Separate Vacations

While our dog Farmer is in Provo crashing a fabulous Latino wedding at the Rock Canyon Amphitheater with AJ, Oliver is enjoying the Greek Festival in Price, Utah as well as using a special permit to visit the Range Creek Canyon Fremont villages.

And I'm saying "hi" from Chicago.
from this field of garlic chives, lavender, and echinacea to be exact.
with my constant companion, Mr. Agreeable himself.
While his 8 1/2 month pregnant momma is patch clamping cells in the lab, we've been enjoying the new 3 story contemporary art wing of the Art Institute. I belong here. Even their bathroom stalls are my style of vandalism. I like my vandals several ways and "kind" is one of them.
signed,
i bought some potted plants from the farmers market because it is too weird to be anywhere without my own patch of garden.

Dear Reader (especially if you live in Provo),

Two questions: Are you sitting down? and were you taught to share?

Yes?

Then prepare to be FLOORED and prepare to share the GLORY!!

Provo's own Brad Barber has been nominated for an EMMY!!! for this documentary:
An EMMY!!

Do you want to watch it? Someone needs to set up a Provo screening of Resolved soon.

signed,
clapping with gusto

One Stitch at a Time

Classic Abuelita drinking yerba mate with a dress on her head.

****
Some people love other people as if one-size-fits-all. They can grab any random hanger off the rack and wear that love just fine. And sometimes...it works. and looks easy. Hey! If you're a clever seamstress, you can alter any generic love to fit you just right.

I witnessed Abuelita's clever seamstress skills all the time. All sorts of people had a place stitched in her heart.

Sometimes (maybe rarely?) loving a particular person is a custom fit from the start. And then it's a miracle. It's sublime. And when you recognize what a custom fit feels like...it becomes the measuring tape which tells you when to iron seams or when to rip them out so that any love can fit just right.

(Or when it's time to give up the alterations and simply wear the dress on your head.)

signed,
off to drink some yerba mate

p.s.
holy gourd! Almost 5,000 views of this video.

Hedge...

...of Evening Primrose in the moonlight.That last post was half-baked.

And gooey in the middle.

This post is raw but with a crunch?

Being in your backyard haven while the entire downtown is exploding in firecrackers,
sirens,
the deafening house band on Center Street,
the port-a-potties on every street corner,
people setting up blankets and chairs to save their spot for the parade,
and bike riders weaving their way through traffic,

It's quiet and noisy
private and public.

And I wish you were here to witness it.

Maybe you are?
(I seldom know who's in the treehouse.)

Besos!

Happy 4th of July!

The last three weeks have been non-stop guests at the cottage. And I can't seem to be with my nieces and nephews and keep house at the same time. Our living room is a nest of mattresses, there are craft projects everywhere...we LOVE it!

Today everyone is in Salt Lake except for me and O'lover. The cottage is in need of some major attention before the whole city descends upon downtown Provo for the 4th of July party. I better get cleaning but first

here's a note about a very different day in the life of a housewife...a day much colder with a splash of good old-fashioned American civil disobedience.

A blustery day last December-
Started off with visiting the Utah Offices of the Bureau of Land Management. I didn't know it then but while I was outside holding AJ's sign, Tim de Christopher was inside following his conscience. Later, the U.S. Secretary of the Department of Interior deemed the BLM's sales of public lands illegal. YAY!!! And the former director of the BLM, Patrick Shea, is Tim de Christopher's lawyer. (Aside: once Oliver and I had lunch with Patrick Shea and told him all about this, which he likes very much.)
After the BLM we went to the Black Sheep Wool Company for gorgeous yarns and expert help. Here AJ is wearing a hat she dyed and felted and a scarf she wove.
*****

And now off to sweat it out on a ladder to repair some peeling house trim, Happy Fourth of July!!!

GP

Blanca Raquel Caceres Di Stefano

Here's Abuelita at her knitting machine. Her fingers worked miracles as a concert pianist (a professor at age 14!), sewing, knitting, cooking, and scratching our backs!

If you met her you were soon adopted and may have ended up in her lap! She was full of hilarious jokes (some way more racy than Mamma Mia could stand!!) and good fun. She was always falling down and then laughing too hard to get back up. Once we were holding hands in Tierra Del Fuego and Abuelita fell in a penguin hole causing quite a ruckus while trying to get back out.Growing up Mamma Mia wouldn't let us eat sweets so Abuelita mischieviously hid treats all over the house and left us little notes on how to find them.

