Ok – onward!  Our friends over at Storey Publishing also sent this book our way.  Even though I’m not thinking about selling handmade goods at the moment, it was a total pleasure to read.  A lot of it is about the creative process, photography, and blogging, and I got some fun ideas.  Now I’d like ...
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A little of this . . .

And stitches cast on for my first sweater for myself (the Shalom cardigan).Ben’s World’s Warmest Hat is halfway done (he tried mine on and had to have one of his own), and Ella’s Provence sweater got finished before all the snow melted – hooray!  One note: this pattern was ...
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Do you see how tantalizingly close this sweater is?  Must. finish.
Even though truly warm weather is a ways off, and I’ll probably still be wearing the occasional sweater in May, my little polar bear was already walking around in short sleeves yesterday.
And also, some new words.  Definitely in progress, but here we go.
* * *
March
by ...
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Here at our house, Ben has been maniacally starting flats of seeds.  He decided that this would be the year to kick the plastic seed-flat habit (gross, breakable, disposable, ugly, totally un-environmental, and completely ubiquitous in the farming world).

So Ben has starting using soil blocks, a la Eliot Coleman (check out his books for instructions ...
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Now that you have your delicious leftovers from yesterday’s Mucho Gusto Black Beans and Corn, you can make this simple, hearty Tamale Pie.  This idea is from Whole Grains Every Day, Every Way by Lorna Sass (her Masa-Harina Beef Casserole), but you’ll see that I have changed it quite a bit.  At our house, we ...
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Hope you’re enjoying the weekend, folks.  Here, I’m trying to get over a serious case of the crankies (seems to be making the rounds at our house – hmmm.)
We are . . .
sending out some love to family and friends (and you too – Happy Valentine’s Day!)

Loving this book, which arrived from the library just ...
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With the help of my friend Jen and these two cutie pies, I entered the world of felting this week.  I’ve been gathering some wool sweaters at the thrift store with this purpose in mind, and I was finally ready to begin!  We took the sweaters, some dish soap, two sweet toddlers and put them ...
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On Tuesday, we celebrated Ben’s birthday.  As you may remember, we’re a big fan of birthday pies around here, and so at Ben’s request I made Pascal Rigo’s Caramel-Pecan Chocolate Tart, from our favorite American Boulangerie.  With the help of my, um, assistant pastry chef Ella (just don’t tell her she’s not the main chef), ...
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(Ben’s preserved lemons-in-process: quartered, salted, smooshed into a jar, fermented 5-10 days at room temp, then put into the fridge.  The best part is you can use the whole lemon after it’s preserved, rind and all.)
It’s always incredible to me how hard the world can be, and also, how incredibly beautiful.  How thoughtless we can ...
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First, I just want to say welcome to all the readers who came over from my interview swap with Heather of Shivaya Naturals.  I’m so glad you stopped by!  Usually I do a Gratitude Friday post, but since we had the fun interviews yesterday, let’s go for Gratitude Saturday.  Shall we?

Grateful for Solstice Bulbs still ...
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