sugar snap peas

this post is somewhat incomplete with a photo but i didn’t get a photo yet and it has to be said.  my garden is filling me with joy and strangely enough, also, with pride.  my sugar snap peas have me totally enthralled.  they are taller than i am and right now they are ripe and sweet and perfect.  while i was away they came into their own and now i can just walk out there whenever i feel like it and have a snack.  a sweet, crispy, green, fresh, homegrown, tasty, healthy, sugar snap snack.

i am in love.  i am in love with the flavor but i am way more in love with the act.  i grew these.  flash and my dad built the garden, beanie helped me plant the seeds, and actual sugar snap peas grew.  they are out in my yard.  they are food.  i am not sure, in my blogging, if my deep love of food has come through clearly and i know that right now is not the moment to wax on about it.  i am one of those people who literally lives from meal to meal, just dreaming up what the next wonderful thing i eat will be.  when i say i worship dill i don’t mean i kind of like how it tastes i mean that when it crosses my mind and i think of all the things it can do i salivate and i also feel at home.  food grounds me, centers me, inspires me, and nourishes me.

to have grown some of my own food is new to me.  this is my first vegetable garden and these sugar snap peas are some of my first harvest and when i bring them in to flash and say, “taste this,” i am saying it with pride.  with my heart full of goodness.  the sugar snap peas we get through our vegetable farm csa are just as flavorful and sweet but they are not infused with my own pride.  slowly but surely i am turning into a down home kind of mama.  i lay awake at night, restless and unable to sleep because i am thinking about making my own cheese.  learning how to can a few things. someday making my own dilly beans.  knitting a hat.  my flower gardens.  how much of the yard i can use for next years veggies.

being the person i am it is easy for me to get carried away with all this thinking and planning and dreaming and wanting for the future.  so the short walk out the back door and across the yard is essential.  the crisp snap of the pea in my mouth right off the vine is here now.  it is here and it is good.  beyond good.  it is fulfilling.  it reminds me to be thankful and to realize my baby steps are enough.  i have the rest of my life to reach my goals.  the process needs to be what i enjoy.  building, planting, weeding, growing, and eating.

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i want more woowoo

i have been thinking some about my own spirituality and wanting for a more regular looking “practice” in my life. there have been times when my guides have called for me to show the discipline to journey every day, or to practice some prayer every day. there have also been times when i have drifted to journeying only once a month or so and when i arrive and hang my head shamefully i am reminded that time and space do not exist and once a month could be every second for all the spirits care. their love and teaching do not cease to carry me even if i journey less often.

 

so all that is to say that i have had daily practice and no defined practice both and i find it all to be well and good and even supported. but lately i think a little focus might be a good thing for me. an element missing from my life that might help me stay centered and located where i want to be.

 

i am not sure what my practice should focus on so i am going to take a moment here to set my intention and see if a little communicating can clear things up for me. intention is sort of the fuel that runs the universe.  knowing, defining, and stating your intention is the key to life – in my most humble opinion. best to start there.

 

my intention is to bring a focus on my own spirituality back into my daily or weekly life so that i stay better in touch with my true self. i want to live as my true self, parent as my true self, interact with friends and family as my true self, be in my daily world as my true self, and take care of my house and land from my true self and heart.

 

 

the feeling you are looking for is a focusing in and a sense of balance. the key here is not to do more “woowoo” work for others but to spend a certain amount of time focusing and centering your self. moments of meditation would be helpful to you. this can be done with the children present and active as long as you are outdoors. the meditation can be a connecting fully with the present moment, observing the land and your children and the animals and the season, noticing thoughts that arise or judgments and then sending them downstream. you do not need silence and you do not need to envision this as a traditional meditation.

please also return to breath awareness throughout the day. your computer does not breath. you know? you do. find time to connect with your breath and with your natural breathing rhythms. notice. greet. enjoy. enjoy is the most important.

 

the work you are doing on planting and gardening is a part of your practice right now so be aware of that. dirt, seeds, plants, creation, care, attention, all these things are working for you right now to help you to get in touch with your true self. an intention to use the gardening as a form of practice will help you to get even more balance out of the time spent.

 

with that, please start working with the spirits of your land. yes, the land you live on was not nourished and loved for a long time and the spirits moved elsewhere. but they would be happy to return to you all you need to do is invite them and show them how serious you are about being a steward of their land. call out to them. ask them to come live with the peas, with your sage, in the grasses and leaves. as they settle into the land around your home, the land your home rests on, they will also fill your home itself with just the kind of energy you are seeking and thinking about.

 

yes, you are correct that the energy in your home and on your land is out of balance and that the area needs some love. you are able to love, the children by their nature love, your husband with his care taking shows love. now simply make your intention more clear. louder. call out to the spirits and welcome them home and ask them to help you care for the home and ask them what they would like their home to be like. listen when they speak. seek their counsel in your gardening.

 

and finally be grateful for your blessings. to have a home. to have land. a family to work on and with. love bountiful in your life. time each day to give thanks would center your heart and bring it into right vibrations.

