Cloverleaf Rolls for St. Patrick's Day

2 cups whole wheat flour
2 1/4-2 3/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 cup milk
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup butter
3/4 tsp salt
2 beaten eggs

Mix whole wheat flour & yeast. Heat milk, sugar, butter, and salt until butter just melts. Add milk mixture and eggs to flour & yeast. Beat on medium speed for 3 minutes. Knead in unbleached flour until smooth and elastic. Let rise until doubled. Divide dough into 72 portions. Shape into balls & place three balls in each greased muffin cup. Let rise until nearly doubled. Brush tops with butter and bake at 375 12-15 minutes.

Planting Peas

Today we put the first seeds of the year into the garden: peas, parsley, and radishes. It was also the first time Hannah was able to hold a fistful of seeds and place one into each hole without me directing each step.

Nora was cranky so we weren't able to get the lettuce, spinach, and beets in today. We'll try again tomorrow. I also need to figure out if I have any herbs or flowers that we can plant this early.

We've got rosemary, strawberries, and blueberries going strong. This will be our first year allowing the blueberries to fruit! And there's one parsley plant that overwintered.

I keep trying to convince Michael we need a fence. Notice the neighbor's pool in the background of the second picture? Ok, maybe it's the neighbors who need a fence. I sure could use one for corralling the girls while I'm working in the garden, though. Hannah is finally able to recognize landmarks as boundaries and stay in the backyard, but I'm running after Nora at least every five minutes. And Hannah could play outside by herself if we had a fence.

Once Upon A Dream

What is almost 17 month old Nora singing in the Ergo while I'm doing the dishes? It's not her typical anthem (the alphabet song)... It's not Elmo's World... Aha! It's Once Upon a Dream!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Nora and Grandpa Larry

I admit there is a resemblance. What do you think?

We found snow!

We are home visiting family, hence the sad lack of posting.

Yesterday my dad drove us up to seek snow. Hannah has been pining for snow for a month. There isn't much hope of seeing any in coastal NC, so we wanted to make sure we got to some while we were here. She was disappointed that it wouldn't pack to make a snowman. It didn't keep the kids from having a snow (not ball) fight, though. They just picked up loose snow and heaved it at each other at close range.

It was Nora's first experience with snow, and she loved it! Kristen pulled her fast in the sled, and was rewarded with big smiles. What, can't you tell she's smiling under that coat? She was frustrated to find she couldn't really pick the snow up with her mittens on. I gave her a taste of it, and she liked it so much she flopped on her belly and stuck her face right in it to get more.

Ok, so there wasn't much snow, but isn't it pretty up in the hills?

It's Potato!

Nora has been doing a mystery sign. She would tap the open palm of one hand with one finger of the other, and look at me like I was supposed to know what she was saying, but I just couldn't figure it out. I asked Hannah, but she didn't know either.

Yesterday, Nora was looking at a farm book and she pointed to the picture of a potato and said, "Potato." Or some approximation of the word, her enunciation isn't the greatest. And then she tapped her palm. Ah... I asked Hannah (yes, she is our resident ASL expert) what the sign for potato is. She showed me one closed fist with the first two fingers of the other hand tapping the back of the fist, "Like you're sticking a fork in it."

I still haven't figured out where Nora picked up the sign. Maybe I showed her in a moment now lost in the fog of my memory. Maybe she learned it from Signing Time. Hannah insists that she did not teach her.

I love this language acquisition stage.

Nora 13 Months

Do other babies do this? As I recall, all Hannah's signs were solo efforts.

Nora thinks that some signs are cooperative efforts. "Bear" for example. She doesn't scratch at her own chest; she leans over and scratches at mine. And when she signs "dance," her little fingers either dance in the air or on my palm, not on her own. She also likes to pull my "I love you" hand to her cheek for hugs.

mischief

Graffiti courtesy of Hannah:

Nora's chair.

Hannah's chair.

Evidently she thought we might forget.

Nora has been practicing her pirate utensil-in-mouth grip.

"Not" Your Head

Here's a new Hannah-ism:

She thinks "nod," as in "nod your head yes," is "not." She told me as she was shaking her head, "I'm notting my head." And then as she nodded her head, "Now I'm yessing my head."

State Fair

We saw rabbits.

And sweet potatoes.

And giant pumpkins, including a new state record pumpkin.

This Brahman cow was beautiful.

The apples smelled so sweet.

Hannah talked with this pretty cow for quite awhile. And the cow seemed to enjoy the conversation. Nora "moo-ed" at all the cows and "cock a doodle doo-ed" at all the roosters.

Hannah took this picture of the piglets.

Hannah enjoyed the PBS booth.

Hannah spun her teacup with abandon.

Hannah wanted to hold every one of the chicks and ducklings.

We had a grand time and wore ourselves out thoroughly. Hannah was making plans about all the animals we should have on our farm. We were disappointed to find that they didn't actually have the petting zoo indicated on their map, but Hannah sure loved the chicks and ducklings.

There were a few things that made the fair stand out as a distinctly North Carolina state fair: the tobacco and the sweet potatoes. The first vendor booth we came across after we came through the gate was a chewing tobacco tent (18 and over only, and completely enclosed with a zippered door). There were also several displays with hanks of tobacco leaves and I noticed one FFA project that was an apparatus for drying tobacco.

We saw a fancy booth complete with a diver in a tank recruiting for Navy EOD.

And of course we ate cotton candy!

Nora is a whole year old!

