Sod-->BUSTED!

The major portion of the garden area has been sod busted!

I did the math, and I worked over 50 hours clearing 160ish square feet of sod.

Today there was just "the island" left. A portion of grass at the top of the clearing that still had to be dug up. Then we're free to rake it level and put in the garden beds!  I started outside around noon, and worked for nearly 7 hours at it. And it was in the low 40's all day...brrrr! I wore my snow pants (waterproof and warm!) and quite a few layers on top!

To give you an idea of how long it takes to get ALL the stinking Bermuda grass out, I took this picture at 5:58

And this one at 6:57

That is some SLOW going!  And that is one solid hour (and two buckets of grass and roots) of work. I got a cup of coffee before taking the first picture and refilled after taking the second. In between I kept my head down and worked and clawed that dirt as fast as I could.

My furry companion was there with me for most of it. At one point he was standing on the island gazing so quizzically at the dirt I went to take a picture of him...and in a second he went from just looking, to 

THIS

to THIS

With me yelling "No dig! No dig!!!"

Then I thought, "Well...maybe it would go faster..."

Then I envisioned a yard full of holes and that affirmed my gut reaction.

And I've learned a few things in my 50+ hours of digging this past month.  

That I love being outside. 

That my hair actually remembers what the sun does to it and gets so much lighter.  

That Tatum loves being outside too, but when I tell her she can't water the plants any more she gets fed up and goes inside.  

That I love listening to the birds flirt with each other. 

That our soil is actually pretty darn healthy--lots of earthworms and very few grubs.  

That I can now quickly dispatch of said grubs with a pop of my fingers, whereas at the beginning I used the spade. 

That I despise, loathe and HATE Bermuda grass and its never-ending maze of stubborn stolons that will magically create another lush carpet of grass if you so much as leave a quarter of an inch of the stuff. 

That dirt will be under my fingernails even when wearing gloves. 

And that I will be very very glad when this is all covered with landscape fabric and mulch and the real gardening (in raised beds!) can begin.

So goodnight...I've earned a long soak in a hot tub for my aching back! And hey--look! I'm actually in a picture! What you can't see is how covered in mud and dirt I am!!!

Either/Or

One year ago on March 3, 2012--I walked into the front door of our house for the first time. I saw walls that needed painting, a cat smell that needed eliminating, and a wonderful floor plan that I could see our family gathering in.  Matt was camping at the time and so I made an offer on my house without even talking to him--thank goodness we have a good relationship!

It is a year later and the walls have been painted, there is now a toddler smell in place of a cat smell, our family regularly gathers and it is time to turn our attention outside.

When we bought the house the backyard was 100% bermuda grass with a wood deck next to the square of concrete right outside the doors. Not a shrub, not a flower, not a tree in sight. In fact, it was so boring we don't really have any "before" pics.

With limited resources and time I managed to do a 4' x 4' veggie garden that I mostly began too late in the season and some potted flowers.

Last fall we planted a Cleveland select flowering pear tree (which I now am reconsidering for something more multi-tasking like a cherry tree or serviceberry tree), and I dug up two flowerbeds alongside the house to prepare for spring. I planted a few bulbs but nothing else, letting cardboard and mulch chill for the winter.

After a lot of research and numerous measurements and countless sketches on graph paper, I've finally got the bones of some landscaping for our backyard down.  With gas and cable lines running a full 5 feet along the back of our yard by the fence, I'm restricted from really doing much along the fence, although I'll try some vines to help bring a little life to the boring wood.

A few weeks ago, after a lot of snow and some rain and before another storm was supposed to hit, I dug up the outline of Phase 1 garden area in our backyard. 

And realized I was either going to have an awesome backyard come June or I'd just made a really big mistake.

So I've spent the last several weeks outside, digging up bermuda grass, adjusting my plans, taking measurements again. Roy has enjoyed the increase in outdoor activity and decided to adopt a log of firewood as his new toy.

It has grown larger over the weeks...

And has spread...

And I've had a very willing helper...

And a very lazy dog (other than chasing away those savage birds)

I was able to find time to put a few flowers in one of the flower beds I started last fall, and the bulbs are coming up now. The back row will be sweet peas, and morning glories will climb the trellis.

And little by little we're digging up the hated bermuda grass and getting ready to put in the raised beds. It looks different every day...put probably only to us! And now to decide...to tree or not to tree...that is the question.

We're hoping to get that done this weekend and get some seeds in the ground before we leave for Northern California next week to spend Easter with Matt's parents. Wish us luck!

Tatum Is

Tatum is a firecracker. 

She loves playing with big kids. 

She loves to say no. 

She brushes her own teeth and has decided to make the switch from bottle to sippy cup a power struggle. And I thought she was totally read to be potty trained and now she knows she is going but runs away when I try to get her to go on the potty! 

She can use my phone almost as well as I can. 

