Tea, Colds, and Scrabble...

Snots and sniffles and an earache or two have been the order of the days (and nights) for the past two weeks here. First Safiya, then me. The general wearing down has led to us parsing out our days into small bouts of chores, leisurely cooking, and long bouts of sitting and watching the snow melt.

We did brave the weather last week for three rounds of sledding, though. We haven't had real winter weather for months, and she was so excited when we got a proper snow ("now it's really winter") that I just stuffed my coat pockets with handkerchiefs and gamely followed her lead. Now it's all melting and there's talk of planting peas....

Safiya is the one who suggested the Scrabble today. Spelling, reading, strategy, adding, and multiplication all in the guise of a game that I can do while nursing a cup of lemon and honey tea? Done!

Works in Progress...

My sock (yes, still the first one :-)


My freezer project happily underway; food for when The Bump arrives (so far we've got curry, spaghetti sauce, cookies, pancakes, soups, and some slices of the amazing toasted walnut and sundried tomato polenta that Mr. S. made on Friday...)


The Bump :-) A little over 2 months to go and all of the sudden, there seems so little time...

Shop Update!

In defiance of the snow and cold, I'm thinking warmer weather and hoping you are too! I've listed a couple of cutlery rolls in my shop, and I'm looking forward to sending them out with dreams of picnics with lots of yummy food and sunny days....


And for fighting off the cold now or for the chilly spring days coming up, Safiya gamely modeled some of the new legwarmers/leggings for me, trying to sneak her favourites away in between :-)

Enjoy!

More Root Vegetables, Please!

It's that time of year. I long for the farmers' markets. Our box of (mostly local) produce comes and I haul turnips, rutabagas, potatoes, storage apples, carrots and so on into the kitchen....and then stare at the abundance for a while.

One of my standbys is The Winter Vegetarian by Darra Goldstein, which, beyond having fantastic easily veganised recipes suitable for a northern climate, is a wonderful read full of food history and stories. It's a cuddle up in the bleak weather treat.

However, looking for new inspiration and building on my experience with the best salad ever a couple of years ago (a strawberry and onion chutney at an Indian restaurant), lately I've found that one of the most delightful ways to face root vegetables is east. A lot of south asian cuisine actually lends itself really well to root vegetables other than the usual potatoes and carrots. Try turnips simmered in a tomato based sauce with Indian spices and you'll see what I mean. This might be obvious for a lot of people, but it was such a welcome discovery for me that I'm kicking myself for not being more adventurous with my rutabagas sooner :-)


So, I introduce to you my very own grated celery root and apple salad with black mustard seed dressing:

Combine:

1 smallish celery root, peeled and grated
4-5 medium apples, cored and thinly sliced
juice from half a lemon
1 or 2 green onions, chopped
about 1 teaspoon finely grated ginger

Toast a couple of teaspoons of black mustard seeds in a couple of tablespoons of oil (I used canola) until they start popping (remove before they explode all over your kitchen!) and pour the warm dressing on top on the salad. Mix well and salt to taste.

Ta-da!

The 1900 House and Making Toothpaste

Safiya is enamoured of The 1900 House. I took the DVD's out of the library one day, intending them for myself, and one day when I wasn't feeling particularly well, I popped it in. In general Safiya is adverse to unfamiliar media, but when they started talking about not having electricity and having to use the outhouse outside, she peaked around the corner and said "watcha' watchin'?"

And so starts Homeschooling History 101 :-)

One of the things which I do on-and-off but which Safiya now helps with with increased fervor after watching the show (a gazillion times) is making toothpaste. She likes to raise her eyebrows at the idea of having to brush your teeth with just baking soda - yucccch!, and thinks our recipe is greatly improved over what they did in the 1900's (after having tried the plain baking soda :-) She actually prefers it to the fruity kids' toothpaste that she had.


Here's the recipe, adapted from my well-worn copy of Jackie French's Natural Solutions:

3 parts baking soda
2 parts calcium carbonate (which I easily ordered from the pharmacy)
1 part vegetable glycerin
drops of peppermint essential oil, as desired

Mix well. Store in whatever way is easiest for you.

