Urban Organica

woodstackers

I so enjoy watching young men jump for their work gloves when there's wood to stack.  Everyone participates on his own terms, & this is Real's first year fully participating.  It doesn't matter if they're 1 years old  or 91, men do love to provide.  

One of the great things I learned from the Celebrating Men, Satisfying Women Course last year: for men, nothing is worth doing, but everything is worth providing.  

I really have so much more appreciation for all the things my fathers, brothers, sons & male friends do when I remember to stop voting on whether or not they are doing the "right" thing.  When I take the time to look & notice, I see that they are always, at all times working to provide something for others.  What was most striking to me at that time was to see how the other women in the course, all much older & experienced than me, went from feeling unsafe in the world because of men, to realizing that they are so much safer in the world because of men.  That it's just a matter of working with some of our fundamental differences.

D did the Understanding Women course this past weekend.  And what's come out of it is a man who's so in tune with what I can & can't do, that I'm feeling like I can do anything.  The first thing he did was apologize, "for not realizing what a gift it is that I will sit & listen" to him for hours, given how diffused my attention is between my other accountabilities.  And then he said he finally got that I can do anything, but not if I'm cold, because then I'm miserable.  And that he's sorry he asks me how he can help, instead of asking what he can do. Then he had us sit down and make a list of things where I have full veto power.  Of course, I've always had veto power, but I tend to not veto things, because I'm committed to other people's full self-expression.  But I have to say, I really feel empowered by this list!  

This was all in the first 20 minutes, & needless to say, there's been some big & subtle changes around here.  It's all had me so inspired, to feel partnered with in these small ways.  I've gone into some kind of protective nesting mode, & my house is sparkling clean.  He really wants me to take the Queen's Course, to support me in having all of my needs met, because he understands now that it's not just me!  All mamas feed others first, hold their pee to do 10 more things, & shovel food in their mouth, ravenous, because they have put their own needs last.  He wants me to be full & overflowing.  Lucky me.

People think too much.  But then I go outside & see the squirrels doing the same nesting, changing, protecting & providing.  It all works in the same ways...

Annie, a fellow crafting Fishy in the Fish Bowl, & who also had the same midwife as us, has me in East Coast considerations, again...

And this mama is reminding me to keep it real...

Candy Math

There seems to be no end to the sugar-inspired moments around here.  From toddlers sneaking up on the counter to Candy Land, I think they've caught the sugarbug.  Oh, how I long for the days before that first Pinata.  But I am for sure the model for all this, because although the Great Pumpkin came & traded their sweets for "Newer, Favorit-er Candies," I have hidden myself a hefty stash of Twix, Reese's, & Kit Kats.  Let's just call that, "Confessions of a full-out-mama."  I am consuming no less than 7 pieces a day.

Meanwhile we have a "candy shop," inspired by both Pippi Longstocking's shopping spree & Wonka's factory.  (They are begging me to take them to the C&H Sugar Factory.)  The shop is selling a mix of boy-made treats consisting of coffee-filter bon-bons, Wonka Bars & my favorite, turtle-fabric-covered "turtles," as well as family favorites like Organic Lollipops, Sunspire Chocolate-Covered Sun Seeds, Fair Trade Dark Chocolate Bits, PEELU Dental Gum & Bach Rescue Remedy Pastilles.  I have no shame in the natural foods department, obviously.  But it goes like this.   

Free steals 5 little cocoa bars from his up-high basket.  I catch him & hand him a glass of water & suggest a piece of dental gum.  Within 10 minutes he starts a screaming tug-o-war with his little brother. I offer them both a Rescue Remedy aka, "Medicine Takes," as they call them.  Peace ensues.   They ask for more candy & I direct them to True, who is selling safer candies on the stairwell.  He divies up the treats, charges them for their goods & takes inventory on his mandatory graph.  Every once in a while someone finds a hidden Sunspire "M&M" in those play candies, at which point everyone jumps around singing, "I've got a golden ticket! dadadadadada-dah!"

a love story : silver star, purple heart

"I'm a viking!  I'm a viking!"  It's 1992.  My Grandpa is in a Scandinavian furniture store.  Most people ignore him - he's a tiny old Filipino man, with a tiny, pretty wife.  One of millions of couples like them in the city.  But he's different.  He grabs a wooden bowl, pops it on top of his head & begins chanting, with his arms in the air.  "I'm a viking!  I'm a viking!"  The rest of the store stops, aghast.  Our family just laughs.  Grandpa knows exactly what he's doing (making himself laugh).  And Grandpa can do whatever he wants.  As they leave, Grandma slips her hand into his, proud as can be.

