R.I.P. Whitey...and thanks for dinner!

Tough in both spirit and texture (have you eaten rooster?) Whitey met his inevitable fate back in September. It didn't go as smoothly as planned, but he cooked up real nice in a Posole soup and the neighborhood has been sleeping soundly at 4:30am again. Sorry to see you go...

Cuteness

Snowboarder girlBiking with Dad

Country Girl

Mid-hike diaper change

Cute as a pumpkin
Mom made BumbleBee costume

The Schlich Family Five?!

It's about time to share the news, if you haven't already heard...We are expecting a new addition to the family around May 14th. I'm 16 weeks pregnant now, we have our first ultrasound in a few weeks and will find out the sex. Although we're open to whatever mother nature provides us, Gig is definitely hoping for a boy. He's surrounded by Luna, Tinker and I, as well as 5 hens. He's feeling the need for more testosterone in the family. It's amazing how much sooner I've started to show this time around than with Luna. We have a midwife, unfortunately my insurance will only cover a hospital birth, but the midwife has hospital privileges. We started out with one midwife who I didn't feel great about, but last week we met her partner and really liked her, so we switched. Luna likes to point to my belly and say "baby". It'll be fun to see how she reacts as my belly grows larger. We'll keep you updated!

Judgements

I'm human...and judgemental. There have been a few occasions lately where I have judged a book by it's cover and have been pleasantly reminded of my erroneous ways. One such occurrence took place the other day as I was heading to the park. Luna decided not to take her morning nap, so I threw her in the car (not literally, but I felt like it at the time) to go to Manito Park. She fell asleep just as I arrived, such is the fate of parenthood, so I stopped by a bakery a neighbor told us about. As I parked out front a woman exited her car looking as if she thought she was in LA instead of Spokane. She was an attractive older woman with a mini-dress on and high heels, way out of my Bellingham-tennis shoe-loving league. I judged. What is she wearing? Who does she think she is? Come on...this is Spokane! I ran inside to buy a coffee while keeping an eye on the car to make sure no one kidnapped Luna. The woman asked if I was in line, I told her my situation and she asked what car was mine and directed her 11 year old to sit outside and watch my child/car until I got back. How amazingly nice! She told me she had 3 kids and understood the situation completely. What a wonderful smack in the face. Aside from the lesson learned, it also reminds me of the fact that it takes a village. We are all in the same boat and could all use a helping hand once and awhile. Gig is reading a book about sex that read about in Savage Love in The Stranger (how I miss drinking margaritas at Casa Que Pasa while reading The Stranger). At this point he would quickly correct me by saying that it's about community, not sex..but the word sex is actually in the title. Anyhow, he is feeling like he lacks community. The book discusses how when we were hunter/gatherers, people relied on one another, they lacked the sense of ownership of their things, their woman, their land. With agriculture came a more distant society, you owned your land, your children, your women, your tractor. Their was less of a community and more of a sense of fending for yourself. I believe the American culture continues to further this sense of separatism. We were trying to define our own community which is sorely lacking. We have a few neighbors that I feel watch out for us and we trade goodies over the fence (salmon from Anne Marie, Tortillas from Dan....yep, they get zucchini in return). I feel a true sense of family with my dear friend Steph, but she's in Vermont. Gig and I do tend to keep to ourselves, we have always enjoyed a few good friends than a slew of acquaintances, but do we have community? We've never seen ourselves as having many friends, but I remember how in awe I was after having Luna and people came out of the woodwork to provide us with meals and a helping hand. I don't think a community has to be dear friends, I just think it requires a mutual concern for humankind. Once again, "it takes a village". I am hoping to foster this kind of community here in Spokane. Oh, cute pictures from the park:

Home grown

In case you didn't know, I have dreams of growing most all of my own food. We've had quite a few dinners this summer made entirely from our own veggies and eggs...potato, bean, zucchini salad; last night was potato crusted quiche with sauteed kale and chard on the side. Yum! I wonder sometimes about the superfluousness of cooking it all into some extravagent feast that I spend an hour making and 5 minutes eating (if that, because I eat far too fast). Helen and Scott Nearing (read: The Good Life) just threw the veggies on the table whole instead of mixing them into a salad. Time and energy saved..and it's all the same to your stomach in the long run. Luna and I just harvested a few pounds of red potatoes, as well as the neverending piles of zucchini. I've had the misfortune of a virus in the garden this year which limited the number of pole beans and snap peas, as well as my tomatoes are rotting on the bottom. It's so disappointing. Gardening is pretty similar to life, you can do everything right, but fate still lends it's hand for the good or bad.
Don't ask why this picture is sideways..I'm too tired to figure it out.

