Art

I love Art! No, I am not an artist by any means, I don't draw well, I don't know any of the hundreds of techniques artists use, and I know very little of the various mediums. The closest I've ever gotten is trying to manipulate my very basic digital camera to see things the way I do. Very tricky indeed! I dream of one day being able to attend art school. Glass? Metal? Ceramics? OHHH the possibilities are endless. Until then, I will borrow books from the library, and read about various techniques.

I also love color, especially in our home. We have had no art on the walls, until I dug out an old gift sent to us from Jaime's grandmother on his fathers side. Grandma Ganoza is from Peru, and from what I've heard, she visits quite often. Every couple of years, we receive a package in the mail with miscellaneous items from her trip. About 7 years ago we received this tapestry, which sat rolled up in the closet of our many homes.

I think it is made of either sheep or llama wool. This picture doesn't show the rich colors, again, failure on my part to manipulate my digital camera. I absolutely love this tapestry! I love the red roofs, and the women by the stream. It makes me smile whenever I walk by it.

Peggy Chun lives in Hawaii, and I love her work too. She suffers from Lou Gehrig's disease, and has over the years lost the use of all extremities. She now paints digitally with her eyes. My all time favorite is Banana Patch Heaven, but I also like Spirit of the Paddles.

Seattle has many talented artists! We've run across several no-name artists at farmers markets and street fairs. Many thanks to all of the artists who make our world a more beautiful place!

Junkie

I am a self proclaimed junk food junkie! I've been like this for as long as I can remember, and this past Christmas my mother commented on how even as a young girl, I loved my sweets. I go through phases, at times I do pretty good. I don't buy junk, don't eat much junk... then it happens, I'm at the grocery store, thinking..."I deserve a treat", after all I don't have a weight problem, never have, why shouldn't I indulge??? Don't get me wrong... I think the occasional treat is fine, but once I have some, I can't seem to stop eating until it is all gone. I will slowly munch on candy & chocolate until it completely disappears. Very little will power.

I'm trying to change my eating habits for myself and the little ones. I want to be around a long time, so I can return the favor and torture them when I'm old! =) Just kidding. The worst part for me is Noah is following in my footsteps. He constantly asks for 'sugar snacks', and thinks whenever we are out and about, someone needs to buy him a treat. It's tough, because every where we go, there seem to be those darn little candy machines that only require a quarter. I say 'NO', then I have to listen to all sorts of whining and negotiations. I've gotten good at taking healthy snacks with us, and not buying junk! Except... when I go to the grocery store! OHH my weakness. Make every bite count, is what goes through my mind every time I eat or prepare food. Bella is nursing, and she depends on me to provide her with essential nutrients.

In an effort to eat better, I prepare snacks for myself that I can munch on during the day. I'm not a 3 meals a day kinda gal, I prefer to graze all day long! I chop fruit and veggies, get some dips ready, cut some cheese, have healthy crackers and nuts available. That way when I'm hanging out with Bella and want to 'snack', I can go to the kitchen, grab a handful of goodness, and munch/crunch on it while hanging with Bella. I need to get back into the habit of baking. I think that would help round out my snacking.

Noah is reluctant to eat healthy, thanks to me! I have noticed if I bake something healthy, or just leave some chopped items on the table, he too will walk by and grab something to munch on. What are your tricks/tips on eating better? Have a favorite recipe you'd like to share? I'm always up for something new.

Fire!!!!

I have said it before, I'll say it again, I should not be allowed in the kitchen!

Today, after picking Noah up from school, I decided I am cold, I'd like to have another cup of tea. So I put on the hot water. Bella was fussing, so I sat down, got cozy with my favorite blanket and began nursing her. Sniff, Sniff... is something burning?? Shortly after the kettle starts to whistle, so I go to the kitchen, with Bella attached... and guess what I see??? Yep, FIRE!!!

My chowder from last night boiled over, guess that was what caught fire... and this is the second time this year that I've done this. Maybe I'm subconsciously trying to burn down my ICKY kitchen???

