Midweek

Things are moving fast around here these days and it's a shame there aren't more of me; I'm feeling spread more thinly than usual. I've been wishing that there were someone in the house taking care of the laundry, cleaning the floors and making meals while I'm outside. I'm busy planting the garden, putting in the bedding plants and hoeing the weeds from the flower beds, but when we come indoors, dirty and hungry, things are just as we left them. But here we are, so I juggle and we eat left overs and navigate around the pile of laundry on the love seat waiting to be folded.

I guess these spring planting days will get a little easier when I don't have the incessant distraction of watching for the little wanderer getting out of sight, extricating the child out of a mud pit and getting snacks etc. My consolation for everything is that the garden is really fabulous and we enjoy it a lot already, even while the plants are small.

Anyway, enough bellyaching and prognosticating.

Here are some photos:

The area I seeded in the back yard is beginning to appear slightly lawnish.

Laddie cuddled down in his couch having an apple!

These are some seriously well worn Crocs, currently filled with half done compost.

Sniff, sniff! Atticus peers hopefully out the door.

Is it Sunday night already!?

Man, the weekend just totally flew by.

There was all the crazy garden related business all last week, and this weekend, no surprise, more garden related stuff, and now it's Sunday night and time to go to bed. It has been a very fine weekend though and we've done lots of stuff together as a family.

We drove out to a little town called Chulafinnee, Alabama to the Tasteful Gardens facility and got some seedling plants for our garden. They have a cool operation out there and the land is absolutely gorgeous. Beautiful rolling hills, fields, big trees, all begging for a little person (and big ones too!) to go exploring. They also had two very nice dogs who were quite amenable to Riley petting them and trotting merrily after them as they strolled here and there.

Today I turned our humongous compost heap to see if any of it was done yet but it's still got some work to do, so Riley and I just gathered some worms from it do put into the garden bed. He's a fine worm finder and when we were done we had probably close to a hundred of them loaded up in his pail. As he filled the pail he thoughtfully sprinkled bits of 'cool, moist soil' on them to keep them comfortable. ;-)

While Riley and I were worming it up out back, Robbie added the sill to our raised bed and ripped down some cedar for the grid that'll lay across the top for the square foot gardening. It's hard to imagine 48 plants in our 4x12 bed, but we're going to give it a whirl and see how it works. The far end and the right side will both have trellises on them, so all the climbing and rambling things will be going up rather than out. We still have lots of room left to plant, so in the next few days little R and I will be seeking more seedlings and seeing what we can still sow from seed.

Shazam! A garden!

A neighbor outgrew this scooter and loaned it to Riley. It's a huge hit!

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Indulge me for a moment and just behold how cute this is.

Oh, hi! Remember us? Riley's parents? ;-)

Very distressed and tearful.

From the Salt Lake City Tribune:
FLDS mothers recount having children taken from them.

I lay awake last night unable to sleep for thinking of how these mommas and babies are suffering. I am literally sick thinking of the level of absolute terror they must be feeling at their forced separation. The cruelty and ignorance of the ruling astounds me.

You'd think if everyone agreed that to have the children torn from their mothers arms left both the babies and the mothers 'distressed and tearful' they'd immediately stop, but they continue! I know if anyone had taken Riley from me I'd have been out of my head and I can't even think of what it would have done to him. :-(

Those babies and toddlers will have been able to deal with everything that has gone on previously in these last chaotic weeks because they were with their mommas. No matter how different their surroundings were and how strange things seemed, they had that one solid home base of security.

And to think that to let the babies be reunited with their mothers once a day would do a bit of good is just ridiculous. Anyone who's ever spent time with a baby knows they are without a grasp of time.

It appears that no one out there on this case seems to have even the slightest grasp of the *need* for an attachment figure in a child's life, without which they suffer permanent emotional damage.

If you can't say it, don't eat it. Well, ok!

