An early Bird Christmas

We had Christmas in our house yesterday, 9 days early.  Jbird, BabyBird, and I will be on the West Coast Christmas so I wanted to give Soph a chance to celebrate with us.  Oh what a day we did have!

The food was delicious but more simple this year.  We started off with a late brunch of sour dough, omelet (on my new Christmas frying pan), and bacon with shandis* and mandarins.  This progressed to crackers, cheese, and like-minded dips.  Our friend Cassie joined us with Chocolate Charlies*. 

The afternoon disappeared pleasantly as we watched Christmas movies and played with BabyBird's new megabloks set.  There was a moment where I politely moved her away from her new toy so that I could set up the circus tower.  Yes, I was that mother.  We have added to our carol music and now have viola duets.  It was fun trying to teach alto clef to Soph but she still sounded better than both Jbird and I.  We also played through some of my new Irish music book which was a gift from Jbird.

Dinner was just a roast chicken this year.  I have a lovely recipe where the chicken roasts on top of onion slices in a dutch oven.  The moisture created by the lid nearly self-forms a gravy which was perfect after the addition of some chicken stock and marmite.  So yummy.  

We reached a climactic point in our cooking this evening where I was fussing over the gravy, there was food everywhere, we discovered some bread that needed garlic, butter, and toasting, I was simultaneously trying to put BabyBird to bed when I discovered her ceiling was leaking from a flood upstairs (!!), Jbird decided it was time to play Christmas carols on the piano*, AND I had forgotten to remind the guests that our garbage disposal doesn't work so the sink started to flood.  It was amidst this chaos that the garlic bread was forgotten under the grill, and flames started spewing from the oven.  It felt like a scene from I love Lucy.  

  

Things have calmed down now.  We're eating Soph's chocolate self saucing pudding with cream and mulled wine. The others are playing Settlers while I knit the last christmas pressie that I'm making.  

*wine and orange juice

*marshmallow, peanut butter, chocolate, peanuts, and rice bubbles dolloped in a bikkie shape.  

*I love that he plays these but it added to the chaos of the moment

What's going on !?!??

My computer died! And I think I have a disease akin to 'writers block' where I'm not much happy with anything I write: it doesn't feel inspired and it certainly doesn't feel worthy to share.  So I don't and I'm sorry for that.  Perhaps things will change.  I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Itsnoweditsnoweditsnowed

We woke up to snow covered ground and spent the day watching the snow fall outside our windows.  It was delicious to have nothing to do that involved leaving the house.  After a week of 10 degree C (50 degree F) weather and returning to my autumn coat, I could finally test out my winter boots.  My feet were deliciously warm.  Please don't quote me later in the season when I'm sick of the snow and ready for some sun!

Nutcracker-licious

IU presents the Nutcracker every year but I only made it out to see it for the first time tonight.  It brought back memories of the last time I saw it, nine years ago.  Syls and I had flown from New York City to London on the red eye the night before and been completely overwhelmed looking for the theatre while passing all sorts of incredible London sites for the first time.  We arrived at the theatre feeling tired, disoriented, and hot.  The result was that I slept through nearly the entire performance.  Every time I woke up I felt confused about the storyline and would allow myself to drift off to sleep again.  

Tonight was another story.  Instead of arriving right on curtain call, I mistakenly arrived an hour early so I could enjoy people watching while sitting under the giant Christmas tree in the foyer.  I managed to read the synopsis before the performance began so I could easily follow the story line.  My view in London had been peering over heads from the back of the audience.  Tonight I was on the top balcony and could see the entire stage and all of the action.  I loved hearing the well known music.  It's such a magical and Christmassy ballet.  Perfect for getting me into the Christmas spirit. 

Turkey day with family

When we first came to America I was amazed that people would ask me if I was going home for Thanksgiving.  I wanted to ask them really? Me?  There are so many problems with your questions.  Can you spot the problems?  If not, let me point them out to you.  1) NZ does not celebrate Thanksgiving and 2) it takes me at least 20 hours to get home by plane (and a $2000 airfare) and it's only a 4 day weekend.  If you get Friday off.  So no.  I will not be going home.  

But you know, in those days I was dreadfully homesick and would have liked to go home for good. They just didn't realise who they were asking, it's just the common question to ask at this time of year.

Actually, all our Thanksgivings here in the States have been really fun.  One year was spent in Texas, another in Virginia Beach, and two at my friend Ashley's place since we've been in Bloomington.  One of those years we had two meals at two different people's places.  Another we had three.  It really is a killer meal, and has convinced me to forever more say "yes" to only one invite.

This year is the first year that I can reply Why yes! I am visiting family for Thanksgiving!  We have driven north five hours to Kalamazoo to have Thanksgiving with my brother, his wife, and her family.  My brother is very happy to have his niece around, she has grown so much since he saw her last. 

It's been half a year

BabyBird is six months today.  I recently watched a few videos from when she was first born and she was so different then.  Her head was huge, her arms skinny, and she had a little pot-belly.  She would sit in her seat all squiggly, moving without meaning to.  My newness at being a mother was obvious in these videos.  When I burp her, I look like I'm  whacking her on the back, and I didn't hold her with the ease that I do now. 

