Spring Science Time!

Hello - Sorry it's been a while since I posted, as always life get's pretty crazy.

I just wanted to jot down a quick note about the scope of this blog. When I started it in 2008, I knew we would be leaving the Upper Valley and our friends would be more dispersed than they already were. I liked that some people had started blogs to keep in contact with friends and family - and so I started this blog. Our generation moves and changes jobs so much more, and so keeping this log seemed like a nice way to keep in touch.

Since then the "mommy blog" field has exploded into some big business (though I often feel that selling to potential mommy bloggers is the bigger business). While I tip my hat to those women, I choose not to throw it into the ring.

This blog will remain, a family log for our friends and family in different time zones. (It's also kind of handy as a "notes to self".) While I have many, many sites and resources for technology, finance, etc. I'll leave it to The Daily Connoisseur (I love her videos) Design Mom (6 kids and she travels with them!) and this Panamanian girl (who is kind of crazy but actually really, really smart. I feel like she could be my manic younger sister. In full disclosure I haven't bought her worksheets, though I love her designs.) - when I'm feeling like some design/living inspiration.

 The past two weeks have been a Science/ Nature exploration experience!

Ger and I took Matt to Naturepalooza at the Philly Science  Festival. See his  "I Love Science" sticker?

Besides the exhibits and concerts they also had live animals!

Matt checks out the Big Bugs! exhibit at the arboretum.

Wow those are giant ants!

Matt's seedling is ready for planting! (I'll try and be a a good mom and do it before I accidentally kill it).

Ger's Birthday and Spring Treats

It was Ger's birthday this week and even though he had to work overnight we had a small celebration with his beloved (and highly toxic) carvel ice cream cake. Ger has a pretty big birthday treat coming up, I'll be telling you about the success of it at the end of May (or you can read about the complete failure of it in the local NH news - but hopefully it won't come to that). ;-)


Also, I wanted to tell you about some new shopping. I don't shop very often so it's worth blogging about- I always like seeing what other people have found so I figured I'd give it a go..

I got a new spring bag- for me a super big deal. 

I had been looking for some time for a new everyday work to mom weekend bag for spring. My current bag is over 4 years old and had a good run. It is ripped on the outside and the lining is destroyed. The requirements: minimum logo (I hate things with logos all over it), had to be kind of spring-y, had to be sharp enough for everyday work yet not overkill on the weekend, had to have one major compartment that zipped shot. Had to be not so expensive that when I spilled Matt's milk or a pen blew up inside it I wouldn't be upset.

The bag below from Macy's is starting the rotation - It has a white leather trim and is beige, so it will go with most outfits and with my trench. It only has small logo -which honestly is the most you can hope for these days it seems.

The lining is kind of fun. You can see it has three compartments. One that zips shut (for wallet, key). I imaging one side will be the "mom" side, and the other side will be the "work" side - moleskin, pens, etc.

I'll let you know how my new bag goes- it starts on the job this week. :-)

Also, I don't normally buy Matt books since we live up the block from the library but this book was so beautiful, illustrations and all, I couldn't resist.

Adapted from a Leo Tolstoy story, It is just a lovely book.

Finally, spring cleaning is underway (sort of) - I recently re-discovered the magic that is washi tape.
If you like your label maker, the next step up is washi tape.

Now we will know who the cell phone charger belongs to!

Into Spring 2013 (and Virginia)

After some pretty serious snows we are starting to feel spring warm us up. The crocus are starting to come up, much later than last year. Here’s what’s on my iphone tap…

It felt good to talk about something tech related, I am a software girl.

 

I totally love this picture of Matt using his tools to try and fix his toy (it was out of batteries).

Matt is so happy on the carousel at the Please Touch Museum.

 

So, in the continual self improvement with cooking files,  I really want to be able to get the slow cooker to work for me. The promise of coming home to hot dinner already made is just to appealing to give up on. So I looked for a recipe to try again and saw this pork chops and rice.

I don’t have a finished picture cause Ger came home and devoured it all, but it was starting to go dry in the slow cooker. This is also a little too heavy on meats for me – but hey.

 

Meanwhile, Ger and I went to Virginia last week to visit an old friend and see Colonial Williamsburg….

Matt loved watching the horses and soldiers….

Some of the interiors of the buildings were just gorgeous…

I was impressed by this little mini piano-forte in the ladies’ drawing room in the governor’s mansion. At the time the governor had 3 daughters and they practiced in their mom’s drawing room on the 2nd floor. That sonata looks complicated. Guess the governor’s wife was a colonial-era tiger mom.

 

Smoothies and other fun...

Every once in a while, I get worried we are all not eating enough vegetables. I came across this smoothie idea for kale and tried to give it a go.

This one was kale, celery, cucumber and apple. It was very refreshing, and it was nice to not need to strain the kale. I normally only drink tea and hot water with lemon but this was fun for the day.

Matt is getting so big! We took him to please touch and he had fun. He definitely knows his way around!