Check out my kettle!

Sunshine!

YES!! The sun is peaking through grey clouds! Is this possible in the middle of winter?
I love sun, it feels great.
Can't wait for spring!

Kids!

Things around here have been a bit busy but uneventful. Is that possible??? Noah and Bella have been sick. Although Bella is feeling better, Noah is still sluggish. He's been home from school quite a bit these last two weeks, first from snow storm, then he got sick. We've had lots of time to talk and just hang out.
I asked Noah, What are your interests?
What's that? He asked
Then we came up with a long list of his interests. Noah is very reserved, and doesn't share much, so it was great to see his face light up with excitement as he talked of his interests.

• Caves
• Rocket Ships
• Ninjas
• Pirates
• Bouncey Houses
• Gymnastics
• Swimming/diving
• Bugs
• Pinata
• Castles & Evil Kings
• Hot Wheels
• Flying Carpet
• Sling Shots
• Tattoos
• Dragons
• Huge Bubbles
• Monster Trucks
• Reptiles
• Super Heros
• Hot Lava
• Cutting things in half
• Swords
• Submarines

Maybe we could incorporate some of these things into a Birthday party? Bubbles, Pinata, and a Bouncey House sound like loads of fun. Hopefully it doesn't rain... a real possibility in April.

Passion

What's your passion?
HMMM, I'm still trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up... oh wait a minute, guess I am sorta grown??? Right?

I'm reading this great book, 'Work with Passion-How to do what you love for a living' by Nancy Anderson. I'm only about 27 pgs in, but I'm hooked. Hope I have enough time to read the entire text. A paragraph in the introduction grabbed me with this:

"Begin your journey toward a more passionate life by eliminating the distractions from your life. Distractions include spending time with people who drain your energy, surfing the Internet, watching too much television, overspending, overeating, overworking, and oversocializing."

Some of these are obvious, like TV and the Internet. I too am guilty of squandering many hours, especially on the Internet. Others... like oversocializing, were not as obvious... to me at least. It goes on to say that it is important to have some alone time just for thinking and being. This I completely agree with. We don't have enough 'alone time' to just be ourselves and do absolutely nothing, a time to think. We are constantly overextended by family, friends, work and other obligations. Sometimes it is unavoidable, other times we need to learn to just say 'NO'. This is very difficult for me.

Anyhow, I hope you all will take more time to figuring out what your 'Passion' is. If you've already found it, Congratulations! I'd love to hear about it.

Advice

Tonight while Noah was brushing his teeth, he called me into his bathroom. Why? He wanted to tell me his secret for getting your teeth extra clean.

• First you brush really really good.
• Rinse toothbrush, then brush again but only with water.

This last step is REALLY important. It will make your teeth 'shiny'. So there you have it, next time you want really shiny teeth, try Noah's trick, he swears by it.

Knitting

I couldn't knit if my life depended on it! But my mom is so talented, she can knit all sorts of great things. Here are a few items she has made for Noah and Bella.

Lady Bug Blanket for Bella

Zoo Animal Blanket for Noah

Cardigan for Bella

Sweater for Noah


Thank you Mutti!

Song

Noah sang us a new song tonight... it was soooo cute!

I love the mountains
I love the rolling hills
I love the flowers
I love the daffodils

the rest was either hummed or muttered...

So, during dinner I started to sing it, but I added
I love the ocean
at the beginning of the song. I was quickly corrected. That is NOT how the song goes. I asked if I could add that part, because I really do love the ocean.

ummm uhmmmmm well, okay if you really do love the ocean, you can sing it that way if you want to. Thanks Noah for teaching me your song.

More Snow!

Last night while Noah and I were making dinner, we noticed it was snowing... again! For the second time this year! I love it!!! Here are a few more photos.

Time to go outside and play!

Another storm

After watching the news this past weekend, I learned we had yet another storm headed our way, due to hit last night... and it did. The weather was nice yesterday morning, so Bella and I headed out to the yard for some fresh air. I wanted to check on our leaning Locust Tree, which is leaning towards a little building on my neighbors lot. Luckily no one is living in it.

On Saturday another arborist came to give me an estimate. He quoted high. I asked why it is so expensive to take down a tree these days, and he stated the obvious. With the recent storms we've been having, and all the wind, they have more work than they can handle, and prices have skyrocketed! Great. He suggested I wait several weeks, and prices may drop. What if my tree falls???? He says Locust Trees are strong, and it may hold. My reply was that I don't want to take a chance... especially with all the crazy weather we've been having. After a little more chit chat, he mentions my neighbor is his guitar teacher. Who Vicky?? Yes Vicky. He goes on to say he will drop the price by $100 and will not charge tax, but I will still have to wait about 2 weeks. Deal!! This saves me about $150 all together.

This morning I checked on the tree again, it is still standing, even after the crazy wind from yesterday. I am counting my lucky stars!

German Style Red Cabbage

My mom taught me how to make this a few years back. This is comfort food for me.



1 head of red cabbage
1 medium onion
1-2 apples
2 bay leaves
6-8 cloves
vinegar
sugar

• Quarter cabbage, then slice into thin strips
• Saute diced onion in a bit of olive or butter until transparent
• add sliced red cabbage and cook for about 5minutes or until soft
• add a splash (to taste) of vinegar(I use apple cider vinegar) while cooking cabbage
• peel & cut apple into small pieces and add
• add bay leaves and cloves
• sprinkle a little sugar (about 1-2 tsp)
• add enough water to almost cover cabbage, but not quite.
  

Cook for about an hour or so, you may need to add water along the way if it gets too dry.
Add additional sugar to taste if you want it sweeter.

Budget

Have you ever wondered... where did it all go? Money that is. This is where my handy dandy budget comes in! Three years ago I created a budget using Excel to keep track of our spending...and I mean ALL of it! Why Excel vs some other savvy personal financial planning software?? I already had it, I already knew how to use it... and it did the job just fine.

In the beginning, it was more of a tracking device than an actual budget. The toughest part was remembering to save all receipts, and getting Jaime to do the same. After about a year of 'tracking' our spending habits, I felt pretty good that our expenses were being logged accurately, for the most part.

I was shocked to learn that most of our disposable income was going to fast food/dining out! Were we really eating out THAT much??? Apparently so. 2-4 times a week added up to several hundred dollars each and every month! This is where the REAL budget came in, and it took a full year to implement. We often went beyond our budget, and dipped onto our savings. By the end of the second year, we noticed a major improvement. We were eating out about once a week vs 2-4 times. This second year was tough, and some months were a lot better than others. We made a lot of life changes in this second year, making it difficult at times to track/stick to our budget. We moved from Hawaii to Seattle, purchased our first home, and enrolled Noah in preschool.

In the third year, things started to settle a bit, but we still incurred some unexpected expenses. We had to replace our roof, replace main water line from meter to house, and we added another beautiful addition to our family... Bella!

We are now entering our 4th year of budgeting, and I think it gets better every year! This year we hope to pay off all of our bad debt, (car & credit card), and I'm working to reduce our food bill. I'm researching local farms and looking to purchase half a pig, and some local beef. Jaime is a big meat eater!! While I do this, I'm also trying to stretch our meat by eating more grains and vegetables. For example, instead of serving several pork chops and mashed potatoes (Jaime's fav) for dinner, we take one large pork chop, chop into small pieces and cook with green beans and Kabocha. If and when we get our garden started, hopefully that will provide us with some veggies. I hope to start baking bread again. Buying in bulk and cooking from scratch seems to make all the difference, and tastes great too.

We buy used whenever we can, and don't buy things that we really don't need. Sometimes it is hard to differentiate between a need and a want. We are working harder than ever to really stick to it, and rethinking many of our purchasing decisions. I'm excited to see where our budget takes us this next year.