Excerpted from 'In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto' by Michael Pollan

1.) Shop at the Fringes

Stay away from the middle aisles of the supermarket, which tend to be filled with ultra-processed food with labels like "trans fat-free," "low cholesterol" and "heart healthy."

2.) If You Can't Say It, Don't Eat It

Don't buy products with more than five ingredients or any ingredients you can't easily pronounce.

3.) Cultivate a Garden

Producing your own food not only saves money and reduces carbon emissions, but it also helps you stay in shape.

4.) Buy Local

Shop at farmers markets.

Double Digging Will Kick Your You-Know-What

There's been little computer time recently, so I'll just do a quick catch up on the goings-on here at the ol' McHouse.

Robbie completed building the raised bed last weekend and when we finish with all the soil stuff we'll staple heavy plastic around inside of the wood to provide a barrier between the soil and the wood, since we used pressure treated lumber. Then he'll install a sill-type thingie around the top so we'll have a place to kneel or lay our tools. The sill will also be a tempting place for one member of the family to practice his balancing, no doubt. ;-)

I've spent the last several days trying to break up the red clay that sits below our raised bed. For a number of years the area was the parking spot for the previous home owners boat, so it was really compacted and we knew the roots growing down from the raised bed didn't stand a ghost of a chance penetrating it. Our reading indicated that the way to go is to double-dig the soil, work in some organic matter and then work in your compost/top soil blend, so that's what I've been doing. What a lot of freaking work.

The soil arrived today! In a dump truck!


This is for me, right?

So far I've gotten the clay broken up (and some of it just hauled out completely) and the rocks pulled out. We're going to amend what's there with Moo-Nure (so clever I'm rolling my eyes) as was recommended by The Tasteful Garden, a big organic heirloom nursery east of B-ham.

I've been kind of liking the feeling of waking from sleep slightly sore from digging. The only thing that hasn't been good is that the place where I broke the daylights out of my toe last year has been hurting. I think a trip to the chiropractor is in order since it feels like something is not right in there.

I aim to get the bed finished by Friday so we can head out to The Tasteful Garden over the weekend and get some seeds and/or seedlings. I have about a hundred books on organic gardening, raised bed gardening, vegetable gardening in central Alabama and other related subjects on hold at the library. Since this is our first time around we hope to learn about how much space different things need, when they should be planted etc. We're thinking we might do a version of the Square Foot Gardening to lay out the plants.

One of the things I picked up for RiRi when we went to the library yesterday is the Grammer Rock video, which he loves. He likes them all but he's especially keen on Lolly, Lolly, Lolly, Get Your Adverbs Here, so this one's by far his favorite. I've always loved those videos and especially the music; the lyrics are fabulous and the tunes are too. I never knew who was behind all that music though, till recently. I checked out a Bob Dorough/Dave Frishberg cd from the library several weeks back and listened to it a lot in the car. It was only today, when Riley was watching Grammar Rock, that I finally started hearing Bob Dorough's voice and style all over the Grammar Rock music. I checked Mr Dorough's site and they have a bunch of good info on his work with that project. I also learned in my looking around today that he was a big influence on Mose Allison's early work. Cool! And who in the world knew that it was Blossom Dearie singing on some of those tracks?

And now on to some shameless cuteness, as predicted in my first post. Behold the boy:

I mean, really. Is this not the life?


Riley pointing out the beautiful stars to his 'boys' this morning.

More house working

We were expecting a big rain last night (which we got, thank goodness, since we're still ridiculously low on rain here) so I made some preparations yesterday to protect the grass seed I put out. I put down some organic lawn food (stinky but effective and most importantly, not toxic to anyone!) and then spread straw to keep the seed and soil from washing. Last night it came a gully washer, as they say here, but thankfully the seed stayed put! Yay!

Come on rain, we're ready!

Today Robbie continued working on repairing the brick on the side of the garage, but it requires him to pour concrete and wait, so it's one of those hurry up and wait projects.

We also began building our raised garden bed in the little strip between our house and our neighbors, where we get some pretty good sun. With Riley's 'help' (um, yeah, right) I got the site laid out this afternoon while Robbie went to get materials. We decided to go for a bed that's 4' by 12', which we're hoping will give us enough room to grow a variety of stuff.

I wanted to square the bed up and started out enlisting the help of my old pal Pythagoras, a friend from my picture framing and carpentry days, but alas I had the help of a three year old and keeping one string still was hard enough, much less two. I finally resorted to using a carpenter's square and it turned out just fine.

Here's the plot at four o'clock--still great sun!

A momma cardinal has a nest in the huge rose bush next to the neighbors house and she's spent the whole day fussing at us for milling around. Hopefully she'll get used to us and we'll get to peek at her little peepers soon!

And now for something completely different

Some Riley related things to share.

First, he's recently grown quite interested in some toys that his cousin Simon shared with him. They're little boy figures made by the Beanie Baby company; a baseball player and a snow boarder. They each have outfits that can be taken off and switched around etc, so of course now we must do that five million times a day. Last night we were putting the shirt on one of the little boys and Riley was instructing the toy how it's done. He said "First you push your head in and then, when you get it all the way up, you just poop it out the top!". I fell out laughing, as you can imagine.

Second, we found a light saber at the thrift store and it's spawned a whole new world of Star Wars fascination. Robbie's shown him images of the characters on the computer and told him about the stories and then last night we watched one of the movies. (The first one was out so we had to start with number two, which started a funny philosophical discussion about whether he'd have the proper context etc. We're such geeks! ;-) So anyway, Riley is really into the Darth Vader character. We're not sure if it's the outfit, the helmet, the clear presence of overt power over others (which we're thinking of in the context of kids being without personal power and identifying with powerful characters like superheros etc) or what, but he has been claiming all day that he's Darth Vader. He donned his longest play scarf, a big piece of black star fabric, and took up his light saber and proceeded to march (strut, even!) throughout the house while Robbie hummed the Imperial March theme. It was hilarious. So serious and intent he was.

Look out! Lord Vader is coming through.

And last, Riley has finally gotten old enough that he's leaving his momma-centric infant and toddler phase behind and his focus is shifting to Dad. When dad's not here and we're having a snack he'll pause for a moment, sigh and say "I wish dad was having a snack with us". And when he wakes up, rather than hollering "Momma!" and pushing dad away if he tries to go to him instead (ouch!) he calls out hopefully, "Dad!?".

He's also expressing some concern about dad's safety, which makes us wonder what goes on in his sweet little head. Yesterday he played a very long elaborate game up in a tree in the back yard in which he had a boy named Robbie and his boy would get into danger again and again and Riley would go save him! I didn't ask any questions about it, not wanting to interfere with whatever processing he's doing, but just listened and wondered and left it open if he wanted to talk about it. Last week while Robbie was out of town we were playing Legos and he told me that one piece was a map of Alabama. (Dad uses a map of Alabama regularly to plot his routes) I asked him what it was written on it and he told me that it said "Work is Very Dangerous". I asked him if he felt that Dad is in danger and he said simply "Yes". I asked him what he felt was dangerous about it and he told me that there are people using saws, sharp knives and crank drills (!) and that it was very dangerous. I explained then that dad doesn't do that kind of work anymore but Robbie's going to talk to him more about the work he does so he can give him a clearer idea of where he goes when he goes to work.

As an adult it's easy to forget how confusing the world was when there were so many details missing.

What dad does Riley does.

Maybe denial is preferable

I went looking to see where we're most likely to run into bisphenol A and found this article on the Food Production Daily website. (Breaking News on Food Processing and Packaging. No, really!)

Unsafe levels of Bisphenol A found in humans, scientists say.

An excerpt:

One review reports that BPA is present in many forms in the daily lives of Americans. The common exposure sources are the linings of food cans and some plastic containers, including some popular water and baby bottles.

The journal will also publish simultaneously a new study claiming that BPA is functionally similar to diethylstilbestrol (DES), a synthetic estrogen banned long ago for use by pregnant women.

DES was banned after studies implicated the chemical in causing reproductive tract problems. The experimental animal study, done by a team led by Retha Newbold, claims to be the first to link developmental exposure to bisphenol A to diseases such as uterine fibroids, precancerous changes in the reproductive tract, and to cystic ovaries.

About six billion pounds of BPA are used annually to make resins and polycarbonate plastic.

Previous studies have linked BPA with increases in abnormal penile and urethra development in males, early sexual maturation in females, an increase in neurobehavioral problems such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism, an increase in childhood and adult obesity and type 2 diabetes, a regional decrease in sperm count, and an increase in hormonally mediated cancers, such as prostate and breast cancers.

And yet they continue to use it?!

For crying out loud.

This is just sad. Talk about innocents falling victim to toxins.

From a study done by the Environmental Working Group:
Dogs and cats have higher levels of mercury and flame retardants than humans do, says a study.

Here's the summary and findings from their site:
High Levels of Toxic Industrial Chemicals Contaminate Cats and Dogs

Very heavy sigh.

What in the world are we doing to ourselves?

From a story on the NPR website:
A report on the safety of Bisphenonal A, a chemical used in some plastics, finds it might cause cancer, early puberty and neural and behavioral changes.

For basic info, here's the wiki description of the chemical: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bisphenol_A

What really gets me are the hazards bisphenol A presents to kids. At least to the extent that we can control what we purchase and where we live, we as adults can make our own decisions about what toxins we're exposed to. Kids can't choose to avoid the questionable packaging their foods come in or the containers that their beverages are served in, and if the adults who care for them don't avoid it on their behalf, they are basically at the mercy of the packaging industries decisions. The impact on childrens small bodies is relatively greater than on adult bodies, so they really get a double whammy. :-(

It's a small thing, given how many sources there are, but we've chosen to use stainless steel containers for our water. Klean Kanteen even has sizes and spouts that very young children can use!

Grassquest '08

We've never had much grass out back. Mostly what grew there was an assortment of green weeds with one patch of grassy stuff that grew in the center of the lower section. When we put the play set in, the mulch bed under the swings buried the few grassy fronds we had growing, so we decided to put down some seed. To our surprise they sprouted and it has actually become quite lawn-like!

By comparison, the weeds and bare soil on the high side of the yard really began to stand out as pitiful and neglected, so today I pulled out the thatch in that section, leveled out the low spots and put some seed down. If all goes well we should have some decent grass. Now we just have to get rid of that termite riddled old shed in the corner and it'll be pretty much a full transformation from where we started.

Lawny

Not Lawny

While I was working Riley ate an astonishing amount of blueberries and created a mud pit, which he worked into the consistency of chocolate frosting. Lord help me.

When we came in he went directly into the tub, where we cleaned off all the mud and did what we could for the blueberry stains. His hands and mouth are now a lovely shade of light purple, which is a considerable improvement over the deep navy color they had taken on.

Purple hands! Hooray!

Who says the fun has to end when you come inside?!

Lovely light

Riley and I were out front late this afternoon when I was taken by the gorgeous light. He was investigating the work of some honey bees who'd come to visit our lavender plant.

Harassing the bees

Harassing is even more fun with a friend!

His shadow looks like one of those old portraits they used to do of kids

A little light reading

Riley visited with his Mimi and Poppy and twin cousins yesterday and I was left with an unexpected block of time to do as I wished. As usually happens in these rare autonomous hours, I was briefly unable to think of what in the world I'd do with myself. When I finally I came to I decided to go find some pants that fit me.

It may be motherhood or my age or a combination of both, but my body has changed enough in the last several years that I'm no longer comfortable in the pants I have. My mission yesterday was to find something that wasn't cut so dang low, because no one wants to see my belly, I can assure you. (a ten pound baby at 40 years old can really work some irreversible magic!)

The problem I had is that I don't know what they call pants like what I'm looking for. I found the juniors stuff, front and center regardless of what store I entered. And I found the plus sizes, the stuff for the business woman, the maternity wear and the things well suited for a first grade teacher, but I didn't find anything for me. Maybe it was just the post-taxes fatigue that I was experiencing, but I couldn't find the stylish pants which come up at least to the general area of my belly button. Where are the pants that have some of the style of the juniors pants but a higher rise? Perhaps boot cut, indigo dyed, even sporting some type of nifty button or snap?

I searched but found little. I did find one pair of pedal-pusher type pants (As we called them when I was young. There! A hint to the demographers!) but nothing else. I seethed as I walked around looking at pants that I wouldn't or couldn't wear and finally left, too annoyed to bother trying anything else on.

So what did I finally do with the rest of my free time? Why, I went to the library, of course! Ah. The quiet, peaceful happiness of browsing the shelves in the adults section. Speaking to the reference librarian without fear that the child is again opening the drawers on the copier to examine the inner works. It really is quite a treat to occasionally go to the library sans Riley.

Birmingham is currently holding a Big Read and everyone has turned their attention to Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird. At first I wondered why we'd need to read that book yet again, given that it's assigned to high-schoolers everywhere, and most folks I know have read it many times, but apparently there are legions of folks out there who have never read it. Imagine! I found a bio on Harper Lee herself called Mockingbird, by Charles J. Shields. I've always had a number of questions on Ms Lee, so this looks like it'll be good.

I also checked out The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri, which I've wanted to read for years. I become aware of her writing just before I started packing to move to B-ham. Then, of course, I had a baby and my steady stream of books slowed to a trickle. She has a new one out but I decided to start from the beginning instead.

And the librarian also sent me with her favorite from last year, Water for Elephants, by Sara Gruen. She described it as a remembrance of youth from the perspective of an elderly man, which sounds interesting, but I think it'll probably make me cry too.

In other news, we've continued to get quotes to replace our lame old drafty metal casement windows and are amazed at how the prices differ. We've finally found a company which has a good price, and seems to have less of the BS factor we've encountered with other bidders, so we'll likely give them the go ahead. They also gave us a quote to put metal siding over the fascia and other wood on the house. There's not much, given that it's brick, but what's there needs painting, which means scraping, and we're loath to scrape lead paint. It'd also put an end to the carpenter bees which return every year to make swiss cheese of the fascia over the garage.

Riley, proud of his tattoos. And check out the boxer briefs! Too cute!

And now on to our day. Groceries, weeding and house cleaning! Yahooo! ;-)

Such a boy

Riley has always been very boyish in his ways; he's physically adept, on the move 100% of the time and tends to climb everything in sight, but recently it's shifted to another level.

For one thing there's the gun issue. Just by nature of our personal tastes and preferences, the media in our household tends to be pretty much gun free. We don't watch violent stuff on TV and when the subject of guns has come up we've talked about how they can be very dangerous and that they're usually something that police and other safety and law enforcement folks use. But then we watched an old Mickey Mouse movie. You'd think Mickey Mouse would be pretty tame viewing, right? Well, in this episode Mickey Mouse went hunting, and suddenly Riley began turning *everything* into a gun. (And also began asking why someone would shoot at an animal. He asked "But wouldn't it hurt the animal?!?" My heart broke a little bit. There's so much sadness he'll know soon enough.)