The first time she made it with me we decided to use an old, well-cleaned toothpaste tube and then duct-tape the end, which worked o.k. at the beginning, but then it leaked a bit at the end.


This time we wracked our brains and found a better solution. We increased the amount of glycerin to make it a bit more runny and reused old honey bears! Perfect!


Oh, and we're well on our way with the reality-tv-show based history curriculum. We've gone through Frontier House (she's trying to convince Mr. S. to keep chickens for eggs in our backyard) and are starting Manor House (originally The Edwardian Country House). This is proper education, right? ;-)

Preparing for The Bump: Food

Our freezer, which was on a power bar (brilliant, I know), was turned off accidentally (I blame the cats, as they can't defend themselves). There was very little to rescue by the time we noticed what was going on. So, start all over again, right?

Thinking ahead to the very likely scenario of our family resorting to all-takeout-all-the-time when The Bump is born, and realising that in reality I prefer the taste (and cost!) of our homemade food, I've implemented a little planning that's actually been pretty easy so far.

Anything that I can make double batches of that freezes easily I'm doing now. This also has the added benefit of me not having to negotiate take-out ingredients, especially when I'll be tired with new baby and my defenses are down and I'm inclined to say "whatever, I don't care, I just need to eat something, damn the consequences!" :-)

Now, Mr. S. is a great cook, and I'll be able to rely on him to cook for us too, but some of this has to do with budget as well. I'm really really looking forward to the four months that he's taking in paternity leave, and wouldn't change that for the world. It also means that there will be a cut in funds to be creatively confronted for those four months, which is fine by me.

And it allows me to start playing in a small way with something I just learned from one of the new people who helps cook in our community kitchen for the free lunches on Tuesdays. We always prepare really good food with enough options so that no matter who walks in, there will be something to eat for them, carnivores and vegan celiac freaks like me alike. We do have budget and availability to consider, and we're trying to do what little we can to ease people into to the idea of eating seasonally and frugally. But then this new person (who is a phenomenal cook) comes in and starts asking if we have things like cream and cheese and sour cream! The decadence! The cost! :-) However, he made a really good point: Everyone deserves the best food we can possibly make, presented in a manner pleasing to the eye, because that's a way of feeding people too. So we've been making a little extra effort with presentation, which makes a bigger impact, even on me as a cook, than I imagined. We all know this, right? Any menu at a good restaurant teases you with the description and presentation of the food, not just what shows up on your plate. "Smoked chipotle chili" sounds better than just "chili". And that extra effort shows respect and consideration for the person eating the food.

So, after all that, what's the point? I guess when I look into my freezer, instead of trying to navigate unlabeled food of dubious origin dumped unceremoniously in a rush before it goes bad in the fridge, I think it'll be nicer to see things like this:


Even the cooks need to nourish their souls :-)

...And Then There Are Socks

Isn't that a lovely scene? Indulgent and practical at the same time - the perfect combination. I really loved this class. Nevermind that coffee and yarn and needles was included; two hours on each of two Saturdays in the warm sunshine at the front of The Purple Purl and ta-da! my fear of knitting socks is a thing of the past, courtesy of Kate Atherly, our instructor. (She's the Technical Editor for Socks at Knitty - I love that there is such a person). I wish I had taken a picture of the inspiring, decadent pile of hand-knit socks that she brought with her - they were gorgeous! And, she showed us how to calculate the pattern for custom-fit socks - be still my beating heart (and ginormous feet!)

She was patient ("oh, that's o.k. - the swatch was really supposed to be ribbing instead of garter stitch, but why don't you go ahead and work a few rows while I talk about this next thing"), straightforward and helpful ("you're really twisted up here, I'll just rip out this little bit and get you started again"), and observant ("hmmmm, I'm not sure about your purl stitch - if you try it this way, you find your knit stitch easier to do). This is why, for me and knitting, a class is the way to go :-)

I like the light in this next photo, because really, it's a sacred moment, me actually having knit that much of a sock (and that photo is a day or two old, so there's almost double that now :-)....


