cook.eat.think.

With the approaching holidays and all of our plans for crafting, gift making, kid projects, field trips and travel, it seems that we will be busy filling up this blog - not to mention all of the cooking, baking, food gifts, fermenting, preserving, local foods finding, and fun in the kitchen.

So what does all of that mean? I started a side blog just for food.

cook.eat.think. Visit it here.

octopus!

The octopus costumes for Halloween re-sparked interest in everything sea creature - specifically, octopus and squid. A had me put several octopus books on hold through the library and we picked up the first batch last night.


This morning we found some octopus printables for him to color. He also wanted a notebook set up with the words octopus and squid so he could practice writing them, and then he asked to do a painting. At A's request, I drew a base sketch of an octopus on watercolor paper, and then the boys painted away. A selected blues to look like a Caribbean reef octopus photo he liked, and G liked a photo of a giant Pacific octopus, so chose reds.

We of course also had to pull out our sea creature stick puppets again and have a few shows!

Here are our three favorite octopus books of the day (and there are more--see the list to the right):





Octopuses and Squids by Mary Jo Rhodes











Octopuses, Squids, and Cuttlefish by Trudi Strain Trueit









The Amazing Octopus by Bobbie Kalman





Lots of fun for a cold windy day inside!

It is that time again!

Can you feel it coming? The last push of crafting, sewing, creating, making (and repeating) of hand crafted gifts for the holidays?

I always try to not be *that* relative that gives crazy homemade things that no one would ever want or use. I try to be the *wow* relative that gives handmade/homemade things that look like they match each personality and that people keep and carry/use happily (or eat and really enjoy). This year I have a nice list of things to make. My biggest challenge each year is to find creative things to make for men and kids - the gals are pretty easy. I think I have some cool ideas this time - we'll see how it goes.

I have been collecting fabric all summer/fall, and have recently added to my stash. I have some specific plans for the batch shown above - I'm itching to start.

Anyone else making gifts this year? What?

Glowing in the dark.

This weekend we tried something new. My toddler was having asthma issues the last few days running and playing outside, so we picked an indoor activity. We ventured north a little bit to a bowling alley which had shoe sizes all the way down to toddler. Lightweight balls. Retractable bumpers. Glow in the dark pins. The boys had a blast. A had the scoring system down in no time, was adding up *his* points compared to ours, and was the only one of us to get a spare (yeah, well, carpal tunnel means mom & dad are lousy bowlers). G would NOT let us even TOUCH *his* ball. Would not let us carry it. Look at it. Breathe on it. He did great squatting and pushing it down the lane.


And this bowling alley just happened to have one of these too (among other things):


Fun!

Final CSA of the Season.

Today is the day. Our final CSA box pickup of the season at the farm.

This week in our box:
Lettuce, arugula, mizuna, saute greens, hakuri turnips, red radishes, green cabbage, celeriac, rutabaga, onions.