We loved playing a Spanish card game named !jodete! (which i just looked up and is a way worse swear word than i thought, no wonder she laughed so hard every time i said it!). More than anything we LOVED sharing a yerba mate. She adored Oliver and they would spend hours and hours discussing old fashioned Argentine recipes and Tango. Abuelita passed away last night. Her beautiful soul will be enormously missed.

!!!Te amo hasta el cielo Abuelita!!!

!!!Muchisimos Besos!!!

Tu nietita

Buying Virtue, Getting "Sexy" Back, and Cottage Industry

We went to the nursery and bought santolina. Santolina signifies virtue and we need lots of that along our path to the front door. We also planted more lavender for good luck.
Yoga for Energy is my early morning best friend. One second you're going from on-top-of-the-world exalted warrior to humble and submissive child's pose (and back again) which makes you feel like everything is going to be okay. And rolling with the highs and lows of life... that's super sexy, eso es el plano.
The result of a two day sew-a-thon: seven baby dresses for TamTam's soon-to-be-born baby girl! The dresses look much cuter in real life than in these pics and will look WAAAAY more adorable with the baby wearing them. Can't wait!
besos!

Shout, let it all out.

Dear Reader,

Two things!

Firstly,
last week I resigned from managing Provo's Farmers Market.
I am sad about it but it's been a very long time coming. The good thing is that quitting gives me more time to focus on shopping there!

I am a bit of a waffler about decisions (just ask Susan KB). (HA! "Waffle"r. That's an inside joke about the market. hint.) But I am not going to second guess this decision! I am/will be working on other projects with inspirational people that I dig! More about that later.

Meanwhile until further notice please direct all market inquiries to Tom Parker at provofarmersmarket@gmail.com or call Sharlene Wilde- at 801-375-5820.

See you at the market!

Secondly,
O'lover just informed me that the green architectural firm he works for is ranked as the top most profitable architecture firm in Utah. That means green building is on the rise! Also, the Wetland Education Center they designed was just certified as the second LEED platinum building (the highest ranking for sustainable building) in Utah! Go Utah!

Cheers,
Quel

Blocking it out

Yesterday Oliver took the day off from work and we:
cleaned up after Sunday night's wonderful dinner party,
constructed and hung two lovely gates,
weeded much of the garden,
carefully watered new plants,
ate strawberries for every meal (straight from the back patch),
harvested our first raspberries,
visited with friends,
brought in our summer clothes from storage,
and bricked up a hole in the side of the house where a broken air conditioning unit used to be.

And every chore was interlaced with conversations about a new vision of our family's future. What do we want?
What do we not want?
Where do we need to build walls and where do we knock them down?
Today we continue in "vision mode". I'm not sure what the future will bring, we are usually too busy to give it much thought. But right now the future seems like a clean slate ready for drafting new plans and reshaping old dreams.

signed,
in love with the colors of the bricks but yes, we will paint over them...

P.S. I'm so proud and inspired by Susan Krueger Barber for having a painting acquired by a very important art collector!! (Ask her about it when you see her!)

Garden Q & A

Dear Reader,

Got any gardening expertise you can lend? (i can't wait til I'm a wizened old farmer!! with ALL the answers!)

***

Question from Rachel of Los Angeles:

Help! My tomato plant! Doesn't look so good! It has all these yellow leaves (see pic). What do I need to do? Water it more or less? yikes
Gritty Pretty's from-the-hip answer*:

Container tomato plants have unique problems. They don't do well in a window or covered balconey, they like the hot sun overhead. Is the tomato inside? They need insects to help fertilize the flowers (or you'll need to hand pollinate with a paint brush). Is there anyway to move the plant somewhere with direct sunlight? Also, watering might be washing the iron and other mineral contents out of the soil. Do you have access to rusty old nails? You can spike the soil with ungalvanized nails (careful not to hurt the roots). And my favorite remedy for general health of the soil...You can pee in a cup and then add water 1 part pee to ten parts water. =) Also, after you water the plant do not touch it. it only likes being handled when the soil and leaves are dry.

Reader, do you have ANY ADVICE FOR RACHEL?

Comments are on.

The garden is in full bloom

So we deliver home grown flowers to the sick and the weary (i'm talking 'bout you Sophie and Hobo, get better soon!!)Lately we've been running skating our flower deliveries and other sundry errands as a family.

signed,
thank goodness we both ride goofy.

Case Solved

Everyone who meets her, gushes over how Mamma Mia is soooo "cute".

It makes her boiling mad (which is very cute) and she often wonders aloud "Why can't people call me elegant?!" (cute pout!)

Well Mamma Mia it's because you're always doing things like wearing a tree identification tag around your neck to remind you that you need to order another winter hardy kiwi from the plant catalogue! Cute!

And because we can hardly take a picture of you without you doing this cute face:
More about Mamma Mia...

Once, when we lived in Chicagoland, Mamma Mia saw a street fight. Mamma Mia stopped the car (with us kids in it); got out; ran over to the huge group, and started screaming that if they didn't break up the fight that second she was going to honk her car horn until the police came.

They didn't believe my super cute petite Mamma Mia.

So she got back in the car and laid on the horn. And the crowd took off in all directions.

Mamma Mia, you may not have the elegant french manicure but instead frequently have dirt under your short nails 'cause your always gardening (and can't stand to wear gloves) and you can't sit still elegantly (for long) 'cause of your non-stop high energy...

but no one

no one

can take cute

and turn it into fiercely cute like you.

Besos!

Roll Call

Confession: Not that long ago I couldn't tell cucumbers from zucchinis (so embarrassing!) I just ate whatever, no questions asked. Now i can name four cuke varieties off the top of my head (armenian, pickling, marketmore, lemon) and i definitely know what i'm eating. and when to expect it to be ripe in our region. (yay for getting savvier with age!)

These are the flowers that grace our table now. They're from our garden and represent the season. You can tell time by flowers.
I am slowly learning their secrets... Every year it's the same roll call. It begins with forsythia, crocuses, violets growing in spring grass, tulips, then the fruit trees blossom, lilacs, the bridal veil bushes, arugula goes to seed, love-in-a-mist nigella is dying down...Currently the daises and irises are at their height and the lamb's ears are flowering with the peonies about to burst. Being in tune with the seasons takes patience in a world where we grew up wanting what we want and wanting it now.

Some peeps who don't know the time line think our farmers market is lacking because we don't currently have fill-in-the-blank-let's-say peaches ('cause they're now the size of marbles in the tree!!). and sometimes these people are quoted in certain local university papers.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

But then i remember i used to not be able to tell if i was eating a cuke or a zuke.

and i sorta forgive.

This is Eve. She was gestating during last year's market and will be raised at the market from here on out. She's going to grow up advantaged, knowing the timeline.
***

signed,
Henry Rollins is in my head. Anyone remember him? "it's time, it's time to align your body with your mind"--only hardcore punk.

I gotta practice!!!

Introducing Darold Francis, our favorite (and only) cooper at Provo's Farmers Market.
He's giving me a discount on one of his lovely handcrafted brooms 'cause I got lift off! five feet off the ground!!!
(Only a few people noticed that for 5 seconds i was air born!! Like that lady in the lower left corner wearing a blue tank top. Thanks for noticing lady!!)

If you can fly one of his brooms all the way around the park Darold will give you one for FREE!!!

Just Tell Your Hoodlum Friends Outside...

...you ain't got time to take a ride!

But also tell them that:

Provo's Farmers Market is manana from 11-2. (and then whisper to them hoodlums that there will be Belgian Waffles and if there aren't no belgian waffles then pappa's gonna buy them a...

golden ring, or something.)


Also coming up...there's a very worthwhile doula training (June 4-6) taught by this fantastic lady:
Melissa is a Birth Doula trainer with DONA International. For details and registration e-mail rawmelissaatgmaildotcom. Oh yeah, she also caters the training. YUM! I took the doula training earlier this year and can vouch that it was LIFE- CHANGING.

Got that, hoodlums?

Another thing!

Melissa has put together a film festival. Click on the photo to check it out!
And that scrumptious baby in the above photo? He's called Lolo and he belongs to my good friend Edie (whose hilarious kids are all hoodlums that can match your hoodlumishness and raise the roof.)

And then there are these hoodlums...
Right now Tam's finishing up her second year in med school and working at an HIV Clinic giving pelvic exams. And most importantly, TamTam is expecting her second baby in August!!! Because of Raw Melissa and the doula training, I am going to be ready to be Tam's doula.

And from one hoodlum to another, being at a birth is the best thing EVER.

xoxoxoxo,
GP




*Have you ever wanted to feel useful while your loved one is in child labor? A doula's primary focus is the laboring woman. The doula supports, massages, performs acupressure, makes sure the mother-to-be knows her options and stands up for what the mother wants. A doula is a woman in service of another woman.

Two Yays!

