• Family

    Muted

    May 6, 2020 - By 

    Day 51. This quarantine has been, more than ever, a time of high highs and low lows. While I recognize the immense privilege that enables me to stay sheltered at home, that does not make it any less isolating. That does not mean my longing to return to normalcy is diminished. I can recognize both the beauty that has come – quality time spent with my family; and the hardship – the isolation, the fear of what the future might bring, what it might look like. The joy of slowing down, the fear of the ultimate slowdown. And on a…

  • Family

    Empty April

    April 28, 2020 - By 

    So. This was my April. The emptiest April in memory. Connor’s big Chuck-E-Cheese birthday is cancelled. In fact, the entire Chuck-E-Cheese franchise is closed, indefinitely. No public Easter Egg hunts no spring craft fairs no silly April Fools with friends. No school. OMG YOU GUYS NO TAXES. Okay, there’s still taxes. But they’re deferred until July. THEY NEVER LET YOUR TAXES BE LATE AND NOW YOUR TAXES CAN BE LATE THIS IS HOW YOU KNOW. How you know it’s a big deal. BUT YOU GUYS. BUT. As much as this month was scary and weird and isolating… it was also…

  • Family - Marriage - Parenting

    An Incomplete List and a Complete Mess

    April 23, 2020 - By 

    Things I have done during the Stay-Home order: Lost a full gallon of milk and found it in the linen closet, two days later Worn my pants on inside out all day before I realized it Cried for no reason Cried for very good reasons Laughed hysterically with my boys Spent too much time on Facebook Made bread Made cookies Been mad at the scale Ordered groceries online As I’ve gotten older, I’ve realized how much I love grocery shopping. I’m also very picky about my groceries and like lots of obscure foodstuffs and bring all my reusable bags so…

  • Family - Parenting

    The Cup Half-Full

    March 27, 2020 - By 

    Today’s homeschool lesson was: how to fill each other’s cups. Also known as “Why mom has always lost her marbles by the end of the day.” I put together a little practical demonstration for the boys. I placed a jar of marbles on the table. Surrounding it, some empty cupcake liners. I explained that the glass jar of marbles represented me: both my physical and emotional energy throughout the day. I then gave them a run-through of what I do, and had the boys select marbles from the jar and place them in the corresponding cupcake liners each time a…

  • Farming

    Tree Hugger

    February 12, 2020 - By 

    I like being outside. I love nature. So, I went to college and studied things like dendrology, limnology, hydrology, biology, meteorology, geology… basically, lots of scientific -ology stuff with some physics and calculus thrown in. I ended up with a degree in Environmental Science and despite all this extensive collegiate training my years of education have often been brushed aside with a sneer: “Environmentalist.” Look, I love nature and the environment. But there’s a balance in all things and I try to look at the bigger picture. To do better when I can but acknowledge there is no such thing…

  • Family

    Misc. Garage

    December 7, 2019 - By 

    If you’ve been following along (or if you know us IRL) we’ve moved quite a bit in the last few years. We had movers box up our things for our move from Arizona to Iowa and then, just two short years later, we had our things boxed up again for another move. Which means that there were some items from our Arizona house that we never got around to unpacking at the Iowa house. Moving into the Kansas City house, we are determined to unpack every single box. Get organized and get settled. There were surprises along the way: some…

  • Throwback

    Wine Snob

    June 28, 2019 - By 

    I went to college just a stone’s throw from Napa Valley. At the time, I knew nothing about wine except what color it was (red, white, or pink) and how it might taste (sweet, or not-sweet). As you can see, I was quite the connoisseur. My university, aside from its patronage by the Mondavi family, had other close links to the wine industry, namely its viticulture and enology department. Viticulutre = the cultivation of grapevinesEnology = the study of wines One could major in Viticulture and Enology, with the hopes of working at a winery one day. Let’s just go…

  • Family

    Acreage

    June 26, 2019 - By 

    While I believe that it is fair to say most everyone’s life is in a constant state of construction, this holds literally true for the last seven years of our family’s life. In 2010 we bought a house in Arizona as part of a short sale. It needed things, like paint and carpet and new tile flooring. Chris and I poured our time and efforts into that project every weekend. In 2012 we decided it was ready for an interior remodel performed by professionals, and at that same time we also decided to build an addition – the guest house…

  • Family - Fun

    Unplugged

    May 27, 2019 - By 

    Chris and I haven’t been camping since before the kids. (I mean, assuming you don’t count the two times we set up the tent in our backyard so our oldest could have a night under the stars with dad while I stayed inside with the baby). I’ve always loved camping, especially tent camping. But with little ones it seemed like it would be a lot of work. It’s probably not, but like anything can be intimidating until you’ve gotten the routine down. This Memorial weekend we pulled the trigger. Even though our version of camping was setting up our tent…

  • Family - Food - Fun

    The Marshmallow-Only Club

    May 24, 2019 - By 

    As I have mentioned in a previous post, the boys love Lucky Charms cereal. They don’t get to have it all the time — mostly because they are notorious for picking around the cereal bits and eating only the marshmallows. And I like to at least cling to some pretense that they are consuming a breakfast-food, not a bowl full of dehydrated sugar soaked in milk. But a few months ago, as I was wandering the aisles of the grocery store, I noticed the promotional box of lucky charms featuring unicorn marshmallows. Connor loves unicorns. They both love Lucky Charms.…