So despite everything, he's suddenly gravitating towards guns, bows and arrows, knives and other assorted weapons. After feeling some ambivilence we've finally decided that it's just him being a boy and not an indication of some deeper, darker thing. A visiting friend actually stated it well when we were talking to him recently. He said that when his boys were going through this phase and gravitating towards aggressive toys he always thought of it as the boys using the toys to amplify their power. That made sense, given that kids basically have zero power over the big stuff in their lives and when they wave that weapon and yell they get a little bit of the power they lack, for at least as long as the game lasts.

Riley and I got a gift for a friends birthday party today and at the store they had an elaborate array of pirate accessories and toys. (Why pirates? It seems endemic.) And there, right at his eye level, was a set including a gun (squirt, rather than bang, thank goodness) an eye patch and a hook. He was immediately besotted and actually clasped it to his chest. What can a momma do but haul out the ol' pocket book and hand over the goods.

Argh! I'm Captain Riley!

And speaking of the boys-will-be-boys thing and the difference between boys and girls, the book Raising Cain: Protecting the Emotional Life of Boys by Dan Kindlon and Michael Thompson is fabulous at explaining what boys are about. I especially liked the way they described what normal boy behavior is about and how it's often misinterpreted as them being 'bad'. All that wild tumbling about and hollering doesn't mean they need medication or time out. They just need to blow off that boy energy! :-)

Despite the gun and pirate infatuation, Riley is still the sweetest and most tender little boy we know, and he is free with the cuddles and the kisses. We cherish every single one.

Riley's baby.

In house news, Robbie's removed all the brick from the damaged area of the garage and today he's started pouring a new cement bed on which to begin laying the brick back. The project is well thought out, neat and tidy, as is his way.

Nearly ready to begin laying bricks!

House Work

Well, we've got a big ol' hole in our house now.

The crack.

Riley and I spent yesterday afternoon extending the trench along the garage foundation to expose the damaged brick. Riley's contribution mainly consisted of scaling the mountain of excavated dirt to sing happy birthday and toss dirt clods back into the trench.

In a hole--what could be more fun?

When Robbie got home it was ready for him to start pulling out the bricks, which was infinitely more interesting to Riley than digging. The crow bar and hammer were intensely coveted and there was lots of drama about this being a job for grown-up people only.

And of course where Robbie needed to sit was directly at the fence, and if Riley was on one side he *needed* to be on the other, so there was a great deal of shoving past dad, which got old fast. At least he used good manners, saying "Excuse me, sir" as he pushed and climbed past. ;-)

Excuse me, sir, could I go past you?

Excuse me, sir, could I go past you?

Excuse me, sir, could I go past you?

Standing in the sink watching dad chip mortar off the bricks and calling out "Hello Dada!!" every thirty seconds. ;-)

Weird

This book strikes me as a sad commentary on our cultures standard of parenting. The dollar amounts they associate with the normal costs of parenting are shocking! I haven't read to the bitter end, but my question thus far is why in the world they don't just skip the costly daycare, the formula and all the freaky intelligence-building gew gaws and have the child spend his days with mom? There's lots of top-notch free food on tap for baby and tons of really interesting stuff to do all day long, all of which teach the little child everything he needs to know about how the real day to day world works.

Granted, some folks actually can't afford to have one of the parents care for the kids themselves during the day, but when it's just a preference thing, like I'll pay someone else to care for my child all day because I'd rather not do it myself, it boggles my mind.

I'm as strong an advocate for women's self-fulfillment as your next feminist, but I think we really shot ourselves in the foot culturally when we did away with the full time momma.

When I read stuff like that article I worry we're all going to you-know-where in a hand basket, so I head over to The Natural Child Project, to remind myself that there are folks who strongly believe that the emotional health of very young children is paramount over most other things. This one, The Critical Importance of Mother (or Father, or whoever the full time caregiver and attachment figure happens to be) is especially good. People wonder what in the world has gone wrong with 'kids these days' and this article seems to state it pretty clearly:

Nothing is more important in the world today than the nurturing that children receive in the first three years of life, for it is in these earliest years that the capacities for trust, empathy, and affection originate. If the emotional needs of the child are not met during these years, permanent emotional damage can result.

Um, hello, Columbine.

Oh. Well, then.

Wow, the things that go on under the radar can really be surprising.

We've been cleaning out the side yard near the garage with the eventual plan of putting in another gate from the front to the back. This evening I was trimming back the GIGANTIC mass of honeysuckle that had grown over from an adjacent yard and generally cleaning up the area when Robbie got home and noticed something in the flower bed near where I was working. It's near the wood shop and last year we'd put down some wood shavings from the planer as mulch. While looking at our climbing rose Robbie disturbed the wood shavings and saw that it was infested with a colony of termites. Argh!

We scooped out all the shavings and the soil below it and put it all in a plastic garbage bag, but when Robbie moved the landscape timbers which edged the bed we saw that they were also totally infested. Argh!! So those came out and went directly to the curb. Then as we began digging out more soil to make sure we'd gotten all the little vermin we discovered that some of the bricks were loose on the wall next to the soil so we investigated further. As it turns out, a crack in the wall that we were aware of is more pronounced than we'd known. Robbie pulled out some of the bricks to see whether he could spot any signs of termites having ventured in but saw nothing, thank goodness. We'll need to do some masonry work, but if that's the worst of it we're grateful.

Dad tries to see what in the world is causing the building to settle.
Riley eats blueberries with gusto.

Um, there's a hole in the house. And the child eats more blueberries.

We were laughing tonight that when I took down some of the tremendous overgrowth of honeysuckle that had come across from our neighbors house I felt a little uncomfortable at how changed it must appear on their side of the fence. I said that if it ever came up I'd just mention our plans to put in a gate 'soon' and that I was preparing for the upcoming project. Well, the joke's on us, apparently, because we get to do it right now! :-)

Gardening plans

Me and the lad at the window

First this: Riley consulted his compass this morning, looked at me quite solemnly and declared "It's twenty o'clock". Sometimes the cuteness is nearly more than I can bear.

And regarding gardening, Robbie and I have been trying to figure out how to put in some manner of vegetable garden. Every trip I take to the grocery store gives me sticker shock and the reading I'm doing on the state of food production here in the states makes me want to bow out of the whole process. (If you're curious about how our food is raised or interested in growing anything yourself, you may be interested in the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver.

The question is mostly about where to site a garden where it'll receive adequate sun. Our back yard is great, but it's very shady, so we're trying to figure out where else we can grow. We have an offer to use some space at a friends house, but they live nearly an hour away, and all things considered, (drought, gas prices, infinite complications of being in the constant company of a three year old child, etc) that doesn't seem like it'd work well, so we're considering our options here.

We have a good strip of sunny yard that runs parallel to our driveway, and while it's not ideal from an aesthetic sense, it's looking like our best spot, so we think we're going to do a raised bed there. We're not yet decided what to use to contain it though. If we're going to be here for several more years we'd like to use something that'll last a while, but we have concerns about the chemicals in pressure treated lumber leaching into the soil. We still have some research to do, but as of now we're thinking we might use pressure treated landscape timbers and then use some kind of liner to keep the soil away from the wood.

Regardless of where we site it and how we contain the soil, we plan to grow the food organically and use heirloom plants. Hopefully between what we raise here and what we buy at Pepper Place we'll have enough to can and freeze for use after the growing season.

Apparently it is now time to play Candy Land. ;-)

Working it out

I'm trying a new post to see if the way I format the pictures on the page will improve the look.

Here's the darling boy in a moment of reverie at the park.

Thumbs up, Man!

Thank heavens for quiet mornings when a guy has time to sit in the sun and wait for pancakes to cook.

Low tech me

Ho hum. I had the best intention of getting the text and photos from last nights post all straightened out, but it's up in all it's wonky glory. ;-)

Today Riley and I have the very thrilling agenda of grocery shopping, taking things to the post office and dinner production. I'm also hoping to work in some guitar playing, since I finally have the chords to the Irving Berlin song Russian Lullaby and I can't wait to see how it sounds. I have the Leon Redbone version and it's so beautiful.

Eeek! Riley was just pretending that he'd found a stink bug in the house and was going to catch it in a tupperware container. As he was reaching up his container and jabbering about catching the bug I was just nodding my head and absentmindedly agreeing with him till I happened to look up and saw that in fact it was a palmetto bug! As long as I've lived down here I still get freaked out by those. It's no longer in the house, thank heavens.

Better get busy!

Fresh Air!

It finally rained, thank goodness, and the air is cleaner now than it's been in weeks.



Today we decided to get out of the house go hiking, so we headed to Mount Cheaha State Park, which is absolutely fabulous! The whole area is strewn with rocks and boulders, and everything, including the tree trunks, is crusted with lichen. The ground between the rocks is covered with bright green moss and the general effect is that it's a magic land. We're headed back to go camping soon because a half day hike is definitely not enough.

Riley took a huge nap in the car on the way home, which means that bed time is totally out the window. Kind of a drag, but at least he's finding interesting things things to do. At the moment he's got his tools out and is measuring and cutting wood (pretend, of course) and making a drawer for me and dad to put our underpants in. Clever lad!

http://www.alapark.com/parks/park.cfm?parkid=7

Haaaa Choo!!

Good grief, how much more pollen can we stand before we all just give out? The trees are going full blast and everything is dusted bright green. We go out regardless though, because we know that soon enough it'll be as hot as the dickens and thick with mosquitoes instead.

Speaking of mosquitoes, we're going to try a garlic oil product this year that some friends used on their yard last year. It repels mosquitoes, ticks, gnats and fleas, kills adults on contact and kills larvae. http://www.arbico-organics.com/1211001.html

Riley says it's time to get off the computer.

Ah, Spring!

What are we doing these days? Getting outside before the mosquitoes set in, for one. The weather is gorgeous and we've been spending a lot of time working on our yard.

In August '04 when we moved in the yard was a wild, overgrown sea of half grown trees and underbrush. Robbie took the loppers and bow saw to it and we were slowly able to discern that there had originally been some order. As we've been able in the last several years we've pruned and weeded and it's become quite a haven for the family, especially the shortest member. (no, not Atticus--he's still indoor only, to his chagrin)

One of Riley's favorite places is the back of the yard behind the giant oak tree where we've created a secret place for children to hang out. It's secluded enough to offer a bit of mystery and the 'boy sized' tree is just right for climbing.

We're interested in putting a deck on the back of the house so there'll be a haven for grown-up people too. Ideally it'd be a screen porch with a gabled roof so we could have a mosquito free place to enjoy our yard, but that's a pretty big deal, so we'll start with a deck and go from there.

For those who know of our desire to buy property in the country, the current housing market has effectively put the brakes on that plan, so we're going to sit tight and make improvements on our house till things clear up. We're just grateful to be here, knowing there are people suffering a great deal right now, so no complaints. :-)

My former Rag Dolls band mate and two of his sons are coming to B-ham to play a show tomorrow and are staying over at our house, which should be fun! Robbie and I will take Riley early to the gig and if it's not too complicated with Riley at a busy venue I'll sing a couple of songs with them. We'll have a little music Saturday morning though, which should be a lot of fun. We've set up a little practice space in the basement and it'll be great to have some pals over to play music.

And speaking of music, I must profess my admiration for the amazing, enigmatic Nellie McKay! NPR has an article and video of her on their music page today and man, I am blown away. Any contemporary gal who can sing like Lotte Lenya gets my vote.

It was bound to happen eventually

Welcome!

Just to let you know in advance, there'll probably be a ridiculous number of photos of Riley here, so if pictures of shameless cuteness are your thing, come on!