Using What We Have

The star plaything in our house this week is unexpected. In fact, last weekend I nearly threw it out.


It is an empty Costco cashew bucket full of old bottle caps. I started saving the caps a while back thinking they might be fun for a project (as the buttons on a cardboard spaceship, the wheels on a toilet paper tube car, that sort of thing). We've used a few for projects, but they add up fast.

In my latest battle against clutter, I moved to chuck the container, caps and all, but as I did, I tiny voice behind me said, "Mama, I want dat."


Since then, the caps have been sorted by color and counted many times, cooked in a stew, batted by cats, and methodically replaced in their container. Elliot proves once again that kids can be satisfied with so little. In too many cases, that is a necessity, as for the children now living on a Haitian golf course who are still finding a reason to laugh amid so much destruction, armed with nothing more than a piece of cardboard, a steep hill, and gravity.

I cringe every time I hear the call for Haitian support reminding everyone to overcome the urge to send blankets or water and simply send cash. We sent some cash, but still the urge to provide real, tangible help remains.

Thanks to a recent Star Tribune article about volunteering with children, The Littlest Volunteer, I can put some direction behind that urge to help and a long held assumption that "someday" I would start doing good in the community with the girls. Thanks to the organization Doing Good Together, we now have many ideas that don't have to wait for "someday."

My favorite starter project is the "Birthday Party" party, where Maya and a few friends can put together birthday party kits to give to a local shelter (cake mix, frosting, candles, and an array of small gifts).

This and other ideas are small ways to give, but may use the time that we have to give our whole family a stronger connection to the world around us. The next step is simply making it happen.

Clean and Green

Elliot's birthday week is just about to begin, and I've adopted the event as a perfect excuse to get my fall cleaning projects accomplished.

I finally found the time to literally green up my kitchen, with a couple coats of Dutch Boy's Refresh, an easy-to-find and affordable low VOC paint that was detailed helpfully on Tips for a Greener Life.

And after cleaning and painting one room, I grabbed the sample bottle of Eco Store's Antibacterial Spray Cleaner I received a few weeks back and really put it to the test.

Eco Store approached me with the opportunity to try a couple of products, and I'm now quite thankful they did. Their products are all plant and mineral based, rather than petroleum-based, totally free of anything nasty, and surprisingly effective. Beyond just cleaning products, they offer hair care, pet care, baby care, and bath supplies as well.

I'm definitely going to check out some of their other items.

The Spray Cleaner smells lightly of citrus, was ready available, unlike my depleted supply of Alice's Wonder Spray, and it cleaned everything it touched. The best part, truly, is that it is safe enough to let my helpers handle. Elliot sprayed windows, blinds, cabinets, floors, walls, and the top of her dolls head. I simply followed, rag in hand, and my house is now the cleanest its been since we moved in! The permanent marker came off our poor doll too!

Eco Store also sent us their hand soap, which also smells great, is adding to the greenness of our kitchen, and is helping us continue our fight against preschool-related germs.


Amid all of this cleaning, Maya has been happily crafting birthday decorations to help celebrate her little sister's birthday, and Elliot is practicing her own artistic talents. So here we are in a clean, brightly decorated house, awaiting our visitors to help us celebrate two years of charming Miss Elle.

Sun, Spring, and a New Face

Clearly, I've overcome my identity issues. The cure? The perfect spring day.

This day was the vision of at-home life that drove me to quit my stinkin' job in the first place (thank goodness... can't imagine nonprofit development is a great field at the moment).

We were outside all day. Maya lured the neighbor kids into our backyard with the promise of open space and chickens. Silly kid laughter and squeals mingled with astonished chicken chirps. And there was time enough for mud pies and tag.

This day was part industriousness, as I raked pine cones and poked around in flower beds for the first shy green shoots. And it was part indulgence, as we dashed off for ice cream and a romp in the park.

We're all a bit pink (oops, forgot to dig out the sunscreen), and completely worn out... A simply unbeatable day!

Flourishing

This morning I heard the most lovely thought: The Greek word for "happiness" can more accurately be translated to "flourishing." And it's true. Happiness isn't the bright smiling faces that first come to mind. No, happiness is a life of flourishing. Struggle and sacrifice and moments of sorrow don't detract from a life spent building relationships with people you love, doing work you love, and resisting the seductions of the material world.

