Square Foot Garden Plan 2011

Behold, my plan to put at least 22 varieties of vegetables and plants in a portion of our yard no larger than a standard bathroom:

There are still a few empty boxes--because I know I'll have to rearrange things when I actually have plants or seeds in my hands.  And when Sam and I go later today to Lowes (my local store has 50% off Burpee seeds this week!), I'm sure I'll end up buying some things that are not on my list, but will need to be incorporated somehow.  Impulse gardening?  I guess there is such a thing.

Am I crazy?

I have an almost-two-year-old and am expecting a new baby in the middle of the summer (i.e., the growing season).  I can barely manage to make my grocery list some weeks, and here I am creating a new project to involve myself in daily?

Yep.

Do you know how Square Foot Gardening (SFG) works?  It's pretty awesome.  You allot one square foot per plant variety in a raised bed.  Some plants require more than 1 square foot.  Since we're somewhat pressed for space, we will use mainly the smaller varieties, except when it comes to the summer squashes.  Tomatoes, squash, and peas will be trained on a trellis, so they have a small footprint and plenty of room to grow upward.

Last year I planted 2 blueberry bushes (which I hope will spring into action this summer), and one cherry tomato.  That little tomato plant did moderately alright, and it gave me just enough hope and a taste of getting fresh tomatoes to whet my appetite to garden for real this year.

Why are we doing this?  Part of it is to see if we can.  Part of me believes it will be rewarding.  Fun, even.  Part of it is to have a reason to go outside every day.  So Lizzie can experience growing plants, playing in dirt, and picking strawberries.  So Sam can have a garden for the first time in his life.  He will learn as much as I will, and hopefully be able to help other people with their gardens.  He'll also have 16 fewer square feet of lawn to mow.  And so we can have fresh greens for salads, vegetables for stir-fry and for the freezer, sun-ripened tomatoes and peppers, fresh herbs, and more zucchini than we will know what to do with.

I'll keep you posted on the progress of our little adventure.  The plan is to buy the materials and seeds now, but there is not a lot to be accomplished before the average last frost date (in this area, around April 15).  Assembly and planting will follow.  And pictures!

Washing Kiddy Straws in the Dishwasher {WFMW}

I'm a lazy homemaker.  Really.  So when it comes to washing some things, like picky little straws that come with toddler cups, you can bet I am not going to break out the pipe cleaners. A good rinse is not sufficient when you have a sick little kiddo.  Or when you didn't realize there was a sippy cup half filled with milk under the piano bench for 2 days. 

 

No, no, that is no good.  I must figure out a way to put them in the dishwasher.  But they fall through the holes. And those crazy bottle/nipple/straw/ baby silverware contraptions are nice in theory, but not worth their space for 2 or 3 puny straws.  And dishwasher real estate is priceless:  I will put more effort into rearranging cups and bowls to make them all fit than it would ever take to just wash them by hand. 

So, here is my solution, and it works quite well.

Wrap a rubber band around at least 2 straws.  You have to wrap it around multiple times, and get around each straw individually at least once.  You don't want to have to fish one of them out because it fell through the silverware during the rinse cycle.

Then, drop 'em in with the silverware.

 

They come out clean and sterilized.  Can it get any easier?  I think not.  That's why it works for me! 
(I also learned that if you have only one straw to wash, you can band it to a knife.  Works just as well.)

{top ten} recipe for a good morning

Mornings.  Sometimes I love 'em, and sometimes I hate 'em.

These are a few things that make my mornings better:

1. Getting enough sleep.  We're night owls, and have lately barely gotten to bed before midnight.  It is a terrible habit, especially while having some kind of pregnancy insomnia.  So "enough sleep" for me is better than 6 hours.  It is preparing me for having an infant again, when "sleeping through the night" means longer than 5 hours at a time. 

2.  Coffee.  You know I love it.  And without it, I get a headache in the afternoon.  So, it really makes the whole day go better.

3.  A quiet time.  At least 15 minutes with an open Bible and no interruption.  Extra good if it comes with coffee.  And the Holy Spirit, of course.  Many bloggers are getting involved in Maximize Your Mornings.  I have almost started many times, but have not made the dedicated commitment yet. 

