plenty

since our move down the street from the library, i've maxed out both mine and luke's library cards.  at one point we were talking with the librarian and luke asked what was overdue on his card and trying not to smile, she said "um, the hip girl's guide to homemaking and jillian michaels no more trouble zones...".  :)

ps.  for every photo i ever take anymore, there is a photo of this guy next to me, taking the same shot. 

happy valentines, happy arizona

 today we celebrated valentines day and arizona's 100th birthday!

ruby and i woke up to luke and mateo in the kitchen making buttermilk pancakes with caramelized strawberries and coffee.  

then i talked luke into watching the babes for a few minutes while i tried to copy this tutorial to make us all some valentines shirts.   ruby already had one from a thrifting trip months ago, so it only took 20 minutes to make the rest. 

then we continued our tradition of a little valentines photo shoot, this time with ruby on the outside of my belly!  these were the photos that resulted in just a few minutes of wrangling wriggly ones and a few tempers and lots of laughter too.

right after luke and i gave up our attempts to get us all in a shot together with everyone's eyes open, we ran around like crazy packing up the car for a happy-birthday-arizona trip to the grand canyon!  we got a coconino mocha on our drive, with a perfect heart of steamed milk and cinnamon drawn on top, and listened to a new valentines mix we got in the mail this morning (thanks ryan and lindsay!).  it snowed overnight so the snow was bright and fresh on the rim and we took a leisurely (stopping every few steps) hike along the rim trail.  and the canyon, as always, was breathtaking and grand.

 

we rushed back home later that afternoon to see a man about fixing our broken dryer, luke worked a few minutes, and then we went out for our other valentines tradition of indian food.  we noticed that we were one of only two families there amongst all of the other peaceful couples eating and thought once again how we really need to be more purposeful in finding a babysitter around here.

all in all, a really nice day.  we hope you had a lovely one too!

a little heart project

we picked up martha's handmade holiday book from the library and saw a project on the cover that we had to try.  mateo peeled the paper off of his crayons for 3 hours while i shredded them up and then ironed them into wax paper and cut them into hearts.  later we found a stick in the woods by our house and hung them in our living room.  i will forever remember this as the first art project where he actually - truly - helped (not just pretended) and where he sat still and worked by my side for hours. 

a morning adventuring around wupatki

 

peaks

luke took this photo of the peaks from our front yard during the evening magic hour when they turn all shades of pink. 

we made some stamps

ruby woke up sad and fevered last week, so i set out to make her some homemade chicken and dumplings (which she didn't end up eating, poor fevered little one).  as i chopped the last of the celery stalks off the bunch, i noticed the end piece was the shape of a perfect rose.  mateo agreed, so we got out a few ink pads and started stamping away.  i enjoyed this project way more than he did and soon i was carving out messages and leaves and other images on half of our potatoes and searching for other vegetables that might resemble something else.  the trick to carving a message though, i soon realized, is to remember to carve it backwards...

we stamped out a few thank you cards with celery-rose bouquets, and then i threw all of the vegetable stamps in the refrigerator in hopes of using them again soon to make valentines for our family.  but after 2 days, the stamps were too soft to use again.  lesson learned. 

chioggia

we received the prettiest chioggia beets in our csa share.  i had been hoping to make this recipe with them, but they were so popular in our house that we all ended up eating them raw.

might we suggest making a rainbow

 recently we happened upon several half-used spools of ribbon at our st. vincent de paul store.  i had mateo (and ruby, kind of) pick some out in hopes that we could make something to brighten up our bedroom which is the only room that doesn't feel warm in our new house.  

i started working on it in our dining room and hung some jute from a shelf to the wall to brainstorm.  as i started tying up some of the ribbon, mateo exclaimed with the biggest eyes ever, "mama, are you making a rainbow?!".  (rainbows are one of his very favorite things).   he was in awe.

i realized immediately that this project wasn't meant for what i had intended it to be, and yes, we were absolutely making a rainbow.  then the sun came in and lit up the ribbons into this mid-day magic hour and these babies of mine played under it for hours.

later we tried moving the rainbow against the wall, and again against the window, but in both places it just became a string of ribbons and we had to move it back to this little corner of the room, (now their claimed space), where it became magical again and we can go through it and under it and hide behind it.  the funny thing is how happy it makes all of us.  we really recommend making a rainbow in your home too.  :)