She says hi and waves to the most scary people in Walmart. 

She knows what Sasquatch says. 

She has the best giggle in the world and we all will make complete idiots of ourselves in public to hear it. 

She loves to tickle her Dada, and only he can get her to go back to sleep in the middle of the night, and stretch a wake up time from 6 am to 8! 

She loves her mama, and snuggles up when she's sleepy and pats my face and says "Mama" in a slow sleepy way that just makes me come undone. Then she squirms to be put down and calls for Roy and goes and decorates him with stickers and sings "Bye-o bye-o baby" to him. 

She is violently affectionate.

She is frustratingly lovable when she "accidentally" feeds Roy or pretends she has to use the potty as an excuse to not take a nap.

This is just a little snapshot of my baby girl--I wrote most of this in an email with my best friend and thought I'd share it with y'all as well :-)

Baby, You Butter My Cheese

I've had the title of this post started for a couple months now and kept putting it off, but after going back to Orange County and talking to so many good friends who follow this blog I realized I need to keep posting things whether its perfect or not.

Was that a run-on sentence?

Too groggy to care. More writing, less editing.

As many of you have seen, I have a very spirited and very opinionated little girl.

She knows what she wants and it is completely my fault if I don't understand the difference between one babble and another. 

A few months ago she was going through a teething phase and was hungry. Bread and butter is one of her favorite things to eat and usually involves her trying to eat as much of the butter and as little of the bread as possible. Another favorite is cheese, which she pronounces "Cheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeese" in a high pitched voice.

She wanted butter. That much I understood. But when I handed her bread and butter tears followed. 

"What do you want?" I asked.  

"CHEEEEEEEESE!" came the tearful reply.

I handed her a slice of cheddar cheese.

She took it...and tears started anew as she handed it back. 

"What?!" I asked, exasperated, "You said you wanted cheese!"

"Bu...bu..." she wimpered.

Then I got it.

"You want butter...on your cheese?" I asked.

Vigorous nodding.

So when we really want to express how much we love each other in our family, we now say, "I'd butter your cheese."

What "Worth It" Means

This post is for one of my oldest friends who was due to have her baby yesterday.  Apparently everyone has been filling her in on how hard and awful and exhausting having a baby is. And all they say in the positive is, "But it's worth it..."

After a long night with a feverish baby waking up every 20-45 minutes, I'd like to (in my sleep-deprived state) share what my "worth it" is.

It's worth it when your baby recognizes your voice the instant she enters this world.

It's worth it when she then recognizes her Daddy's voice a few seconds later.

It's worth it when you see she has your eyes and her Daddy's cheeks.

It's worth it when you watch her little body and fingers and eyelashes uncurl from those cramped months like a flower blooming.

It's worth it when you see her smile for the first time. And the second. And the third...

It's worth it when she turns her head towards you when you enter the room because she can smell you.

It's worth it when you're the only one she wants.

It's worth it when it's 3 am and you doze off while nursing and then wake to find her just watching you.

It's worth it when you see her roll onto her tummy reaching for a toy.

It's worth it when you sneak up to her crib and watch her sleeping so peacefully, a binkie halfway in her mouth.

It's worth it when she figures out how to shimmy/slither/crawl in order to get to you.

It's worth it when you get to dress her up in the cutest outfits EVER.

It's worth it when you hear that most wonderful name, "Mama."

It's worth it when she lays her head on your chest, snuggled right up under your chin.

It's worth it when you watch her play in the sprinklers for the first time.

It's worth it when she laughs every time you fake sneeze. 52 times in a row.

It's worth it when you watch her smile make strangers light up on a daily basis.

It's worth it when she grabs onto your butt and wants to play choo-choo.

It's worth it when you get to watch her open presents. And it is SO much more fun than getting present ever was.

It's worth it when she's been ornery all day and when you're kneeling and cleaning up spilled cereal, she attacks your back with a bear hug and says "aawwwwww!"

It's worth it when she kisses you. For no reason.

Those are a few "worth it" moment off the top of my foggy head. Yeah, they may be cliche, but for good reason.  They do, ever so, make the late nights and spit up and everything horrible you hear...worth it.

Oh, and it's worth it when she does hilarious things like deciding to make your dog the toy box while he sleeps.

Favorite Moment

My favorite moment of the day started when I heard Tatum calling "Mama!" as Matt was bringing her to the bedroom.

Then my favorite moment of the day was seeing her practice using a spoon with her oatmeal and making a grand old mess.

My next favorite moment was when I was watching her dance to Bob Marley, and she danced her little booty over to me and leaned back with her chocolate-covered face pressed against mine.

But then Matt came home and my favorite moment was watching her try to count "One, two, THREE!" with him as he would shoot her into the air and then pretend to wear her like a hat as she dissolved in giggles.

It's a good thing when there are too many favorite moments in a day.

The Chocolate Pickle

Halloween is approaching, and as a Christian I'm faced with a few issues.

One is I know that for many people, witches and ghosts aren't cute decorations to put up in your yard.  There are real, satanic roots there, and demons from a dark past (or present) do haunt many that night.  

I grew up knowing there really are witches and there really is much evil that goes on in the world and especially on that night. (I still love Harry Potter...but that's a different blog...) I'm grateful for that exposure and that I wasn't given a pat "Halloween is bad" excuse, and we still managed to have a "Harvest Celebration" and not feel like sticks-in-the-mud.

But that is not the issue I want to focus on today.

A year ago I read an article about child slave labor in the cocoa industry. And once you learn something, you can't unlearn it.

Granted, I love me some M&M's. Favorite candy, hands down.

But every time I've bitten into that wonderful crunch I've had this nagging voice in the back of my head, and I know for a fact my consumption of Hershey's or Nestle products has decreased in the past year because of that awareness.

This is the first year in our own home, and the first Halloween we are even able to hand out candy to trick-or-treaters. And as I pass the shelves and shelves of jumbo bags of bite-sized chocolates I just can't bring myself to buy one.

When I hear the word "abolitionist" I think of 19th century parchments and hoop skirts and other things long out of style. I think of great men and women like William Wilberforce and Harriet Tubman.

But then I consider the fact that according to the International Labour Organization (ILO) there are between 20-30 million slaves currently in the world. More than at any other time in history. Not only that but the value of a slave has increased drastically. In 1809 a slave was worth about $40,000 in today's currency. The average today is $90. You can see more stats here.

Cocoa isn't the largest group by far, and there are slaves closer to the door of your home than you may imagine.

But let's focus on cocoa for the moment. Here are a few facts:

Two West African countries, Ghana and the Ivory Coast, supply 75% of the world’s cocoa market.

A report from the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture finds that there were 284,000 children working on such farms, often in dangerous conditions, often in some form of indentured servitude.

Some children are “sold” by their own relatives to traffickers or to the farm owners.

 Traffickers often abduct young boys from small villages in neighboring African countries, such as Burkina Faso and Mali.

Most of the children are between the ages of 12-16, but children as young as 7 have been filmed working on the farms.

In recent years, cases have been documented in which children and adults on cocoa farms were retained against their will and forced to work.

Cases often involve acts of physical violence, such as being whipped for working slowly or trying to escape.

The point of this post isn't to make you feel guilty.

It is to make you aware.

Having recently watched the movie Amazing Grace it stood out to me that most of the people who helped bring the brute force behind the movement were common people. People who listened to someone or read something and gave up sugar and signed a partition...and that was mostly it. Most were not the spearhead of the drive for abolition, they did their minor parts and collectively helped drive the initiative.

Both Nestle and Hershey have tried to downplay the percentage of cocoa that is obtained through child labor, saying most cocoa is from small family farms (doesn't that paint a cozy image?). And both have now signed they will exclusively use Fair Trade certified cocoa by 2020. Hmm, good thing it's such a small problem it will only take eight years to fix.

I'm not hereby vowing to never eat another bite of Godiva again or put out any ultimatum like that. I know I won't be able to adhere to that. But I am trying to make a more conscious decision about what and how much chocolate we consume. I'd love to take a bite of frozen yogurt and crunch into those frozen M&M's without that nagging voice in the back of my head.

So back to the cute four-year-old Captain America at your door saying "trick or treat!" What do you do?

There's a few alternatives. There's Fair Trade certified chocolate, organic chocolate which--according to an article on UCSD's website--is OK because organic farms are subject to independent monitoring, and there are alternative to chocolate altogether.

You can do something like Annie's Organic Gummies, bags of chips or HERE is a great list of more alternatives.

Tatum is still going to be an adorable little bumble bee this year as we hand out candy because locking your doors and pulling the shades on the darkest night of the year is probably not the best way to let your light so shine so that Christ may be glorified. Greater is He who is within us than he who is in the world. But this year, maybe be a little more aware of what you are consuming, and what you might can do about it.



If you're looking for more information on this topic, a quick Google search can provide loads of information, but here are a few sites I pulled information from (all of these are credible sources, not blogs):

http://thecnnfreedomproject.blogs.cnn.com/category/chocolates-child-slaves/

http://blog.worldcocoafoundation.org/2009/11/cocoa_livelihoods_program_stee.php

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/17/us/hershey-foreign-exchange-students-pleas-were-ignored.html?_r=4&

http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/10/17/is-child-labor-going-into-your-halloween-candy/

http://www.garstangfairtrade.org.uk/slave-trade-fairtrade/chocolate-slavery.html

http://www.foodispower.org/slavery_chocolate.php

http://www.motherearthnews.com/Real-Food/Chocolate-Organic-Fair-Trade.aspx