Ezra's Sunshine Quilt

I made a quilt for Gibbie when he was small, and have been intending to make one for Ezra ever since. Gibbie's is rather a Valentine's quilt, in reds with lots of velvet and corduroy and flanneliness. Ezra, of course, needed something different. I believe the first time we took Gibbs to church, he was wrapped in his quilt, as it was winter and none of his limbs would stay in their places in a snowsuit yet-- Ezra's, being just finished now, obviously was not in use as a baby quilt, but has been fun in a different way because he can be a part of it.
Ezra's quilt is sunny. I remember sitting all day in my nursing couch with this one when he was yet tiny--my August baby, and just thinking how sunny and joyous all was. He has often chosen bright sunny colors. In fact, I often look to his drawings for color inspiration; he picks loud but harmonious combinations I wouldn't think of.
We went to the fabric store together, and looked at fabric. There was also a lot of searching in the piles of old clothing and linens. My neighbor Wendy gave us the backing fabric, which had been a crib sheet, and was nicely softened. I embroidered all the borders between squares. That was fun. Embroidery is one of my favorite crafts, and I don't do it very often. Partly, I just like looking at and using my amazing embroidery floss box, which I started way back in junior high or high school, when I did a rash of crazy quilting. (still working on that quilt too!)I have these lovely blue birds from an old garment my friend Maggie gave me. They have been waiting for homes. Two flew onto Ezra's quilt, where he wanted them, in the middle of the back. One alighted on Gibbie's quilt. Another reason I like quilting is that we can always add on later. Working on this has given me all kinds of ideas--how fun and easy to add pictures, or sew on special things, or stitch in a little poem or song.
For batting, I used an old lambswool sweater that was beyond repurposing. I think this will be warm. It is not bulky at all. The binding is inspired by those blankets that were always on the bed at Gramma Loretta's house, with the silken edges--so nice to rub as you fall asleep.

A good small quilt remains good. It can always be used along with bigger blankets to stay warm in bed. It can go on laps to watch movies even for teenagers or grownups. Kids use them to lie on the floor, or build forts on the couch, or any number of other things. And the more loved they are, the more reason to keep growing them, with new patches and pictures! Plus, they're good for you, with all that love stitched into them!

Collaborative Art with a Child

This piece was a collaboration between Gibbie and I. I was working on a small piece Paul's mom commissioned, and Gibbie was so enamoured of it he wanted me to make a copy for him. I said I wondered if he wouldn't rather choose a favorite animal, and that launched this simple project.He drew the landscape and the sky, and told me which animals to put and where they should go. He brought his stuffed animals as drawing models and set them up for me on the dining room table. I drew the animals and painted in the colors, with consultation and discussion about the Antarctic. This is a painting of the time of year when it is dark all the time--we don't really know what that looks like, so we surmised, and we will learn more about it later.

We talked about painting snow. At first, Gibbie said it was white, and wanted me to use white paint. I suggested he look out the window at our snow heap and asked how he can see the shapes in the snow. He decided that there are blueish parts, so we put those in.

For the sky, I just used a watercolor wash, sprinkled with table salt . We both signed it. The most challenging part of this painting for me was keeping my admirers from sliding the tablecloth off the table and bumping my arms in their excitement while I worked.

I love working together with my kids! We will both treasure this painting.

Biking Together Again--Gibbie Helping!

So, after a long hiatus, prompted by Gibbie's new found ability to ride behind an adult on his "tagalong" (meaning he hated the old trailer and I didn't know how to carry Ezra with the tagalong) I finally mustered up the courage to just try something. Lo and behold, it worked!I just tie Ezra, who is is now four years old, on my back. I don't do this much anymore, as he walks everywhere, but it worked just like always, and doesn't hurt when I'm leaning over biking, as it tends to now if I tried to wear him while walking any distance. It's similar to biking with a heavy backpack, which I am used to. Ezra loves looking over my shoulder, and we can all three of us can talk much better than when I was hauling them in the trailer because they are closer. I think it's quite safe and feel more comfortable in traffic than I did with the trailer. Plus, Gibbie is contributing to the ride! He can pedal along, and push hard on hills. He's really helping now!

