Category Archives: children

Peas and Cookies

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Trellis for Peas Woven from Saplings

Trellis for Peas Woven from Saplings

I have been jonesing for cookies or pudding or ice cream or some sweet thing. I was going to make some pudding, whip up some cream to plop on top. But my wife made cookies. A local teenager is going to watch my daughter after school so I can go to a meeting tomorrow afternoon. So my co-parent whipped up some chocolate chippers. I went with those.

Also, I spent this weekend in the garden. I dug and prepped and then planted. I can’t say I planted because my children were right there with me. I set aside a chunk of the garden just for them this year. They planted peas, carrots and (early) pumpkins. I hope the pumpkins do OK given that it is so early, but we can always replant them. In the larger garden I planted peas and carrots.

That is the game we often play in the winter when we are waiting at the end of the driveway for the school bus–Peas and Carrots. We jump up and down and someone shouts out a number and you have to get in a group with exactly that many people. It has limited usefulness as a game when there are only four or three or even two of us, but it keeps us warm. Anyway, we kept singing the little ditty as wel planted–“Peas and Carrots, Peas and Carrots, Peas and Carrots.” We had a good time.

I ate one cookie but I could use another. Tomorrow I have a busy day. I get my daughter on the bus, drive my son to school, go to Burlington to work with three groups of students in a row, head to the office to get as many tasks done as I can, drive to Milton for a faculty meeting at the high school, head home to meet my daughter at the house of the aformentioned teenager, drive with her to get my son, get home for dinner, then head up the road for T-Ball practice. Then home in time for bed.

Knowing that the garden is doing its silent job of growing will help me mentally once the day begins. And that extra cookie will come in hand, too.

Stories Before Bed

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The children love it when I tell them stories before bed.  The stories are all over the map.  Sometimes they are easy–a spin on the Thomas the Tank Engine stories for example.  Sometimes they are exotic, like the family that sails around the world and visits various sites.  Sometimes they are just plain silly.  If want to get them to sleep faster, I do what I can to make them boring.

I put the kids to bed last night, so they got a decent story.  It was about a group of explorers who traveled the southwest looking for a magic rock.  They narrowed it down and then searched for weeks by foot, drinking water from puddles and peering under cactus plants.  Finally, they discovered a staircase made of narrow steps in a steep wall that could only be seen in the setting sun.  After waiting the night, they climbed the dangerous wall and discovered the rock among thousand year old corn and baskets.  It turns out all of them made a wish and the wish came true.  Was it because of the magic rock?  Or not?

They left the rock in its place and told no one about it, so who knows?  The kids went to bed wondering.  This can backfire, of course, when they keep asking questions about the story.  Tonight my wife puts the kids to bed.  They asked for me and complained when I said no, it was Mom’s turn.  She doesn’t tell the same caliber of stories, I guess, at least not as regularly.

I like the ones where the family travels the world.  They see all kinds of interesting things and meet curious people, like the woman who wears only purple who seems to show up on every continent.  How does she get around, that purple woman?  I get to imagine that our family is doing the traveling, and I hope I am planting the seeds for our children to want to travel.  One of these days we may.

They are drifting off now, story over, such as it was tonight.  I need to plan ahead for tomorrow night’s story.  I am not sure what it will contain, but the purple woman hasn’t made and appearance in far too long.  She needs some story time.  I am thinking she may get it in about 24 hours.

Tomatoes Up

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I planted tomatoes in foam cells a few days before we went away for a few days.  I was hoping they would be popping out of the dirt when we returned.  They were not.  They were still buried.  Pokey seeds.  I was worried they might be duds.  The next day was eight degrees plus.  They started to rise then.  I guess they like it hot.

No peppers have risen yet.  I planted those at the same time as the tomatoes.  Pokier seeds.  The leeks and onions are doing fine, curling all over.  I had to give them another haircut tonight.  That smelled pretty dang good.  In two or three weeks I will plant all this stuff in the ground.  I am looking to plant other things earlier–peas, lettuce, carrots maybe.  Pumpkins.  We’ll have to see about the weather.

I planted an oak tree from an acorn with the children last June.  It was a father’s day gift.  I never planted it and then winter came.  I thought i would plant it this spring.  When we returned from our trip it was dried out.  I thought watering it would help it bounce back.  It isn’t dead but it is still pretty limp.  I guess you shouldn’t treat your trees like dirt.