I also learned that I cannot knit socks and talk at the same time, although I'm working on it. Also, fitting knitting into the day is a skill in and of itself. But I love the portability of knitting, and that even if I only put a few rows on each day, socks work up pretty quickly. And did I mention that I love wool socks? I'm committed, now...thanks Kate!

There Are Socks...

These are my favourite socks. Wollen, warm, cozy, cushiony - they are the perfect cold weather socks. Consigned to the back of the sock drawer (if Mr. S. detects holey socks he chucks them!), they lay there forlorn until, inspired by Becky's darning post, I decided to rescue them.

I probably could have winged it, but I approach any new skill with hesitation (what if I mess up darning socks? what horrible unremovable mistakes could result?), so I used a Very Instructive Video.

This is my fuzzy in-process-shot (having no darning mushroom around, I instead availed myself of a lightbulb):


And this is my not-much-better results shot (black-on-black yarn doesn't show well, sorry, but look - no hole!):


And now they are cozy-comfy on my feet again! Oh thrift, how I love thee.....

Many Words for a Good Week

See that light coming back into the house? That's another kind of new year for me. And that light arrived at the same time as a whole cascade of good things.

It started with an amazing community dinner. We had taken a break from the monthly community dinners in December, so it was good to gather with familiar and new folk, laugh in the kitchen, and eat hearty.

The next day my friend Tanya (who lives on the opposite side of the city - is it wrong that I not-so-secretly hope when they have to move they can't find a place in their neighbourhood and come to the east end? Hey...hey! Over here - it's cheaper here! :-) visited with her two (really lovely) kids. We re-connected, ordered Thai food and just hung out for the afternoon.

Saturday, well, last Saturday was a real treat. I had finally signed up for.....sock knitting! Woolen socks are right up there for me with chocolate, a thorough foot rub, and good sex, and I kept telling myself that it couldn't be that hard to learn. Bought a book and everything. Ignored book and sighed over expensive wool socks. Envied my friend Katharine's sock knitting prowess. Finally splurged (i.e. spent money on myself, which never happens without the prerequisite guilt) and signed up for a sock knitting class at The Purple Purl. It was indulgent and perfect and I'll write a bit more about it soon. This is the very first sock I knit, which Safiya is keeping for The Bump (which is what she calls her little brother-to-be). It is ridiculously small and I am inordinately proud of it:


Sunday a dinner with long neglected friends who Safiya adores. Anna and Carla leave this imprint on me, a kind of saturated, vivid emotional prism of light that does the heart wonders. Sustenance for Refik, Safiya and I came in the form of wonderful food, crazy laughter, surprise musical talents, and oil pastels. Our collective creative endeavours from that night now have a place of honour on the playroom wall:


And then last Monday came a crazy day where somehow things fell into place and a friend selflessly made the day so much easier. "Hey - no worries, Safiya can hang with us until Mr. S. can pick her up." "Hey - why don't you borrow our car?....and my cell phone." This from someone whose days are more hectic than mine. That help enabled me to in turn to be there for someone else, and I'm overwhelmed in a good way and constantly grateful.

And, on that same day, she gave me this:



Come on. It's a crocheted thyroid! It's beyond awesome, and I clutched it all day, a talisman to remind me where strength really comes from.

Then it was another great community lunch, a happy playdate for Safiya with a friend, and her circus class on Wednesday (where I witnessed her struggle with the idea of crazy groups of kids but also get in there like a dirty shirt and proudly master some new moves). Thursday I dragged her to a free lunchtime Canadian Opera Company concert ("I don't want to go!) which was so wonderfully crowded that we had to sit on the floor. She was mesmerised, as was I. Afterwards we tried a new sushi place and eagerly discussed which concerts we'd be able to go to in the following weeks. That day I also watched her swim. I mean really swim. It was short 'cause she's not quite mastered not swallowing the whole pool yet, but her little legs kicked and I could see where grace is going to soon emerge from that new-ability-awkwardness.

