New Year!

Happy New Year to all our friends and family! 2009 was a spectacular year - the highlights being the purchase of our land and welcoming our wonderful daughter, Flora. The last few weeks have been a nice wind down time. Less hours at work due to the holidays, and I've had a 2 week break from teaching too, which frees up my time after work. In 2009 one of my goals (documented here last January) was to learn to crochet. I started it, but as it goes, it fell to the side. During my pregnancy I vowed to crochet - that didn't happen. During my maternity leave I vowed to crochet, the closest I got was getting the yarn and hook out. It then sat on the end table in the living room for the next 2 months. Frustrating. I want to learn, but time always seems to have the last laugh. I told Tim that during the last two weeks of the year I NEED to crochet....and he made it so! He reminded me and helped me find time. And, I made my most complex project yet - a hat!!! I love it! It's warm, and cute - at least I think so. Also, the great thing about this project is that it gave me confidence I needed to keep crocheting. Another thing is that I feel as though I'm actually "getting" it....before I was just following the instructions, now I get why I'm doing things a certain way. It's exciting to think about new projects - I have a few planned for 2010. Tim has put in a hat request, so I am going to make his next. Here is my project (Tim's won't have the flower):

P.S. The blog has a new look. The white text on blue background got too hard for me to read...seriously, I'm getting old. Hope you all enjoy the new look. HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Game/Reading Night

When Flora was born, we felt our days and nights completely change in pace. As it was, we didn't do much TV viewing during the week. If we are watching the TV, it's either Thursday night "Office" or a movie we've rented from Netflix. But, sometimes we would find we had a moment, and the tv would go on for lack of better things to do. Now, we have a better solution: Game Nights! We are finding that it didn't work to say that these nights are always Monday and Saturday, but we have been trying to spend at least one night a week playing a game together (usually after Flora's sleeping...she's not into Scrabble - yet.) Games are fun, and generally require some thought. Both good things :) We usually end up playing our favorites - Scrabble, Sorry, Spite and Malice, Farkle....this last weekend we played Monopoly for a change of pace. First, I kicked Tim's butt, and then he kicked mine. Here's a snapshot of how the first game went. Me on left, Tim on right.

We hope to keep this up as a family tradition - games, at least once a week! Having wind-down time is so important when it seems like all there is to do is working, running errands, and keeping busy one way or another. Games have been a way to unwind, while having fun, not just sitting in a vegetative state in front of the tv screen.

An Autumn Visit

Usually during this time of year we take a week long road-trip vacation to celebrate our anniversary. This year, due to our amazing girl Flora, we felt best foregoing the week long trip. Too hard to travel for that amount of time with a 1-mo old, 2 dogs, ourselves and luggage. Instead, we went out for a nice dinner on our anniversary, and then this past weekend, we took our last trip for the season up to White Sky Woods. We did just one night. We left the dogs at home with my Mom who watched them, and we headed out early Saturday morning, all packed up and with baby in the back seat. Since the heat in our camper is somewhat unreliable when it comes to providing a constant temperature, we felt it safest to stay at a hotel, and then spend the days at our property. On the way up, there was snow! The night before had left about 4 inches of snow in central U.P., but once we got closer to the Keweenaw, there was no snow and lots of fall color! Since the climate zone on the peninsula is the same as where we live here in WI, it was prime color viewing for those fall leaves. We headed directly to White Sky Woods. Wow! It looked so different from our last visit over Labor Day weekend. It's always wonderful, but the colors on the trees were just amazing. The color was from the ground up. Lots of leaves on the ground, colorful grasses, and brilliantly colored trees. The most impressive were the tamaracks, which were a bright sunny yellow color. On saturday we hiked our cleared (okay - semi-cleared) trails and spent a little time in the camper for Flora's feeding since it started to drizzle outside. When it got dark, we checked into our hotel. We ordered pizza from a local place - it was delicious...maybe some of the best delivery pizza I ever had. Later, Tim went swimming while Flora and I watched.

The next day we went back to our property and decided to do some off trail exploring. Tim carried Flora in the front pack both days, which worked out great. She loved it, the motion lulls her to sleep. We found some areas of our property that have older hardwoods, along with Cedar and different types of conifers. Tim's eye caught one of our forest creatures. A blue-spotted salamander! Cool looking little salamander. We found a dilapidated hunting shack that a tree fell on. It appeared the shack was built around the tree. Hmm. We then headed back to the camper. While I fed Flora, Tim picked lots of apples! We have tons of apple trees with a variety of apples. The best looking apples were Golden Delicious apples. He also picked a lot of apples that will be better suited for baking. So, this week, I have a project on my hands! I will be dehydrating a portion of the apples for healthy snacking, not sure about the rest yet. Before we left, we also talked to the neighbors for an hour of so. They told us about 2 wolf encounters they had this summer. Overall, it was another great trip to White Sky Woods! Can't wait to go back...

Back pasture.

In the forest.

All bundled up!

Snow! On the way up, but no snow at the property :)

Spotted blue salamander.

