Winter Madness

Little Mechanics


Max Guns It


Thomas Loves Speed


We have more snow in Vermont than I think I've ever seen there. The banks are taller than the boys, which is useful when they are snowmobiling.

Kind of like giant bumpers.

I am reposting these, so that you can appreciate anew just how crazy these boys are. Not even three and I think they drive a snowmobile better than I could - except for the braking part, of course. And also so that Papa Gary can see just how crazy the twins are on the snowmobile.

How To Visit The Mini-Farm: Part m, Part t

Start by being two, and a twin. Wear the biggest pom-pom you can find. Don't bring directions, you don't need them. You're two. Let this be one of those places so familiar to you that you don't even know where it is, just what it's like. Be curious. Find out. Look in the barn, open cabinets, flush the toilet, see what happens. Look for animals, find only the dog. Be curious about her, but shy. Fall in love with the riding lawn mower. Point to things. Eat as many tangerines as your mom will let you. Hop on pop. Hug your aunt, she sounds like mom. Sleep in a tent (indoors) with a tiger (stuffed). Be adored. Wake before everyone else, open doors, peek inside. No one really minds. Wave goodbye when you leave, buckled into your carseat again. Forget your sippy cup. Make dad drive back. Drive away again. Grow up a little, not too much. 

Come back. Come back soon. You are missed. 

Eagle Fest

The weekend has been too short. I haven't put together the new wardrobe I bought for the same room upstairs, the one that will allow me to move beyond boxes, get clothes off the floor, make weekday mornings easier, or set up the little bench with the baskets underneath it. I didn't make gougeres or fish tacos, or finish all the promotion and merit increase letters for work, and now I'm leaving sick Tom with nothing easy to make himself to eat (except frozen pizzas) while I go to Dad's for dinner, a trip that will be 5 hours at least because of the drive. I have to admit, I feel a little discouraged and behind. 

Which makes this the right time to remind myself that I did get to the grocery store and to think again about how yesterday afternoon, six bald eagles sailed and swooped over our back field while we stood there, amazed. They were so close, you could almost feel the weight in their bodies as their huge wings labored to lift them higher, then extended to stillness, coasting. I got a few rows done on our couch blanket, and made fresh-squeezed orange juice, and most everything else will have to wait.

Blue

Creede was the first place I ever really felt the weather intensely. I had to think about that a bit, before I typed it here. Growing up in Seattle, you do feel the weather. We have seasons, vivid memories of the occasional snow in the winter, streets closed, sledding, or summer t-shirt weather, the way there was still a chill in the morning when I went outside to ride my bike, probably the last days of me rising early on purpose, and of course there was always rain. We did feel the rain intensely, but in such a different way, and maybe the difference has something to do with the fact that it was more of a mood than a force.  

In the city, rain was something that, in a matter of minutes, you could get away from. Even if you get caught in a downpour on the way home from the bus, there are dry things at home, you can take your wet shoes off, towel off your hair and put your PJs on.

The rain is back, and my whole house has wet shoes it can't take off. There is a constant trickle through the basement and the sump pump goes off periodically all through the night. Thomas Road is closed again, and so is Allen West just past Chuckanut. The water in the fields reflects the moon at night, and it ripples in the wind, almost as though it had a tide, and maybe it does.

Three Years Ago

I didn't have a good camera. I didn't even know what a good camera was. I liked taking pictures, though, and when I look back now, there are still photos I like from back then. Like this one, frost on a few little tufts of grass next to the hot springs in Colorado where I spent a night with some of my favorite friends three years ago this January. The hot springs in the freezing night air, steam rising from them - heaven. Those friends, also heaven.

We picked words for the year while we were there in Colorado. What did I chose then... bravery, I think? It worked. It was a year when I needed it, and it came, just enough. I haven't picked a word for this year yet, I'm at a bit of a loss. Two weeks in and it's a mixed bag so far.

When Tom and I walked outside this afternoon, there were frogs croaking everywhere, and a bald eagle in the tree, and I spent a roll of film on him and Emmy and it was almost 50 degrees, I think, but more importantly, it was not raining. What do you call the pool of flood water that lives behind our field for these wet winter weeks? There is some word between pond and puddle for it. Sometimes, I just struggle for the words. Today I tried to write an email that felt important, and finally, after writing and deleting and cutting and pasting, going away from it, coming back, I just gave up.  It might be one of those situations where saying little is best, and at this point in my life, I can live with that. I'm better at that than I used to be. That was how I ended up outside with Tom and Emmy - I had been drafting that email, until all the rewrites made me realize I should go outside and walk around, and then see how I feel.

When I came back inside, I felt the same as I had before, at least about the original email to which I was trying to respond. Wounded, incredulous, disappointed. A little scornful. Still, calmer. Resigned. Tom made bread and I watched the Golden Globes and ate tamales for dinner and drank some fresh apple cider and did the dishes, a few at a time, never quite finishing the whole sinkful. 

What's Gone

Sunday there was snow all day. Kate and I had a trip planned, me heading south down the island to meet her in one of my favorite little towns anywhere, meeting up for coffee and lamb chops and yarn and books and girl talk. I was going to take the big camera and a million layers, including fingerless gloves for my hands which more and more turn white at the fingertips in the winter cold. But once the snow starts like it does, things get unpredictable, and venturing over a sky-high bridge at a place called Deception Pass starts to seem  more stupid than adventurous. So we called it off, and when it warmed up, I took a field trip over to Anacortes, up the snowy hill and off to the yarn store for supplies for a blanket for our new couch. I bought groceries, filled up the car with gas, felt all stocked up for more winter. On the way home, a huge fog bank had rolled in, and the sun was setting, and I kicked myself for having left all the cameras at home. I do that, all the time. Then I vow to never leave the camera at home, then I vow to be okay with letting things go. That day, it was just me, frozen fog, sunset, the whole valley spread out, fields and trumpeter swans and red-tailed hawks and the long roads that take us where we want to go, and on every one something to see. 

Resolve

Everyone has been fed crescent rolls and coffee, Emmy is napping on her blanket on the couch and Tom is fooling around on a guitar. Some of my time over the weekend needs to be just this. Calm. I have resolutions too, though, a need to get things done. Those sweaters in the messy spare bedroom aren't going to fold and organize themselves, and at some point we need to put up the hardware for the new curtains in the living room, and take down the Christmas tree. For Christmas, I gave away some things handknit by me, a hat for Dad, one for Tom's sister Jenny, then a few weeks later I finished Jessica's Lighter Lights Darker Darks hat, which turned out to be the red-tail hawk hat in the end. She wore it to the Longhorn for taco Tuesday and I loved looking at that hat on her so much that I vowed to knit more, and give away more. Time to learn honeycomb stitch for a navy alpaca scarf that will eventually makes it way to Maine.

Something New

The back porch finally defrosted the night before last. The last day of Jessica's visit, little snowy hailstones had fallen, covering it and sticking there, cemented by the cold nights. Inside, I wear a rotating selection of handknit hats, two layers of sweaters and there are two comforters on every bed. Every single day home over the holiday break was beautiful, rain, sleet or snow. We watched a redtail hawk catch something on the mole-infested croquet lawn (if only it had been the mole!) and the binoculars we got for Christmas were kept on a top shelf for easy access in case that bird which may or may not be an immature bald came back. Tom cooked good food and when I got really cold, I did dishes to warm up. The dining table is too close to the pellet stove to use it for heat, and anyway that funny noise it made last time we used it has made us wary. I know, time to go to the woodstove store and finally learn how to maintain the thing. In the mean time, I've been liking the bundling up, the fake suffering (oh no! it's a mere 64 degrees in the house!) and how nice it all makes a cup of hot tea seem.

Sun Today

kitchen at Tweets

There was a little. And we were aware all day of the solstice coming. I felt terrible mostly, headache from something or other, but at least there had been a good night's sleep, and things accomplished on Saturday. The holidays feel like homework I can never catch up on, then an obstacle race, then a long wait in the waiting room for next year. I don't know anyone who doesn't have some mixed feelings about the holidays, but opting out doesn't really happen either. I don't even want to opt out, but every year I do think about what will be most comfortable, and every year I take a guess, never sure. 

Still, there are only three more work days left, and then a few days of chaos, and then... time at home. For a little while there, I was cooking some, doing dishes, knew where things were in the kitchen, had clean laundry. But then there was the sinus infection and portrait class finals and clothes all over the spare room upstairs and the little room off the living room neglected, card table from Thanksgiving still up, and I have not even come close to doing my share of housework. I'm ready to look for curtains and replace the refrigerator, and at least sort clothes into piles. I'd like it if there was a day when I did all the cooking, washed all the dishes. Sometimes that feels good. The mini-farm taught me that.

Everything's fine once you get your crossover back

Outtake from final project for color portrait class

At some point this weekend, someone, Susan maybe, asked me what I needed to do when I got home on Sunday. I was thinking about the all-county Western Washington flood watch. The basement, the sump pump, the puddle that forms in our circular drive, the one that sits just on the other side of the fence from the greenhouse. Not to mention the photos on the wall at the coffee shop on the corner, the intersection of our road and Chuckanut Drive, completely submerged, the marquee changed to read "No wake zone." Not that there's anything I could do about it, but that's what I was thinking about.

I had gone to Seattle completely unprepared. I wore a long underwear shirt with dragonflies on it to the roller skating rink, a fur cape to dinner in the rain, suede boots all day both days and didn't have socks to wear roller skating (Jenn saved me with a pair she had in her car). I did have my knitting with me, and I worked on a hat while Jenn and I sat at her kitchen table, the night I stayed over at her place. We ate cereal and drank tea and talked about handwarmers and reading and which one of us had time for it and who did not, and it felt like a present to hear that she still wears the handwarmers I knit for her I don't even remember when. In the morning Freddy's little 4-year-old voice woke me up and I stayed in bed a little while listening to him and trying to commit the little things he said to memory. All that's with me now is the way he said he had gotten "soakin" the day before in the rain, and how he tricked me with the plastic poo he and his dad left in the room with his paintings for me to find. Tricky kid! Apparently he and Chris had been scheming all evening. 

It didn't matter, my unpreparedness. I went from one thing to the next, friend to friend, totally delighted to see every single one. I didn't care about my dirty hair or wet feet or anything else. The feeling of seeing everyone was the best thing. 

Even so, I wanted to get back to the valley. The Samish River, closest to our house, has gone up to 11 feet from 6, and is 7 feet from flood stage. Our road is closed just past Chuckanut, but it's not the way I need to go anyway. From inside the house you could hear the water streaming off the gutters after our movie ended. When I came home, though, the rain was gentle, and Tom and I went out in wellies and duck boots, did the usual backyard survey, feeling how soft the saturated ground has gotten, looking at the pond that has formed in the cow pasture, watched the trumpeter swans sail overhead and then glide in to the new water feature out there. If you look over our back fence just the right way, it looks like we have a view of a lake, or the ocean, or something much bigger than a puddle. It's pretty, and there is at least one bald eagle back in the biggest tree on the property, and I'm happy to be here, for however long I am. Sometimes it's obvious just how little that is up to me.

In Case You Were Wondering

The twins are on strike. They've chosen the Bob the Builder theme song as their anthem.

Quiet

At exit 212 on Monday, a coyote lingered in the median, so small he looked like a cat on first glance. The next day, an eagle tore apart its prey right there on the ball field at the corner of Chuckanut and Allen West. The hawks wait, on fence posts and guard rails, on snags and bare tree limbs, always. 

The other night, Tom sat on the edge of the bed playing guitar as I fell asleep. It was so pretty, a sound that equalled quietness by the sheer force of how gentle it was, in perfect harmony with rest.

A friend who I don't see often lost her husband yesterday, out of the blue. He was our age. When I called Karl to tell him, I couldn't help but cry. Who wouldn't? For some things, there is little consolation. He was a good person. Funny, and talented, and smart, the kind of man who looked at his wife with love and nearly always wore a smile. 

After

This morning I couldn't get the pancakes to cook right, hang together or hold blueberries. I browned Tom's egg a bit, and the medium-boiled eggs just weren't appealing. At dinner time I realized I just don't feel like cooking any more. I'm not sure I even feel like reheating. Yesterday evening the turkey sandwiches were so good, the poached salmon a bit tough and not really flavorful. There are two pounds of green beans already prepped, ready to just cook in butter. That might be dinner. We have so much cheese left, but the dip has expired. The little satsumas should have gone away with Allison and the boys, who could have eaten a dozen of them before breakfast, I think. The best part of their visit was going up to my bedroom the morning after Thanksgiving, crawling into bed with Thomas and Allison. He was awake and talking, Allison, barely. It wasn't long before he crept out in his little PJs, to go see what his brother and dad were doing downstairs. Allison put a sweater on over her nightgown and followed after him, but I just stayed in bed for a while. It's cold in that room in the morning, but the comforters and quilt are heavy and the white sheets are cozy. 

I haven't figured out what to hang on the wall up there yet, so there's a Karie Jane drawing that belongs to Tom, and that's it. He put it up there when we first moved in, and every once in a while he notices it again and says Hey! That's mine. There are so many Karie Jane pieces. Also four Todd Horton's and four Jessica Bonins, not counting Tom's. We moved the table that was in the little room by the kitchen into the living room by the wood pellet stove, and the little room by the kitchen has a couch now, and a side table, and its own tree. You can sit there and strum on the baritone ukulele when no one else is home, or drink hot chocolate and think about what art you want to hang where, or read the internets, or write a blog post. It's better this way. I made a striped hat that goes with my sparkly wellies, and very little progress on the trashed spare room, but I did wash a lot of kitchen towels, and sheets and the bathroom is still mostly clean and the big vacuum cleaner doesn't work now but you can still get by with the dustbuster on the area rugs if you're patient.

I don't know what's going to happen with the little study off the living room. For Thanksgiving it was the kid's room, sort-of, which wasn't too smart when you consider what a bad idea it is to slam that door that has all the glass in it. It turned out fine in the end, and nothing was broken, and nothing burned. Afterwards, we were tired, but sometimes a nap is another one of the best parts. 

This is it

We were determined to get a portrait of her. She was determined to bark. We both won.

All week there were rumors of snow, and all week I thought to myself, I hate having to cheer against it. Once we've been to the grocery store, and the drafts under the door have been stopped, and there are plenty of wood pellets for the pellet stove and I'm off for the week, then, I cheer for snow. Until then, I hope against it, regretfully. 

When I pictured going to the Anacortes farmer's market this weekend, I naively imagined the food vendors all cooking over their hot grills, tamales and pork tacos and vegan stir-fry wraps and maybe something with an egg in it. I was pretty sure there would be a latte. There had to be a latte, right? No. That wasn't the scene at all. In fact, it was so cold that the coffee in the thermos at the coffee stand had gone most of the way cold and the stand itself was practically blowing down in the chilly wind. There were lovely piles of produce at the few produce vendors who were there, but almost everyone seemed to be asking the vendors "What will you do with all the extra?" since the wind seemed to have kept people away. The beets I had my eyes on for roasting were on their way to the co-op, at least that's what I think I heard that vendor say. Ordinarily, a line two deep at a farmer's market is no deterrent for me, but Tom had been right when he declared the cold "unbearable" almost as soon as we got out of the car. It really was, because of the wind, mostly, and neither of us had dressed for it, so the beets stayed there and hopefully I'll catch up to them at the co-op tomorrow. There was no line for rainbow chard or red carrots, and the vendor piled a little tumble of loose carrots in with my bunch, and both big bundles only added up to $4. It was warmer inside, so we went there, where people were selling soaps and cheeses and dog biscuits and felted cell phone covers and snowman soup and beautiful looking puddings and baked things with cranberries.