End up the week with a Friday-house-full-of-kids and good conversation, good homemade food, and just goodness all round, top it off with a Saturday where I wore grown-up clothes to a fabulous dinner at our friends' house with other grown-ups and our kids played and we stayed up late talking and then walked home on a just-past-full-moon night, and that will get you here.

Here. Safiya and Mr. S. went swimming together today. I sewed and listened to a little Ms. Reynolds. There was baking. Safiya requested to have that "really yummy soup" that we made together for lunch at dinner again. And, the house is clean. There's nothing sexier than a husband scrubbing the bathroom tiles in his boxers and socks :-) I'm also exhausted physically and have wicked heartburn, 'cause that's what The Bump does to me. I probably won't sleep very much tonight because of said heartburn.

But it's all good, and I wanted to write it down, and then go and dream of it....

On Dropping Out and Then Coming Back (or, Trying to Ignore Physics)

This feels awkward. I'm still here, and I've desired to write lately, but there's a little something that keeps getting in the way, so I'd like to deal with it. Namely, not being around for a couple of months. I'm going to go beyond a simple apology because although what's been occupying my time and life really has been personal (and broader than what I'm going to write about now) and there are a lot of details that I'm going to omit here because yes, they're personal, there's something really important that I've learned that I'm going to write about because it's a lesson that I cannot let myself forget.

Mr. S. was right.

Ha! He'll like that....Actually, it's more along the lines of him, frustration in his eyes, sitting across from me at the kitchen table, saying "you can't take care of everybody."

Now, most of you who know me could probable take a stab at what would be my usual response to that. "No, but I can try...."

Guess what, I failed. How do I know? Because in trying to take care of everybody, I failed to take care of myself. I ended up with a huge thyroid hormone imbalance (I'm dependent on thyroid hormone replacement as my thyroid decided to mutiny a couple years back and I had it dealt with) and a massive B12 deficiency. While being pregnant. (p.s. baby's o.k. and kicking up a storm) Crawling on my hands and knees up the stairs to go to bed at 6pm wasn't a big enough hint. Having to bow out of volunteer commitments wasn't a big enough hint. Mr. S. doing the laundry, the cleaning, etc., etc., to cover for me wasn't a big enough hint. Even Safiya looking at me with a smile after a rare moment of light-heartedness from me and saying "Mama, I like your face like that!" wasn't a big enough hint. Not caring; being too tired to care after a lifetime of being able to find a little bit of beauty, no matter how small, in every single day didn't do it either. Actually, it was the not caring that frightened me the most (although, at the time....)

I don't do weakness well, and I certainly don't do vulnerability well. I understand that many, many people are dependent on something external to themselves for their mental health. To be brought to that lesson in a physical way (and by my own doing) was a harsh lesson for me. I am dependent on this:

That's my daily medicine. That is one molecule, one vital link, in all the hormonal workings in my body. And to this I say to myself, to remember: You cannot argue with physics. If you don't pay attention, sooner or later the physical world is going to smack you, and you'll be caught by surprise. Which brings me to gratitude. I have a great husband and daughter, a social safety net that provides free access to excellent physicians, and I have education and experience enough to know my way around the system to get what I need when it hits me that I am in need. That is, I am fortunate that my life has back-up and resiliency to allow for stupid self-care.

Hopefully I won't have to use it again. And it is my hope as well (and it's been proven already) that the lovely people around me also have back-up and resiliency to allow for my stupid self-care (which regretfully translated into neglect for some of my loved and much-liked ones). And to them I say, with much gratitude and humbleness....thank-you.

Now, let's carry on......

This One is For Ruthy

Back in October at Thanksgiving, we were fortunate to meet up with old friends for the evening. Good people who now live far away and live separate lives from us - we were just getting to know them before they moved, so I was pleased to have the opportunity to see them again. I was taken aback (in a pleasant way) when she said, "Hey! You haven't blogged in a while!"