A lot has been going on with her in the last few weeks.  We had a few tricky early mornings with daylight savings but I also think her recent developments were affecting her sleep.  She is very good at getting up on her knees now, though she still moves backwards rather than forwards, but she mostly just rocks up there.  She is able to balance while sitting but only when we place her in the position, and we have to watch her carefully, she also holds herself up in her bath.  However, today I looked over at her after placing her on her tummy and she was sitting on her bottom! She'd got there all by herself, what a surprise, she had a surprised look on her face too. 

We've been slowly introducing her to solids.  Did you see the carrot video?  I introduce a new food to her every four or five days and now she eats egg yolk, steamed carrot and brocolli sticks, peas, cucumber sticks, cooked apple with cinammon, banana, and pear.  I am introducing it all as finger food which is mostly fine except for  banana which is a complete mess.  I had been feeding her in my lap but I got out her high chair in the weekend and she's very good at sitting in it.  In her bumbo, she'd arch her back pretty quickly.  I think being on the floor and far away from all the action was a problem for her.  She will sit in her chair just watching me cook and we have a pretty nice time in the kitchen together.  My sweet, sweet girl.

The last of the garden

We had enough snow to kill the plants which hadn't been able to stand the recent cold.  Luckily I remembered to grab the last of the green tomatoes the night before, only missing a few.  Jbird and I spent just an hour clearing away the debris left behind.  I didn't bother to prepare it like I did last year with Mum, I don't think I'll have such a garden next year as our plot is too small and annoying.  Do you remember?  It was one of the most fun days with Mum.  We made lasagne layers of paper, leaves, compost, and soil, laying down seeds I had collected from the garden that year.  Some lovely sunflowers grew out of those seeds but nothing much else survived.  Without proper protection from critters, planting seeds doesn't really work in this garden.  I swear a couple of bunnies have been living behind the big corner bush.

The last of the tomato crop has been fun.  I made two batches of green tomato salsa.  It's sugar-free so the flavour isn't very intense but it's nice to use as a chutney.  Unfortunately I made a spicy batch and a not very spicy batch and the spicy batch felt TOO SPICY so I ended up combining them both.  Pretty boring of me, I know.  I guess I was doing things in between BabyBird naps and was too rushed to think about it and retaste.  Anyway, I have jars and jars of the stuff so I'll have to give some away.  Next I'll make spaghetti sauce and soup out of the tomatoes as they turn red.

Further into the going sugar-free journey

In March I wrote about going sugar-free here.  I didn't last very long at the time - maybe only one or two days.  Going cold turkey felt too impossible.  But slowly, slowly, I have been extending the reaches of my sugar-free-domain.  It helped that I decided that rather than being sugar-free, I would be 'refined white sugar-free'.  As other sweeteners are expensive, I am sure to think twice about baking and I end up baking a lot less than I used to.  Although I am not sugar-free by any means, I consume much fewer sugary foods and the ones I bake don't have white sugar in them any more.  

My main difficulty is trying to get the sugar substitute in good proportion.  I start off with a normal recipe and make substitutions as I see fit.  One biscuit* I baked ended up being more of a chewy scone because I guessed an amount of dates to put in and also added 1/4 cup of raw sugar.  So next time I used molasses as well as good quality dark chocolate chips and it was really really sweet (and really really yummy, like a fudgy chocolaty brownie bikkie*.  I got the thumbs up from Jbird).  Also either the molasses or the dates burn quicker than white sugar so I needed to watch them very carefully.  The date ones smoked nearly as soon as I put them in the oven, setting off the fire alarm.  I'm also careful to make sure there are lots of savoury snacks available as between meals is my weakest sweet-tooth time.

*cookie

Warm soup on a Fall night

We had lentil soup and wine on this cool Fall night.  Jbird's sister came home and it felt friendly and relaxed.  Although it didn't look very appetising, the soup was a hit and I love that I could throw it together in about 10 minutes.  It reminded me of the very early months of our marriage when I made it often.  In fact, it was this lentil soup that brings this story to mind.  It's  easy, yummy, and seemingly very healthy so I thought I'd share the recipe.  I had Jbird pick up some crusty bread and white wine while Soph and I played with BabyBird. 

Ingredients;

A splash of olive oil

1 Tblspn curry powder (whichever kind you have in your pantry)

1 Tblspn chopped garlic

1 Tbspn grated ginger

1 chopped onion

1 cup chopped carrots

1/2 cup chopped celery

1 or 2 bay leaves

1 cup brown lentils

1 litre or so chicken stock

salt and pepper to taste

chopped cilantro (coriander if you're in NZ) to garnish

sour cream to garnish

Heat olive oil in a heavy pan/pot (I used my cast iron pan).  Add onion, cook until it starts to soften, stir every now and then.  Add curry powder and cook one minute, stirring with a wooden spoon.  Add remaining vegetables and cook with onions to distribute curry flavour.  Add stock, lentils and water as needed.  Bring to a boil then lower heat and simmer covered until cooked.  Around 40 minutes.  

Blend with an immersion blender.  Serve hot with bread, garnished with cilantro and sour cream.

What a price

Jbird bought me a pair of $200 winter boots today.  TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS.  We never spend that much on clothes.  Every winter I look and look and look for a pair.  But I don't like any of the shoes in my price range ($50 tops) so I decide that I'll wait until the Black Friday sales*.  Only during the sales, I'm often all caught up in the holidays, travelling and visiting people, and I forget about the boots.  Then my birthday comes in January but I decide that winter is nearly over and I will just make do and I choose something else for my birthday.  So once again I survive the winter with a pair of flats (too cold), some old high leather boots I don't really like (the leather is saggy at the ankles), and a pair of ugly sneakers (they are so ugly).  

But today I got some boots and they are lovely lovely lovely.  I sat around with the babies all day thinking about them sitting at home waiting for me.   And wondering if I hadn't spent too much on a pair of shoes.  When I finally got home I went online and found the same pair for $100 less*.  ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS.  What a discrepancy!  So I bought them and I'll take the other pair back tomorrow.  Phew.  Now I don't feel so bad.  I hope I wear them happily for ever and ever and ever.  We'll see. 

*the most extreme sales day in the US is the day after Thanksgiving, known as Black Friday.  I will do all of my Christmas shopping online at this time as the online sales are normally about a week long. 

*I chose the black pair but the pair I first bought were grey.  Which I may have liked a bit more.  Too bad, it's ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS IN MY POCKET. 

A narrow miss

Two weeks ago I discovered that I could not find any of BabyBird's original photos from birth to three months!  Can you imagine the panic that ensued?  I spent hours trying to recover them, dreamt about them all night, and eventually discovered them the next day on a hard drive I thought I had checked but hadn't.  Phew.  

I remember doing this once before in Bangladesh with one of my favourite albums {The Flaming Lips: Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots.  It's really a very very good album}.  That time I was mortified.  Even though I owned the cd and it was back home in New Zealand.  The loss made me feel really far away from home.  Alana introduced me to windows search and I found it dumped into another folder.  Thank you Alana.  Meanwhile Alana could not even use her entire hard drive full of travel photos and music because she lost the specific USB chord and I was crying about an album of music?

This time I told myself Annabel...you don't need those photos! You'll be able to get a ton of them offline because you're always uploading the ones you love.  You have all of the memories...etc. etc. etc. but I felt sad anyway.  I'm beginning to think I spend too much time with those photos.

Stretching and growing

Here's a clip with some snippets of BabyBird playing with me on the bed.  She's just learning to push her self up here so it feels like I must have filmed it a long time ago.  Now she spends most of her time on her tummy, holding herself up and even getting up on all fours.  We have regular wrestling matches when I'm trying to change her nappy because she flips herself onto her tummy and will not stay on her back.  I've even had to have Jbird help me hold her down so I can change her in a hurry!  I've learnt that if I let her have her play first, she will lie happily on her back afterwards.

Really? Culture shock?

I can't remember if I wrote about a conversation I had with my Korean friend regarding my culture shock.  She was at BabyBird's dedication where I mentioned the culture shock I had on moving to the States.  She really couldn't believe that moving here would be a culture shock for me, she kept suggesting that speaking the same language made all the difference.  She even implied that my culture was very similar to an American culture.  I saw her again today and she said she had realised that when she is in a room full of Chinese people, she becomes very aware of the differences in their cultures, even though they look the same, and so now she can understand where I was coming from.  Anyway, I wish I told her, there are Koreans everywhere.  I know four kiwis in Bloomington.  One of them is my daughter (who doesn't even have NZ citizenship), one is my husband, and one is my sister-in-law.  There are Kiwis everywhere, but not so many here!

Speaking of cultural differences, Jbird and I come from the very same city and consider ourselves to have the same ethnicity (Pakeha/European on the NZ census).  You would think this would make our marriage easy but even he and I experience cultural clashes.  For example, his family are late to bed.  Mine are not.  We often spent Christmas day at the beach.  His spent Boxing day there.  Seemingly little things, but they all add up to make very different people. 

A little overthinking

When I first started writing this blog my idea was to literally write a thought every day, just as the title suggests.  I wrote short posts that would hopefully grab the reader's attention and were easy for me to write well.  I wrote nearly every day of the week for over a year.  No pictures, just words.  Then I dropped my deadlines and decided I'd continue writing but not as frequently which led to last month with only eight posts.  I also started adding photos and found I didn't need to write as much.  A picture says a thousand words, after all.

Without the deadline, I will think of a good thought to share and grab onto it but I don't feel the pressure to write it immediately.  Instead, it sits inside my head for a couple of days.  During that time I might start writing a draft but I not bother to finish it.  So it gets more head time.  By the time I try to seriously write it, the thought is too big and I no longer know where I want to take it or which parts of the thought are relevant so I end up scrapping it altogether.  

The deadline was a good idea, even if it was only important to me.  It got me writing, editing, and publishing often.  A small thing perhaps, but it gives me so much satisfaction, this tiny bit of sculpted writing.  I have no solution that I'm happy with, just this thought.

Did I show you these?

