hump day nuggets :: i heart october

hump day nuggets :: little bits of the season in photos and words about the last week

This week was...
Filled with friends and family.
Monumental celebrations, amazing sunrises and sunsets.
Community meetings and school conferences.
A trip to the big city and visits to a few farms.
Cooking endeavors and fall yard clean-up.
Potluck gatherings, a small town flea market and a short trip to the much-loved bookmobile.
Computers were upgraded and girlfriends came over to download on my front deck.
This week was...full, memorable and absolutely lovely.

nuggets.

Fake flies on the butter courtesy of three little pranksters

:: Feast.  Let's just say that if I make boeuf bourguignon for you - it means I love you.  For real.  And if I make you homemade seedy bread and a flourless chocolate cake?  Well, then I really, really love you.

We celebrated three birthdays and a wedding anniversary with and for our dear friends.

The evening ended with a Beastie Boys dance party in the living room.  It was time to get ill...in a good way.

:: Plenty.  On my way to the bookmobile this week, I stopped to pick up my bookmobile buddy and couldn't help but admire her pumpkin installation on the front porch.  She grew every single one of them.

She even had a sweet little pumpkin shaped like a heart. We bought a few smaller pumpkins that were cone-shaped and will try to turn one of them into Cyclops (one-eyed giant in Greek mythology).  We'll see how that goes at the annual pumpkin-carving contest this year.  Um, for the record, I've placed twice at this party and can't wait to compete.  Remember my prize-winning cute, silver owl pumpkin from two years ago?  Check it out here.  Oh, and I'm in it to win it, friends.  Results in next week's nuggets.

Claude, the Albino Alligator

:: Hooky.  Friday was a half day at the boy's school and we played a little hooky and headed for the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco.

The boys were so excited and ran from one exhibit to the next.  Grady even spent time petting the rainbow boa snake that was in the lobby.  I was totally shocked by his fearlessness and mildly freaked out at the same time, as I have a major snake phobia.  G was completely nonchalant and walked right up, asked to pet it and got the sweet satisfaction of seeing his mom cringe all the while.

The boys were also fascinated with this 1,700 year old Giant Sequoia that was cut down in 1917.  They quickly set out to count the rings, but gave up after they hit 56.  Did you know Giant Sequoias could live to be 3,500 years old?  Neither did I.  Absolutely stunning.

They offered up suggestions for making the planet healthier, as illustrated above, and added their handiwork to the ongoing installation about global warming.  Such wise young men.

:: Wordsmiths.  Our last stop was the Academy library and the boys bustled up the steps, grabbed the first book that interested them and lounged for a bit on the bean bag chairs.  This was my favorite picture of the day.

Half of the Babylonian Book Club of Bodega Bay

:: Celebrate.  Our dear friend had an open house and 70th birthday party all rolled into one on Saturday.  And while we never quite could grab the birthday girl for a photo op, the usual suspects gathered on the front deck.  We basked in the glow of a glorious October sunset, as the fiery orb slowly dipped behind Bodega Head and disappeared into the Pacific Ocean.  Downloading this photo made me smile and take note of the good friendships I've cultivated over the last decade we've lived here and called it home.

:: Soccer.  Grady ended the season on a high note and we gathered with the rest of his team for a potluck gathering in West Sebastopol.  It was so stinking hot here over the weekend, but that didn't stop the boys from running around and enjoying the three acre property.  G was awarded a certificate and acknowledged for his happy, jovial presence on the field and one of the most improved players of the season.  Remember, he did run the wrong way during his first league game!

:: Jamming.  Well, our freezer was just about to run out of room and the time was here to put all that summer sweetness into a mason jar and call it a day.  

My neighbor, Beula, was kind enough to come over and walk me through canning for the second year in a row.  You see, they were taking over almost half of my freezer and it is precious real estate around here.  I still have about four large freezer bags full of berries and some errant used milk containers full of summer strawberries.  So much happy work still to be done.

Beula has been canning for over 50 years and schooled me on the tools I need, organizing my kitchen for the task and timing it all out for me.  She was quality control, too.

:: Overabundance.  In the orchard next to my office, there is a sea of rotting Bosc pear soldiers.  The yellow jackets and flies are having a field day with the carnage strewn about the orchard floor and I wanted to gather what I could from the branches before they met the same fate.

I picked what I could with the extended-orchard-picker-thingy and gathered the last of my tomatoes from the deer-proof patch that was generously loaned to me this year by my colleague.  It's now time to put my summer garden to rest and start planting a few things for winter.  I'm so pleased with what I harvested from my little plot this year.  Tomatoes, chard, beets, carrots and more zinnias than I could shake a stick at.

Last Friday's sunset called to me like a siren and I pulled over on Highway One and snapped a few shots of the dried up fennel seed heads and some strange little creature with horns to the left of me.  Hmmm, where on earth did he come from?