World War 2.  1941.  Pearl Harbor is bombed.  10 hours later, the Philippines is attacked.   A few years later, they meet.

She is looking for her brother, accompanying her father, from jail-to-jail.  They are hoping he is a prisoner of war, they are hopeful they can find him, that he is not dead.  Grandma is a young lady, & gorgeous.  She has smooth, high cheekbones, a ready smile & large, lucid eyes that sparkle with mirth & curiosity.  (2 days before she died, someone had tied her white hair into an 80's style pigtail on the top of her head with a hot-pink scrunchie.  She remembered none of us, & hadn't actually, for a long time.  But still, there was that laughter & wonder.  That regal beauty on milk-chocolate skin)

She tries to pretend that an "old man" hidden in a cell corner isn't staring at her, but she can't deny how striking his eyes are.  (Yes, years later she'd laugh in the kitchen, telling me how old he looked, how penetrating his eyes were.)  Once she leaves the jail, so does my grandfather, really a young man hidden behind massive hair, a beard & mustache that had grown long with his time there.  He, too, is gorgeous. They were beautiful.  But I'm ahead of myself.  

That's the thing about angels.  Their time here becomes all collapsed.  There's no way to really lineate the stories from before I knew them, the memories I have & the dreams I have where they come to me still, telling me more stories, giving me more reasons to love my husband & always leaving me feeling visited.  So let me try again.

Grandma, she thought he was old.  But he was young.  A Pinoy in the American Army, he was a part of the Bataan Death March.  American & Filipino soldiers, already diseased & weak from 4 months of fighting without food or aid from America were surrendered to the Japanese, who proceeded to march them for 65 miles.  10,000 men didn't make it, being shot or bayoneted when they slowed to catch their breath.  But he did.  Most of the men who made it were imprisoned for years.  He also belonged to a group of men used to test atomic warfare, exposed to massive amounts of experimental radiation.  My dad used to say he was sorry I didn't know Grandpa before, "before he was in pain & so grumpy."  But we didn't mind.  He was so military & so religious.  Too us kids, he wasn't grumpy, he was old.  We always knew what to expect.

So. He escaped from that Japanese prison & chased after her.  When he arrived at their home, he was a mess, having fallen into a pit of rain & mud, having traveled by foot, having been through the hell of war & back.  She was a young Dona, an upper-class mestiza with the regal name of Aurora Legasca. Her father had great respect for the young soldier, & insisted she come to greet her guest.  And like the princess who resisted her frog, she declined, worried about the old man in the jail cell.  My great-grandfather had their family servants take Grandpa - Agripino, his name was, & they cleaned him up, shaved him & put him into fresh clothes.  A warrior-turned-prince, she was smitten for the rest of her life.

 He had to go back to the Japanese jail, or they'd find him once they knew he was gone.  So that is how their courtship was.  He would escape, then return after the guards switched, saying he was let out for a cigarette.  He is who I think of when I hear the phrase, "What would you do for love?"  They had two sons, Orville & Wilbur.  And two daughters, Eve & Ruth.  Sometimes grandpa would sell paintings on the street to feed them.  When Wilbur, who was very smart & loved to dance, was a small child, he died of fear.  I don't know how they handled that, but I would assume it had to do with their faith.  Grandma & Grandpa were insanely devout Catholics, & even though I am not, I've inherited their love of Spirit, their relationship to prayer & their success with miracles.  They had all kinds of crazy miracles.