Pumpkin Project

On Saturday we went to out local grocer who annually has Pumpkin Blowout. Local pumpkins for $2 each! We purchased three pumpkins and then planned to carve them. I can't remember the last time I carved a pumpkin. I painted a pumpkin in college with a little girl I mentored, but that's my most recent memory, and that was almost 10 years ago. We had a carving kit that we purchased a few years ago and got underway with our Pumpkin Project. Tim carved one pumpkin and I carved another, so we each had our own unique design. The third pumpkin became Flora's. She slept through the whole project, but since she's less than a month old, I don't suspect she could have done much with her pumpkin :) The pumpkins turned out awesome! Also, we saved the seeds and roasted them. Yum! Here's some shots from the Pumpkin Project. The final night picture with them light up shows mine on the left, Tim's in the middle, and Flora's on the right :)

Fall Splendor

Fall is here! The average temperature during the day has been in the high 50's and there have even been 2 frosts overnight. We covered the garden as best we could and seemed to save it. When it hasn't been raining, I've been taking walks with Flora in the afternoon. I love fall! The changing colors and the crispness in the air. When the sun is out, you can almost feel your body soaking it up, regardless of the slight chill in the air. Hands down, this is my favorite season. I was up for the early sunrise last week and captured this picture of our backyard. There is steam rising off the river and the colors on the trees are slightly changed. Beautiful!

Drying Clothes, Saving Money

Since we live in a village, we have sewer and water. We get a bill quarterly for our usage and it's typically only within dollars of the month prior. We had a bit of a surprise this past bill as it was almost $20 more than usual. Since in the past three months we had baby on the way, we were doing a lot of laundry. All the clothes we received used or new were washed, all bedding, etc. Lots of wash! And, now that Flora is here, I'm still doing just as much laundry. It's amazing how many clothing changes this little gal will have in one day! The bummer about being hooked up to the village sewer and water is that you pay for the water that comes in AND the water that goes out. At this point, I don't see any decline in our water bill.

The good news is that we have a process that helps offset this new cost! This past summer, we purchased an outdoor clothes hanging dryer for under $40. We successfully hung about every load of laundry on it to dry in the warm sun and fresh breeze. Now that the weather has quickly turned from summer to fall, the opportunity to dry laundry outside has pretty much disappeared. Time to move clothes drying inside...without using the dryer. For our baby shower, we registered for a drying rack for drying Flora's cloth diapers. Air drying is supposed to help them last longer. We actually received two racks and were happy to keep both. We can hang more than just diapers! Then, we received another, larger drying rack for Flora - so we have three. I am so happy we do! We have a perfect space for these drying racks right by the patio door where they can get sunlight to help dry. We have enough drying racks to hang 2 loads of laundry. Although you need some patience for the drying process, it saves the cost of 2 - 60+ minutes drying cycles in the electric dryer.

It feels good to offset costs, and be good to the environment. In the process, we are also putting some free humidity into our home now that the heat is on and drying things out. Here's a shot of our drying set up.

Our Baby!!

WE HAVE A BABY!!

Flora May Reitz

5 lbs. 15 oz.

18.5 in. long

born 09/15/09

at 7:15 AM

To everything....turn, turn, turn....

The title is appropriate lyrics by The Byrds to sing to our baby, who is still in breech position. Since she hasn't yet turned, we are now scheduled for a c-section. They simply won't deliver a breech baby naturally - too risky. So, unless this little one moves out of breech on her own, she will be welcomed into our big world on Tuesday, Sept. 15th. :) Wow! What an amazing step forward in this process! I guess I never really expected to know in advance what day would be her birthday...but it's now right around the corner! We are so excited to welcome our little one into the world and we have a lot of love waiting for her! Tim has been working on some final things at home and I have been doing as much as I can from the couch or kitchen table. Today I cored and diced about 100 tomatoes which Tim then took care of the rest of the canning. We have just about everything checked off our to-do list...it feels good! For most of Sunday we can relax. Monday, we both complete a full day of work before leaving bright and early on Tuesday morning for the birth of our baby.

Early in our pregnancy we hired a doula to help us with labor assistance. Since it doesn't appear we are going the labor route (not by choice or without trying all other means!), our Doula has given us the option of being there for the c-section and post-op, or for a post-partum trade out. We have decided to have her with us for the c-section and post-op. She will be an extremely important person in keeping us calm and collected while I'm prepped for the operating room. She will be in the O.R. with us, allowing someone to always be by my side and then she will stick around afterwards to get the bonding process going with our little one, help get breastfeeding established, and just help out in general. I am so happy to have someone with us who has supported this type of situation and knows Tim and I. I know the nurses will be simply amazing, but we are really another patient to them. Our doula knows us as people.


I had planned on having music during labor, but since the c-section was planned, I gave up on the idea. Our doula suggested that we still plan to have music and keep the mood relaxed with dimmed lights, etc. for the pre-op. I'm working now on the music compilation. I'm keeping it upbeat/relaxed to stay positive. Between Tim, myself, and our doula - we will make the c-section a positive experience, considering it's major surgery! I pray that all goes safely and well and that the recovery is quick and comfortable. Also, that our little one is healthy and happy when she arrives!

The day is almost here!

Moderate Bed Rest in the U.P.