We have biked like this to several places including our church, which is about five miles from home and up quite a hill! Another disadvantage which kept me from doing it for so long is the lack of storage space--I can't wear my backpack. This should be easily resolved with a generous handlebar basket and a rack over my back tire to support panniers. Maybe we could even put a rack on Gibbie's tagalong? I can't use a rack with a crate on it, because the tagalong runs in that space over the wheel.

Making Waffles

Gibbie loves to make waffles. And eat them. We really lucked out when my dad gave us this wonderful old waffle maker. It has a tiny round glass window on the top cover with an arrow that points to hot when it's ready for batter. Gibbie has been really coming into his own in being helpful around the house. I'm not sure if he thinks of it as being helpful or having fun or doing work, but I am celebrating his growing competence.

I was making waffles one day for our weekly breakfast with neighbors, and Gibbie was watching, and all excited over our new contraption. A waffle maker is one of those things that would usually have no justification in our kitchen. I don't like single-function gadgets, or most things that plug in, and try to cook without that kind of stuff. Except for waffle makers, which are just a phenomenal thing. Because we mostly eat all homemade food, sometimes there's not enough around our house in the way of snack food. Sure, sometimes I make energy bars, and the kitchen is stocked with yogurt, granola, fresh fruit, bread, and cheeses. But during busy weeks, when we're more likely to need more snacky stuff, I'm less likely to have all that around. Waffles are a super thing for this! We can have fun making a big batch, have a luxurious breakfast with fruit and cream and all, and then freeze the rest for instant toaster fun for ages to come.
So, in my waffle enthusiasm, I was eager to introduce our budding cook to waffliciousness. I had no idea how much of the process he would be able to do. The first morning he tried it, he ladled batter for dozens of waffles, pressed the lid down, watched for the steam to stop leaking out (the waffley sign of doneness), open the lid, and fork out a couple of lattices of golden goodness onto the butcher block. It's really fun for me to cooperate together, rather than just teaching cajoling. I like hanging in the kitchen, working together, a lot. Especially on Saturday mornings, when Paul is home, with BlueGrass Saturday Mornings on the radio (Local public radio jewel Jazz 88's jewel; just the best show for that sunny, relaxing productive kind of Saturday morning I like), and a morning with friends ahead of us.

Air Popper Home Coffee Roasting

I've been roasting my own coffee at home now for about five months. It all started when my great friend and former roaster Pat and I took a trip to his cabin and couldn't find any decently roasted coffee on the way. The Co-Op in Menomonie sold some green (not roasted) beans, so we decided to take matters into our own hands and see if we could use what tools we had available at his cabin to roast something better than the usual stale and burnt co-up coffee. We had some encouraging success using an oven and baking tray (better than co-op) and some fun failure roasting over a bonfire (very uneven and scorched roast). (btw- Pat, do you have the pictures from that trip? Want to post them on your blog? hint, hint.)

I got home from that trip with almost a pound of green Guatemala and a little bit of boldness. I walked two blocks to a thrift store and spent $2 for a used popcorn air popper that was to become my first roaster.

Gibbie and I roasted at least once a week in the back yard until one day it was too cold for my little popper to achieve proper roast temperature and I ended up with a very sad batch of Kenya French Mission coffee. Since then, we moved into the basement stairway of our house, which isn't heated, but is usually warm enough to roast. More importantly, being out there doesn't get our house all smokey. Much of the roasting process smells pretty good in one way or another, but the lingering smell afterwords is pervasive and not much like good coffee. Smoke detectors don't like it much either.
Here's Gibbie with the green beans. They don't seem much like coffee. They're feel more agricultural and smell of the earth.
Once the popping chamber heats up, Gibbie pours them in.
I've recently outfitted my popper with a candy thermometer. This helps me to monitor the roast more systematically than I previously could. I've gotten a lot of useful information on using and modifying air poppers for roasting from Kenneth Davids' book Home Coffee Roasting: Romance and Revival. There's also a lot of good information at Sweet Maria's on air popper roasting.This is Gibbie's main task in the roasting process. He stirs the finished beans after we pour them out of the popper to ensure that they don't keep roasting themselves with their own heat. He's convinced that the more he stirs, the better the coffee will be. He's a good roasting buddy, and we're both excited to get a first crack on a real machine some day soon.