Firstly, as of last night Provo City does indeed allow urban hens! YAY! There was a revote and all but one council member voted for a revised ordinance. To celebrate Oliver is planning a Tour De Coops. There are some very lovely hens living in clever and charming hen homes out there in P-town...more about the tour later.

Secondly, one of my top favorite private blogs went public! I went to art school with Pamo and am so inspired to see how art not only remains a part of her life but how it forms the adventures they have as a family. (WOW.) She throws birthday parties for dead artists plus other art themed elaborate projects. Her three children are so lucky! And her blog readers are lucky!
Cake for Picasso.
Even the littlest Greta has her art displayed at a family art show.

So go check out Pamo's In My Shoes and add the feed to your google reader!

You're very welcome,
GP

Exiled

Sometimes an afternoon sipping vegetable juice and laying on your back in the treehouse observation deck...with only one beloved visitor...
and an evening sipping more vegetable juice and wrapped up in the Brazilian hammock so the mosquitoes can't eat you...
are just what is needed.

Since the news that the hen ordinance had been VETOED...

I've been referring to the ladies as political refugees. I know, so dramatic, but they are an integral part of our homestead and the thought of turning them over to willing friends' who live in a different city was...NO CAN DO. Fortunately, after speaking to Helen of the Mayor's Office, I've learned the hens are safe, for now, and hopefully forever. There's some ordinance tweaking going on and Provo may yet end up with a great urban hen ordinance.

Meanwhile the ladies continue to eat our kitchen scraps, our neighbors' kitchen scraps and even the Campus Plaza Apartments' kitchen scraps that Janise (pictured below) collects and regularly delivers on her bike. The never ending task of weeding continues ever so much more satisfactorily when you know the hens will be thrilled to feast on the greens. Spreading the chicken manure in our garden beds is a joy when you know you're using the best soil amendment for Utah's high ph.

and even though we have plenty of eggs we still buy eggs from Provo's Farmers Market as a novelty because check out Honey's good sized brown egg compared to a giant goose egg from Ralph Steele's booth.


Brings new meaning to a one-egg omelet.

Signed with a prayer,
May concerns about ordinance details be ironed out promptly

bzzzzzzzzz

Farmer wants YOU to come to Farmers' market tomorrow.
Word is that if you take a photo of your wondrous self (or even just your elbow) next to art for Provo's Farmers Market and post it on your blog/facebook/website you will get a free Provo's Farmers Market bag.
The bag is fair trade 100% cotton with non-toxic inks and looks cool.
If you please, you can snap your pic at any of the downtown kiosks that have art in the morning and then claim your bag at the farmers market sometime between 11-2. Wait, the breathtaking cjane already said all this.

See you tomorrow!!

Rising

There's a Man who i watch sleep at night. He does not wake up when I stroke his hair or let my finger ski down his nose and crash land on his chin. Even when i press his cheeks in search of dimples or lift and then drop his heavy arm HE DOES NOT WAKE UP! 

Why? Why does he not wake up? 

Because he gave the day everything he had.

Happy Birthday O'lover. Thank you for being born. You are my true love.

signed,

your happy wife

p.s. Ollie, thank you for sprouting grain and making your own starter and trying every trick under the sun to bake bread that a grain allergic gal can eat. You are a miracle worker!!!

Typiquel Day

One of our backyard prairie mushrooms for break-the-fast.
Tara and I went hiking 'round the waterfalls.We held each other back from going for a swim... it was really very very hard to not jump in.

Ran into the super great Denny Jenks of the Adonis Bronze foundry who was helping the scouts put in signs along the trail. Denny and I used to work together in my former life as a public arts director. We got home to find a naughty dog named Farmer trying to impress some strangers/visitors by playing keep-away with mouse poison. This is Tara picking up pieces of poison while Farmer was at the pet hospital where all the veterinarians know him well. Update: Farmer is still foaming grey at the mouth from the poison's antidote. He thinks it's cool. On the other hand, the intended recipient, our greenhouse resident mouse whom we named "Leprechaun", has never touched the poison. I psychically warned him not to because life would suck if he touched it but to please leave my pumpkin seeds alone. Well, Leprechaun has heeded the don't touch the poison warning but still ate every pumpkin seed I planted.

Typical. Typiquel.

Phasing out the Grass

I checked out Front Yard Gardens from the Provo Library a couple of years ago and loved it so much that I then checked it out again and lent it to my neighbors...to test the waters. One must be careful about disrupting the lawnscape of a neighborhood...And though they didn't know it, I was ANXIOUS to learn of their verdict. How would they feel about more garden and less grass?