I'm paraphrasing of course, from Minnesota Public Radio's Midmorning broadcast. Kerrie Miller interviewed Laura Rowley, a financial journalist turned divinity student and religious instructor. She's also the author of Money & Happiness. Listen to the program if you have a chance!

The interview is fantastic, both engaging and inspiring.

As we all tremble in the shadow of the current economic terror, I've been wondering how prudent it really is for me to remain unemployed. Ameriprise is laying off people left and right, and I have plenty of marketable skills.

Rowley's advice, that we live according to our values and relationships rather than the material goods that simply drive up our debt, was a good reminder.... Besides, it's not like there are jobs available at the moment... sheesh!

I'm rambling now.... Listen to the program if you can. I'll try to snag some pictures of my flourishing girls to jazz up this post!

Bombs Away!

No, this isn't a post about the upcoming inauguration and my hopes for a more peaceful future (though that has been occupying my thoughts!) No, this is a bit of a rant about one of our latest purchases.

I'm assuming all of you have heard the latest household toxin to avoid: BPA or Bisipherol A. It's an estrogen like toxin in many plastics (and other household items) that tends to leach into our food and bodies in tiny amounts. Cumulatively, these tiny amounts can be incredibly harmful to growing neurological systems.

When the information on this latest little terror started mounting, our family ditched as much of it as we could. We tossed our brightly colored plastic drinking glasses in the recycle bin, trading them out for the classic 1950s aluminum cups that have made most of our guests sigh with nostalgia for grandma's house. We replaced many of our sippy cups with BPA free NUBY cups.

And for Christmas this year, Santa wisely brought Elliot a fancy, stainless steel Kleen Kantene sippy cup. The thing isn't cheep. It was $20, including two tops, compared to $4 for a NUBY. But it is oh so chic in the high fashion world of stay at home, suburban, hype-aware parents.


I did like it at first. It doesn't leak unless shaken really hard or tilted just right after a big drink (sadly, that's better than most of the other cups we've tried). It has a sort of funky look. At first the only drawback was that it's a bit heavier than her other cups, but she managed it just fine.

Maybe a little too well, in fact.

She now wields it like a weapon! She has actually dented the stainless steel along the bottom in several places, simply by hurling to the ground with all of her considerable might. I don't want to think about what it would do if it connected with my toe... or the window.

Occasional buyer's remorse is one of the drawbacks to my (and Joe's) uber decisive personality. It doesn't happen often, but this is one instance that I can't deny. Next time I'll consult this lovely review of BPA free sippy cups and bottles, which has a surprisingly wide array to choose from, and then consider the weapons grade potential of the actual item before I purchase it!

Yet it's fashionable, still works, and was spendy. So for the next year or so that Elliot will require sippy cups.... Bombs Away... hopefully away from anything breakable.

Easy Garden-Bounty Dinner Recipe

It's time I shared my favorite garden-related find of the summer; essentially, it's spaghetti sauce.

I don't remember if I got the recipe in Cooking Light or Food & Wine or Better Homes (we get a ridiculous and environmentally atrocious number of magazines!), but no matter where it came from, it's spectacular!

The beauty of it is, while you boil your pasta, you can prepare a simple tomato puree. When the pasta is ready, you just mix the two together, allowing the pasta to heat the sauce, and add some Parmesan cheese. The flavor is amazing, if you like garden fresh tomatoes. It's really creamy, thanks to the tomato paste, and last time I substituted some roasted tomatoes for some of the fresh ones - it was outstanding! The original recipe called for sundried tomatoes too, but I'm not a fan of those, so I left them out.

Beyond its utter simplicity, this recipe is spectacular because it showcases all of those tomatoes I've been harvesting without requiring canning skills!

1 pound Penne
4 medium tomatoes, diced (I used two roma, one herloom, and a bunch of golden pear and cherry tomatoes)
2 tbs tomato paste
4 large basil leaves
1 garlic clove
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
kosher salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

1. boil the pasta in salt water
2. puree remaining ingredients in a blender. Pour sauce into a large boawl.
3. drain the pasta, add it to the sauce, and toss well

Serve immediately, it does get cold fast

Little Things That Have No Business Making Me So Happy

1. Morning Glories. I've never planted them before. This year, I read somewhere that they look really cool vining up sunflowers. Now they are vining all over my garden fence, up sunflowers in the front, even up the wild patch of dill that has taken over part of my flower bed. They have taken a while to begin blooming, but they are fantastically cheery, and almost more beautiful because they hide after 11:00am.




2. Cucumbers. I'm on a serious vining kick, with the morning glories, crazy pole beans, and a vining black eyed Susans, but I'm in love with the cucumbers that I've vined around some sunflowers. I've been cautioned that this may kill my sunflowers, but so far they're all growing just fine, and I love the way it looks.



3. Purple Green Beans. They are everyone's favorite. In fact, Maya eats a handful of them raw every time we go outside. They are sweeter than regular green beans, more tender, and incredibly hardy and prolific plants. Plus, they turn green as they cook, so you know exactly when they are the right texture to eat!



4. Elliot in this hat. She looks so grown up!

Meet the Chicken Ladies

The residents of Dove il Coop are more than satisfied with their new accommodations.

They have grown a bit more tame, and a bit more fluffy, each day as they work up their courage to eat cracked corn out of Maya's hand in spite of the likelihood of a little rough petting. Joe and I, and even the odd house guest, have handled most of them enough to learn their personalities.

They are officially pets, and unless desperate times arise, they will never see the inside of a stew pot!

Here they are:


This is Maya's chicken. She named her Clementine (with a curious nickname, Gorgo). Poor Clem is easily spooked, which is frustrating for Maya. She is also the only Black Sexlink chicken we've got, and she seems to be a bit lonely. We'll cheer her up though.

Below is a picture of Big Bertha (the White Rock) and Rosie (the Rhode Isle Red named after Lynn Rosetta Casper). It's hard to take a picture of these two when they aren't eating. They are extremely tame, speedy, and greedy.



Here Maya is chasing down Ina (Barefoot Contessa, anyone?). Ina is pretty tame, as well, and she tries to stick with Rosie whenever possible. We have a bit of a racial segregation problem among the ladies. They don't fight, but it does contribute to Clem's grumpy mood, since she doesn't have a partner.

Below is Gladys. She is nearly as timid as Clem, but in her effort to stay near Bertha, she must build up enough courage to come near us. Any quick movement sends her wobbling for the coop, though. Our teenage neighbor, who attended a metro-area grade school that had chickens, believes the White Rocks, Gladys and Bertha, are both nearly ready to lay.




Elliot doesn't get to enter the chicken run all that often, but she finds other ways to entertain herself.

What a summer!

Taming the Jungle

When we left for South Dakota, I left a thriving but adolescent garden behind, along with watering instructions for my teenage neighbor.

Ten days later (the first three of which required an arc to navigate the flooded garden caused by a distracted teenage waterer) I returned to a jungle, still thriving, nearly ready for its first harvest, but desperately needing some love and attention. Mostly desperate for some weed control!

I spent most of Tuesday weeding the garden while the girls played in the yard, and that got me about 1/3 of the way through it. Maybe by this weekend I'll be finished. Most likely I'll be eating summer squash, zucchini, and green beans too!

My first attempt at growing cabbages may yield some dimple-cheeked children before too long!
The make-shift teepees are really working for the pole beans. Joe is so handy! Check out the coop back there.
And the girls are actually, honestly playing together! Elliot follows Maya everywhere and giggles while Maya tries to give her a ride in the Coop. Yes, we're standing nearby to catch her when she inevitably falls off!

Fruit Fly, Don't Bother Me

I'm not sure what it was. It may have been my under-the-sink composting garbage can (or the fact that I only empty it into the big outside bin once or twice a week). It may have been the aging bananas on our counter. It may have been the house plants I have been over-watering. It may have been the gooey high chair that is impossible to keep clean for more than a couple of hours a day.

I'm not sure what harbored them, but I have a fruit fly problem.

I've tried cleaning my kitchen and bathrooms thoroughly, and spraying almost everything with Lysol (not so green...).