Updated cuteness...please don't vomit.

Free Range

We've been letting the chickens free range it in the backyard. Surprisingly, Tinker hasn't ate a single one! Luna seems to be more of the danger to them. Or me, if they don't keep out of my tomato plants. It's relaxing to sit back and watch the chicks roam. A neighborhood kid brings friends over daily to watch, and occasionally chase them. Make note: if you come to visit, you will leave with chicken poop on your shoes. We are getting 4 eggs a day now. I've been trading veggies for 18 eggs a week from some folks from craigslist, but now with our chicks laying as well, we are over run with eggs. We've been eating combinations of eggs and zucchini for most meals and dessert.

Whitey is still alive...and crowing. I always thought roosters only crowed in the morning, but whitey seems to do it throughout the day. I was awoken at 5:15 this morning by his crow, which I love, but not sure if the neighbors do? He's turning into quite a beautiful bird, we hate to see him go, but we must keep peace with the neighbors...and the law.

New Addition

I won a piano! This piano was given away in a raffle at work that I was probably the only one that entered. It needs repairs that would cost more than it's worth, but we still jumped at the chance. It needs a tuning, but we'll live with it's other imperfections. It's beautiful, with actual ivory keys. I'm sure hundreds of people have played this piano in it's lifetime. Luna is loving it and we all look forward to learning to play.

Catching up on cuteness

Haven't posted many pictures of Luna lately, so I thought I'd just wallpaper you with pictures of our little bean...

An unwelcome visit from the tooth fairy

Luna had the misfortune of losing her first tooth. The worst was having to tell the dentist how it happened. See, Luna has a love of beer. She pulled a beer bottle out of the recycling and was drinking the air out of it. We, being the hip (read: irresponsible) parents we are, thought it was cute and grabbed the camera to capture the cuteness. Then, she fell. With the bottle in her mouth. Screams. Blood. Tooth (root and all) falls to the ground. Not so cute anymore. We called a pediatric dentist and they said there was nothing we could do and it won't grow back until she's 6 years old. So much for family portraits. Poor baby.


Good times gone bad...blood on shirt, 3 teeth on top.

Fences

Fences, that's what our life is about. My reason for lack of blogs are fences. First, we had to build the chickens a fence. You see, we added 6 new girls to our family back in March. Looking forward to eggs in September. We haven't named them because they all look the same except one...Whitey. He's named for the simple fact that he's whiter than the others. Whitey has always had a lot of attitude, pecking at us and being protective of the other chicks. We now believe we know why...she might be a he...a rooster...dinner.

Breast or thigh?

Home sweet chicken home.

Second, we had to fence in the backyard to keep Luna out of harms way and Tinker from attacking evil skateboarders that menace her. Tinker believes skateboarding is a crime. This fence is Gig's pride, he consulted many library books on fence building and would sit out at night enjoying a beer while admiring his work.

A man and his fence.

Third, we had to fence the garden as Luna and Tinker love to trample through it. We ripped up a good spot of land for veggie gardens. The rustic look that I was hoping for wasn't in the cards, so I went for bright instead. I think it'll look great when the veggies and nasturtiums are overflowing. Imagine a picket gate and colorful faux birdhouses on top of the posts. I also pulled up all of the roses along the front walkway and planted cucumbers and added 4 winter sqaush beds outside the fence. Still need more garden space, hoping to grow enough to harvest and store for the winter someday. We want to plant grapes and more fruit trees as well. What I love about this place is that we've put in tons of garden space and chickens and haven't even touched an ounce of our property. Love it!

Luna making sure the posthole was deep enough.

Next up for home improvement is a deck off the back of the house. One day we will rest, but until then we will keep building, digging, and growing...and have a nice rooster dinner after we're done.

Where does the time go?

So I started this blog post in March (It's now June) with announcing Luna's first birthday (which was even a month past due for that). She's now 16 months and I'm finally getting around to finishing that post. I can't believe how time has flown by, I'm still tired and often frazzled, but she's worth it. She's becoming such a little person, talking non-stop (not that it makes any sense), dancing, getting into everything, fussing when she doesn't get her way, and melting our hearts and making us laugh just as we're about to throw her out with the trash. She is becoming quite the little helper, always having to carry the water out to the chickens and wanting to feed Tinker. It's a pleasure seeing her become the little lady she is.