Friday in Pictures: Deep New England Spring

{let the images tell you a story}

Tuesday Happenings: Springing

Discovery is always a thrill, no matter the season, but there is something about the new tendrils of growth and baby shoots to invigorate the senses. Right up until the allergies hit, we can breathe a little deeper and feel that things are about to change. It feels like a shift we can translate from our wilder (and wider) environment to our human scales.

That is sort of the theme this year, we think: human scale. Focusing on what we can do with our direct care and responses, honing in on our small measures, while keeping our integrity and universal goals in mind. We won’t really have much choice in the matter, so it is good to prepare that ground — really get the regenerative juices flowing and the soil fertile, giving back as much as we take (if not more, because we take).

We’re finding that to do so, we need to spend a little more time on the things that nourish us. We want to keep our minds open and sharp and to do so, we need to not focus on the things that damage us. J is from VT and I’ve now lived in New England longer than anywhere else, the fundamentals of social justice for American society are questioned here (with many historical corrections to be made) — the pragmatism of ecological care is deeply ingrained, and direct discourse used to be encouraged. As many of you might know, we are connected with The Good Life Center, the educational homestead of Scott & Helen Nearing, and feel very strongly that there is good ground to grow from there. There is a lot to discover about the past to care for the present and prepare for the future. We’re Goddard College students, for Scott’s sake! (see what I did there — ha!). Fed from Bread & Puppet fires, wading in the waters of Lake Champlain, and traversing the Long Trail. And like the Nearings, we’re here now in lovely Maine — connected to the ocean and the mountains, hanging with the sturgeon, eating wild blueberry pie, and feeling like there is still moments and growth to be discovered and inspired by.

We live in one of the most supportive civil rights regions of the U.S. — which somedays is hard to remember. We have water (though yes, might need some care and cleaning up, but we have it!), we have fertile ground, we have all the geographical richness which means we have the tools to also have the most resourceful innovations to create community (both human and nonhuman). But we have to focus and not be distracted by the noise — the literal noise of negativity and energy-sucking regressions, by the pitfalls and setbacks (failures are opportunities to find new solutions). It’s hard. It’s hard every day, but we have immense privilege here — even in our everyday struggles and situational experiences. This human scale is our superpower because we can make community with each other, one by one. We can change many things that fall into our personal sphere and act accordingly in the world with integrity and care.

Spring. When the fullness of life reminds us of change.

Duendesday: Life after Skool

Duende’s school experience didn’t last long (a mere 6 months) but at 14 there isn’t much time to waste — either it’s a good match or it isn’t. This particular school was not a good match for her and in this area there are not a lot of options, so back to homeschooling we go. We are lucky to be confident in our life choices to have this option and we wish others were, too. Freeschooling is a wondrous way to grow and learn to be a part of the world we live in.

We’ve fielded a lot of questions over the years about the (redundant and misguided) concerns folks have regarding social skills, conflict resolution, their own math or science or english skills, homework, transcripts, and grades. None of that actually comes into play for us. Freeschooling is a way of letting them live their own little lives and helping them find the answers when they have the questions. It’s about pointing out the learning moments in our everyday life. For us, it is finding interesting and engaging resources so we can all learn (and re-learn) together. She already lives in the world so her social skills are marvelous (and perhaps better than many school system education’s since she engages with people of all different ages, all of the time, in the functioning world), which seems to be the number one concern of random people.

Do we wish somedays that her spelling and writing skills were better? Sure, but that doesn’t change from any other parent wishing their children excelled at everything. Duende has an amazing imagination and can translate that into art, costume design, stories, dances, baking, and isn’t afraid to try new things. Maybe she watches a little too much Korean anime right now but she also helps out at the store, engages with her friends and the folks in our little town with care and respect. She’s a really great kid. We couldn’t have asked for a better little person to share our life with (who is not so little these days, especially now that it is Spring and she’s back on the roller skates!).

Lately, she is making costumes for the Renaissance Faire tours we’re planning on for the Summer, working on a homeschool project of miniature scenes with a story line to be filmed by June, making cakes, scones, pancakes, and Moroccan food (she loves Djej Emshmel: Chicken with Olives and Preserved Lemons), and had a smash of a time decorating eggs for Spring a few weeks ago (she likes to blow them out and paint them — a lovely local homestead sells us all blue eggs and duck eggs every week!).

