-You know you are an animal lover when...you crawl back into bed at 3am after having a little computer time (have to do it when the babe is sleeping on her own) and there is only about 4 feet of space to squeeze into because there is one little babe sleeping in the middle of the bed, one fat Corgi who has crawled onto the other side of the little babe, one 50 lb Romanian dog below her at the foot of the bed, and then one scrappy Sheltie mix next to him - right where my feet should go. I cram myself into my designated spot with blankets that only come up to my waist because of the dogs pulling them down. Then I shiver a little before I get up to get another blanket to throw around my shoulders, which is easier to do than kicking off the dogs. (some observant people might notice that I didn't mention my husband in that furry huddle - that is another post!)
(Wallace - King of the Bed)
-I am trying to keep Christmas decorations simple, cheap, and more natural this year and have been getting inspiration from some great Etsy shops like The Sitting Tree and The Vermont Branch Company. The weekend before Thanksgiving my brother stopped at our house asking to borrow our handsaw and said that he was going on a "birch tree hunt". He wanted to make those cute votive candle holders out of a birch branch. The problem is that here in suburban Pennsylvania, most birch trees are planted in people's yards as landscaping, not growing in the wild free for the cutting. We have one in our front yard, but the branches that were the size he wanted were the main parts of the tree, so I wasn't giving them up! We racked our brains trying to think of where we had seen some and I don't know if he ended up finding any. Today I was walking the dogs up the street past the building for the local water well, so technically municipal property. What did I see? The perfect sized birch branch just lying there for the taking! I was so excited I actually exclaimed out loud! It must have fallen from the snow and ice we had last week and since we were away for the holiday and then I was sick, I didn't see it until today. I gave it a little feel to see if I could lift it by myself and then quickly finished my walk with the dogs, hoping that in the next 15 minutes no one else came and took this large tree branch lying on the side of the road.. After throwing the dogs inside, I headed back up the street with my little babe still in her carrier and hoping that all the neighbors were at work, I picked up that branch and hauled it down the street to our driveway. Luckily since we do have the birch tree in our front yard, it just looks like it broke off from that. I can't wait to tell my brother what I have for him. He has to split the bounty with me though!
-About 3 weeks ago we got a large cheese pumpkin in our CSA share. I was intimidated by it and it just sat in the front hall, on top of the hat and glove basket, so I had to use two hands to move it everytime I needed to get in the basket. When I was sick this weekend, my husband finally decided to take the plunge and whack it open. He made a winter couscous with it, and that barely made a dent in it. So I have to take the time in the next couple of days to bake the rest of it and then puree it. I am happy we got it, but it is just SO BIG!
Hope you have a warm bed to stretch out in, some seasonal decorations to make you happy, and some good food to fill your belly!