a month of making

February seems to be a month of making.  Making valentines.  Making cookies.  Making snow people.  Making hot chocolate.  Making gardening plans.
Here's a little of what we've been making:

snow, playsilks & 'I'm not a dirty hippie' party

Rob took these shots on his way home from work yesterday--we had a beautiful snow and it was so heavy and wet that it stuck to everything like crazy.

We dyed these lovely playsilks with my friend Joni and her children yesterday.  They did yellow, red and orange and they all turned out beautifully.  Unfortunately, I forgot to take pictures of the process. 

Below--I had an awesome 'I'm not a dirty hippie' party tonight with 10 other women.  It was so fun.  Really, really fun.  Fun to share food,  talk and laugh, and make something earthy and useful.  Recipe from here.  Every single one of the women I have things in common with--different things perhaps--but I love that we all share some common ground.  Tonight what brought us together was homemade deodorant.  And laundry soap.

this jar (by Casey) says 'Krista's Hippy Pits Mix'.  Ha!

Oh yeah...Vermont Woodchuck and a seed catalog that will not sell genetically engineered seeds--sweet!

in love

february 2007

february 2006

It's February!  I love the month of February--it seems so close to spring.  I do hope we'll get more snow though.  The light seems warm and the days are noticeably longer.  Next month we will be sowing seeds inside--it isn't so far away. 

Yesterday was a pretty perfect day.  Somehow I got four, four! hoops taped which is awesome.  Usually I feel lucky to get one done.  I don't know how it happened.  I was totally in a zone.  I didn't do them all at once, but I kept coming back and doing more and boom, four gorgeous hoops!  I love it when that happens (and that synergy where it just all comes together is so rare).  So I'm excited for my hoop group to start, plus I'm doing a demo at a weight loss group next month.

Rob took Grace out for a bit yesterday for some one on one time and they brought me back a sweet vintage Pyrex refrigerator dish with lid from a downtown shop.  Aw!  Then I was going to take Eric out to Goodwill for some one on one but he didn't want to go!  Said he's tired of Goodwill, he just went last week (true, we did, but tired of secondhand shopping?  what?!)  So I took Grace and we were there 2 minutes before they announced it was closing time.  But I did get a cute sweater, half price.  Then we got a couple groceries and had a good time talking.  She's so funny, smart, sweet, and real and down to earth.  I'm thankful she's who she is and I really enjoy her.

We had a great evening together, all of us, and everything just rolled smoothly.  Lily ate supper as 'Fifi' in her pink poodle costume.  Love it and I'm so in love with my amazing family.

Seed love

Yesterday I stopped by this nursery to pick up a couple of packets of seeds in anticipation of spring (still a ways off, I know) and somehow ended up with 17 packets.  Yes, 17.  Oh my. 

Pros:

*purchased from a small independent business which is so incredibly important. 

*they are heirlooms, which fits my ethics and desire to grow unusual (nowadays) things, plus I am really annoyed angered by GMO's and Monsanto.

*they are so awesome--I mean, who can resist tomatoes called 'Black Krim'?

*my children will LOVE growing these together.

*we will LOVE eating these together (well, not the flowers)

Cons:

*where on earth (ha, ha) will I be planting 17 packets worth of seeds?  I see much garden work ahead, many more gardens to be made, somehow, some way.  Poor Rob.

And I had to post this today as my fb status update, since I read it last night and went 'WOW.' 

To live as closely as possible to the numinous wild a woman must do more head tossing, more brimming, have more sniffling intuition, more creative life, more 'get down dirty,' more solitude, more women's company, more natural life, more fire, more spirit, more cooking of words and ideas. She must do more recognition of sorority, more seeding, more root stock-keeping, more kindness to men, more neighborhood revolution, more poetry, more painting of fables and facts, longer reaches into the wild feminine.

~Clarissa Pinkola Estes, from Women Who Run with the Wolves

Earth Cycle Calendar & the coolest market in town (longest name, too)

I got this beautiful Earth Cycle Calendar and love it, so do my children.  It's so lovely to look at and so educational too.  We're watching the moon cycles which is fun.  If you order one from Lacey, tell her I sent you.  She's great!

Lils and I made this sign for our market, inspired by the Mudsock Market at Conner Prairie.  She came up with the name for the market and we started out hand drawing a sign wherein I did block letters and she was coloring them in.  We were also drawing pictures.  Then the phone rang and as I answered it, Lils decided to help more by coloring (scribbling) in large sections, making it unreadable.  So with naptime for Calvin running short, I printed the words but the printer is nearly out of ink.  Therefore the sign doesn't meet my aesthetic standards, but oh well.  It's only a matter of time before it gets torn down by Calvin, I'm afraid.  It says 'The Cow jumped over the Moon and the Chicken went into the Barn Market.'

I think here she's directing my next move.  Hm!