I can't get you out of my mind...

She needs me.

I found Flojo at the Animal Lifeline in Carlisle, IA., last week, and since then I've come up with her new name (Flossie), a plan for introducing her to our dog, Wally, and our four cats, Fern, Elmer, Fannie and Lester.
I haven't yet been able to convince my dh that we need another dog. Or rather, how desperately I know she needs me, umm, us.
You see, I regularly check the photos at most of the nearby animal shelters as well as breed-specific animal rescue organizations throughout the Midwest. I'm not exactly looking for someone to adopt; I just can't help myself.
There's something in my core, something almost instinctual, that drives me to need to care for other creatures.
I have four children and if it had been up to me, we probably would have 6 or 7. Now that the kids are growing up, that yearning for another baby has wained somewhat.
Or perhaps I've just changed focus.

Now it's Flojo.
I can't get her out of my mind....

Allergic to Life

Well, I don't have to move.
I spent Monday afternoon in the allergist's office, only to find out I have a severe case of SOUO. Sneezing of Unknown Origin.
I'm not allergic to anything. Not dust. Not molds. Not pollen. Not dust mites. Nor cats, nor dogs, nor any living thing.
The jury is still out on the bat guano. The allergist didn't test me for that, alluding that it would be highly unlikely, despite the bat colony living in my rafters.
So, apparently I suffer from periodic unexplained fits of sneezing, watering eyes, running nose with NO KNOWN CAUSE.
It does, however, have a medically auspicious sounding diagnostic name: Vasomotor rhinitis.
Sounds like a rhinoceros with coordination problems.
According to the experts: The exact cause of vasomotor rhinitis is unknown. It may be a hypersensitive response to a dry atmosphere, air pollutants, spicy foods, alcohol, strong emotions, or some medications. Vasomotor rhinitis is not caused by an infection or allergy.
Great.
There's no telling what sets me tripping down sneezing lane. It could be red wine, burritos or a row with my husband.
Kind of spooky, isn't it?

Papourri

Bring on the Science Fair!
Melissa decided to make paper for her project.
We had been reading a book Marco Polo for Kids that includes lots of great activities, such as weaving a wall hanging, making yogurt and making paper. We had already done some of these activities, and the Science Fair gave me the impetus to try our hand at paper-making.
Paper was first made by the Chinese in the 2nd Century BC. It may seem a little odd to "make" paper using paper, but it is a great way to recycle paper scraps, old lists, even your older sister's old homework!

The steps were really quite easy.
First, Melissa tore up old paper and put it in a large bowl. Our recipe suggested about 3 pieces of torn up paper to make one sheet of "new" paper.



Then, cover the paper scraps with hot water and leave them to soak for 30 minutes.




When the scraps are done soaking, place them in the blender with the water and blend until scraps are completely pulverized.



Place a piece of window screen on a large cookie sheet. Pour the pulverized paper mixture on top of the screen and spread it out to cover. We found it worked best to strain out some of the water.

Melissa collected lots of tiny flowers and leaves from outside and from some old bouquets. This is one of the most fun parts - getting to customize your paper with "add ons." Place a second piece of window screen over the top of your paper.


Next, carefully lift both screens, with the wet paper sandwiched in between to a solid surface covered in towels to absorb excess water.

Use a sponge to press out as much water as you can.


Cover the screen with paper towels.

Now, remove the screen, cover the paper with paper towels again. Cover the paper with a heavy object - we used a large cutting board - and press some more. There is a lot of water to remove!

Carefully remove the paper towels. We were able to set them aside to dry so we could use them again.

Carefully peel the paper away from the screen underneath and set aside to dry. Our paper took almost a full 24 hours to dry. It was so much fun, Melissa made another piece. To color the paper, just use colored paper scraps.


The finished product!

Simply Stix

So, what does an unschooled 11-year-old do with her time?
After all, we have no formal lessons (except for the occasional panic-induced math her mother is prone to), no set schedule, no daily tasks that must be completed.
She probably sits in front of the TV all day, zoned out, learning nothing, right?
Or else she's staring blankly at a computer screen or having her mind-numbed by violent video games.
Everyone knows a kid can't constructively occupy her own time. A kid can't know what's best for her; after all, she's only 11.
Here is merely one totally kid-inspired activity my 11-year-old daughter created last week. Meet Simply Stix, a line of dolls by Melissa.





Not too shabby, huh?

Allergic to my house?

Yesterday was one of my "lost" days.
No, I don't drink, at least not to excess (well, most of the time).
For the past year or so, once every couple of weeks, I wake to the rhythmic pulsing of my sinus tissues. This is followed by acute episodes of sneezing, followed by sneezing, nose blowing, more sneezing and the occasional cough.
I think I am allergic to my house.
This all started about 6 months after we moved into our gorgeous, somewhat dilapidated, but worthy 1904 house.
I've been taking a generic form of Allegra, prescribed by my doctor, instead of popping a nightly dose of Claritin D and Benadryl. I thought, perhaps, I had this beaten. But yesterday was the last straw.
I was up early yesterday, as I had a full day of errands planned. I felt a little sneezy, but tried to put it out of my mind. I would give this a holistic approach, I decided, and proceeded to make muffins. I was in denial, plain and simple.
By 9 a.m., after spilling my coffee with yet another seismic sneeze, I realized that the plug had been pulled on the power of positive thinking.
Hoping that it wasn't yet too late to stop the inevitable, I took some Actifed.
By the time my daughter came downstairs at 10 a.m., I had used an entire box of Kleenex, my nose was sore, I could barely see through my watering eyes and I was keeping my head tilted back on the couch, my mouth open.
"Mom, what are you going to do?" she wailed.
The only thing I could do. I would resort to Benadryl.
"But doesn't that make you sleepy?"
"I'll just have to keep myself moving."
Ha.
Don't you admire such optimism in the midst of sure defeat? Sort of like Bush and Iraq; I was definitely fighting a battle in which no one would come out on top.
By 11 a.m., I was so desperate I placed a call to my doctor, in the hope he could suggest something to put me out of my misery.
By 11:30, I ordered a Neti pot from Amazon. I paid $3.99 for next day shipping, even though I get two day shipping for free. The very idea of pouring something into one side of my nose, let alone letting it run out the other side is somewhat horrific to me. All I can conjure up in comparison is the time I snorted pickle juice into my sinuses in my college dining hall. Did I mention I was sitting across from the most gorgeous man I had ever seen at the time? I can't believe he married me anyway...
By 11:45, the sneezing hadn't slowed, my doctor hadn't called me back and I was well into the second box of Kleenex. Through my half stupor, I barely remember spelling words for my daughter as she typed a story into the computer. I sort of remember begging her to bring me some water...
By 1 p.m., I couldn't stand it anymore and took yet another dose of Benadryl. As my kids came home one-by-one from school, all I could do was nod, open-mouthed, as they told about their day and croak out between sneezes: Fend for yourselves.
By 1:30 I called an allergist and made an appointment for Monday, making sure they were aware that I live in an old house, I have had bats in the attic (and still do) and my basement is more like a damp cellar than modern living space. "So be sure the doctor checks to see if I'm allergic to bat guano or old-house molds. Please make sure she knows I live in an old house."
Geez, you'd think I was the only person to ever request an allergy test for bat guano.
By 3:30, the sneezing had finally mostly stopped and I managed to stumble and drool my way up to bed. The doctor called and suggested I try Zirtec.
He was clueless.
Everything from about 4:30 to 7:30 is fuzzy; I know I slept through several movies and asked my son to bring me soup.
The rest of the evening was pretty much under control, as long as I continued to take Benadryl every four hours.
But then, perhaps the worst thing of all happened. It was midnight, and I couldn't sleep. There must be some threshold you reach with Benadryl after which it no longer knocks you out but keeps you awake and jittery. All. Night. Long.
I took Benadryl again this morning and have my fingers crossed it'll keep the sneezing at bay. I managed to do all my errands today, despite my Benadryl hangover. Yes, I operated heavy machinery while in a Benadryl hangover. Dangerous? Yes, but I had to buy felt and fabric glue, mangos and bananas. My daughter's book club was depending on me.
What if I am allergic to my house?

Yum!

Look what for was dessert last night:



The first homemade ice cream of 2008 with hot fudge sauce made with goat's milk from Northern Prairie Chevre and a sprinkling of peanuts.

Actually, we ate breakfast at 11:30 and lunch at 5:30, so technically, the ice cream was our supper.

And boy, was it great!

Argh, mateys!

My little girl is growing up fast!
Here she is in her first high school production, Treasure Island.





Sarah had a small role, but also helped build scenery, research props and tear down the set when finished.





She's the sailor with the short hair.
It was her decision to head back to school full-time after years of unschooling and taking the occasional class at public school. Once she realized the school work wasn't going to be an issue, she dived into thespians. Acting has been her passion for several years now and she is so happy with this group of kids and the drama teacher.





Though it was hard to see Sarah go back to school, it has turned out to be the right decision for her. Her little sister and I miss her when she's at school or staying late working on a play, but supporting and respecting the decisions Sarah makes for herself is one of the best was to show her how much I love her.

Spring is Here!

Saturday we had an absolutely gorgeous spring day; sunny with highs in the mid-60s. We did lots of spring-time activities, too.

Our day included a trip to Woodward, to visit Picket Fence Creamery to stock up on milk, hamburger and eggs; Prairieland Herbs, to buy handmade soap and furniture polish; and to Northern Prairie Chevre, where we bought tons of artisan goat cheese, including feta, parmesan and manchego.
I like buying as many products as I can from local farmers and craftspeople and these stops certainly fit the bill.
After a delicious lunch of eggs w/goat cheese and spinach, dumpster bread and dumpster tangerines, we headed outside to start work on our raised bed garden. We worked up the soil, added some compost from the bin we started last summer and planted cold-tolerant crops, including two different kinds of lettuces, swiss chard, radishes and carrot.


A great surprise was Sarah's discovery that our vermicomposting worms are still alive! We thought we'd killed them by leaving their bin outside too late this fall. So now the worms are happily eating yesterday's cabbage scraps and a couple of old bagels.
We now have two active compost bins made from garbage cans and our vermicomposter.

Next on the agenda is building another raised bed garden and adding a strawberry bed. There used to be an old carriage house behind our house. Sometime in the recent past, that was torn down and a new garage was built off to the side. Unfortunately, no one every dug out the old foundation of the carriage house and doing so doesn't fit in our budget right now. So this area is where we're building our raised beds.


We plan to take down these two trees, so we have enough sunshine for the raised beds. We want to plant two dwarf apple trees to take their place.












I'm sad that this big, old soft maple tree will have to come down, too. In trimming some branches last year we noticed that the whole trunk and the major branches are hollow, creating a dangerous situation. In the sunshine that will be created by its loss, we plan to reclaim a lot of the side yard and turn it into garden space.




















Other great news: Our three Freecycle peonies survived the winter! Peonies are notoriously difficult to transplant. We received these and a bunch of other perennials in June of last year and didn't get any of them planted until July or so. I'm delighted they made it!

Wistful Abandonment

There are a lot of abandoned farmhouses in Iowa.
Ever since I was a kid, seeing the ghostly remains of a house would sadden me. Not just your average - gee, isn't that too bad - kind of sad, but a visceral mourning for what once was and is no more. Sometimes I'd see just an empty lot rimmed with day lilies in the middle of a soybean field; the only monument left to mark where a family once lived and worked and played. Were they happy? When did they leave the farm? How many children played in that yard?
Now I live in a city, albeit it a small one, in a run-down neighborhood where most houses are rental properties and almost all suffer from years of neglect. My house was built in 1914; a foursquare in what was then undoubtedly an upscale suburb. We have put more than $40,000 into this old house, with tens of thousands more needed to repair and replace, remodel and resurface. My house deserves every penny we have put into it. It has original stained glass windows, gorgeous floors (those that we've been able to refinish so far), woodwork that would be prohibitively expensive to make today, and grand pillars inside and outside.
But there is a street in my neighborhood that is deteriorating rapidly. One house has nearly been torn apart just within the last year. It seems that as soon as a rental property is left vacant, it is vandalized. The first to go are the windows, then even the aluminum siding is stripped off to sell.
I certainly don't understand the vandalism or what kind of life experience leads someone to enjoy destroying.
But what bothers me even more is that the city allows landlords to simply abandon properties; at least it seems as if they have been abandoned.
Des Moines, as do most cities nationwide, has a growing population of homeless people. The current mortgage crisis will turn more families than ever out into the street. The waiting lists for low-income rental housing are prohibitively long. Yet Des Moines allows empty houses to be desecrated beyond repair. Why are property owners allowed to leave an empty house to simply disintegrate? Why isn't there a program to condemn these properties before they are severely damaged, sell them at auction for renovation or take them over and contract out the renovation?
Every time I walk past these houses, I am overwhelmed with sadness. Maybe someday someone in power will recognize the value of using and repairing what we already have.
Maybe someday, these once proud houses, where families lived, some happily and, undoubtedly, some not, will again be called "home."