Now that it's later, here's lots more!

You probably don't care to hear about MY GARDEN. But it's our first big garden, and it's doing great, and I like to give updates! If you don't care, just skip along to the section on books...

Our zucchini plants are huge, starting to get out of control. They get way too much water. Nate is big on watering them every morning. I keep trying to tell him no, they're fine, they can get a light watering most days and they will be perfectly content, but he thinks we won't get any veggies off the plants if they don't get water. Well, I picked 12 zucchinis yesterday and added them to the seven I picked on Friday. I think the plants are doing fine.

For the record, the 12 zuchs did not come from one plant. Some how I ended up with three plants. I promise you, I only deliberately planted one. The other two were supposed to be other types of squash, but I guess I got my seeds mixed up or something. The strangest thing is that none of the three zucchini plants look alike (each have different shaped leaves) and the zucchini they yield is unique (one yields dark and skinny zuchs, one light and plump, and the third in the middle of these two extremes).

Almost none of my squash-family plants (including the pumpkins) ended up as planned. There's a scallop squash that was supposed to be a zucchini squash (or maybe a crook-neck; I can't remember exactly -- but not a scallop). There was supposed to be an acorn squash. Two pumpkins ended up in the main garden, where they are going crazy and making a mess of things. They were supposed to be in a different part of the yard where they would have plenty of room to run wild, but again, I must have mixed up the seeds when I planted them because it's a mess. In fact, I had to cut back a lot of the pumpkin runners in the main garden area because they are taking over, attacking the onions and such. Sad.

Half the corn came up and is going strong, the other half is struggling. They are in two long rows, and the healthy half are in a lower-elevation part of the garden, so I think they get more moisture. Before it became garden, that area also had more compost-like material enriching the soil. I'm noting this for next year, so we can make sure the "upper" area gets extra compost.

Some of the onions are struggling. No surprise. Onions like cooler weather; ideally they should have been harvested by now. But I didn't get them in the ground early enough, so they aren't big enough yet to harvest. Hopefully they will weather the heat and I'll get a good yield in another month or so.

The tomatoes are happy and have been thriving in the heat. I had a lot of "volunteer" plants again this year. I made room for as many as I could, so there's about 10 of them around the backyard (not including the four that I deliberately planted). It will be too much fruit when it comes to bear, but I can probably give some away at church. Oh! And to my mom. She didn't get to garden this year. .:Sad face:. for her.

The bell peppers are still growing slowly. I'm just praying that they yield something before the end of the season. Next year I will get the seeds started earlier in the green house, for sure. I also need to do more research on how to make them happy, and put them in the sunniest spot in the garden.

Finally, the sunflowers: small but cute. They are out front in the side yard. We ended up with about 25 plants. They are all for chicken food and I have no idea how much we'll get from them or how long it will feed the chickens, but I'm hoping the fresh squash and pumpkins will feed them for a couple of months, and then the dried corn and sunflower seeds will make it through a few more months. Nate's parents say that chicken feed is expensive (of course, we're just going to get two chickens, which is a lot less expensive to feed than 20+ animals.)


Now on to my next topic, one of my other favorite things: BOOKS

A couple of weeks ago I read Memoirs of a Geisha. It's a moderately dense book and takes a little while to get through. We own the movie and I've watched it several times, so it was playing in the back of my mind as I read. I was impressed at how well the movie tracks the book. It picks up on a lot of subtle details from the story line, even though it didn't have the time to get in to everything.

Apparently that put me in an Asian mood because last week I read Pearl S. Buck's timeless classic, The Good Earth. Oh... such a good book. The story was very dense so it lasted me most of the week. When I wasn't reading it, I was thinking about it. I was still  "digesting" it days after I finished reading. In fact, I'm still pondering motives and themes. It is the kind of story that literature teachers probably love to assign to students. I know I would have loved reading it for a class in college, and being able to participate in discussions and write a paper or two. I'm thinking about writing a paper on it just for fun. (It's that good.) It was a hard  read, though; it's not a standard "western" story where everything works out and the characters live happily ever after. Parts of it left me deeply troubled and saddened -- I have to remind myself that it's only a book, not a true story.

Now that I'm physically done and mentally almost done with The Good Earth I need a new book. It's August, so I can get a new "free" book on my Fire this month. I don't know what to read, though! Suggestions anyone? Grandma? I'd like to check out another Susan May Warren book but I haven't seen a free one that appeals to me. I might have to just buckle down and pay for Duchess.

My friend who is an author will be publishing a new novel by the end of the month, Queen Witch. I get to be a beta reader and I'm waiting for her to drop a copy of the manuscript in my hands. Any day now... I'm very excited! I'm hoping she might let me tease out a bit of the story line here on my blog. I might even interview her about the book, just for fun and promo. You should all be sure to download a copy when it's available and support my inspiring, aspiring friend! I'll let you know when and where you can get it.


Before I move on to the beloved topic of Baby Girl, I have a few OTHER updates...

Nate's best friend (and his lovely wife and their kids) moved into town one week ago. We've been out to see them twice -- the first of many visits! They are really easy people to spend time with, and I just adore the wife. She's a sweet woman and an amazing mom. She doesn't know it, but every time I'm with her I'm quietly watching her mothering skills and trying to pick up as many tips as possible. She inspires me; I want to be just like her.

I got a haircut this week and chopped it in half. I guess the new 'do is kinda cute.With the heat, I've just had it up, though. Whatever. It's just hair.

