Alaska, Summer 2011, Part 6: Make Way for Ducklings

Posted on August 3, 2011 by Nik

Part 6 in a series about our trip to Alaska in late June through mid-July, 2011. 

Who doesn’t love ducklings following behind their mama duck?

Posted in Alaska, Ellie, family, travel | Leave a comment

Nursing as Comfort Food

Posted on August 3, 2011 by Laura

to commemorate World Breastfeeding Week

While we were in Alaska, I was most grateful for the nursing relationship that Ellie and I have.  Nursing allowed both of us to feel comforted, connected, safe, and at home, regardless of where we were.

Even in a tent.

Posted in Alaska, Ellie, nursing, parenting, politics, reflecting, travel | 6 Comments

Figuring out how to roll

Posted on August 2, 2011 by Laura

Ellie has finally figured out that rolling is useful.  She’s been able to roll since January but basically never has.  She clearly didn’t feel the need to do so.  Just in the last day or two though, it’s as if her little brain figured out, “Wait a minute.  I don’t have to flail around on my back waiting for Mama to pick me up.  If I just roll over, then I can sit up or crawl anywhere I want to”

And so she does.  When we want to change her diaper.  When it’s time for nursing and nap time.  When we’re trying to get her dressed.  Basically, any time that we want her to be still, she wants to move.

It’s a bit difficult.

And a bit adorable.

And a bit exciting.

Seeing my darling little baby grow up into a little girl is so fun.  But sometimes, when I watch her roll away from me, I think, “What?  You don’t need me any more for your every little need?  You can independently decide to move away from me?”  I’m not 100% in favor of this.

Independence.  I know that my job as a parent is to help Ellie become independent of me. Honestly though, I’m glad she still needs me for almost everything.

Just not to move around.

All that other independence stuff can come later.  Much later.

Posted in Ellie, parenting, reflecting | Leave a comment

Alaska, Summer 2011, Part 5: The Middle Leg

Posted on August 2, 2011 by Laura

Part 5 in a series about our trip to Alaska in late June through mid-July, 2011. 

The next day, we tackled the second leg of our Coastal Trail adventure.  Selah, deciding that we were crazy, declined to walk the second leg with us and so it was Nik, Ellie, and I, walking from Point Woronzof to Westchester Lagoon (which is about 3 miles or so).  We managed to walk the entire stretch of the trail without taking any pictures but we did document that we’d finished it at least!

Thanks to my dad who was magnificent in his role as support team chauffeur with all the pick ups and drop offs that our walk required!

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Alaska, Summer 2011, Part 4: The Big Walk

Posted on August 1, 2011 by Laura

Part 4 in a series about our trip to Alaska in late June through mid-July, 2011. 

The main item on our list for being tourists in Anchorage was walking the Coastal Trail.  The Coastal Trail (or CT for short) is about 11 miles long and runs from downtown Anchorage, along the coast (if you hadn’t guessed that), to Kincaid Park.  I’ve walked on bits and pieces of it but never had walked the entire thing.  Rather than tackle the whole CT at once, we decided to break it up into three legs.

On Monday of our first week, we walked from Kincaid Park to Point Woronzof.  This is the longest unbroken stretch of the trail (about five miles) – once you get on, there’s no way to get off until Point Woronzof because we were basically skirting the perimeter of the airport almost the whole way.  Selah accompanied us on this leg of the trip.

And yes, she volunteered to push the stroller. It was not a requirement for getting to hang out with us.

The walk tired Ellie out and she had to take a nap, while holding her Baba’s hand.

We stopped for a little liquid snack for Ellie along the way.

As we were hiking, we saw lots of wildlife, including chipmunks,

spruce chickens (we think) (with lots of cute babies),

and a moose with a pretty good set of antlers.  Alas, we have no picture of the moose because we were more concerned with putting more than 10 feet between ourselves and the moose than taking pictures.  Thankfully, the moose was more interested in eating than in us and eventually, he moved off the trail and on to better things so that we could continue.

Finally, we reached our goal: Point Woronzof!


It was a gorgeous day for a walk.  Selah was a really good sport to walk for such a long time without complaining (or at least with only a smidgen of “How much longer?”)!

Point Woronzof is right at the end of one of the main runways so while we were waiting for my dad to pick us up, we had the fun of watching both gigantic cargo jets and little planes take off over our heads.

Even Ellie had fun!

We felt like we’d earned our dinner that night!

Posted in Alaska, Ellie, family, travel | 2 Comments

Happy Birthday Addie and Ezra!

Posted on July 26, 2011 by Laura

Ezra turned 4 on Monday and Addie turns 5 on Thursday.  So we’re splitting the difference and posting late night on Tuesday!  We hope you both had/have great birthdays!  It was so fun seeing you in Alaska!

Love,
Auntie Laura, Uncle Nik, and Cousin Ellie

P.S. And you know I love seeing the owl pillow in action!

Posted in Alaska, family, sewing | 1 Comment

Please don’t judge me

Posted on July 23, 2011 by Laura

If you come over to my house this weekend, you might walk around and think, “Hmm.  This place is a [more than a ] little messy.  The bathtub looks like it could use a good scrub.  There’s crumbs all over the kitchen floor. The kitchen is cluttered.  Ellie’s dress for the wedding tonight is wrinkled.  Tonight’s wedding present didn’t get sewn (but it is cut out!).  The office is a MESS.   What have these two been doing all week?”

All I can say is, please don’t judge me.

On Wednesday, the day I normally vaccuum, it was 92, with heat index, much hotter.

On Thursday, the day I normally try to clean the bathroom, it was over 100 with a heat index of something like 115.

On Friday, the day I normally try to do laundry and clean the kitchen deeply, it was 106.  In fact, it was the 2nd hottest day in Baltimore on record.  Ever.  Add in the humidity and it felt more like 116.

Today, it only got up to something like 99, but add in that humidity, and bam!  Right back up into triple digits.  And my sewing machine and ironing board are in a non-AC room.

We don’t have central air.  We do have window units, for which we are exceedingly grateful.  So we can sleep in the cool and live in the cool of our office during the day.  Many people don’t even have that and so we are grateful for it.

I think you will excuse me for shirking my housecleaning duties and spending a lot of time in the office, where we do have air, where we have been living our life, and where a consequent mess has accumulated.

We will be glad when the heat is gone.  But in the meantime, we are grateful for air conditioning, for kind friends who offer their central-AC-houses for cool play dates, and for a vacation which will soon take us to the [much smaller than Alaskan but still beautiful] mountains and the lake.

We are blessed.  And we’re hot too.

Posted in house/neighborhood, reflecting | 2 Comments

OK. Fine. I lied.

Posted on July 21, 2011 by Laura

Just a little joke.  (Did you really believe me?  I’ve got to stop being sarcastic!)

I’m not going to abandon blogging about sewing, Ellie, or Alaska.  But I probably will write all those blog posts that I promised at the bottom of my grand monetizing scheme post.

And no, I have no plans for joining Twitter, getting a FB like button, or getting ads.  Although I suppose a little extra money would be nice!

And I wasn’t lying about my popsicle post being my most searched-for post.  It’s true!

Just to make everyone feel a little better, here’s a couple pictures from about a month ago, before Ellie started crawling forward.  At that point she was pushing herself backwards and ending up in funny places!

Posted in Ellie, just for fun | Leave a comment

How to eat steel cut oats for breakfast without getting up before sunrise.

Posted on July 20, 2011 by Laura

In our quest to eliminate all processed food from our diet, cold cereal was one holdout.  If we stopped buying cold cereal, what in the world would we eat for breakfast?  I make our own bagels but we don’t like to eat bagels for breakfast every day.

I don’t love normal oatmeal.  It gets too gluey for me.  I like steel cut oatmeal but that takes about a half hour to cook and who has time in the morning to do that?

Eventually, I invented this method for making steel cut oats.  It is easy, delicious, and after the initial work, very quick in the morning.  In order to make this worth your while, you want to make a lot of oatmeal at once.  This much oatmeal will probably be enough for 15 or so breakfasts.

“Oatmeal Cookies”
adapted from Alton Brown’s recipe

5 T butter or coconut oil
5 C steel cut oats

In a very large pan (such as a soup pot), melt the butter/oil and add the oats.  Mix well and stir on high heat until the oatmeal is starting to toast and smells nutty and delicious.

15 C water
salt, to taste (you’ll need a lot – probably at least 1-2 teaspoons)

Add the water and bring to a boil.  Cook, uncovered, for 25 minutes, stirring occasionally to make sure it’s not sticking on the bottom.

3 and 3/4 C milk
raisins, as many as you want

Stir in and cook an additional 10 minutes.

vanilla (lots)
brown sugar (just enough to make it barely sweet)
cinnamon, cloves, ginger, nutmeg, cardamom (or other favorite spices) (use plenty)

Take off the heat and add vanilla, brown sugar, and spices.  I like to use liberal amounts of vanilla, spices, and salt because then it takes a minimal amount of sugar to make it taste delicious.

At this point, you will have a gigantic pot of really delicious oatmeal.  I usually stop right at this point and eat a bowlful of it because it’s at its most delicious best right now.

Then, wait, stir, wait, stir, wait, stir until the oatmeal is completely cooled. (This usually takes a few hours.)

Once it’s cool, it will be fairly solid.  This is when you make your “oatmeal cookies”.

Onto cookie sheets, dish out one-cup lumps of oatmeal.  Put the cookie sheets in the freezer, freeze until solid, and then transfer to ziploc bags. They come off the cookie sheets fairly easily if you just let them sit for a minute or two.

When you’re ready to eat, put one in a bowl, microwave on defrost for a minute or two until hot, add milk if you so desire (as I always do), and voila!

Steel cut oats for breakfast without getting up before sunrise!

They are easy, delicious, and good for you too!  (And now we don’t have to buy cold cereal!)

Posted in cooking, How To ___ Without ___ | 5 Comments

My Grand Monetizing Scheme

Posted on July 20, 2011 by Laura

That’s it.

No more cute posts about Ellie and sewing.

Oh no.

I’m all about making money now and I have a grand monetizing scheme.

No more posts about Alaska either.  (And did I mention no more posts about Ellie?)

Instead, all my posts about going to take the form of,

“How To _______________ Without ____________.”

Why?

I first did a blog post entitled, “How to Make Popsicles (Without a Popsicle Mold),” almost purely as a joke because I wanted to put that hilarious picture of Ellie eating a popsicle.

But amazingly, it’s been my most-searched-for post ever.  It’s been searched for 58 times.  58!  (That’s way more than all the other search terms combined.)

My path is clear.  From here on out, it’s all about unique page views, new subscribers, joining Twitter, getting people to “like” me on Facebook, and getting ads.

Here are some of our planned upcoming “How to ____________ Without ___________” posts:

How to eat as many spring rolls as you want without spending a fortune.

How to eat steel cut oats for breakfast without getting up before sunrise.

How to feed a baby without using a spoon.

How to bake easy French bread without knowing how to make bread.

Sound like a good start?  Tonight, we’ll begin with oatmeal.

Posted in How To ___ Without ___, just for fun | 5 Comments