By the time I knew them, they never spent a second apart.  They had moved to Chicago together, attended Black & both received law degrees.  They moved to San Francisco & bought a house, above the huge Asian Farmer's Market.  One day a truck came to their home & men in uniform awarded him both the Silver Star, for unusual valor, & the Purple Heart, for his extraordinary injuries. 

Anry & Rory

Held hands every single day.  Kept a compost & had a jungle in their Bernal Heights backyard.  Walked all over San Francisco, took buses & visited friends until the day he died.  They made us laugh.   Scolded us during pre-dinner prayers.  Had a crazy-gaudy Christmas set-up.  Had 70's-cool style with fitted leather jackets & plaid pants.  Saved everything in case of a war.  Labeled everything just like in the army.  Even their towels & their tin pie-pans.  Prayed together, on their knees, no less than 3 times a day.  Saved the neighborhood cats until they had 13, their favorite bearing the name, "Survivor."  Would talk over each other constantly, saying, "No Darling!  No Darling!"  They always called each other Darling.  She could read palms perfectly, without even really looking.  He was an animal whisperer, being adopted often, including his cockatoo which flew into his mailbox.  They loved to watch boxing.  The 'Niners.  Would scream at the tv during games.  Had a love beyond their own full lives, one that feeds me still, in my own marriage.  They were resilient.

My Grandpa would understand why my family keeps "Conscientious Objector Scrapbooks" for each of our boys, which carefully detail our values, what we advocate & the members of our community who work for Peace.  These files will allow my boys to powerfully choose a life of peace, or the life of a warrior, should there ever be a mandatory draft.  And Grandpa would not question my patriotism.  I am clear that my particular ethnic makeup is an American Soup, as is my children's.  We are deeply grateful, & we are proud of the diversity, geography, indigenous cultures, migrant stories & art forms unique to America.  I am not a supporter of war.  But I am a supporter of troops.  These soldiers out there - they are never far from my mind.  I am scared for them.  What I am grateful for is their individual acts of resiliency, the quiet moments that no one will ever know about, save for their families, where they are still able to experience awe, beauty, & love.  

Here's Hope.  A global movement of leaders & citizens actually giving Peace a Deadline.  Please consider adding this video to your blog.  xoxo, Maya

recipes :: black eyed pea fritters + coconut butter drop cornmeal biscuits

LUNCH is sultry, soft-veggie stew with a secret crab, savory-mysterious black-eyed pea fritters freshly bloomed from a foamy bath of hot organic coconut oil & baby cocodrops (as named by the boys), surprisingly sweet with a tropical back-note.  Crazy.  Delicious.  Yay.  Yay.  

More me-made love stolen from VSK.  Check out this newsreel where he talks about the new face of Soul Food.  And how this food passes the cousins test down South.  The recipes below are excerpted gift-bits from the book.

And, thank you for the love, friends.  I so appreciate your comments & emails.  I'm working on getting to each of you directly, but please know I'm thinking of your words 'till then.  xoxo

Black-Eyed Pea Fritters with Hot Pepper Sauce (gluten free)

Yield: 4 to 6 servings

Soundtrack: “I.T.T., Pt. 2” by Fela Kuti from The Best Best of Fela Kuti

Art: “Three Wise Men Greeting Entry into Lagos” by Kehinde Wiley

Books: How Europe Underdeveloped Africa (Howard University Press, 1981)

by Walter Rodney and Graceland (Picador, 2005) by Chris Abani.

While bean fritters are thought to have their origin in Nigeria, one can find them throughout West Africa. Inspired by the Black-Eyed Pea Fritters served at the Gambian-Cameroonian restaurant Bennachin in New Orleans, I whipped up this dish.

1 cup dried black-eyed peas sorted, soaked overnight, drained, and

rinsed

1/2 medium onion, diced

1/2 cup raw peanuts

1 teaspoon minced thyme

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons water

1 teaspoon coarse sea salt

1/2 cup finely chopped green bell pepper

1 tablespoon cornmeal

5 cups coconut oil

• Remove the skins from the beans by adding them to a large bowl, filling the bowl with water, agitating the beans, and fishing out the skins that float to the top with a fine mesh strainer. Rinse beans well.