 

as always, we are here with you. if you feel pulled off course simply ask for help to feel right again. rest in our loving embrace where you are whole and strong and bursting with white light from within. that is the truth. the one truth, of course, is love.

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gardening (or monday stroll)

today was a good day to get things done.  i got my meal plan sorted out and headed out to the grocery store at eight am with the pea in tow.  the bean stayed home and played with flash.  after i was done at the grocery store i decided the pea was doing well enough that we could swing by the nursery to get a few things i needed.  on saturday, at the farm festival (held at the farm we get our CSA veggie share from) we bought a bunch of plants to finish off the raised veggie bed and all my container planting.  this morning the pea and i got some potting soil, tomato cages, a few packets of seeds on sale, a badly needed new hose, and a sprinkler.  sometimes i feel like it is fantastic having a discount nursery located between home and the grocery store.

 

by the time i put her down for her nap we had already grocery shopped for the week, done the nursery stop, cleaned out the fridge, and put groceries away.  this head cold will not keep me down i tell you.  i am far to stubborn.  

 

now, for some pictures…of our monday stroll around my backyard containers and raised bed.  with some questions included for those of you who have done this before!

 

here is a view of a few of my planters on the back deck and below.  in the largest planter is some calendula from the farm, in the middle planter a dwarf sunflower, and in the smallest planter only dusty miller that you can see but i planted a few sunflower seeds in there.  we’ll see if they turn into anything.

 

here some sweet basil, dusty miller and marigolds in a planter that is one of many now surrounding the base of the deck at ground level:

 

flat parsley, curly parsley, rosemary and curry (i never knew you could get a curry plant. had to buy it when i saw it):

another shot of the dwarf sunflower on the deck:

 

i think this calendula is so pretty!  so one more peak at it:

 

a close up of some dianthus i have in many of the planters:

 

now out to the veggie patch.  here is my spinach which i think i need to thin out maybe?  someone please please help me before i ruin what could be something to eat!  and the carrots on the right hand side…do i need to thin those as well?  directions please!

my sugar snap peas growing up the string i put up for them.  do they look ok?  anything i need to know or do here?

 

my 4 “rows” of bush peas.  again, they look ok to me but i don’t know if i should be thinning so each plant has more space?  

 

the whole bed from the far end.  (did i do the tomato cages correctly?  or do they need to be pushed more deeply into the ground?) tomatoes, peppers, eggplant and broccoli, bush peas, marigolds scattered throughout, snap peas:

 

some close ups just for fun:

 

 

 

 

 

oh, i almost forgot!  i planted a row of colmbine seeds between my spinach and broccoli (they were a party favor), and a row of “sea shell mix” cosmos between my bush peas and the eggplant/broccoli row.   

 

my next planting project is to plant the rest of my dusty miller and two packets of “wildflowers” in with my “baby tree garden.”  of the ten trees i got only one is showing signs of life and it is getting a little depressing.  hoping to perk things up again by adding some life.  while i was planting in the veggie bed the eggplant’s told me that vegetable plants like to be near flowers.  take it or leave it as your belief system allows.  sounded good to me.  who doesn’t like to be growing near flowers?  so, my trees with get some flowers.  that is, if those seed germinate.

 

all in all a good day so far.  i am hoping to make the homemade pasta off pw cooks this evening at my parents house for dinner and flash is throwing together a tomato and eggplant sauce to go on it and my dad is putting something on the grill. both the bean and pea seem to be fighting the same cold i am so they are a little down and out. here is hoping we make it through for a nice dinner. and perhaps some nice wine too…in honor of some of my new mama blogger tweeting friends.

peace out people.
woowoo

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reality check

 

naps

 

i have been exploring twitter recently which is a win lose situation.  on the win side there are some funny people out there and reading their quips and looking at links they put up is entertaining and occasionally enlightening.  on the lose side i have yet another social media to spend my time on and yet another way to compare myself to others and come up short.  

 

not that anyone on twitter is telling me i am mediocre or anything.  (and not just because i seem to be the only one who uses that word.)  its just that i read these little updates and i have to stop and think, “what?”  sometimes when i look around my cluttered house with camera’s and arbonne products on the kitchen counter, cloth diapers and shipping boxes on the dining room table, toys in every room including the bathrooms, i can tell myself it is ok because i am very busy taking care of my two kids.  or even, on my more judgmental days i might think that people with cleaner homes must not be parenting as attentively as they could, or that they are perfectly wonderful parents but they are not ap and i have chosen to be ap and thus i get less done.

 

but then i get on twitter and there are these potentially great, maybe ap, mom’s and dad’s on there who are tweeting away about their swept homes, and line dried laundry, and early morning 5k runs, and late night shredding and i am a little unnerved.  i can’t help but compare myself and conclude that i am falling short.  i do not have this whole thing down.  i might be a farce.  i do still spend some time every day with the chickpea in her wrap snuggled in on my chest for a nap.  and i don’t get much done during that except laptop type things.  i don’t really want to say goodbye to this nap time together, snuggled with my baby, bodies fitting nicely together, feeling her move through sleep cycles.  this is the last baby after all.  when she is done with the nap thing i will never do it again.  

