Wee folk in the garden

I know. It's been awhile.

I've been in one of those weird funky transitional thought-provoking places in my life lately. When you find yourself in a place like this, things tend to get discussed into the ground, so I would rather not talk about it, if you don't mind. Let's take a break from that and talk about some slightly more superficial but much funner things.

Like this. I just found this website, They Draw and Cook via The Pioneer Woman.
It's a fun little place where people share their favorite recipes, which they have also illustrated! I love browsing through the little works of art.

This particular example is by Lindsay Schmitt

I haven't wasted nearly as many hours there as I would like to yet. But it holds promise. The recipes don't look too bad either. I suppose no one is interested in spending an hour or two in devoted doodling or watercolor to anything like... chicken nuggets. You would probably have to like the meal quite a bit.

After our Saturday coffee this morning, I decided to do a little window shopping. So the family and I headed to a home decor type place for which I had received a gift card for my birthday... about three months ago. Usually, I am bent toward being frugal, and usually, I would save my gift card until I actually needed or wanted something in particular. But I decided to do it a little differently this time, and have a little shopping spree, with nothing particular in mind. I ended up coming home with a tea strainer, a colander in the color of robin-egg-blue, a bar of dark chocolate, some decaf earl grey from Twinings, and a wind chime. I looked in my grab bag as we left the store and laughed at the... variety of items. Just some treats for me, I guess you'd call it.

Update on Fred. Mainly for your amusement.

He produced one gloriously delicious, deep red, organic tom-mah-to, which accounted for about 1/6 of a greek salad one night for dinner. I was kind of excited to finally eat of his fruits, and kind of apprehensive, since I hadn't seen any other fruits eager to burst forth. Surely I wouldn't have to wait three months between tomatoes - that wasn't gonna work for me.

Within a week or so, this little guy showed up.  Notice anything out of the ordinary?

Well, besides the fact that he is about 1 cm wide, how about the fact that he's already turning red? :) So much for this one. Apparently he doesn't have ambitions much higher than being a small something stuck between my teeth. God forbid I should drop him on the floor, I would loose him completely.

Also disheartening is the fact there are no other little fruits to speak of. Nothing. The branches are otherwise barren and slowly falling off to die.

...So much for patio gardening! I give up. Again!

Although I confess to eyeballing the herb seeds at the store this morning. If you remember, my theory with Fred was that he was already an adolescent, and I hoped he would last longer because of that. Maybe my new approach should be to find a plant with a life cycle already so small, there is no way I could shorten it.

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In a completely unrelated note, I found myself humming Nat King Cole's "Too Young" last night. I was enjoying it so much in my mind, I decided to find it online. All I found was this cheesy video, which I just listened to. A couple times.

Well, how can you only have one song's worth of Nat King Cole? I ended up searching Autumn Leaves and of course, Nature Boy. That song. That song makes me want to cry. It gives me goosepimples. I really love that one.

I've also been kind of enjoying the Indie Singer-Songwriter Channel of pandora.com lately. It's cool to listen to new music mixed in with some familiar tunes. And the Indie stuff is, in general, alot prettier than the tripe that makes it on the radio lately. Although I must note that Joel says grooveshark.com is a better player. I'll have to look into it.

I guess it might be time to invest in some new music. And some seeds.

...maybe Nature Boy can give me gardening advice.

The value of money earned

Joel and I have talked in the past about whether or not we plan on giving our kids an allowance. I like the idea of kids learning how to deal with money, or having some kind of income. I would want to give them the benefit of working, saving, putting thought and effort into acquiring that which they desire and therefore find the value in their work as well as their possessions. But I don't like the idea of just giving them money for no particular reason except that it's That Day of the Week. Then there is the question of whether or not their chores should have anything to do with their allowance - whether or not to pay them to clean their room and so forth. I wonder then how will they would learn responsibly - that there are duties we have in life that must be done, whether there is reward or not, whether we feel like it or not. As an adult, I don't get rewarded or paid to make my bed, cook my dinner, wash my bathroom. But I do these anyway, because it's the responsible thing.

I've also been thinking about something I read in a pretty good book once. The author was talking about the difference between a child who gets whatever he wants given to him freely and a child who is told 'no' occasionally or gets a more reasonable number of gifts. At Christmas time, for example, the child who gets whatever he wants, a hundred presents wrapped round the tree, is less likely to really see the value in any of those gifts, tossing them aside at once for the next. But the child who only gets a few gifts, is more likely to take care of each of them, and appreciate both the gift and the giver more. I suspect that it's true of a child who puts his own time and effort into aquiring something as well - he values it more.

