Our Thankful Garland

Every year for Thanksgiving, our family does a little "Thankful" craft... we always make a little banner of paper leaves, on which we write things we are thankful for. (You can see last year's banner here) Some of the leaves are very sincere... "Our Home" "Our Cats" etc... while others are a bit sillier (like "Peanut Butter") We've  been making these in one form or another since my oldest child was about four, so I think this is our tenth year! It is definitely one of my favorite family traditions.

It begins as cut out paper leaves and sharpies

This year we did it a little differently... rather than hang the leaves from string or twine across a wall or window as we usually do, I decided I wanted to put it up on our newly-revamped mantle this year. I found some nice grapevine garland at AC Moore, which seemed perfect to use as our base.  I'm very happy with how it came out.

After writing things we're Thankful for, we
tucked the leaves into the grapevine garland.

Finished!

Sharing is Caring

Some silly fun with friends... Turning the
Three-legged Race into a Five-Legged Race!

Last Friday we had the most WONDERFUL Community Thanksgiving with our Homeschool group. All the families contributed traditional homemade dishes and gathered together to decorate the room, play games, talk, and share a delightful feast together. We all had a great time, and many wonderful memories were made. We feel so lucky that events like this are a regular part of our life, and we know we are truly Blessed to have so many amazing friends to share in this homeschooling journey. Whenever people give me that "You homeschool? But what about SOCIALIZATION?!" line, I always laugh, because my kids have a much more active social life than I ever did as a public school kid.

But the downside to all this socialization? Sometimes along with sharing food, friendship and fun, we also sometimes inadvertently share GERMS. About 30 or so hours after the party, at least 30 people, fully half of the party attendees, came down with a nasty tummy bug. My three kiddos were among those hit. I don't know what this bug was, exactly, but it was a strong one, to affect so many people. In our family, Noodle was the first, at 1:30am on Sunday... we were awakened by "that sound" that no parent wants to wake up to. By 10am the other two had it. Fortunately, the first two kids only threw up a couple of times then just slept it off. They were both fine in 8-12 hours. Monkey, on the other hand, continued to vomit for 13 straight hours. I brought him to the ER 6 hours in, and he ended up with an overnight hospital stay. It took two different anti-nausea meds and four bags of IV fluids to get him over the hump. This is  the second hospital stay for Monkey in less than a year. I had hoped after his bout with Norovirus in March we'd be done with hospitals for awhile, but no such luck. I'm now trying to heal his gut and boost his immune system with probiotics and vitamins. Fingers crossed we'll get through the winter without further incident.

After all this drama, we are getting back into the swing of normal life. Today we've got a busy day of classes, appointments and activities. I am grateful that we're all healthy, and able to do this stuff! Once we get caught up, I do have several posts I've been wanting to write, (about my indoor garden, and my new cold frame, my bird feeders, some recipes, and more!) and hopefully now that things are settling down I'll get to those, soon. Stay tuned! :)

A Furry Love Story

In February of 1998, my former husband (who was not yet my husband) and I had just bought our first house, and we were set to move in in May. After living in "No Pets Allowed" apartments for many years, I was very anxious to welcome a furry friend or two into our new home.

Meanwhile, that very month, some friends were walking home from the subway very late one evening when they found a small cat wandering in the cold. They brought her in for the night, to keep her warm. After trying hard to find her owners, to no avail, they ended up finding themselves the parents of this sweet little girl. They named her Twizzler, and it was soon determined that Twizzler was expecting! When we heard that our friends would soon have some kittens needing homes, we immediately volunteered to take two. It was meant-to-be.

On April 15, 1998, we got the call that the kittens had made their debut. Like the eager expectant "parents" that we were, we rushed over to meet them as soon as possible. There were four, altogether, and we named our two kittens that night... Gus and Tallulah. We visited  them often over the next 8 weeks, and we brought them home to our new house in June. They turned out to be wonderful cats... funny, affectionate, each with a distinctly awesome personality.

