Botulism in a Bottle

There's something about the pressure canner that scares me. It probably is related to heating glass jars in a 240 degree, pressurized receptacle. If that thing blows, you're dead. But say it doesn't blow. Say you do get these beautiful jars of green beans. You're still in danger. Those innocent looking green bean may not be so innocent. If you happen to ingest an invisible toxin, then wham! You're dead. It all just seems too risky. Growing up, my mom always canned stuff. But pressure cooking? No way.

The Doomsday Divas and Dudes (a Food Storage and Emergency Prep group) decided to face our collective fear of pressure cooking. Carrie, one of my heroes, nonchalantly demonstrated the process. Admittedly, my fear of pressure cooking was not based on ever having seen it done until this night. Turns out, the whole process is straight-forward. However, I was still scared to try it on my own. The next day when I was making another batch of beans, I made two panicked phone calls to Carrie before the pressure cooker ever left "0" psi (solution to problem #2: screw the lid on tight to "closed"). The beans look okay. No. They look beautiful! I'm still nervous to eat them, though. And my respect for the pressure canner remains intact.

Now that that is all said, I must say there is something supremely satisfying about seeing rows and rows of fruits and veggies you've preserved yourself. I feel like it ties me to generations past, not to mention what it does for feelings of self-reliance. Not that I'm going to start making my own clothes or anything extreme like that ... but ... hmm ... a small sheep in the backyard would be quite picturesque ...

If your friend gives you a ride in his airplane ...

... then he'll probably want some blackberry jam to go with it*.

Such was the arrangement Grandpa K and his friend Mike made. They'd fly from Utah to Oregon in Mike's homemade plane as long as Mike could pick blackberries while he was here. The only stipulation was the blackberries had to be free from wild bushes and they wanted the novelty of walking home from the local airport. Not only were both objectives accomplished within an hour, but we also upped the ante on the freebie scale by stopping at Costco on the way home for a lunch of samples.

What a wonderful and productive two days with grandpa and Mike! We visited a couple U-pick farms to supplement the roadside blackberry supply. Grandpa also picked the last two pints of available blueberries in all of Oregon for grandma. Together they plucked 10.2 pounds of green beans . Continuing the harvesting theme: at home they also graciously accepted the backyard apple-picking assignment. They picked 10.2 tons of apples which yielded 7 jars of applesauce. Grandpa fixed the drainage problem of the bathroom stink, so it doesn't. Mike helped hold fussy babies. Amidst all this, good stories and conversation swapped back and forth.

We hope to see Mike again next blackberry season (or sooner!). And grandpa? Talmage woke up the next morning wondering, "Where'd grandpa go?" My sentiments, exactly. It came and went way more quickly than we wished. Thanks for the fly-by. And Mike, if you read this, "bon appetite!"
(*"If You Give a Moose a Muffin" by Laura Numeroff).

Peer Pressure

"Come on, Sydney...everybody's doing it."

A Sunny Saturday at the Seaside.

Heidi and crew ran Hood to Coast this past weekend. I babysat her kids. That is, I let them do whatever they wanted, including eating ice-cream for breakfast and playing the Wii all day long. Shouldn't every kid have such a dream day? They for SURE should if the babysitter has three kids in diapers. On Saturday, I drove the kids out to the coast to meet up with the runners. Briton drove The Bogus with our kids, and after leaving the Bruno clan, we spent the rest of the afternoon at Cannon Beach. Clear skies. Warm. Mmmm. Inspiration for future beach trips.

Syd's particular about solids at this time in her life. She won't eat carrots, pears, peaches, green beans, peas, avacados, etc. Sand, though, is another matter. The beach was a new sensory experience.

"A ram-sam-sam."

Drawing some "ABC's"

That's Talmage in the middle of this pic, off in the distance.And up close.

Jack Johnson

It's been lively around here, lately. We went to the Jack Johnson concert with "A", "C" and "N" (wink, wink). Very fun. It was so cool to hear him in real life. We didn't really see him that well, what for the sea of people (around 25,000, I heard).

Briton and I were right up next to the stage at a Dave Mason concert way back when and it was, um, earthy, being close enough to see the individual beads of sweat streaming from his face and feeling them splattering on our bare arms. I wanted the same experience with Jack Johnson. So "A", "N", and I made a patient, valiant effort to wiggle our way forward through the packed bodies up "close". I think it would have taken the rest of the evening to make it right up to the stage. I gave up after three songs' worth of strategic maneuvering and staring at the back of heads of Tall People. Plus, I was nervous about leaving Sydney so long ... like, what if she was crying because she was hungry? And does second-hand marijuana smoke get absorbed into breastmilk? She was just fine, of course. We enjoyed Bubbletoes and more from a distance. See the lighted area to the left-hand side of the picture? That's the stage. It's too dark to see the clouds of marijuana smoke.It was slow getting to the concert due to stop and go-an-inch and stop again traffic. The 40 minute drive took over 2 hours. Briton, who should have been with us, but wasn't because his flight out of Dupont, Washington was canceled, ended up arriving at the concert gates about the same time we did, even though he had a 2 1/2 hour drive. Thankfully, the concert started late, in consideration of the bad traffic, and none of us - those coming from the North and those coming from the South, missed a single JJ song.

The Claw

Like he just stepped out of a salon...

Having a Ball

Syd and Sonya

Slippery When Wet

This is one of those days where you think you are going to post about this:(read: hot weather bed-time attire)

but end up posting about this:





Talmage found this giant chocolate chip cookie on his pillow when we came home tonight. It’s a “get well” smiley face cookie from Sonya and clan (thanks, guys). You see, moments after the first picture was taken, Talmage was whisked to the shower for a pre-church washup. However, he ended up missing worship as the wash-up went down the drain. He slipped in the shower, the back of his head hit full-force on the metal lip of the doorframe. Immediate gushing of blood. So scary and painful. Since the gash was wide and long (about an inch), Briton took T to the ER where talented doctor and nurse cleaned out the wound, numbed it up, and shot in five staples, without nary a peep from the T-ball. He was very brave and came home happy as a clam, pointing out the “ant-bug” sticker on his admission wristband. He napped well, played happily the rest of the day, and then to find the Smiley Face Cookie was, well, icing on the cake. You'd think he didn't even remember the morning's trauma. You can learn a lot from a kid.

Wildwood 2008

Exit 203

Coincidentally enough, we left Idaho heading west about the same time Dave and Jo left Oregon heading east. We crossed paths at the Middle-of-Nowhere Exit 203. Witness two ecstatic two year-old boys running in circles around each other in the parking lot of the creepy "hotel". No doubt part of their glee was the chance to get out of their carseats. The meeting was made possible by tracking each other's gradual approach via regular cell phone notifications. I wonder how pioneers on the Oregon Trail managed without cell phones. And Wendy's.

Improv

Driving around in the car tonight, I hear this song coming from Talmage in the backseat:

"Where is octopus? Where is octopus?
Here I am. Here I am.
How are you today, sir? How are you today, sir?
We love you. We love you."

Adventures in Babysitting

Santa Fe Chicken for dinner. Chicken, corn, black beans, salsa, and cream cheese. Yum. A sure-fire winner. But not for four-year-old Stevie. He covered his mouth with both hands and sent his entire body into heaving convulsions. "I'm not going to eat that!" he moaned. Then, in plaintive tone: "I'm going to diiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiieeeeeeeeeeeeeee!" Lucky for me, I've been reading "Parenting with Love and Logic." Unlucky for Stevie, he is the guinea-pig recipient of it's principles. "OK, " I say calmly, completely unruffled (yeah, right). "This is what's for dinner. We'll see you at breakfast." Stevie looks at me and squints his eyes shut in an attempted glare. Both fists curl into tight balls of shaking anger. He stomps to the couch, starts jumping on it and hucking pillows in the general direction of the dinner table.

After 10 days in Utah, I came home to a 5 day babysitting job at the H's home. There were six kids, plus our two. That equals 100. Including our kids, the age range was 13 years down to 6 months. Stevie's eating aversions aside, they are great kids - they readily posed for this picture in the "eagle nest" at the zoo. However, I think this will be the last year I babysit them. 100 kids is just too many.

A Penny For Your Thoughts

Eyes on the ball, and watch your bank statements. When I refi-ed the home, I was apparently signed up for a Premium Line of Credit and Checking Account (the best available from Wells Fartgo, I was assured). I've keep $0.00 balance in there ever since, ie. never used the thing. Yesterday's statement showed an Overdraft Protection Advance of $300 from my el primo line of credit hee ha to the checking account. That's interesting. Oh, there's a $25 fee for not maintaining a minimum balance this month (why not the 3 months previous, I don't know). To boot, throw in a $2.25 finance charge for the $25 fee.

At least the phone call at lunch today got me to a real person in less than a minute (as opposed to Verizon FIOS's non-highspeed customer service lines). After getting everything sorted out, they decided to “downgrade” my account one level, from el primo to el sub-primo. The lady assured me that by downgrading I wouldn't lose any of my current benefits, but I wouldn't have to have a minimum balance either [sic]. Subtle. I glady accepted el sub-primo. When said and done, all charges were reversed, and I was allowed to keep the $0.01 of interest I earned on the $300 that they pulled in this month.