Evie's Pet Potato

So a lot of my friends know this story, but random internet folks do not.
Let me preface this by saying that when the dirt princess and I go to the grocery story, she WANTS TO HELP. Big time. And when she WANTS TO HELP, that can be satisfied usually by handing her whatever I've picked off the shelf to put in the cart. She holds on to it until I find the next object, at which point she usually lays the current object aside or helpfully turns and drops it in to the cart behind her. And she does this while charming the boogers out of everybody who works there and some of the shoppers.
The only exception is when I hand her unpackaged produce. This started as an attempt to show her what different things were that we were going to eat. I would hold up a tomato and say "This is a tomato!" and she would happily grab at it and hold it until I held up the bag with several more tomatoes in it, at which time she dropped it in among the others of its kind.
Sometimes this backfires, though. See, my kid is curious and loves to learn and she's still at the stage where things go in the mouth. Parents are familiar with this across the board, so I won't explain.
Earlier this year, winter I believe, I was picking potatoes up for reasons I can't remember. I held up a big ol' Idaho baking potato and told my daughter "This is a potato!" Forgetting at that moment that I also referred to hash browns and french fries as "potatoes" so she would understand what she was about to eat.
By the time I had turned back to her with a bag filled with more potatoes, she had scraped a half inch gap in to the top of the one I had given her, was making a face, and clenching the potato closely to her. When I attempted to get her to put it in the bag, for some reason that time she refused, holding it close to her chest.
I jokingly asked "Is that your pet potato?" to which she nodded, as she does almost any time I ask her a question. And onward we went through the grocery store, my child clutching this potato for dear life.
I couldn't put it back because the kid had obviously drooled all over it and torn it up, so I was resigned to taking it home and making something out of it. It got all the way to checkout with my daughter holding it before she grumpily let it go to be weighed and rung up.
I set the potato aside and almost forgot about it until one day I remembered I had NOT used that one with the others in the dish I'd made (the top turned gnarly colors and I was concerned about cooking it for someone) and that it was still in my kitchen somewhere. I sought it out, found it nestled behind some bananas on our toaster (I don't know... it must've seemed like a good resting spot) and realized with surprise that the thing had green sprouts coming out of it!
I have big plans for my dream garden, and one of those is having a potato "tower" to grow my own potatoes in. When I saw those sprouts, I realized I could start growing the potatoes right now, just keep it in a pot and size up as necessary until I had the proper space for it. With great excitement I sectioned it out so each part had two "eyes" sprouting, and buried it in a mixture of potting soil and coffee grounds.
Don't do that. It's horrible, retains moisture, and I ended up losing three of the four sections to rot. At that time the 4 sections of 6 that had survived being in a dish with standing water went on to be transplanted to an apothecary jar. I thought it might be cool to see the roots grow in it. I labeled it in case people would be coming in to see the house, as I still had pipe dreams of getting the place on the market back in January/February. It just seemed important that people know WHY I had an apothecary jar full of dirt chilling on my pie cooling rach-cum-plant stand.

I promptly left it to its own devices, thinking that it would go slowly due to the lack of sunlight and heat until I opened it one day and OMG WHAT IS THIS THING??

I had apparently grown a miniature Elder God. Which was cool, don't get me wrong. But it just looked.... wrong. And I'd read that exposed roots and tubers could turn poisonous so I quick-like-a-bunny got some more potting soil and coffee grounds in there (see? I kept making the SAME MISTAKE. DON'T USE POTTING SOIL AND COFFEE GROUNDS, IT DOESN'T DRAIN AND GETS MOULDY LIKE CRAZY. End of public service announcement.)
I was happy that I would have one potato vine when I peaked in one day and....... a neighbor??