Nate and I are continuing to remodel in the basement, mostly in the hallway and utility room. Nate framed the door for the water heater, so there's a whole section of the wall under the stairs that's now ready for drywall! I asked him to buy a drywall knife-saw and I am ridiculously excited to use it. I've been doing a lot of wiring work in the basement. I was just going to add an outlet in the hallway, then I decided to replace (i.e. update) several sections of wiring, and I moved a light switch, and now I'm feeling so confident  in my skills that I'm going try and rewire a big section of the utility room. Doing wiring makes Nate uncomfortable but I've been reading a how-to book on basic wiring and electricity, and I don't have a problem doing the work. Plus, it's fun! A bit of puzzles and problem-solving. (Where does this why go? How do these things connect?) The downsides are that it's dirty, so I can't chase my kid around while I'm working, which means Nate has to watch her; and it takes awhile because you have to be very careful. Hopefully I can find enough time this week to finish the parts that I've started so we can get the power back on to the currently shut-down half of the basement.

I've had water on my mind a lot lately. Maybe it's the heat, or The Good Earth or Dune, or my obsession with Africa, or maybe just because I'm a hippie. (Probably all of those reasons and more.) Whatever the reason, thoughts on how to use less water and preserve/reclaim water have been swirling in my head for quite some time. Last week I ended up spending a whole evening doing research on rainwater collection and storage systems. Nate and I have been discussing this topic for quite some time; he wants to store water to prepare against a natural disaster or Armageddon, and I just want to save some money and create a more sustainable home (For once our extreme differences in opinion are a non-issue, yay!)

I chatted with my awesome mom about my research, my hopes for our system, and the possibilities. She went into research mode (gotta love it when that big brain gets set on a task -- there's no stopping her!) and found a place about 20 minutes east of here that sells slightly-used barrels for a bargain. So on Friday Nate and I took the baby out to the store and picked up five 55-gallon barrels for the price of two brand-new ones. (Nate and Kimmy, we should chat, I think you'll want to check this out.) We've lined them up at the back of the house and are planning to pipe them together, then hook up one of the rain gutters to divert the runoff into the barrels. I ordered a filter for the gutter. We also need to install an overflow valve.

Eventually we'd like to set up barrels at three or four different places around the outside of the house. It will be a tricky balancing act -- we need rain in the summer, when it doesn't rain much; they will be totally full in the winter, when we won't need rain. Hopefully we can set up enough of them to store rain in the spring that will last us through a month or two of summer. Someday I'd love to make a system that feeds some of the water back into our house, or at least into the sprinkler system. How cool would that be? We could do something like this:

At long last, here's a mix of general updates and things to do with BABY GIRL...

Nate goes back to work next week, and I go back to working part time. I will have to be in the office one more day each week, but since I will be on a reduced schedule it will only a couple more hours a week in the office. Still.... I'm not wholly thrilled about being in the office another day a week. I'm not as productive from the office, and I don't like the environment. Being at home brings me much closer to a decent work-life balance. While I'm researching away at my day job, Baby Girl will have a couple of days a week with grandma, and then a couple days a week with a friend from church. My mom very generously got a car seat for the sitter to use for Darling. It was an unexpected blessing, and frees up the money I was going to spend on a car seat for use on a bike seat!

That's right, the biking fever is intense in our house. Last week's 10 mile race got me in the mood for more. I have been back at it a little bit in recent weeks and looking forward to more time out, and taking my daughter for rides. I just ordered Darling a helmet; I'm looking at bike seats.

I'm particularly interested in this bike seat (from Amazon, available here): The WeeRide "Kangaroo" child bike seat. Instead of the traditional seat that goes behind the rider, this one is designed to sit right behind the handle bars, in front of the biker. That's appealing for several reasons, but also has its drawbacks. There's a Britax-brand seat that goes behind the rider which also appeals to me, but its a little more expensive.
I'm still in the research phase, so we'll just see where my analysis leads me. (Don't worry, I'm not going to drag you through every option and indecision with this purchase!)

My mom is helping us look for a bike trailer. She found a promising ad from someone who lives near her current house. Hopefully the trailer will be in good condition because the price is quite reasonable!

Now how about a few words exclusively on my beautiful daughter?

Baby Girl is becoming significantly more expressive. She's been clapping for awhile, and is just now mastering waving. She loves to wave at people driving by or people in the store, which tends to make people very happy -- it's really sweet. We're working on teaching her ASL signs. She has her own sign for "up" when she wants to be held (she makes a Y with her arms). She can do the asl sign for "more" food, but she's still learning that one. I'm not sure if she really understands what it means, but she will sign "more" when we're at the table feeding her. She can also do the sign for "milk" but I don't know if she's connected it to the white drink in her sippy cup. In general, Darling is very interested in signing and I wouldn't be surprised if she started picking up more things soon. I love it.

Her spoken vocabulary is still very limited (mama and dada, mostly) but she has "baby words" for things. Yesterday, for instance, when she was eating black beans for breakfast, she pointed to the dish of beans and said "bla-ba" and signed "more". So I think "bla-ba" is her version of black beans. She also has a word for water... kinda like "ar-rrr". And she definitely understands a lot of our words, but you can only tell by her face or body reactions. Still, I'm loving this phase where we can interact more and understand her needs!

In just the last week, Darling has started to stand up and "cruise" around. I've been telling people for ages that I want her to start standing and walking (I'm tired of holding her and fighting her when she wants to crawl in unclean or unsafe places), but now that she is getting on her feet, I'm a little sad. I realized that walking will be the end of crawling... it's just sad to see the end of a phase. But she really is a big girl and it's appropriate that she gets on her feet. To that end, here's a parting picture (obviously from bedtime) of my little stander: