Category Archives: General

Please take a minute to vote

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http://boost08.perfectprize.com/voting/

Some of my friends have an amazing opportunity to win a Forbes contest that would give $100,000 to their local, eco asheville business Honeywear. So far they are just make slings (produced locally), but they are releasing a line of organic clothes for babies this Fall. They have gone from 1500 people to top 20 (actually they are in third place right now)!! Will you take a sec and vote for them? Click on the link, vote for Honeywear, then confirm from your email. Make sure to do both steps!! Feel free to send this on! I would love to see them win!!
Thanks!

Here’s an article about the business

Hot Chili!

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I canned up 10 pints of chili this morning. It was my first attempt at canning up meat, and it turned out really yummy!! Tomorrow I plan to make a very large batch of bone broth to can up. I’ll probably take some of the broth and add some chicken meat and veggies to it to make a chicken soup, and can that up too. It’s funny, I love looking at my filling pantry shelves, but I don’t want to open up any of it! I wonder when I’ll start eating from the supply 🙂


addendum: Here’s the recipe

With the night weather cooling, we’ve noticed a draft coming from under some of the doors. We haven’t done any winter insulating yet, and we need to get on that. But, in the mean time, Kaia and I sewed up some ‘door snakes’. We have a bunch of sand left over from building. So, we stuffed the snakes with sand. They are really heavy… I hope they hold up!!

Yummmy, Yummy, and just plain yummy!

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Kaia and I went apple picking yesterday at the Long Branch Environmental Education Center, about 30 minutes north of us. They have 57 varieties of heritage apples! But they also had a ton of blueberries ripe and ready for picking. So, we ended up getting ~a gallon of blueberries and ~35 pounds of apples! I have no idea what kind of apples. We just hopped from tree to tree picking the best looking ones. Then we came home and did some canning!!
We made Spiced Apple Rings, Spiced Apple Berry Syrup, and Caramel Apple Butter!!!! MMMmmmmmm
Here are the recipes:

Spiced Apple Rings
6 pounds of firm tart apples
2 cups of sugar
6 sups of water
1 1/4 cups vinegar (I used apple cider vinegar)
3 Tbsp. Whole Cloves
8 Cinnamon Sticks

Combine sugar, water, vinegar, cloves, and cinnamon in a large pan. Heat to a boil and simmer 3-5 minutes.
Core, peel, and slice apples (I use one of those apple slicer thingies that does it all at one time). Place apple rings into wide mouth pint jars and fill with hot syrup, leaving 1/2 inch head space. Tighten lids and process in a hot water bath for 25 minutes. Makes 8 pints.

Spiced Apple Berry Syrup
6-8 cups Berries
Apples, cored, peeled and in little chunks
8 Vanilla beans
Big pinch of Chinese Five Spice Powder (you don’t have to have this for the recipe, but I do, so I used it 🙂
pinch each of nutmeg and cardamom
2 cups honey

In a large pot, put 6-8 cups of berries (I used blueberries, hawthorne berries, and rose hips and cover with water 2 inches over the top of the berries. Add to this vanilla beans, Chinese 5 spice, nutmeg and cardamom. Simmer until berries are soft (about 30-40 minutes).
Strain out berries and vanilla, pressing out as much juice and pulp as possible (if your berries have no seeds, you can keep them in the syrup! Just remove the vanilla beans.)
Put the juice and pulp back in the pot and add honey, stirring well to mix.
In your 4 or 8 ounce jars, put cored, peeled apple chunks.
Cover apples with syrup, leaving 1/4″ head space, and seal the jars.
Process in a hot water bath for 25 minutes.
Makes 18 four ounce jelly jars!

Caramel Apple Butter
8 pounds Apples
1 cup water
3 cups sugar
2 cinnamon sticks, broken into pieces
8 whole cloves
2 Tbsp. peeled, minced ginger root
2 Tbsp. lemon juice

Core, peel, and chunk apples and put them in a large pot with the water. Simmer for 30 minutes, stirring often.
In another pan, heat 2 cups of the sugar over medium heat until it melts/caramelizes.
When apples are soft and mushy, pour the liquid sugar into the big pot of apples, as well as the last cup of sugar. Tie the spices in a muslin cloth and add to the mixture. Simmer for an hour, stirring often. Remove the spice bag, add lemon juice, and put into jars, leaving 1/4 inch head room. Process in a hot water bath for 10 minutes. Makes ~9 half-pint jars.

Busy week already

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This weekend, Toby started working on the front steps. We are putting in 4 steps that come from the drive to the front door. We will also be putting in a little landing-type porch, just to keep the mud and dirt from coming in the house all the time.
Since you always get the butt and back shots of Toby at work, I made him turn around this time:-)

The steps will be filled in with gravel once he digs out a little more clay for a drainage pipe to help divert the water that comes down the stairs.

On Monday, Kaia and I took a little drive to get some new chickens. Our three old ladies are looking bored and seemed like they might need some company. They are also not producing many eggs these days. So, here are the new ladies:
The two small ones in front are Speckled Sussex and they are probably about 3-4 months old (the old ladies are in the background).

This cute little one is Poodle Noodle. She’s our Silkie and she’s also ~4 months old. She will be a smaller chicken, but still lays nice eggs and we just couldn’t pass up getting her.

Here are the other three. They are all about 6 months old. The larger one is an Ameraucana Rooster! I never really wanted a rooster in our bunch ’cause they can be so rough with the ladies, and so loud. But this breed is supposed to be more gentle, and if we hatch any of the eggs he fertilizes, those chickens could lay brown, blue, or olive colored eggs! Cool, eh? His name is Crowy. The whitish lady below him is Biscuit and she is an Ameracana female (so she’ll lay blue eggs). The orange lady is a Salmon Faverolle. I’d never heard of this breed until I went out to get the chickens, but she is very docile, friendly and supposedly will be a good layer. She is also really cute! I’ll have to get a better picture of her for you.

And just for the snuggle fun of it, here’s Kaia and her little friend Max 🙂

Tomatoes and Berries galore!!

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Kaia and I went Blackberry picking yesterday and got gallons of blackberries, and even a few raspberries. The vines were dripping with berries as big and juicy as I’ve ever seen. The raspberries weren’t ready just yet, but the farm owners had picked some of a different variety a few weeks ago and frozen them. So, I got a few gallons of raspberries too. So, we should have lots of yummy jam soon!!

Look at how huge these things are!

We’ve also been canning up some tomatoes. A local organic farm had some problems with their packing boxes and ended up with some bruised tomatoes that their buyers wouldn’t accept. So, they were trying to get rid of them and selling 20# boxes for $12!!! We got two boxes and I can’t find a bruise on them! They are perfect!!

So, tonight we canned some salsa, and on Sunday we are going to can some Pelati and some Roasted Tomato Garlic Soup. MMmmmmm…..

All is well on the baby front. I was showing so early and measuring ahead of dates, that we though we might have twins. So, we decided to go for an ultrasound just to be sure all was ok. Turns out there is one happy baby in there and one freakin huge placenta! From what I understand the main reasons for big placentas are moms with Syphilis (which I don’t have), diabetes (which I don’t have), Rh incompatibility (which we don’t have), and just because. I guess it’s just because. Big placentas often grow big babies… :-O

Isabella and Daisy went in to get spayed last week. Daisy came back her usual self and just bounced all over the place. We tried to keep her calm so that she wouldn’t break her sutures. She did fine, but for some reason Isabella’s wound opened a tiny bit, about the size of a pencil eraser, and she was having some swelling under one of her nipples. So, we took her back in and they put an adhesive on the skin to get the wound to close. But they also had to give her a cone to keep her from licking it.

She was not happy about it, walked around the house backwards, and somehow still got around it to lick the wound. Within a day it was opened up again, so I decided to do it my way. I cleaned the wound and put a sterile dressing with honey on it, then wrapped her belly in an ace bandage. So far so good. She’s able to move around and hasn’t tried to take it off. She’s eating well and I’m giving her some herbs in her food to keep down infection and to decrease the swelling (which is gone now).

many disconnected thoughts

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We have been without a good rain for months! The pond is dry, the plants are wilting, and everything is parched, and there is no rain in site! Please do a rain dance and send some our way!!!

Kaia, Toby, and I took the Amtrak up to RI and Mass. for a family reunion this past weekend! It was the first one in 22 years! It was wonderful to see everyone and hear so many family stories. I was 12 at the last reunion, so I didn’t remember much. All of my great Aunts had fun telling me how much like my great grandmother I am. I found out that she couldn’t work as a Nurse once she came over to America, so she got her certification in massage and worked as an herbalist and massage therapist. One of my cousins remembers her having 2 recipe books that she kept everything in, so he is going to go through some of the boxes of stuff in his attic (that have some of her old stuff) to see if he can find them. Wouldn’t that be amazing!! Some of those recipes would be from the 1800’s! She also read palms and tarot, which I think is pretty cool too.