In the midst of February this thing was bound and determined to grow, and it DID... like gangbusters. You can see the white roots pushing up against the sides of the jar behind the label.
The only problem was that apothecary jars offer no drainage, and coffee grounds and dirt apparently don't drain worth a galldang. I have now tested this three times by accident, trust me... they do not. So a fine whitish blue fungus grew on the surface of the soil and eventually took out one of the vines.
I decided to transplant the other one to try and save it, and when I dug up the dirt, the stuff around the other potato just smelled of solid rot. There wasn't even anything left of the potato or plant, just black smoosh. So I quickly got the other plant out of there, dumped the entire thing of corrupted dirt, set it on fire with napalm, then sanitized it so that nothing would ever grow on the surface of that glass. Except I'm exaggerating, I just ran it through the dishwasher. The other vine, though, went to its happy home in a pot with drainage and plain, boring potting soil. It even had two tiny buds on it that looked like they might become potatoes!
I actually ended up having to move it from THAT pot in to an outdoor-ready pot, to accommodate the root growth and the inch or two of extra growth the vine put out.
I ended up accidentally tearing some of the roots, so it was only left with a couple to try and grow from. I was concerned for a bit, but it kept green. It stayed about 2 inches tall from then until I moved it outside to hang with the strawberries, trying to see if the sun and outdoor life would suit it. For size reference, that pot is about 6 inches tall.

I eventually moved it to the plant rack where everything is currently living happily, including our new seedlings (update on that later, there is news!) seeing that it was starting to grow a bit finally OMG WHAT HAPPENED TO THE POTATO????

So this thing is a MONSTER now, and that top part literally grew in 4 days, after 2 days of mist and rain and 2 days of 80 degree temperatures. I have to transplant it AGAIN. That will be the THIRD TIME. And I'm going to do it in a plastic pot, which is very big and will only be half full of dirt, so I can start mounding up because I need to get some of that stuff covered if I'm going to be getting more potatoes out of it! Needless to say, it likes its currently home and seems to be doing just ducky. I predict we'll have a nice-sized vine by the end of summer and quite a few tubers to try and dry-store and start the process over from again in the spring. I have in my mind an idea for a potato dynasty, all sprouted from the one ridiculously chewed thing my daughter brought home that acclimated to the Pennsylvania summers and crazy soil conditions to be hearty, delicious, and highly bake-able. And that's more than you needed to know about any potato ever, but will help you understand why I take so much pride in this little guy and why I'm bothering to keep him alive so much. I have the same type of story regarding my fruit trees, but that's a post for another week.
In the meantime, we were in the grocery store yesterday when I tried again, saying "This is a peach!" and watched her take a tentative bite from its flesh (we only pick up veggies and fruits we're buying anyway, as an aside. I don't let her chew on stuff we don't intend to use) chuckling that we might have a pet peach tree soon.... except....

...nope. Not this time. It was cleaned to the stone before we even got home and the pit had to be tossed before it could get sticky and end up in dirt princess's hair. Which is where all sticky things end up lately.

Ah well. Another time then. I still have three more peaches waiting to be snacked on, anyway.....

What We've Been Up To

As of now the house we are trying to sell is FINALLY on the market, and we're currently going through everything involved with trying to pretend we don't live in it to keep it clean while actually doing so with a dog that sheds massively and a very active nearly-two-year-old.
I'm REALLY lucky we started it on a holiday weekend. Otherwise I would probably already be in tears. We've already had one thing broken and one thing stolen during the open house, so my formerly excited and cheery outlook has been dampened in all of this.
BUT... in the mean time... I am still, as ever, getting ready for the next step! We will be moving to an apartment where I will be free to have a billion plants and dirt all over the deck, and this makes me AMAZINGLY HAPPY. Somebody just needs to want this house! SEND US GOOD MOJO! And now on to the part where I actually talk about being creative.
I'd been sitting on a project for a long time because I wanted to do it with my little girl. She is absolutely a dirt child, (we have nicknamed her dirt princess for how much she gets in to it) and loves scooping and playing in potting soil and touching plants. We picked out small metal buckets from the dollar bin at Target and I grabbed some fun and easy herb and flower seeds to plant while we were out taking a break from house sell-er-y the other day:

The only downside of this is that while we were in mega OMG HIDE EVERYTHING FOR THE OPEN HOUSE!!!!!!1!!one! mode, they ended up being stashed and we couldn't risk getting dirt everywhere.
So, yeah, there IS part of me resentful that my daughter and I can't have fun developmental playtime because things will get dirty and this might potentially displease people who aren't even going to buy the place.
Well, today it seemed like we had only 2 requests to view the house, and they were both in the morning. So I decided THIS was the best day to just make a mess on the back deck, let my child play in the dirt, and plant seeds together.
It was glorious. I loved every minute, and she loved every minute of it. Allow me to illustrate.