My forest

One of the reasons I love our property is because we have so many trees on it. We have several big ones in the back, and three closer to the house. Near the house we have a cherry, birch, and 'The Monster' as the arborist called it. The Monster needs to be thinned... badly.

This past week my mom and I were walking through the back end of our property, when she noticed one of smaller trees was majorly leaning towards my neighbors shed. Upon closer inspection, you can see a mound of dirt around the base where the roots are near the surface. Must have been that bad storm we had several weeks back. Darn, guess that one needs to be cut down.

I called several, about 7, tree specialists/arborists, 3 promised to come and give me an estimate, only one showed up. He was a real talker, told me all about trees, how they grow, why this and that happens, how people don't take care of their trees, how his house & shop were broken into, his brand new truck stolen, a piston went out on his best chipper... you get the picture. Since he was so talkative, I thought I'd ask about thinning The Monster. Bill (the arborist) was upset! Someone had just chopped The Monster years ago, just 'topped it', which has apparently ruined the look of this beautiful old tree. He said it was going to be a pain to trim/thin it, and keep it beautiful. He recommended only cutting 25% at a time, and starting at the bottom, it would cost about $1,000 for each trimming/thinning... WHAT??? Gulp! That was hard to swallow. I was informed it would be cheaper to take The Monster down. NO WAY! I love The Monster, besides, it is so old, and has been around so long, what gives me the right? Besides, it provides us with wonderful shade in the summer, beautiful yellow leaves in the fall, and lots of leaves to rake up. We make huge piles of yellow leaves, Noah jumps in them, then we compost what we have room for. It's great fun and exercise. I will do what I can to save The Monster for future generations.

Exhaustion

The kiddos are tucked in and sleeping, kitchen has been cleaned...house has not, laundry has been folded but not put away. Whew, what a day! I did manage to get myself to the library to get a few books that were on hold, just to learn that I couldn't check them out because I had an outstanding fine of $11.10! How could this be??? Oh yeah, all those books that I checked out shortly before Christmas needed to be returned/renewed. Whoops! The librarian informed me she could only take cash, or I could get on a computer and pay over the web with my Credit Card. Well, the High School across the street from the library had just let out and was flooded with loud obnoxious teenagers. No free computer in site. So... I pick Noah up from school, run a few errands, go home and pay my fine, and head back to the library. That will teach me to return my books on time! I'm usually really good about it. As for the teenagers... I was one, and will eventually be the mother of one. YIKES So scary, and yet so exciting!

School

Today was Noah's first day back to school. I work up early to prepare his lunch and breakfast for us. With all the noise in the kitchen, Noah sleepily stumbled out, rubbing his eyes. It was still a little dark out. He wanted to know what I was doing up so early, then smiled when he realized it was just the two of us, Bella was still sleeping. After snuggling by the heater, a disappointed look covers his face as he realizes today is a school day. Once at school, he refuses to get out of the car, holds on to his carseat, and announces he is 'never taking off the seat cuffs' (aka hand cuffs). On the way home, I learn of a fatal shooting at a local high school about 20-30 minutes away. HMMMM Homeschooling sounds more appealing by the day.

A New Year!

Whew, the Holidays are over, and life is slowly returning to normal. Tomorrow my mom flies home to Wisconsin and Noah goes back to school.

I can't believe another year has come and gone! A sure sign that I'm getting older. I'm not big on New Year resolutions, but I have a bunch of things I hope to accomplish this year. All of the usual stuff... eat better, exercise more, love others, etc. On the top of my list is starting a garden! I really hope we can make it happen this year. I hoped to get it started last year, but then we found so much garbage buried under the blackberries that Jaime cleared. We also found an old dilapidated shed that we had to break down. We still have a lot of work to do. If only this rain would slow down long enough to get some fresh air.

Our future garden.... hopefully next year this time it will look totally different.