With all these things in mind, Joel and I have come to a compromise with which I am quite satisfied. My son is still only 2 years old, so all this talk about allowances and money is mostly just a plan for the future. But the gist of it is this: their chores will be an unpaid lesson in responsibility (making bed, putting away toys, etc). but they can earn money by doing any extra chores that are normally done by mom and dad (yard work, vaccuming, etc) Now they know there are some things that they will have to just do for the sake of getting it done, but that they can earn money by working for someone else.

All of this is just leading up to a sweet moment that happened this afternoon. I pulled out my little swiffy mop, to wipe up the kitchen floor of some sticky spots after lunch and saw my son playing quietly in the living room. And just on a whim, I decided to give him his first lesson in wages... even if he's a little young to grasp it completely just yet. "Hey, kiddo - do you want to help mama mop the kitchen?" His eyes lit up for something new to do, "Yeah!" and he ran over to help. I showed him how to wipe it back and forth and then let him at it. He proceeded to mop back and forth around the kitchen, with much more detail and interest than I expected. He even got in all the corners and under the table! I was planning to pay him 25 cents for about 2 minutes of work. But he did such a good job, I ended up giving him 50 cents for a job very well done, and I made sure he knew that.

He took his 50 cents and proceeded to play "spinnies" with them on the kitchen table. Hahaha. So much for learning the value of money at this age... Maybe I'll wait til he's older before I offer again. I think it also might click better in his mind if we went through the process of purchasing something with his money together and talking about it then too. But this was a good start. :)

Do you give your kids an allowance? Did you get one as a kid?

Hilda and Fred

One of my hobbies since I was a teenager has been working on my genealogy. I'm in and out of it alot. But, over the years,  I've accumulated some good things - information, documentation, and photos. My mom has been sending me some old photos whenever she finds them. Especially if they were from my dad's side of the family, since they are of more significance to me than her. Luckily, the Petersen family was filled with pack rats. They saved everything.

In a box of treasures that mom recently gave me, there were some really great photos...
these are just a couple of them from the turn of the century - about 1910.

The bride is my great-grandma - Hilda Cornell.

The groom is my great grandpa - Fred Noyed.

Fred is attended by his brother. Hilda is attended by her sisters.

They both came from farming families in Watertown, Minnesota .

Hilda's parents immigrated from Sweden. Fred's grandparents as well.

What a gift a photograph can be. I never met my great-grandparents. They were gone way before me. But here I can see their faces. The gleam in their eyes. Imagine what their lives must have been like. Were they hopeful of the future? Were they burdened by obligation? What were their dreams, or ambitions?

They look so young.

They have no idea what's ahead. What's in store for them. The strange thing is that here I am, their great grand-daughter, looking at them now. And I know what's ahead. I do know a little bit about what's in store for them.

That in 1915, they will have twin daughters, Ellen and Eleanor. That less than a year later, Eleanor will die, leaving Ellen an only child. That shortly afterwards, they will separate - Hilda will take the baby and move back in with her parents, and Fred back with his - although they will still be in neighboring farms. That little Ellen would grow up, marry and have three boys, one of which was my father. That me, my siblings, and our two cousins are their only posterity of our generation.

That 100 years later, their granddaughter will be looking at their wedding photo, wondering about their lives and thinking about their story...

The most profound thing I have learned as I've investigated the family history is how fragile our lives can be. The people themselves can be very strong. But the details of their lives seem almost paper thin. What brought Fred and Hilda's ancestors to America? What if they had decided it would be easier not to come? What if Ellen had gotten sick instead of Eleanor? What if, later on, when Ellen was a young woman, she had never met grandpa? What if, after their first date, she thought - "well, he's nice, but I think I'll keep looking?" What if after waiting so long for babies, they decided not to try, then they would've never had my dad. What if my dad, being enlisted in the Air Force, had never been stationed in San Rafeal (where he met my mom). What if he had never gone into the cafeteria for burgers that fateful night - would they have ever met? These are just some of the larger turning points. There are an infinite number of possibilities, paths our lives can follow. So I start to realize - how perfectly everything had to come together for ME to exist. Can you imagine - if anything had been one iota different, how our lives would have changed. Or maybe we wouldn't be here at all...

And yet here I stand. With Hilda and Fred Noyed's blood coursing through my veins.