She was all business. I would hand her an empty bucket or pot, and she would scoop soil out of the big blue pot in to whatever was empty. I showed her how to press it down gently, then made holes to put seeds in with my thumb. The seeds may or may not have made it in to the soil. I would give her a few and sometimes she sprinkled them in the pot we were working on, sometimes she threw them in the big blue pot. That's okay, this was a learning period.
So we ended up planting quite a few things, and I became surprised at how many things we had going. I had to actually juggle pots, thinking we'd purchased too many originally.

The first thing we planted were teddy bear sunflowers. I had this image in my head of my daughter hugging a fuzzy plant as high as her. I told her we were making "teddy bears", and she happily dumped all of her seeds in the proper container. It's a bit bland, but as the starter container, it should do nicely. I expect we'll have a few billion because dirt princess did not skimp in seed distribution. I intend to transplant as many as possible, because I utterly ADORE sunflowers, and this is the only sunflower action we'll be seeing this year.




Then after that we planted two different kinds of lavender. We had had a devil of a time locating lavender seeds, probably because it's so popular to grow (and kill, apparently, based on the resale rate). So when I found the last two packets at Target the other day, I snagged them. We have one of just plain Angustifolia, and another of Munstead. What's the difference? Heck if I know. But it's my favorite plant/herb, so I wanted to have some growing on my deck this summer, for transplant next spring in to our official, non-swampy garden! (Please pardon the saddest looking Gerbera daisy in the world behind those two. I bought one at Trader Joe's for my birthday and for some reason it hates life. I'll have to go get another. :( )

Following that came the single hardest won herb seeds ever.... I could find literally NO rosemary seeds at any of six different places I went to. Maybe this is The Year of Rosemary Usage in Food and I missed the memo? So I found an old packet I'd never planted in the midst of packing and set it aside. Will it come up? I sort of doubt it, as I think the seeds are 2 or 3 years old. But if they do, BOOM! My second favorite herb is ready to go! Fingers crossed the seeds are still viable. I long for the days when I lived in the Pacific NW and managed to grow a rosemary bush the size of a dog. I'll settle for a potted lovely that I can move inside and outside with the weather and harvest as necessary.

After that we planted marigolds, because those are always fun and brightly colored, and I thought my girl would love feeling the seeds and seeing how they blew in the wind.... yup, she blew them alllll over the deck. That's okay, though, they gave us a ton in the packet! We also planted another container with teddy bear sunflowers, and a third one with chamomile. I'd initially planned for it to go with my strawberries, but the strawberry jar seems crowded enough already without attempting to side-load herbal starts that might die in the summer's heat. So I'll hang on to them and figure out how to use them to help my baby girl relax better at night. I've also never really enjoyed chamomile tea, and suspect it's because I've tried the heavily manufactured stuff. So I'll harvest the blossoms and see what comes of a pot of fresh brewed chamomile later this summer when I have Huge Baby Belly Syndrome and need help relaxing. And heck, if anybody else loves some, I LOVE to share.

In the end, our outdoor shelf looked quite spectacular with everything all lined up on it next to the already booming strawberries and the Girlchild's Pet Potato that has actually turned in to a potato vine. (Damn proud of that one, might I add! I've never grown potatoes in my LIFE and it's going gangbusters in a pot on the deck! Will need to transplant VERY soon, though!)
In the midst of all the craziness, taking a moment to do a bit of Earth Mothering and letting my child experience dirt and growing things made me feel good. It took away all the pent up frustration and the feeling that there is nothing of ME or my family left in this house, as we desperately try to cater to strangers walking through. The deck swept off easily enough, my daughter wiped down without issue, and we have lots of fun little plants to look forward to. I also got to create something, and my severe need to nurture and grow stuff that has come along with this pregnancy has been sated, if ever so briefly.