Martha suggests covering bowls of cider vinegar with saran wrap, poking some holes in it, and then waiting for the fruit flies to get trapped. I have no saran wrap at the moment, but I put a ziploc over a bowl of cider vinegar, and that seems to have worked pretty well.

I'm off to acquire some saran wrap and put a bowl in every room of the house. Hopefully it works. Otherwise, when we return from our 10-day siesta at the lake, we may find a house over run by the little guys. We'll have to welcome the UMN scientists in to conduct their experiments right here.

If that doesn't work, it sounds like they may be gnats (from my houseplants) instead of fruit flies. The recommended action there is not to water your houseplants.... since I won't be home for a while, that will be a snap.

Let's hope I come home to a house devoid of the flying little creepies.

Down with Long-Ears

We have a real problem with bunnies in our backyard.

There appears to be a family beneath our garden shed. Given that female bunnies can raise 6 litters in a single season, we are getting a bit over run. Our neighbor claims to have caught more than 22...

A mouth ago, I was exceedingly proud of my bunny protection methods. Our garden fence is a 20' by 30' fortress of chicken wire. So far, nothing has attacked my adolescent veggies. The beans are climbing up Joe's homemade tee pees, the peppers and tomatoes and potatoes are blooming, the cabbages look like some exotic tropical plant (I've never planted them before, so they're exotic for me!).

I put a flower bed in around the outside of the garden. My thinking was to pretty up the pragmatic vegetable part with a mess of extravagant blooms.

To keep the bunnies away from the Ben & Jerry's of the bunny world, my petunias, painted daisies, black-eyed Susans, and all the rest, I picked up a bottle of Repels All. It's apparently all natural, featuring a lovely bouquet of fox pee and rotten eggs.

It certainly repelled us, when I accidentally sprayed it up wind!

It really does work on the bunnies. They won't eat anything that has been sprayed adequately. Unfortunately, as plants grow, the new foliage and flowers are not protected.

Those naughty little bunnies will eat EVERYTHING that hasn't been sprayed down to teeny little nubs that can't possibly grow back. The result is a less than impressive flower bed. I am enjoying the purple, orange, and gold blossoms from the same two-inches of petunias that I sprayed shortly after removing them from their little plastic 6-packs.

I must admit, it's an improvement over last year's annuals, which were completely devoured.

I'm just going to have to spray the Repels All more frequently, start trapping the bunnies, or become accustomed to the minimalist look in my flower beds.

Yes, that is the coop coming together at the back of the garden!

Adventure Day - Up a Notch!

Thanks to the handy website TwinCitiesMom.com, we discovered the perfect Adventure Day park today. For one thing, the North Mississippi Regional Park is easy to get to, which is critical for us.

Even on a good day, with a happy baby and an excited preschooler who can help pack her own stuff, it takes us about 45 minutes to get out the door for an adventure. After gathering all of the extra clothes, snacks, and miscellany, we have to track down the sunscreen, maneuver everyone into the car, put the cat back inside... Then find my cell phone, re-read the directions, check to make sure the front door is locked.... Phew. Maya needed a snack before we left the driveway!

Actually, I did too!

It was sooo worth it. Our morning started at the park's nature center. Sandy was working the front desk, and was more than happy to give Maya a personal tour of the Habitat Puzzle and other preschool games that filled the center. Sandy then showed Maya the special room full of animals... Grandma and Nana would have been shouting nearly as loud as Maya was, but maybe not with the same tone... It was full of snakes, giant African millipedes, salamanders, and turtles.

Maya kept running around saying, "Have you never seen one of THESE before!?"

Elliot loved the center mostly because it served as a useful runway for the stroller. She pushed it all over!


Then we were off on our hike. We have gotten much better at this part of Adventure Day. Here is what I've learned:

1. Don't bring the double stroller, or Maya will refuse to walk.

2. Prepare to ditch the stroller (don't leave the wallet or keys in there!), or wear the baby plus a backpack. I try to encourage Maya to take the rougher diversions (when it looks safe). She has gotten much more adventurous, and much more interested in inspecting the biggest trees, strangest mushrooms, and funny animal tracks.

