Dining en plein air

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For the second time this spring.  Hamburgers and hot dogs on the grill.  His special deer mug.  And (always) the attempted escape when the sun goes down and it's time for bed.

Sunday observations

1. He's a very smiley baby ever since he learned to walk. Often I will look over my shoulder and catch his eye and he will lower his chin and smile a conspiratorial smile, like we have an inside joke that no one else will ever understand.
2. His drawings are always about a story he wants to tell, and not about the finished masterpiece (although some of them are also masterpieces, says his proud mama). Today it was a story about a little fish named Flash who lives in an underwater barn with water bugs and worms. There was lots of straw for all of the animals to eat. Oh, and it's always mixed media and collage, which I love.

It is winter

How did that happen? Wasn't it just summer? Well. I've been having fun cutting paper snowflakes based on the ones on this site for at least a month. Such good fun. Back soon, I hope.

Three hundred sixty-three

So, in an effort to learn to use my camera better, to make documenting our lives more a part of living, I've begun project 365. Only I began a couple of days late, so for me it will be 363. I'm too chicken to open my whole set up to a broader audience yet, but I'll share a few images here from time to time. Taking photos everyday really does help me appreciate the beauty in our routines, in our little house. The growing set of candid snapshots of some of the tiny pieces that make up our days is really making me happy, too.

Friday nights

On Friday evenings, I knead the dough alone. But by the time it has risen and the pizza needs topping and baking, he is usually home. We talk about the week. He spreads the cornmeal on the pizza peal carefully, and I give it the final olive oil drizzle before it goes in the oven. We've got a comfortable rhythm going.

Out of season

Today the weather really feels like Autumn, and all of a sudden I noticed the slanting light on the dining room table as I fed the boy his peas and carrots around five this evening. My grandmother called this afternoon to tell me that the damson plums are in at the farm stand, and the foxhunting season (cubbing) starts this week.

Suddenly, the signs are all around us that summer is over. I'll sleep with the windows open tonight, and breathe deeply.

(These are some unrelated crafts that have been completed lately. Top: The Baby Sophisticate sweater done up in Dream in Color Classy held double. I made the six to twelve months size and it's already kind of snug around the middle. Oh well, still cute. Bottom: A wee wonderfuls kitty made for Cousin Hannah's third birthday.)

The Fourth

There was a little bit of this:
Mixed with a lot of this:
And then some of this:
Followed by a lot of this (for everyone):
And that was about right. I hope your Fourth of July was just as good.

Shady days

Just what we all needed yesterday. An afternoon on the front lawn with a bowl of cherries (for me) and a big white sunhat (for him). Ahh. I love the shady, breezy spring.

Kicking bag

Henry: Happy, healthy, hale and hearty. Mama: Tired. My husband has been sick, so I've been flying solo on all baby duties. My mom was here to help for several days (which was so nice!), but the middle of the night is still and always my responsibility.

Luckily some of the sweetest moments also occur in the middle of the night. I don't speak to him, since we're trying to get Henry to sleep better and longer, but the baby snuggles up on my chest and buries his dandelion-fluffy head under my chin. After some warm weather last weekend, the past few nights have been very chilly. Perfect for the Kicking Bag for Babies, a free pattern on Ravelry. I used just over two skeins of KPPPM that my brother thoughtfully gave me last Christmas. The warm wool makes this baby even more cuddly there in that dark room as we rock and rock and rock. This bag used to swallow this baby whole, but now he's filling it out more-- he grows and grows when I'm not looking.

I'm hoping that the weather will turn warm again soon and Spring will be here to stay. I'm ready to get this kicking baby out into the fresh air. (And to take some photos with natural light again.)

Back to the farm

Yesterday. It was a little cold and windy.

Projects

We're still alive! Baby and I are surviving our first weeks home alone and trying to establish a routine (for example, the "routine" morning nap for both Mama and baby, with baby's head nestled softly under my chin as he sleeps on my chest).