Happy hump day out there.

hump day nuggets :: falling

hump day nuggets :: little bits of the season in photos and words about the last week

I forget how much I enjoy this time of year.  The hillsides are slowly coming back to life with bits of green stretching to peek through the brown, crusty layer of dried grass that covers the sprawling farmland around us.  Wild fennel has gone to seed and the lemon-colored flower heads look like a mini-fireworks show exploding on the stretch of road between town and home.  The artichokes and sunflowers are spent and slowing shrinking into shells of their former, glorious selves.  It is time for a rest is what nature is telling me and I feel it, too.

nuggets.

:: Style.  School photos were scheduled for this week and the boy was all about setting out his outfit the night before.  This year's uniform consisted of slightly dirty cargo shorts, a button-down surfer shirt that says Rude Boy on the side, a green carabiner hanging from belt loop, a soaring eagle (or hawk?) pendant necklace, braided wrist cuff, electric blue shoes and his wild hair flowing.  Imagine it, if you will.  He tried to get me to say yes to donning his deep purple baseball cap with the missing button on top, but I felt that would have just taken him over the crazy line.  A mom does have her limits, right?  He looked like Grady and that's all I could want for a third grade school picture.

::  Jog-a-thon.  Grady has been hitting the streets in order to obtain local sponsors for the jog-a-thon at his school.  This year he wrote a little cheat-sheet for his speech and was a little shy in asking people to sponsor him.  It's hard to ask for money, but when he shared that this money would go to buy special art supplies and provide field trips for his third grade class - no one could refuse.  This is the only fundraiser that requires the children to solicit money and I think it's a really important lesson in teaching them that working for something, getting invested in the cause, performing the task, following up, sharing results and reaping the rewards is worthwhile.  He made a difference for his class.

It was a really warm day last Friday and he ended up running 19 laps (1/8 mile each) in about 30 minutes.  The principal was there spraying the kids with a garden hose as they went by and there was hip-hop music blaring from the school sound system.  He was so proud of his accomplishments and that his parents were there to see him run and take pictures.

::  Poetry.  I had the privilege to spend last Friday evening listening to the lovely and insightful poet, Mary Oliver.  She was witty, strong, wise, funny, insightful, calming and sharp.  If you ever have the chance to hear her read her work, jump at the chance.  It was amazing.

:: Chicken Model.  This hen's name is Kiki Larue and is named after my best friend (whose name is not Kiki Larue, but that's what G has been calling her for years).  Kiki's blond twin, Dolly, died a few months back from starvation and Kiki has been lost without her.  She roosts all alone on her perch and navigates the pasture all day by herself.  She has taken to hopping up to the highest point on our porch, stopping to survey the land, squawk for a bit and then elegantly fly down from her post and scratches & pecks just along the periphery of the rest of the group.  I talk to her a lot, but she just looks at me like I need to get a life.  Enough said.

:: Cooking.  I've been doing a fair amount of cooking around here and made my first ever pesto using Alice Water's recipe.  Spaghetti & meatballs just may be my new favorite Sunday night dinner, as there is really no better way to tuck-in a weekend than gathering around the table with a warm plate of pasta and recalling all that has happened in the span of a few days.  I also had a failed attempt at yogurt and not sure where I went wrong, but I'll try again.

Yes, another martini photo-op.  They are all the rage around here lately.

:: Reading.  All three of us are into different books at the moment, but we are all very much into reading right now.  I go through phases where I'm reading novel after novel (the phase I'm in now) and then I'll hit a wall and have to resort to magazines and cookbooks until the mood strikes me to delve into another book.  I just finished Joyce Maynard's At Home in this World: A memoir and I'm about to start Barbara Kingsolver's Lacuna.  Grady has been on a Roald Dahl binge for the last week and finished Fantastic Mr. Fox, Esio Trot, Revolting Rhymes, BFG and opened up The Witches this morning on the ride to school.  I love watching him go deep into a book and get lost in it.  Steve is having a harder time getting into the Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller, but is giving it time and learning the meaning of a few new words in the process.  He has been the bedtime reader-on-duty for the boy and orates a chapter each evening from The Trumpet of the Swan by E.B. White.

:: Soccer.  The season ended over the weekend and a series of 5 games were on the calendar starting Friday night.  Grady scored his first goal ever on Saturday afternoon.  I got all teary, as he ran down the field to hug a fellow teammate and celebrate.  He's waited almost 10 months for a soccer goal and he finally got one (he played indoor winter and now outdoor fall season).  Good thing he had on his lucky underwear, right?  What a great kid-moment.

All blurry photos...they were moving too fast for me to capture!

:: Wrestling.  G wants to wrestle, or as he calls it "fight", with his dad almost every day.  I don't quite understand it, but just know that I will not be a part of it.  As I like to tell the boy, I'm too fragile to do that with you.  Go see your dad.  And off he goes.  Mild insanity dominates our living room almost every evening this week.

:: Loving.  I'm enjoying this season and settling in, paying attention to the changes and shifts going on around me in nature and trying to be still...to just be.

I love being the person Grady goes to when he wants to relocate a spider.

I love that I purchased $1.50 worth of artwork from that same little boy over the weekend.

I love that when we exit the car I always ask - Shall we? And the boy always responds - I think we shall.

I love the late afternoon light in my home right now, as the sun starts its decent just west us.

I love the daily parade of turkeys that clumsily strut through our yard, as evening approaches.

I love neighborly visits.

I love coming home to gifted produce sitting on my porch.

Happy hump day, friends.

Song for Autumn

Song for Autumn 

by Mary Oliver

In the deep fall

    don't you imagine the leaves think how

comfortable it will be to touch

    the earth instead of the

nothingness of air and the endless

    freshets of wind? And don't you think

the trees themselves, especially those with mossy,

    warm caves, begin to think

of the birds that will come — six, a dozen — to sleep

    inside their bodies? And don't you hear

the goldenrod whispering goodbye,

    the everlasting being crowned with the first

tuffets of snow? The pond

    vanishes, and the white field over which

the fox runs so quickly brings out

    its blue shadows. And the wind pumps its

bellows. And at evening especially,

    the piled firewood shifts a little,

longing to be on its way.

Tonight I'm going to see the wonderfully talented Mary Oliver read poetry selections from her large body of work at the Wells Fargo Center in Santa Rosa.  I'm really looking forward to it.  I've been absorbing her books of poetry over the last three years and find them so comforting to read and re-read, especially before the household wakes up.  She always seems to find the perfect words to honor the natural world, the changing of seasons, loss and the excesses of modern life.  Should be a beautiful and inspiring evening.

hump day nuggets :: celebrate good times, c'mon

hump day nuggets :: little bits of the season in photos and words about the last week

We're having a bit of a schizophrenic October at the moment out here on the coast.  Clear, blue skies one day and then the clouds rearrange themselves and turn a charcoal grey and drop rain on us for hours at a time.  This is most definitely not our usual Indian Summer weather.

nuggets.

:: Anniversary.  This week we celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary and returned to our honeymoon spot in Big Sur at the Post Ranch Inn.  In a weird twist of fate, I now work for the man/company that manages this incredible property.  Our room was luxurious, relaxing and romantic and completely off the charts (they upgraded us twice!).  The attention to detail at this property is impeccable.  We had champagne chilling upon our arrival (and in the lobby as we checked in), along with a personal note from the General Manager wishing us a happy anniversary and acknowledging our return.  Homemade chocolate chip cookies, cheeses, snacks, wines and the like were ours to enjoy on the deck overlooking the Pacific.  Multiple trips to the perfectly heated infinity pool overlooking the ocean, sumptuous robes, turn-down service for the most comfortable bed I've ever slept in, great bath products and a view to absolutely die for.  Yes, this was exactly what we needed to commemorate the last decade together.  Check-out was 1 pm and we checked out at 12:59 pm on the dot, so as not to miss a danged thing.  We'll do it all over again in another 10 years.  Yesiree.

:: The boy had a sleepover with our good friends and was spoiled with an after-school beach romp, made-to-order dinner of his favorite foods, arts & crafts, bedtime stories and a morning breakfast of a homemade smoothie with a side of bacon.  Talk about living the life!  Thanks Scott & Jill.  We couldn't have gone on our trip without you. 

When we picked him up the next day he was somber and sad.  He was stung by a yellow jacket, again.  This is his third sting and he was really bummed.  It's a wee bit odd that every time he has been stung - I'm nowhere around!  What is that all about?   He shed some tears of sadness about the sting and a few more of joy that we were home.  He missed us.  A lot.  

My mommy guilt for leaving him pushed me in the direction of indulging him on Saturday.  We decided to spend the day inland and visit the Charles Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa.  

::  Inspired.  We did a little research before our trip to the museum and discovered that cartoonist Justin Hillgrove was going to be the featured artist.  He creates a wonderful series called Imps and Monsters.  We learned he is a self-taught artist with four kids.  He paints every day (with acrylics) in his garage, usually with his two year old.  He used to paint scary monsters and, upon having children, softened the monsters up and they morphed into the sweet series he has today.  He was really kind and his son sat next to him creating his own comic book while his dad fielded questions about his art and his process.

G was shy when asking his questions, but truly interested and really liked his work.  He quickly gathered his art supplies and started about his business of drawing in a brand new sketchbook.

To say that the boy was inspired would be an understatement.  He immediately put pencils to paper.

And didn't stop drawing all day long.  He found a bench in the museum and knocked out four or five monsters.  He buckled himself in the car and immediately set about creating story lines for his creations and naming them.

When we got home he went straight to the table and put the finishing touches on all 25 of his monsters by adding color to them.  He was so proud and wanted to show anyone who would take a look at his book.  He is calling it Nymphs and Monsters, as an homage to Mr. Hillgrove and his cartoon clan.  You can see more of G's work here.

I love watching this boy's creativity unfold.  He tells anyone who will listen that he is an artist.  And he is.  His confidence is definitely puffing up as the date to his art show is approaching.  He spent two hours in a private lesson with his art teacher on Friday and moved to a new medium with acrylics.  He loves it and says he has more control over his paintings now.  His teacher shared that he painted a yellow jacket in jail.  Art imitating life, again.  I can't wait to see that one.

:: Harvesting.  The remainder of the weekend was spent gathering what I could from the garden.  Here at home the artichokes are in full bloom.

My garden plot at work is going crazy with zinnias, chard, tomatoes & basil.  I used Alice Waters' recipe for pesto and the family liked it.  I would add fewer pine nuts next time and more basil leaves and garlic, but it worked.  I had to decrease the olive oil to 1/4 cup, too.  Grady ate every last bite (which is a major feat in and of itself) and had no idea what pesto even was, but assured me it was delish.  Yes.  We will try this again and again.

 I picked the last of our Asian pears and apples on our property and then popped over to the orchard at my office to pick as many Bosc pears as I thought we would eat this week.  They are so sugary, grainy and sweet.  Dipping them in caramel with fleur de sel sounds like a must-have dessert.

My parsley went to seed, but I think it makes for a pretty little bouquet.

My 82-year old neighbor (she would hate knowing I refer to her this way, but I feel so lucky to know and live by her) gifted me with more tomatoes this week.  Her little garden really produces!  I decided to slowly oven roast them in olive oil, salt & pepper.  When I woke up at 2:30 am and pulled them out of the oven, they were a bit crispier than I had wanted.  I decided to put them in a glass jar and added a bit more olive oil to soften them and will use them like sun-dried tomatoes.  My house smelled delicious and that's probably why I woke up at that ungodly hour.

Snowflake surrounded by lazy snakes

And the cockroach strikes again

:: Pranks.  Yes, the pranks are still on around here.  I found snakes in my car today and cockroaches in books, my purse, on my pillow and on my nightstand throughout the week.  The boy could not be more pleased with himself.

::  Star Wars.  Well, it was inevitable, he is totally into Lego Star Wars figurines.  When he doesn't have his head stuck in a book or drawing, he's playing with these little, tiny guys.  He methodically takes them apart and then puts them back together every day.  The huge Yoda was acquired from his best friend and is "teaching the star wars' guys science, mom".  Right.

:: Library.  We hit the Sebastopol Library on our way back from the museum this weekend while monsters and cartooning where still fresh on his mind.  I love how whatever he is passionately into at that very the moment is reflected in his books, movies, CD's, fashion choices and his artwork.  

:: Reading.  I didn't make our monthly Babylonian Book Club meeting, but I did read The Paris Wife by Paula McLain and really liked it.  I could totally picture Paris in the 20's and it reminded me that me and the husband were there almost a year ago next week.  I could quickly recall the city in my mind and it unleashed a lot of vivid food and drink memories, too.  The book also spurred me into ordering a few classic Hemingway books from the library, as I've never read a lick of his writing.

My little bunny rabbit.  Or beaver.  Or woodchuck.

:: Loss.  The boy lost another tooth.  That brings the tally up to six baby teeth...gone.  He yanked it out himself while we were watching Secretariat (an 11-letter word, by the way, just in case anyone else crazy out there notices things like this...) last Saturday night.  He was quite pleased with himself and promptly took to putting the tooth in a Star Wars Lego Man secret compartment contraption, wrapping said Lego with a large rubber snake around his bedpost and thinking himself real clever.  He wanted to scare the tooth fairy.  I'm pretty sure this was his way of saying he thinks I'm the tooth fairy, without really saying it.  That's okay.  I did him one better...I mean the tooth fairy did him one better and left him a crisp, new $2 bill AND a plastic cockroach under his pillow.

:: Over it.  My husband was over my haphazard flower and eroding vegetable beds in the back of the house and went ahead and removed every last plant over the weekend.  It was time.  It was an unruly mess back there and when I came home and saw what he did - I felt relieved.  He spread the extra straw we had and put the beds to bed for the winter.  I like the order of it and it feels quite appropriate given the end of the summer season and the jumping into the autumn weather we have happening at the moment.

Our week was full and lovely.  I hope yours was, too.  Feel free to share in the comments below.

Happy hump day out there.