FIN

I screwed the tops on 14 pints of salsa today, and officially declared the canning season here on the roof over.
We did not too bad this year, canning more varieties of stuff than ever before. Still, for next season I'm hoping that we can get a pressure canner (do you hear that, Santa?) and I can go way above and beyond what we did this year. However, between Picklepalooza (dills, bread and butter pickles and relish,) peaches, apple sauce, blueberry jam and salsa, I'd say we did OK.
I'm also over the top excited about my new little basement "pantry," even though we ran out of room half way through the season (there's a bunch of pickles stacked on the floor, and the salsa is still cooling in the kitchen.)

There's also a bushel of tomatoes that were blanched, peeled and put in the freezer, because I ran out of time to can them all before they went off! Good thing though, because we wouldn't have had room for them!

I didn't freeze as much as I could have this year, there were a lot of beans that could have been salvaged, and I'm sorry that I didn't cut the kale more often and freeze it. However, there is a whole pile of blueberries in the freezer, and even more strawberries to get us through the winter.

There are still a ton of potatoes in the garden that haven't been dug, and a wheelbarrow full of squash sitting at my back door. Seriously, a wheelbarrow. What the hell am I going to do with a wheelbarrow full of squash??!! I'm considering digging the potatoes and trying to store them in the basement somewhere cool, but I'm not sure if it's actually cold enough in the basement for them. Anyone have any potato storage tips?

(By the way, this year's salsa? Is AWESOME! It's got a nice kick, with a bit of a smokey flavour thanks to some chipotle chili pepper I tossed in there at the last minute.)

So, when winter's frigid hand finally strikes, we'll be the ones sitting around eating salsa and sweet Ontario peaches, tasting the fresh tastes of summer all over again. You know where we are, if you want to come and join us!

Everything's Blooming

My seedlings....
My purple tulips...
The yellow flower tree that my sleep deprived brain can't think of the name of.... (We had a repeat of the Corbenathon from 11pm till 12:30am last night.)
My Hostas...
The pine trees....
And yes, even the dandelions.
And even the kid!

New Crib

For the past few months, we have had a family heirloom perched next to our bed. This cradle has been handed down through the generations. My mother and (I'm assuming) most of her siblings slept in this cradle. My brother and I, and most of my cousins slept in this cradle. Griffin, and his cousin Peter slept in this cradle too.

Corben has slept in the cradle too...for a grand total of about 10 minutes. He seems to be more of a "body heat" kinda guy, and much prefers being cuddled in the bed with us. However, my chiropractor seems to think that snuggling with my little bug could possibly be at the root of my new found migraines. The thought is that I may be tensing up without even realizing it, and thus causing myself grief.

I'm not willing to give up co-sleeping just yet, but decided there was maybe a better way. So today, I set about to build a sidecar crib.

The fact that I was able to take on such a task is a testament to the exceptionality (is that a word? It is now!) of my baby.

The great thing is I was able to do it completely with materials we had here at the house, with the exception of one little piece of wood that I have tasked Steve with stealing from the theatre he's currently at. This piece of wood is missing, but other than that it's finished, and my angel is currently sound asleep in his new crib as we speak!

I won't be winning any awards in Better Homes and Gardens for this thing, but it's safe, and will hopefully serve it's purpose of keeping Corben close enough for heat, for snuggling, and for nursing.

Corben tests it out, not quite dry!
Where my baby is now...
So that's that. A successful day. And now if you'll excuse me, I have to go clean up this before my husband gets home:P.S. Honey, I think we need a bigger shop!

Harvest Saturday

Whee - a new look! I'm testing out some new backgrounds, in preparation for a BIG CHANGE at this here blog. In honour of my 3rd Blogoversary, which silently slipped by unnoticed last week, I'm splurging for a new template....I'm SO excited! I can hardly believe I've been at this for three years! And here we are, 3 years after that first post, doing the same thing we did then - harvesting! (At least this time it's from my OWN garden...)

Yesterday I went and picked all the "leftovers" out of the garden in fear of a heavy frost. I had NO idea that there was still so much stuff in the garden! Do you SEE this bucket...it's taller than the bread maker! I spent the entire day in the kitchen yesterday...unfortunately my garden picking was the LAST thing I did - should have been the first - thinking there was nothing in the garden, I stupidly bought $15.00 worth of tomatoes yesterday morning for this little project:Can you say SALSA??!! 3 batches of it, all currently in mason jars, heat processed, and awaiting transportation to my cellar. Or awaiting someone to maybe BUILD me a cellar, since I have no where to put all this stuff! Not to mention the 10 jars of strawberry jam that have been hanging out on the buffet since strawberry season, or the dozen or so jars of pickles that are hanging out at Cara's house. OR the massive pot of squash soup that I made today, waiting to be ladled into jars as we speak. Hope y'all like preserves - they're whats for Christmas!We also spent a few minutes doing some pre-Halloween testing here yesterday. I have no intention of taking Griffin out on Halloween, but I bought this cute helmet cover a few weeks back, and then came across a little cuddly lion outfit at Value Village on Friday and couldn't resist. I think we'll hit the Halloween party in Orangeville on the 25th, just for the sake of parading this bundle of CUTE around town. We'll skip the candy and the cold night, stick to the daylight fun.

Seriously, how adorable is my kid??

Picture This

Oh, how I would love love LOVE to show you the pile of potatoes that I just picked out of my OWN GARDEN! I would be thrilled to share with you the mass quantities of squash that are climbing up the garden fence (hope y'all like squash...it's what's for christmas!) I'd show you the piles upon piles of tomatoes that are slowly thinking about ripening on their vines. And I'd give you an uber close up of the one eggplant that is growing, because you have to get pretty uber close to see it...it's that tiny! For contrast, I'd show you the pitiful corn that never made it past 3 feet tall, and the beets that for some reason reached pebble size, and then quit. Can you picture it all? You'll have to trust me when I say it's a beautiful sight to behold!

My garden is making me so happy right now, and even though I only spent about 26 minutes out there tonight (the minutes between toddler crashing time, and "It's so dark I don't know if I'm pulling weeds or veggies" time,) and even though I'm pretty sure I got a mosquito bite for each minute I was out there, there's nothing that quite beats the satisfaction of pulling fresh produce out of your very own back yard!

Detoxify

So I'm doing this "cleanse." Basically it means taking some fancy colon cleansing herbs and total body cleansing herbs, drinking enough water to float the damn ark on, and starving myself to death for 7 days. Awesome!

OK, so I'm not EXACTLY starving...but when you eat mostly fruits and veggies for days on end, it's pretty tough to feel FULL at the end of the day. I must confess in increasing the portion sizes maybe by a tad...after all, it says the meal plan is for a 150lb person....so if I was doing this cleanse when I was TWENTY I would go by their portions, but since I'm not a good 10 years and a few pounds past 20, I feel like it's OK if I maybe eat a bit more.

I have no idea if it's working. I feel no different. I have a little less energy than usual, but that's maybe because I have to walk to the toilet at least 47 times a day. Although, if smelly farts are an indication of successful detoxification, then it's working REALLY WELL!

Luckily, I'm on this plan till Saturday, so I'll have plenty of chances to "share my success" with my new co-workers at my new job which starts on Wednesday. How to make friends and influence people at your new job....yeaaaah. Actually, this could work to my advantage - if I'm really lucky, I may fart myself right into my own office, rather than forcing everyone else to suffer by stinking up the cubicle farm...SUH-WEET!!

The "E" Word

It's the younger brother of the F word, and not nearly as foul, but the consequences of uttering it in a crowed room could clear the room just as fast. (OK, not really, but you get my point...)

I think my kid has Eczema.

I have been hearing a lot about eczema lately, it's been a heavy topic on the neighbourhood (not mine) list serve. I DREAD eczema, and anything that may possibly be food allergy related. The thought of food allergies in my family makes me tremble in my boots! OK, we mostly don't do dairy, and we've dealt with that just fine, but having to figure out if soy, wheat, fish or eggs needs to be eliminated from our diet sounds about as much fun as poking plastic (toxic plastic...there's another can of worms) forks in my eyes!

Seriously, all you gluten free-ers, and celiacs out there who successfully abstain from all the things that make you go coo coo, I have only the heartiest admiration for you. (And did you know that the spell checker has never even HEARD of you people?? You should tell them!!) I tried once to eliminate wheat, but I like to eat, and I have the will power of a gnat, and if you place a big bowl of chocolate and stomach cramps next to a big bowl of no chocolate and no stomach cramps, I'd choose the full bowl of coco coated crampy goodness any day!

So, now the kid has potential food allergies. Which means he's going to have to abstain, which means I too am going to have to abstain, and that just takes the fun out of everything! That'll darn near ruin christmas!

I think, I think the first step is to eliminate all the CRAP that he gets fed at daycare. We LOVE LOVE LOVE our daycare lady, and every little thing about her, but the food that G eats there is not quite what we're used to eating here. And understandably so, as this woman feeds a hoard at lunch, including my hollowed leg little trucker, and no one has time to pop homemade organic scones for 8 into the oven, while stirring the vegetarian lentil stew and wrangling 8 screeching kids. So the kids eat processed pizza from boxes. And foods of a similar vein. Now don't get me wrong, there's certainly no homemade organic scones baking in my oven, or veggie lentil stew simmering on my stove, but there is homemade bread from the bread machine. And vegetables, sometimes even grown in my own garden, and I think that's what we have to get back to.

If you were a daycare lady, would you be offended if someone sent their kid to you and started packing them their own lunch? I mean, that's the simplest thing to do right? She doesn't have to cook different for the whole brood, just feed my little rabbit his chopped up melon, and the other kids get their pizza and hot dogs and mac and cheese, and we'll all be happy!!

And in the mean time, I need something to clear this up. Suggestions?

Spring, I can taste it!

My friend Cara and I just spent a marathon afternoon wading through seed catalogues, choosing the best and the top varieties of EVERY VEGETABLE IMAGINABLE to plant in our vegetable gardens. Oh my! Our list was longer than I ever could have imagined, and included just a little bit of everything.

Last year we both got to our gardens way too late in the season - they both had to be tilled from scratch, and things like babies and toddlers and stuff got in the way, and before we knew it, it was June, and there were still no plants in the ground. But this year is going to be different. This year, we're ON TOP of things, as evidenced by our January seed ordering!

So, this year we're going whole hog right off the bat. We're going to divide and conquer, plant some things at our house, some at hers, see what grows best where, and then split the spoils. First off though, we're going to order the seeds, and get a whole whack of them in seed trays, and set them up to do their thing in Cara's south facing windows of her living room. Because if there is one thing this house is lacking, it's south facing windows. Strange, eh? Who would build a house with the majority of the windows on the north side? Not ME, that's who!

This January garden planning is kind of nice. It seems somehow appropriate, since around christmas time it felt like I had been sewing presents since July. Christmas in July, spring in January. It's ideal really, and gives me something to look forward to!

I can taste the melons, strawberries, romaine lettuce, pole beans, peas, eggplant, spanish onions, red onions, green onions, leeks, spinach, basil, carrots, pumpkins, corn, asparagus, cukes, eggplant, zucchini, tomatoes, peppers, and beets (phewf!) now!

Just in the (Saint) Nick of Time.

I. Am. Finished.

The christmas crafting, it's done. Phewf. I never did get around to making a christmas ornament for Griffin, but I've decided it may be a nice hand stitching project for christmas day, sitting around by the fire and handmade this year.

So pretty much everyone on our list is getting a homemade gift of some sort this year....with a few exceptions, one being my sister-in-law...I started the same project for her over and over again, screwed it up about 3 times, and finally tossed it to the wind tonight after ripping apart a seam and putting a big tear in the fabric in the process....maybe it just wasn't meant to be! Sorry Stace...I made some very cute things for your son, if it's any consolation!

So that's it. Handmade Holidays are wrapped (all in handmade fabric bags, I might add!) and awaiting the big day. Hope your christmas crafting is done, and that you didn't have to throw anything away! Happy holidays everyone!

Natural Toys

If you still have some christmas shopping to do for any wee ones in your lives, may I point you to my new favourite place: Nova Natural Toys and Crafts. After perusing their website a few weeks ago, I ordered their catalogue. It is the most beautiful, artful catalogue that I have ever seen, on very scrumptious paper. And I've seen a few catalogues in my life (OK, I kind of love them!) and this is my favourite by far. Their toys are stunning. Most are produced with natural renewable resources, like wood, wool and silk. Fantastic hand made dolls (they would be great for little ones expecting siblings) tons of wooden toys of all shapes and sizes, just too much to tell you about! Go check it out!