Unschooling Our Four Year Old or Backstage with Little Bear

Putting on Birthday Soup for Gibbie's birthday party is such a great example of our learning process that I want to explain how it all came to pass. Gibbie loves pretending. We're always making up a story, or acting out a favorite book. Gibbie lives for the days when we go to our neighbor's house and the kids all put on costumes and do a little "show." (the show is usually mostly Gibbie announcing that the show is going to start in three minutes! a loose string of "tricks" or one well-used story about a lion and a Chinese person and a baby putting out a fire)
I don't know who's idea it was, but we started talking about doing a show for his birthday party. Lots of enthusiasm. I suggested we pick one of his favorite books as the story. We looked at his bookshelf and discussed the possibilities. He picked Little Bear's Birthday Soup. That was maybe a month before his party.
Gradually, the plan developed. I started a page in my planner for his party, and as he had ideas for it, wrote them down. It was my idea to make real curtains for the "stage" and I went and bought an old sheet for the fabric, but it was his idea that they would open by pulling a string. I sewed the curtains while he danced around excitedly one afternoon.
We read the book a lot. We discussed his costume. He and I both made drawings and discussed the features. I found out what he considered the essential features of little bear. He listened to my suggestions too. We tried out various plans for costumes for the other characters, and face paints for everyone. We ran our ideas by Paul and shared excitement with Ezra and friends and family.
We discussed the invitations; what they needed to say, what he wanted them to look like. We started making some by hand. He did drawings of little bear and told me what to write. We worked together, but he became very frustrated that they weren't turning out all the same, and it was taking a long time. I ended up making invitations/playbills by cutting and pasting from photocopies of the book's title page, and copying them. He folded them up and hand-delivered them.
He had a longer list of people who he wanted to come than could fit in our house. We talked about how this could work and decided that the kids who were going to be in the show would come first, get ready, and practice, and the grown-ups and little kids would come later. The little kids would sit on cushions in the front. He had definite ideas about all kinds of specific decorations, activities, and foods. Some he made happen on his own, some I did for him, a lot we worked together on, and some were eventually forgotten or rejected. He helped me clean the whole house for the party, bake the cake, prep the food, set up the props, make decorations and party favors. He designed valentine name tags and tickets for popcorn. The popcorn tickets were a feature he was most proud of. As per his instruction, I carved stamps out of rubber erasers that said, "popcorn!" and "recycle me!" He cut out tickets, stamped them, and planned how they would be used for the guests to order popcorn for the show. For a long time beforehand he dictated little signs advertising the show which he cut out and taped up everywhere.

Some weeks before the party, he stopped wanting to play Little Bear and was reluctant to practice acting it out. I got a little worried, because he had so much invested in this idea. We talked about the need to practice, and kept reading the story. He seemed nervous about being watched and wouldn't even repeat the lines. I resolved to abandon the show and just have games and cake if it looked like it was going to be too stressful. A few days before the show, he practiced it with me in costume, and had practically all his lines down word for word! After that, he wanted to practice every chance he got. We went over it with some of his friends when we could. We worked out some staging, talked about talking loudly and facing the audience. It seems he worked through his nervousness all on his own, and had been getting ready inside-- until he was ready to do it with others.