 

They are Aurora's passport photos and were taken when she was about 7 weeks old.  They took quite a bit of re-taking and editing to get right so we could send in the application.  We used the bottom middle one.  We have them stuck on our fridge now and I think they are adorable.  Expressions she didn't know she was giving me that she'll probably always have.

Will you crawl soon?

BabyBird has been rolling over for at least two months but she has only just realised that she can use this wonderful skill to be mobile.   All of a sudden she can get to the other side of the room all by herself.  I guess she's much stronger now too.  In fact, she's started to get up on her knees and does mini push ups and planks all day long.  It looks exhausting.  

Play has become prolonged and much more enjoyable (especially for me) as she is immersed in her happy exploratory activities.  She lasted THREE HOURS without needing many cuddles or even a nap yesterday.  I couldn't believe it.  Not that I can just leave her to it - she hates being alone.  Here's a wee clip where she shows off some of these skills. 

It's that time of the year again...

Not only has Halloween been and gone - as is made evident by the stores already setting out Christmas decorations - but I have a second Christmas fruit cake in the oven.  And it smells delicious.  This one is a gift for a certain somebody who may or may not read this blog so I can't say his name. Okay, it's my brother, a true lover of Christmas cake.  Jbird loves Christmas cake too so the first is for us.  To be honest, I'm pretty sure he loves anything sweet.  Except for the evil American candy: dots which may or may not be made out of plastic.  They are a definite no-go for him.

So.  Thanksgiving in Michigan, Christmas (and wedding) in Seattle, New Years in Portland, and my birthday in Bloomington.  Then: here I come, Auckland baby!  Note to self: stop counting away the days. 

A Bird and her Daddy

This is the special smile BabyBird saves for her Daddy.  I love watching them play.

Can I make it mine too?

Here is a wee taste of an American holiday.  We didn't dress BabyBird up this year, and I have not been much of a team player in the past - although I've carved a few pumpkins - but the decision I made this year is we will make it a family holiday soon.  As soon as BabyBird can Trick or Treat and know what's going on.  While it's not a holiday at home, I like the community feeling Americans create through this holiday, walking around their neighbourhoods and visiting their neighbours.  And though I have always rejected Halloween before, it makes more sense to me now.  Like how Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy were part of my childhood.  I guess these are things a new mama questions all the time.

Banjo banjo o' mine

Jbird and I went to see Béla Fleck perform last night. Jbird had been at a lunch with Béla as the guest artist.  He was there to talk about succeeding in the music industry and Jbird got us the tickets there.  It was fabulous fun, I couldn't help smiling the whole way through.  That is a sure sign of a good concert.  He played solo banjo in the first set and his wife joined him with her banjo and voice for the second set.  His solo performance was amazing but it was lovely to see him play with his wife.  She has a lovely lovely lovely voice and a cute laugh, their chemistry was so comfortable.  They kept 'playing to the death' which is the best type of banjo playing.  It was very cute.  Banjo is such a sincere instrument, so earnest in its intensity as the musician tries to throw out as many notes as possible per beat.  I think it has a bad rap by those who haven't stopped to listen.  But then Jbird and I are big bluegrass fans. 

During the course of the concert, I discovered that Jbird and I have a lot in common with this husband/wife team.  First and most obvious, her name (Abigail) is three syllables and starts with the letter A and so does mine.  Ha ha.  Jbird made me promise not to write when I told him this idea but I told him I needed to underwhelm my audience for all the other amazing commonalities.  Alright, here goes.  They play the same uncommon instrument as each other, just as Jbird and I both play viola.  The have a five month old baby, born two days before BabyBird (this was my favourite).  She has been to the Sichuan provence in China, as have I.  And actually, there I end, though Jbird added that they are on tour and we are about to go on tour.  I think he was talking about the viola duet music he just got out of the library that we will be playing together with a possible audience of one (BabyBird).  Why yes.  If that is being on tour then yes, so are we.

Seriously, those two are so talented.  Not only has she been to Sichuan, she SPEAKS CHINESE and SINGS CHINESE and sounds awesome.  Meanwhile, he has won FIFTEEN grammies, and been nominated for thirty.  Come. On.  Why is he so amazing?  Huh.  Here they are back in April with her bubba in her belly.  And here's a neat tune from a few years ago.  It was such a great concert, I hope you can see them some time if you haven't already.

A missed opportunity

I was thinking about missed opportunities today. Maybe because my husband lives by the "but this is a once in a lifetime opportunity" mantra.  This is a pretty nice mantra to live by sometimes, it can help you really appreciate an event.  Because, after all, said event is a once in a lifetime opportunity.  It can also be a pretty bad, especially when he uses it to get out of a previously made commitment.  It makes me feel guilty if I want to make him stand up to the commitment.  Because, after all, I'll be tearing him away from a once in a life time opportunity. 

As for me, I don't really believe in these once in a life time opportunities.  I believe they come along again.  I mean they don't come along in exactly the same reincarnation.  But you can make other cool things happen, even if you miss that one cool thing.  This helps me when I'm deciding how to treat Jbird's epic opportunities he just can't miss.* 

Except for once.  When I was a little girl my best friend offered me a ticket to go with her to Cirque du Soleil in the big circus tent.  But my mum said I had to go to the two day orchestra camp I was already signed up for.  She said it would be good for me.  