A Mei Tai for Kater

While in Ottawa we had a chance to visit Kater and Cameron, as well as to deliver Kater's new Mei Tai, made by me! This picture hardly shows off all the beautious colours on the back of it, and even though Cameron looks less than impressed in this photo, he did seem to enjoy his new carrier!

Kater also presented us with a hand knit wool diaper cover, which I am happy to say is keeping us and our bed dry. Most nights. Last night not so much, but I think that's my little pee-king's fault...that kid wets like no other baby I know - I can wring out his diapers in the morning! Promising pictures soon...it's really the cutest thing!

Today's Challenge

So. I need a name. Most of you know that I've been in the process of doing my doula training, and it's getting on time to start printing brochures and business cards, getting a website and all that. I had one in my head, I don't love it, and it turns out that the domain name is taken...so it must be a sign!

I do however, have a logo - here it is. OK, here is isn't. Blogger is being a poophead again! Maybe later...How about I describe it for you - it's a single line figure of a woman, a pregnant woman to be precise, with her arms reaching up into the air - her arms turn into a Celtic knot like version of branches, and her legs turn into a similar version of tree roots. Jeez...hard to describe. I'll post it later.

So here's what I'm all about, to help you be inspired - I'll be working specifically as a Postpartum Doula, and perhaps Antenatal Doula as well (helps Mom/Family BEFORE baby comes, most often in situations where mom is on bedrest, disabled, etc.) I plan to add Prenatal classes, as well as BabyWearing workshops in the future. So where it is a Mom centred service, it certainly does reach out to baby, and family as well.

Here's a little blurb from the DONA International Website, about what we Postpartum Doulas do:

In traditional societies women and men grow up around birth, breastfeeding, infants and children. After giving birth, women are surrounded by caring family members who have a great deal of experience and wisdom to offer. This kind of help is rarely available to new parents internationally. The doula’s support is intended to fill the gaps left by our customary postpartum practices, which usually include only medical procedures, occasional checkups and the purchase of baby-related paraphernalia. The doula’s education, quiet support and guidance are a manifestation of the traditional postpartum support that our society is missing.

Doulas are trained in postpartum adjustment, newborn characteristics, care, feeding and development, and the promotion of parent-infant bonding. They are experienced in supporting families through their postpartum experience. Coming into the home during the fourth trimester following birth, the doula’s role is to provide education, non-judgmental support and companionship, and to assist with newborn care and family adjustment, meal preparation and light household tasks. Postpartum doulas offer evidence-based information on infant feeding, emotional and physical recovery from birth, infant soothing and coping skills for new parents and can make appropriate referrals when necessary.

The doula can serve as a "buffer" for new parents, who receive a great deal of unsolicited and possibly outdated advice. The doula can help friends and family members to foster and support the parenting decisions of the new parents. By modeling a deep respect for the wisdom and decision making abilities of the new parents, she makes clear that supporting them in their own choices will have the best possible results.
By dedicating herself to the family in this way, the doula validates and enhances the parents’ intuitive ability to nurture and encourages them to develop and implement their own parenting style.

My "Company Name" needs to be short. It needs to be catchy. It needs to have an available domain name! I'll take all your suggestions. I've you've never commented before, NOW IS THE TIME! If I pick your name, I'll make you something pritty....how's that for a deal??

OK, off you go and be creative!!

Thanks!

Making Art

Another trek into the smelly city today, another tired tired Mama. But good tired, today I went out there and made art. Or Stage Managed art anyway. It's nice to be back out there in the theatre world. It took me a few moments to remember how to do it, but I'm back!

And now for today's obligatory post (this whole post once a day stuff is actually harder than I thought it would be, but I am enjoying it!)

NaBloPoMo has certainly brought more traffic here to The Roof. As a result, I too have ventured out further into the blogosphere and found more and more people that I want to keep reading about. Someone makes a comment, you head over to their site, like what you read, make a comment, check out their blogroll, go here and there, make another comment, and so the cycle continues! It's a ton of fun, and my list of faves is growing longer every day.

