Busy, busy, busy

I've neglected the blog for a bit now, haven't I? But I have an excuse or two. First, I suddenly got a job. Wasn't really expecting to get one, but I got an email asking if I'd be interested in some part time work from home, work that could be done around two small boys. I'd stopped looking for a part time job a while ago since Arden is only in school for 2 1/2 hours this year, which leaves no time to get anything done. So I jumped on the chance and have been training like crazy for the last two weeks.

I'm working with The Grocery Game, a service I've happily used for years now. You know those ladies who go to the store with a fist full of coupons, buy $300 worth of groceries and pay only $50 for the whole lot? The list was started by one of them. She decided to share the information she uses each week so other people could simply look at the list and decide what they want to buy that's at the rock bottom price that week. The List shows which coupons (if any) to use, what the final price is, and what the % saved is. It really does all the work for you - I spend maybe 20 minutes cutting out every coupon I might ever be interested in each Sunday morning, then pop over to the List and match up what I'd like to buy. And I save around 30% on my grocery bill each week, sometimes more. I get high-end stuff (coupons are almost always for brand names and not generics) for wee prices: I rarely pay more than $1.50 for shampoo (even Aussie or Fructis), almost never pay more than $1 for toothpaste, never pay more than $1.50 for a toothbrush, or more than $1.50 for a box of cereal. It's a pretty sweet deal, all told. If you aren't familiar, go check it out. Seriously. Anyway, I'm now helping make up the list for my area and working like crazy. And getting paid - woo hoo!

Another reason is I now have what my Neurologist calls an Idiopathic Essential Tremor. Tremor means I shake. Essential is the kind of tremor - I shake a little when I move for any reason. My hands shake, my legs shake when I walk, even my mouth tremors a bit when I talk. The Idiopathic means she has no idea why I have it, though she thinks it may have something to do with recent thyroid issues. In the meantime, we're trying out medication to help control the shaking. Unfortunately, what I've tried so far works on the shaking but leaves me tired and drugged and not really functional, which kind of defeats the purpose. So we're working on other medications to hopefully help. In the meantime, it makes fine motor things like typing, writing, oh and knitting very difficult. Hence the lack of crafty content. I'm working up the courage to start knitting again with the tremor, but it's frustrating and I feel a bit like I'm 80 years old when I try. The good news is that it doesn't seem to be caused by anything scary, so I'm grateful.

One more bit of news. I'm going back to school! I start at the end of the month taking pre-requisites to get into nursing school. I've always been fascinated by all things medical and have felt called to help people for as long as I can remember. Ultimately, I'd like to become a Nurse Practitioner, mainly because I like being in charge and that's not exactly going away any time soon. More importantly, that's what I want to do - see patients and help them hopefully get better and healthier. For now I'm taking one lone class this summer, then going full time in the Fall. Ought to be a bit crazy, but I'm then I do crazy quite well. I'm nervous, a bit scared, but very excited. Kind of odd to be 38 and going back to school, but it's good to finally have some idea of what I want to be when I grow up (though I don't necessarily plan on the growing up part).

Insanity rules

Proof: I made my own oreos.

I haven't washed my hair in a week

No, I haven't been sick or busy or even too lazy to get out the shampoo. And no, I'm not a person who can get away without a good hair wash for a week - my hair is fine, thin and oily and looks pretty nasty if I miss even one day. Lately I've been trying to find a shampoo that doesn't coat my hair with stuff, since it's so baby fine and doesn't need help laying down and playing dead, thank you very much. I've tried brand after brand, good brands even, volume building varieties...and every last one of them lately leaves my hair feeling heavy and coated. By the end of the day I look like I haven't washed my hair at all. Bad enough to look like this on the rare day I don't have time to shampoo, but on a day when I did? Not fair.

So in desperation I started poking around online. I found a bunch of obviously insane people who wrote glowing reports on how they didn't wash their hair any more. What??? I bet these are people who feel that bathing is optional, too. What a crazy idea....until it started growing on me. I read over and over again about people who found their hair was healthier, shinier, more manageable, and even seemed thicker once they stopped the ol' shampoo habit.