The two things were not comparable.  I was a third violin.  And I couldn't read music.  Or even barely play the violin.  I mean, I was really, really awful.  And I was so shy, I hadn't made any friends.  I spent the weekend lost and alone.  Truly, it was the worst camp I've ever been to.  Every meal/evening/other social time was like torture.  Every rehearsal was like torture. Torture.  Meanwhile, my friend went to the circus and had an amazing time.  

Since then, I've never been able to catch them doing their big show.  I've seen an off-shoot in the Civic theatre.  And listened to another friend (Hi Syls) decide she wanted to be a clown after seeing their big tent performance.  And then listened to her for weeks afterwards reliving how great the show was and how she got to meet the performers and how, oh boy, she was somehow going to become a clown.  Because it was so great.  She hasn't yet become a clown but I loved her zeal.  

To try and recreate what I missed, I even went to see the Warner Bros. circus.  Unfortunately it was winter and circuses are in tents (brrrr).  And the show wasn't all that well attended so it was missing some (a lot of) zing.  I bet Cirque du Soleil would have heated their tent.  From what I have heard, the Cirque du Soleil big show is leagues better than any other circus.

Boy.  That was really a once in a life time opportunity. 

*Jbird has such an amazing zeal for life, he really does.  It's inspirational.

Phew. Five months today!

 

This little snuggle bunny is five months old today.  What can a girl learn in five months?  

BabyBird has been rolling over for over two months and is really good at it now.  She prefers to go to sleep on her side but will also sleep on her tummy or her back.  She is slowly getting stronger at her mini push ups, sometimes getting her legs right up under her and sometimes holding her upper body off the ground.  

She started playing with pieces of fruit last week in preparation for eating solids.  They're often too slippery to hold onto for long but easy for me to prepare.  

She is a screamer!  Many of my friends haven't heard such a loud, urgent cry.  Besides that two days ago she started screaming just to get my attention or because she's bored or even happy.  They are really ear piercing screams too, I can't wait for this phase to pass.  Please.  Let it pass.  She also has a lovely laugh and will laugh when I sing to her or hold her above me or just when we are playing together on the bed.  

She loves taking a bath with me and will splash and play with the water.  

She's really alert, always watching and taking everything in.  

She loves to be carried in her baby carrier when we go for walks.  She only complains in there if we stand still for too long, loving to be snug next to me and often falling asleep.   As we walk she looks back and forth from side to side to see what has changed.  

She loves playing with her toys but she loves playing with people even more and her face lights up whenever her Daddy comes into the room.  She loves to play with her Daddy.  

She is very good at sleeping now sleeps anywhere we are either in her pram or the port-a-cot with her Ellie and her Lambie.  This is great as she takes around 10 naps out of our house each weeks and gives us a lot of flexibility.  I have caught her sleeping with her eyes open on her play gym a few times which was really scary for me and I had to wake her to make sure she was still alive!  Generally, she doesn't sleep if people are around.

Although the left breast makes her MAD (it's just not fast enough!) and she fights (and shouts) while feeding on that side, she is a snuggly little sausage and buries her face in my neck sucking on my shirt and talking to herself when she's tired. 

She loves to be around other babies and children, becoming very relaxed and quiet as she takes them all in.  

The worth of thy self

Oh how I do love to complain, I'm really good at it.  Extraordinarily good at it!

I was stumped by a friend once when I was complaining to her about our situation.  The gist of the complaint(s) was: we have no car, no house, no job, no money, no future (i.e.; I didn't see how we could possibly afford to have a baby).  She (being a lovely American girl) asked me why I was so busy seeking the American dream.  Well, she didn't say it like that, but that was the gist.  And thus I was stumped.  Is that what I want, the American dream?!  Huh.  I thought those things just meant comfort.  This, by the way, was only a year ago.  And now we have a baby and car so two of those things can be checked off. 

I still find myself falling back into those complaints.  Sometimes the 'American Dream' comment manages to keep me in check.  And sometimes instead of just complaining, I want to do something about it.  I keep coming back to: I should just try and get a job.  But why do I need a job?  Doesn't BabyBird need me in the nest?  But what worth do I gain from being with her in the nest?  Isn't she the only one that notices?

The thing is.  I'm not lacking in love.  I'm not lacking in experiences.  I'm not lacking in friendship and Christian fellowship.  My family are too far away but that, right now, can't be helped.  The only thing I'm lacking is climbing that ladder of career opportunity, and the ability to buy whatever I want.  Material goods aren't so important (I often need to remind myself of this).  And is my career?  Does it matter if I'm not winning any awards?  

I would argue that happiness comes instead from loving well, which is what I intend to do.

I'm thinking about formatting

I don't know much about computers and their memory.  I remember formatting my new camera only to find I may have lost all the pictures I'd taken around New York City, England, and Europe.  This was back in 2005.  I learnt a quick lesson that day.  If you format something, everything you have done to it is deleted.  It's the most thorough cleaning a digital item can receive.  I've got a virus so I'm considering it for this computer, and I'm counting my possible losses if I do.  I have backed up my files but I may lose programs, or spend years re-installing them.  On the plus side my computer would work so much faster and everything would act close to new again.  How fresh.

Perhaps my brain would feel a little clearer and I'd be able to think straight if I could format parts of my life.  All the cupboard space in this tiny place, the cobweb I often notice and don't quite get to, and I spoke of our freezer in my last post.  Not to mention our fridge.  Everything could be cleared out allowing us a fresh start.  I suppose technology will allow this one day as it allowed it on The Jetsons.  But it's hard to throw things out.  What if we need them again?  And it seems impossible to wipe clean every surface, there is always more scrubbing to do.  

For now I guess I'll just work on the computer. 

Clearing it out

My freezer is a sight to behold.  At any given time offers you berries, vegetables, soups and stews, popsicles, icecream, fish, beef, chicken, bacon, coffee, ice cubes, pastry, waffles, and ginger.  All in the frozen form. 

It has been full to bursting for a while now and I noticed that I was only using the things I could find on top of everything else - certain parts of my freezer had become a 'no man's land'.  It started when Jbird discovered ten opened packets of frozen vegetable.  Then I defrosted a soup and remembered making it at least six months ago, maybe more.  I could taste freezer burn on the berries when I put them in a smoothie.  What had been a treasure trove was turning into an antique yard sale - or something similar.  

I decided it was time to clear it out and start again.  I stopped buying meat (and frozen vegetables!) to force myself to dig to the bottom of that black hole and it's been a fun journey.  For example, frozen salmon had become a trial to use after a few botched meals so I had been reburying in the abyss it whenever I came across it.  This past week we had a yummy fried salmon steak one day with a fresh and full salad, and salmon and mushroom fettucine carbonara two days later.  Today was chicken and dumpling barley soup and we had ham and pea soup for lunch on a rainy Sunday.

Some of you may baulk at freezer burn.  Though it wasn't so nice on the berries which weren't cooked, it hasn't been noticeable on anything else.  My internet research tells me it's not dangerous! What does the inside of your freezer look like?

Coming into the cold weather

It has been so hot here that it has only really started to feel like fall this week.  There was a clear change in temperatures at night and in the early morning, and the leaves have suddenly started to change.  I have also been doing a lot of bottling.  Pears with my friend Ashley, and some tomato chutney and apple preserves here at home.

As I hung our coats, gloves, hats, and woollen undershirts in the sun to get some air today, I tried not to feeling a sense of foreboding I often feel about the impending long cold wintry months.  Instead, I have compiled a list of good things about this coming winter and I see there really are a lot of things to look forward to after the nice fall weather ends.  

1. Snow.  Rolling BabyBird in the snow.  Snow.

2. Hot chocolate with snow outside (and all wintry type foods).

3. Having our own car during cold weather. NeatO.

4. Alana and Marshall's wedding in Seattle (and our trip to Portland to visit Sandi and her hubby).

5. Christmas with friends (Alana's family).

6. Spending time with my brother and his wife.

7. Our first Christmas as a family of three.

8. Late January, BabyBird and I are flying home to NZ for a whole month.  And well.  That's cheating.  Because I'm putting some summer into my winter.

Things aren't looking pretty nice.

Travel in the future?

A small plan has been hatched for BabyBird and I to go home for a visit at the end of January.  This is a whole year earlier than had been previously intended but the idea is to let her meet her distant relatives.  It's an exciting plan.  Perhaps too exciting as it's all I can think about.  In fact, when I fed her at 4am this morning I then spent the next two hours laying in bed thinking about New Zealand.  Now I'm exhausted.  How will I ever get through the next few months?

An alternative communication

Did you ever watch Felicity? It was a fairly popular show back around the turn of the century about a girl who moved to NYC from California to go to college.  The show often started and ended with the narrative of her recorded voice which she was recording to send to a penpal we never got to see on the show.   I had always thought it was a cumbersome form of communication.  The recordings were made on tape which would have taken up a lot of storage space, especially in a small college dorm room.  It also seemed to be more expensive than a regular letter because they were sending each other packages.  And you have to go to the post office to send a package to make sure you get the correct postage while letters can be posted in the mail box down the road.  Despite all these negatives, there is something nice about hearing a close friend's voice.  Almost like you're sitting down with them and having a cup of tea together.

I'm telling you all this because a friend of mine recently sent me a recorded message and since she did, we have had a to and fro of ten minute recorded messages.  With email and mics on computers, it's a much easier method of communication than it was in Felicity's time. I also like it a lot better than straight email.  It's quick, we can do something else at the same time as recording, we definitely don't need to proofread what we've written as we would with email, there are no time zone differences or babies needing our attention, or lagging internet as there sometimes are with Skype.  And we have the added bonus of hearing each other speak.  Lovely.

Soundbite

Jbird is rather clever with recordings and editing and here is a soundbite of our sweet BabyBird over the past month or two as she learned how to laugh. 

Apple picking

We took some international students apple picking today.  It was a very fun activity to do at this time of year while the weather is so ideal.  It seemed quite American too.  When I think of baking with apples, I think of Americana, probably from seeing apple pies on various TV shows, movies, and books.  We actually had an apple tree in our backyard back in New Zealand, but I have never been to an apple orchard before.  

There were so many varieties, it was really fun eating a few and just tasting a few and climbing up the trees to get them.  Mostly I sent these guys up there, but there was a moment when BabyBird wasn't in her carrier and I could hop up too.  It gave me that feeling of being in my childhood house and climbing trees again.  I hope BabyBird experiences that often.   Jonathans were my favourite, and the only new variety I remember (new to me).  I also got quite a few granny smiths which I have always thought were best for baking.  BabyBird will be on solids soon so I want to tin* some apple sauce for her. 

I filled a peck which I found out today is equal to 10-12 pounds, 32 medium apples, 3-4 nine inch pies, 7-9 quarts, and 4 quarts canned.  A quart in Annabel-speak is a quarter of a gallon.  A gallon is around 2 two litres or approximately 4 litres.  Maybe a little less.  

It was the fall festival at the orchard so there was also a craft fair and various venders selling lunch.  I bought Jbird a gallon of apple cider, one of his favourite drinks. 

*tin=can

 

He blew them all out

We finally had Jbird's birthday cake I wrote about recently.  Remember? I made a red velvet using beet root* instead of red food colouring.  I had to freeze it as we had the cake cutting a whole week after his birthday.  I was pretty nervous about taking this particular cake and feeding it to other people so I ended up making regular cream cheese icing* with plenty of icing sugar*.  This way if the cake was a complete flop, the icing would mask that.  My original plan had been to make a swiss meringue cream cheese icing using turbinado sugar because it used a lot less sugar than regular cream cheese icing uses.  Unfortunately when I tested it, I found that the turbinado stained the icing brown and I didn't have time to come up with another solution.  In my opinion, red velvet cake is complemented by stark white icing.

Well.  What can I say?  The icing was delicious.  And full of sugar.  The cake itself tasted like beet root.  But not in a really horrible way, it's just that beet root isn't what you plan on when baking a cake.  It certainly didn't taste anything like chocolate which I think is the point of red velvet cake.  It was also denser than I had hoped.  I think it needed to be eaten the same day it was made. From now on I'm going to save my lower sugar baking for home.  Lesson learned.

 

*beets

*frosting

*powdered or confectioner's sugar

It's a puzzle to me

In the old days, I'd whack one of these out in a couple of days.  But now I find myself easily distracted, easily frustrated, and needing to go to bed much earlier than I used to.  This one has been at least two weeks in the making.   

Jbird is good at encouraging me into doing puzzles.  He talks about it for a while, gets it out for me, and even finds all the side pieces.  With his busy schedule this semester, he's left me to do most of this one alone.   I've had a picture of this same castle all covered in snow on my desktop for the longest time.  Hopefully we'll visit it some day.

  

I wonder where that missing piece could be?

Sing me a lullaby

As we try to instil night time habits for our dear little one I am collecting a number of little lullabies.  I hope to help her know it's sleep time and have noticed she responds well when I sing to her.  My first were Twinkle Twinkle and Jesus Loves You.  A fairly basic repertoire.  During the day I sometimes sing her I'm a Little Teapot.  It makes her smile and I can move her body to make the actions or dance her around the room with it.  The closest I got to a true lullaby was Go to Sleep You Little Baby from Oh Brother Where Art Thou.  I feel a bit weird that I don't know any true lullabies and would sometimes make them up, but can never remember those when I need them again the next day.

Recently I was given a book - Yellow Moon, Apple Moon - which has a lullaby in it.  I first I thought the book looked cheesey and kind of dumb.  But I read it a few times to the boy I babysit for when he was 7 months old and it was the only book that he would sit still for.  Mysteriously.  Out of all the books, this nonsense one was his favourite and I didn't even sing the lullaby in the middle.  Then his parents gave it to me along with a pile of other books they were going to otherwise get rid of.  I guess it wasn't their favourite book but it had become mine so I was very pleased to find it in the box.  This is the book.

I thought I might find the song from it on youtube to share with you but alas it wasn't.  I did find this.  Jbird and I coincidentally sometimes play this together as a duo on the violin and viola but I hadn't placed it into the context of a true lullaby for my baby.  It's so pretty, I'm going to buy it to put on repeat in her room.  And learn the words so I can sing it to my baby. 

 

Slumber, my darling, thy mother is near,
Guarding thy dreams from all terror and fear,
Sunlight has pass'd and the twilight has gone,
Slumber, my darling, the night's coming on.
Sweet visions attend thy sleep,
Fondest, dearest to me,
While others their revels keep,
I will watch over thee.

Slumber, my darling, the birds are at rest,
The wandering dews by the flow'rs are caressed,
Slumber, my darling, I'll wrap thee up warm,
And pray that the angels will shield thee from harm.

Slumber, my darling, till morn's blushing ray
Brings to the world the glad tidings of day;
Fill the dark void with thy dreamy delight--
Slumber, thy mother will guard thee tonight,
Thy pillow shall sacred be
From all outward alarms;
Thou, thou are the world to me
In thine innocent charms.