Have you looked into your family history? I think you'll find it worthwhile. You may fin priceless stories. Maybe some photos. Most likely a heritage to be proud of. If you've never done it before, talking to family members is a good way to start a family tree, gathering names and birthdates, maybe photos. When you are ready to delve deeper, or can't find any info from relatives, try ancestry.com. I use it quite a bit when I'm in one of my researching stints. Or you can do research at libraries and request info (birth and death certificates) from the local government where the event occurred. If you've already studied your genealogy, what are some interesting things you discovered?

T Shirt Bag

Speaking of less waste market bags!

I've been thinking of this craft project I saw a few months ago, where you make a market bag out of an old T-Shirt. I don't really remember where I first saw it, but after searching a bit, I found out it was originally a "Good Thing" from Martha. You can find her video/tutorial here.

The main thing I was waiting for was a good candidate for the project. Then the other night my husband was cleaning out his closet and asked me if I wanted to do anything with this old shirt. I said yeah! I do! :)

Here it is. Cute, huh?  I bought it as a gift for Joel about 9 years ago, when we were dating. I remember hanging out at his parents house, laughing at old Strong Bad emails. Good times. ♥

Needless to say, it's getting kinda ratty. Especially around the neck. But a perfect candidate.

The project was SUPER easy. I think it took me about 15 minutes to do the whole thing.

 

The only problem now is... I feel kinda funny bringing a ratty old tshirt bag into the grocery store. Haha. :)

Waste not

I'm inspired when I hear about the different ways that people are living sustainably. Especially when it's those in lead of companies.

Like, hearing about how Subaru created a zero landfill auto plant that captures and recycles, reduces, or reuses their resources in such a way that they send nothing to the landfills. Can you imagine? Creating as many cars as they do every year, with no waste!

Or hearing about Sierra Nevada's practices here in Chico, about which I've already shared briefly. Besides the solar panel, there are other ways that they've worked hard to improve efficiency. These efforts include heat/Co2 recovery, using locally grown beef in their taproom, and dig this - they even  have a biodiesel processor so that they can use 100% of the used vegetable oil from their taproom as an alternative fuel source for their transportation fleet. Amazing.

I'm not sure exactly why things like this can get me excited. In such a wasteful, frivolous society, I like seeing others who are more careful with what they have. Thoughtful about how much they really need. Fitting environmentalism into a contemporary lifestyle sometimes makes for some interesting progression. People become inventive, they get to work the puzzle and hopefully come up with clever solutions to have a low impact on the planet.

Taking it closer to home:

I've been taking a fresh look at the items that I've been making and selling in my etsy shop. In an effort to reduce waste myself, I have from the very beginning, kept scraps of this and that, hoping to use or upcycle it elsewhere. But, after over a year of doing it this way, I realize that all this leaves me with is a pile of scraps to be used! And how much better would it be to redesign my products so that there was no waste at all.

For instance: my loveys were at one time an 18" square. I would get an 18" length, and since most cotton fabrics come in about a 40" width, there was always about 4" off the end that I would cut and set aside in my scrap pile (to use in something someday, I tell myself)

But when did I decide that my blankets needed to be square? Is it just because every one else's were square at the time? Why not make my loveys 18" x 20" and not have any waste at all. This actually works out fabulously, even though the minky I use for the backside of the fabric comes in a different width. It is however 60," which is also divisible by 20, so I don't waste any minky either! Brilliant. Why didn't I think of this before.

I will be redesigning my burp cloths and a few other items as well.

One of the biggest producers of scrap for me was my market bag. It was the only thing I had in the shop with rounded seems (in the straps). Which meant I was cutting a round peg out of a square hole, so to speak. Just today, I am proud to announce, I have successfully designed a new kind of grocery bag, that not only uses about half the fabric, but also produces less waste!

Here is an example of one of the older market bags (reversible)

And here is how much I scrap I had from making one:

Here is the bag I just finished today:

And here is my waste:

Two tiny little triangles! They are equivilant to about a 5" square. This is a great improvement over what it was before - I will use less and waste less.

[BTdubs, the new bags will be in the shop later this week  are now available! here]

My next project is to finally use up all those old fabric scraps so they won't be laying around my craft station - that will be a relief! And from now on, with a bit of cleverness, and a fresh perspective, hopefully I can continue to think of ways to not create waste. Or even scrap!

What are some ways you have found to reduce waste in your home or business?