3. Don't have an agenda. We only made it about half a mile, but we saw EVERYTHING along that half mile. She loved it... next time I might bring some reading material!

The best thing about this park is it's dual purpose. We fully explored and delighted in the natural world for more than an hour and a half. Then, when that lost her interest, we jagged a half mile in the other direction, donned our swimsuits, put Elliot in her stroller for a nap (perfect timing!), and played in the COOLEST wading pool ever.

Next time, we'll pack a lunch and bring some friends. What a great find!

More Than We Can Chew?

Well, I think I'll need a pressure cooker by August. And if anyone knows of a good book on how to can vegetables, please send it my way.

Our garden has been in since Memorial Day, when Joe doggedly completed the fence. For some reason, every year I'm pleasantly surprised when all of those little seeds pop up as potential feasts. Maybe it's something about the mystery of life, that those specks can contain an entire living thing... or maybe it's just my own skepticism about how accurately I followed the planting instructions.

Whatever the reason, Maya and I have been circling the garden fence daily, enthusiastically monitoring our growing things. Now that everything has proven its will to thrive in spite of a cold soggy spring, tiny feet, and sloppy rows, I'm beginning to wonder if I haven't over done it just a bit.

Our garden is about 20 feet by 35 feet. I divided it into 12 beds with walk ways between them, with each bed measuring about 3 by 10 feet. We planted 5 types of tomatoes, 3 types of peppers, 4 types of green beans, 2 types of cabbage, 2 types of lettuce, beets, carrots, radishes, parsnips (although they aren't up yet and may not make it!), 2 types of cucumbers, zucchini, summer squash, butternut squash, and 2 types of potatoes. We also have rhubarb, asparagus, basil, oregano, lavender, parsley, thyme, sage, and savory.

Keep in mind that this farm-in-the-city is a 15 minute drive from downtown Minneapolis, not on a hobby farm in the ex-urbs.

Every year my enthusiasm during the planting stage wanes as the weeds encroach. Now I look at that massive garden and my two busy girls and say a quiet good bye to any nap-time lull I thought I would get this summer.

Not true, not true. The beauty of having a giant backyard in the summer is that all of the neighbor kids want to play over here. Maya is thoroughly entertained by the antics of three 8-year-old boys and their pre-teen sister who loves to make Elliot giggle. As soon as this rain lets up, I'll have just enough time to pull weeds and train the pole beans up the crazy-looking tee pees Joe built while the big kids distract my girls.

**Coop update! Joe (with a little of my help) built the floor of the coop this weekend. Slooowly, this project is going forward. We're headed to South Dakota for the first couple of weeks in July, so we don't plan to adopt our chickens until we return. We'll keep you posted!

Growing an Adventurer

The girls and I have committed to having an "Adventure Day" each week all summer (not exactly an exciting title, I realize). The plan is to explore the many metro area parks, teach Maya the rules of playing in nature (primarily, don't run away from me, explore but don't eat anything, and the basics of Leave no Trace). Of course, we'll add in a few of the more spectacular playgrounds and water parks in the region, too.

The point, really, is to explore new places. I'm a creature of habit, and I really don't want to get stuck in a rut when there is so much good stuff to do!

SO on the agenda last Friday was the Ramsey County Nature Center at Tamarack.

Maya started the day with a nature collage, using pictures of things we might see on our hike. I originally hoped she would glue them in her notebook, which we could then use as a nature guide to record what we saw.

As it turns out, she wasn't interested in that, but she was incredibly enthusiastic as she glued all of the pictures on top of each other! Plus, it bought me some time to pack the diaper bag, stroller, sling, snacks, binoculars, sunscreen, and infinite other accessories critical for adventure with young kids. We're not exactly spontaneous over here!

Maya loved the frog made from recycled materials (otherwise known as garbage) that adorned the park entrance, but she was less impressed by the collection of taxidermied beavers and birds in the nature center.


When we started out on the trail, Maya kept asking when we would get to the slides. Uh oh. Then she sat down and demanded a snack.