Of course, not everything worked out. There were some timing and logistical issues, things we would do differently next time. There were some nerves before and after the show, but what actor or host hasn't experienced those? I'm not going to detail the academic skills practiced here, or knowledge gained but I do want to highlight our process: how much it was driven by Gibbie's vision and ideas, how that vision led him to gain new skills, seek out resources, and solve problems; how he was externally supported but also internally motivated; how each step led to new ideas and spurred him on to try new things; how naturally social and interdisciplinary the process was; how much fun we had, and what a thrill of accomplishment!

Happy Birthday, Little Bear!

Gibbie's birthday, clearly, was a big big event in our house. Ezra, throughout the day, sings to himself, "Happy Birthday, dear Little Bear..." (see "the show" for the reference.) We also had a special birthday visit from our dear Grammers, pictured above.
And here is Gibbie, showing off the new light he received as a much-appreciated gift from his Grandpa Bill. He is planning to use it to "look for the dark slugs in my garden, at night." With a few tantalizing garden gifts, plans for the garden are kicking into high gear. I'm putting together my seed order. Gibbie is planning a garden of his own. It will be, according to plan thus far, a new garden, in the grass, with logs around it, painted black. He has made signs to label his plants and four useful warning signs which each read, "no dogs out loud." So much fun.

Making Knipfle

A favorite dinner of ours is Knipfle. It's German for noodles, though I just know it from my Gramma Loretta, who says, "ki-NIP-fla". I only know this word orally but poking around online, I found spellings Kinipffla, and Knepfla. She and my Grampa Bob grew up speaking low German in a small town in North Dakota and foods like this are one of the only remaining elements in the family of our German roots.
Knipfle are chewy noodles, filling and unctuous. They're cheap, and made only with things that tend to be in the house anyway (handy when one's run out of meat and fresh veg and fruit, and pulling together dinner!) Ezra calls them "sticky noodles". It may be the love of my teeth sinking into knipfle that has driven my love of chewy foods.
for an actual recipe, look it up as "German egg noodles" in the Joy of Cooking, but here's how I make them:
Knipfle:
in a small mixing bowl, stir together with a fork
several handfuls of flour
two generous pinches of salt
a dash of parsley
and a dash of nutmeg. (I've had questions about this: a dash is when your spice jar has a top with holes on it and you shake it once )
dig a hole in the center of the pile of flour.
break an egg or three in this hole
beat the egg up with a fork. as I beat, flour will be incorporated into the egg; let it. Mix until a soft dough forms. I usually add extra water; if too wet extra flour could be added instead. Knead for a few minutes. It's often quite sticky, and requires generous flouring, especially for children.
Now I usually drop a puddle of olive oil in my mixing bowl and roll the dough in it so it doesn't dry out while I work on some other thing for a bit. If I'll be a while, I've found it's best to put the noodle dough in a plastic bag in the fridge.
When I come back to it, I knead it until it feels stretchy. It gets smooth and feels quite like skin!
I take this elastic dough, cut it into a few pieces and begin to roll them out into ropes about the thickness of my finger. When a piece of dough gets too long for my bread board, I cut it in half so I can roll it comfortably.
Knipfle can be cooked in plain water, or it's great in chicken soup or broth. When the broth or water is boiling vigorously, I take a snake of dough and cut it into pieces maybe the length of the first joint of my finger. Gramma Loretta says, "you cut them as small as you can." I cut these straight into the boiling pot. Usually the kids like to cut some too, over a bread board, and I put these in as well.
Kids can make these start to finish with a little direction; scooping handfuls of flour, pinching salt, stirring the dry ingredients, beating the egg, kneading, rolling, and cutting dough. Both our two year old and our four year old can cut knipfle.
If your kids are anything like mine, they will enjoy also the eating! Mine like their knipfle in broth, or plain with ketchup. They are good with sour cream and salt or baked with cheese and buttered bread crumbs. Also would make a nice side for kraut and sausage, or roasted veg or meat, in stew or with gravy.

Birthday Soup

For Gibbie's Fourth birthday, he decided to put on a show of the story "Birthday Soup" from the book
Little Bear by Elsie Homelund Minarek (illustrated by Maurice Sendak). He spent a lot of time thinking about the details of the performance (curtains, costumes, etc.) and working on his lines.

Here's the final product, recorded live at his birthday party:

Polishing Shoes

We recently found the most fabulous old little leather shoes for Gibbie. They are so nice that they are decidedly only school and church shoes, or for dancing. They inspired us to get out the shoe-shine kit. Gibbie and Ezra get out the polishing work, and lay out all the pieces.They apply polish, rub, buff, spit, and shine, with a small arsenal of brushes and rags. They have thus far been very tidy, with no big shoe polish messes. They pack all the parts of the work neatly back up in the box and close the lid when they are done.Gibbie has also polished boots and shoes for Mama and Papa.
He's almost ready to hang out his shingle!

Making Sauce

Gibbie and Ezra made tomato soup, from whole fresh tomatoes, at Oma's (that's their maternal grandmother) house the other day. In these pictures they are working with the great Vitorio Strainer. You can see Ezra plopping the tomatoes in while Gibbie works the crank.
It was a delightful little meal to greet me after my morning off, complete with fresh baked biscuits too! Oma maintains that they actually had a hand in every step of the process.
It was honestly all delicious!

Car Boy

Things break, you know. Cars, phones, CPU fans, our neighbor's wireless router (which is why we haven't posted in a long time) all break. Good thing I usually enjoy fixing stuff.

Yesterday I was out with Gibbie and our car started running very poorly. It hesitated and stalled whenever I was pulling away from an intersection. Gibbie was disappointed that we had to go home, so I asked him if he'd like to help me fix the car. He was very excited about that idea.I grew up around car-fixing. I can remember the little stool that my dad would let me sit on and watch him work in the garage. I thought that Gibbie would be a little too young yet, but this 3 year old was both interested and helpful. He could even hand me some tools. Because he can't read, he couldn't differentiate between an 8mm or a 10mm wrench, but he could understand the instructions "hand me the smallest screwdriver with a yellow handle." I have to admit it was pretty great to have my son already handing me tools. He also insisted on personally inspecting each spark plug.

Here we are looking at the offending distributer rotor. The rotor and cap were more worn than any I'd ever seen. No wonder things were running so badly.

What started out as let-down turned into a pretty great experience for Gibbie and I.

Barista Boy

Gibbie really knows his way around coffee shops. He has his favorites and list off most of the independents in St. Paul. He has his own regular drink (foam, aka a cappuccino minus the espresso). He does a better job of busing his own dishes than a lot of regulars I know. Sometimes he plays coffee shop at home and serves up pretend drinks. He can recognize a latte on sight.

Today he got some behind-the-bar with my best buddy and pro barista Pat. I was impressed that Pat could pour a good rosetta with Gibbie on his shoulders. I don't know if I could do that!

A Cheery Table for All

Montessori, and many others tell us to make each meal special, to communicate care by setting a beautiful table even if the meal is merely a snack for a small child. To me this means, firstly, flowers. I've long imagined that the greatest thing about being rich would be being able to have flowers inside all year long. But I'm coming around on this point. There is a time for every beauty. Flowers grow in long days, not short ones. The most cheering thing on a winter table is a candle. By dinnertime, it is yet infallibly dark already. Gibbie likes to talk about the "dark, dark world out there." What we need is a bit more light.


