FOODIE: The Pioneer Woman Cookbook Challenge | January Update

Whew, this is so much easier than I thought it would be. I've decided to make at least two recipes a week from the cookbook, which really helps me feel less overwhelmed when thinking about 109 recipes to get done in 2015. I've stayed right on top of it for this first month, but haven't felt strong love for most of the recipes (except one, which I'll save for last here). I have, however, been thrilled to find a compelling reason to finally open the box of vintage Lenox china c. 1960 that haven't been used in at least ten years. Every Sunday night is Pioneer Woman dinner, and we bust out the gorgeous gold leaf china. What a fun new tradition!

THE REVIEWS:

Let's start with the NAWS.

Chicken Tortilla Soup:  My Lucy is the biggest soup fan and she loved this. Dr. Brown and I both thought it just okay. We make a version of this ourselves that we've perfected over the years, and we think it's better. The addition of cut up corn tortillas, though, is a brilliant idea.

French Onion Soup: Meh. Julia Child's is SO MUCH BETTER. I think it's the addition of chicken broth in this one that just makes it blah to me.

Hummus: So garlicky that it gave me a super upset stomach. Admittedly, I'm way sensitive to garlic (unless I'm pregnant - I know, weird), but Dr. Brown has a stomach of steel and eats ALL THE THINGS and it did the same to him. Also, Dr. Brown is Greek, so we are a bit snobbish about the Middle Eastern foods and we have a Mediterranean cookbook with a killer hummus recipe that this one does not beat.

Brie-Stuffed Mushrooms: We made these for Katy Bowl Sunday (football WHA?!@#) when our friends the Zehnas were in town from Utah, along with the hummus above (and PW's bacon wrapped jalapeno poppers which were in her first cookbook and we will make for the rest of time they are THAT GOOD). These were the best of the naws, but not amazing. Fine, but I'm not searching for just fine in this quest.

Pork Chops with Apples & Grits: Much like garlic doesn't agree with my stomach, grits do not agree with MY ANYTHING. Listen, I've even lived in the South for a short time (I went on exchange during college to Charleston, SC) where grits were served at every single meal (sigh) at my college dorm lunchroom. I've tried and tried and tried and even made them homemade myself to no avail. I ain't doin' it. Also, the pork chops weren't that great, and I do usually love them with apples. Dr. Brown did like the grits (he thought them better the next day), so he gives this one a higher ranking than I.

Let's move on to the FOREVER AND EVER AMENS.

Rigatoni and Meatballs: I made this for my grandma's 85th birthday party dinner and OMG WE ALL LOVED IT. Seriously, those meatballs?! We used tomatoes we had roasted with garlic and herbs from our own summer garden and frozen in the sauce and they truly made the difference. This recipe is not on PW's website (which is where I've linked all the other recipes here), so you'll just have to get the book if you want to make it. Also? Kid-approved. Even Arlo loved his teeny tiny bite sized pieces.

Meatball Sliders: PW directs you to use the leftover meatballs and sauce from the recipe above for these and holy moly, we almost loved these more than the rigatoni above. Paired with baked French fries, it was a super easy leftover kind of meal for a weeknight. Alice and Lucy also loved this one.

Classic Hot Wings: These are spicy as hell, but Dr. Brown is the wing connoisseur and he gives a big stamp of approval. It makes a ton of sauce, though, so you could probably cut back on that, or else more wings than the recipe calls for.

Roasted Cauliflower: We made this as a side dish to Dr. Brown's BBQ ribs and both agreed that this was the best way we've ever eaten cauliflower, hands down. So yummy! (Again, no recipe on PW's site for this, sorry!)

 

 

Billie's Italian Cream Cake: This, my friends, was January's crowning jewel. The best recipe I made all month. This cake is a winner. It took hours, was three layers high, and was my grandmother's 85th birthday cake. It was even better the next morning with coffee. Super rich and lovely. I'm a huge cake snob, and once you've had homemade cake, you'll never, ever, ever be able to eat store bought or boxed cake mix cakes again in the same way. We all give this the highest ranking. Grandma-approved!



Power to the (Fat) People

Six years ago I started my own body revolution. I devoured books, like this one and this one, and started following fat feminists like Marilyn Wann, Ragen Chastaine, Lindy West, Tess Munster and Jes Baker. They helped me find my way and find my voice.

Three years ago I spoke to a sold out crowd at the Egyptian Theater downtown Boise about how to be fat and fabulous. I stood on that stage and was more scared than I had ever been. I told Boise that I weighed 250 pounds and my life's purpose wasn't determined on whether or not you wanted to fuck me and that I was happy with myself, just the way I am and that I eat cake and celery. Ignite Boise filmed all the presenters' five minute pitches, and posted them on YouTube. My little talk has been viewed now by around 900 people, and commented on by various trolls (the term for being a prick on the internet because you can). They wrote things like "this woman wants to keep people down" and "people like you make me so angry" and "you lost your way for a number of reasons."



Two years ago I got the burning desire to once again bring my ideas of Health at Every Size and fat acceptance to a wider audience. At an event similar to Ignite Boise, I proposed a public, family-friendly, dessert picnic for International No Diet Day at the very first Feast. The whole thing was a dinner event at the Visual Arts Center in Garden City and the house was packed and I was nervous but talked about body love and size discrimination and healthy relationships with eating and food. The audience votes on the best community/art project proposal and the winner got $1000 to make it happen (it wasn't me). But, once again, I felt good about getting the message out there, even when one female audience member came up after and was like, "I'm all for loving your body and stuff, but wouldn't your event be so much better if you, like, served fresh veggies and fruit instead of desserts?"