We had a prenatal today and all is well. I’m 13+ weeks, but measuring ~16, so I may get an ultrasound, just to make sure I’ve not got two in there :-O We did hear the a heart beat though, nice and strong. And I’ve started feeling movements (Toby and Kaia felt it too). I felt them really early with Kaia too.

We’ve been trying to clean up the yard to get ready for our open house party in Sept. Toby’s mom came up today and helped chop up a bunch of construction wood for winter. The longer pieces will go towards making the raised garden beds.

A friend of mine is wanting to get ‘back to the land’ and has asked to live on our property for a year in exchange for house and childcare help! This would be an amazing help to us!!! She could help me get the garden beds prepared before the baby comes, help when the baby gets here, help with spring planting, etc… We are probably going to get a big family tent for her, and set up a propane stove and composting toilet for right now. And before the cold weather sets in, we will probably build a small addition onto the cabin with a separate entrance. That way she will have water, heat and electricity. I’m not really looking forward to more building, but it would be great to have her out here. And the guest house would be great in the future for friends/family, or WWOOFers or something.

Wild Herb Weekend

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Today I got a call from a friend of mine who also happens to be the president of the NC Herb Association. She’s asked me to be one of the main speakers at next years Wild Herb Weekend Conference! I’m really excited! I get to teach 3 classes that are a little over an hour long and she’s asked me to try to include classes that will draw a younger (20’s) crowd… stuff like ‘herbal mead making’, or ‘tye dying with herbs’ or stuff like that. This will be really fun for me, especially since I usually teach the more scientific stuff at the herb schools. The herb of the year is Bay Laurel, so I’m not really sure how to include that… (last year was lemon balm and this year is calendula… those would have been easy to build a class around… but Bay laurel???) So, you guys have any ideas about fun herbal classes you’d want to attend? It’s funny, when I’m not trying to think of things, I have all kinds of ideas, but when I need to come up with something, I’m blank.
I really wanted to go this year because James Duke was the keynote speaker, and I love him! But, it didn’t work out. Next year they are hoping to get Richo Cech (author and owner of Horizon Herbs).

Dirt!

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Guess what!
Yep, our little soul is back again and it looks like he’s staying put this time! I’m at the end of my first trimester and feeling good. I’ve had very little nausea, moderate tiredness, and couldn’t get enough nectarines to eat. I am not really craving pickles and ice cream, I just happened to get both when I was grocery shopping… I did try a pickle when I was having some ice cream just to see if it fulfilled some pregnant need, but nope.

A friend recently had a dream that we had a boy and he had beautiful dark hair. She kept saying in her dream that his hair was the color of good dirt and she could grow a great garden on his head (she’s a gardener). Then, she decided that his name was Dirt. So, Toby has taken to calling the baby Dirt. Poor child! (oh, and no, we don’t know if it’s a boy or a girl, we just keep saying ‘him’)

2009 Herbal Journal is out!

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In 2007 I discovered the new Herbal Journal, written by UK Herbalist Zoe Hawes and her friends. It’s a weekly planner with fabulous pictures and write-ups about herbs, herbal history, and anything herbal! I love it! Well, the 2009 Journal has just come out and I have 4 entries in it! I’ve written about Usnea, making herbal root beer, children’s herbal pillows, and Blood Root (which is called red root in the journal). It looks fantastic! If you like herbs and are a planner, like I am, you should definitely get one!! You can get them through Pomegranate publishing, or through Zoe Hawes, though she doesn’t have her site updated yet, you can email her about the 2009 Journals! Tell her I sent you! She’s an amazing woman!!

Thank you!

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Thank you Robbyn, for the beautiful Arte y Pico Award! It’s for creativity, design, interesting material, and contributing to the blogging community (in any language). I’m humbled. Thank you!

Though so many are deserving, I would like to pass this award on to:
–Daisy the Curly Cat – for keeping me laughing everyday with her creative thoughts!
–Suburban Tomato Liberation Front – for her beautiful and inspirational photography
–Greenwoman – again for lovely photography and thoughtful/informative herbal posts
–The Unusually Unusual Farmchick – for inspiring me to try new things
–Eco-Child’s Play– for putting lots of eco-friendly child rearing ideas out there for all of us!

I hope you enjoy flipping through some of these blogs.

Second Annual Hoop Path Retreat

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Last weekend I spent 3 full days in Chapel Hill, NC for the second Hoop Path Retreat. I went to the first one last year and had such a wonderful time. The main teacher is a man named Jonathan Baxter and he’s been hooping for ~7 years. He has amazing hooping skills, but it’s his words that are so potent. It’s like going to a meditation retreat and using the hoop to focus your mind and get past your issues instead of just sitting. Here’s a video from some of the classes and jams. At the end of all the classes, there is always a “hooper’s ball” where we get dressed up and hoop our hearts out! I didn’t take many pictures this time of classes or hooping, but I did get lots of the outfits for the ball!
These are my hosts from last year and this year, Erica and Beth. They are both amazing hoopers. Beth has one of the most beautiful, graceful hooping styles I have ever seen.

This is Martine getting ready for the ball. She’s originally from Canada (and has a cute little french accent:-) ) but is living in MD now with her new hubby.

This is me and Geof. We didn’t get to hoop together too much, but he’s amazing… and I like his tiger outfit :-0

Here are Jessica and Victoria, beautiful hoopers from Alabama. Man, I need to whiten my teeth!!

And here are Natasha (san.fran.), Nicki (milwaukee), Khan (san.fran.), and I getting ready to hoop at the ball. (I know, my outfit isn’t as daring or sparkly as most… maybe next year:-)

What I won’t give up to be ‘green’

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A few weeks back I was tagged by Two Frog Home to tell the truth about the 5 things I won’t give up for the environment. This was a really hard one! Every time Toby would mention something I would say, “well if I had to, I’d give it up” 🙂 But, here are 5 things that are not going green any time soon that I don’t want to get rid of:
1- my computer: There is a ton of waste produced every time one of these puppies is made and trashed, but I don’t see any green options on the horizon for this one!

2- my car: I’m still very reliant on my car and would have a hard time doing without. We have looked and looked for a more environmentally sound option, but they don’t (yet) make affordable family size electric cars that I could power off of a solar panel. Here’ hoping!

3- prepared cat and dog food: With all the food allergies we have in our pet family, I have no idea how I would be able to feed the pets without the already made foods I buy. I know that there is a lot of waste in the packaging and the shipping, but there ain’t no way I could make my own perfectly formulated rabbit and venison food! Believe me, I’ve tried!

4- Toilet paper: I’m with Two Frog Home on this one! It will be a while before I’m willing to give up the paper and use washable cloths. I know I used cloth wipes with Kaia when she was a baby, but I was glad when we ‘graduated’ to toilet paper.

5- I don’t know… I’ve been sitting here for 30 minutes trying to think of something else… What do you think? What should I give up??

Oooooh, she’s growing too fast!

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My sweet baby girl turned 5 years old tonight!!! I can’t believe it was 5 years ago that she was born. I mean, I can’t remember life without her sweet giggle, but it seems like just yesterday that we met!

She had some grandparents and friends over to celebrate with pizza, cake, ice cream, and pin the tail on the mermaid. And she requested a Unicorn cake. I didn’t think I’d ever be able to outdo last years cake but I may have done it! 🙂

I made a 10″ round cake and 4 cupcakes, then cut and placed the cupcakes on top of the cake to form the unicorn head. The rest was done with icing. It was a Honey cake from a Winny the Pooh cook book Kaia has, and cream cheese frosting.

Flying high!

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For Father’s Day, I wanted to give Toby something that he would really love. He’s always done so much for Kaia and I, and I wanted to find a perfect way to say “Thank you”. I remember once when we were taking a road trip, Toby mentioned that there were two things he really wanted to try before he died, one was Subaru rally car racing, and the other was to learn how to fly. So…
Here he is taking his first flight lesson. It’s called a discovery flight. You get the basic info about planes and the controls, and then you go up in the sky for ~30 minutes to see how it all feels. The instructor has the controls most of the time…
Here they are, getting strapped in. They talked for ~1 hour before taking off. This is a C-172 Cessna Skyhawk 4 seater.

And off they go…

Wait… here they come again???

They taxied down the runway, and turned around and came right back… I thought maybe the weather wasn’t good enough (it was sprinkling), or maybe Toby got cold feet. Turned out there was smoke coming from the control panel!!

So, the instructor decided to take Toby up in his personal plane. It’s completely different to fly than the cessna, so he got another little lesson. This plane is a 1946 Aeronca Champ. The center of gravity in this plane is much farther back, so it’s harder to control and land (yikes!).
Kaia couldn’t have cared less about what daddy was doing…. there were puddle to jump in!

And off they go, again:

They flew over downtown Hendersonville, where some friends of ours live. So, I called them up and they said they could see them from the house. Cool!
And here they come, in for a landing:

We all had a blast!

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I’ve got a moment of reprieve right now, but it’s been go, go, go! The first weekend in June I spent 4 days at the Medicines from the Earth conference taking classes and assisting Rosita Arvigo. She was the keynote speaker and gave some great classes on fertility enhancement, and spiritual bathing. Then I spent 6 days (ending tomorrow) with Rosita assisting with her Professional Maya Abdominal Massage training. It’s a very intense learning time, not to mention all the things that come up with the students after giving and getting so many abdominal massages. It’s pretty amazing! This morning I went in to class completely exhausted, so she told me to go home and take a nap. (I just got up from a 2 hour nap, so don’t give me crap about being on the computer :-)) Tomorrow is our last day.

So, you can imagine that things are still not unpacked or cleaned up around the house. And the cabin is just full of unpacked boxes. I’m hoping to get the office/cabin set up this week (it’s funny how much I dread going in there now that we have the house built). Maybe I’ll put up some pictures tonight… or maybe I’ll go see a movie and eat some chocolate… hmmmmm, which should I choose…?

Berries galore!

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I was happily surprised that our little berry patch is doing well this year. After the chickens scratching all around and kicking up so many roots, I didn’t think it would survive. But last week, I saw some red coming from the weed surrounded strawberries and found ~1 1/2 quarts of ripe, red strawberries! I’ve since picked another quart or so.

I wanted to get lots more strawberries so we could freeze a bunch. So, Kaia and I went out for Flying Cloud Farm for a little berry picking yesterday, and got ~2 gallons! MMMMmmmmm!! Their berry patch is huge! The strawberries plants are all so big and healthy, and everything is organic!! (I need to give my berry patch a little time and attention so I can try to get them to grow as big as the ones at the farm!) the patch is surrounded by flowers that you can pick a bouquet of for just a couple of bucks! So, Kaia and I had a really nice afternoon!

Last night we has a pasta dish with a salad topped with strawberries and a strawberry vinaigrette for dinner, and for dessert – strawberries dipped in home made whipped cream.

How’s this for a yummy treat??

Now that we are living in the house, and the projects have slowed down (a little), I feel like Toby and I are taking on roles parents that we haven’t been able to yet. We are playing family games at night, taking outings without having to hurry back home to get some building time in, we are sitting down to healthy, home made meals. It’s been very, very nice!! Though there is still the stress of completing the home projects and paying off the bills, it has lessened.

Crazy cats!

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The cats are having a grand ol’ time together and have really adjusted well in the last 10 days. Daisy is still a bit skittish, but calming down each day.
Here’s a nice picture where you can really see Isabella’s wavy coat. It’s extremely soft! You can also see her white ‘racing stripes’ on her legs. The white stripe goes down each leg and meets in the back, and leads to her white underside. She really has a cool pattern on her.

We got a new rug today and every one has really enjoyed it! Kaia used it as a dancing spot for a while. Then the girls (kitties) decided to fight it out to see who could be proclaimed “queen of the rug”.

Max decided to join the ruckus.

But quickly moved off to allow the girls to finish their Battle for the Rug!

Isabella has also decided that she likes to view her kingdom from above (way above!). That way she can be sure that all of her slaves are properly performing their duties.

And I don’t know if I have mentioned it, but within every 257th litter of kittens born in the world, one is born who possesses the magic of Merlin’s cat (remember how he had that cat who was really special to him, so he gave him the ability to do magic? Sure you do!) Supposedly, since cats can’t hold magic wands, they do their magic with a twitch of their ear. We’ll this magical gene is so rare, I never thought I’d have a magical cat of my own. But, today, Isabella showed her true colors. The sparkle of Merlin’s magic appeared over her ear as she wished up more wet food in her bowl! Guess I’d better keep a sharp eye on that kitty!

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Some of our kitty friends,Lilly, Mu Shue, and Iris, lost their home in a fire. So, Camie’s Kitties is having a fund raiser for them. They are donating $0.50 for every blog that posts their favorite knock-knock joke with a picture. So here is mine. Kaia and I made it up on a long road trip. It especially funny to crazy 4 year olds!!!

–Knock Knock!
-Who’s there?
–Peace Up!
-Peace Up Who?
–AHHH HAAAAA! You said Piece of Poo!!!! HAHAHA Haaaaa HAaaaaa!

Discovering the roof

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Max has been staying with us in the upstairs bedroom, and seems to like it there.  Today, while I was doing some more cordwood, I left the door to the bedroom open so Max could explore the rest of the house.  He seemed to get a kick out of running up and down the stairs.  The temp. got to 70 today, so I opened all the windows and doors, and Max decided to explore the roof.

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I think he likes it out there!

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Toby took the pics with his phone camera, so the quality isn’t too great, but can you see the smile?

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We had a busy weekend doing things other than working on the house.  But, 5 of the cordwood walls are now done inside and out, (WOOHOOO!) and I will hopefully finish them off early this week.  A lot of the ‘big’ stuff that needs to be done so we can move in are things that we are waiting for others to do… like plumbing, electric, and gas finals, finishing the stairs, painting the house, and dirt on the roof.  Oh, speaking of dirt on the roof… I may have found a way to get it up there that doesn’t involve us and a bunch of 5 gallon buckets full of dirt!  I’m going to try to hire a mulch blower truck.  They work well with dry, light dirt also and can blow it up on the roof!  There is a long hose and someone stand at the end and directs the dirt exactly where we want it.  Wouldn’t that be great!!!???

Closer and closer!!

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Lots of progress this weekend!

Kaia and I seeded the yard.  We put red clover everywhere, field peas in front of the house, oats behind the house, and wildflowers in the front field area.  If they all grow, we will have lots of herbs and medicine, along with a beautiful yard!
We found a great vanity at an antiques warehouse. I only measured for the size of the sink and forgot that I needed to leave room for the faucets, and after buying it realized that it wasn’t deep enough. So we attached some pine boards to the side and stained them the same color as the original vanity.

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Then we took a 2 inch slab of oak that Toby’s brother gave to us, cut it and framed it for the top of the vanity. I need to add a strip of wood to the front, and we’ll cut the hole in it for the sink and faucets once the glue dries.

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A lot of the little finish carpentry details are getting done too. Here, on the cordwood side of the house, where the concrete slab meets the foundation there is 2 inches of insulation.
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So, that has been covered by a boxed out baseboard. We’ll probably run a little strip of wood along the bottom to close up that gap and I’ll finish it all with the Earthpaint oil.

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And you may have noticed that the cordwood looks much cleaner and lighter in the above picture. Here is what that same spot looked like before:

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To clean it up, we first sprayed it down lightly with bleach. We got this suggestion from Clarke Snell and it worked like a charm to lighten the wood ends. Then we took a metal putty knife and scraped the extra mortar off of the log ends. Then we used a hard bristle bathroom scrub brush to give the logs a final cleaning. We will scrub the outside logs, but not bleach them… they will weather anyway. But lightening the inside ends really brightens up the room!

And last, but absolutely not least, we have a kitchen!! A good friend of ours, Bruce, who is Toby’s computer business partner, also happens to be a carpenter. So he came over on Sat. to help install the cabinets. (You know, I don’t think I’ve ever posted a picture where you can actually see Toby’s face… it’s always the back of his head as he works on something 🙂
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These cabinets are fully installed. The dish washer and fridge will go along the wall to the right, along with upper shelves that we will build.

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Here are the cabinets to the left. We haven’t secured these in yet, ’cause we have to build a bookshelf in the corner first. For the counter top we are using the marble and granite that we got (for free!) 1 1/2 years ago from a stone cutter who was moving his shop.

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Check it out!

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Our little home was featured in two articles in the New Life Journal this month!  This one about cordwood and this one which was an interview.  Cool!

We are attempting to finish the cordwood in the kitchen today and clean it well.  The kitchen cabinets are scheduled to arrive on Wed!  Woohooo!

Blessing our home

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I need some creative thoughts here…

We are wanting to carve a blessing into the piece of wood that we put above our front door, on the inside. Any advice… It needs to be a fairly short blessing to fit on the wood. Two that I have thought of so far are:

May this home be a place of happiness & health. May those who visit & those who live here know only blessings and peace.

Bless this home and all who enter.