The tomatoes are pretty wiry at this point.  I’ll need to bury them deep so they grow well.  I decided not to repot them this year to see what happens.  I thought maybe I wouldn’t lose as many that way.  Last year I repotted once, the year before twice.  I’m all about efficiency.  I still need to prepare the garden.  It is in pretty good shape but the lawn keeps encroaching.  Too bad we can’t eat that.  Tomatoes are tastier.

Things are greening up all over the place.  I am again amazed at how winter turns to spring and then all of a sudden it is summer.  I can’t imagine ever getting tired of that.  I say “wow” a lot this time of year.  I watched a vulture swoop low over the field tonight.  My son and I said “wow” together.  It was in the eighties again today.  That is a wow in itself.  We watched snow fall last month.

So things are growing.  Hopefully I can translate that into some food and some beauty in our garden.  I can almost taste the tomatoes and lettuce and onion sandwiches on homemade honey oat bread with Cabot extra shart cheddar cheese.  Oh crap, I just drooled on myself.  Keep growing tomatoes.

Firewood on the Deck

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We have a pile of firewood on the deck.  That isn’t where we keep the firewood, mind you, but there it is.  It came from under the big old spruce tree.  That isn’t where we keep it either.  It migrated to its spot under the tree from the pile next to the garage.  We usually keep the firewood in the garage, not next to it.  The pile is smaller than it was a while ago.

We got a load of firewood delivered last summer.  We let it sit in a pile, near the garage but not right next to it, for several months.  Once it was clear that winter would not hold off any longer, I moved it into its neat stacks in the garage.  I ran into a problem, of course.  The logs that were against the ground were muddy, gunked up with our clay soil.  So I took those pieces and made a smaller pile as I worked.  I ended up with a pile of muddy chunks.

I left the mud encrusted heating fuel there all winter.  I thought I might move it once it got dry enough to move under cover.  But it never got dry enough.  Then the logs got frozen.  And it snowed.  And I left them there.  When spring arrived and the children started to muck about outside without snow, they decided that firewood makes excellent building material for houses and other imaginary buildings.

That is how the wood found its way to the spruce tree.  New construction, using recycled materials, were used for the new building on the deck.  It was not as practical a building as they might have built, but I was proud of my children for their sustainable building practices.  The building has fallen out of use, and its remains were piled up.  I am waiting for the clean up crew to manage the debris.

The muddy wood pile is now fairly dry.  The mud has fallen off.  I need to move that pile out from the flower bed.  Leaving it there could become a problem soon.  The children will need to find other sustainable building materials.  I am going to burn these.

Perfect Winter Day

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One Week Ago Today

One Week Ago Today

No Snow but Cold as Winter

No Snow but Cold as Winter

The temperature was in the 20’s when we got up this morning.  Of course, with the children so excited for Easter, we rose earlier than usual.  It was still pretty much dark.  It was 6:00.  I was not ready to get out of bed.  But I did.

Then it snowed.  We have had snow showers all day in fact.  At times it has come down pretty hard.  It has been a perfect winter day.  Only it isn’t winter any more.  April is offering its usual assortment of weather.  Tomorrow the temperature will be in the 50’s.

A week ago we work to snow on the ground.  It did not last long as the day warmed.  The day did not warm today.  It has been below freezing for the duration.  And cloudy.  When the sun shines our house warms nicely.  Today, with the cold, the clouds–and did I mention the wind?–it has not been what you might call a sauna in here.

We have had a fire in the stove.  The children raced around hunting for eggs in the chilliness.  Their faces got red.  They welcomed the woodstove when they came back in, sitting next to it with toys and books.

We may get more snow.  April is not over yet.  May should be free of the white stuff, although one never knows.  I look forward to feeling some more spring tomorrow.

Too Much Sugar

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Crowd at the Shelburne Farms Sugar House

Crowd at the Shelburne Farms Sugar House

The first dose of sugar at least came from natural sources. We visited Shelburne Farms for their pancake breakfast, complete with real maple syrup. The cakes were complemented by juice and then hot chocolate. It was a great breakfast, a fundraiser for 4H. But sweet for the children.