The next day I began a week-long, painful miscarriage of a baby we had already grown to love, somewhere around eight weeks along. The day after that I found out that a local male business owner who goes by the Twitter name "Cranky Clown" was at the Feast event and had been live tweeting negative things not only about my message, but about my body, my words, my mind, my family, my friends, and about fat people in general. And when I found out about it, I tweeted him back, and his responses got more hateful. Some of his other local Twitter friends joined in and started attacking me, too. (And, yes, I know his real life name and his real life business - that he has since lost - but I won't tell you here.) Years later, he still tweets on occasion about how much he hates fatties. He never thought, I'm fairly certain, about the real life woman at home, curled up in a ball, bleeding and in tears, wrapped up in grief around a hot pad while she missed her daughter's kindergarten registration.

About a month later, the fat hatred and misogyny found its way to my Facebook wall, where I had begun posting body confident links and messages. This time, the meanest came from two different men, who I knew barely in real life, and a handful of women, who I also knew personally. After mean-spirited back and forth banter I had to unfriend them, on the internet and in real life. I took the entire summer off from the internets because these bigoted trolls had so damaged my heart, mind, thoughts, and activism, that I desperately needed a break to heal. (Years later, these people, too, still post on Facebook bigoted and sizist commentary.)

But I came back, stronger and louder. The trolls are still here, on the internet and in my little Idaho city. In fact, I'm currently fighting some misogyny due to my strong, loud voice. This week Lindy West, a nationally known writer and feminist and fat activist, told a story about a particularly hurtful troll who created a false Twitter account, posing as her recently deceased father, on NPR's This American Life. She tweeted about it, he read it, and apologized to her. They have a live telephone conversation on this particular podcast and the story will both break your heart and make it grow. This woman encounters trolling and hateful comments about her weight and feminist stances on a daily basis, so her skin is thick.

Mine? Not so much. Also, I'm no Lindy West. I can count the troll commentary I've received on one - okay, two - hands. Does that make it hurt less? No. Have any of my trolls ever apologized? Never. In fact, Lindy's troll is the first person I've ever heard of admitting to his hatred and trying to make up for it.

Do I write this because I want you to feel sorry for me? Not at all. What do I want, then? When you hear or read someone using bullying, dangerous and hurtful words, I want you stand up next to me, and speak loud and strong, too.

THRIFTY: Homemade Bath Goodies

Every year for the holidays, the girls and I love making homemade and handmade gifts for our friends and neighbors. Often it's baked goods, like my family-famous pumpkin bread, candy or cookies. Some years, though, we get a bit more ambitious and want to make something new and offbeat, not your traditional Christmas goodies. This past year was one.

 

 

As always, I love to use inexpensive ingredients and reuse and repurpose items. This fall we had harvested our lavender plants, dried the flowers, and put them in the freezer to preserve. I had also saved this bath sachet recipe on a Pinterest board several years ago and knew these would be perfect.

 

 

I had a box of powdered milk in my pantry, as well as oatmeal, rubber bands and twine. I ran to my neighborhood Dollar Tree and grabbed a few boxes of baby washcloths, which were 4 for $1. You could, however, just use any scrap of fabric you have, cheesecloth or muslin.

 



I think the images do justice in place of written explanation on how to make these (read: SO EASY). I typed up these little directions, printed them off, cut them and attached the to the sachets.

OATMEAL LAVENDAR MILK BATH SACHET | Tie the twine to hang the bundle under the faucet as hot water fills the tub. Squeeze the sachet to release the herbal properties into the water, or swirl the sachet around in the tub. The tub is now your giant cup of herbal tea! Once the bath is over, shake the wet herbs into a flowerbed, compost, or other container for disposal. The washcloth is yours to be used again!

In addition to the bath sachets, Alice and I whipped up some brown sugar coffee scrub. Every day after drinking my pot of java, I dump the grinds onto a large tray in the garage to dry. Once dried (this may take a few weeks because you really want them to be very dry), you mix the coffee grinds, brown sugar, olive oil, a tiny bit of vanilla extract, and a few shakes of cinnamon. I used a version of this recipe, but quadrupled it to make a lot more. Having a plethora of baby food jars from Arlo, I spray painted the lids a festive red, filled them with this yummy scrub, and tied on a cute paper tag. This scrub is ideal for dry hands and feet and works really well. It makes a huge mess of coffee grinds if used in the tub, though, just FYI. For this project, I had all the ingredients on hand, and repurposed the jars and paper tags, so it cost me next to nothing. Both projects turned out great, were fun to make in the kitchen, and so easy for the girls to help with. They'd be perfect for Valentine's Day or Mother's Day, too!

STYLE: Chewbeads

My friend Kristyn wore a strand of these really cute large turquoise beads to a party about a year ago and I complimented her on them. She told me they weren't real costume jewelry, but these safe spongy rubber-type beads for teething babies. You guys, this blew my mind. Being pregnant with Arlo at the time and knowing the chewiness that comes with baby territory, I couldn't wait to get my own.

Fast-forward about six months and I had my wee babe in my arms and he was so drooly and trying to eat all my unsafe vintage necklaces. I called around town and found out that both our baby boutiques downtown Boise, Cassis Kids on Idaho and Buns in the Oven in BoDo, carry Chewbeads. They are 100% silicone necklaces that are cute for mom and safe for baby. They come in a variety of styles, but the classic one I'm wearing here is the least expensive, running about $29.99. The colors are fun and funky (I picked bright yellow but they have more muted colors like brown and black if that's more your style) and I can't even tell you how much Arlo loves them. As soon as I put them on in the store, they went straight in his mouth. Worth every penny.

FOODIE: A New Year's Resolution Revolution, Take Two

Resolution, resosmultion. I don't resolve to do most things, but I can totally get behind the desire to evolve. So I never do New Year Resolutions, but New Year Revolutions.