My parents are pitying Nora because she didn't get to eat any birthday cake. Michael will probably also be horrified when he hears. But Nora is only eating bananas, rice, millet, pears, kale, avocado, sweet potato, peas, and squash. And the cake has three of the top eight allergens (milk, wheat, and eggs). Not to mention all the sugar! Nora favors fruit already. If I fed her sugar she would go on an everything else strike for sure.

Hannah and I enjoyed the cake. Anyone want to help us finish it off?

Nora kissing Papa night-night

rain makes everything grow

At dinner tonight Hannah was lamenting how small our house is compared to her friend's. Then she looked out the window and said, "The rain is making our house grow taller!"

Nora loves kale!

I have to say, I'm a little surprised.

Steamed & pureed kale, mixed with millet porridge is apparently much tastier than millet porridge sans kale.

Pretend Soup

We checked out Pretend Soup and Other Real Recipes: A Cookbook for Preschoolers & Up by Mollie Katzen and Ann Henderson from the library and Hannah and I are both enjoying it! She's been choosing a recipe to make each day. Here she is cutting bananas for the title recipe:


And enjoying the finished product:


Each recipe is presented first on a two page spread for the grown ups, with notes about what kids can do at different ages and safety tips, as well as the recipe in a traditional format. My favorite part of these sections are the reviews by their preschool aged testers, like this one: "I also like cinnamon on broccoli."

Then the next two page spread shows the recipe in a pictoral format that pre-readers can follow. Hannah loves telling me what to do next! This can be a little troublesome when I want to modify a recipe and she insists that I'm doing it wrong.

Katzen is the author of the Moosewood Cookbook so it's no surprise that the recipes in Pretend Soup are all vegetarian. Most incorporate lots of fresh fruits or vegetables and are things that I'm happy to see my preschooler eat. And if Hannah helps prepare a dish she is much more likely to actually eat it!

unwanted traffic

We live on a pretty quiet street. This morning I was wishing we lived at the end of a dead end road with no neighbors within earshot because a brief episode of anxiety left me with a racing heart, certain that each vehicle I heard drive by was going to stop in our driveway to deliver dreaded news. I got on the computer to try and distract myself and got an email from Michael. He hasn't been able to email much, but the timing couldn't have been better.

Hannah still seems fine. She's not acting out. She isn't expressing any sadness. She's very matter of fact about it. Papa is in Iraq to help people and he'll be back around Easter (which is after Nora's birthday, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Papa & Momma's birthdays). I wonder if there will be a change as the days turn into weeks and she starts to really miss him.

Nora, on the other hand, notices that things are different. She had several evenings of very unusual fussiness after he left. She loves to look at Papa's pictures on the fridge. Every time we go by them she points and says, "Papa, Papa, Papa, Papa!" She's pronouncing the "p" now, too, which she hadn't quite managed before. She enjoys holding the laminated picture and "hugging" it.

I don't think this is dark enough to be called gallows humor:

Nora 11 Months

Nora turned 11 months yesterday. We were hoping that she
would walk before Michael left, but no such luck. Hannah took her first steps the day after she turned nine months and was walking everywhere within a week. Michael missed that by 2 months during his first tour in Iraq. Nora is still just not interested in walking. I stand her up and let go and she just squats down and crawls off. She can hold my hand and toddle along, but she doesn't want to. She'd rather crawl. Even on the laminate floors. We've been joking that she'd start walking as soon as Michael left, so we'll see how long it takes.

Nora may not walk, but she does talk! She says: Hannah, Momma, Papa, cat, outside, night night, bye bye, banana, Grandpa, Nana, Oma, all done, eye, thank you, and amen. Along with a slew of other things that I can't understand and a handful that I'm forgetting.

Speaking of Nora's "Amen". . . She prays, too. At Bible time every night, she folds her hands with a big smile on her face while we're praying. And of course says, "Amen," at the end.

he's gone

We saw Michael off today. He's headed to Iraq for a third time.

I feel different this time. I hate to have him gone. I'm not looking forward to being the lone parent present for 7 months. But I know I can do it. I've been here before. The only thought that makes me cry is "What if he doesn't come back?"

God, please let him come home to us.

I don't mind so much that he's gone, just as long he comes back.

Hannah took everything in stride. No tears. I don't think she fully grasps the situation. She knows Papa is going to Iraq for "a long time." We told her a couple of days ago that Papa should be back by Easter, and she kept asking if Easter was here yet when he hadn't even left. She loves traveling and was excited for him to get to ride on buses and planes. When we got home she spotted all the free Priority Mail boxes we got for care packages and said, "We must send those to Papa!"

Nora actually seemed to know that something was up. While we were waiting she kept fussing in my arms and reaching out to Michael. She'd even cry when he gave her back to me. She's very much a momma's girl and the situation is usually reversed. She slept through the actual send off, though.

Nora's New Skills

Last week Nora started cruising and waving. She has also been crawling (as opposed to scooting) a lot more since she started cruising. And she is trying to climb up onto various things. She can nearly do a pull up on the back of our dining room chairs. If she succeeds, she'll pull the chair on top of herself.

She practises waving every chance she gets. Any time someone leaves a room, there's Nora, waving away. She also experiments with different waves: sometimes she'll wave with her whole arm, sometimes she does a little wrist flick.

Just today Nora started clapping. She's been trying to for a few days, but today she's finally put her hands together. She is so very right handed. When she claps she holds her left hand still and brings her right hand to it.

Yesterday we were visiting friends and Nora was fascinated with their cat. She petted it (with some help) and kept trying to grab its ear. She was also trying to say "cat." She's been trying to say "Hannah," too.