Cod and Charts

Hello - I'm trying something new, posting from my iPhone, so I apologize in advance if the pictures come out weird.

This week I finally got around to doing a chore chart for Matt. I saw this one on the honest co blog, and decided it would be a good temporary one to see if it worked out. It's made from the box that the honest co supplies come in. It was nice to do something sorta crafty and green, if the idea takes off and we use it a ton we could always update with a nicer one (ie one not made from a cardboard box).

Meanwhile my parents came this week to help me out with some scheduling. I came home and my mom made baked cod in orange butter sauce. What a nice dinner to come home to!

Meanwhile to follow up on our cleaning discussion- here's a quote from Heloise, who is world reknown for her cleaning advice. I couldn't agree more.

About Cleaning

Hey There- Can you believe it is March already?

So here’s what I’ve got on the iPhone this week…

One of the other blogs I check from time to time has been doing some “simple pleasure” posts that I’ve found kind of nice, so I wanted to share some thoughts on that…

I always like reading about what people find cool and useful, so here goes. So right now, I’m kind of in love with The Honest Company.

Basically, it is eco cleaning and house supplies mailed to your house. The company was founded by Jessica Alba and Christopher Gavigan (the latter being the author of “Healthy Child, Healthy World”).

Now, basically, if you know me, you know cleaning is not my favorite thing to do in the world. I appreciate it when things are neat and tidy, but in general cleaning is not my end goal. My goal in this regard is to match the S. household, an Italian family I grew up with across the street. Their house was IMMACULATE, but Mrs. S was known for her awesome rice balls (I still think about them). Apparently they made tomato sauce from scratch – grown with tomatoes from the yard. I still remember the rows of neat jars in their shed – and this was Jersey City mind you. So the house was beautiful, but there was still super tasty treats coming out of the kitchen among other things.

In general I vacillate between feeling that life is too short to spend too much time cleaning the house but appreciating cleanliness is a major reason for the health advances in the last 200 years. Plus I understand if you can’t make those chocolate chip cookies in under 12 minutes cause the kitchen is trashed, then that is a problem too. So the knife cuts both ways.

Of course, cleaning the house at the expense  of adding to the chemical load in our water and soil is just not worth it. To quote the Super Baby Food book, “Kids are more important than the carpet".”

Now, when I share this sentiment, I hear back, from time to time, “We used these products growing up and we are all okay”. My main answer is as follows:

1) The products are not the same. They change the formulations. Oreos are smaller than they once where – it is not your imagination.  (Companies are under no legal obligation to tell you when their formulations change).

2) The products are not made in the same place. With the focus on cost cutting, many of our products are made in places that have less than stringent oversight. Add point 1+2 and very often we are not talking about the same stuff.

3) We are not all okay.

However, this is not a place for an eco-rant so I will stop there and just say that certainly the eco aspect was certainly a reason to think twice about doing something I was already not terribly excited to do. When Matt is playing nicely in the tub, that would be a great opportunity to give a quick swish to the toilet – but really toilet bowl cleaner feels like it is pesticide grade practically. Why would I want to spread that stuff around when he is in the room? Heck, what could be growing in the toilet that could be worse than long term exposure to the chemicals in that stuff? Toilet bowl ring is not attractive true but I’ve not read of  flesh eating bacteria attacking people via their toilets (knock on wood). Perhaps the pendulum has swung too far in “kill everything at all cost” direction.

Any-who, enter the Honest Company and their nice, reasonable, effective, low environmental impact and super cute products. Did I mention how cute they were? So cute!  Plus they are not  too extreme, they just seem very sensible to me. So totally under the column listed “simple pleasures”  I can write – my monthly box from The Honest Co.

 

However, if an aversion to cleaning is genetic, Matt did not get it. Ex: I’ve been trying to do more project time with him, especially as he is getting older…

 

I saw this kaleidoscope painting thing on pinterest. Basically you take an empty container, poor some paint in with a small ball (marble or something) and shake it around to make designs…

 

 

Raw Supplies

Matt loved pouring in the colors

This particular project fell down a little cause I didn’t have a little marble or ball – so in hunting around the kitchen I had some very old, not edible, cashews. I figured they’d rattle quite nicely in the container but no such luck. If you decide to try this project, I think an actually marble might be the-way to go (or maybe more watered down paint)? It certainly was very gloopy.

One thing I learned doing this project is that clearly, Matt doesn’t like a mess…

 

p.s. Still cold weather means one or two more cottage pies before the weather gets warmer and it won’t feel right to eat them…

Blast form the Past - Sorting Piles

Sorry I've been behind on posts, we are sorting ourselves through so much, least of all piles of crap as we get ready for some new projects, and so it has been very much a working weekend. We went through one pile of old books and I found an old Clifford A. Pickover book, and I was so excited to be able to just google him and realize there are 40 other books he's written! Yay! Sorting bookshelves is a VERY VERY VERY dangerous things for me to do....

Hidden in that pile of combined stuff from our teenage years is this little gem from a 14 year old Gerry: