felt flower wedding bouquet (borrowed from Princess Lasertron's blog)

I found these when googling “felt flowers diy” because I want to make wreaths using felt leaves and flowers: maple leaves, sunflowers, mums for a fall wreath and poinsetta and holly for a Christmas wreath. Holy stockpile of inspiration!

I love Glen Hansard. He’s half of Swell Season, lead singer-songwriter of The Frames, he won an Oscar a few years ago for Best Original Song for the song he co-wrote for “Once,” the movie he starred in. I love him.

Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova

So when Swell Season covered Neutral Milk Hotel’s “Two-Headed Boy” for the A.V. Club, I pretty much lost my mind. One of my favorite bands covering a song from my favorite album of all time? Yes, please. And when he said that he stayed up all night recently singing all NMH songs with friends, my brain exploded. Watch the video, and if you don’t immediately fall head over heels in love with Hansard and run to buy every piece of music he’s ever touched, well, we have nothing in common. And I’m a little bit ashamed of you. Sorry, I had to say it.

I really, super-duper, multiple superlatives and exclamation points, love Fall!

the family in a corn maze

I know that I don’t need to sell you on Fall. Fall sells itself, baby: the weather, the colors, the foliage, Halloween and Thanksgiving, pumpkin-flavored everything, root vegetables, scarves and corduroys. Fall is when I feel like I am the best possible version of myself.

this tree was about a hundred different colors

On top of all that, just as Fall is petering out, I don’t even have to mourn its loss, because it segues right into my absolute favorite time of year, Christmas! But my Christmas love will need to wait for another post. Right now I need to tell you about how much…

I love my new glasses.

my new glasses

I bought them from the Etsy shop Vintage 50s Eyewear, which I heartily recommend if you’re looking for vintage frames in impeccable condition. Mine don’t even look as if they’ve been previously worn. I’ve been coveting her glasses for over a year now and finally bit the bullet after asking on Twitter for pals to pick among three pairs. This pair was the nearly unanimous winner.

They arrived yesterday and as soon as I can get an eye exam and have them fitted with lenses, I will share a photo of them on. They are definitely a bold statement, but I’m ready for a big change! I’ve never liked any of my previous pairs of glasses enough to wear them regularly, which is why my eyesight has gotten so much weaker over the last 10 years. Well, that, and all the staring at computer screens.

What are you loving lately?

I love CB I Hate Perfume. I used to search for my one “signature scent,” but now I’m more more attracted to the idea of treating scents like accessories which change according to season, mood, and outfit. The CB I Hate Perfume is perfect in that regard, because each scent is like a bottled memory.

four phials of CB I Hate Perfume

Currently, I own (and adore): “In the Library,” “November,” “Mr Hulot’s Holiday,” and “In the Summer Kitchen,” but I hope to add: “At the Beach 1966″ and “Winter 1972″ soon. And “Burning Leaves.” OH OH and “The Fir Tree.” Okay, let’s be honest, all of them.

I love baking bread. The few times that I attempted bread-baking were the old standard “knead for a hundred years and cross your fingers” recipes and the results were more or less disasters, or at least not up to my standards, so I gave up the whole pursuit.

oat bread from "Kneadlessly Simple"

A month or so ago, I belatedly jumped on the no knead breadwagon and checked out Nacy Baggett’s “Kneadlessly Simple” from the library. I’ve made around a dozen loaves of bread since and they were all perfect. Tearing off a hunk of freshly-baked bread and eating it with Earth Balance is one of the most satisfying culinary experiences I’ve ever had, and as hobbies go, this one is as cheap as they come: each loaf costs around $1!

I love making my own cosmetics.

ingredients for face oil and deodorant

I started making my own face oil a year and a half ago and my complexion has improved drastically. Recently, I have been using the face oil as a base to make my own deodorant, too, since all deodorants eventually make me break out, including the hippie ones. The details are on the photo’s Flickr page.

Finally, I love balloons. Friend to parents and nannies worldwide.

In addition to being my birthday, the party was a celebration with our Portland pals of Matthew’s and my nuptials. I was all set to make a wedding cake, and then I remembered that neither of us really likes cake. What we do like is cookies, so I made six dozen cookies, all of our favorite varieties, and stacked them in the shape of a 2-tiered wedding cake:

wedding cookie cake

The wedding topper are statues that Matthew and I found in a “free” box outside of an apartment complex while on a walk last year. They made me laugh, so I pocketed them and they’ve been on my bedside table ever since. Five minutes after I took this photo, they fell off and the lady rabbit lost her ears and part of her hat!

For the food, there was a baked potato, tater tot, and tortilla chip bar, with all the fixins:

baked potatoes, tater tots, chips, chili, fixins

This was pretty much the party food of my dreams. (If you want me to cater your wedding, don’t just sit there being jealous, just say the word!)

But I know why you’re here. You want to know if I polished off any more items on my “32 Before 32” list.

After the last update, there were still 17 items left. In 20 days, I only managed to knock out two of them:

14. Donate dead car to charity

dead car being towed out of our driveway

I can’t even take credit for this one, though, because Matthew did all the work! Thanks!

15. Make five year career goals with micro-goals to work on now

I did an awful lot of thinking on this topic. In the past ten years, I’ve been a: Montessori school assistant teacher, cubicle worker at a dot com, massage therapist, labor doula, after school childcare worker, telecommuting production specialist for the same dot com, cookbook author, and now nanny. Each has had its benefits; none were so rewarding that I thought of them as my career. I was just trying to find something that wasn’t too terrible and mind-numbing, that paid the bills, that would never require a 60 hour work week.

The fantasies that a lot of teenagers and college students have of making big money, living in a huge house, taking extravagant vacations; I never did that. As a college freshman, I watched the (pretty terrible) remake of Sabrina in the basement of my dorm with my RA one night, and Sabrina’s father says that he became a driver so that he could read all day, and I deeply related to that line.  I could (still can!) totally envision taking a job just so that I was essentially being paid to read all day.

So I drafted several five year career plans and came up with nothing. I will continue doing what I’m doing now because I love being able to spend so much time with Milo, I love the kids who are staying with me, and I am good at it. When Milo is old enough to start preschool, I may continue to watch children or I may switch gears. If Portland is still supporting a food cart culture, I think that I would really enjoy having my own food cart. I don’t know right now. But not for lack of thinking about it. If anything, I’m giving myself permission to stop thinking about it all the time.

Please let me know about your own experiences around deciding what you want to be when you grow up. I would love to hear them.

4. Visit parents
5. Build vegetable boxes
9. Get patio set so that we can eat dinner outside on nice nights
10. Build sandbox for Milo and pals
11. Go down a dress size
12. Do yoga at least three times a week
13. Sign up for charity work
14. Donate dead car to charity
15. Make five year career goals with micro-goals to work on now
16. Don’t say anything negative about anyone for at least one full week: friend, family, acquaintance, celebrity, no one. Then try to increase that to a month.
18. Take Milo to the coast for the day
19. Have a family picnic at the Arboretum before magnolia season is over
20. Go on hikes at least twice a month before it gets too hot
21. Bake for friends
22. Host a dinner party
23. Try a vegetable, plant, or spice I’ve never tried before
24. Perfect a Thai drunken noodle recipe
25. Cook Matthew a meal of all his favorite foods
26. Paint the kitchen nook
27. Touch up the border of our bedroom
28. Paint and assemble our headboard
31. Put up up blackout blinds in Milo’s bedroom for naps
32. Edit and upload a few of our videos that are sitting on the hard drive

I’ve managed to knock out a few of these!

4. Visit parents

Milo eats breakfast with his favorite dude

Thanks, Mom and Dad!

Mom and Dad

5. Build vegetable boxes

Not going to happen! I reused the boxes I used in the fall, which I made out of salvaged untreated drawers from The Rebuilding Center. They’re not going to last past this fall, so I guess I’ll have to build new vegetable boxes next spring.

18. Take Milo to the coast for the day

MILO! You GOOOOOONIIIIIIIIE!

I love living so close to the coast. To hop in the car at 9 AM and have my feet in an ocean by 10:30 is just the greatest.

22. Host a dinner party

One of my oldest friends, Jesse, is strongly considering moving to Portland, so on recent visit, we had him over and sweetened the pot by making him cocktails, delicious food, and playing volleyball in my front yard while listening to the Top Gun soundtrack. That’s what you do when you want your friends to live nearby, right?

Clifton and Jesse on our front porch

1996 was a very long time ago, everyone

24. Perfect a Thai drunken noodle recipe

I hesitate to post about this, because it has happened, but I haven’t written up the recipe yet, and I know that proclaiming: “I have perfected a vegan Thai drunken noodle recipe!” will only inevitably lead to 25 comments demanding said recipe. I will get around to it! I swear! Eventually! Maybe it will be on my “33 Before 33″ list.

