I was pretty much over the finish line, and we were done!!!  (and then I turned into a chattering ice cube in the car, Neil decided I needed to get into a hot shower before I went into some sort of runner's shock, and hence, no picture.)

We ran the 13.1 miles in 2 hours and 6 minutes, or just over 9 and a half minutes per mile.  My main goal was anything less than 2 hours and 10 minutes (my dreaming goal was 2 hours and 5 minutes), so I was really happy with the time and with how I felt physically when we were done.  I placed 258th out of the 640 women who ran.  I think Neil could have gone much, much faster without me, but we ran it together, and it was awesome. 

now I'm going to go limp over to the 'fridge (except not as much of a limp because my dad massaged my feet) and eat the ice cream that my mother has informed me I need to replace all the calories I burned this morning.  I love parents! 

Foodie Friday: Dijon fruited salad

True story:  I told Abigail she could have whatever she wanted for her birthday meals--anything. 

"Salad," she said.  "Cut-up apples and oranges."

"That's all?" I said.  "Nothing else?  Really, you can have anything you want."

With a speculative look in her eye, she said, "Salad for lunch and dinner." 

So salad it was.  But with a salad as tasty as this, you can understand her reasoning.  Go here for the recipe.