Little Bits

I got to have a little fun over the holidays and use some little bits of fabric scraps from my unfinished wall hanging to cover up a bit of our new computer desk. The desk is nothing fancy, a craigs list find, but with the hard drive on the floor it was a baby magnet, so I made a cover that velcros in place, letting us access the printer and hard drive easily while keeping it hidden. River has shown some interest and likes the sound of the velcro, but for the most part it is working great.

While we are now officially a tv free family, we do like to enjoy a movie every once in a while. Ben and I got to enjoy a lot while Asher was with my mom and River slept- it was so relaxing and enjoyable after a dry spell.

I also fashioned a cover for the computer moniter, because, really who wants to spend a lot of time looking at it?

11 Months!!

The youngest member of our family is getting ready for a pretty special celebration. We are really looking forward to all of our family coming into town, but for now we are trying to focus on what this little guy is up to at 11 months.

Walking, walking, walking... he is all over the place though he will crawl if he needs to make a beeline for anything in particular. He also is standing himself up in the middle of the room.

Most interesting is his new obsession with the alphabet song. Ben always signs it to him, and for the past couple of weeks I swear I heard him say "H, I, J, K" now he does that tune while moving his fingers trying to sign the letters. I am shocked with how recognizable the tune is for me, as I feel Asher is just now really carrying a tune well.

He signs for more, is pointing more and more, saying hi-when he feels like it, bye as well. Is finally discovering his fondness for books. Loves things with wheels, nursing and food.

Bacon

Ben did a silly thing over a year ago, he got rid of our old oven that we had fashioned into a smoker that totally rocked the meat world in our home. We used to sit on the driveway and have that thing running with some good 'ol bbq ribs and I really think it is how we met the majority of our neighbors. On the thought of no longer looking ghetto now that we are parents and all, and Ben's desire to rid our home of things that we don't need, the oven left the property. Silly boy though, we don't have surplus cash to buy an actual smoker, and I don't know if our home can survive without Bacon, we were stuck in a not so good place until push came to shove and the trash can smoker in Ben's head became a reality.

A trash can re-purposed from housing chicken feed from all those years ago when Ben did his master's research. A bought electric hot plate, some metal cutting screws, duck tape and old shelving and the Lubchansky's are back in Bacon for the cost of a belly from the Moore's and the $5 hotplate and oh so far from being trashy!!

Into the Woods:: 1/7

Thought the snow and freezing temperatures tried to keep us out, we were able to ditch our baby with the papa and have a solo mama/boyo outing adventure in the snow.Kicking the powdery stuff, so fun.Carefully climbing down the stairs, thank goodness some kind Urbana Park District Staff had shoveled all the way across the bridge! (Asher totally had a face plant on the last step after I turned my back from taking pictures of him, good recovery though: brushed off all the snow inside his coat via the neck and were on our way.)While you may have thought this was the face plant instead it is Asher as a Fox.Trudging through the snow. It was very powdery, but the kid is pretty short, so snow to height ratio made for some tough walking.

The quiet of the sun shining. I really love winter in the woods after a snow fall.

All the winter plants catching it's beauty.

And nothing is better than extremely watered down warm chocolate after the trudge. Except for a special mama made mint echinacea tea, which we had four cups of. Only 2 inches of sugary substance- hooray for Asher's good choices.

And papa cardinal galore- while mama had a little time to knit.

I could do this everyday. I am so happy that we got some snow. Not so thrilled that R has gotten some sort of bug, he was throwing up this morning into the afternoon, but appears to be on the mend. I hope the echinacea boost at the nature center helps the rest of us.

Wee Gifties

I finally made some soap again. I haven't gotten the lye out since before I was pregnant with Asher. Why does anyone buy soap, I mean besides the obvious reason of not knowing how? It is so so so easy... my soap making life was changed by this book.

For reals all you do is melt the solid oils, mix it with the liquid ones in a crock pot and then with a stick blender, blend in your lye/water mixer until is traces. Cook for one hour, add essential oils if you like, throw it in a mold, wait (the hardest part) 8 hours and cut. I dried mine in back of the woodstove for a couple of weeks as the bars were a little softer than I found to be ideal, but that wasn't necessary.

No more are the days of stirring the mixture for what feels like foreve with a wooden spoon until it traces. And I am very happy to say farewell to the waiting 6 weeks for all of the lye to saponify and the fear that there may be some lingering, just lying in waiting to burn an unintended gift recipient. I was happy to get so many bars out of two batches and stock up a year worth of supplies for our family as well as hit all the family members with a bar.

Yarn Dyeing

As I geared up to make the boys solstice sweaters, the crazy notion popped into my brain to buy a bare washable merino for A's wallaby.

As I have little time to begin with, this really wasn't a rational thought- not that many of my thoughts are these days- but it was sooo easy and I was pretty proud of my first attempt. Granted it isn't streaky and variable like some beautiful yarns out there. It is a solid blue, I am but still happy. I just wish that someone would have told me how to keep it from becoming a freaking rat's nest as it cooked away. I have at least untangled one skein- 3 to go!!! Yikes, really that is no fun and I thought about it as I dipped the yarn in, but darn it, I was just too excited to get the color on the yarn to worry about it user friendliness.

Do try this yourself if you have been thinking about it: buy dye, dump into water.

Stir, add yarn.Bring temperature up slowly to just under boiling and cook for 30 minutes.

Let cool overnight and drain and rinse. I didn't have to rinse much though as the water that was pouring off was amazingly clear!Dry and then ball up- still working on that. I will post my beautiful balls of yarn when they are ready, but I need a couple more movies to get to that point.

Fun with One Kid

We were so lucky again this year to have some Asher free time. We love him, really, but we can't get all that much done with an active two year old tagging along. Plus River really needed some center stage attention of his own. This sequence of pictures was almost to much for us. He loved the spinach soup that the Food Nanny whipped up last week.

He also mastered walking without his brother around to "accidentally" knock him over.

Plus the signing and saying, "hi." Oh he is a ball of fun. And we are counting down: 6 weeks until the number one birthday! This final picture, really just a babe? He looks like an aging man.

Happy New Year

Quickie post as I need to resume with blogging.

I am thrilled to enter a new year, while I know that life doesn't just change with a single day, this past year has been considerably a bigger challenge than most of my other years... I am happy to have it behind me and look forward to the days of juggling two kids and a home based business becoming more familiar and dare I say routine? We are searching for our daily rhythm and I am thinking we may be on to something.

Back soon with pictures and a lot more rambling.

Into the Woods

What do you do when you get back from the dr. and baby number two has an ear infection, but the day is just so lovely? You simply must bundle him up and throw him on your back because the woods are calling.The color seemed to have been sucked out of the woods as we approached over the bridge, so went searching for anything we could.
R's eye was looking pretty pathetic, but no worries the antibiotics are working now.
Asher told tales of being a deer and was on the lookout as always for his real mama.
Osage Oranges seeds seem to now be the hit of the woods. Their crumbs were spread all over, a little pale yellow found in the woods.
Bright green on this alligator log.

Pale green found on the forest floor.
A transformed squirrel practicing scurrying up a tree.
Ashened moss on a downed tree.
Green stood out the most.
White mushrooms were pretty subtle color finds.
A seahorse missing his sea.
Ashened tree. I don't know if there was a burn in this part of the woods this year as the leaves don't look it, but so many of the trees and snags really show signs of burning.
Bright yellow found last
A great day in the woods, running into some of our most favorite new friends at the end.