As she snacked, I wheeled Elliot around nearby and found all sorts of interesting things that lured Maya into exploring. We counted the rings on the tree stump, we found a hollowed out tree that looked cool, and we watched a million birds flitting around. She never really finished her snack. She snarfed down an orange, grazed on some pretzels, and and polished it off with Elliot's cheerios (yes, she's big enough to eat cheerios!). We were at the park for almost two hours, and she snacked the WHOLE time. Just wandered and snacked.

On the whole, it was a great first Adventure Day. We found a new park with lots of wild space and few paved trails. We spent the morning somewhere new, but with no agenda, no time outs, and no distractions. By the end of the morning, Maya was looking for interesting things to point out to me (like a pile of sticks that she called a birds nest with cracked eggs.... awh, poor mama duck).

And Elliot slept the whole time!

It's a Hard Knock Life for Ducks

My enthusiasm for providing Maya with a touch of wildlife in her own backyard has waned.

Instead of a beautiful spring experience, protecting a brooding duck and seeing newly hatched chicks, I had to explain the trail of broken eggs leading to poof of mama duck feathers and a crack in our gate. Luckily Maya is little enough to believe my story about the baby ducks going to live at the pond. This was, certainly, not my most forthright parenting moment, but I didn't have the heart to tell her about the neighborhood raccoon or fox or whatever it was that wanted scrambled eggs for Sunday brunch.

At least we've learned a valuable lesson for our prospective chickens: coop them up at night!

It broke my heart each time Maya went outside today. She walked straight to the nest and looked down saying, "I just wanted to see mama duck's eggs one more time. Did the chicks have to move?"

Bring on the Chicks!

Mama duck flew away for a her lunch yesterday evening, and look what we found! Not to worry, though. She was back on her nest just a bit later. As I rocked and comforted my newly-vaccinated and upset baby in the wee hours, I thought about how easy mama duck had it, cozied up with her eggs, keeping them out of the rain in the shelter of our prairie grass.

Bring on the Birds!

No, we’re not ready for our chickens just yet. As it turns out, there is no real market for backyard chickens. Home Depot and Lowes sell doghouse kits, but no chicken coop kits. Most of the online resources we have found reveal the true nature of fellow backyard chicken keepers: uber greenies. They by and large build their coops themselves with scrap materials the scavenge throughout the city.

Off we go then. Joe has been to Andover, Minnetonka, and south Minneapolis, filling up the Vibe with odds and ends ranging from plywood large enough to serve as a wall to small pieces that will probably end up in our bonfire this summer. We’ve got floor plans and power tools. We even have the neighbor girl lined up to watch the girls for a bit.

Soon our backyard will be a construction zone... and a hatchery.

It appears that our poultry farm has gotten off to a fruitful start!

For a week or so, we have watched a couple of wood ducks waddle around our yard. Yesterday we discovered their nest! I was tipped off by the mama duck’s crazy flapping and squawking each time our enormous house cat would get to close to one corner of the fence. Maya and I watched her dance around for quite a while, long enough to toss her some breadcrumbs and pull up a chair by the gazebo.

Apparently, if we’re wiling to limit disturbances around her nest, keep our cat inside, and only go near the area when she’s away feeding, in about 5 to 7 weeks the chicks will hatch and relocate to the pond!

Elliot's New Favorite Food

Mango-Banana Puree.


Elliot loved this stuff so much, evident in the way she giggled, then hollered, then tried to bounce out of the high chair after the spoon, that Maya and I had to try it. The three of us ended up having mango-banana baby food together for lunch.

We would never have done that with baby food in the jar. That's just baby food. Today's flavor of the day, started out as chunks of fresh, non-stringy mango and perfectly ripe, just-turned-yellow banana, so it seemed more like food... and more acceptable for Maya and I to steal a taste.

With all this extra time on my hands (yeah, right), I've gotten into making my own baby food. About once a week, I spend 10 extra minutes in the kitchen steaming peas or apples, baking squash or sweet potatoes, or pealing bananas and mangoes.

When everything is pureed to the right consistency, I just smoosh it into ice cube trays, and then have perfect baby portions that thaw in the microwave or (to preserve more nutrients) in a little boiling water.