THEY LOVED IT! (They're also the neighbors that suggested we tear down the fence between our yards and share a miniature Jersey cow so...)

S l o w l y over the years we've been carving garden space into the lawn.
Last year we planted rhubarb, watermelons, and squashes amongst many flowers and dwarf fruit trees.
Yesterday, to celebrate Cinco de Mayo, I planted tons of bright red Mexican Sunflowers.
And next week we're planting these cool seeds courtesy of our friend Thailer Bushman.
We're going to be growing these by the front porch.

This pic of the cottage was taken today. What else to plant in between the perennials...

Besos!

For the Love of the Ladies

Introducing Beverly Simone...

isn't she cute? And despite her looking forward, she was very aware that I was taking her picture. Beverly Simone is our sweet hen...who didn't get her fair share of press recently when the Deseret News and Daily Herald came to snap photos of the ladies. photo of Bridget and me by Stuart Johnson, Deseret News

photo by ASHLEY FRANSCELL/Daily Herald

Honey and I were front page news.

Many thanks to the municipal council members who voted in favor of urban hens.

I've heard tales of their fantastic gardens...

But that was before Afghanistan was in a decade long war with the USSR. Spectacular Spectacular. Afghanistan's mountains remind me of Utah.
My bro is a Major in the Airforce now stationed in Kabul.
He skyped me this morning and it was great to hear him talk and laugh and tell me about his daily life (busy). He's well versed in Afghani history (unlike me).

This is a picture of a flower garden in Kabul. Have you heard of Defiant Gardens? It's a website about gardening in war time.
I love the painted clay pots stacked in the background.

Signed,
my throat catches and i can't wait til my bro is safely home.

New Art

Oliver made this year's poster for Provo's Farmers Market. I love Ollie's lines and the old world steam punkishness.

The market starts May 2 from 11-2. Judging by the size and quality of last Saturday's vendor meeting it's going to be a rockin' year.

More from the homefront

This morning I thought a hot air balloon was landing in my back yard but really it's my neighbor powerwashing their house. SO LOUD. This is me scolding them for the assault on my ears.

Just kidding, that was me a few months ago pretend scolding (to be theatrical for the camera) the hens & ducks for eating our swiss chard down to nothing.

having the rug eaten out from under you

Our doggie Farmer was once always deservedly in the dog house. He used to eat everything including all of our rugs leaving our floors bare. The chewing phase seems to be done so I'm making some new rugs. One is braided and the other crocheted. The braided one I've taken apart several times to get it right. The crocheted one is made out of old clothes and is sooooo easy except that Farmer plops down on it every time I start crocheting.

From the Larder- Part II

Every apple that wasn't made into sauce was dehydrated. I filled about 15 jars (like the white one pictured) and cannot believe they were GONE months ago. I also dehydrated Italian plums...next year I need to do about ten times as many prunes 'cause they are delicious. NOTE TO SELF: Never again eat half a jar of prunes in one sitting. We also dehydrated zuchs & peppers and reconstitute them for soups.
Below are two of my favorite things...grape juice and vegetables in oil from an old French recipe. That old French recipe saved my taste buds! If you come for dinner request it!
Home made plain yogurt and the jam that will flavor it.
From the Blooper Reel...Ollie made me a gellatin man! With my canned peaches and grape juice. It made me sooooo happy.
Spaghetti squash really does look like pasta. (That's Robin Gumaelius's "Book Lady" hanging in the background.)
I refound the above place mats from my childhood. We're learning random factoids about the solar system and the Periodic Table of Elements while we eat.

From the Larder- Part I

I've been taking inventory and planning how we can do a better job of stocking the larder next year. I ran out of dried mint for tea by December. 50 lbs of potatoes is way too much. Last year we ran out of walnuts early but this year we still have plenty. There are a few more acorn squashes in the cellar. But we ran out of butternut squashes and spaghetti squash (my favorite!) a few weeks ago. We have one more sugar pumpkin for one more pie. But we have enough canned applesauce for deserts until next September. We have canned tomatoes and grape juice to last us a couple more years (oops). And so on...

Thank goodness for eggs. Because we keep the ladies in the warm greenhouse and make sure they have light for 14-15 hours a day they lay throughout the winter. A common meal is a walnut & honey crust filled with savory quiche or sweet pumpkin.
Or assorted greens from the greenhouse with sunny side up eggs.
Though the garden currently looks like a plot of mud if you know what to look for you can find plenty to eat already.

signed,
if there ever was a certifiable emergency there would be no gnawing on shoe leather