• In a food processor fitted with a metal blade, combine the beans, onion, peanuts, thyme, cayenne, vinegar, water, and salt and pulse until completely smooth. Transfer to a medium bowl, cover, and refrigerate for 1 hour.

• Preheat the oven to 200°F.

• Remove the batter from the refrigerator, add the bell pepper and cornmeal to the batter, and beat with a wooden spoon for 2 minutes.

• In a medium saucepan over high heat, warm the oil until hot but not smoking, about 5 minutes.

• Lower the oil to medium high, and in batches of 5, spoon the batter into the oil, 1 tablespoon at a time. Fry, stirring around, until golden brown, about 2 minutes. If necessary, adjust the temperature to ensure that the fritters do not cook to quickly.

• Transfer the fritters to a paper towel-lined plate and allow them to drain. Transfer the drained fritters to a baking sheet and place in the oven to keep warm.

• Serve hot with Hot Pepper Sauce

  
  

  [uo: I've no doubt Bryant's Hot Pepper Sauce is off the hook, AND, once those cocodrop biscuits came out of the oven, a small army of football-flag-wearing males walked into the kitchen & demanded their eats.  Soooo.  That would be my 30-second version of B's recipe, so I'm sure it's altogether different.  But so good, still: one roma tomato, chooped fine.  I green bell, chopped fine.  Lotsa cumin (1 T) lotsa cayenne (1 t) ketchup! (4 T) hot vinegar (4 T), salt (1 t), & white pepper (1/2 t).]  

  Black-Eyed Peas

  
  

  African in origin, black-eyed peas are one of the most salient staples of African American cooking. They tend to cook quickly, but if they are old, it may take longer to prepare them. While canned black-eyed peas are available, I always make mine from scratch. In Southern lore black-eyed peas are thought to bring good luck when eaten in copious amounts on New Years Day. So my family slow-cooks them in a crock-pot every December 31^st.

  
  

  Sweet Cornmeal-Coconut Butter Drop Biscuits 

  Yield: about 24 biscuits

  Soundtrack: “Turn Left” by Little Dragon from Little Dragon

  [uo: I combined the two wheat flours & used 1 1/2 cups of gf pastry flour.  My recipe below.  You could also sub the Gluten Free Pantry's Pie Crust mix.  In a pinch, I use that as my pastry flour]

  
  

  3/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour 

  3/4 cup unbleached white flour

  1/2 cup medium grind cornmeal

  2 tablespoons raw organic sugar

  2 teaspoons baking powder

  1/2 teaspoon baking soda

  1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

  1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt

  6 tablespoons chilled coconut butter

  3/4 cup original unflavored rice milk

  2 tablespoons pure maple syrup

  1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

  
  

  • Preheat the oven to 425°F.

  
  

  • In a large bowl sift together the flours, cornmeal, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. Rub the coconut butter into the flour mixture with your fingertips until the mixture resembles sand with pebbles.

  
  

  • Combine the rice milk, maple syrup, and apple cider vinegar and mix well. Then, make a well in the center of the flour pebbles, add the rice milk, and stir just until the dough comes away from the sides of the bowl.

  
  

  • Drop walnut-sized balls of dough from a spoon onto a parchment-lined baking sheet and bake for 10 to 12 minutes, or until lightly browned.

UO Gluten Free Pastry Flour Mix

Brown Rice Flour        1 1/2 cups

Potato Starch                         3 cups

Tapioca Starch         1 3/4 cup       

Fine White Rice Flour              2 3/4 cups

Xanthum Gum      5 teaspoons

gumbo z :: recipe

Excuses, Excuses

10 Reasons I'm Lovin' Me Some Z

1. It's an excuse to add Mustard Greens to my already-favorites, Collards, Spinach & Dino Kale

2. It's an excuse to feed my kids mad amounts of greens

3. It's an excuse to make real stock, with a final vegetable count of, well let's see...mushrooms, onions, green beans, carrots, garlic, bell peppers, mustard, collard greens, spinach, + dino.  That would be 10.