So I gave it a try. Everything I read said there's about a week of not so great hair as you get used to something new and your scalp gets used to no detergents. I figured I'd stick it out one week as an experiment. Each day I took a tablespoon of baking soda and tossed it in a cup of water, then poured that over my scalp and rubbed. Rinse. Then vinegar in more water poured over. Rinse again. I was sure my hair was going to be a gnarly, oily mess by the second or third day and figured I'd be wearing a lot of ponytails.

Day one and two were a bit weird, I'll admit. My hair felt a bit oily and stiffer than normal. After that, each day my hair was shinier and had more body. It looked thicker, too. And when I blew my hair dry and curled the ends under, they actually stayed that way! Oddly enough, my hair felt clean and fresh after the baking soda and vinegar. It even felt lighter.

So I guess I've stopped washing my hair for good. The end result? Take a look for yourself. It's amazing what a week of no shampoo can do, isn't it?

Two ways to tell it's Spring time

Asparagus spear, peeking out of the ground. I just planted 25 crowns and am impatiently watching as all these beautiful green bits make their way out of the ground. Can't wait until next year when I can start harvesting.

Arden and his "Hairy Harry" plant from Kindergarten. He gave it a flat top right before coming home from school. I love it!

Shocked, stunned, and amazed

This is what Ryan had for dinner tonight. Voluntarily, even. You are looking at: brown rice, green onion, egg, carrot, nori (tried for the very first time!), sesame seeds, pickled ginger, and avocado, all topped with a citrus-soy dressing. Dan and I thought it was delicious but were less sure Ryan, who is not the most adventurous eater in the world, would want any. Shows how much we know. He had seconds and demanded I make this again soon. The recipe comes from Super Natural Cooking, which I'm liking quite a bit. Can't wait to try more from this cookbook, if only to see what else he'll try.

Ah, the joys of seed catalogs

I just got a housewarming gift from a friend back in California. Since we have a decently sized yard, she figured a gift certificate for seeds and plants would be perfect. Correct! I just spent an hour poring over the pages of the Nichols catalog, mulling over all the different herbs and plants and trying to figure out what to order. It's too late for strawberries, sadly (would have tried some of the new Seascape variety), but they carry a lot of herbs I haven't seen.

What did I get? I wanted some medicinal herbs, so arnica, calendula and chamomile went onto the list. Dan and I love all kinds of Asian foods, so Thai basil, cilantro, culantro (similar to cilantro, often used with pho), and papaloquelite (also similar to cilantro, but I've heard the flavor is even better) are represented. Almost ordered some Delfino cilantro since it's slow to bolt and the ferny leaves are easier to cut, but I've seen reports that it only tastes mildly of cilantro, so that was out. A variant of marjoram - Zaatar - sounded really interesting so I ordered some as well. Supposedly it has a flavor that's a cross between thyme, oregano and marjoram. I also ordered some clary sage because I love the scent, and sweet violets because they're just plain pretty. Oh, and some Sweeter Yet cucumber seeds for summer salads.

I was like a kid in a candy store, drooling over all the possibilities. Though this stuff is definitely better for me than candy.

Finally caught up on sleep

...since I finished the beaded mat! It was down to the wire, but I finished right before leaving for the bridal shower. My sister cried happy tears, so all the hours I spent working on this were worth it. I had the hardest time capturing what the beads and the pearls looked like - the smaller beads sparkled caught the light, while the larger pearls just glowed. The smaller pearl beads were actually from my wedding dress - a bit of something old (and good!) to add to her new life as a couple.

Whew - the beading is finished! I ironed, but many of the wrinkles just wouldn't come out. Proof that it's hand made, I say.

Satin laid out on a pre-cut mat, then trimmed down to size.

Edges glued down to the inside and outside. This took quite a bit of pulling and re-arranging to make sure the beads stayed centered on the mat. I used an acid free glue stick with a pretty heavy hand.

Up against my wall - this is the best picture I got of the completed mat. Sorry about the lighting - it was a really cloudy day. I wanted to get a picture of the mat uprightl, a bit like it will look with a picture and a frame on the outside. I tried to design it so it could hang in any direction since my sister doesn't exactly have her wedding pictures yet.

Close up of the vines and flowers. I really like how the grayish beads accent the pearls and the ivory colored satin. The overall look was very old fashioned, like something made in another era. May have to do *one* more beaded project for myself. There are beads left over, after all...

Half way there

Let's not talk about how many hours I spent trying to thread a needle about the size of a hair, or about how many beads fell off into the couch or onto the floor yesterday. Or about how many tiny needle holes there are in my fingers right now. Or about how late I was up last night trying to sew down that last strand of shiny glass bits. None of that matters. I'm half way there! If I really work today and tomorrow, I should have the beading done in time for my trip to California. Sleep? Sleep is for sissies.

Beading progress

I'm done with one of the four sides and I'm really pleased with how the mat is looking over all. It's a really cloudy day today so lighting is lousy - sorry for the poor photograph. It's hard to capture the sparkle of the tiny beads in any light, especially with such subtle color variations. Back to the grindstone. I need to get this finished by Sunday, so there are many hours of staring at a tiny needle and coaxing itty bitty beads out of containers still ahead of me. Wish me luck!

Secret project revealed

Remember this? My sister was so wistful and sad that she wouldn't be getting any beaded love that I had to do something. I'm already making a shawl for her wedding, so a wrap wouldn't work. Tried to think of something she could use, something that wouldn't get stuck in a box and looked at possibly once a year. I thought and thought, and then the idea came. My sister loves pictures and scrap booking and is very sentimental in general. Why not make a beaded mat for a picture frame? The beading would stay under glass, so no dusting (I cringed at the thought of a beaded frame that would gather dust and dirt constantly), and it would be something she could enjoy every day. Perfect! With a bit of help from her good at being sneaky fiance I got the future wedding picture size and off I went. I'm in the middle of insane beading at the moment that has to be finished by Friday afternoon (her shower is this Sunday and I'm flying out to California for the weekend), so hopefully more details soon. In the meantime, a few pictures to tide everyone over.

Bees!

With all the talk lately of declining and disappearing bee colonies, I've been keeping a watchful eye on my yard to see if I could find any. Despite many flowers, I hadn't seen any bees....until today. We have a huge Spanish lavender plant out in front that evidently is bee heaven when the flowers are in bloom. I counted at least a dozen bees flying busily from purple flower to purple flower. Such a lovely sight. I'll have to plant more Spanish lavender out back. Wonder if I can get cuttings to grow?

Wee bit of knitting

I haven't been knitting much at all in the past few weeks. This puts me behind schedule on my sister's shawl, but there's not much to be done about it. My hands have been shaking recently and it's just hard to do things that take a lot of fine motor skill, so gardening has been getting a lot more attention. No worries - I went to a Neurologist last Friday and hopefully will be getting some answers and in the meantime the shaking is getting a bit better, so all is well. Here is the center and just a bit of the first edging for my *almost* Cobweb Crepe Shawl. I picked up stitches all the way around and am using two long circular needles to continue on in the round. Keeping track of where I am in all of this is surprisingly hard to do so I copied the chart and am marking off each row as I go along. It's starting to look lace-like - see? Hard to see much of anything without blocking, but it's coming along.

Doing thing differently

I've been doing a lot of gardening lately. Took this picture after realizing that perhaps I use slightly different tools for the job. The basket of seeds is pretty self explanatory. The paper to the right is a garden plan drawn on grid paper so I know where everything should go. The L square is handy when measuring out square foot increments. I'm using biointensive gardening methods since I have such a small garden plot (8 x 8 feet, plus the smaller raised beds by the house). Planting involved tracing out each square foot, then filling each with whatever each block was supposed to have in it. I did a good bit of reading on companion planting so there's a stab at having plant "friends" close together (corn and pole beans, lettuce in the shade of cucumbers, etc.). I'm also trying to entice as many bees and beneficial insects as possible, so there are a goodly number of flowers, onions and garlic planted in and around the edges of the plot.