We’re not surprised she enjoys being home with us — she’s already happier, healthier, and less stressed, isn’t that what we want for all kids?

Happenings: In Transition and Translation

It’s been a minute since we’ve posted about our homestead adventure. Sometimes things take a turn and you’re back to wondering what exactly is the definition of homesteading and why does it matter? The place the world is in right now is a great reminder of why it matters and what it is becomes experiential in definition. For us, homesteading has been about reconnecting with our resources and our full ecologies — where does our food and health come from? How do we access the natural world and how do we work in partnership? Self-reliance, self-sufficiency is not an endeavor of the sole rugged patriarchal lone wolf fantasy; instead it translates into a personal response-ability to care in the world (for humans, non humans, the earth itself).

And everyone comes to it in their own way — some are lucky enough to own their land/house/homestead and some must dance that mortgage line dance, some are healthy enough to be grossly sufficient and some have to do what they can when they can, some have big families to help, some have small enough families to maintain easily, some are able to make money from excess goods they provide and some provide just enough for their needs (and further some are only able to provide supplement to their abilities and needs), it’s a hard life. We came to it knowing that but also knowing that sometimes hard is better, better for our longevity, better for the planet, better for our quality of life, etc. And we don’t believe in failure; we believe in learning and experience so some years when the gardens were good, we thrived, and when they weren’t as good, we focused on celebrating our CSA with a local farm. Our ideals are not tarnished by our ‘successes and failures’ but adapted to our needs.

We also believe in listening to our bodies, our communities, our land, and the energies surrounding all of these things. When I got Lyme co-infections (apparently on top of previous undetected Lyme, Epstein-Barr, which all induced 2 bouts of Shingles, one on my face/ear which has resulted in continuous nerve problems and loss of some function in both) setting back much of my ability to homestead, and the baker got injured overdoing it (resulting in minor surgery on top of foot problems and lifelong dental issues), we had to learn to listen. So, we started over — focusing on the things we could do, turning out to be translating all of our experience and impetus to homestead into supporting others to do so.

We are trying to listen to what the energies are telling us; that it may be time to reassess and change things up, to adapt in different ways.

We firmly believe in having a direct say in what we put into our bodies and food sovereignty and safety are the biggest issues in the world. We will continue to support and educate ourselves on clean and best practices when it comes to food and medicine, and source our needs accordingly. We believe that not only should our food and medicines be free of contaminants and grown responsibly, but the people who do it should also be cared for and supported. We have loved our homesteading adventure. It is something we would love to continue and will find our way in other ways (likely smaller ways). We have been lucky to have had this opportunity.

With that said, we are leaving this lovely homestead. It is time for us to downsize our life, in care of ourselves and our community in the way that we can actively care for both. Our beautiful 14 acres of woods and gardens will be put on the market for an accessible price very soon. If you think you want to relocate to the rich and resourceful mid-Maine area, there is a lot to connect with here — please contact us and we’ll give you the low down. We will be posting the property soon on Maine farm/homestead listings. We’ll detail a post soon with a full description of our changes and the great features.

Thank you for going along on this journey with us. We’ve had so many good times here, and so many friends visit and share this bounty. We are truly grateful.

Deep Winter Happenings

It’s been a bit of a back and forth with the weather — snow every other week, biting cold every other week from that. It feels like a ‘real’ Winter, for sure. But somehow we’ve missed it, we only see it peripherally these days and rarely get to get out in it. We thought there was going to be a great minute there where sled trails were going to be dug out and a little sledding party could commence but then the kid got sick (again, her poor immune system is just battered, she’s sick every 2 weeks — it’s not just her, the school says this is the worst year for sickness and absent students they’ve seen in years — for which we have to clarify because homeschooling prejudice is rampant and many will retort that “since she’s never been subject to all these illnesses it must be her sheltered immune system” but she’s Tonka tough and has been out in the world this whole time. Perhaps it is because public schools struggle with offering health education, handwashing stations, and demand attendance — our culture does not promote staying home when you are sick or wearing mask if you are struggling).

However, when she is home and starting to recover she makes things — miniature worlds, bunny backpacks, braided bracelets, and cellphone purses for her school mates, dresses and clothing repair (the Winter Ball dress is below that was unable to wear because she was sick), scones, biscuits, and other treats (though the cake below is my fail, I’m determined to put everything in a bundt but not all things are meant for it — like this coffeecake — but it was delicious!). Hopefully, she will be up and ready for sugaring season soon and will get a little outside Winter time.

Until then, we stay cozy by the woodstove and getting through our bookstacks (we’re on a family 50 book reading challenge for the year, J is winning right now). Using up our foraged and herbal medicines, drinking our lovely homemade white wine (it came out fantastic, if I do say so!), eating crazy pizzas (like this ‘Turkey Dinner’ pizza with mushroom stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy as the base, turkey, mozzarella, and a bright cranberry sauce dotted on after cooking — reminds us of this great sub from the VT Sandwich Co years ago called The Patriot, we miss it), and finding a moment or two for date nights out. It’s seed buying time and we’re dreaming of all the time we think is going to materialize this year for the homestead (because owning your own business puts everything on the back burner…). J is trying to talk us out of chickens this year and last year I was ready to turn the coop into a garden shed but I miss their beautiful little feathery selves across the yard and the eggs.

Winter — the time to dream about the growing seasons (and the growing seasons are the time to dream about the tucked in time of Winter!). Take care of each other out there.

Recipe Thursday: Mushroom Chickpea Barley Stew and Focaccia

These days we’re always looking for a quicker dinner. This is very unlike us, as generally we are a slow cooking, easy moving, enjoy the process kind of family but with the shop, our time is more frugal than it used to be. Who knows how long this will last, it is not in our nature so we are already scheming other fantasies, trying to make other plans but those take time as well. However, our ‘quick’ dinners are not probably as quick as many would think. We still make almost everything from scratch but some things we have our own way, which feels fast to us. This stew is lovely because our local mushroom farmers are having a great Winter season, we’ve still got a lot of dried herbs, the storage onions and carrots from the CSA are great, and their hoop houses keep churning out great greens, add in a couple of pantry shelf staples and we’ve got ourselves a delicious Winter dinner.

Take this Mushroom Chickpea Barley Stew — because we’ve had some bone broth working on the stove for a bit, we already have the base of all the good stuff happening (this time ours has chicken bones, lamb bone, turmeric, onions/carrots/garlic/celery, ACV, parsley, and kale in it). The mushrooms will saute slowly in olive oil and butter with a little onion, garlic, sage or rosemary (optional), and carrots until they are deep in color and a little crispy on the edge (always season your veg while cooking), then go into a pot of simmering broth. Add the barley (if you are using hulled, soak first. If it is pearl, just add — see pic below; hulled looks more like wheat berries, the pearl has the husk removed and has a whitish edge), and cooked chickpeas, and simmer for 25-30 minutes (add more broth if needed or desired for stew/soup thickness). Add chard or spinach and let simmer for another minute or two, then add heavy cream and let simmer another 5 min. Let sit for 5-10 minutes to come together. Season with sea salt and fresh ground black pepper. I will probably roast up the last of the Delicata Squash in rings, as a sweet savory garnish.

[If you desire amounts (I generally just wing it based on what I have and we love leftovers): Serves a crew…(great for a sledding party, Imbolc gathering, Scotch tasting, etc). This is a vat, scale down to your liking.
2 Tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil
2 Tbsp Butter (or bacon fat, or vegan butter)
I will go heavy on mixed gourmet Mushrooms (though you can use whatever you have — my mushroom folks show up at the Farmer’s Mkt every now and again and I go crazy) at about 2lbs chopped coarsely
1 medium Onion (because my kid doesn’t like them so she won’t notice 1) chopped small
3 white or yellow Carrots (again, my kid doesn’t like cooked carrots so if I choose a different color than orange, she doesn’t notice as much but you can use whatever you like) chopped small
2-3 large cloves of Garlic
2 Tbsp Fresh Sage, Thyme, or Rosemary leaves (or 1 Tbsp Dried), optional
5 cups good Broth (homemade, bone, chicken, veg, whatever suits your fancy)
2 cups dry Barley (mine is hulled so I will boil some water, add it, put a lid on it taking it off the heat, and soak it for a couple of hours first)
2 boxes (or 14 oz cans) of cooked Chickpeas (or soak and cook dried the day before) drained and rinsed
1 big bunch of Chard (or Spinach, or if you only have Kale, let it cook an extra minute or 2) chopped (I throw the less leafy stems back into the broth pot with any trimmings from the carrots, onions, garlic, and mushrooms)
2 cups Heavy Cream
Sea Salt & Fresh Ground Black Pepper

