Holiday Aftermath Part II
I'm a little down. I always get bummed out after something really exciting is over, and this year has been exciting, indeed. I was also uber-stressed about doing the holidays with Ophelia after she had just gotten into a napping and sleeping schedule, and while she's teething and crabby. And I paid the price for it. But, now things can get back to normal, and she doesn't care. It's just that the only thing in the world that can really just kill a mom is feeling like you can't make your baby happy.
I'm also not looking forward to going back to work and school, and I have some work I need to get done before those things begin again in the next week or two.
But, we've had a wonderful year, and I couldn't be more grateful for our beautiful daughter, our wonderful family and friends, our home, our jobs, and the opportunities we've been given. I think '09 is gonna be a good one too.
Anyway, many exciting moments of the last week or so to share through photos:
Ophelia is starting to eat rice cereal and LOVES it. Tonight she kept grabbing the spoon and shoving it in her mouth. These photos are from her very first feeding!
These photos are from Christmas morning, and are probably my favorite photos of her yet. I absolutely refuse to use a flash (which is why so many of my photos are dark. And blurry. Though I like to think of them as "arty." :) ) but here the light was good. I priced some of the fancy digital SLR cameras at Best Buy this week but they are waaaaay out of my price league. I'd love to have one so that I could manually focus and take better photos without the flash. But I digress... Look how adorable she is!!!!
Lana made her a bunch of totally cool leg warmers from socks, and these snowflake ones are my favorites. She wore them three days in a row. Slept in 'em once too.
A first family Christmas self-portrait
Mutt tires of ChristmasHighlight of our week: O's Aunt Erin is in town!
Erin and Colleen getting their O fixA totally rad Christmas gift from my mom was The Peekaru, a fleecy vest that goes over a baby carrier so I can keep O and I warm while we're outside. Bask in its awesomeness! Ophelia loved it, we were both toasty, and we got lots of attention on our walk to Bread Co.
I also haven't had a chance to talk about all the pork we have. We have lots of pork. A whole pig of pork, actually. This is one attempt to reduce our carbon footprint, to know the health and well-being of our food from cradle to our mouths, to buy locally, and to save money. But rather than me try to describe the how and why, I'll send you to Larissa's post about the hog harvest. She and Jason are our friends and local farmers, who raised Dagmar and Cocoa from piglet to plate. It's a darn good thing they're doin', and if it weren't for them, it would have been difficult for us to be so close to our meat. Our (half) cow comes next, in a few weeks. That will be a pro job, however. If this sounds at all appealing to you, read Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life. And thanks to Lindsay for not shutting up about that book when she first read it. :)
Have I told you how much I love Barbara Kingsolver?
By the by, I effin' LOVE that Peekaroo picture. You kids these days with your fleece and babies.
And the pork is awesome. Thanks for a righteous (and off-the-hook, I might add) party to bring in the new year!
Man, that book!
I was so skeptical and now I love it forever. We don't buy bread anymore! I've started sprouting beans in our kitchen! I'm going to turn every spare corner of our yard into garden space!
There's a cheesemaking class at FPCC, and I'm all "It's the final frontier!!"
I know, that book'll ruin your life, won't it? We're planning on making half the backyard a garden this spring. I can't always afford to shop at Local Harvest on my Aldi budget, but now that we've got enough meat to last a long time, that helps. And hello, homemade baby food!
I've been wanting to make the mozzarella recipe from her book forever. We should have a cheese-making party sometime.
Heck yeah, sisters!
As a semi-seasoned cheesemaker my damn self, I'll let you know ahead of time that I haven't found a single brand of milk at any market which will make mozzarella. It's either too pasteurized or too old! If y'all need a milk hookup, my man Carl Wilson sells me gallons of raw creamline milk from his Jerseys once a week. It makes heavenly mozzarella, and the cream is super good.
PS I plan to start blogging the technical aspects of the farm on a weekly basis again starting....now.
Jason, you officially sound like a farmer. And we'll take you up on some of Carl Wilson's milk. I've been hearing about your mozz for a while, but have yet to taste this deliciousness.
I'm excited to read about technical farm stuff, like holding a gun to a pig's head and saying, "Right here? This spot?" BAM!
And, I'm TOTALLY in on feral hog hunting, as long as I can shoot the pistol from out the top of the Bronco, Serengeti style...
By the way,
Is this the same guy with the Local Harvest raw milk hookup. I've been thinking about that! I was also about 5 seconds away from purchasing a yogurt maker this week, no lie.
Honestly, I think this all fits in very nicely with my DIY ethos, y'know?
Oh shit, I was going to look into getting a kombucha mother at Soulard this weekend. Thanks for reminding me, fermenting budz.