Wow - life's plans have taken a bit of a different direction this past week. At my last Dr. appointment my blood pressure was up, so now I'm on "moderate" bed rest. This means that I'm supposed to be at home relaxing, sitting, no errands, no chores, etc. Thankfully, my employer has been so flexible with me and is allowing me to work from home full-time on my laptop. Working from home is actually going very well, feeling productive and accomplished. Also, at the last appointment, we found out that our dear daughter is still quite comfortable in her breech position. We did a lot of homeopathic attempts to have her turn prior to this revelation, and nothing worked. So, our next option was to go in for an external version to have them attempt to manually turn her. They tried with all their might for 45 minutes and she didn't want to budge. So, at this time, she's still breech. Unless she turns on her own, we will be scheduling a c-section. This has been a bit defeating to me, but I understand that we need to do what is the best route for safe delivery and that our goal outcome is a healthy baby! We have all the love in the world waiting for her when she arrives!

Over labor day weekend was our last opportunity to go visit our favorite place before baby arrives, White Sky Woods. We left on Friday evening so we would have a few full days instead of traveling Saturday morning. Our trip was so well needed. Since I'm on moderate bed rest, I did nothing but relax. We read, listened to NPR, played games, napped. Tim finished one last thing on the outhouse to have it winter ready. It was a great weekend to unwind, relax physically and mentally, and slow down the pace of life before our baby arrives. Here is my favorite photo from the weekend. I took this when I woke up from an outdoor nap under the apple tree. The sun was shining so brilliantly illuminating the leaf. Oh, we also saw our friend - Paulie the Porcupine! He was chilling out up in one of the Aspen trees.

Blueberries!

We returned Sunday night from another great, and extended 3-day weekend at White Sky Woods. It was rainy on Friday and a bit overcast on Saturday, but Sunday was simply amazing. 70 and sunny - blue as blue sky. The Sunday theme must have been blue. Blue sky - blueberries. We discovered a month or so ago that there are patches of blueberry bushes on our property...but until they came ripe just recently, we didn't know how many! Wild blueberries - everywhere! They are sweeter and smaller than the grocery store variety - simply delicious. We had a couple of gallon pails up there for just this type of event, so we went picking. After over an hour of picking, we had a full gallon of blueberries. The dogs also ate their fair share - straight off the bush! We have the blueberries home now and all the supplies to make jam. We will reap the benefits from our beautiful day of picking all winter long :) UPDATE: Tim made 10 half-pints of blueberry jam and we still have more blueberries left over which I will make blueberry bran muffins with and freeze so we can thaw and eat as we please.

Cloth Diapering

Upon finding out we are pregnant, we made the decision to try to keep our earth-friendly practices consistent with baby. She deserves less chemicals (food and body products), more natural remedies in life and also the privilege to leave behind a smaller carbon footprint (in a literal and figurative sense!). One of the decisions we made was to choose cloth diapering. In doing research, I couldn't believe how far cloth diapering had advanced since when I was a kid. There were many options and all different styles. These new cloth diapers are no different than putting on disposable diapers, expect that you reuse them over and over again. No pins, no special folding...just put it on the baby and velcro up. The great thing about the type we chose (BumGenius 3.0) is that they are one size fits all...adjustable to your growing baby.

So, we made the purchase and now we have over 30 diapers in a variety of colors to keep us going. No running to the store because we ran out of diapers. No wasteful piling of garbage. No spending thousands on diapers. It's shown that it will cost around $2,000 to diaper a baby through their time prior to potty training. Our cloth diapers were $500, plus the cost of laundering, which is simply water and slight cost of laundry soap (since we make our own). We have drying racks to air dry the diapers which will keep them in good condition longer - so no electricy costs on that front either. We were excited when our delivery arrived via FedEx! We ordered with a special discount that was running through clothdiaperoutlet.com. The husband/wife duo had excellent service and shipping was free. They have many natural products for baby care and other earth-friendly solutions on her site. There a few more purchases we plan to make with them, including wetbags (nylon bag to put dirty diaper in on-the-go) and reusable diaper pail liners that can be washed with the diapers.

It feels good to be eco-friendly and save money :)

Unique Plants

We are blessed to have our piece of paradise in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Although we haven't even seen all our property yet (or is it possible to ever!), we've been able to do some exploring! Tim's seen more than me since he's not pregnant and has much more energy and mental-will to take him around :) A few trips back, we had Tim's Mom, Aunt, & Uncle visiting and Tim when exploring with his Uncle while I napped. Tim came back with pictures of plants that many people might never encounter including lady slippers, rare mushrooms, and the carnivorous plant - Pitcher Plant. I've never seen lady slippers in the wild, but last year Tim and I did see Pitcher Plants in a bog we visited in Minnesota. What a unique plant! It produces a sticky type of material which bugs will land in and then the plant digests the bug. Amazing such thing could even grow in Upper Michigan where 6 months out of the year there is snow on the ground! When Tim saw the pitcher plant on our property, he even saw it when it was blooming. What a beautiful sight!

I saw the pictures and knew that next year I would be able to go back and see them with my own eyes. Well, somehow on our last trip Tim convinced me and our visitors that it was a short/easy trip. Not without complaint, we FINALLY got to a pitcher plant (he had marked it on the GPS). I was the only one complaining...my 8 months pregnant body didn't want anything to do with the trip, and my mind really got at me. It wasn't too bad of a hike for our friends or dogs, but was a different story for me! I can't quite paint a good picture of the trip, but imagine being stuck in a dense jungle with no path to follow. That's what this was like...but less tropical :) Looking back now, it was kinda funny...but I definitely pushed myself a bit too much that day. Anyhow, we found the picther plant, and it was beautiful! We also came across many other cool things - living and dead. Several deer skeleton's and also a pretty big pile of poops...maybe bear? We saw Cedar Trees, Spruce, Tamarak, and some hardwoods. Quigley found himself a deer foot to run around with, so he was happy as pie.