Ideas for winter cheer at our kitchen table:
-anything colored tissue paper taped to the windows; cut stars, snowflakes, squares, etc.
-a candle. We have a favorite candle holder (wedding gift, from 10,000 villages; thanks, dear friends!). I buy candles at the coop (yes, expensive), or the thrift store (cheap!), or make our own (the last time we did that was years ago! man, it's a great winter activity!), or scrounge them from my Dad's basement (we call it the "great source and final resting place of all things", though my brother and sisterinlaw are working hard to change that!). We light a candle at every meal. Blowing it out signals the end of the meal. It's a great way for Gibbie to understand that Mama and Papa are still busy when we're catching up after work at the end of the day.
-a nice tablecloth. Hem any piece of cloth, or buy on the cheap at a thrift store. Ours need to be changed frequently! I don't worry about stains, as we have lots. Some I shake out or flip over before changing.
-cloth napkins This is an easy way to dignify and green a meal. My mom always kept a basket near the table, and we just threw them in the wash. Even using them every meal makes an insignificant dent in the laundry load of a family. No sense in buying these new, as they are the easiest thing to sew. Old clothes, like button-down shirts, actually work much better for napkins than new fabric, as absorbency and softness are key. Easy to find in thrift stores. A family can almost stop buying paper products.
-real silver I've found that real and quite beautiful silver is shockingly cheap in thrift stores. I think no one wants to deal with polishing it. (Hint: preschoolers love to polish!) I'm having a love affair with a particular teapot I found for maybe three dollars.
-books at dinner? Sure! I do try not to keep my nose in a book at the table, but we have a special book by the table and Gibbie always looks forward to reading from it. This is covered beautifully in Honey for a Child's Heart by Gladys Hunt. I adored this book, though I must mention that the edition I read was from the 1970's, so I can't vouch for the newer one I linked to.
-kids help set the table At 3, I hope Gibbie is soon doing this on his own. For now, I keep the children's things in a drawer they can reach. I ask him to do a specific tasks ("please put a plate on the table", not "set the table") one at a time and do it with him if he's not enthusiastic about my request. Doing it with him has been a great thing. It doesn't make it a negative or adversarial thing at all, and has been a wonderfully effective tactic for growing willingness to help. In the summer, he loves arranging the flowers he picked in a jar.

Cooking with two. Easy kids aprons.

Ezra now wants to help in the kitchen too. I've been letting his big brother help while I cook, sitting on the counter, and doing everything he was able to, since about Ezra's age. The little one is no longer riding on my back during cooking times. He wants to be right in on the action!

It's a principle I read about somewhere, of "downward delegation", of assigning tasks to youngest child in the family who can do them. It makes sense. This way, Ezra will get to do things as he is ready to, rather than everything remaining "Gibbie's job" just cause he did it first. It also keeps us challenging the kids, each of them, with new tasks as they grow.

Unfortunately, downward delegation, in this instance, doesn't make sense in terms of my counter space. Look at the above photo. Where am I going to actually knead the bread here? I suppose if I were really delegating down, Gibbie would be moving on to other things and I wouldn't be amassing children on the counter, but he is just now getting to a point where he can do a lot of the cooking stuff. We have a rhythm. It works for us. Ever wants to be on the counter, but if he's there I have to go back to policing the knife block, and watching half the ingredients fall on the floor when he takes his turn stirring. True, that's just how Gibbie learned to do all he can do now, but he learned it when I only had him to watch. Lots more time. Maybe more patience. No baby pulling on my leg, wanting to come up and help too.

We'll see where this goes.

Oh, by the by--they're both sporting my new kid's aprons. I only wear full aprons, not these little waist-down-only skirts. But the half-aprons are the kind one can find, vintage, handmade, and darling in abundance at thrift stores! (Or make super-easily) It happened on this day that the kid's real kid-sized aprons were all in the laundry, so I pulled out these little decorative ones and did this:
-lay the apron across the child's chest, with the sash ties going over his shoulders
-cross the ties in back and bring around to the front, under his arms
-tie in front, on top of the apron.

Voila! A full-coverage apron sized just right for the baby, toddler, or pre-schooler!

Egg and Laundry Thoughts

Bread and Jam for Frances by Russell and Lillian Hoban is one of our very favoritest books around here right now. Inspired by her, we have been having lots of soft-boiled eggs in the morning.
As Frances' father said, "What a lovely egg! If there is one thing I am fond of for breakfast, it is a soft-boiled egg."
"Yes," said Mother, spooning up egg for the baby,
"it is just the thing to start the day off right."
"Ah!" said Gloria, [the baby] and ate up her egg.
My friend Liz Winter taught me how to make a soft boiled egg and we learned how to eat them at our friend Ann's annual St. Patty's day bash. Lots of fun is had by all. Except for non-egg eating Paul.

