face wash and other treasures

On this fine Memorial Day I'm forgoing all the barbecues and swimming pool parties and getting some stuff done around the house-- and feeling very satisfied with myself. I made a batch of deodorant for a friend, and a batch of my favorite face wash-- the Miracle Grains in Rosemary Gladstar's book, which I do not own. It must be out of print. Luckily, my library has it. This is such a great face wash! It is the closest I've found to my favorite Dr. Hauschka face wash, and so much more affordable.

While cleaning out boxes of stuff in my sewing room, I've come across lots of little treasures. For example, a thrifted dish, a cross-stitch dollhouse pillow my mom made, and a tag for a dog named FANCY.

This week I've enjoyed reading through the archives of this new-to-me blog: Fields and Fire. The family runs a bakery in Amherst and does a grain CSA, on top of hand-washing all their clothes and dishes at home, using a work horse for farm and garden work, and growing most of their food. Amazing and inspiring. This photo really made my day! They might just be living my dream life.

scenes from Farm Friday

American Buff gosling

the squashes are in!

beach baby, beach baby there on the sand...

California was....awesome! It was my first visit and I kind of fell in love. I was a) surprised at how cold it was, b) in awe of the foreign (to me) plants and wildlife, and c) seriously impressed with the food and beverage selection. We went to Santa Monica first, where we stayed with a friend who works at Rawesome (a raw meat and dairy market) making raw chicken salad (I tried it! It was good!), raw coconut concoctions, raw bison burgers, and nut milks. We did lots of biking around and walking on the pier. Here I am playing on the rings at the beach:

Our friend took us to lots of gorgeous and tantalizing farmer's markets. One of them spanned about 5 blocks and had hundreds of vendors! This is so very unlike anything where I live... These herbs are from one of my favorite booths.

Ruben ate strawberries and raw avocado honey for breakfast the next day:

We also ate at the Library Ale House and though I don't remember a whole lot about the food, I had the best beer of my life (this one). Seriously, I don't even like beer, but I am STILL craving this one. Of course no one in our entire bioregion sells this. I've already checked.

Then we said our goodbyes, rented a hybrid, and headed up the coast. Here I am in an herb garden in Cambria:
We took the scenic Hwy 1 all the way up to San Francisco. It was so beautiful, and our camera broke on the first day of the drive. Torture!! So, no more pictures of the trip. We tried to burn everything into our memories, though.

We spent a night in Big Sur and ate twice at the amazing Big Sur Bakery and Restaurant. I highly recommend that you stop here should you ever find yourself in the area! I had a wood fired pizza and snacked on delicious olives while sipping wine and staring out at the green mountains. This was a PREMIER EXPERIENCE of my life...not sure if I can convey my contentedness and joy that evening. Something about the view, the food, the weather and the company. Anyway, we came back for breakfast, which was a very good decision. We had pop tarts, chocolate croissants, and a delicious banana strudel. We hiked around the state park, carved a heart into a bench, and gawked at Pfeiffer Beach.

Next, we went to Santa Cruz where I had an appointment with a homeopath, and we met up with one of my oldest friends for a snack at River Cafe, which I totally loved. This place is seriously cute, with delicious food (we had sweet peas with spicy tofu skins, and lavender sugar cookies...not at the same time) and only two kegs on tap (one beer, one kombucha)! I loved it and wish we had stayed longer so I could have eaten there again.

In San Francisco, the highlights for me were eating at Sushi Ran (actually in Sausalito) and Magnolia. There were lots of places that I wanted to eat (hello Zuni Cafe, Boulette's Larder, Tartine, Chez Panisse, Greens, and Ubuntu) but that just weren't in the cards for us this time. I may have been a bit overzealous (nice way of saying obsessive) in the planning of the food aspect of our trip. What can I say? I like to eat.

I was kind of overwhelmed by the hustle and bustle of the City, but our friends showed us around and we had fun walking around the parks and shops. Also, I finally get what the big deal is about the golden gate bridge!

We stayed our last couple of nights at Cavallo Point, where a childhood friend of Ruben's is a chef. It was crazy nice, and we got to do a spa treatment, and I remember saying to Ruben, "Why don't we do this ALL THE TIME?!?" We got to experience a 10 course meal with wine pairings one night, and a 3 hour brunch out on the porch that looks out over the bay the next day. Really incredible and totally not our normal style of staying/dining. Thanks Tim for hooking us up!