4.  Setting realistic expectations for my day.  This goes in all directions:  Expectations of what I can accomplish, of what I can expect from my 21 month old, of what I can expect from my husband.  If I think I can clean the bathrooms and organize the pantry and still go to the grocery store, while keeping peace in toddler-land and making a delicious dinner for all of us, you can expect me to melt down by 2 PM.  I'm usually better off re-prioritizing before I go into angry, overwhelmed mode. 

5.  Having a dinner plan.  If I know what I will make for dinner, a huge burden of stress has been lifted from my day.  And if it's something easy, all the better.

6.  If I can wake up before the toddler does, I feel like I'm 4 steps ahead of the game. 

7.  And if I can get dressed, wash my face, brush my teeth, and perhaps even fix my hair and put on makeup, before anyone else needs me, I feel like I'm ready for just about anything. 

8.  This one is completely out of my control, but if there is sunshine in the morning, my day is that much happier. 

9.  Breakfast.  Ideally something with a substantial amount of protein in it.  Sam appreciates when I eat a good breakfast, too--I'm a lot nicer.

10.  I have noticed that on days that my computer is not touched before noon, everything goes much more smoothly.  As much as I love it, it sucks the life out of my days.

What makes your mornings lovely?

Lizzieism - Figured it Out!

Lizzie is finally at the age of saying funny and cute things.  And because I am not organized, this is the closest thing I have to recording them.  Facebook is nice for getting immediate feedback on something funny, cute, or frustrating that just happened, and while some marketing company may know everything I've ever said about my child, there's no hope of my ever retrieving something of importance from my status updates.

Yesterday, she learned how to use her step stool.  
She calls it her "stool" except she doesn't say "st" she says "f" and she doesn't say her "l" so it sounds more like "foow".  I purchased this step stool at one of the consignment sales I went to a couple of weeks ago.  It was $3 and it has been one of the fun things in her life lately. 
Well, the joy has been multiplied, because she has learned that the Foow can be used to reach things.  Like light switches.  "On!"  "Off!"  "Fan!"  "On!" "Off!"  "Yay!"
When I applauded her brilliance, "Lizzie, you figured it out!"  Lizzie ran up to me, beaming.  "Tiny!"  Tiny is a Pteranodon on the PBS Kids show Dinosaur Train.  On occasion, the young Pteranodons conquer a challenge and sing a brief song:  "We figured it out, we figured it out!  We worked together and figured it out!" 


Last night we talked about muscles. 

Well, we saw a commercial for some car.  Somewhere in it was the word "muscle." 

Lizzie turned around and exclaimed to me, "Muscle!" (Musso!)  I was surprised that she picked it out.  Then she said, "Sid!"  Of course.  Sid the Science Kid has muscles.  We learned about them yesterday. 

I'm so glad to know that she relates all episodes of learning to an episode of a television show.  I feel like my job as a parent is so well done.

Questions for a Blind Man

I am slowly making my way through the book of John when I don't have inspiration as to what to focus on during my quiet times.  This morning I read John 9.

The first segment of the chapter covers the story of the man born blind, whom Jesus healed.  I have read this passage many, many times, but never saw it in quite this (comedic) light before.  Here is the loose Cindy-fied translation:

Jesus is walking along, and he and his disciples see this man who has been blind his whole life.
"Whose fault is it that he is blind?  His, or his parents'?"  Pinning blame must help us make sense of the world.
Jesus said, "Neither.  He is blind so that God could be glorified in his life."
After he said this, Jesus made a substantial spit wad on the ground and made mud from his spit.  He took that mud, put it on the blind man's eyes, and told him to go wash it off.
[OK, I have to butt in here.  Imagine being in the blind man's shoes so far: the disciples started talking about him as though he not only couldn't see them, but he couldn't hear him either, then next thing he knows, someone hawks a loogie and smears mud on his eyes.  Then he has the gall to tell him to go wash it off.  Can somebody say 'lawsuit'?]
While the man goes to clean up, Jesus and the disciples continue walking along.
Later, the blind man comes back, not blind anymore.  His neighbors question him, "What happened?  Are you sure you're the same person?  How can you see?"
The man says, "Yes, it's really me.  Some guy called Jesus made some mud and put it on my eyes, and told me to wash, so I did and now I can see!"
"Where is he?" they asked.
"I don't know," the man answered.

Can you anticipate the question that is begging to be asked?

"Well, what did he look like?"



If you're looking for some serious encouragement, track back to the ladies at Soli Deo Gloria.  They're pretty amazing, if I don't say so myself.

Today in La Cocina de Chen

It's not often that I roll out not one but two restaurant-quality meals in one day.  It all started by my telling Sam, "I have steak, and we can either have it for lunch or for dinner, and I don't have 2 meals in me today, so choose when you want a good meal."  However, inspiration apparently struck.  I should have taken pictures.  I'm going to have to recreate these one day--soon.

We had steak for lunch.  Our afternoons tend to go much better if we're all well fed with a good lunch.  If only I had it in me to make a great lunch every day.

Skirt steak, seasoned with salt & pepper, cooked (in a glob of butter) on the cast iron skillet, served with:
Red onion marmalade: one red onion, thinly sliced, sauteed until tender, then cooked for just a few minutes with equal parts sugar and red wine vinegar (about 1 T each).  Trust me, it's an amazing garnish for steak.  And just about anything else you might want a sweet pickled vinaigretted (I just made that word up) onion flavor on.
Yellow rice (in the rice cooker: rice, chicken broth/water, a spoonful of ground turmeric, and a dash each of: oregano, coriander, and cumin), with the addition, when finished, of:
microwaved peas & carrots.

It was the most delicious and colorful and easy meal I've made in a long time.  The colors were remarkable.  The whole plate was beautiful. 

And for dinner, I wasn't feeling like making dinner, and our refrigerator had a strange hodge-podge of ingredients:
A somewhat questionable package of baby spinach, 5 eggs, half a package of bacon, half a package of hash browns and 3 overripe bananas.  Plus the leftover sauteed onions.

Brinner!  Of course!  No, there's no of course about it.  I was grasping at straws, and got lucky.

I mixed up a dozen banana nut muffins, omitting the nuts, and instead adding oat bran for a portion of the flour.  While those cooked, I threw bacon on a skillet and let it do its thing on low heat.  You can never go wrong having bacon cooked.
In the meantime, I browsed cookbooks.  There's not much to be made with the remaining 3 eggs.  So, one egg per person, and it has to count.
Once the bacon was done, I used the same pan (and the grease; don't judge me) to fry the hash browns.  Which were originally shaped like tater tots, but I overcrowded them and they fell apart, so they became hash browns.  Amazingly, the timing of everything came together at the end.

The assembled meal was such:

Spinach on plates.
Bacon crumbled (or not) on the spinach.
Onions on the spinach.  With, or without, salad dressing.
One egg, fried to order (or as it comes off the frying pan, and scrambled for the tot), atop the spinach.  (The tot's plate was sans spinach.  She did try it.  For a second.)
Hash browns on the side.
Amazing banana muffins to polish it all off.

Seriously, I've eaten 2-1/2 of the muffins.  They are that good.  I can't wait to be hungry again in the morning.

Five Minutes in the Mirror

When I look in the mirror I see....

A bit more gray hair than I would like to see.
Hair that has been ignored into a ponytail more times than I can count.
Wispy "wings" around my forehead that won't cooperate, no matter how I straighten, blow dry, or try to join them instead of beat them.
Round cheeks and an overbite, but at least I have straight teeth.  Thanks for the 4 years in braces, Mom and Dad.



Again, there is a very distinct roundness in front.   Evidence of a little girl hoped for, and as yet unseen.  A little child with a promise of grace. 

I see, finally, a grown up who has replaced the quiet girl.  A woman.  A wife.  A mother. 

I've linked today with Gypsy Mama (Links and pics added after 5 minutes were up), and Company Girl Coffee.   Feel free to hop along with the Company Girl Blog Hop, below!