 

but still, i can’t help but feel i am falling short.  disorganized.  untidy.  not working out enough days a week.  garden not weeded and mulched, some plants still not planted, laundry in the washer and drier that should have been folded and moved this morning to make room for me to start the next load, fridge full of who knows what.  i could go on.  it might be nice some day to see a succession of tweets about the things we have not finished.  just so i didn’t feel so alone.  i can’t be the only one out there with my mouth hanging open and my brain exploding.  can i?

 

 

dining room table post fsot photo shoot

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peas

victory told  me that if i planted some seeds i would end up with things growing in my garden.  the thing is i totally did not believe her.  i was thinking i have no green thumb and no idea what i am doing and what will happen is i will look forlornly out my window at my 4×8 raised dirt patch all summer.  but guess what?  victory was right.

 

 

above you can see my two rows of sugar snap peas in the center of the photo with my bush peas peaking out behind them and a little carrot fluff in the lower left corner.  carrot fluff!  and my spinach is not in the picture but it is there.

 

i am totally thrilled that there is some green.  green!  in my vegetable garden!  sometimes just peaking out the window at this sight kind of makes me feel a little burst of energy.  now if only i could figure out if my baby trees are ever going to come out of “dormant” and into “alive.”  i am worried they are not getting enough sun.  anyone have any tips?  or gifted at speaking with dormant trees?  or got any idea who i should talk to since the dormant trees don’t seem to be very chatty?

 

while i am on the topic of talking the trees.  i remember reading this book about ten years or so ago when i first got serious about animal communication and it was about this botanist that talked to his plants and was a very sucessful and famous botanist.  do any of you know who i am talking about?  i would like to revisit the man or the book but i am totally drawing a blank.  and then there was this garden somewhere….maybe in scottland?  or somewhere like that, where they were growing tropical fruit and had this lush amazing garden in land that was supposed to be unable to sustain that kind of growth and they said they talked to the land fairies or plant fairies or something.  i would like to find that information also.  but, for all kinds of reasons that we do not need to delve into, i seem to be incapable of remembering enough to relocate these sources.  so if you read this and have a clue please help me?!  thank you.

 

peace out people.  remember, i won’t be around this afternoon because i will be in the hands of a very capable hair artist named jimmy.  not that this blog is live and you care if i am around or anything.  but just so you know.  

 

i just was thinking me and my haircut is a lot like a kid and their birthday.  i talk about it everyday for weeks prior to the event.  i wonder if the anticipation is more then half the fun…like birthdays.

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my garden! it grows!

 

or possibly these are all weeds.  ok, that might be.  i will put some pictures up and let the seasoned vegetable growers tell me.  but, i see green!  in my vegetable patch!  and this is my rookie season!  thank you victory for telling me to plant, and telling me to go look.  alrighty, i know these pics are kind of m.c. sucky suck but it is hard to get a picture of things this small with my lens.  

 

 

this might be spinach? maybe?

 

more spinach? (or just hay grass growing;)

 

one of these three things might be a snap pea?

 

i think these are more potential sugar snap peas?

 

(although i can’t now remember where i took this picture.  maybe these are the potential um bush peas.  wanado?  i have NO idea what i am talking about.  luckily these little green shoots don’t care.  they are just aiming for the sun no matter what i call them.)

 

chick pea loves the gardening.  her favorite part is testing the soil to be sure it is primed up nicely for the plants.  here she is right after i removed a clump of dirt and two small sticks from her chompers.

 

 

yum

 

see my funny stick row markers? i also used a sharpie to mark the bed wood!

 

these could be little marvel bush peas. or they could be weeds.

so that is what i got today.    maybe as these tiny little sprigs of life grow larger, if they deign to do so, i will be able to get a few clearer pictures and the whole thing will look more like a garden and less like a place full of sticks and dead leaves.  i will have to know i shoveled up those sticks and dead leaves (with a little soil mixed in) from a paddock at my parents house wearing the not so tiny pea on my back during our first heat wave and filled muck buckets with it and brought it back here just to treat my plants to some composted horse poop.  so i am totally sweating out the hard labor as a rookie.  so it would be awfully kind of the universe if i got a plant, or even a vegetable out of it.  although, even if i don’t, i guess the pea got some seriously nice dirt to eat.

 

three cheers for creating.  it seems to be the theme this week.  go forth and make something for yourselves.  and if you find an obstacle in your path just ask your guides what to do.  they have the most wonderful advice sometimes.  and they are more then happy to hold you tight when you feel dark and alone.

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growth

things can grow around here.  i have proof:

 

 

my sage

 

 

 

french tarragon

 

both of these came back in the front garden my mom and i planted last summer when i was very very very pregnant.  i did plant some seeds in the raised bed this week though.  if anything decided to grow i will show you.  if not, at least i tried.

 

peace people. lots and lots of peace.  we need it.

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