Here's what we do:
-Put eggs in cold water on the stove. Bring to a boil. Boil for three minutes, counting from when the boiling actually starts.
-Since the kids are waiting at the table hungrily, after the three minutes, run the eggs under a bit of cold water so they can touch them.
-Set an egg on an egg cup (found ours at the Vinnie, down on West Seventh. Small baby food jars or shot glasses also work great.)
-Use a spoon or fork to crack a ring around the top of the egg by chiseling at it somewhat carefully. Then whack off the top! (I don't remember where I got this great pointy spoon, but it's just perfect!) Dig to the yolk, if necessary. Ideally, the white is all cooked, and the yolk is still runny and bright yellow or orange.
-Salt and pepper to taste and let the kids dip little sticks of toast or pita into the yolk
-Lo and behold! Egg yolks taste way better when they are less well cooked! (we like to use eggs from happy, healthy birds.)

I have seen more than a few bloggers whom I really like post such picturesque photos of hanging their laundry up to dry. Ha! My laundry line is certainly not fit for public display! I'll just show you a little corner to show off Gibbie's hanging job. I guess laundry can be pretty even if it's not all bright white and red tablecloths and vintage linens snapping in the breeze.

So, around here it's getting too cold to hang clothes to dry outside. What's an earth-lovin girl to do? While indoor drying racks are a pain on rainy summer days, I've found they are wonderful for chilly winter days! When it's cold out, the air gets painfully dry inside our old house. I'm real sensitive about this. I have dry skin, and get uncomfortable just breathing the dry air all night long, so we tend to keep a humidifier going at night. Laundry can be a great help too! On a cold day, it will dry inside in no time!

Advantages: Humidify the house and dry the laundry at the same time with no use of electricity!

Plus, our folding rack has lots of spaces that are low enough for Gibbie to hang up the clothes himself. It's pretty fun, working together like this. He can focus now, for a whole basket of clothes, actually hanging each piece up as nicely as he can. He's also started helping me fold things! Here's how it went.

Little Bear: What are you doin, Mama?
Mamabear: Oh, just folding these blankets.
L: I don't know how to do that.
M: Would you like to learn? I can show you.
L: No, I am not big enough to do that. When I am a man, I will fold blankets. I will do that when I am a big big big big kid. Not until then.
M: folds another blanket
L:joins right in
So I showed him how to match up the corners, and stack the folded ones in their place. Now he helps me with all sorts of folding! Above is pictured a common sight around our house these days. The littler one climgs into the stroller and the big one pushes him all around the house. They are taking a lot of trips to the cabin, the lake house, the coffee shop, and the restaurant these days.

A Tisket, a Tasket, a Little Blickey Basket!

This little basket is called a blickey. I adapted it from an idea in the excellent wild foods guide Forager's Harvest by Sam Thayer. This book is well-written, very practical, and available from the Saint Paul public library. As soon as I return it, that is. The blickey is just a little container you strap to your waist for berry-picking. It's great:
-two hands free for picking
-no accidentally kicking over my berries
-don't have to keep track of where the berries are
-less squishing them in my hand as I pick
-great for kids (pictured here on Gibbie)
This blickey is wicker, made from leftover basket supplies I got from my mom. A very simple little basket, I designed it to not spill and fit well against the body. It has little loops in back to run a string through for tying on, or one could run a belt through it. We've been using ours daily for raspberries, which are finally ripe! Those aren't raspberries in the picture, however. More on the joys of mullberries later.

If anyone wants their own blickey, talk to me. I would gladly give a blickey lesson or make one for you!
Enjoy this beautiful day!