We visited the sugar house, watched them boiling down the sap into syrup. Of course, they handed out free samples, small for an adult but large for the tykes. In the sugarush they had hidden small wooden disks, sliced from small maples. Those could be handed in for hard maple candies, one for one. So the children each had one of those.

My parents, visiting for the weekend, wanted to puchase some maple syrup, so we stopped at Palmer’s Sugarhouse, a little closer to home. We watched them boiling as well and got, again, free samples. These samples were much more generous. And my wife also bought some cotton candy and–how could she not?–shared that with her progeny.

Back at home we had lunch. That was a little healthier. Even the afternoon snacks were decent. The problem came later. My children, with their cute wiles, convinced my parents to take us all to Friendly’s for dinner. Friendly’s is fun but doesn’t exactly serve health food, if you know what I mean. After a dinner a little too concentrated in the fried genre, we had ice cream sundaes. The sundaes were part of the point of dining at this particular establishment so they were not to be denied, but whew, it was good that have that over.

Too much sugar today. Normally I would not allow all that crap to enter the system of my small and precious youngsters, at least not all in one day, but it seemed a tricky one to navigate, what with the pre-planned pancake breakfast and the grandparents and Friendly’s. It is only one day, however. Tomorrow we get back to cracking down. Apples and yogurt will rule over treats.

It was a fun day. The children settled down and fell asleep without too much trouble. We had a fine hike while we were at Shelburne Farms and they ran around a lot today. It was pretty much perfect–sunny and in the 60’s. So hopefully they managed to work the sweet out of their little systems. Maybe it evened out. I ran eight miles this afternoon, so I’m not worried about myself too much. Except that I need a haircut something fierce, but that is off the topic.

All in all we enjoyed our maple sugaring open house day, even if it meant too many sweets. What’s one day? It is a good thing sugaring season only lasts a short time. And that the kids get sick of pancakes. Plus, I won’t have the clean the griddle tomorrow morning. That will give me more time to run off the ice cream I ate with dinner.

Sugaring Weather

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It has been pretty ideal sugaring weather lately.  Warm days and cold nights.  The sap is flowing.  This weekend is open house weekend at sugarhouses across the state.  Tomorrow we will head out to one or two of them, do some tasting and watch the sap boil.

We will start off with a pancake breakfast at Shelburne Farms.  My parents are up for the weekend and we will make a morning of it.  Pancakes and syrup and some fun together.  Sunday it looks to rain all day.  It will be a wet one.

The sap should be flowing again tomorrow.  The children can hardly wait to sip those little cups of syrup.  Neither can I.

Rain Falling in the Dark

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After dinner I checked the NOAA website, as I often do, to see what might be in store in the next few days. It told me to expect rain tonight. I said this to my son. His response: “I want to hear it start raining.”

After I put him to bed tonight, it started raining. He missed it by maybe ten minutes. He may even have been awake still when the rain started to fall. Now it drips onto the deck, slowly drumming away the paint. I will go to bed listening to that.

Maybe it will still be raining in the morning. My little guy can listen to it then as he wakes. If the rain has stopped, my guess is he will have forgotten his comment from the previous night. Another day it will start raining, he will listen to it and, even though he does not know I am watching, he will plaster on a big old grin.

Mud and Plastic

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My daughter had the idea over dinner that we take a family walk down the road.  When your kid asks to do something outside as a family, it is awfully hard to say no, even if you have your pajamas on unaccountably early and the hour has crept beyond the usual one for dinner.  So I donned the jeans once more, slipped on mud boots with my children, and off we went.

A month ago, the ditch lining the road was deep with ice.  We would walk across with nary a step down.  Now it is muddy, running with melted snow.  The children tossed rocks, some of which made the hoped for splash, some of which stuck impressively into the mud.  They stomped and squished.  The shouted and laughed.  We had a hard time getting them to turn around so we could get home for bed.

We picked up a crazy amount of trash a few weeks ago, but there is more now.  Some of it has peeked out from the ice or snow, but some of it is new.  I can’t get over the amount of new litter to be found in those few weeks.  I want to believe it is just an accident, that each new piece bounced from a truck bed my mistake, but there is too much of it.  People are tossing that crap out the window.  It can bring one down, seeing how someone cares little enough that they will leave it to others to pick up their empties.

