We came across on the barge in the truck yesterday in a snowstorm and it is still snowing as I write this. I have enough wood on the covered porch that I can wait this one out in slippers. The dripping of melting snow off the roof sounds noisy on a sleeping island. I welcome the silence like fresh air. This morning we watched a deer out the window. It's ears were up listening, probably to our mouselike noise where none existed before. Mid-morning I dug out the butter yellow wooden chair out of the back of the truck for Babygirl and put it beside my rocking chair on the covered back porch. Bundled up in snowsuits we ate warm peanut butter cookies that we had just finished baking. The connection to the landscape and the straight forward work of a cabin life satisfies something in my soul. Later with Babygirl in the pack I carried her down the beach. I found a partial skull of a sea animal washed up in the beach gravel and seaweed. As I gently brushed off the wet, clinging snow with my ungloved hand I marveled at my ignorance for not knowing what animal it was. Yet, I felt a kinship for it and it reminded me the lesson all animals and birds live.
"There's a lightness in things. Only we people move forever burdened, pressing ourselves onto everything, obsessed by weight. How strange and devouring our ways must seem to those for whom life is enough." Rainer Maria Rilke, Songs to Orpheus

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Oatmeal bread

Homemade bread tastes delicious and I make it once or twice a week. It is a task I take great pleasure in. I used to only make white bread but to increase both nutrition and variety I began to find new receipes and experiment. This is an adapted recipe from All The Way Vegetarian by Dorothy Simms. I bought this cookbook at a local thriftstore for a quarter and it is definitely one of my better finds. I looked online and while it is out of print I saw a copy on eBay for five bucks. This is my adapted recipe. In large bowl combine the following ingredients: 2 cups quick oatmeal, 1/2 cup wheat germ, 1/4 cup molasses, 1 tsp. sea salt, 3/4 cup vegetable oil, 1 cup brown sugar, 2 Tbsp(s) instant yeast, 3 cups whole wheat flour. Add 4 cups of warm water and stir in 3 cups of white flour. Gradually add as needed approx. 7-8 cups of white flour turning out to knead when necessary. I kneaded my dough ten minutes. It will still be a little sticky. Put into greased covered bowl and wait 1 hour or until doubled in size. Grease 3 bread pans. Punch dough down and divide into three equal parts. Shape loaves and put into pans. Allow to rise approx. 1 hr. and bake 325 for 35- 40 mins.
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Boots

I had no intention of looking at boots and in fact had forgotten I needed a new pair when I pushed the stroller with Babygirl in it down the aisles of a small town hardware store. That's when I saw a red Canadian flag tag on a pair of mens rubber boots. Curious, I stopped and examined them. They were light, had good tread and there was another small card explaining they were made from recycled rubber with a mailing address to return their worn -out boots to. These are Baffins and for 18.99 I now own a pair. I have high hopes for these boots that they are going to last awhile. Now I've got to figure out what to do with that made in china pair that leaks in the right foot. I wonder if Walmart will take them back.

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Things that matter are not easy

Ghandi said. "True love is boundless like the ocean and, swelling within one, spreads itself out and, crossing all boundaries and frontiers, envelops the whole world." Romantic love is shallow until everything has been stripped away and each can see the faults clearly in one another and still embrace each other for who they really are. In love like this there is hope. I took up watercolour almost a year ago. I needed a way to express my creativity quickly. It has become a filter for heart ache. Lately I have been making handmade paper from recycled paintings. But my thoughts are back with the chickadees at the cabin. I long for their cheerful chatter, to feel the tickle of little feet while feeding them in my hands. I had wanted them to come to my daughter's hand but they hadn't....yet. Instead she watched them at mine and the little birds held her spellbound long beyond the typical toddler attention span. Birds like all wild animals live in a world that is beyond the human scope of that which we qualify and that which is quantifiable. It is in the secret realm of not being fully understood. They possess the mysterious that the human soul needs including a toddler. It's time to go home.

Nursing and weaning

We are nearing the end of weaning. Babygirl is 22 months old. I was planning on having her weaned by her 2nd birthday but she is leading the weaning herself and it may happen sooner. I have been weaning on and off over several months and when I begin another round of eliminating a feeding I experience mild depression. I know it is linked to the shifting hormones in my body. I remind myself that I have reason to celebrate. My body did what it was supposed to do. Carrying a baby, childbirth, nursing and stay at home mommy hood is the most beautiful, intense, experience ever. The rewards are unmeasurable. I never planned to nurse this long. But when I saw the security and comfort it gave my daughter I wouldn't stop. There are drawbacks to toddler nursing: 1. Criticism. There is still a stigma attached to toddler nursing. 2. During this second year I have had a problem with weight gain. But the pro's out weigh the con's: 1. All the medical evidence I found makes it clear that there are numerous benefits for both mother and toddler. I found no evidence to suggest otherwise. 2. Instant toddler solace. I know that the mild depression I am experiencing now will resolve itself once my hormones stabilize. I know that my little girl still needs me and I know I am deeply blessed.