For the Focaccia, I will just take a frozen Pizza dough (we use ours which is fully-fermented and naturally-leavened), thaw in the fridge overnight and bring to room temp on the counter day of (takes an hour or two), spread out on a parchment covered sheetpan dusted with semolina pressing two fingers in two lines down through the dough (but not making holes to the parchment, just big indentations). Drizzle Extra Virgin Olive Oil liberally over top and into dents, sprinkle with coarse Sea Salt, and Dried Sage or Rosemary, and cook in a preheated oven at 425 degrees for about 20 minutes until it is puffed up and golden. Cut in half longways, and then into long 2″ pieces, perfect for dipping into stew.

With the snow still on the ground, this stew calls to me — cozy up!

Tuesday Happens. Winter is for…

regrouping, recouping, recharging, taking it slow, hunkering down, tucking in, mending, breathing deep, making new plans — reading plans (50 book Family Challenge), garden plans (seeds — buying, starting, designing), health plans (assessing new concerns, maintenance care), yearly plans (camping, Ren Fests, travels), snuggling, making art (and apparently inspired cardboard constructions), playing board games and listening to records, watching long-winded movies (and maybe fun ones, too), feeling fresh cold air, icicles, seeing the fields clearly, hopefully tapping trees and boiling syrup, remembering how lucky we are (even when we’re not feeling it), remembering loved ones, drinking hot tea/hot broth/hot coffee/hot toddy, fighting colds (with everything we’ve got — elderberry, mullein, usnea, reishi, mint, lemon balm, pine, cinnamon, ginger, garlic, chili, eucalyptus), wearing slippers and sweaters, and taking care of one another in a world that sometimes feels as if it is too overwhelming to do so.

Happenings: Bringing in a new year

We have had a wonderful time to be together this Winter Solstice — we did many of the things we set out to do; relax, clean up the house a bit and get into the studio, eat biscuits with jam (and marmalade — thank you to the beautiful bread members who shared their Autumn Olive Jam and Ginger Orange Marmalade with us — so delicious!), and spend a really lovely day in Brunswick. We can’t recommend Reverie Coffee House enough- it has fantastic coffee, is a supercute place, and is committed to local crafts and community. We also adored The Mix art supply store, where I found some lovely Maine-made metallic watercolors, and D got a great little set of fancy colored pencils and a calligraphy kit. We loved visiting Beth and Gary at Gulf of Maine Books — hearing stories about Gary Snyder and Lucy Lippard and buying books by both. We found treasures at Bull Moose; D got a goddess coloring book, I scooped up the Kim Deal album, and J got me the new Laurie Anderson. D bought a wooden spoon treasure from The Nest (where I could get lost for days), and we even had a good run in Morning Glory Natural Foods where I knew (and was right) I could get some Naan and now know I can get Wild Fruitings mushrooms, too!

We then went down to Portland to the Victorian Mansion for their holiday tour (all rooms are inspired by different holiday stories and decorated by professional designers). D is a junkie for all things Victorian right now (getting 2 crinolines, hair ribbons, and a chatelaine for gifts), so she was in her glory. Then we had brunch at Hot Suppa, our long-time favorite. We also hit Bard for some coffee and Rosemont on the Hill for snacks and a view of the old ‘hood and bay. At some point, J and I had a nice anniversary date (28 years!!!) at State Lunch in Augusta. And we ate at home like we weren’t worried about anything – lamb mechoui with gorgeous pinto potatoes (and then lamb gyro pizza), Ottolenghi sweet potatoes and chicken, pumpkin curry, peach crumble, breadboards with fancy cheese and fig/walnut bread, chocolate, and pomegranates, so many treats.

There was a little snow in there somewhere (and 50 degree rainy days), sushi luncheon with Nana (thank you for the lovely gifts! like Paco the giant goose!), homework on Washington’s Farewell Address, house repairs (water pressure problems, sump pump replacement, assessments, plans), movie watching, video game playing, dressmaking (for the Winterball!) and dance moves, board game playing, and art making. It was a great way to wind down from some bad habits and wind up into re-energizing our efforts.

The actual new year (for us and how the world actually functions biologically, astronomically, cyclically) is also the Solstice. Well, really every day is a new year but we don’t need to get into that. And some will question why we don’t just follow everyone else on their cultural calendars — claiming we are no fun. But it’s hard to be fun when the ‘holidays’ are built for folks who have the privilege of ignoring those who don’t and just make up ‘white culture’ as they see fit. It is strange to us, and not very fun at all. We’re adults, we can decide to jump on the bed and eat ice cream for dinner, we can choose to take care of folks better.

And this is where the homestead and the shop come together for us. If nothing else, if we can’t save everyone all the time, we can make better choices for a better world. We’ve tried out ‘social media’ and find that it is not the great equalizer or barometer of information; after a year of advertising and sharing our life there, we don’t necessarily see a benefit of more folks showing up for events or community (unless there is some drama happening, which we do appreciate the support when we are challenged). We’re not blaming folks, but the medium of flashy postscript hashtag fly-by-night engagement (and also Zuckerberg, he wasn’t great before, but now is worse for his support of fascism) is not for us. Word of mouth, deeper connection through our newsletter and blog, person to person relations — these suit us better.

Deeper engagements are our focus for this new year. Radical entanglements, deeper ecologies, intricate and discrete commitments, showing up for the community in the world we want to live in.

Tuesday Happenings: Winter Solstice on the way!

We are generally trapped by the dominant paradigm of colonialist/commercialist (because the Santa you know and love is a coca-cola marketing campaign) racist/sexist/homophobic ‘holidays’ that seem to permeate the last couple of months of the year. I know, I know, we’ve been told we don’t have any christmas spirit (and you are right, nor do we want either of those things for several reasons). But contrary to the limited scope of how we function in the world, we do enjoy marking the seasons and celebrating life on the longest night of the year.

Our Winter celebrations, however, begin with the Solstice (not end the ‘holiday season’) because it is the long Winter we are hoping to make it through. We have stockings which we fill with treats and small gifts for each other and maybe if it is a good year we can get a gift or two for each other (this would not be one of those years, but maybe next year). We have an ‘Event Calendar’ to mark the December days until the Solstice where we do fun things like make waffle breakfast, listen or make music together, play board games, have spa time (Duende likes to paint our toes while we sit around with face masks), maybe go out and see other people’s lights in the snow, and get a few treats like chocolate or pomegranates. D usually decorates a cover for an old type tray that we’ve filled in the slots with pictures of our ‘events’. Most years she paints or draws some kind of house and we cut out the windows, this year she pencil-colored a ‘sewing kit’ and we cut out the spools of thread. I like it when we take a seasonal walk to see how the land is shifting and our environment changing.

If we get any other presents, we generally just open them before the Solstice. Solstice is just for us and our celebrating together. If we have the morning off of work during our celebration D makes lovely biscuits and we eat them with honey and jam together and then for dinner we get Take-Out (we only get take out maybe 3 times a year, so it’s a big deal for us). This year, hopefully we can still do the latter — last year, it was so busy we had to wait a week.

This year, too, we’re going to take some time off together. Because D is in school, she has the week off (subject to the dominant paradigm, of course) so we want to spend time with her. We will likely relax a bit, clean a bit, and have a couple days out and about in one of Maine’s cute little towns. I’m sure D will take some time to make us biscuits then, and maybe we’ll make some homemade pasta. We’ll do a New Year’s dinner of a beautiful leg of lamb (thank you Mutton Claus!) and an Upside Down Peach Gingercake I’m dying to make.

We manage our lovely celebration despite having to work around the notion that everyone should do what the dominant paradigm dictates — it’s good to remember there are different kinds of folks out there, doing different things, just trying to get along. We hope you enjoy a celebration that doesn’t dictate how others live their lives.

Happy Winter Solstice.