Standards have been lowered slightly (This morning, I was eating a blueberry waffle that I made and froze in the first weeks of H's life when he was sleeping a lot. Since the child wants to be held constantly, he was in the Baby Bjorn, riding high on my chest. A droplet of syrup fell on his tiny, downy head and I licked it off without a second thought.), but we're enjoying each other.

I have been missing my crafting time, however. I've been dreaming up elaborate quilts in my head, quilts that I probably won't have time for in the next eighteen years. And although the dreaming is fun, I'd love to get my hands on some actual fabric someday soon. I'm trying to institute the solo afternoon nap, for baby only. In the meantime, there are two crafty products in the photo above. The heart onesie is probably the only thing I've finished since H was born. I whipped it up in about seven minutes on Valentine's Day as H's (and my) gift to his papa. Yay for scraps of quilting fabric and interfacing!

The crumb quilt that the baby's lying on is another story. I finished the piecing and quilting several weeks before he was to be born, but since he surprised us and came almost three weeks early, there's no binding. Luckily, in this view you can't tell. More about that little quilt when it finally has some edges-- maybe in three years?

Happy New Year! And the pregnancy ring

Happy New Year one and all! We ate the traditional New Year's day meal of black-eyed peas and greens last night when Brian was home from work. So yummy with some over-sweet cornbread and butter.

I'm really looking forward to the new year. I'm so incredibly excited to meet the newest member of our little family next month (or late this month!). I do have a couple of back-logged baby-related posts to put up later this week.

But today I bring you the pregnancy ring. Up until the holidays, I was doing pretty well with the symptoms of gestation. Good mobility, not a lot of weight gain, not a lot of tiredness and almost no swelling. Then came holiday travel and multiple Christmas dinners. My mom noticed that I had taken off my wedding and engagement rings at the table and invited me to wear this ring until the end of my pregnancy.

I love it. It was my great-great-grandmother's wedding ring. Inside, it's inscribed: "E.D. to L.W. Nov. 16, 1892". It's so comfortable and large, worn thin on the edges and beautifully patina-ed. Plus, it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy to think of this 116-year-old ring worn by that long-ago mother and grandmother now being worn by me, a soon-to-be mother.

The winding road

Seems I like to post photos of this peaceful road on this day each year. A sun-dappled space for a deep breath. When I took this picture this morning around 10 am, it was so cool and fresh in this leafy corridor. I wonder what's around the bend.

The summer between eighth grade and the beginning of high school (how old were we then, 13?), my friend Addie came to the farm with me to visit my grandparents, and we took this road to riding camp each morning. One morning she sighed and said, "Oh, this road is so romantic!" She always did remind me of Anne Shirley, red hair and all (although hers would probably be called a distinguished auburn).

I think the romance is part of what is so calming about this place. It is quiet, but so full of possibility. It always reminds me of that Celtic blessing that begins, "May the road rise to meet you." This road always reminds me to breathe.

PS: Corny today? Yes. But if not today, then which day?

Rainy day: Flowers inside

It's a bit rainy today, so I've taken photos of the lovely flowers that I've been able to bring inside this spring. Does anyone know what this is? It's rather woody, a little gangly, and was covered in those tiny hot pink buds for almost a month before the star-shaped lighter pink ones opened. The flowers are clustered almost like on a hydrangea. Here's a photo of what the whole plant looked like earlier in the spring. *ETA: Mountain laurel! (Maybe kalmia latifolia) Just stumbled across my own answer by accident today.
These are peonies from my grandmother's garden. The beautiful just-pink and yellow one on the left is called raspberry sundae. Isn't that beautiful? Our house is kind of small and not so well-lit, so the counter top beside the sink is the best place to display fleurs. There, I see them often.

Also, Happy Anniversary to my cousin Krista and her husband Brad!

