the little things

I love Sealion for a lot of big reasons, some that I have mentioned here before.  And I love him for countless little reasons.  Those that sometimes might go unnoted, but when I pause to think about them ~ are the ones that moisten my eyes and make me smile when there's no one around to see it.  

Ever since we had to do it in my cooking class (and then reinforced by working at Three Stone Hearth for years), there has been a rule in my kitchen about labeling leftovers:  on a piece of masking tape, usually, and usually with a Sharpie (because that's what's in the drawer and works best on the masking tape), you write the contents of the container, and the date.  This goes for takeout boxes, and for jars at home.  Yeah, it might be a bit type A ~ you can say that, but I like it.  With the advent of Anjali, Sealion has taken on more of the kitchen duties than previously shouldered.  Now, whenever he puts the leftovers in the fridge, he most always comes up with a corny pun, or fun/silly way to spell the contents of the container.  

You see the way there are curly-cues on the letters?  He doesn't write that way; he was doing that to be funny.  When I pulled the jar out of the fridge to heat up for my solitary dinner tonight, seeing that bit of silliness was what made me smile and warmed my center before there was any soup in there.  

A little thing.

and the recipe for that SOOP.              

california poppy (the state flower) and calendula

carrots

Remember what I was saying about the garden not abandoning us?  Check out the carrots we forgot about and just harvested!  They were the stubby Nantes variety, if I remember correctly.

 They're tasty, too!  

yummm!

finally getting around to adding some posts to my other blog, food-a-file , after being inspired by this book:  A Homemade Life, by Molly Wizenberg.  

lovin' the springtime

wow. it's amazing how invigorating the sunshine and warmth are. i forget every year. and then it happens and i have more energy and a spring to my step and motivation.

we've been partaking heavily of the backyard. it's so yummy.

spring!

Sealion and the super-dooper raised beds he built. 

Anjali inspects a soily pot in the shade. 

another view of the beds.  

Kitty supervises. 

and now back outside.     

crafty

i have been working on some sewing projects. wedging in a few minutes here and there when i can, i get a little obsessed.  a finished product is rewarding.  the main (huge) thing is ten "all-in-one" diapers for Ms. A. i made some basic prefolds for her before she was born, but quickly learned that others are more effective and practical, especially when out and about. alas she has outgrown the first set of handed-downs, and i looked all over online for more used ones in the next size up, and just decided to make some. boy was that an involved process. i'm happy with how they came out, though. all from recycled fabrics. and there are cute wool covers of essentially the same design that i don't have a photo of.

on the tushy, just freshly test-pee-peed

and the creation that gets the most raves is the one that took a small fraction of what the diapers took to finish. kind of reminds me of icing on a cupcake. yum! and, yeah ~ what was i saying about pink?

on the train

i'm still figuring out how to get blogging accomplished with the little one in my life.  right now i'm writing bit by bit as i find the time, and adding photos later.  we keep photos on the other computer ~ Sam ~ because he's faster and smarter.  but right now he's under the weather.  so i'm just going ahead and publishing the little tidbits i had been working on, and will add the photos when Sam is well.  so there are some entries that will be showing up on down the page if you feel like scrolling.  i don't think they're nearly as interesting without the illustrations, but i just want to keep up with my blogging endeavor.  thanks for reading.  

and here's a photo of my sweet daughter just to hold your interest.  ;-)
this photo is commemorating her newly acquired laughter, as opposed to simply smiling.

well, now that i'm looking, it seems i already added photos to a few of them. .
so anyway.

White House Kitchen Garden

yeah!
this is an interesting article about the awesome fact that Michelle Obama is implementing a kitchen garden for their food.
cool.

sign language

one of my new-mommy friends reminded me about using sign language with Anjali, so i looked up the site that was recommended.
it's so much fun!! check this site out. i love iconography ~ the pictures people use to express language. like the handicapped-accessible toilet sign, speed bumps (or humps, if you're lucky. ;-) ), etc. how few lines can be used to get a point across, oftentimes to people of many languages. really fascinates me. so i can see why sign language would enthrall me as well.
look up the sign for "boring" and read the explanation. :-D

Hollis

Hollis in our dome during a windstorm at BM0...6

Hollis and i at the Tobin James winery on the way back fron LIB

oh my.
while brushing my teeth i checked my email this morning.
almost not bothering to scroll to the bottom of a page, i would have failed to read that
my friend Hollis was in a near-fatal motorcycle wreck in India 2 weeks ago.
she has been flown back here to Stanford where she is in the ICU.
Hollis and i became friends upon working with Lucent Dossier. she was from Tennessee. having both become recent transplants to a whole new world, we felt a bond. she and i road-tripped to the Lightning in a Bottle festival together, driving a rental car from the bay area down through the valley to Santa Barbara. the only food vendor at the festival being (delicious) raw vegan, our first stop that monday morning was a mom n pop diner where we ate eggs, bacon, buttered biscuits, and spiked our coffee with bourbon. at burning man she adorned our camp's table with, "don't sweat the petty stuff, pet the sweaty stuff." she always called kombucha, "kombucha-cha." a dreamer, a dancer, a spunky, sweet soul.
we had lost touch, as you do sometimes, but i had been wanting to contact her.  
hmmm.

ommmm.
sending some love to Hollis.

http://www.friendsofhollis.blogspot.com/

first harvests

Summer brought intolerable heat for the watermelon-bellied mama.  Toward the end of the season, I must admit to abandoning the garden.  I harvested tomatoes, and that's about it (many of them not making their way inside).  But the garden did not abandon me.  The rain has done the yard good.  Flowers are blossoming in every corner.  Happily, many of the seeds I planted last year that did not sprout ~ I went fairly nutty in seed-sprinkling last year! ~ are unfurling with life and color.  What a welcome surprise!  On our way in yesterday, we brought enough parsley to season dinner's roasted beets, and a flower for the centerpiece.  Just bringing in this handful of the outside breathes so much energy into the house.  And makes me want to get outside and dig in the dirt!    

Spring! and an idyllic afternoon

 will add photos when our other computer ~ the faster smarter one ~ is home from the doctor.

Ahhh.  For Sealion's birthday, he happened to have the day off from work, and cleared his schedule otherwise so that he could work in the yard.  His favorite activity in the world is to build something, and having a warm sunny day after many days of rain was all he needed to immediately imagine the perfect outdoor project.  In the sun, Papi (pronounced PAH-pee, btw) sawed boards, dug holes, and created raised beds for our garden (yippee!).  In the shade, Anjali worked on her locomotion skills, inspected nature (and every other object close at hand), snacked and napped, and I worked on a sewing project. Spring blossoms all around, bees buzzing, birds tweeting. .  Pretty near perfect, if you ask me. 

in appreciation

for Kitty.    
Kitty has been my devoted friend for nine-plus years. I don't know why, but she clearly chose me to be the recipient of her greatest loyalty very early on in our relationship. As Anjali was growing in my belly, I felt concern about Kitty. Rodolfo ~ I knew he might be somewhat effected, but he would remain his resilient somewhat-standoffish-shy self. Kitty, on the other hand, Kitty might take it personally. When Anjali arrived outside the belly, a tiny squirming bundle with a piercing scream, the cats went running. They investigated every item with her scent, but would not even sniff of Anjali. As the days passed, they quit jumping every time the new member of the family cried. Eventually, they each found the comfort to occupy the same couch or bed area as Anjali. Now that Anjali is more directly vocal, and lurching eagerly in their direction, Rodolfo hits the high road every time he senses her presence too close. But Kitty ~ she's holding her ground. I think somehow she knows that to be close to Tiffanie, she has to learn to tolerate the little human. She even keeps her purr going if Anjali unexpectedly grabs at her face (although I try to be moderator for these interactions ~ on each of their behalf). She's gently holding her own, and nudging and nuzzling in her insistent way, as close to Tiffanie as she can manage with the new girl around. When I shove her away as Anjali is just drifting off to sleep, later on she still greets me by the bathroom sink in her regular spot for a pet. I don't know what I did to deserve her lifetime devotion, but I have a friend in Kitty. As much attention as the furless kitten gets these days, I just wanted to send Kitty a little love note.

Thank you, Kitty!  You are generous and forgiving.  I love you!      

Happy Birthday, Papi Sealion!!

Wow, do I feel lucky!  

photo taken today by good friend Erica

epilogue to la vie en pink

geez!  reading over that last entry later in the day ~ perhaps less caffeinated, it sounds like a bitch session more than anything else.  i certainly didn't mean it that way.  more just a funny possibly ironic anecdote to being a parent.  i much prefer second-hand clothing to new ~ socially, environmentally, financially..  i had no idea that this clothes hand-me-down phenomenon would happen when we had a baby.  it seems that hand-me-downs crawl out of the woodwork, and propagate (like the fuzzy bunnies that adorn them) in the hamper.  and i am grateful for it.  long live the hand-me-down wardrobe!  and may my daughter derive less of her self image and identity from the fabric covering her skin than her mom obviously does.

~*~ Epilogue to the epilogue ~*~

so i decided to delete that previous post. it was poorly written, and bugged me whenever i thought about it. we all have things that in our mind are witty until they come out and then ~ thud. it felt like an old song that used to hit that perfect note that since has fallen a little flat. mainly i just prefer to live in gratitude.
Anjali has helped me more easily to smile and roll with a lot from well-intentioned others. and if i'm very honest, as i look in the laundry pile these days, my heart lightens a little to see the generous splashes of pink. the pink reminds me of Anjali.