But I know there are more out there…. Let’s hear em!

Amazing website builder!

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You all have to check this out! My husband and his computer business partner just launched a new business site! It’s called Restaurantzite It’s being used by restaurants to create a great website really easily. But, I used it just now to see if I could do some other kind of website and it was really simple. I did this in 20 minutes!!  It would be really simple to expand on this idea and create a whole ‘this is our home building project’ kind of website with it.  Cool, eh? I love the drag and drop aspect of editing. It makes it all really simple. No more dealing with Dreamweaver to create pages and trying to learn html! This is great! Maybe I’ll do a site like this for Kaia so the out of town family can keep up with her escapades!

If you know of anyone who is looking to build a website please direct them here!! Oh, and they are going to be adding ecommerce and blogging capabilities in the future to. So you could build your own blog or e-store with this. Cool, eh? I’m very proud of them!

Poo

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The house continues slowly. All the doors and trim has been hung, and lots of little carpentry details are getting checked off the list. We’ve ordered a Caroma Sydney 305 Elongated Dual Flush toilet for the downstairs bathroom. It’s a toilet that has two flush options, .8gal and 1.6 gal (depending on if it’s #1 or #2). We were initially planning on just using composting bucket toilets, but you know… you have to think of the in-laws and other company that may be squeamish about the poo thing. 🙂 I’ve also got the cabinets on order. We are getting some fancy schmancy stuff! We were going to build all the kitchen cabinets, but we decided it would be more worth the time and money to just purchase them. Well, we will actually be building upper shelves and be buying the lower cabinets. I’ll try to take some pictures this week…

I’m so gonna downward-dog your ass!

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I’m so gonna downward-dog your ass!

When it comes to yoga, honey, I’m one Ashtanga crazy beyatch throwing my Sun Salutation all up in ya face.

Don’t you come in here posin’ because up in this Y, we yoga tough. This ain’t your mamma’s yoga, this is extreme yoga.

Monkey pose … bam! Flying Crow pose … bam! That’s right. I’m not even spilling my latte. You scared now? You should be.

Uh oh … Upward Facing Dog … bam! That’s right. I’m doing the dog. Uh oh … did you hurt yourself? Why don’t you take a break and see how the big girls play.

Why don’t you sit there and watch me reach a state of perfect peace? Check it out … Bam! Peace! Right there. Just reached it. I reach inner peace faster than any of these chumps circular breathing in here. I got so much inner peace it’s shooting out my nose. But I’m not done yet … oh no. Lotus pose … bam! Headstand pose … bam!

How’s that? You’re like all upside down and stuff. Firefly pose… bam! Baby, look at me. I’m a firefly. My ass is lighting up and I’m flying around in my backyard on my peace wings. Damn, I’m good.

Give it up, honey. Why don’t you try some Jazzersize or something, because in here, yoga is for the big girls. Loka Samastha Sukhino Bhavanthu – Chump!

Posted in the local paper, a spoof about the yoga attitude at our YMCA-

Yawza!!

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We started putting the finish oil down on the floor and MAN!!  is it gorgeous!!!

But first, here’s a picture of our new front yard!  Kaia loves the running room (so does Suki and the chickens!)

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For the floor, we sanded it down to 220 grit.  The large floor sander only went to 120, so we went over it one last time with a hand sander.  Then we wiped down the walls, vacuumed, and ragged off the floor.  We used the One Coat oil and applied it with a lambs wool applicator for the first coat.  Look at the color!!
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Then Toby went over it with a buffer.  It was pretty funny to watch him try to control that thing!

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Then we wiped off any excess with a soft cloth.  The wood feels very smooth!

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My favorite part was the landing at the top of the stairs.  We have all kinds of woods up there.  #1 is our only piece of tropical wood in the floor.  It’s Cocobolo.  #2 I believe is Cherry.  #3 are Black Walnut, and #4 is Spalted Maple.
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And here is the landing once it has a coat of oil.  Beautiful!!!
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This piece really changed colors once the oil was applied.  It’s very pink.  I’m not sure what kind of wood it is.  Any thoughts?

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Tomorrow, we will put on another coat of oil.  This time we will use the Biopoly for a harder finish.  Buff and rag off and it’s done!!!

The babies

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They are a month old now.  Cutie pies, eh?  We are getting the black one with the strip on her head.  The little calico reminds me of johnny depp in pirates of the carribean, with the black eye make up 🙂

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