And, finally, the Heath Factory Store. Yes please. We have $200 worth of gorgeous ceramics heading our way. Happy Birthday/Christmas to us!

Ruben lost his wallet at the airport on the way home and we almost weren't able to get on the plane. Now I'm wondering...would that have been such a bad thing? Bye for now Cali, and thanks for the hospitality. We're already saving for vacation #2.

Whew. I just got home from a California vacation! We flew to LA and then drove up Highway 1 and flew home from San Francisco. So fun! I am so sad to go back to work in the morning...

chicken feed

A few weeks ago I started thinking about what we feed our chickens. They are free-roaming in our (fenced) yard during the day, and we give them a good amount of kitchen scraps and leftovers, but they also love to eat their feed that we get from the hardware store. We really haven't found a good, organic brand of chicken feed locally. For a while we were buying organic feed from a farm that was ordering it from Virginia, but they stopped ordering it after a few months of using it, because of the cost of shipping it down here. So we've been using Layena, which they like just fine, but I'm pretty sure is full of factory-farmed animal parts and GMO corn and soy. Not exactly what I want to be supporting, or putting into my eggs. So. Enter my awesome friend Monica, who kindly showed me how much fun it is to make your own chicken feed! And that's just what I did.






Here's the recipe she gave me. It's modified from here based on the grains we can find easily in our area.
2 or 3-4 cups corn (grind or use grits) (use the larger quantity in the winter)
4 cups winter wheat (grind)
3 cups spring wheat (grind)
1 cup barley (grind)
1 cup oats (grind if whole)
1-2 cups sunflower seeds
1 1/2 cups millet
1 1/2 cups quinoa
1 cup sesame seeds
1 cup lentils (grind)
1 cup split peas (grind)
1/2 cup flax
1/2 cup Fertrell Nutribalancer (per 10 lbs feed, depending on quantities you use)
1 1/2 cup fish meal (per 10 lbs feed)


You can substitute amaranth for the quinoa or millet sometimes, or give other grains like kamut, if you can find it in your area.


Here's a post on Wild Roots Homestead with the chicken feed recipe that they use for their large flock. They also have some great ideas on foods to supplement your chickens' diets (sprouts and kombucha!). I could use some more of those in my diet, too....

Ruben's band played at a local music fest this weekend and we took Jackie and had fun dancing, relaxing with some great people, and drinking malted milkshakes.

mama's south of france salad dressing

This dressing is light, easy, and perfectly compliments fresh, tender lettuce. To make a complete lunch, add a boiled egg, some slivered radishes, and a handful of sugar snap peas to your salad. My mom picked up this recipe when we visited the south of france years ago, and she still makes it nearly weekly!

mama's favorite salad dressing

4 tbsp oil (hazelnut or sunflower…something light)

1 tbsp white wine

1 tsp Dijon mustard

salt and pepper to taste

Mix white wine and mustard together well. Mix oil in slowly, whisking constantly. Season and serve.

We are having an honest-to-goodness spring. This never happens here! I have tomatoes in the ground, and we ate our first ripe strawberry when my nephew was visiting last week.

I walked to work this morning (which I don't do as much as I should because it's a 40 minute walk and I have a seriously hard time getting myself out of the house these days) and the air was heavy with flowery smells. It was a lovely morning--cool, clear, and sunny. It's spring break, too, so there were no kids yelling at me as I walked past the high school! Perfection.

The spring clock change kills me every year (I think I might finally be almost adjusted. Maybe.) but it is just so so nice to have more evening. I am getting stuff done!

weekend projects

Fabric bucket pattern here. For an artist friend. I have one that I keep my paint tubes in.
Baby kimono pattern from Weekend Sewing. It was a bright windy weekend here and I loved spending time at my sewing desk with the windows open. This little kimono is for a sweet girl who's due to arrive in June. It was fun to sew, but I was confused a bit by the tie placement and ended up not following the pattern exactly. Also, the underarms are kind of wonky. Oh well. I have some of this beautiful Lecien fabric in the blue colorway too, so I'm starting on a boy version of this tonight. Three cheers for getting my sewing mood back!