Tom was sure that they only picked him for the door prize (every 20th person wins! the woman told him) because he was the grouchiest looking person there, and I liked that idea. Wouldn't it be brilliant if it were true? We bought a salt and pepper shaker and tasted a wheel of cheese that had been covered in cocoa powder and chile and black pepper, and Tom tried on hats but didn't find the right one. Afterwards, we had breakfast at Adrift, my favorite place in Anacortes. My mom took me there the first time I went, and it was crowded then and has been 20-minute-wait-crowded a few other times I've been there too. I've always been happy to wait, though, like the time Tom and I went to Todd's art opening and then afterwards had a late dinner where I got the last of whatever it was I wanted, and we sat at the counter, watching everything come out of the oven and off the stovetops on to the table in the middle of the kitchen where everything gets plated and arranged before it is promptly transferred to you where you wait. All the past waiting only served to make me feel lucky when we walked in at two and never slowed our stride from the time we walked into the restaurant until we sat down at our table in the room with all the books and the sails overhead and that painting of the gulls and sky, framed by what looks like driftwood that's been nibbled at artfully. Everything I ordered tasted like the right thing, and it was turning out to be the kind of day where even what looks like a boring old red apple sliced in a fan on your plate turns out to be a perfect crisp pear instead.

After errands we went home to Emmy, and I put the delicata squash in the oven right away, then for a little while watched Tom fiddle around with the sorts of things that you fiddle around with in the cold when you are trying to take care of a house, and then the squash was ready to come out, so I started cooking up the chard with onions and bacon and Tom put a pot of water on to boil for the tortellini and soon enough dinner was ready. It was a good food day.

On Friday the Molly Moon ice cream truck came to work and everyone came outside, whether they had warm coats or not. The rain started 30 minutes into their visit, but that only meant that we congregated in the lobby, comparing pumpkin clove to scout mint, hot fudge to vanilla caramel sauce. Some people had cones that their dishes of ice cream wore like hats, and I had whipped cream, jimmies and a cherry on top. The only thing I skipped was the walnuts. Never was a big walnuts fan.  Walnut fan or not, though, both days were days where there was very little to complain about.

First rule of cooking

Kate, who is skilled enough to leave the kitchen when she cooks, in our Ballard kitchen. 

(the kitchen I never use & in which I do not have one single possession or item of food)

Stay in the kitchen while you are cooking. This is something I am not good at. I'd rather have something else going at the same time, why is that? It leads to disaster, though, things stuck to the bottom of pans, burning, or failing to realize that I've got the wrong burner on, or accidentally turned the oven off after I preheated it to 450 for the steaks. I'm getting a little better, though, now I'll stay in the kitchen mostly, doing dishes if there is a little down time. Mostly, though, I'm still cooking too many things at a time. Pasta boiling and fresh cherry tomato sauce cooking and steaks being pan-seared before their trip into the oven, and a butter sauce on the stovetop, missing most of the ingredients that would make it qualify as a sauce rather than just melted butter. 

Last weekend that meant that I made the nice fresh cherry tomato sauce but ruined it with too much salt, until Tom came in to try and rescue it, and I opened the fridge to look for some miracle rescue ingredient that we were talking about when I saw the ricotta cheese that was supposed to be part of the sauce. Whoops. Forgot! Luckily, the ricotta did in fact rescue the sauce and it was delicious, though at that point there seemed to be about a gallon of it, owing to the fact that I had added every single tomato I could find and various other things before discovering the ricotta.

Oh well.

If anyone thinks that Thanksgiving dinner will be anything less than chaotic, well, then they are an intruder who doesn't know me and should be promptly invited to vacate the premises. Or they are related to Tom and should be settled in on the couch with a nice pumpkin cracker and some crab dip and possibly a hot cider. I don't know why I think that Thanksgiving will be lovely, but I do. Between the turkey, ham and salmon, one of those things has to turn out edible, right?

In which things get better

Around mile 21, there was a heron like a hitchhiker, standing right by the side of the road. At mile 18, there had been a bald eagle in a tree, same milepost where I saw an eagle drift over all the lanes of I-5, last time I made the morning drive from the mini-farm. The dessicated corn stalks that I had hoped to photograph in front of one of the abandoned houses on our street had already been cut down by the time I got back from California, but there are red blueberry bushes now, brighter than flame, and I know now how many things there are to photograph on Bow Hill Road.