It's simply amazing how many different things you can find when you are looking on just a small piece of land in the realm of an entire region, country, continent, world! I recently read an article that reminded me of how cool it is to discover something. Explorers found the largest pitcher plant yet. It can eat rats! Here's the article: Giant Meat-Eating Plant Found

Here also are some pictures taken at our favorite place - White Sky Woods!

Cedar Trees

Pitcher Plants on the property. This is a grouping of several with some of them flowering!

Pink Lady Slipper on the property.

Gourmet by Lisa

Yummy, easy, quick, and healthy dinner from the weekend.

1.) Set aside 2 large tortillas.
2.) Cut up zucchini and mushrooms. Saute Garlic, zucchini and mushrooms with Olive Oil.

3.) Rinse black beans. Rinse quartered artichoke hearts.

4.) Smear light layer of cream cheese on half of one side of each tortilla.
5.) Cut up into small pieces or shred your favorite cheese.
6.) Put sauteed zucchini and mushrooms on 1/2 of tortilla (on top of cream cheese). Add black beans and artichokes. Top with Cheese. Fold Tortilla in 1/2. Put in toaster oven or conventional oven for about 5 minutes at 350....or until cheese is melted and tortilla has slight browning.
7.) Enjoy with fresh fruit!

The great thing about this meal is that you can really put whatever you want in the tortilla! I also really like artichoke hearts, black olives, tomatoes and sprinkled with basil. Yum. Try your own version. What would you like on yours? Share in comments if you feel so compelled!

Passing it on...

Through the pregnancy, it's been tempting to buy cute baby clothes, but we've done a good job controlling that.  We only have a few pieces.  We figured people always like to buy cute outfits, even when what you REALLY need is practical things, so that's what we've avoided buying clothing for her.   Well, wow, generosity has taken place in a serious manner.  One of my coworkers has a daughter who was born in late August a few years ago.  That means that the sizing and season of her daughter's clothes will be similar to our needs.  She said she would bring some stuff in that she would like to get rid of.  People say these kinds of things, so I wasn't counting on it.  Monday when I came in, there were 3 BIG boxes by my desk.  All clothes!   We are officially set on clothing for our daughter  - at least for the first year and a half!    She passed on everything from newborn to 18 months!  We have lots of great things from shoes to onesies to sleepers to bibs.  My mom also had picked up some cute things to contribute to our clothing needs last time I saw her.  We are so blessed to have all this wonderful stuff without having to acquire it on our own.  Attached is a picture of just SOME the great stuff my coworker passed on....this picture is only newborn to 6 months, huge stacks!  Even though she said she didn't want any money, I plan to do something nice for her.   This was such a nice gesture and needs to be noticed :)

This is a cool thing about bats and moths if you like that kinda thing :)

Scifri Videos: Moths Can Escape Bats By Jamming Sonar

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10 Things You Should Avoid

"What you choose to buy or not buy has a tremendous impact on the world we share. Every year, the average American household will spend $17,000 on basics including food, clothing, body care, housewares etc. Now imagine that every dollar spent went toward promoting healthy, organic food; ending sweatshops and promoting Fair Trade; and creating a national marketplace for green products. That’s what buying green is all about." Read More.

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

I'm happy to report that I'm finally on the last pages of "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle" by: Barbara Kingsolver! It's not that the reading was arduous by any means, I just hadn't found the time to read it in a reasonable about of time....instead, it took me about 3 months - haha! Too busy. Anyhow, the book is awesome! I would highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in local food, sustainability, organics, homesteading, etc. In the book, Kingsolvers details a year of her and her family eating locally. This means producing the majority of their own food, swapping resources with neighbors, hitting up the local farmers markets, and ultimately attempting to eat only that which is grown organically and locally. The book is structured by months, which if you garden is a great way to follow! It gives tips on how to plan meals around what is abundant during certain months (i.e. Tomatoes in September). Also through the book are exceprts from Steven L. Hopp (Kingsolvers hubby) regarding some of the ramifications of our current food habits. He discusses the conditions animals are in prior to making it to the grocery, how far our food travels, the result of pestisides, and lots of cool, geeky science stuff. Kingsolver's daughter, Camille, also writes excerpts from her perspective of eating local with her family. She's in school for biology and has a interest in dietary needs - so she includes many great recipes. I can't wait to try them! That's that for my amatuer book review. I'd rate this 5 out of 5 - great book! You can get more information about the book: http://www.animalvegetablemiracle.com/

Hot Hot Hot

Wow, it's been a long hot week - I'm convinced it hasn't been below 90 on any given day. Apparently we are going to get a break for the weekend, when it will be REAL summer weather here - in the 70's. Perfect! My favorite!