Plus... dirt princess had herself one hell of a time. Look at that. That child is walking with PURPOSE. Even if it WAS to dump dirt in the citronella candle, since it was the only bucket lacking soil.













The next project will be aimed at this bad boy, picked up on sale at JoAnne Fabrics for a ridiculous percentage of what they were originally asking. I have always wanted a Savage Garden filled with carnivorous plants, and once I get the seams coated with silicon and the base painted for water resistance, I'm gonna have me a fancy terrarium marsh of meat eaters!

And now... goodnight. We're super tired after wearing ourselves out with all of this good, earthy fun, and we're still kinda dirty and stinky and it's time for bath time and sleep time. Thanks for stopping by!

Creativity Roundup

Recently I acquired an Ott Light for my birthday, in order to work on painting and drawing in the evenings after my daughter has gone to bed. She's wide awake during the good sunshine, so I never get to use that. Thus, it's been a life saver.
I've started taking one hour every evening to mess around with watercolors in an attempt to try new styles and improve my skillset. I paint with a travel watercolor set on postcard-sized watercolor paper in an attempt to do something quick and make the most of a limited pallet. So far it's been really fun and really re-awakened my creativity! I'm going to expand this in the future to include other things I love, like Zentangles, inkwashes, acrylics... heck, even some oils once everything is back out of storage!
So far, this is what I've managed with my time in the evenings. Each was done in one night, and yeah, it probably shows.

On top of this, though, I have a crazy yen for terrariums. I had one when I was little, lots of ferns and small plants collected in the woods out back of our house and stored in an empty coke bottle... this was back when the base was made from a dark, solid plastic and you could cut the clear part off, fill the bottom with dirt, then nestle the clear top back over it. I loved that thing dearly. I don't remember exactly what became of it, but seeing as I don't recall having it much longer than a summer, I'm guessing something happened and it didn't survive.
To this day I still want to put plants in to small, protected spaces and arrange them like they're miniature worlds. Worlds that I really want to put plastic dinosaurs and maybe an ugly faerie or two in to. (Pretty faeries get all the press). So today, realizing I had a hen-and-chicks plant going crazy with offshoots out on my back porch, I decided to make a very tiny one.

That little chick in the middle is actually the size of a nickel, and the jar is a very small jelly jar snagged for a dollar at a craft store. I already had al of the other things on hand to create it. I really like how adorable and simple it is.
In the future I'm planning on making a Savage Garden terrarium with carnivorous plants, as it's something I've been wanting to do for, oh, YEARS now. And I'm feeling super earthmother-y at the moment, probably due to incoming baby and spring. I'll do a step-by-step of that when it happens. This one was so fun, I just rushed through and finished it without taking any "how to" photos.
That's all that we've been doing around here so far this week, but there should be more to come!

Other Mothers

I've experienced Mother's Days before, and at this point I've had 2 as an actual mother (though one was just in utero and we were jumping the gun) so there is experience here with the holiday. I've given many gifts to my Mom in my life, including --and almost exclusively limited during my childhood/teenagedom to-- a plethora of African Violets because one year my poor Mom made the mistake of saying how much she loved them. Some of them survive to this day, and in my head when I see them, they are HER flowers.
For some reason, though, this Mother's Day feels very different. And I think I might know why.
Prior to now, there had been, in my head, only one kind of mother - the one that watched over me, gave me life, nagged me to brush my teeth and made me sit at the table until I had eaten that squash, darnit, because it was good for me. Even when I became one, there was a disconnect... I had this blond, squalling thing in my arms that nursed and needed diapers changed, but... well, I was certainly not the mother that my mother was. I was me. Silly, clueless, fumbling me. Who had a child that seemed to be okay with that, so we got along swimmingly.
I have a nickname, used jokingly by my spouse when I go crazy and grow All The Plants (and trust me, I do). During these times when I'm wrist-deep in potting soil with an enormous grin on my face he calls me "Earthmother". Earlier Saturday I was in the midst of repotting 4 small lemon trees I'd gotten to sprout from an organic lemon, 2 small apple trees, and tending to a 1.5 foot tall avocado I had sprouted similarly. I was transfering the houseplants to bigger pots, settling a ginger in for its life as an indoor provider of zippy flavor for our family, and moving a potato vine outside for the first time, excitedly noting it had two veeeerrrrry tiny tubers growing on it already. I had already gone about decking our front porch out in sedums and flowers and the hem of my dress was peppered with vermiculite, when my husband came downstairs, grinned and said "It's the Earthmother!"
And I realized that I was blissfully happy, content, and genuinely felt caring and responsibility for these green things I was tucking in to their new homes. I was, in fact, mothering them.
It was also at that moment that I realized my now 18-month-old daughter made me truly feel like a mother, as well. When she is upset, she runs to me. When she sees me first thing in the morning, she holds her arms up for me to lift and hug her. She giggles and plays with me, and if I step outside and close a door between us, the world has ended and she cries until I return. I'm her mother, and she wants me to be one. That wasn't truly in place this time last year. We were still in the survival and need fulfillment aspect of care-giving at that time.
Add to that the pets we currently have... when they're hungry, I'm the one they seek out. I'm the one they flounder on for attention, and when they're scared. So I'm also an animal mommy.
The more I thought on it, the more my old idea of what "Mother" is broke down. Because I felt like a mother to all of these things. I felt strong. I felt confident, even competent, and protector and caregiver to all of these things. Mother wasn't an external thing that I observed any longer, it was me. And it meant different things at different times, changeable and malleable as I was called upon and chose to respond.
So while I settled in to lodging another lemon seedling firmly in its new pot, the expansive nature of the job title and the Sisterhood I had finally allowed myself to join became very clear to me. And it was awesome, in the true dictionary sense of the word. Having only ever been a part of a group experience like this courtesy of a gaming convention, and this being by degrees more vast and historic, my thoughts actually quieted to a dull hum. I pressed the earth down. I watered. I covered the delicate stem and new leaves with a clear plastic cup, taping it in to place to protect it from chewing cats, then moved it back in to its sunny spot on the plant rack. There was nothing in that quiet space but caring for those plants as the dog slept contentedly 5 feet away and my daughter napped upstairs, happy and secure.
There is MOTHER. The one that apparently needs roses and diamonds and brunch and stuffed animals and the perfect celebratory card and occasionally 23 new African violets, if you will believe the ad campaigns. But there is also Mom. Mommy. Mama. Earthmother. Critter Momma. Doggie Mommie. And a host of other names that describe anyone who cares, nourishes and protects something, whether they have two X chromosomes or not. It feels a little silly to have taken this long to see it, but now that I am here and in this space, it feels right, and it feels welcoming. I guess I'm home.

Happy Mothers Day to every type of Mom out there.

This is a Thing That I Wrote!

Welcome!
It's always hard to start out something new. There are schools of thought that say you have to do it with great intention, hold the image in your mind and carry it sharply so that your energy (and the Universe, as your cosmology permits) can make opportunities and churn away at a subconscious level to bring it to fruition. Another school of thought says... jump, and the net will appear. Also, stuff changes, so, like, you can adjust things later on, dude.
This is a jump and the net will appear kind of gig.
Here is what I know.
1. I love to create.
2. I love this planet we are on and everything encompassed therein.
3. It has been my goal to help this place and others on this planet as much as I can, within my capacity at the given time. (Yup. We read the Four Agreements in our 20's).
4. At this point in time my life is about to be uprooted and moved for a myriad of reasons, but this will result in a LOT of positive changes in the lives of my family members. It will also allow me to seriously take up gardening on the scale I want, and start my little homestead I've been dreaming of for 5 years.
5. My friends said it would be cool if I had a blog with this kind of stuff and apparently I bow to peer pressure.
So here it is. The blog. About the homesteading. And the gardening. And the crafting. And the arts. Because of all the constants in my daily life, there are two... changing diapers and making something.
I hope you enjoy my experiments!

**As a note, I will specifically be tagging posts according to what it's about to make things easier. People won't want to read about my painting, but love to hear about chickens. Other people will want all the fiber crafting they can fiend on, but think the rest can DIAF. I will try to accommodate!**