4. It's an excuse to spend the entire day in the kitchen

5. It's an excuse to make Southern Food & be grateful for a certain favorite family

6. It's an excuse to use Gumbo File, the shavings from a sassafrass tree.  Very odd, & just plain crazy-savory-smelling.  It's like a mix of thyme, oregano & fresh pine sawdust.

7. It's an excuse to feed the neighbors

8. It's an excuse to listen to "Time Is On My Side" by Irma Thomas - a song that makes everything right 

9. It's an excuse to buy eat some crab - blue crab, no less

10. It's an excuse to be Happy

Alrighty, I called Bryant to see if he would let me share one or 2 of last weekend's recipes from Vegan Soul Kitchen, with my GF modifications, & he said I can give you the whole shebang.  Sweet.  Here's the Gumbo.  Being that I'm an always & forever Pacific Islander, I had to throw in a crab.  I'm missing my dad, & he loves himself some crab.  Anywhoo.  From the book:

Gumbo Z

Yield: 4 to 6 servings [Urban: D had 8 bowls, I had 4] 

Soundtrack: “Back Water Blues” by Irma Thomas from Our New Orleans!

Gumbo Des Herbes . Gumbo Z'Herbs . Gumbo Zav . Gumbo Z

Gumbo Des Herbes was traditionally eaten as a non-meat dish during the Roman Catholic season of Lent. In addition to rue, which is used in many traditional gumbos as a thickener, Gumbo Z'Herbs included a combination of several greens (sometimes up to nine), along with other vegetables. As time passed, seafood and meats were also included in the dish to season it and add animal protein. But I’m taking it back to the old school with this one.

While I heard a lot about Gumbo Zav when I lived in New Orleans, I never tried it until I visited the city years after I moved away. Since I didn’t eat pork, I just picked out the pieces of sausage that were floating around in the stew and dived in. That ALL GREEN gumbo was scrumptious and deeply satisfying. I felt so nourished after eating those nutrient-dense greens and drinking that belly warming pot likker. I decided to create my own version—Gumbo Z.

Coarse sea salt

1 large bunch collard greens (about 1 pound), trimmed and chopped into

bite-size pieces

1 large bunch mustard greens (about 1 pound), trimmed and chopped into

bite-size pieces

1 large bunch kale (about 1/2 pound), trimmed and chopped into bite-size

pieces

1 large bunch spinach (about 1 1/2 pound), trimmed and chopped into bite-

size pieces

1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

7 garlic cloves, minced

1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour

2 large yellow onions, cut in 1/4 inch dice

2 large red bell peppers, cut in 1/4 inch dice

2 celery ribs, halved lengthwise and chopped

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

6 cups Simple Stock (page xx)

1 tablespoon minced fresh thyme

1 teaspoons filé

1 tablespoon Hot Apple Cider Vinegar (page xx)

2 large scallions, thinly sliced for garnish

• In a large pot over high heat bring 4 quarts of water to a boil. Add 1 tablespoon of salt.

• Add all the leafy greens to the water, bring back to a boil, and cook uncovered, for 3 to 4 minutes, until the sulfur has escaped. Drain in a colander and cool.

• Transfer the greens to a cutting board and chop well.

• Combine 1/4 cup of the olive oil with the garlic in a large sauté pan over medium heat and sauté for until fragrant and starting to turn golden, about 2 minutes. Add the greens mixture, raise the heat to high, sprinkle with 1 teaspoon of salt, and sauté, stirring occasionally, for 2 to 3 minutes, until well coated with oil. Set aside.

• In a large pot over low heat, combine the flour and the remaining olive oil and cook, stirring often with a wooden spoon, until caramel colored, about 25 minutes. Add the onion, bell peppers, celery, cayenne, and 1/2 teaspoon of salt. Raise the heat to medium and sauté, stirring occasionally and scraping the bottom of the pot, until the vegetables soften, about 15 minutes. Slowly stir in the stock. Add the reserved greens, bring to a boil, and reduce the heat to low. Cover and simmer until meltingly tender, about 45 minutes.