Things are going great at our house! My pregnancy is still rolling along smoothly. It's been hot, albeit only June! It's probably best I get used to this....the last three months of my pregnancy will be mid-summer. We finally have the rest of our garden planted. We didn't do much for variety this year. We have strawberries, which have provided me much joy of eating! We have around 12 or more tomato plants since Tim's Aunt and Uncle had some extra's to give away. We have two eggplants (one that came up from last year and one gifted). Our garlics are coming along real nice. That's it though. We wanted to keep it realistic since baby is due during harvest season! I'm sure we'll still have our hands full when it comes to those tomatoes. We'll probably do a combination of canning and freezing. A gal I work with roasts her tomatoes in the oven and freezes them. She said it's quick and easy to use when thawed. Might give that a whirl. Sounds good with pasta! I'd also like to try canning salsa this year. Salsa is so great on so many things, potatoes, chicken, chips, burittos, etc. For our strawberries, we ate some fresh, and froze the rest whole so we can thaw and use for pancake topping, etc in winter. I'll have to post some pictures of our strawberry abundance!

Another project Tim did this summer was to let a portion of the backyard grow out. Well, it wasn't exactly a high labor project. He just don't cut the grass there, which has been a huge time and gas saver for mowing! The grow out is getting interesting. Some flowering plants are popping up, including white and purple clover, thistle, and we planted some coneflower and transplanted daisy. It's looking good - but we aren't sure exactly how our neighbors feel about it! We've noticed a significant increase in birds this summer. The long grass is probably a great place for them to hide out and eat bugs of all sorts! We have some really orange orioles, many robins, starlings, grackles, sparrow, chickadee's, and we also have some squirrels and a bunnies. The front yard, which is much more groomed is looking great! The groundcover I have in the beds is blooming, so there is a carpet of white and pink all over, looks great!

Oh, did you hear Michael Jackson died? I'm being facetious of course. It's all over the media. A very talented man with a mixed-up life. I won't be surprised when the autospy comes back stating he had an overdoes of prescription drugs in his system.

On that note, happy Friday and here's to a safe and happy weekend!!

Oracle in the Desert | Craig Childs | Orion Magazine

Thought this was an interesting narrative about a cop who now seeks solidarity in the desert.

Oracle in the Desert | Craig Childs | Orion Magazine

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Purple Flower

The Beach

We spent some time at the beach down the road from the property.  There was no one else there - it was about 80 degrees.  I take it the beach is rarely frequented since it's completely unmarked and we've only once seen someone there.  Tim decided to go in the water.  Let's remember, this is Lake Superior.   As suspected, it was COLD water.  The dogs enjoyed running in the water and of course came back to the blanket I was sitting on to come and shake off - after they rolled around in the sand.  Here are some pictures of the beach:

Paulie the Porcupine

We were up at the property this weekend.  It was a wonderful trip!  The weather was sunny and 68-75 degrees - beautiful!  When we got there, we were surprised to see all the apple (and other fruit trees?) in bloom. Lots of new ground cover and flowers were coming up too.  Drawf dogwood, ferns, starflowers, violets, and stagham moss in the wooded areas.  Hawkeye, raspberries, possibly a daisy of sorts (hadn't blossomed yet) in the sunny areas.   Marsh marigolds, iris (not in bloom yet), unique mushrooms, and more violets in the bog area.  Just amazing!   We find beauty everywhere on the property.  While we were sitting under one of the blossoming fruit trees, Tim spotted something in one of the aspen trees near by.  He came running back for the camera, and we took pictures throughout the evening.    It's a porcupine!  We watched him up in the tree top, sleeping, observing us, and eating.   I am amazed by porcupines!  I guess I never really seen one in the wild, and up in the tree it was a slow, docile creature.    Of course, I would never want a close encounter with one, but I'm happy to have at least one who lives on our property!  We named him Paulie the Porcupine :)

We have a doula!

Since we are going about the pregnancy and our life in general in a natural way, we figured that it would be helpful for us to look into hiring a doula.  Most people are familiar with midwives, but since we are seeing a medical doctor through a women's care practice, midwife wasn't much of an option.   Insurance doesn't cover midwives, and it would be very difficult to birth anywhere but home with a midwife.  We felt safest with a medical setting, but still want to be holistic.  We found out that a doula would be a great fit to what we were looking for.  For those that don't know, a doula is a labor-support professional who offers emotional, physical, and educational support during pregnancy and labor.  The support is for both mother and father.    A doula does NOT take the place of the father.  The doula will arm Tim with techniques that will be suitable for him to best comfort me, and have a greater understanding of what's taking place.   We just felt it would be wonderful to have someone in there that's aligned with our philosophies to help us, explain to us what's happening, and make us comfortable.  Years and years of studies show that women who have doula support are less likely to have c-section, have analgesia/pain meds, give birth with vacuum or forceps, and report negative feelings about the childbirth experience.  The doula we chose will give 3-4 prenatal visits for education purposes as well as be there for the entire labor/delivery, a few hours afterwards, and provide follow-up support.  We are looking forward to developing a relationship with our doula! I feel positive that this support will be one more way to make the labor and delivery an experience as pleasant as it can be. 

Update

Hello all!

It is I, Tim

Just a quick update on the potatoes and the worms.  I just added the next tire to my stack yesterday and it looks like everything is going really well.  The plants must be 16" or 18" tall now.  The taters are growing great and yet the tomatoes are growing poorly.  Hopefully we'll get some warmer weather here eventually and they will catch up a little bit.  We also have some strawberries that are just starting to ripen up.  It will be nice to get some fresh food to eat from our own backyard.