The hippity hop? Well, it makes a really nice seat, much better than a step stool or chair. Comfy, easy to lug around, and the rounded bottom doesn't poke holes in the ground.

I'm sure these aren't standard gardening tools, but I like them!

Weekend gardening

So much clearing, weeding, cultivating, amending, and planting this weekend. Dan is my new hero, the man with the pickaxe and a shovel ever-ready to haul rocks and dirt. Managed to clear out and 8 by 8 foot garden plot out in back and add in compost and peat moss to lighten up the soil a bit. I had already planted some peas there - added sugar snap peas, pole beans, and "Rocky" cucumbers (wee, bite sized seedless wonders) along the back fence as well. No other planting in the big clearing yet, since that got finished towards the end of the day and I was completely beat by then.

I did get tomatoes in: one Pik Red, one Oregon Spring, and two Brandywine. Planted some calendula out in front of them, and some butterfly mix to the side. My square foot garden plots from last year are all filled out now with basil, parsley (which is huge and taking over the right side there), oregano, thyme, cilantro, arugula, corn salad, butterhead lettuce, baby lettuce mix, green onions, radishes (plain and "Easter Egg" mix), teeny baby carrots, and some bush beans. Doesn't look like much yet, but give it a month and there'll be a lot of green.

We also pulled out a ton of stuff out in front of the house. Red lava rocks...oh, how I hate the stuff. It's everywhere, including down into the clay soil. Lovely. We filled bucket after bucket with rocks, then amended the soil a bit. Dan pried out the brick edging strips along the curb (they just made one more spot weeds could hide), then I planted a bunch of sweet alyssum and hostas. Also tossed out some "bee and butterfly" mix in the open area where our bush used to be - we'll plant something else there soon, but for now filler will have to do.

It was so nice to finally be able to plant and really get working on the yards. This is one of the things I have been looking forward to the most since hurting my ankle - getting out and gardening.

Once a month baking

Did a bit of easy baking today. Needed something to take along with us to Game Club - a local Asperger's support group event that happens once a month. The boys really look forward to going, and I don't blame them! Board games, video games, card games, snacks and pizza, and a showing of a new DVD on a big screen complete with popcorn are all great, but having a group of other kids who are all at a similar social skills level is even better. Most kids with Asperger's have a difficult time making friends due to problems picking up on social cues, added to the fact that many of these kids do a lot of things that seem a bit odd as well. So a night like this means pretty much guaranteed success, which is huge. Parents get to hang out and talk and generally get a very well deserved break, so everyone wins. Each family brings a snack (hence the baking) and a $5 donation that helps go towards games and upkeep. Well worth it.

Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars
makes 24 - 36 bars

These may look like just another ho-hum cookie bar recipe, but give them a try - they're quite addictive. You can play with it quite a bit, too - add other extras, leave some of mine out, it's all good. The whole wheat flour is mainly there so I can delude myself into thinking that these are marginally healthful, so feel free to leave it out and use all regular flour instead.

1/2 cup melted butter
2 cups brown sugar
2 eggs
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup flour
3/4 cup whole wheat flour (or use all regular flour, or 1/2 cup whole wheat and 1 cup all purpose)
2 tsp baking powder
1/3 cup coconut, unsweetened
1/3 cup quick oats
1/3 cup chopped walnuts or other nuts
1/2 cup chocolate chips

1 Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Butter a 9 x 13 inch pan. If the pan is glass or Pyrex, turn the oven heat down to 300.
2 Mix butter, sugar and eggs together well. Add salt, flours and baking powder and stir until thoroughly mixed. Add coconut, oats, and nuts and mix to distribute evenly. Spread over the bottom of buttered pan (the batter is really thick). Sprinkle chocolate chips over the top. Bake for around 25 - 30 minutes, or until dry on top and almost firm to the touch. Let cool until chocolate chips are solid again, then cut into small squares.

Milestone

Ryan lost his first tooth today. I think he's officially the oldest kid in his school to lose a tooth at a few months past eight, but he's alway run on his own personal timetable. I can't get over how different he looks! The tooth is in an envelope inside his favorite jacket, which he lost today, so the Tooth Fairy is waiting a day for him to search (which coincidentally gives us time to find a dollar coin to pop under his pillow tomorrow night). I've already showed him how to slip a straw into the gap, but I haven't showed him how to squirt water through. Some things are better figured out on your own.

Happy Easter

I'm a bit in between on celebrating anything religious today - still figuring out where I am and what I believe. But today feels like Spring and renewal and life, and that I'm happy to celebrate to the hilt, regardless of anything else on top of it. Today the boys woke up to Easter baskets filled with colored foam sheets, water balloons, bubbles, glow in the dark bracelets, pinwheels, ceremonial chocolate bunnies (must bite off the ears first), and tiny wooden birdhouses. We all had pancakes with berries and yogurt for breakfast, then spent the morning baking a humongous beehive bread. We all had fun rolling out strips of dough, twisting them together, then wrapping them around a pyrex bowl to bake. The boys attacked the loaf less than a moment after I took this picture, and I don't blame them! It was delicious. It was a beautiful, sunny day today - perfect for watching the boys run through the breeze laughing and chasing each other. They had their fair share of fighting today as well, but I savored those perfect moments of sunshine, flowers, and innocence.

I got several requests for the Beehive Bread recipe, so here 'tis. The bread is sweet and rich with just a touch of lemon and goes really well with just a dab of sweet butter.

Beehive Bread
adapted from "Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads"

5 1/2 to 6 cups bread flour (I used unbleached all purpose flour)
1 package dry yeast (or 2 1/4 tsp instant yeast)
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup sugar
3/4 cup milk, warmed
1 Tb grated lemon peel
5 eggs, room temperature
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1 egg, beaten, mixed with 1 tsp milk

1 baking sheet
ovenproof glass or metal mixing bowl - 9" wide by 4" deep

Mix 2 cups flour, yeast, salt and sugar into a large mixing bowl. Stir in the milk and lemon peel. Beat until mixture is smooth. Add in eggs, one at a time, mixing after each is added. Stir in the butter.

Add flour, 1/2 cup at a time, until the dough can be lifted from the bowl easily (you may have flour remaining).

Knead the dough about 10 minutes, until it is smooth and elastic. Cover top of bowl with plastic wrap or a damp cloth and let dough rise until doubled in volume, about 1 hour.

Take dough out of the bowl and knead for 2-3 minutes. Put back in the bowl, cover, and place in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours or overnight.

Shaping - the fun part!

Turn bowl over and cover with aluminum foil, pressing down to smooth the surface. Rub generously with butter and place on top of a baking dish without sides.

Take the dough out of the refrigerator. It'll be cold and pretty hard, so work it with your hands for a little while to get it moving well again. Roll dough into a thick snake and cut into 20 pieces. Roll each piece into ropes about 18 - 20 inches long and about 3/8" thick with narrowed ends. Take two ropes, pinch the ends together, and twist them together.

Wrap each twist around the bowl, starting from the bottom rim. As you add another twist, pinch the ends and overlap them a little to blend them in. Keep wrapping until you run out of dough. You might not get all the way to the top, which still looks great. If you need to have a solid bottom start from the center top and spiral around from there and down.

Cover with a cloth and let rise for about 30 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Carefully brush the bread all over with the egg mixture. Bake until golden brown all over, 25-30 minutes. You may need to turn the bread around once to get all sides evenly golden. Put the bowl on a cooling rack and let cool.

When the bread is at room temperature you can either leave it on the bowl (I did), take out the bowl and crumple up some foil to hold up the center, or flip the bread over to use as a basket. If you want a basket you may want to bake it flipped side up for another 5 minutes or so to firm up the inside edges a little.

Place bread in a conspicuous location and bask, then tear off a bit to enjoy.

Spring has sprung

Pink Bleeding Hearts, out in our front yard:

White Bleeding Hearts:

Wild fringed Bleeding Hearts, which have taken over a large patch out in front:

Blooming tree:

I love this time of year :-)

...and cast off!