• Stir in the thyme and simmer for an additional 2 minutes. Remove from heat, stir in the filé and the Hot Apple Cider Vinegar, and set aside to cool for 10 minutes.

• Serve garnished with scallions over long grain brown rice.

   

  
  

  Elrik - remember when we were crabbing at Fort Mason with David?  

When I was about 7 my brother & I were dropping huge wok-like nets into the San Francisco Bay.  We were at the docks by the Presidio, now home to my very most favorite restaurant, Greens.  The water was maybe 30 feet below us.  We'd load up the nets with chicken shreds, lower them in, then leave them for the crabs to discover.  We'd pull up the lines slowly, so they wouldn't scramble off.  We were with a friend from church, David B.  I remember El setting up the net & loading the bait, when David took the chicken & threw it into the water, almost as if to see how far it could fly.  El was about 13.  "What are you doing?!!"  I'll never forget it.  We came from working families & were looking for a treat in those nets.  Throwing in a whole chicken was just a crazy-wrong thing to do.  (sorry) I can actually see us all so clearly, David with a shaggy mop of blond hair, not sure why he did it, my brother incredulous, in his faded black Members-only jacket (this was the early 80's) & me, about the size of a 4 year-old, in a thick wooly sweater, looking up at them like they were two adults & the world had gone mad.  After that net came up we jumped on the Muni bus & headed home.  

 

Saved By Soul Food

color week :: yellow

On Friday I found myself sitting in Borders, self-comforting with 3 stacks of craft books, cook books & blogging books.  I love all three.  And I've been feeling totally burnt-out on all three for awhile now.  Some of you noticed my little project on the right, there, The Totally Organized (gluten) Free Lifestyle Kit.  Except, it wasn't a little project.  D & I have been wanting to simplify for a long time, to downsize enough for life to slow down so we could only take on businesses that were really aligned with our values.  Enter the economy, "setting a new stage" for nearly all of us. The Spring brought the perfect chance to create a marketable version of our kits.  I thought these up years ago, when I was just trying to manage keeping a home, & having a hard time working it into everything else I love.  

Eventually these "Homemaking 101" kits became gluten-free-specific.  Friends got word & we've been making small batches of them since last Fall.  We put out a  test site & it turned out that folks wanted & needed them much sooner than we could bust them out.  Even though I've felt strongly for myself that required diets can be a strain on a marriage & a family, it was moving to see how real this is for others.  And the hope of an easier way.  Even more, my biggest wish is to help others do what they do, to help them get the blocks out of the way.  And the GF diet is important because it has people talking about healing themselves through diet.  If anything can save the world, it's that conversation.  So from April to September, I've been working on it 'round the clock, writing, cooking, testing, shopping, calling, editing.  I've missed my kids.  I've been really tired.  And really tired of cooking, blogging & crafting.  Actually, not crafting.  Tired of wanting to craft.  A lot's been put on hold.

I picked up BT's book, which I already owned, for a little inspiration.  A word on B.  When we first met I felt like I already knew him.  He carried himself similarly to my brothers, Elrik & Alvin.  Like, when he walks into a room, everyone looks up because love just walked in.  On purpose & low key, B was wearing a bright green polo shirt with a charcoal tweed fedora!  I'd have worn that if I owned it.  He talked about his Green & Black fund, & that he's Green (being an award-winning Environmental + Food Justice Activist) & Black.  And he had just published his now best-selling book, GRUB, Recipes for an Urban Organic Kitchen.  Nuff said.

B taught me to let go of the diet titles (I was an organic vegetarian) & to eat what my body needs while still upholding my ethical values.  He cooked our crew veggies, then.  I was 7 months pregnant with Free.  2 years later our family was in West Virginia where I was co-facilitating a Leveraging Privilege for Social Change Jam.  B was heading up the kitchen & I was secretly pregnant. B took a special day trip to find me local, natural free-range lamb.

As I thumbed through his book I began to well-up - look at what he's doing!  I called him up right there.  He was at some conference in some far-away state.  He was on his 75th event for the book since it came out this year.  I've been in "mama-mode" for so long, I've forgotten that it takes major work to shift things.

