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Scat

Yes, this post will be about poop. Around here, we aren't afraid of it. In fact, we have more than one book dedicated solely to the subject of feces. So when we happened upon some odd looking crap (literally) on our walk through the wetland area of the Discovery Center, we just had to take a closer look - even needed to probe it a bit.
And do you know what those ducks have been eating?

Crawfish!
Lucky ducks

Farmers' Market

Around here, it's not quite so easy to come across local food as it was in Lancaster. That is to say every second house does not have a sign advertising some yummy home-grown thing to stop and buy. We do have an in with a fabulous dairy farmer whose cows are pastured and make yummy milk ;o), and Bessy from the freezer sure tastes good! So we haven't explored the other beef and raw milk suppliers much here.
We have joined an online farmers' market (Stones River Market) where we got lots of summer veggies, pastured chicken, pork, eggs, and a couple of gallons of milk (for the cats, of course). This week's order :
garlic, ground pork, pork fat for making lard, collard greens, lettuce, and

Arknsas black apples
We had enjoyed a similar market while in Sewanee and were thrilled to find such a convenient way to get great local foods.
Where do you get your local foods? Have you found an online farmers' market in your area?

Baby It's Cold Outside

Yes, I'm already listening to Christmas music folks.
My friend Tania asked about fun things to do with kids when you can't get out, and with all the Christmas music and crafting going on around here, naturally lots of these are Christmasy. Some days I feel like I'm just scraping by as a mama, but on my best days, I find that making an event out of pretty much any activity makes parenting lots more fun. Owen loves to help with things when I make them into activities. Cooking dinner or a treat, cleaning (spraying vinegar-water on stuff), and watering the plants are all activities if I remember to let them be more than just a list of things that I need to get done.

Here's some things we've done or hope to do:
1. paint brown paper bags (for gift bags)




2. paint rolls of brown paper or newsprint end rolls for wrapping paper
3. paint wooden cut-outs for ornaments and gifts (We did stars and snowflakes - about 25 cents each at Michaels)

• A few notes about painting - potato stamps (or turnips in our case - gotta use what ya got), sponge stamps, and stencils are all easy to make at home almost for free. Paint brushes, fingers, and toes are fun too! I try to limit the number of paint colors I put out when I am doing a project that will become a gift. With snowflakes and stars, I just put out white, silver, gold, blue, and yellow. We have also painted big wooden initials and picture frames as gifts.
  

4. make sugar plums

• We did this just this week. After Owen asked what sugar plums were, we looked them up. They sounded a lot like the faux Lara bars we've been making, so we just chose our ingredients from our pantry and made them up. This falls into the make an event out if whatever you're doing. This all came from reading "A Visit From St. Nicholas."
  

Dried cranberries, dates, almonds, nutmeg, and cinnamon (about 2 parts fruit to 1 part nuts) . . .
. . . chopped in a food processor and mixed together (because I have a little bitty one and had to do it in parts). . .
. . . and formed into balls like meatballs (oh so fun to stick your hands into!). . .
I must confess that I skipped over coating them in sugar. They were sugar plums all the same!

5. do an advent calendar or two

• There are a gazillion different ways to do these. One of the simplest I've seen is a stack of 24 envelopes each with something special (an activity or verse) in each one. I really love to plan an activity for each day so that celebrating Christmas and doing all those things I want to do doesn't become overwhelming. See the first link for a sampling of our kind of activities. I have also taken the liberty of changing those activities around to suit our needs. If we have a busy day coming up, I make sure to change the slip of paper in that pocket to a simple one like "sing Owen's favorite Christmas carol."
  

6. face painting

• because: What kid doesn't like to paint his face?

7. play in the bathtub

• Oh, yes, this is a bona fide activity in our house. Run that tub full of warm water and bubbles, and let 'em play. It's almost like playing in the kiddie pool in the summer.
  