The worms also turned out pretty well.  A week or two ago I finally got around to separating the worms from the castings.  I ended up with a little less than half a 18 gallon bin full of castings.  If my estimation is correct, it is about 25 Lbs or so.  According to a website, that's about $30 worth of castings.  I didn't think I would end up with nearly that much after only 6 or 8 months.

Well, that's all for now.  I will write again shortly.

The World Without Us: 11 Fun Facts from a Book about Earth without Humans

An interesting, thought provoking article by Mother Earth News:

The World Without Us: 11 Fun Facts from a Book about Earth without Humans

Sloppy Joe - Yum!

This past weekend we made a 4 day trip to our land. What could I pack for food that would be easy and quick? I was craving sloppy joe, so that's what I made! (Well, among other things!) It worked out great. I precooked a double batch and then we took it in our cooler, heating up the serving size for the meal on the stovetop in our camper. It was delicious and easy!

Here is the recipe to give it a try. This yields probably 6-8 sandwiches. (I double batched it from this).

1 pound ground beef
1 pound ground turkey
1 onion, diced
1 green pepper, diced
1 celery stalk, diced
1 can condensed tomato soup (you will add water to make the consistency of the Joe right).
1 tsp. cumin
1/2 teaspoon worcestershire sauce
6 whole wheat hamburger buns

Instructions: Crumble beef and turkey in skillet over the stove and cook until brown. Drain off liquid. Add onion, pepper, celery and cook until soft. Stir in condensed tomato soup, cumin, worcestershire. Add water as needed to take the thick off. I filled the tomato soup can with water and used about 1/4 to 1/2 of the can. Taste test and add cumin and worcestershire as you desire. Serve hot on top of wheat bun. Get sloppy!

Potatos in tires!!??

It's Tim again...

In the last post I mentioned "projects" so here is the other one. This one is still a bit of a work in progress.

I read somewhere that potatoes will grow in used tires, and it caught my attention. I decided to try it this year. Fortunately, Lisa needed new tires on her car late last year, and I was able to keep the old ones.

I've not planted potatoes before, so the whole thing has a bit of a learning curve. We normally buy organically grown potatoes to eat, so I just used some of those as my seed potatoes. I let them sit on our kitchen table in the sun until they had started to grow some shoots from the eyes. I only cut about three or four of them up with each piece having about two or three shoots on it. I had so many pieces that I probably planted way too many in my tire.

I filled one tire with a black dirt and peat moss mixture and just stuck the potato chunks in. It's been a few weeks now since I started and for about the first two or three weeks there was nothing happening. I started to worry that something was wrong. But then, low and behold, I happened to be walking by the tire one day and noticed just the tiniest plant starting to grow. I had to look closer now. That day I discovered about three plants growing and within a week there were ten.

As I understand it, once the plant itself gets tall enough, another tire is stacked on top and filled with dirt as well. Apparently, potatoes will grow in each tire and as the tops get taller, you just repeat the process with a new dirt filled tire.

I'm happy that I finally have some plants growing and hope to have pounds and pounds of potatoes by the end of the season. I'll try to give you and update as the plants keep growing.

Stay tuned!

Worms

Hi everyone, Tim here.

Just wanted to do a quick update on a few of the "projects" I've been working on.  Some are turning out well, others are still a bit of a work in progress.

The first project began last year a little before Christmas.  We got interested in vermicomposting and decided to start a worm bin.  After a little bit of research on the net, we were set to make some bins and buy some worms.  I made the bins from some Rubbermaid bins I had down the basement.  The one on the bottom is intact and another modified bin nests on top of it.  The upper bin just has some holes in the bottom for drainage and some holes in the top for air flow.  We put some dirt, paper, and food scraps in the bin along with the worms.

At first, the worms didn't like the bin very much.  They liked crawling out all the time.  After picking them up off the floors (and sometimes the walls)

I finally called the worm farmer we got the worms from.  He suggested a night light so I rigged up an LED night

 light to fit in the top of the bin and a little bit of tape got the light to stay on all the time.  No more problems.

It's been a few months and after the bugs were worked out (including some fruit flies) we have a whole bin full of worm castings.  The castings are great compost for the garden and we'll mix some in with the garden soil when we plant in a few weeks.  Hopefully it will help us grow some nice fruitful plants!

Getting the Garden Ready

Getting the garden ready has been slow going. We were out the other Monday and I was working on some of the flower beds while Tim cultivated the garden beds with the composting leaves we put on over the winter. The garden beds look great, but we still have a lot do with our flower beds. We have about 2,000 tiny trees growing in everything. We don't even know what kind of tree it is. We thought it was probably maples from the two bigs trees we have in front that leave whirly-gig's all over the place, but sure enough, the leaves have opened on these tiny trees and they aren't maple! I guess we have something new on our hands to figure out. Tim took a bunch from the beds and planted them in a little growing tray. They are growing well, but what are they? Huh. We still have our started seeds insides. They are doing well, but nothing like they were last year when we transplanted them in. If the weather is nice this weekend, I might bring them outside to acclimate a little bit. Usually I plant right before Memorial Day weekend, but this year Memorial Day is sooner than usual it seems. I'm going to have to play it by ear.

Rhubarb Update: It's coming in, but not even close to ready. I can't wait to harvest it and try something new! Have a good recipe, please e-mail it over! I still have some frozen strawberries from last (unbelieveable!), so something strawberry/rhubarb would be great too!