So this is for Ruthy, because she's the kind of person who so easily reminds me of the wonderful things in life to be grateful for.

I am grateful for (in no particular order):

The warmth of Safiya's little hand as we walk (she still takes mine automatically whenever we set out somewhere).

Cats. Somehow we've ended up with two cats. Cats are ridiculous creatures, and they make me laugh.


That tenacious streak in Mr. S. and that he's got my back.

Sleep.

My mother and I can drive eachother crazy (Mr. S. often says it's like listening to one person argue with themselves), and probably we both often fail to live up to one another's standards of what we think a mother or a daughter ought to be, but we've got the kind of relationship where after tensions rise, that's it, we're done, now let's go watch a sappy movie and cry together. She tries so hard to be a good person all the time (I've only recently gotten her swearing - it was necessary, and I was so proud of her), she's trustworthy, reliable, slightly crazy (as all mothers are), and I like her the way she is.


Morning sun. That first cleansing morning light.

People who don't remind you of your faults when you've failed, even when they're pretty obvious. I think that's called grace.

After a summer of not being in the studio, coming back and feeling like I'm falling in love all over again.

And that trepidation/joy feeling of new growth (five months of it so far, to be more or less exact :-)



I love that Safiya's drawn the baby upside-down and that I apparently have a gazillion legs.

Like I said, a lot to be grateful for.

Summer Sweet

Sometimes you're lucky. Sometimes tomorrow is rainbow day at music camp and your Mom happens to have a pillowcase with a rainbow on it at home.


Sometimes you're lucky.

The Complex Life

Safiya took this picture on the subway the other day. I love it.

Someone said, roughly speaking, that the "simple living" movement is a misnomer; that's it's really complex, rich, meaningful living that we're after, and that "simple" does not mean "easier". My life has certainly felt like that recently. Rich and busy since the last time I posted. So, to kind of update on at least one layer of my life:

Our neighbour removed the 10'x10' metal shed in our backyard so now Safiya has the largest sandbox (read "mudpit") ever...Hmmm, what else? I'll probably expand a lot on some of this stuff later, but since right now I'm supposed to be getting ready for the Leslieville Tree Festival tomorrow, here goes:

There was the day that my friend Katharine and I decided it was a great plan to take our four kids to the Textile Museum of Canada's annual fabric sale, walk a couple of subway stops to Royal Ontario Museum, and then top the day off with another friend's school fair (they all slept really well that night) ::


A new icecream place opened up right across from our favourite local park (bad idea, really bad idea :-) :: There's been the conflicts and dramas of childhood played out in said park, with many hugs and the stretching of confidence and bravery and the holding tight of her hand :: She had her friend over for her first sleep-over ::


Bike Pirates is a new favourite haunt, where Safiya has handled a wrench with much frustration and little aplomb, but has made new friends and changed her first set of brakepads (I'm so so proud) :: we've got a homemade bike trailer in the works ::


She and I went out of town with friends for a couple of days :: my good friend Lara's much anticipated baby was born, safe and sound (yay!) :: There have been visits from family, a graduation, and much last-minute house cleaning :: A rather dismal craft fair last weekend :: The farmer's markets have started up :: Music and swimming lessons have ended for the summer, and beach season has started ::



And in-between everything there are books to be read, questions about advertising on cereal boxes to be discussed, sarcasm to be discovered, popsicles to be bought with her own money, really bad jokes to be laughed at, sculptures of dinousaurs to be made, food to be made, arguments to be had, and a lot of laughing.

She's getting really big. And it's happening so very fast.

The Litterless Lunch and Food Fit for a...

King? Queen? Sultan? A hungry kid and her mom.