This year I'm taking on an old favorite. In 2010, I made the pledge to cook every single recipe in the Pioneer Woman's brand new, and first, cookbook, a la Julie & Julia. I've been a fan of Ree Drummond since way back in her beginning blogging days, and now she's a full-fledged celebrity chef. Five years ago I was super successful in making all fifty-something recipes in her book and it was a treasure and a treat. Many of those recipes are now mainstays in our culinary repertoire. I'm a bit of a Food Network Fangirl (see the Food Network Cookoff I've hosted every year for the past five years). I'm also a bit of a cookbook hoarder. Combine the two and you've got a kitchen revolution in the making.

For 2015, I decided to take on the challenge of making every single recipe in one of my newer cookbooks. I lobbied for Smitten Kitchen, or maybe Paula Deen's classic, but Eric won me over with his profound love of PW, so I hearby announce that I'll be making all the recipes in her second cookbook, The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Food From My Frontier (2012).

I'm really excited. But also a bit worried. Because there are 109 recipes in this book. ONE. HUNDRED. AND. NINE.

Rest assured, I'm aware that means I have to make at least two recipes a week for the entire year. Or have several parties where I make, like, ten of them. A handful of recipes are cocktails, and some are side dishes, so that should help. But, STILL. And, if you've ever made PW's recipes before, you know they can be massive, home-cooking, comfort food undertakings. And so, so worth every minute and ingredient.

A few recipes from this book are tried and true family favorites already, so I'm scratching those from the list: Simple Sesame Noodles, Restaurant Style Salsa, and her Apple Dumplings. Not because they aren't amazing, but that they are SO AMAZING that we make the all the time already. They've been a staple in our house for years, as I first discovered the recipes on her blog. (In fact, the year I took on the Pioneer Woman in my Food Network Cookoff I won first place with those Apple Dumplings in the dessert category because MOUNTAIN DEW is the secret ingredient.) Also, two recipes at the end are canning recipes and while canning pushes me outside my comfort zone in a good way, the recipes are for sweet pickles and strawberry jam, two things I do not love. So, 104 recipes it is.

Wish me luck.

(PS I'll be grammin' all this over here and posting regular updates on the blog. Last night I made the Roasted Cauliflower and it was truly the best cauliflower I've ever eaten. Eric agrees. And, yes, I always write notes in my cookbooks for future chefs and memories sake.)

A Death in the Family

I'd just moved from Portland to Corvallis, Oregon, to move in with my boyfriend. I loved him, but I'd left a museum career and friends to go to a small town where I knew no one but him. This boyfriend was in graduate school and working as a teaching assistant and doing research and never home. I had a shitty job I hated at the county mental health clinic. One day in the staff newsletter of the shitty job I saw another county employee had posted an ad for a bunch of feral kittens she'd rescued at her farmhouse and that they were free to a good home. She'd had them spayed and neutered and they were healthy. I drove out immediately after I got off work at 5pm. As a champion for the underdog, when faced with selecting a pet, I will always, always defer to the least pretty/likeable/difficult. (As a child, when presented with a litter of purebred miniature poodles I selected the runt born with only three legs and loved him to death.) So, I picked the tiny gray and white kitty, hiding under a chair. Oh, honey, you probably don't want her, the kind-hearted woman said. She hates other people and other animals, she's been picked on here by all the other cats.

She's perfect, I said.

I took her home in a cardboard box and she crawled behind the stove and hid there for days. Eventually, she snuck out to pee and we named her Zooey, after a character in one of my most favorite J.D. Salinger novels. She puked 35 times in one hour after getting vaccinations to move across the country from Oregon to Minnesota. We popped tiny anti-anxiety pills into her throat with tweezers. Zooey slept on my belly every single night for seventeen years. Her purrs were the soundtrack all of my babies grew to in utero. She loved chirping at birds and drinking the water from under the Christmas tree. I cleaned up her cat puke every day for seventeen years. She hated my children, but loved Eric fiercely. She never once climbed on our countertops or peed outside her litter box.

About a year ago, at the age of sixteen, Zooey started peeing blood, her fur was matting, she was puking more than normal, all classic signs of kidney failure in older cats. She was still eating, drinking and purring, until she wasn't anymore. We loved her so much and waited and watched as it got worse and worse and this past July our beloved Zooey died. We came home from a camping trip in Atlanta, Idaho, to find her bleeding from the mouth, eyes sunken in, and barely moving. Eric wrapped her in an old towel and we placed her in the cat carrier she'd ridden in to move across the country with us two times, for her very last car ride. The girls and I sobbed goodbyes and sent Eric off by himself to the Idaho Humane Society to euthanize our very first baby. He held her and cried with the kind technicians and brought her home in a handmade baby quilt and dug a hole in our backyard under the lilac tree. We handmade a headstone with a garden marker kit from Jo-Ann Craft Store.

Everyone cried for days, weeks. Lucy kept hearing her meow for food, Eric kept picking her hair off everything, I kept feeling her clawing at the side of our bed. Alice helped pack up all her things to gift to a friend in Utah, another young girl, bringing home her very first kitten. It was a joy to gift her our precious Zooey's items.

It's been five months now, and I don't think of her every day any more. Her picture still resides on our fridge and clumps of her hair still get swept up from underneath furniture, but it's becoming less and less. A few weeks ago when we pulled out the Christmas boxes everything, all the emotions of loss, came rushing back when Lucy pulled out Zooey's stocking. It hung by our fireplace every year and Santa never forgot to stock it with some toys or special cans of soft food. She burst into tears that wouldn't stop, my girl.

We came up with a plan for that stocking and that grief. Lucy and I decided to donate a portion of the monies we earned with our artsy crafts we sold at Wintry Market and the Boise MADE Pop Up Shop to the Idaho Humane Society in memory of our dear cat. Today, with friends in tow, we made the trip to donate $30 in cash to the place where we our sweet Zooey took her last breath and was able to be euthanized with kindness and love. A place that gives so much honor to the animals in our lives, through living and dying. It's a small gesture and the cash isn't really that much, but to our family, to Lucy, it was huge. And so important. Sometimes to best way to grieve a death is through living a good life, in moments big and small.

Sexy Time

Soon, I'll be saying goodbye to these old friends. And I have to say, good riddance. While you've saved my life, probably hundreds of times, and I appreciate all you've done for me, sayonara.

 

Well, soon.

 

Like sometime after, oh, 27 MORE TIMES THAT I HAVE TO INVITE YOU TO ALL OUR PARTIES. Sigh.

You see, my husband, Eric, had a vasectomy a few weeks ago. It was traumatic and terrifying, wonderful and worth it. After giving birth to three beautiful babies over the course of the last decade, we were done making more, but WAIT MAYBE WE AREN'T BECAUSE I LOOK AT THIS AND MY OVARIES ACHE. AND, my heart:

It wasn't so bad, the vasectomy, Eric says. Scheduling it on a Friday afternoon for a long weekend of pajama pants and laying on the couch watching football with icy nutties works pretty well.

(Yes, since we had a baby boy we've come to charmingly referring to his - and his daddy's - testicles as nutties. I know, I know.)

What sucks, I hear, is going back to work the next week and standing all the livelong day on concrete working in a lab, and walking across campus, and teaching classes. It's then that the pain gets a wee bit worse.

But that, too, dissipated within about a week and soon we were on our way to, ahem, "completing at least sixteen ejaculations" before sending in the first cup of semen to be tested. Until then, condoms, you'll be standing bedside. (Double sigh.) And even AFTER THEN, I learned when reading the paperwork, because we have to commit sixteen MORE ejaculations for test cup #2 and to get the clear that the little sperm are truly dead ending in there.

And we've already had two broken condoms (whoa, WHOOPS) and I can't wait to toss a little plastic cup full of my husband's semen into the diaper bag some morning eleven or so more times from now.

But, I still get a little teary-eyed about the whole thing.

You can read more about the big V-DAY at Mamalode where I wrote a little story about it. Click on over and give it a read - I think you'll like it. The theme during November at the mag was MEN, and I've sure got a special one.

ARTSY: Needlework for Wintry Market

We're celebrating our fourth year putting on Wintry Market | Handmade for the Holidays, an upscale and inventive indie art/craft holiday fair. I'm co-creator and co-organizer with my friend and local interior designer, Kristin Montgomery.

 

This year's Market will consist of innovative and original items produced using traditional art/craft methods created by 48 vendors from around the Treasure Valley. Also part of the Market will be a Kid's Craft Workshop by Bricolage, coffee by Joe 2U, baked goods by Boise's Bakery, food truck by P. Ditty's Wrap Wagon, local live music curated by Go Listen Boise and a winter-themed photo booth. For the locals, Wintry Market will be held Saturday Nov 22 (10am-5pm) and Sunday Nov 23, 2014 (10am-3pm) at the El Korah Shrine on the corner 11^th and Idaho Streets in downtown Boise. Admission is free to the public.

 

In addition to organizing the event, I also operate a little vintage booth called Ticky-Tacky. I typically sell mid-century home wares and quirky items, and this year I'm adding some hand-stitched artworks to my usual fare.





As an artist, my work blurs the boundaries between fine art and craft. For me, the repurposing of found materials adds both tactile and historical elements integral to the contemporary story each piece tells. I learned needlework and cross-stitch from my mother as a girl.  My foundations with fabric, combined with my academic background, have allowed me to explore traditional women’s handiwork in a non-traditional way. Needlepoint has been an important part of America's past and a recent resurgence in the art/craft has proved its duration and importance in our lives. 

As a writer, words and storytelling are also ways I express myself. Combining contemporary text, often song lyrics from female pop stars like Katy Perry, the Dixie Chicks, and Taylor Swift, with stitching can be both playful and powerful. It speaks to history and generations, telling stories of women throughout the years - the (presumably) older ones who lovingly hand-crafted the vintage tea towels and linen napkins in the 1950s with the pop star girl power of twentysomethings today.

 

I've also made a handful of these lovelies, of course, inspired by Julie Jackson of Subversive Cross Stitch, of which I've been a fan FOR YEARS.

 

This year my ten-year-old daughter, Lucy, will be joining me. I've taught her how to embroider as well, passing along the craft, and she's decided to have a little booth called Embroidery by Lucy. She's making these darling little initials, some Christmas tree ornament sized and some larger to hang on a wall. Be sure to stop by our booth, as she'll have all 26 letters of the alphabet.

ARTSY: Dia de los Muertos Skulls

I'm a huge fan of the Dollar Tree just a few blocks from my house in Vista Village shopping center here in Boise, especially around the holidays. Their décor is killer, and so much fun to be creative with without costing much at all.

 Last year I saw (too late) these large felt skulls, probably 18" tall by 12" wide in both white and black for a dollar a piece. By the time I thought about crafting them up to make darling Dia de los Muertos skulls and went back to the store, they were all snatched up.

This year I bought three, one each for Lucy, Alice and I to try our hand at. While I originally thought I'd get out my embroidery thread and needles for some cute stitching, I quickly changed my mind because, um, crafting with kids is sometimes hard enough without making it harder (am I right or am I right?). A faster, easier method of getting the same colorful details as thread? Brightly colored Sharpies.

Pull up some sugar skull and face painting images of Day of the Dead from the Internets for inspiration. Add in a few tubes of glitter glue, sequins and leftover Mardi Gras mask making feathers. Voila! Cutest decorations to grace our front window during any Halloween season we've had. (Pro Tip: the plastic hanging hook that the price tag was attached to? Don't rip it off. Use it to hang your skulls on a tiny suction cup hook on your window!) I even ran back to the Dollar Tree to snatch up three of the black skulls to craft up next year before they ran out. Again.

CULTURE: Of Death

My first one was a suicide.

A middle-aged man overdosed on pills in the front seat of his red pickup truck in a forested area about forty-five minutes outside of Corvallis, Oregon. He'd probably been dead, oh, maybe a day, twenty-four hours or so. He'd left a note on the front seat next to him. I drove the van with the mortuary science student who lived in an apartment connected to the embalming room at the back of the funeral home. The road was dark and winding, it was 2am and I was nervous. And twenty-three years old.

We met the police there, as the undertakers' assistants, like me, were the Girl Fridays of the local death scene. (I was, in fact, the only Girl Friday in town, and there were only a handful of Boy Fridays, I should note.) There was no morgue at the city hospital, so we did the dirty work for the police, doctors, and the like, picking up bodies from all sorts of locations and end of life scenarios, from automobiles in the mountains to attics of houses to nursing homes. We helped the coroner perform autopsies and embalmed and cleaned up messes and held people's hands.

Both dead and alive.

I decided I might want to become a mortician about a year before that, a young girl finding her calling. After having heart-to-heart conversations with funeral directors around Idaho and Oregon that I interviewed, they suggested I get a job in the field first before committing to mortuary science school (I already had two bachelors degrees at this point and getting a third was something I needed to think about) to see, you know, if I had the stomach and the heart for such a gut-wrenching career.

It was so hard, they said. I wouldn't recommend this field to anyone, they shared. It is a calling and a career that can keep you up all night and away from your family on birthdays, they lectured. Funeral directing will drive you to drink, they warned.

They hired me at one of two funeral homes in Corvallis to be a mortician's assistant/night-time removal driver. I had a pager and worked full time during the day, awaiting deaths in the dark of the night. And they came, sometimes more than one a night. And I took off my pajamas and brushed my teeth and threw on some nice conservative black clothing, drove to the mortuary, picked up the unmarked minivan and met the family/nurse/staff/police at a number of locations. Physically, dead weight is hard to carry. Emotionally, it's even harder.

I have stories to tell that will knock the wind out of you, make your stomach churn, make your heart break. People hugged me, screamed at me, said I was too young, too beautiful, too sweet to be doing this job.

You make me feel better, she said. Your kindness is so soothing, they told me. I'm floored that a young woman is here to take my father away but I'm so glad you are, I once heard. I hate you, she cried. Please don't take him away, they yelled down the hall, tearing at my clothes.

In graduate school I found myself studying art and architectural history, continuing to learn about the American way of death. These stories bore a hole in my heart and my mind and my academic research. It can be different. It should be different.

 

Fifteen years later this young, sweet, beautiful girl in California picked up where I left off, and I'm so glad she did. Her YouTube videos, Ask A Mortician, are charming, relevant and on the mark.

Caitlin Doughty is a mortician who's telling you that you don't really need a mortician to mourn and bury your loved ones. Home funerals and green burials and bringing death back to our conversations is such an important movement. She's also founder of The Order of The Good Death and writer of a new book and recently interviewed by Terry Gross on NPR. All of these things are so, so, so worthwhile, friends. Please give them a watch, read, glance. It's kind of a matter of life and death.

And fun! (For real.)

A letter to 226 pounds

Dear well-meaning woman at the DMV,

It all started so well last Friday morning. You called my number and I hoisted my six-month-old baby boy on my hip while balancing a purse and a coffee mug so clumsily. I just knew we should've brought the stroller in with us, but we didn't. You see, my husband Eric and I came together to renew our Idaho driver's licenses together, as they expired on the same day, and we figured one of us could hold Arlo while the other filled out paperwork and got a new photo, but, sigh, we were wrong.

Eight years ago we had just moved to Boise from Minneapolis. We'd left little two-year-old Lucy at my mom's house where we were living in her front driveway in her camp trailer while searching for a new home. It was our sixth wedding anniversary and a hot summer day; my hair was shorter and less silver. I was wearing a cute striped tank top I'd got for a screamin' deal at Old Navy. My license photo was, dare I say, cute. And after pouring over the Idaho drivers manual the night before, I'd just passed the written exam. Whew.

This morning Eric and I stared down at these old licenses we were about to surrender to you with delightful nostalgia. Look at these young kids, we said. So much life lived since then - different jobs, many more babies, a new home.

Not only did we look different - younger - I also looked back at this 30 year old girl with fondness. She was about to get so much stronger than she ever imagined. Which is why, dear lady, when you asked if all the info on my drivers license was the same, I laughed.  Everything is different, I thought. But I said, No, my address is no longer my mother's driveway. It's a house, an important sanctuary I call home. Done, you said. Easy enough. Anything else?

Yes, my hair is no longer brown, obviously, I laughed. Looking at my side-swept silver locks with bright red highlights and back to the wee baby in my arms you seemed confused. Well, what are my other options? I asked. Sandy, red, white, gray......

Gray. My choice.

You eyed my conspicuously. Ummmmmm, okay. Anything else?

Yes. I have not weighed 140 pounds since I first got this license when I was 16 years old. I now weigh 226. No one has ever changed it. I'd like to change it.

You furrowed your brow and would not look up at me. I knew all these proclamations made you uncomfortable and I know you were trying to help, really. No, no, we can just put, how about, 180?

200? I countered.

You changed the subject to sweet Arlo and suggested I hold him down low, at my waist, so his head wouldn't be in the photo. I got to see the image on the screen, not a cute girl anymore, but a wise woman, nearly forty, with a double-chin. You filled out my paperwork for me, as my jiggling arms were full of motherhood and confusion and you cooed.

I didn't have the energy to fight the fight this time. Your 'helpfulness' (lying about my weight) did not really help me, though. In fact, it made me feel bad and shameful when I'm really proud and happy to now weigh 226 pounds.

Twenty-two years ago that 16 year old girl would've never seen this day coming. But she'd be so proud of the big mama I've become. So, eight years from now in 2022 when I renew my driver's license again, maybe you'll listen to me. Maybe I'll speak louder, stronger and demand the 226.

Sincerely,
Amy

THRIFTY: 6 lbs of Gummy Bears

A few months ago we happened upon a gigantic 6 pound bag of gummy bears at our local Costco. We laughed about it because it's Dr. Brown's most favorite candy, but it was only about $8, which was really a steal when I started thinking about it. So, much to his surprise, I tossed it in our cart.

 

I knew, however, that if I didn't do something smart and creative and snacks-sized with these treats immediately they'd all be eaten within a week. (The doctor and his two daughters have incredible sweet-tooths. Teeths? Whatever.) So I opened the bag and divided them immediately into 8 oz. canning jars. That bag filled SEVENTEEN of these jars. 17. I was amazed, and thrilled. I doled out one jar every day or two for them to share, hiding the other 16 in a top secret box in the garage. (I'm not mean, for reals. It's just that they would've gone out to the garage and gotten more jars and eaten them all quickly. I'm so serious.) They lasted for weeks this way and if you do the math, each jar came out to something like 48 cents for 8 oz of gummy bears, which is such a deal.

STYLE: The Best Fatkini

Who in their right mind is going to post pictures of themselves in The Internets in a bathing suit when they are a fat woman, amIrite?! And a bikini, no less. Well, lots of women, including myself. It's pretty much become a movement, really, in fat acceptance and Health At Every Size circles. (And I've written before how I'm proud to part of those circles.) Hell, it's become a movement in any womens' circle, really. And a lot of it started with blogger Brittany Gibbons who, in 2011, did a Ted Talk where she stripped down to her bathing suit on stage and not long after that, posted a photo of herself in a fatkini on her website, and she ain't no thin girl.

 

She inspired us all to do the same. Don't hide under long clothes in the summer. Buy a bathing suit and own it. Get in the water with your kids (which I am doing in all these photos: at Roaring Springs Water Park, drinking beers in a hot springs in the Idaho mountains, tubing in Warm Lake and floating in the river outside of Atlanta, Idaho). Flaunt your fat in the sun. Let sand stick to your cellulite and sweat drip down your cleavage. It's what summer, and life, is all about.

I bought my first fatkini in 2013. It was black and white striped and so darling and fit like a glove, perfectly snug in all the right spots. It was comfortable, and really, barely a two piece, with a high-waisted vintage-type bottom with skirt like scrunching fabric in the front and a halter on the top (a fashion blogger I'm not, obviously). I wore it like mad that year, pushing the bottoms under my growing pregnant belly while I wore it to prenatal water aerobics twice a week for nine months while pregnant with baby Arlo last year. I wore it so much that it eventually wore thin and gave out.

I loved the style and fit so much that I ordered the exact same one again from Walmart.com in a size 2x. It was on sale for less than $30 (a steal!), but only available in red. The suit was recommended by another blogger, Rachel, who ordered the navy anchor print and rocked it on her website (although her image was sadly stolen and used for a diet company's promotion because sometimes people suck).

It's the Catalina Suddenly Slim bikini from Walmart and it appears they are all sold out online now so (I'm kinda freaking out about what I'm going to do when my red beauty gives out, but it's holding up great so far.)

I'm not gonna lie, when I first put on my black and white striped one just over a year ago and wore it to the city pool with my daughters for the first time I was a nervous wreck. I was self-conscious and felt like everyone was staring at me. Turns out, many people (although likely not as many as I first thought) WERE looking at me, because they thought my suit was so cute and I looked great in it. I found this out, as many, many women have complimented me on my suit every time I wear it in public. It really is cute and much more flattering than these images (snapped unplanned by my youngest daughter) show. And it's so comfortable to wear and now I don't really even think about it being a two-piece and whether or not people approve of me wearing it. I feel great in it, it's comfortable, it's darling, and I get to enjoy the water with my family. It's made me brave enough to share unflattering images that my daughter Alice took of us having fun together, just because she loves me. And that's all that really matters.

KIDDOS: Boise Bench Junior Master Gardeners

As School Garden Coordinator for my daughters' little elementary school on the Boise Bench near our home, I have spent the last two years learning about, building, and growing our school's first veggie garden and native plants garden. I wrote (and received!) a $2000 grant from the Whole Kids Foundation and received a training grant from the Boise Urban Garden School (BUGS) as well. Bringing growing and earth-friendly practices to children has become somewhat of a new passion of mine and has been so much fun to implement.

 

Part of this adventure included learning about the Junior Master Gardener certificate program. It's just like the adult version, but a bit more playful and can be taught as a community club or a 4-H program. Also, the leader can be an invested parent like myself, and isn't required to have Master Gardener certification. All I had to do was purchase the teacher's manual and some textbooks for our kiddos and find some interested children around ages 8-12 and we were set. My friend Kelly offered to be my co-leader, which has been a great help having baby Arlo around, and we quickly got 6 kiddos who were interested. (We could've opened it up to so many more who have expressed interest, but we just can't manage that many with the two of us.)

The curriculum is so much fun and we began meeting for an hour and a half every Thursday during the summer at Borah Park in Boise, where we also rented a community garden plot for our little gardeners. We've organized field trips, like the one pictured above to the Boise WaterShed Educational Center for a wastewater treatment plant tour, and even made some "crop art" out of seeds and recycled wood to enter in the Western Idaho State Fair (we won a third place ribbon!).

The kids have had a blast planting flower seeds, weeding, capturing bugs, journaling in the garden, and doing art projects like pressing flowers and leaves and making them into cards, as pictured above. (Really, the little girl above was having fun, I promise.)

We have invited guest speakers, like Jan the Worm Lady, from Capital City Public Market, to come and teach us all about worms, their importance in our gardens, and help the kids build a worm compost system.

Our crew continues learning and finishing up the projects and lessons in our book until February, when they will all graduate with their Junior Master Gardener certification. Next week we are having an apple harvest party here at my house, picking, peeling, coring and baking an apple dessert from our little urban mini orchard. After that, we are creating a scarecrow for the Idaho Botanical Garden's fall festival Scarecrow Stroll. Soon we'll be wedding and cleaning out our garden and will start meeting in our homes after school each week, but you can bet will still be digging around in dirt, brought inside in buckets.

KIDDOS: Best Baby Buys {part 2}

 

I had read stellar reviews of Aden + Anais muslin swaddle blankets on several mommyblogs before Arlo was born, so I splurged and bought myself a 4-pack from Amazon and was that ever a good idea. We LOVE these blankets. You can see we brought the monkey print one to the hospital for Arlo's birth and it became a feature in his hospital birth photos and therefore a keepsake. They are the best for swaddling wee babes tightly with warmth, but are very breathable. Perfect for winter and summer alike, I can't express enough how much we use them. Arlo is still wrapped in one every night and there's always one in the diaper bag. They also make great makeshift nursing covers on the go without leaving me sweating like mad on these 100+ degree days. They cost about $34 for a 4-pack, so an average of $8 a piece.



 

 

{photo courtesy of www.target.com}

 





We started using Aveeno natural oatmeal formula baby wash & shampoo when Lucy was just a few months old and fell in love. It seems less harsh than the Johnson & Johnson products and less drying on soft baby skin. It's also tear-free, and since it's a hair and body wash, it's all we use on our wee ones for years (until the girls' hair was long and ratty enough it needed separate intense conditioning treatments). I usually get it from Diapers.com when I order our Nature Babycare organic diapers and it's really not that much more expensive than other brands, around $5 for an 8oz bottle, and you can find it anywhere, like Target, Walmart or Walgreens. 

 

 



{photo courtesy of www.diapers.com}

Another item we've been using since Alice was born over six years ago are these glass bottles from Evenflo. I freaked out about BPA in plastic bottles and started using these when our babies drank milk and we love them. My kiddos never drink more than 4 ounces at a time, so these little bottles are perfect. Some people are afraid of their babies/toddlers dropping the bottles and them breaking, but we've had them chucked across concrete and tile kitchen floors and never had one break at all. You can find these everywhere (again, Target, Walmart, etc.) and at just around $5 for a package of four, they are so inexpensive and worth it (sans BPA).

Something else we've had for over ten years and has been a life-saver is our Baby Bjorn front pack carrier in navy blue. All our babies have ridden close to our hearts in this device, and have viewed the world from the safety of our chests. Dr. Brown (the hubs) loves that it is unisex and easy to put on for daddies as well. It retailed for about $80 then (my dad bought it for us for a baby gift) and they are still pretty expensive, but you can also find barely used ones on craigslist and used baby stores for like $20. They hold up SO well, also. I know there are a million other kinds of baby carriers now, but this has remained a favorite of ours.

ARTSY: Art Party Boise

When Tahirih Cahill of e11even Shades Studio contacted me in February about coming over and showing what her mobile art studio, Art Party Boise, was all about, I was super pregnant. Like, ready-to-pop-dilated-to-3-centimeters pregnant. So, as excited as I was about learning more about her cool small business idea, I had to wait until May to act on it.

I knew that my super artsy daughters, Lucy and Alice, would love a mother-daughter date night painting, and Tahirih agreed. She sent me several samples of paintings she thought the three of us would like, and be able, to do. Of course I picked the quirky little owl with hipster glasses.

The concept is brilliant: Tahirih or one of her staff artists (that's right, she's had to hire two new gals to help her out given the popularity of her mobile studio of late) comes to your house, or business, or the park, or wherever you choose, brings the supplies, and teaches you how to paint a lovely acrylic piece for your home. There are various sizes and styles to choose from and the idea is that everyone is an artist. She's right.

She got the idea from talking with a fellow mom friend, who wanted to do something fun with her other mama friends, a ladies night out with wine and the like, but all the things that make it hard for mamas to get out - like newborns and the cost of babysitters - were a problem. So, why not bring the mamas night to the mamas in her own comfortable place, making it less expensive and easier? What a great idea! The prices range from about $10-$25 per person, and include all the supplies and you leave with your own masterpiece.

 



It was a bit of a challenge to find something to paint that would fit the range of 'talent' from my six year old Alice to my thirty-eight year old self. Tahirih did a great job - and walked us through our owl process. I put out some snacks from our new Trader Joes - organic strawberry lemonade and a bowl of kettle corn - and daddy took Arlo for a walk. The whole art party lasted about an hour and a half.

 





Here's our completed paintings, all hung in a row above our play kitchen in our family room. The cattywampus arrangement wasn't intentional, but I kinda dig it. Fits the playfulness of the paintings and the play area and, well, our family style. In order from left to right is mine, Alice's and Lucy's.

Alice, my ever self-critical artist, didn't love how her owl turned out at first. She said it looked nothing like Tahirih's and looked like a bat. We thought her puffed out wings made her look like she was about to take off in flight. I think she's perfect. Like Tahirih said, "There are no mistakes in art." I couldn't agree more. And, I think, we're all sold on a girls birthday painting party for next spring.

Find our more about Art Party Boise on her website or Facebook page. Thanks, Tahirih!

KIDDOS: Best Baby Buys {part 1}

 

So, baby Arlo Valley Brown was born a little over six weeks ago on a gorgeous Friday morning, March 21st. He waited until one day after his due date and the spring equinox because he probably wanted to be an Aries like both of his sisters. He was big and beautiful with the darkest hair, weighing 8 pounds and 14 ounces and measuring in at 21.5 inches. We are over the moon.

 

Needless to say, I've been busy staring at our bundle of joy and trying to cope with the changes that happen when you have three kids, not to mention my copious volunteer duties around town. Whew. That means no blogging for a while, especially when you have to type one-handed, as baby boy continuously occupies the other.

 

Daddy's on duty at the moment, and I've wanted to write a little series on best baby buys - sort of my take on a few things I can't recommend more to new moms, especially since this is my third go around. It KINDA makes me an expert. Just sayin'.

 

{Image courtesy of febriedethan.hubpages.com}

 

First up, I was lucky (smart) enough to start prenatal water aerobics at just 17 weeks pregnant and I couldn't have made a better move. I don't know why I didn't do it with my other pregnancies, but it was amazing. Just $30 a month for one hour classes on Monday and Wednesday evenings every single week in the warm water of the local rehab hospital pool? It was wonderful. Not to mention the friendships I formed with other beautiful bellied women. Here in Boise you can sign up through St. Lukes Hospital here. If you're expecting, trust me on this.

 

{Image courtesy of www.theawesomer.com}

 

My dear friend Kristin had the brilliant (BRILLIANT, I SAY) idea to sign me up for MealTrain, this fantastic and free website where your friends and family can sign up to bring you meals on dates you pre-select. This is perfect for people having babies or in the case of sickness or death or any major life-changing event. We just finished up getting SIX WEEKS worth of food from friends, from homemade feasts to Jimmy Johns delivery to gourmet boxes of ingredients from Blue Apron. The girls loved the surprise dinner menus and I couldn't be more thankful and amazed by the graciousness of others. As my friend Melanie said, "MealTrain is like having a church lady committee without having to go to church." AMEN, sister.

 

{Image courtesy of The Laurie Berkner Band blog}

 

Ten years ago when Lucy was born my dear friend Betsy introduced me to Laurie Berkner, who she saw on a cable television show on Nick Jr. She had a CD and it was catchy and cute and not annoying to listen to on repeat. Laurie and her band play and write the kind of music parents love as well, and we quickly became fans. We now own all of her CDs and they get resurrected with each new baby in our family. She has her own little indie label and you can buy her CDs for cheap from there, if you're old school like me, or download them. I can't recommend getting one (or all of them) enough. Take a listen to the song that stole my heart.

 

A broken heart is not the end of anything. It’s the beginning of everything.

I've written before about my respect for the brilliance that is Glennon Melton behind the blog Momastery and her book Carry On, Warrior. Today's post by Glennon on Facebook captured everything I've been feeling this week and made me cry huge fat hormonal pregnancy tears.
She writes,

"We try to protect ourselves by not allowing our hearts to be broken. But a broken heart is not the end of anything. It’s the beginning of everything."

(Oh sister, ain't it the truth.)

Along with this video:

)


Here's the full link to the post Broken is the Beginning (this accompanying poem is heart-wrenching).

One year ago this week my heart was shattered in ways I never knew possible. It took me a whole year to get here, but here I am, living proof that it was the beginning of everything.

I'm 39 weeks pregnant.

With my first son.

With a lost mucus plug, bloody show, hours of painful contractions, many centimeters dilated, a car seat installed and two big sisters excitedly awaiting his arrival, any day now.

It's the beginning of everything.

Follow me

So, I'm finally joining the century, oh, say 10 years late, and have started a Facebook page for this here blog which, coincidentally, links up with my Twitter account. You should really follow me on both, as I post more than links to the stories I write here. I write all sorts of commentary (snarky and sincere) on life, love, motherhood, being an Idahoan, puking, giving birth, peanut butter M&Ms and more. It's really fun. Although I'm so old-school at heart, I also blame part of my slacking in the social media trend on growing humans for the better part of the last ten years.

 

 



 

And baking lots of sweet treats as a result. Just keepin' it real. And delicious.

 





ARTSY: A love poem

love is:

the smell of his sweat, knowing... glances, a rash from his beard, staying in bed all day, hungover breakfasts, running away, crying through vows, sharing one car, proofreading thesis, U-hauls, Wall Drug, Graceland, swelling bellies, death, heartbreak, blood, vomit, growth, care, learning
 
and:
 
her big brown eyes, April, thunderstorms, cradling in hospital beds, Minneapolis, ticks, fear, introversion, owls, airplanes, anxiety, books, sweetness, curls, math, so much kindness
 
and:
 
her tiny features, daycare, dance parties, big sisters, camping, chaos, fast, funny, speech therapy, fearless, blond, puzzles, Idaho, cuddling
 
and:
 
two pink lines, nausea, exhaustion, sadness, worry, ultrasounds, heartbeats, rolling, lolling, quickening, stretching skin, exploding hearts, belly kisses, tiny blue onesies, joy



*A valentine to my family. I wrote this a few weeks ago for a contest called Speak To Us Of Love, hosted by jenny wren designs and Rose & Odin, two makers of art extraordinaire. I won some fabulous prizes, but the best part? I cry every single time I read this.