8. DIY snowglobes
9. roast chesnuts
10. Silhouettes

• These are easy to do if you takes a picture of your child in front of a window, print it out, and glue the paper to the back of a pieces of construction paper. We have used these as gifts.

What are some indoor things you like to do with your kids?

Happy Belated Birthday, Baby!

With the anniversary of Caedmon's birth approaching, there was lots of knitting

and stuffing,
and crafting,
and packing,
and cooking,
and loving,
and roasting,

and singing,and help blowing
To get this boy properly turned one.
When the big day arrived we did a little outside working,
and nursing ('cause, you know, he's still nursing!),

and eating a little grass
since you know they grow up so fast - gotta get that grass-eating in before he gets too old.
Happy birthday, Baby!

Fall Bulb Planting

Thank you very much to Tracy for the wonderful daffodil and narcissus bulbs she sent us.




With Caedmon on my back and Owen in his PJs, we went out one morning to plant them. I decided on putting them right out in the yard in a few places. Soon after we moved in, we had our main water line break, and the dirt out by the water meter was easy to dig, in a nice sunny spot, and in a good location for viewing just as you enter our driveway. I headed on out there, and just as I started to dig, the roof guy pulled in, freaked out to see a woman wearing a baby digging at the water meter, and ran over to ask if he could do anything. I assured him I was only planting bulbs and taking advantage of the already loosened soil there. So he dropped off his things and went on his merry way, and I finished the bulbs.
Now we just have to wait 6 months for spring to come and the flowers to bloom.

Savor

these little hands because they grow oh so very quickly!

Uno!

Owen is getting big - really big - and he wants to do what the big kids do. At Grandma Sharon's weekly Wednesday Family Dinner Nights, the big kids play games; so, of course, Owen wants to play games - big kid games. I recently found this deck of Uno cards for 50 cents at the thrift store, and Owen is learning to play so he can run with his older cousins. Above, we're play with our hands face up for learning purposes.

Making Music

A long time ago - almost two years - Owen kept asking for a guitar/violin. While I wanted to honor his request for a stringed musical instrument I debated what to get him since he wasn't quite sure exactly what it was he wanted, he certainly wasn't mature enough to start to use either well, I didn't play either, and I didn't want to bring something into our home for him to use poorly or break. So . . . I waited. And I talked to some musician friends and family to get opinions. And Anne and Granddaddy sent use some money for a guitar/violin. And I waited some more. And finally last winter when we were trapped in our tiny apartment with not much going on, I ordered a lap harp. So why after all that time did I get a lap harp?
Owen, of course had never asked for a lap harp. I had never used one.
But after a lot of thinking and waiting, I decided that what Owen was asking for was a stringed instrument to play, and what I felt our home needed was an instrument that he could play with some reasonable and early success, that wasn't difficult to use, and that would withstand the use of two small boys (with mama's help, of course).
Our lap harp came with a small set of song sheets with notes marked under each string, and we ordered an additional set. With the help of the little wrench and an online tuner, I try to keep our little harp in pretty good tune so that when the boys want to play, it sounds right-ish.
Owen has done well with using it nicely. Our only issue to date was that he immediately put the pick into the hole in the center, and it's still rattling around in there. A walk to the guitar store across from our apartment in Lancaster solved that, and the new ones are just a little too wide to fit in the hole - ha! We know because he tried right away when we got home.
Owen has enjoyed strumming the strings, listening to the sounds as he plays up or down the scale, and has even started trying to use the song sheets. I'm surprised that he can hear when he plucks the wrong note, and just like I did when I was staring piano, he starts over at the very beginning of the song to get the whole thing right.
Caedmon who loves music and dances any time he hears it has observed enough to know that you are supposed. to. use. a. pick. Now he must. use. a. pick. when he gets a turn. You can't see it in the photo, but you can see his hand molded around it plucking those strings.
It was worth the wait, and I'm glad for now to have a little lap harp we can use well instead of a violin that sits way up on a shelf and gets brought down to touch and pluck a few strings unsatisfactorily once in a while.