What's Up?!

No excuses, but I haven't posted since APRIL!! That's simply too long. So, what have we been up to? We went up to the property two weekends ago, we simply didn't want to wait too long to go up again so we decided that we would do another quick weekend. It was great. We rode our bikes with dogs in tow (on leashes running next to us) down to Lake Superior. The ride there was good, but the ride back was too much for me. My body said "I'm too tired - you stop now." :) I pushed the bike back the last 1/8 mile. We built a fire and enjoyed nature that night. We chilled out on Sunday morning because we were simply too exhausted. In one day we cleared a path on the front 10 acres. It was a lot of work for Tim because he had to use the machette to clear some areas. We are happy how it turned out and plan to continue making some trails. Our next trip up is a long weekend, so we have more time to do things and more time to relax!!! Ahhhh......relax. We haven't had a day off of work since 2009. It will be nice to have an extended weekend. I may want more after that :)

The next weekend we celebrated Mother's Day at our house. My Mom and Dad and Tim's Mom came over. We had a burrito bar and then showed them the video of our 20 week ultrasound. Oh yea! I forget to mention that. We had the 20 week ultrasound. We found out if baby is a boy or girl. Well, we showed the 4 minute video to our parents and they all guessed boy. Well, SURPRISE - it's a girl!! We were surprised too, Tim and I both felt boy. The ultrasound was great, but she was being a little stinker...turning away and moving all over the place. The Dr. was able to get most of the measurements he needed to be sure she was all on track, but he didn't get a good enough look at her heart. We have another Ultrasound in early July that he will take a better look at her heart.....and hopefully she cooperates! There were no worries, so we are very happy about that. Since she was moving all over the place, from what he could get a look at he felt that baby is a girl! I guess we will for sure know by next ultrasound :) Exciting times! We also showed our parents some video we've shot of the land.

My birthday came and went on Monday, 5/11. I'm 30 now - wow! Shocking, but acceptable. This weekend we have errands to run and will also be going to the Green Bay Botanical Gardens. I recently started working with a gal that works there, she was in my media class. Since Tim and I love gardens, we thought it would be nice to support this local group. This will be our first visit with membership. We haven't been there for about 3 years, I'm looking forward to it!

Hope all is well with our family and friends!

Tweeting!

Can't say I know much about it yet, but I've signed up on twitter as "onthefox". So, if you twitter, or are interested in twittering, come "follow" me at twitter.com. Hope to see you there and let me know if you have any good recommendations on twitter or if you twitter! -L

Clothing Give In

After we found out about being pregnant, suddenly baby clothing was looking pretty cute!  We've avoided buying any at this point, since we're sure we'll find lot of nice used stuff and have many essentials from gifting.  Well, today I gave in.  There is a store by my office called "A Better Footprint" and she has all fair trade stuff.  Since it was Earth Day today, she had 22% off of everything in store.  I decided to check it out and found the cutest shirt and onesie (with hat!).  I couldn't resist.  I got the onesie in size 6mo-12mo, and the shirt 12-18mo.  The Onesie says "Future World Explorer" and the shirt says "Peace, baby".  So cute! They are on a unbleached 100% cotton and the sale proceeds go to a group in Honduras (where Tim and I honeymooned) for treatment of women with HIV/AIDS.   Here's a photo!

Spring is in the Air!

Hi Everyone! I am happy to report that spring is here! At least for yesterday and today! It's 70 degrees outside and wonderful! I opened up all the windows in the house to get that winter stuffiness out, it's so refreshing! With spring comes blooms.  Our tulips are coming up, but no flowers yet.  Some perennials are showing their green and the garlics we planted late fall are up and rising!  Of course, so are all the weeds.  How is it that some plants will die off during a harsh winter....but not weeds!  They are persistent, year after year.  I have crab grass growing in my strawberry patch, and in random places in the garden.  This weekend, some spring cleaning is on the list.  We also have to start getting together our camping materials.  We found a cheap, retro hardtop camper for sale that we purchased and will be taking to our land next time we are up.  It's not deluxe by any means, but has what we need.  Bed, storage, stovetop, and heater.  The heater was the biggest thing since it will allow us to spend nights on the land when otherwise we would have to stay at another place about 30 minutes from the property.  We'll post some pictures once we get it up there, we are pumped to get everything together and go up for our first weekend where we can spend all day and night at the land!

Anyhow, back to spring - here's a picture of the garlic coming up and also of the dogs playing outside! 

Cloth Diapering

We've been doing some research on cloth diapering to decide which cloth diaper to get for when baby arrives.  We found a great Pocket Diaper called Bum Genius 3.0.  They are affordable, fit all sizes from infant to toddler (with out having to buy a different size for each weight group), and are environmentally friendly because they are washable and reusable.  I was reading a local blog that shares a lot of great information about "natural" parenting.  She also owns a local shop/cafe: momandpopplace.com

On the blog I found this great information advocating cloth diapering:

Reason Number 1: The Environment

            Disposable diapers are the third most common consumer product filling up our landfills today.  One baby will contribute at least a ton of waste the local landfill!  Not only do disposable diapers take over 500 years to decompose, they require toxic chemicals and vital resources to manufacture.