Weekend photo update

Birthday cake: coconut with lemon curd filling, coconut cream cheese frosting. Happy Birthday Brian! The easement: A long hike up. I love the contrast between the black tree trunks and telephone poles and the new spring green leaves and grass. We end up galloping up and down this cleared-out space, back and forth sometimes, when we foxhunt in this territory.

Ode to Mud

Dear Mud

You are sticky

You are dirty

Still

You are nicer than ice.

We're spending today recovering from two days of sleet and ice. The kind where you have to remove your cowboy boots to climb carefully the stairs to your front door in stocking feet because you forgot to get ice-melt until all the stores were out. Yeah.

Here are some prettier photos from earlier this winter. We have a blue sky today, too. But no snow (yet).

Until tomorrow.

Another snow day

I guess I got my truly snowy day and white roads. It's been snowing since about 9:30 this morning. (NB: I'll never get tired of photos of this road (although some of you might).)

Just in time for my completed Fetching mitts. I knitted these from some Malabrigo in my stash (I don't know the colorway) on number 9 needles, as the pattern suggests.
I worked an extra repeat of the cabling at the wrist and omitted the picot bind-off. I really like these-- they're so soft and were a really quick knit-- but they're way too big for my tiny child hands. So I think I'll make another pair for myself on size 8 needles and give this pair away. Even though I think this colorway doesn't really do the cables justice, I may even be able to eke another pair out of the leftovers from this skein. That would be truly thrifty.Also thrifty and a perfect snow day activity-- homemade bread. This is honey oatmeal bread from the little spiral-bound cookbook that came with my mixer. Yum. More snow photos on Flickr.

Real Winter

Yesterday I took the horse to my friend Karen's place for our weekly Tuesday morning group ride over hill and dale. The sky was grey and thick and it was bitterly cold. We mounted up, and the dog was left behind in the trailer to wait this ride out as there were a couple of excitable babies (baby horses-- sometimes called "greenies") in our group of six. We trotted away from the barn and all the horses felt as though they might explode; they snorted across Pony Creek and up the hill to the big field full of holes where a house will be built soon. Full of anticipation and joy at being out.

The snow came slowly at first ("Nothing but flurries!" said George) but soon big wet flakes came quickly, blown horizontally by the wind. Little mounds of frozen white built up on the brims of our hats and in the soft spot between my horse's wither and the saddle pad. Moving through, it seemed as though the wind was swirling us along with the snow.

Then Karen's hearty laugh from behind me, "I can't see anything!"

"Me neither!" Snowflakes burning in my eyes.

"I'm just looking down at my pony's withers and trusting him to guide me home."

"Me, too." The horse tossing his head like he's carrying the queen through that snow. Proud and full of hot air, prancing along.

When we got back to the barn everything was coated in thin and airy snow and the dirt roads were beginning to turn white (I love it when that happens). I let the dog out of the trailer-- he always looks a little yellow against that white white-- and we jumped in the truck and drove the horse home.

When I got back to my home, there was not a spot of snow on the ground. It was like the ride in the snow never happened, but for my chapped face and lips. The snow may not have changed the day at my house, but it did make me feel like hunkering down and getting some quilting done. So, although it took me a while to get here, I present block 6 of the quilt-along. I'm really digging the batiks in these two, especially the smaller squares in the block on the right. *By the way, that Grady photo at the top was taken last February, but you get the idea. I hope we get some truly snowy days like that this year!

Grandmother Gnome

Another little gnomey today. It's still grey outside, but getting brighter as we march toward Christmas. Posting may be sparse this week as I head out of town to give this little one to my real Grandmother. Have a great week!

Snow day

It snowed all day today and is still snowing, but the flakes are small and it's not particularly cold so we only have about three inches' worth of accumulation. For some reason our teeny tiny camera (as opposed to the huge digital SLR) makes snow scenes a little blue. But the sky really was this grey, and I kind of love how this photo would have been changed not so much were it in black and white. It's winter. Don't you love those branches against the sky? And the pattern of snow on the magnolia?