This way, I can guarantee that the food was fresh and organic, plus save a little money. One mango and one banana (probably $1.10 at the store on Sunday), made about 6 jars worth of baby food (not including the two jars Maya enjoyed)!

I have a great book of recipes (mostly guidelines for preparing the fruits and veggies without cooking away the nutrients) called Mommy Made, and Daddy Too, but WholesomeBabyFood.com has a lot of good recipes and tips too.

At the moment, we're stocked with acorn squash, winter squash, peas, apples, mango-banana, and prune-banana.

This baby is in for a treat!

Green, Greener, Greenest

The Sunday Star Tribune has a great insert about Living Green.

For at least the past three years, I have been reasonably committed to making “green” choices. A lot of our purchasing and lifestyle decisions are now so routine that I no longer think about them as sustainable, like recycling, buying organic milk, and using earth-friendly laundry soap. It’s just what we do.

I have a long way to go. I realize this every time I read articles like Living Green. The cloth diapers just didn’t work for us (we settled on Seventh Generation diapers as a slightly less guilty alternative to regular disposables). Rain gardens always seem so complicated. I haven’t yet resorted to putting a bucket in my shower to catch the “grey” water for my garden. And finding the little alternative stories that sell eco-clothing never meshes with my mad dash to the grocery store between Elliot’s naps.

Yet I keep reading all the green living tips I can get my hands on. Each time my favorite magazines or websites feature an article on the green living basics, I congratulate myself on the few things that we do well (which has grown a lot recently), and evaluate the remaining green suggestions to see what would be simple to take up next.

Each time I read about rain barrels, self-propelled lawn mowers, eco-clothing, and other sustainable options that we haven’t incorporated yet, I feel a bit more comfortable with the idea. The more familiar the option (like the self-propelled mower), the more likely we are to just start doing it.

Last week, Amazon’s Deal of the Day was a push mower. It arrived on our doorstep yesterday (during the freak blizzard that pelted my hydrangeas with snow). I can't wait to That’s just one more thing on the list that we can celebrate, and a lot of others that we just might try next time.

So check out the articles. Find one new thing to put on your to do list!

In the middle of a blizzard, we had a summer fashion show!

Earth Day - Shmirth Day

Does anyone else loathe birthdays?

I love the idea of them of course (not the getting older bit so much as the me, me, me theme). No, I tend to feel the love of my family and friends and the depth of my good lot in life more on a random Tuesday when the girls are tucked in and we take a moment for real conversation and a good glass of wine. For me, along with nearly everyone I know over 21, the reality of birthdays tends to be a depressing rush of schedules and expectations that never quite line up.

Earth Day 2008 has shaped up in much the same way.

Elliot in Joe's Old Chair

Yesterday, I was definitely in the mood to celebrate our connection to mother earth. It was finally over 70 degrees! We were outside nearly all day, slathered in nontoxic sunscreen (Blue Lizard has been my favorite for three years now!) Maya and her imaginary friend Butrik bonded in the sandbox over mud-pie (atta girl Maya), while Elliot rolled around on a blanket eating grass and developing a strong tolerance for common allergens. Meanwhile I raked, dug in the garden, and scouted our yard for the best place to plant my 6 new raspberry bushes.

Maya (self styled!) at play.

I felt especially mother-earthy when I nursed Elliot in the shade of a tree in our backyard while Maya chased a worm around in the flowerbed.

Today, though, I’m just not feeling it. None of us are. Maya was only marginally interested in painting the planet earth picture I drew for her, refused to make the crafty “rain stick” out of a paper towel roll and rice, and spent our entire walk to the park in her stroller eating goldfish crackers rather than scouting out birds and bugs. Apparently you just can’t force Earth Day.

My less than sunny mood is probably caused by endless MPR stories featuring the interwoven crises of environmental degradation, gluttony (in the developed world), and poverty (everywhere else). It’s hard to feel good about rededicating ourselves to compost and low flow showerheads when food riots in Cairo and environmental refugees are the problems we’re trying to solve.

I’ll let you know if I discover a more effective way to bring the global battle for balanced survival to the level of the household. In the meantime, I’m going to track down an American Elm tree with Dutch elm immunity… I’ll just celebrate Arbor Day early; it’s less depressing.