Solar Oven Love

So this morning Gibbie helped me cook dinner.

We lugged a bag of carrots and a lil sack of potatoes out the back door.I peeled carrots while the kids played in the grass. We washed the potatoes together. (Gibbie also helped by fetching rags to scrub with, putting the lids on, and he and Ezra gnawed on carrots. They love helping with real work) We put everything in our black enamel pots along with half a dozen whole raw eggs. The pots went in this black box, then a big clear lid and a collapsible reflector. We turned it to face the sun and played all day in the yard. Twice in the afternoon I turned the oven a bit more as our northern sun arced across the sky.
By our 5:00 dinnertime we brought out bowls and drinks, served up piping hot food and had a dandy little picnic. A simple meal, quite good. We are looking forward to using this new oven lots and lots. The next day we got a little more adventurous. I adapted this recipe from The Sephardic Table,
a lovely Middle Eastern cookbook.

Solar Oven Lamb Stew
This is one for the recipe box. It was easy and delicious. It makes its own gravy.

1/2 onion, chopped
6 md. yellow potatoes
12 carrots, peeled and broken into finger lengths
1 lb. pieces of lamb stew meat (so worth it to get organic, pastured meats!)
1 tsp. fresh ground coriander (let me rave about my mortar and pestle sometime!)
2-3 bay leaves
1-2 tsp. tumeric
1/2 tsp. salt
a few grinds of black pepper
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
handful of raisins
a glug or two of apple cider vinegar
I've given measured amounts here for the spices, but I honestly just do dashes and handfuls and pinches myself. These things are flexible.
Put all ingredients, in a black covered pot, into the solar oven. We cooked them 5-6 hours. The oven temp never exceeded 250F; these low temps make for tender, juicy meals and apparently more of the vitamins stay intact than when cooking conventionally.

We toured the Solar Oven Society where the oven was made. (it's in Mpls on Hennepin!) All of its simple, carefully engineered parts can be cut, folded, and assembled using hand-operated jigs. No electricity is used. They are a pretty great organization. Half the price of our oven goes towards making these affordably available in third world countries where this kind of technology makes so much sense, for the same reasons I want to cook solar here in Minnesota though the needs in other communities may be more accutely felt.

Solar cooking doesn't:
-consume natural resources
-cost anything
-degrade our air or water
Our friend Willington, a Ugandan priest who attends our church while working towards a PhD, said of solar cooking, "The one thing we have so much of in our country is sunshine! And all it does it seems is to make it too hot, to make the groung too dry. But this-- this is a way to catch it-- and use it, for something good!" You really have to see his face and hands while he talks-- he was quite excited. He wants one for his mother.
Many people in Uganda (and countless other countries) cook daily over open wood fires. Now, I love a good campfire, but a little reading has opened my eyes about the implications of cooking with fire everyday. The byproducts of cooking with wood are deforestation; (fully on half of the wood consumed today is used for fires--more than that for paper or lumber!) lung problems, especially for women and children; and lots of time spent gathering wood as local supplies diminish.
Now, while we don't typically cook with wood,

for us, solar cooking means:
-Gibbie's increased participation in cooking (safer for him to be near than the stove)
-decreased use of non-renewable resources
-not heating up the house in summer! We try not to use A/C and I missed cooking so much last summer. Bread, vegetables, meats, eggs, cake, cookies can all be made in the oven.
-the simplicity of consuming less
-the pleasure of being outside more
-a lower energy bill (I said above we don't cook with wood, but we use it indirectly; our power comes from a grid of nuclear, wood, and coal power plants, each of which create their own types of disastrous waste. We try to use as little as we can.)

I think this oven is a do-able choice for anyone with access to sunlight. This is Minnesota in April! It doesn't need to be hot to cook; just sunny. It was also less expensive than I thought it would be, and very easy to use.

Thanks to our neighbor and friend T.J., who swang, slid, and rolled on the ground entertaining Gibbie and Ezra while I wrote this post!