And so it began. Those cats stayed with me through my engagement, marriage, the births of three beautiful children, a move to a new house and the end of my marriage. They were by my side through money struggles, new careers, and new friends. They were there for the formation of a wonderful new relationship, and making of an expanded family. They were with me while my family suffered loss, and while we worked our way through grief. They have been furry little constants for me in this crazy life, and I'm so grateful for the quiet comfort they have given me all these years. My kids have never known life without these two cats in it. They were so sweet, gentle and patient with the kids, allowing them to pick them up, hug them, hold them and even tolerating being dressed up in doll clothes. Not once did they ever scratch or bite, but instead would just get up and walk away if they'd had enough of playing. For my youngest child, who had challenges with developmental delays, Gus and Tallulah were like therapy cats for him. They taught him so much about love, compassion and patience.

One year ago tomorrow, on November 7, 2013, Gus left this Earth at the age of 15.5 years, and is still sorely missed. Today, after a long illness Tallulah joined her brother in Kitty Heaven. I am so sad at this loss, but I take comfort in the idea that their souls are reunited. I hope there is some good catnip up there.

Time to Harvest the Herbs

With the temps outside dipping below freezing, it's time to harvest our herbs from the garden. A little past time, actually, but I was a little slow this year. It seemed like the cold weather sort of snuck up on us! One day we were outside in just our shirt sleeves, and the next day they were predicting frost. We even had a little bit of snow this past Sunday! Since I didn't have time to harvest then, I just draped some tablecloths over the herbs to protect them until I could bring them in. This morning I finally got out there, and cut a whole bunch of herbs... rosemary, thyme, oregano, lemon balm and sage. They've all been trimmed and rinsed, "yucky" leaves discarded, and are currently spread out on towels on the counter, ready to be bundled up and hung to dry for our winter enjoyment. Later I'll go out to get the chives, mints and catnip. The last of the lavender came in a few weeks ago, and the last of the basil has already been turned into pesto, which is in the freezer, ready for our pastas and pizzas over the winter.

We use our herbs for so much more than culinary purposes. While I do love the delicious flavor my herbs add to my cooking, we also use herbs for medicinal purposes. Peppermint, spearmint and lemon balm make a nice tea to soothe tummies and aid digestion. I love to have a cup of this tea after dinner. When you've got a cold, tea made from thyme with a squeeze of lemon and a spoonful of raw, local honey is great for soothing coughs and sore throats. A rosemary rinse in your hair after washing is great for soothing a dry itchy scalp, and is even said to promote hair growth. No matter the ailment, chances are there is an herbal remedy to soothe it.

And finally... we'll also be reserving some for some herb crafts: smudge sticks, wreaths and fire bundles. But first, I'm going to sit with a cup of peppermint tea and enjoy the wonderful herbal smells wafting though our home.

SPROUTS!

Just a quick post, today... I just had to give a little update on our indoor gardening project! 

A few days ago, I filled up the flat bin with some rocks (for drainage) and some of that homemade potting soil I was telling you about. I planted one side with spinach seeds and one side with arugula seeds. 

This morning I noticed:

SPROUTS!

See those little green spots in there? Such a cool thing to have brand new things growing while the regular summer garden is winding down. I'm looking forward to planting some indoor potatoes this weekend, and will also be getting our coldframe up on our bed of hardy greens out in the main garden. So far I am having a grand ol' time with this project!

Indoor Gardening (and Homemade Potting Soil!)

Remember when I told you about how we were doing Winter Gardening this year? WELL... we've been doing lots of stuff to get ready! One of the things we've been doing is setting up an indoor garden area in our basement. We plan to try indoor potatoes (again) as well as growing a variety of greens. We also plan to use this area to start seeds for next year's crop in the late winter/early spring. We haven't actually planted anything yet, but I do want to share a little "sneak peak" at how it's coming along. Before I show you pictures, though, I do want to issue a warning. These are not "Pinterest Worthy" pictures. This area is not pretty. It is functional, but not pretty. We are using stuff we have, so things are not all matchy and nice.

We purchased a grow light at Home Depot, to provide adequate light.
The orange buckets on either side of the desk will be used for potatoes,
and the plastic tub on top will be for growing greens. Inside the
 desk, we have a plastic bin in which seeds and such are stored.
  Under the desk,we have a watering can, and a big bucket of potting soil.

Inside the seed storage bin: seeds, markers, peat pots, trowel.

Light!

We chose this location, as it's a spot we can block off from the cats, who view all such things as there personal playground. We have a small finished area of our basement which contains a TV room and a small kitchen area, which seemed a nice, out-of-the-way location which is still easily accessible.

About our bucket of potting soil...  I knew I'd be using a lot this year, since I plan to do lots of container gardening, so I started looking into ways to save some cash on potting soil. I found out that it's actually really easy to make your own, and way cheaper than the stuff you buy pre-mixed. I measured my ingredients with an old almond milk carton and mixed it up in the bucket. Here is the recipe I used:

1-1/2 gallons peat moss
1/2 gallon perlite
1/2 gallon manure or compost
1 cup sand
3/4 cup organic fertilizer

This makes about half a bucket of soil. You can double the recipe, but I find it easier to mix in smaller batches, so I mixed up one batch, then another, then put them together.

This is sort of a basic, all-purpose potting soil. If you want to get really fancy, you can find a lot of other recipes which are good for specific planting purposes such as seed starting or for particular plants.

I am hoping to get things planted this coming week, and will update. If anyone else out there is trying winter gardening, I'd love to here your experiences!

Master Shopping List

I'm constantly looking for ways to live a greener, simpler and more frugal (frugaler?) life. One of the tools I've come up with recently to help me toward this goal is my Master Shopping List. It's something I've been working on for quite some time, and I've finally got it down to a system that really works for me.

Now before I tell you about this, let me just say that I have tried several phone apps for this purpose, but none of them have worked well for me. I have a way of doing things, and none of the apps were a good fit. I know several people who use grocery apps and are very happy with them, but they really just don't work as well for me. I found that having a physical list works better for me, so I created a printed out master list to take with me on my errands.

Prior to creating my Master List, I would sit down each Thursday and make my menu plan for the week (I still do that part) and then I would write up a shopping list of all the things I needed to make that week's dinners, along with any staples we needed. I realized I was spending a lot of time writing the same things over and over each week, as, like most families, we do have a good many items that we purchase every (or almost every) week. I decided it might be easier to type up a Master List of all the things we buy regularly, and then just have space to add special items I need to buy on occasion. I put the list in a plastic page protector, so I can cross items off with a dry erase marker, then wipe it clean for the following week. I put my list on a cute little clip board, which fits easily in my purse.

I do my grocery shopping at three different stores each week, as I've figured out over time that this is the best way to stretch my grocery buck. I am fortunate to live in an area where all the stores I shop at are close by and en route to places I end up in my day-to-day travels, so shopping at three different stores isn't all that inconvenient for me. (I understand that this might not work for everyone... back when my kids were little, and errands where a bit more of a project, I did one-stop shopping once a week at one store, as the convenience factor outweighed the extra expense.) Since I shop in several places, I set my list up by store, with a post-it note, if needed, to add any additional items. I wanted something small, that I could slip ealiy into my bag, so I formatted the list to fit on a half-sheet of paper, which fits perfectly on the small memo-sized clipboard I picked up from the clearance bin at Staples.

This Master List saves me oodles of time, and it saves paper, as I'm not writing up a whole new list each week. My whole shopping routine just feels much more streamlined and efficient now.

Next post: a little update on our Winter Gardening! In addition to preparing for a cold frame, we've also set up a little indoor gardening area. Pics and details, soon!