On Friday I hobbled into the doctor's office, more than ready to get this blasted cast off my foot. Out came the big, scary saw. You know, the one that doesn't cut skin but looks lethal. That one. After a lot of careful cutting my doctor admits why she's extra cautious with this thing: it used to be a bone saw. Images from assorted horror movies are at this point dancing through my head. Then, halleluia, no more cast. On went the ol' walking boot, and off I went into the sunset. Walking still hurts a bit so I'm taking things very easy, but I'm a lot more mobile now so life is good.

Speaking of good things, look what I got in the mail today. Yarn! I won Lorette's knitting tip contest (random drawing, but still!) yesterday. Got the yarn today. That lady is lightning fast. The Opal Lollipop 1009 will most likely end up as socks for the boys - they both loved all the colors. Now the Cherry Tree Hill Glitter Alpaca is just beautiful. It's full of purples, deep greens, and a bit of bright pink here and there shot through with tiny winks of shine all over. So soft and light. Haven't a clue what I'll do with it, but I think knitting it up will be my reward for finishing up my sister's wedding shawl. Thanks again, Lorette!
Also finished up Ryan's socks, made from the yarn I dyed over at Abundant Yarn. He loves them and will not take them off. I'm taking this as a good sign.

Spring Break

Haven't posted in a bit, mainly because there hasn't been a lot going on here other than finding creative things to do on one leg. This gets old, oh, within about the first 10 minutes of starting out on crutches. The ankle seems to be mending well, and thankfully the cast comes off tomorrow. I'm counting the minutes until that doctor's appointment - not only will I be freed from crutches and the itch way down where you can't scratch it cast, but I'll be able to drive! Oh, glorious day indeed. There's nothing like being stuck at home and put at the mercy of others for a ride. Brings me right back to fifteen, right at the cusp of being independent and just tasting freedom.

This is day four of Spring Break, and I'm proud to say that both the boys are alive. Oh, and I appear to also be sane. This is quite a feat, one accomplished so far by signing Arden up for drama camp (two hour rehearsals each day, rides from my mother in law), craft projects galore, many taped episodes of Mythbusters and Dirty Jobs, and the baking of many, many cookies. And a healthy supply of Mike's Hard Lemonade. It's medicinal.

Last night, I was able to have a Spring Break of my own. My mother in law dropped me off at Abundant Yarn, where I promptly sat down with a bag o knitting to wait for Ann and Kay of Mason Dixon fame. I worked on the not quite Cobweb Crepe Shawl since the center is really just a great big dishcloth knit on very fine yarn. Also brought my *almost* (really, honest!) finished Perfect Sweater. We all sat and waited and talked, and in the process I met two of the nicest knitters: Meghan (no blog yet, but I'm working on her) and Janna (brand new blog - go take a peek!). We had a great time talking and admiring each other's knitting, and I hope to see both of them again sometime soon.

Eventually Ann and Kay arrived and they were just as real and funny and sweet in person as their writing would suggest. We got to see glorious blankets, dishcloths, and my personal favorite, the wee baby Blu Jeans. So incredibly cute and so soft in Rowan Denim. As everyone was waiting in line, I sent up a basket of sugar cookies to properly fortify signers and signees alike. I waited until things thinned out a bit, then made my way up to the table. Ann gave me the warmest hug when she figured out who the heck I was. I laid out the Perfect Sweater, mentioned being chicken to finish the buttonholes, and got invited to the SlogAlong - which I will be joining. We all talked for a while (again, did I mention how nice Ann and Kay are? They're both just plain good people), then set off for dinner. Had some amazing pizza at Ken's Artisan Pizza, talked and talked and talked. Finally got everyone's name! Aside from the wonder twin powers of Ann and Kay there were Larissa of Stitch Marker, Jessica of Rose-Kim Knits, Sarah of Cafe Mama and Sarah of Zeitgeist. I got home after ten (Sarah took pity and gave me a ride - thanks again so much!). Felt like summer break back in high school, between bumming a ride, hanging out and talking at a pizza place, and the whole summer camp feeling of meeting people from far away.

Not a bad Spring Break at all.