From someones blog (I can't even remember who now!) I also linked over to this yesterday - you'll see the badge over there in the sidebar. I think this is a WONDERFUL idea!! The more surfing I do, the more people I find out there crafting beautiful handmade things. As a result, I also have been sewing more and more, wishing to be one of those makers of beautiful things. I have been stewing in my head for a few weeks now about what sort of holiday gifties I can make for everyone on our list, and have come up with a little something for almost everyone who we normally shop for. I'm not saying that every single gift under the tree is going to be handmade, but my goal is to have quite a few of them. I encourage you to do the same - get out there and buy handmade! Or even better, buy local handmade! Our area of the world is teeming with artists, and we should be taking advantage of this whenever we can.

Thats it for me, I'm pooched.

Oh, one last thing - Griffin hit the 14 month mark yesterday - I wasn't sure I'd continue the monthly letters, and didn't do one last month, but now am reconsidering. Look for one in the next few days!

And for the very last thing - it was kind of half raining, half SNOWING tonight. Winter, she's a'commin!

OK, done.

Clean This!

Last week I had a cleaning lady come for a visit to give us a quote on cleaning our house once every 2 weeks. Tonight she called me and told me she "didn't think it was going to work out." The reason? I had asked if she would use our non-toxic cleaning products, as well as asked for a reduction in her price since she would be using our stuff. She didn't feel comfortable with this, and said that she couldn't guarantee the same results without using the chemical products she normally uses. Huh? You can't guarantee me respiratory illness, central nervous system depression, asthma? You can't clean my house because I'm asking you to use products that are safe for my family, not to mention safe for you??

If it's cancer vs a dirty toilet, I'll take the dirty toilet please!!

Diaper Dilemmas

Last week I went out and bought a wool sweater and cut it up into pieces to make a wool soaker. It worked OK for the first half of the night, but by the morning the bed was all wet. I don't know what went wrong. First off, Griffin is a HEAVY HEAVY wetter. The other night I tried a G Diaper instead of a cloth soaker and I could have rung both of them out in the morning - they were DRIPPING wet. Last night I put a cloth soaker inside a disposable. That actually worked. But I really want to get this wool soaker thing figured out. The sweater didn't shrink that much when I washed it, so something tells me it's not as much wool as I thought it was. But I did buy a second sweater, this one claims to be 70% wool, and it hardly shrank either. So what gives?

AHHHH...this is driving me crazy!

Here's a few pictures of a VERY tired boy and his new "Lederhosen" as Steve has taken to calling them. They're actually a bit too small too. Baby's bottom is larger than I though!

Cloth Diaper SOS

So I know that there are cloth users out there reading this, and I need your advice.

We recently got back on the cloth bandwagon, we had been off for a while waiting for a shipment of bigger diapers to arrive. But we're having wrap issues. Leaking leaking everywhere! The irritating thing is it's not always - some mornings G. wakes up dry as a bone (well, aside from what's in the diaper) and other mornings he wakes up wet wet wet - like this morning, when he woke at 6:30, his jammies were soaked, crib was soaked and he was frozen! I'm surprised he slept that long! We use 2 diapers at night, one as a soaker, and one BIG one as a diaper. Some mornings the diapers aren't even totally wet, but there are still leaking issues.

Leaking onto clothes and jammies left right and centre, plus the diapers themselves makes for WAAAY more laundry than I signed on for!

So what kind of covers are you in love with? I'm currently using the Kushies covers, they're big, which is great, because adding 2 big fat diapers to an already big bottom means we need lots to cover it, and the Kushies covers do. But all this leaking, not to mention the joys of changing a soaking wet, cold, less than impressed with life baby at 6am...well, it's driving me mad! And driving me back to disposables, which I don't want to do!

I was thinking maybe I should go with wool covers - anybody have any insight on them? Anybody ever made them? Knit, or sewn with felted wool perhaps?

I have tried the Bummis covers, but they seem to leak too. It could also be a hard water, or detergent issue I suppose. I just don't want to go spending gazillions of dollars that we don't have on covers that suck!

Help!