Reason Number 2:  Your Family’s Money

Disposable diapers cost about $1500-$2000 per child.  Yikes.  You can cloth diaper all your babies for under $500.  And you can use the same diapers for more than one child.  Even with the cost of water and detergent, you WILL save a ton of money.

Reason Number 3:  Your Baby’s Health

Disposable diapers contain polypropylene and other synthetics and chemicals, and dioxins from bleaching.   Their super-absorbency encourages caregivers to go longer between changings.  Many parents find that their babies suffer less diaper rash and irritation when diapered in cloth.  Soft cottons mean healthier bottoms!

Antarctica to Pyramids, lights dim for Earth Hour

Crowds in Times Square watched as many of the massive billboards, including the giant Coca-Cola display, darkened. This phenomenon happened all around the world on Saturday, March 28th from 8:30pm - 9:30pm local time as a coordinated effort to make a statement about global climate change. Visit Earthhour.org for more information and read full story at link below.

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Planning the Garden

Last night we started our garden planning (a little later than usual). Tim really wanted to expand the garden this year, but we've decided to stick to our little garden since we have baby on the way during September harvest time. We have to keep the garden manageable. This year we will continue to have our strawberry patch. We'll also grow green beans, cantaloupe, and we're going to try out the seeds we harvested from Roxie and Doug's paste tomatoes and green peppers. I want to try my hand at some more canning this year, and also some new methods of dehydrating. I got a great book, Food Drying with an Attitude, that gives unique ways to dehydrate and use dehydrated food. Maybe we'll also be able to harvest some apples and blueberries from our property! Tonight we'll start the seed indoors in the basement where we have the huge window with the nice hot sun coming through. That worked great last year!

Obamas Prepare to Plant White House Vegetable Garden

On Friday, Michelle Obama will begin digging up a patch of White House lawn to plant a vegetable garden, the first since Eleanor Roosevelt’s victory garden in World War II. There will be no beets (the president doesn’t like them) but arugula will make the cut. This makes a great statement to sustainability! See the full article written up by the NY Times.

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We're Having a Baby!

I suppose the title of this post told what we have to share, but I'll say it again - We're having a baby! We are as excited as any first parents could be, and we are so blessed to have this baby on the way. The picture below was taken at 12 weeks and 1 day. The heart was beating, the baby was moving all over the place, and hands with fingers and feet with toes could be seen. It was simply amazing! I've been feeling really good, and I hope that that stays the case for the next 6 months :) The due date is September 22nd, which seems like a long time off, but I have a feeling it will just breeze by! In just 7-8 weeks we should be able to find out if the baby is a boy or a girl.  There is a poll on the page here where you can vote if you think baby will be a boy or a girl (to the left).  I won't tell you which once I think it is :)  What an exciting time of our life!

Baby!  Head on left.  Legs on Right.  

Picture doesn't show, but I saw feet and hands with fingers!

Getting Sunburned in the UP (in March!)

This past weekend was the best!  We decided a few weeks ago that if there was a weekend coming up with good weather in the UP we would head up to the property.  We were hoping for anything over 30 degrees, and that happened to be this past weekend! What an awesome time we had!  We left at about 6 AM Saturday morning and got up to the property at about noon after we dropped off our stuff at the cottage we stayed at.  We drove over to the property and were looking around and checking out the area by the road and out walks our immediate neighbor to the North.  We had a good talk with her and her husband and got lots of valuable information on our property and the neighborhood.  After the chat, we had to climb over the 8 foot tall pile of snow on the edge of the property.  (It was particularly deep there because that is where the plow pushes it all).  We thought we walked all over the place on Saturday, but as it turned out we really didn't walk all that far, but it was certainly a work out.  Most of the snow was between 2-3 feet deep, mostly hard and easy to walk on with snowshoes except a few spots where you seemed to sink in a foot.  We saw probably 20 or 30 whitetail deer throughout the day.  (Only two or three on our property, but a herd of about 50-80 hangs out by the neighbors because they feed them).   We were tuckered out and headed back to the cottage.  

Sun coming up in the east.

Looking South, this is the back field which we think is about 5 or more acres.

Fire that Tim built for us to enjoy lunch over.  It smelled so nice like camp and outdoors!

The "tree organizer" - where we hung the stuff we didn't want to carry while we snowshoed.

On Sunday we headed out to the land again.  We were a little more prepared to do some walking than the previous day because we knew better what we were getting in to.  We found a potential building spot for a house when we move up some day, but we will keep looking as we get to know that land more.  The property just seems bigger than we imagined!  Everything seemed bigger than our first tour of the property.  Since we were planning on staying through lunch, we paced PB&J sandwiches, crackers, and lots and lots of water to drink.  Around 12:30 we found a spot to sit.  There was a chair we found, and a big bucket that we flipped over to sit on.  Tim built a fire and ta-da...we had a camp!  We ate and talked about the property.  It was about 45 degrees, with a slight breeze, and was just lovely out!    On the way out we talked to the neighbor again for a while, which was nice!  They seem like very nice people and we are looking forward to getting to know them!

Overall, it was a great weekend and we learned a lot more about the property including more about the trees, landscape and space.   Oh, and regarding the title of the post, I am sunburned!  Between the sun and the snow, I am a bit red in the face!  So, who says you can't get a tan in the U.P. in winter? :)  We can't wait to go back!

-L