Today is Wednesday, which means we have lunch at Sultan's after swimming lessons at the community centre. We are fortunate to have an amazing network of community centres in Toronto which provide an astonishing array of classes for large and small for very little money. We are also fortunate to have people like Tamara and Samer who provide the yummiest falafel ever, not to mention homemade lentil soup, vegetables with garlic sauce, and other delectable handmade Jordanian food (vegan and gluten-free not even on purpose!)....mmmmm.....it's only 8:45 in the morning and yet I crave already.....that's Tamara walking away in the picture below, protesting the picture :-)


Safiya has been taking classes at this particular community centre for a couple of years, so it is a ritual and delight to walk in at lunchtime. She orders "the usual" and has started being in charge of the money, and we chat with Tamara and Samer and watch Danforth Avenue life pass by, usually playing "I Spy" as we eat.


That white sauce on the vegetables is the garlic sauce. It's basically just garlic and oil blended together. Soooooo good.


This Wednesday ritual has also provided me with an opportunity to practice and perfect the litterless lunch. We try to eat mostly at home, but it would be foolish to pass up good Toronto food and the opportunity to support our small restauranteurs, so I always carry our water bottle and cutlery roll with us. And now, I've added a couple of tiffins (got them here, but I'm sure there are many places to get them) and, on Wednesdays, a lug-a-mug (Tamara makes Safiya a special sweet black tea with fresh mint that we savour on the way home). At Sultan's they gladly fill up the tiffens instead of the foam one-use dishes that are offered, as do most restaurants if you ask nicely and just emphasize that you're weird that way :-) Or, even better, with a smile say that you're trying out the first "R"; the reduce one. Most of the time no explanation is necessary, which is great.


The tiffins took a while to take, as with any new habit, but they're perfect for picnics, which we will be doing a lot more of as the weather gets warmer, and, also important, leftovers from restaurants, even ones that are sit-down with china (apparently if you have kids, you have left-overs :-) I don't know the energy input required to make these, but they're light, unbreakable, I can pass them down to Safiya, and they're better by leaps and bounds than recycling, which also requires high energy input and doesn't always happen as it's supposed to. Sometimes the recycling thing seems to me to be just a salve on the eco-conscious, kind of like buying indulgences were to the church in the Middle Ages.

So, if you're in Toronto, say hi to Tamara and Samer at Sultan's, which is at the north-east corner of Main Street and Danforth Avenue. And bring your tiffin :-)

Mending Mondays: Evolution of a Patch

Remember the yelling hole in the pair of cords that I was working on patching? Well, two weeks ago I finished it, with little ado but a lot of satisfaction. So, using the tutorial that I posted worked fantasticly (is that a word?), although when it states "most pants have extra fabric that you can steal from to make a patch to match" (maybe that's another tutorial I'm thinking of - I vetted a lot of patching tutorials, you know :-) this is not true of factory made pants made by say, G*P (that's a swear word around here). They are stingy! I had to steal that little extra front pocket that I only ever use for tampons, and since these are destined for a guy friend, I doubt he'll miss it....

Here's that hole:


1. Inside reinforcing patch (just used a scrap of mine) to prevent further tearing, pinned, seen from the wrong side (the inside of the pants):


2. Seen from the right side:


3. I basted it on the right side so that I could see where I was going, and knew to stay on the inside of the pins:


4. Basted patch, seen from the wrong side:


5. I zigzagged around the edges of the patch:


6. Seen here from the right side of the pants:


7. And then, on the right side of the pants, zigzagged the edges of the hole (I know, this is getting really ugly):


8. So, the inside reinforcing patch is done. Now, made a matching patch from that little pocket and sewed it on the outside. Now, ideally, you'd have enough fabric to turn in the edges better and be picky about whether the patch itself was already a little worn, but whatever:


Ta-da! Considering that he said not to be to picky 'cause they're just hanging around pants, but they're his favourite, I say "not bad!" and pat myself on the back.


It's a crazy number of pictures for such a little thing, but I went a step further than the other tutorial by adding an outside patch as well. I think it's a really effective, thorough way of repairing clothes, and I fully intend to keep doing it this way. Also, I have to teach Safiya how to do this, 'cause she's just taken a pair of scissors to her newest jeans that she got from Granny. When I asked her about it, she said, "That's o.k.! We can just patch them!" Ha!