Slumber, my darling, the birds are at rest,
The wandering dews by the flow'rs are caressed,
Slumber, my darling, I'll wrap thee up warm,
And pray that the angels will shield thee from harm 

A baker's substitutions

Did you know that red velvet cake came about during war time rations when beet root* was used as a substitute for cocoa?  Jbird turns 30 (!!) this week and I'm making him a red velvet cake with beet root in place of nasty red food colouring.  Every cook needs to practice and as this yummy looking cream cheese swiss meringue butter cream frosting looked a bit complicated, I made this sugar free carrot cake as cupcakes as a practice canvas.  This is a really delicious carrot cake recipe.  

In my goal to avoid refined white sugar (and any artificial sweeteners), I tried using raw sugar.  This gave the frosting a pale tan colour.   To remedy this, I'm going to try making it with a smaller amount of raw sugar.  If that doesn't work, I will add a tiny amount of beet root juice which will give the icing a slight hint of red or pink.  This is unfortunate as part of the delight of a red velvet cake (in my opinion) is the stark contrast between the red cake and the white white icing.  Does anyone have any other suggestions for natural sweeteners?  I'm assuming honey has too strong a flavour.  I'm not going for less calories, just less evil white sugar.  I've thought of buying some natural stevia but for some reason it frightens me.  The question I ask is: if it's so amazing, why have I never heard of it before? 

*beets
**turbinado

I also used butter in place of oil in the carrot cake.  And dates in place of raisins. 

First bluegrass festival

This was saved in the drafts.  Perhaps I forgot to click 'publish'?  It was kind of a time sensitive post but I think I'm going to post it anyway because it reminds me of a time when I didn't know BabyBird very well.  Or myself and Jbird as parents.  Life was all different and it kind of hurt and overwhelmed me... 

The Bean Blossom Bill Monroe Bluegrass Festival is on this week and it's just a 30 minute drive from here.  On Sunday afternoon we took the opportunity to expose BabyBird at the primitive age of 2 weeks and 5 days to our favourite American musical genre. She survived it like a champ.  I did too but I was glad to leave the drive home to Jbird while I had a snooze.  Everything takes so much more energy than it used to at the moment.  

It's neat to live in this part of the world when things like this are on.  The accents of the presenters were especially country-Indianaianingly fantastic.  Nothing like a little bluegrass to put a spring in your step.

See how little she was?

 

Oh me, oh my

With the inclination to cook something different and without the creativity to think of what that could be, I have been using my old friend Yummly.com.  In our pantry we had chicken and couscous.  Sounds pretty bland to me.  But I typed those ingredients into the Yummly search bar and they came up with this chicken-broccoli couscous (I used peas instead of broccoli, and it was still delicious) on one occasion and this tangerine barbecue chicken and curry couscous (I used an orange instead of a tangerine) on another.  Actually, I made other minor substitutes but those seem important.  Perhaps because of them I would need to change the names of the dishes.  No matter.  Weirdly, they were both Rachel Ray recipes.  I used to love watching her show but I haven't seen it since we lost cable t.v., three years ago.  Thank you Yummly, for your ability to search for all things tasty.  And thank you Rachel Ray, for incidentally enjoying couscous as much as I do. 

Where have you been??

You may notice that my posts have been fairly sporadic recently.  Life is pretty ho hum - I'm stuck on a three hourly rinseandrepeat of feed, play, sleep.  However, that's not a good excuse because BabyBird is completely captivating to me and I could write about her and post photos of her all the time.  

The truth is, I've been stuck in a game on facebook.  Completely addicted to it.  It's not candy crush - I've never played that before but it seems like that's what all the cool cats are talking about.  No, it's called Words of Wonder.  I've unlocked 7 chapters and I'm up to level 91.  I spend so much time playing this game, it will sometimes get to lunchtime, BabyBird's onto her second nap, and I've only just managed to eat and change and do nothing else!  Seriously.  90% of the time I'm spelling three or four letter words so it doesn't feel like it's stretching me very much yet I cannot stop.  I think the addiction is due to the different aspects they add to each level.  There are flame letters, timed rounds, flying letters, ink to be cleared, and an owl which narrates each new level.  Luckily there are only 12 chapters so there is an end to my addiction...

100 days celebration

Our friends threw BabyBird a little celebration for her 100th day (which was about 10 days ago).  It's traditional for South Koreans to throw this celebration.  These friends adore BabyBird.  I think they like her more than us! We are always greated with "BABYBIRD!" (they actually call her that).  I'm guaranteed a babysitter so I spend a lot of time with them.  

There was cake, we said a prayer in Korean, and one in English of course, and everybody had lots of BabyBird cuddles.  I feel more confidant about passing her around now, I don't know why I didn't do it much before.  Maybe because she was less predictable.  But she's a happy, predictable baby these days.  I can't believe she's 100 days old already.  Here are some pics.

HakSoo LOVES BabyBird. This is his first cuddle.

Team shot.  These friends are from Singapore, China, Taiwan, and South Korea.