There are some items which should really come off this list because I can tell you now that they just aren’t going happen in the next three weeks! But I will make some earnest effort on the more easily attainable items and check back in around my birthday.

It was truly epic! Thanks to all of you who were watching the live stream and have contacted me to tell me how much you liked it, but I deserve none of the credit. I just showed up and ate mind-blowingly delicious gourmet vegan food, for free. Best gig ever! Next year, I hope to have the time in my schedule to volunteer and help put it together.

I just wanted to share a few memories of the event, accompanied by some photos courtesy of Lucas. The secret ingredient was chocolate (I might have let out an audible anticipatory gasp when it was announced), and the chefs outdid themselves incorporating the chocolate into their dishes.

Here I am at the judges’ table, trying to quickly devour coconut-chocolate-chickpea dal prepared by the fine chefs from Blossoming Lotus:

judge's table

That dish was the dal of my dreams. I wish that I could eat it every day. It shouldn’t even be called dal, it should be called “silky flavor explosion heaven, put it in your mouth!” (Hey Blossoming Lotus, if you end up naming it that at your restaurant, you’re welcome.)

Another appetizer favorite of mine:

Qausu's fried plantains with chocolate-ginger dipping sauce

My favorite dessert of the night was Qausu’s chocolate-cashew pudding with fresh berries and peanut brittle:

oh hell yes

It was no surprise to any of the judges that Chef Qausu AsaaseYaa won the tournament (although the votes were extremely close and both Wes Hannah and Aaron Adams made some outstanding dishes), but we were all a little surprised that we teared up when she accepted her trophy.

the winner!

It was a good day to be a vegan! Can’t wait for next year.

I know it’s a phase, but it’s a phase that is troublesome to me because his father has crippling social anxiety, which makes us both hyperaware of all signs of social anxiety in Milo.

So I bought him a little bear.

I got this little rubber panda bear for $.50 at a toy store in Nob Hill when I was shopping with Lauren. When I came home, I told Milo that it was his Brave Bear, and that he should keep it in his pocket and whenever he was scared, he could take out the bear and the bear would help him to be brave. I don’t know if this was the best approach, or if it will work at all, and I’m thinking I should probably go back to the toy store and get a dozen or so of these as backup, but Milo is really into the idea so far.

I might be biased, but I think that my dude is pretty awesome, and I just want other people to have the chance to get to know him. When I was his age, I was starting conversations with strangers in the grocery store. Come to think of it, I am still doing that. I don’t expect (or want) for him to be his loudmouth mother, because that came with its own set of problems, but if he evolves into a taciturn person, I hope that it’s not because he’s too afraid to be himself.

Let’s cross our fingers for Brave Bear.

4. Visit parents
5. Build vegetable boxes
8. Plant flowers
9. Get patio set so that we can eat dinner outside on nice nights
10. Build sandbox for Milo and pals
11. Go down a dress size
12. Do yoga at least three times a week
13. Sign up for charity work
14. Donate dead car to charity
15. Make five year career goals with micro-goals to work on now
16. Don’t say anything negative about anyone for at least one full week: friend, family, acquaintance, celebrity, no one. Then try to increase that to a month.
17. Go to the hot baths with the ladies
18. Take Milo to the coast for the day
19. Have a family picnic at the Arboretum before magnolia season is over
20. Go on hikes at least twice a month before it gets too hot
21. Bake for friends
22. Host a dinner party
23. Try a vegetable, plant, or spice I’ve never tried before
24. Perfect a Thai drunken noodle recipe
25. Cook Matthew a meal of all his favorite foods
26. Paint the kitchen nook
27. Touch up the border of our bedroom
28. Paint and assemble our headboard
29. Sew bedroom curtains
30. Figure out clothing storage solution that will work
31. Put up up blackout blinds in Milo’s bedroom for naps
32. Edit and upload a few of our videos that are sitting on the hard drive

Since then, I have crossed off:

8. Plant flowers
29. Sew bedroom curtains
30. Figure out clothing storage solution that will work

And my personal favorite:

17. Go to the hot baths with the ladies

My legs and feet in a bathtub at Bagby Hot Springs, taken by Katie Marggraf

We’re going to Texas in two weeks to visit my family and have a small wedding celebration there, and I’m really looking forward to it. What I’m not looking forward to is plane travel with a 2-year-old. Twice. Milo is an easygoing and adaptable kid, but when I think of how grumpy airports make otherwise rational adults, I can only imagine what it will be like for him. If you have any tips, please feel free to send them my way.

The previous owners of our home did absolutely zero in the way of landscaping, so we have a clean slate: 1700 square feet of potential. While I should find that kind of freedom exciting, I’ve just been intimidated by it, because the sheer work required just to have an organic, weed-free yard was daunting in and of itself. However, if I lay down a carpet of anti-weed material and then put gravel and mulch on top of it, I may never have to shovel out another dandelion in my life.

Let me know if you’ve done away with grass at your home, and if you have any advice or tips!

I turn 32 on July 17, so here is a list of things I’d like to accomplish before then. I went into this deciding that fewer than half of these could involve spending any money whatsoever, and keeping to that was surprisingly difficult!

I’ll repost the list every month between now and then with items removed once I accomplish them.

Original list:

1. Get married
2. Plan wedding parties
3. Finish wedding website
4. Visit parents
5. Build vegetable boxes
6. Re-pot and fertilize indoor plants
7. Plant herbs
8. Plant flowers
9. Get patio set so that we can eat dinner outside on nice nights
10. Build sandbox for Milo and pals
11. Go down a dress size
12. Do yoga at least three times a week
13. Sign up for charity work
14. Donate dead car to charity
15. Make five year career goals with micro-goals to work on now
16. Don’t say anything negative about anyone for at least one full week: friend, family, acquaintance, celebrity, no one. Then try to increase that to a month.
17. Go to the hot baths with the ladies
18. Take Milo to the coast for the day
19. Have a family picnic at the Arboretum before magnolia season is over
20. Go on hikes at least twice a month before it gets too hot
21. Bake for friends
22. Host a dinner party
23. Try a vegetable, plant, or spice I’ve never tried before
24. Perfect a Thai drunken noodle recipe
25. Cook Matthew a meal of all his favorite foods
26. Paint the kitchen nook
27. Touch up the border of our bedroom
28. Paint and assemble our headboard
29. Sew bedroom curtains
30. Figure out clothing storage solution that will work
31. Put up up blackout blinds in Milo’s bedroom for naps
32. Edit and upload a few of our videos that are sitting on the hard drive

So far, I’ve accomplished:

1. Get married

exchanging vows

Yup!

2. Plan wedding parties
3. Finish wedding website
6. Re-pot and fertilize indoor plants
7. Plant herbs

Let me know if you’ve made similar lists!

I want to be that person, but transition and uncertainty make me physically ill. I like to know where I’m headed. I don’t even like to go on walks unless I have a destination in mind. I’d love to be the person who can just happily wander around my neighborhood or fly by the seat of my pants, but I’m so not. I’m trying to make peace with that.

Luckily for me, my life is starting to have a definite routine again. I began nannying on Monday and so far, it’s going even better than I had hoped for. I realized that all of things that I hated about my previous daycare jobs is nonexistent in this situation. I worked for several daycares where I was overworked, underpaid, utterly unappreciated—by my boss, that is, my kids always loved me and attacked me with affection, which is the best perk!

Worst of all, there were multiple times where a child with a behavioral problem was compromising the happiness of the rest of my kids, and I was powerless to do anything about it. When I was at the Montessori school, the director of the school didn’t want to have to deal with the parents at all, so she made it my responsibility to talk to the parents of problem children. I was 21 and there I was, having to tell a crying mother that other parents were threatening to pull their children out of the school unless her child could behave. I was having to tell her that while 14 other toddlers swarmed around me, tugging on me for attention. It was a nightmare.

Being a nanny, on the other hand, has been truly awesome. I am keeping the group small, and since all of the kids are only with me part-time, there is a nice rotation and variety and there are still some chunks of time where it’s just me and Milo. Matthew is currently in the application process for a few apprenticeships, so I’m really glad to have an extra hand when I need one, but the kids are sweet and easygoing, and when I wake up in the morning, there is no sense of dread. It’s funny how I didn’t really notice the dread until it was gone. How long had I been waking up, hating the idea of having to lock myself away at some point to get work done? I don’t even know. Possibly it had always been that way and I just didn’t notice, because I thought that was the default, it was what everyone felt on a weekday.

Anyway, here is what you came for, pictures of cute kids:

Jack, Milo, and Cal having a snack

Holy crap, so much cuteness!

I’m thinking about starting a happy hour for nannies and caregivers in Portland. It will be a monthly opportunity to get together, compare notes, talk about experiences. I definitely do not want it to be a bitch-fest. If you know someone who might be interested, send ‘em my way.