Bow Hill Road is the route we took to the Bow Little Market the last time Kate was in town. They've got their holiday fair going this weekend, so tomorrow I'll be up before noon, eggs for breakfast, then on my way  to see what our Bow neighbors have to offer. There are errands to run as always too, a trip to Lowe's for a space heater for the upstairs bedroom, which won't get warm unless you've thoroughly roasted the downstairs rooms. Cozy is good, roasting is bad. Hopefully we'll pick up the last of our new light fixtures, and run some errands in preparation for Thanksgiving dinner, which is going to be the biggest gathering we've ever hosted at the mini-farm, double the size of the infamous bachelorette party. 

There's a frog in there somewhere

I did it again. Made what seemed like all the mistakes possible. But I'm getting better at recovery. I had the enlarger set to white, which was a problem since it turns everything red - Emma looked like she was playing guitar in a moodily lit nightclub rather than the northern California fall sunshine. Then the kickstand on the lens was wide open so duh everything was overexposed at first. But by the end of the night I had some beautiful 10 1/2 inch prints, if I do say so myself. I love seeing the images that big, even on the toy camera shots that I was printing, the color was pretty good. The Bronica shots are just downright gorgeous, so crisp, with rich bright color. If I could have gone out and spent more film that moment, at 10PM, I totally would have. 

The photo above, just a snapshot. Tom and I were in the yard and he spotted one of the sweet bright green  wee frogs that live there, and I wanted to capture it. So there it is. A frog.

Just showing up

I'm not sure which writer is was who said to pay attention to the stories you find yourself telling over and over, to find where the meat is. On the radio today, there is another story about the new Cleopatra biography and two about sonar affecting marine mammals and what is being done to fix that. I'm thinking about hot chocolate and seasonal ice cream flavors and color correction. The photo above is the one that came out right in the color darkroom the other night, so I have finally dragged out my box of 11x14 paper and  will see how that goes tonight, with the help of my portrait class teacher. I have to give a talk on a photographer whose work speaks to me, so I'll introduce the class to Mary Randlett, even though I can't find a single color portrait she's done. I feel so clueless when it comes to fine art photographers, especially photographers who work in color. If you anyone out there has ideas about who I should be looking at, speak up! 

On the phone at night, Tom and I talk about Thanksgiving, what we need to do, what we want to make, me in my bed in Ballard and him wandering around the back field at the mini-farm, investigating Emmy's hunt near the greenhouse. I imagine him wearing the grey wool cardigan he fished out of Jessica's basket at the LaConner thrift store and tell him to give Emmy a pet for me. I've got another night in Ballard before I can join them and our new light fixtures for hot tea and knitting on the couch before bed. 

Pretty Much Everyone Was Smiling

It was a big deal for me to ask the other writers in my workshop to pose for portraits for me. The fact that part of the piece I wrote for the workshop and then read in class talked about what a terrible student I was for my first photo class only added to the angst. But in the end, people volunteered and were patient with my fiddly focusing and even Ron C agreed to a photo, all Ray-Banned, silver-haired, well-seasoned cool, but not before specifying that the portrait should be for my own use only, of course. It was a good week, just enough clothes packed, all the signed books I came home with fitting into my luggage, but just barely. The week felt economical, well-used, not a moment wasted or to spare. There was the trip to coffee in town every morning, then the rush off to workshop til noon, panel discussions after lunch, readings at  night, and then a few nights crammed into Sarah and Emma's room, with bananagrams and chocolate and gossip about ourselves and bad song lyrics. Always bad song lyrics. 

I came home with a notebook full of scribbles, a few word documents and some thoughts about form. I've never really thought about form before, how to map out a piece of writing, in my case, just how to put a frame around the space I'll make for sitting down, writing out what I've got. 

This is about as close as we got to Happy Birthday

It's harder than you might think to get two toddlers to sing or say happy birthday and simultaneously film yourself and them doing it. I'm just sayin'.