“Holymessaphobia” and other homemaker disorders.

Since you have last heard from me my to do list grew, exponentially, voluntarily, and frankly exhausting!  I have also added a non voluntary to do called “dealing with the worst spring allergies I have ever experienced” which takes up way more time than I can spare.  Grant it the voluntary to dos are a lot of fun: the community theater play, wearable art show, and a walk/run for cancer in memory of a dear member of our community!  My house is suffering the consequences!  So why can’t I take my own advice and weed my to do list?

I believe it is “todomanicism”, a understudied disorder of the chronic volunteer and underemployed mothers that also suffer from “domusphobisplasia” (the avoidance disorder that causes women to volunteer to be away from the reminder that they need to do the dishes from yesterday still because they have perpetuated a cycle of to little time in the day) a very difficult disorder to dig out of.

On top of all this, it has been unseasonably nice out and I have been easily sidetracked in the ‘spare’ time I have to play outside, fish, and garden. Build a ‘greenhouse’, install address signs for the volunteer fire department… You get the picture.  I am getting buried by the home I am supposed to be cultivating, yet again!  Am I alone?  My dearest friends also suffer from the same disorders, one of them somehow manages to get her home neated up daily but she claims that is made possible by ‘holymessaphobia’.  Something else I find that we also suffer from is the procrastinated shower which makes us fresh and nice smelling in the afternoon and evening, having to ‘wash the mom off’ before our evening adult contacts, giving the illusion that we are fresh and rested when in fact we are frackin exhausted!

Add on to this the list of concerns and worries with no solution in sight pingponging back and forth in my overwhelmed brain and voila!  I have “brainfartstotia”, the side affect of all above disorders. So my dear contacts in the world around me, I apologize for forgetting about the details of your lives as I can’t seem to keep track of mine. That being said I am very proud of the fact that I have not forgotten my csa fruit/veggie box pickup for 4 weeks straight!  So proud of myself! Not to mention my potatoes are planted and I have that one haven in the yard that is winter waste free.

On top of my ‘brainfartstotia’ my daughter also suffers and told me an hour before her school music program that she needed a white shirt (never to be found in my house as the quickly become destroyed since I am just not a white shirt capable person) a black skirt and black tights, also not in the home as my daughter is a bit rough and tumble with the outdoors.  Solution?  The shopping options are limited here to basic mercantile supplies so the white shirt and black tights were a quick fix.  The skirt?  Well I happened to have a lace and satin tutu type skirt with an elastic waist that came with another, uh, item that I purchased for myself, eh hmm.  Worked like a charm and appeared totally appropriate on my ten year old sweety pie whom I will tell her at her bridal shower someday what that skirt was supposed to be for.  I can hear the laughter now.

Thinking outside the box at the last moment seems to work for me, I just wish I didn’t have so many of those moments in my life! I also wish I could take my own advice!  Every time I make a resolution and I am just starting to really get going with it some disaster derails me and sends me off course and finding my way back through the piles of to dos is daunting at best.  It seems so easy to walk outside and play in the dirt, a gardeners way of putting her head in the sand that eventually bears edible fruit.  If only the laundry and dishes weren’t the most productive growers around here!

Weed your to do list. Include sun in the daily forecast.

The sun warmed my face as I woke up this lovely Sunday morning. I stretched as I opened my eyes to find I had been joined on the bed by the little lab as she cheerfully implored with happy eyes and wagging tail if we were going to get up and have fun. My dear one softly snoring away having been called into work at 2 am and returning home sometime just before the sun fully rose.  I dose in and out enjoying this rare quiet Sunday luxury and garden in my head.

Each day I impatiently await total thaw.  The birds are singing now each morning and the sun has that extra touch of warmth and each day the sun is up longer and longer.  I am not patient.  I daydream of some sort of magical power to zap my house clean and warm the soil so I can garden my days away.  My list of daily activities contains to many undesirable duties.  I pout.

But today is Sunday and it is a day of rest, so the house is a mess?  Who cares, no one is coming over, I can do whatever I want.  I think I shall gather seaweed by the seashore for my garden and build some planters and plant potatoes, sunchokes, and peas.  The dogs will love it, and so will I.  Sometimes you need a day with no undesirable duties.  Monday is always a good day for those.

The soul’s sun is doing those things that bring you a deep warmth and pleasure, if you look at a new plant growing, maturing, and finally bearing fruit you will see that it requires 75% sun and 25% rest to really grow.  Now if you only ‘sun’ your soul a little bit, on occasion, I don’t think it can grow much less bear fruit.  To truly garden your home you must sun your soul, who wants to be in a home with a bunch of dried up shriveled souls!  Strive each day then to meditate, find peace, create, spread love, do a kindness, witness a moment of beauty and focus it in on your soul.  Weed out those undesirables to just the required, we all have responsibilities in our life that have to be maintained. But who said we need to torment ourselves with perceived requirements?  If it is a burden and not a true you need to do it for responsibility reasons, then don’t obligate yourself to those extras in life.  While I enjoy physical labor and pounding sign posts in the ground so the fire department can find the address faster another person might enjoy hosting bingo.  I might enjoy helping in the community garden while another person finds pleasure in throwing a bake sale for Head Start.

Find your joyful strengths and lend a helping hand with things that feed your soul, not things that drain it.  We don’t need to be martyrs to do a good thing.  One thing I have noticed about martyrs:  they are a pain to be around, not edifying, uplifting, or joyful! I find them down, drained and draining, shriveled up and dry!  I have been one!  Why?!  They are now worthless to themselves and their homes.  They have nothing left to give, so cut out those extras if they don’t edify your soul! Each day let the sun warm your face at some point, and grow well.

Buying local isn’t always about food, think about sustainable economy.

lindsaymcnamara.com

Stainless steel water bottles, reusable bags, and recycling are frequently associated with “going green” or “sustainability” in U.S. popular culture.  However, if asked to define sustainability, chances are, most Americans would falter.   At the Brundtland Commission of the United Nations in 1987, sustainable development was defined as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”  By the 2005 World Summit, it had been determined that sustainable development requires the collaboration of environmental, social and economic needs, known as the “three pillars” or the “triple bottom line” of sustainability.  The phrase, “going green” is now frowned upon by most sustainability advocates because of its emphasis on environmental sustainability and complete omission of the economic and social aspects.

The three pillars of sustainability are colloquially referred to as the three E’s: environment, economy, equity.  After attending the American College Personnel…

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Versatile Blogger Award

I must thank Rachel of ‘Peace, Love & Fabulous Things’ for awarding me the “Versatile Blogger Award”!  Thank you so much, Rachel!

Here are the rules of the award from Rachel’s wonderful blog

If you are nominated, you’ve been awarded the Versatile Blogger award.

1. Thank the person who gave you this award. That’s common courtesy.
2. Include a link to their blog. That’s also common courtesy — if you can figure out how to do it.
3. Select 15 excellent blogs/bloggers that you’ve recently discovered or follow regularly.
4. Nominate those 15 bloggers for the Versatile Blogger Award
5. Finally, tell the person who nominated you 7 things about yourself.

So, again, thank you to Rachel!  I included a link to her amazing blog on my page which we can all thank Rachel again for my blog makeover, as I made it over in the process of trying to figure out how to put a link on it!

And now for MY nominations of Versatile Blogger:

1. julesgemstonepages @ http://julesgemstonepages.wordpress.com/  Lovely ‘haiku sparkles’

2. make me @ http://makememori.wordpress.com/ great do it herselfer with way more talent than I!

3. Peace, Love, and Fabulous Things @ http://peacelovefabulous.wordpress.com/ a gal after mine own heart!

4. The Hippie Housewife @ http://thehippiehousewife.wordpress.com/ good giggles and deep thoughts

5. Giantveggiegardner @http://giantveggiegardener.com/ Great gardening info!

6. Minnesota Transplant @ http://minnesotatransplant.wordpress.com/ Another mamma like me, a former Minnesotan!

7. We Call Him Yes Chef @ http://callhimyeschef.com/ Amazing food photography and recipes

8. brainfood @ http://brainfoodblog.wordpress.com/ more amazing food photography, health fact, recipes and FISH!

9. big crunchy nut @ http://bigcrunchynut.wordpress.com/ another Mom with her know on!

10. Eat, Play, Love @ http://ourfamilyfoodadventures.com/ Mom and Fam cooking together foods from the globe

11. Sitka Local Food Network @ http://sitkalocalfoodsnetwork.org/ Group claiming food security!

12. The Handmaden @ http://handmaden.com/ Another do it herselfer in the know!

13. Superurbangeek @ http://superurbangeek.wordpress.com/ an urban experimental farmer!

14. K. abc @ http://kabcphotography.wordpress.com/ photography and healthy eats

15. The Dirt on Gardening @ http://gardendak.wordpress.com/ where gardeners go to dish on dirt

 

Wow, I just had a blast putting that together!  Thanks Rachel!

Finally, what you have all been waiting for (giggle, he he) Seven Things About ME!  HAR HAR

1. It was my birthday yesterday.  It snowed in the morning and was sunny in the afternoon. I was born in Minniapolis.

2. I am a certified Firefighter 1 and an AK Emergency Trauma Tech.  I volunteer at the local FD.

3. I am in a community theater group, we are putting on a play in May.

4. I went on a deer hunting trip with my ex, two dear friends and well the guy that owned the boat who used to be a friend… the boat sank and we were rescued by a coast guard helicopter.  That was my first helicopter ride.

5. I grew up on farm for part of my childhood and a WW2 era tug for the last part.

6. I want to go bear hunting for brown bear with my boyfriend.  I should pry have my head examined.

7. I am a pretty damn good shot with my rifle, but have only taken one deer and it sunk with the boat mentioned above. I am a new waterfowl hunter and think it is the best thing in the world to sit in cold mud all day waiting to shoot at something that never shows up.  I think I am drawn towards activities that celebrate peace and solitude.

 

I hope you all enjoy your awards and the little tidbits about me!  Thanks and Congrats all at once!

Waste, Waste Not

What is waste?  I think the definition of waste can be all over the map.   Take my lovely Sunday expedition to a local salmon fishing hot spot with my man and boy, we brought home ZERO fish. We did however bring home some fun pictures, smiles all around, and the wonderful memory of little man catching his first king salmon (to small to keep, barely) and another picture to prove it.   So, is that a waste?  I don’t think so, others might argue that we wasted fuel to do that, but then I can argue that the semi driving across the entire US carrying GMO negative value food, harvested by giant carbon burning equipment, processed beyond recognition by more machines has way less value than that very fun and important time spent with my family. Then, what is waste, what do you bring to the dump?  A table and chairs?  Really!?  Well guess I have two chairs I can paint brightly for the outdoor dining area!  (the table and other two chairs were smashed by other dump stuff)  Now I just took someones waste and gave it new life!  Along with some corks for the subsistence hooligan net.  A small gillnet set in the river held up by corks that quickly catches the little tasty morsels:

 

These little oily fish are good dried, smoked, salted, baked, or boiled but the very best way is floured and fried!  Can’t wait to be sitting around the campfire here real soon frying up the days catch up the lovely Stikine River.

So here I am dreaming of the river, hooligan frying in the pan on the campfire, early morning sun – but not yet!  First I have to salvage these corks off of the various discarded nets up at the dump!  They are frozen to the ground and each other, arg, and I forgot a knife.  So I walk away from the dump with two chairs and 20 corks for five bucks. Ehh, not bad!  I will update when I get the net done!  I have to go weed my kitchen now.  I really don’t want to though, I want to go up the river!  Happy first day of spring, folks!

food security – what’s that all about?

This is a part of the picture, I am cultivating lots of these great kind of ideas in my soul garden.

thegreenrock

my friend likes garlic.  she also likes local.  but the garlic she had seen at the supermarket were all grown far far away, so she planted some last fall because she knows it grows here.  that’s a part of food security.  remember that Halloween when the pumpkins were all sold out?  all the ones that grew were gone and there was no truck bringing in any more?  that’s a part of food insecurity – absence of supply.

food security is when all people at all times have access to enough food to meet their physical and cultural and economic needs, and the food is created in a sustainable, socially just manner.

the food system is everyone, from those who grow to those who make to those who sell to those who eat and the ground it grows from and the rain that falls and the trucks or planes or boats…

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Sweet Mini Peppers

What a delightful recipe (and I didn’t know the brown bag trick) I think I might grow some sweet minis now!

We Call Him Yes!Chef!

I saw these colorful mini sweet peppers at the store the other day and I wanted to photograph them but I had to come up with some sort of recipe so that Yes! Chef! would make them for me and then I could photograph them. Lo and behold there was a perfectly great recipe right on the back of the bag.  I brought them home and waved them in front of Yes! Chef!  He said something like, “Yes, they are pretty”.  He knows my propensity for Crow Photography (photographing any pretty, shiny or colorful thing that I see), so he wasn’t culinarily very interested.  Then I showed him the recipe on the back of the bag and I said things like, “Mmmmm.  This looks great” and “I sure do love capers, olives and peppers” and finally, “Could you please make this for me and we could put it on steaks…

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If a garden isn’t just in your yard, but your home…

It might be that the world is your garden too!  We had put some crab pots out almost two weeks ago and I was really hankering to pull ’em before… well before it was pointless.  So my stubborn self picked up the kids at 3:30 from school (I was going to go before they got out of school but you can bring more crab home with more people in the boat) ran us all home, hooked up the boat trailer to the Jeep… which died.  I swear I asked the mechanic to change the oil when he fixed my brakes… Put some oil in the Jeep and had the boat with children inserted in the water by 4:00!  Feeling proud of myself.

I have never pulled one of these pots before.  These particular pots are commercial pots, ie: intended to be hauled with mechanized device, not bare hands.  No problem!  My daughter takes the till and off we go, wind in our face happy smiles, excitement mounting, and guesses to how many Tanner crab are in the pots.

I am optimistic, I have a girl trick a girlfriend set me up with yesterday, I got this.  The trick is not slick, not sure it’s a trick. First pot is not in good shape, was that me or some other force?  I am going with other force, my boyfriend assures me it was ‘other force’.  Nonetheless, messed up pot = no crab, well and that took 30 minutes, yay.   The second pot I decided to lift with pure girl power, no tricks, no gimmicks. Okay I used my brain a little since it was clear that pure brawn was not an option for me.  An hour later and I have re-baited the pot and have 4 Tanner crab on board. Disappointing? Nope.  Perfect. I left the third pot where it was, we can deal with that on Saturday.

Tanner Crab harvested on our last outing... I was too tired to take pictures of the ones we got today.

Point?  We had fresh from the sea crab 20 minutes after it left the water steaming on the deck in the crab cooker.  Fresh, sweet and nutrient rich.  A product of my suburban farm that happens to be on the edge of a rich wilderness full of harvests for my table.  More effort than I would have liked? Maybe, but worth it today. Tomorrow I am going to shop for lighter crab pots, or a davit, or both.