We generate enough trash as it is.  Americans generate about 4.6 pounds of solid waste per day, per person, and only about a quarter of it gets recycled, even though we could recycle about 3/4 of it.  A large percentage of that 4.6 pounds seems to wind up along the road.  I picked up two aluminum cans this evening–one whole and filled with mud, the other squashed flat–and one flattened plastic bottle.  I will recycle them.  At least, I will take them to the transfer station to be recycled by someone else, but that is more than my untidy neighbor, whoever he or she might be.

The kids are happy to help me clean things up.  I guess they do understand the importance of cleaning up, even though they left a huge mess on the floor this evening before they went to bed (it got too late to push that one).  They were dirty enough that I told them to leave the rest of the plastic bottles, half buried in the winter’s layer of sand, where they were.  I can go get those later at some point.

I had to do some boot rinsing when we got home.  We were a tad muddy.  I tossed what I was carrying into a blue recycling bin, cleaned some footwear, washed my hands, and headed to the kitchen to clean up that mess.  Sometimes it feels like I spend my whole day cleaning up messes.  But what fun would life be without messes, right?  As soon as I am done here, I think I will pick up all the toys on the floor.  I should probably make the kids clean up their own mess, but I need to be a nice guy once in a while.  Maybe tonight will be that once.

Sausages and Tofu

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We don’t eat meat in our house.  I guess that isn’t totally true but almost 100% true.  My daughter is pretty good at counting but she can count way higher than she needs to in order to count the number of times she has eaten meat.  I have cooked meat in our house exactly twice, and when I did so it had been many years since I had cooked meat at all.  Tonight for dinner we had cheese quesadillas and salad.  It was light fare but was just what we needed.

My daughter likes breakfast sausages.  She has eaten them only a few times.  The last time was at a community breakfast at her school.  There were many families there.  It was a fund raiser for the local pre-school.  We had tons of fun and my daughter wanted some sausage, like many of the other children there.  I hate to be the parent who says no all the time, especially when I don’t have the best of explanations.  I didn’t want to eat it, and this particular sausage wasn’t exactly of the highest quality, but why the heck not let her have it?  She’ll try to some time anyway.  And it won’t kill her.

I hear people talk about how they could never be a vegetarian.  As if they would have to jump right into eating tofu and beans and kale at every meal if they decided to stop eating meat.  I think most people eat plenty of meals that don’t contain meat without even thinking about it.  Peanut butter and jelly?  Macaroni and cheese?  Breakfast cereal?  Who eats meat at every meal?

Anyway, I am currently of the mind that we won’t have meat much in our house at all.  My wife and I are on the same page with that one.  But if the kids want it once in a while when it is offered, I will let them try it, as long as it isn’t too nasty.  I made them fried chicken a couple of times here at home, at my daughter’s request to have chicken.  She thought it was OK and my son just said no thanks.  I have cooked up chicken many a time and this was, and I’m not just saying this, really good fried chicken.  I ate it right up.  The second try provided the same results.  Salad is a bigger hit.

We do eat tofu occasionally.  It is good stuff if you prepare it right.  Kind of like cauliflower.  That stuff isn’t exactly great plain, if you ask me, but in a gratin, oh baby oh.  I can whip up some tofu into a tasty meal.  We even eat meat substitutes.  For me, it isn’t that I don’t like meat as a food.   It just seems irresponsible to eat it.  Eat it if you want but, knowing what I know about where it comes from, I don’t want to support such a destructive and unhealthy system.

We have talked about trying to eat meat that is locally and responsibly grown.  That is where the chicken I fried came from, a local farm.  At this point that is hard to do, more because we are in the habit of not eating meat than anything else, but meat still has a larger ecological footprint, even if it is raised in the best way possible, and that factors in as well.

For now we don’t buy it, don’t prepare it and don’t really eat it.  I won’t be a hindrance to my children experimenting with it if they want to do that. Maybe if they experiment with that they will be more careful experiementing with things like smoking banana peels.  And we will likely cook up something fleshy again at some point.  But for now I will toss that fake sausage on the pizza and bake the tofu pot pie.  That will do me more than just fine.