"B, I don't want to market.  I'm an artist.  I just want to make a difference.  And cook."

He stepped outside & dictated a prescription from his latest cookbook, VEGAN SOUL KITCHEN.  

I began with the Simple Stock on Saturday.  And yesterday I cooked from dawn 'till dusk.  It was too dark to take a picture by the time I finished, so I'll do that at lunch, & I'll put together a couple of recipes.  But this is what he said:

"Gumbo Z.  All those comforting greens & that warm-gravy thing going on.  Black-Eyed Pea Fritters with Hot Pepper Sauce.  You'll love that.  And Sweet Cornmeal-Coconut  Butter Drop Biscuits."  

There's friends.  And then there's life lines.  

Thanks Bryant.  Mom's don't need food that's transformational.  They need food that's transporting. So they can come back to their families, as a full & overflowing cup.

Bryant & I in 2005.  I'm 7 months pregnant with Free.  B suggested our Jam take a silent hike through Petaluma's golden hills.

Color Week :: Yosemite

 tunnel view

So it looks like I'll be doing the Color Week this week.  When we went to Yosemite, one of us (can't tell who, I'm afraid) got a mild concussion.  He was checking out a waterfall & bringing back some water to share, when he hit a fallen tree.  We got out of there fine, but he was in a fog for the next week, & we've just been catching up since then.

the boys tell me there's a bear up there.  that black spot, see it?

Tifanie commented on how the color white encompasses all colors.  Indeed.  I'll have to start wearing more white.  We have tiny crystals hanging in certain parts of our house so that the sunlight can hit them, creating wee rainbows across our home.  Aside from being pretty, we like to believe those rainbows represent all possibilities.  They bring in a world of diversity & magic, while also diffusing any energy that's too intense.  It works for us.   D, my brother Franz & I attended Karen Kingston's 3-Day Clutter Clearing, Feng Shui & Advanced Space Clearing Workshop a few years ago.  Each day was so very different - the first day on Clearing Clutter was extremely useful, but really just an edge past "mainstream," nothing you couldn't get from her book.  The next day, which incorporated a Balinese version of Feng Shui, was taught at an entirely different consciousness level, a rung up from everyday learning.  She's the real deal, not out to make friends, but to literally remove blocks & raise the quality of life in one's home & workplace.  And the third day?  Off the hook.  Let's just say that 3 days later I was in a different kind of class, & using a technique Karen taught, I was able to - get this - just stick my consciousness up in the air several feet, then proceed to write out a long menu & grocery list while getting the entire seminar without paying attention.  I was even able to tell where people I knew were sitting in the room of 500 without looking for them.  There's way more to that story, but it's kind of an in-person type of thing.  

D set us up with a picnic on the valley floor.  have you ever seen the sunset on a large-as-life mirror?

This is one of those moments when I'm so aware of the limits of this online format.  Or should I say my own boundaries?  In person, I say all kinds of crazy things, because, as someone who had the chance to unschool growing up, I've seen so much.  And I laugh. A lot.  More than most people.  I naturally go back-&-forth between being very urban, sketchily scattered & totally cerebral.  So it's easy to take myself with a grain of salt, & I'm really comfortable with the range of things I believe, trust & share.  But online.  Well, that's different.  

True just had a book club that featured Pippi Longstocking & I'm always intrigued by her madcap qualities.  Pippi's great imagination has her love life so, she's very human, & has more than enough freckles to leave people feeling authentically engaged.  She leaves people wide-eyed & about 1/3 of the time she says, "Actually.  I'm lying again.  Totally made that up."  She does this for her own amusement, & apologizes afterwards.  She isn't oblivious to her own outlandishness. She is fully self-expressed.  

Like most female bloggers, I consider erasing my blog a couple of times a week.  I'm very sensitive to the diversity of thinkers out there.  I think most people don't believe in many of things I take for granted.  And that they take for granted things I just don't believe.  While I'm committed to being transparent, I'm also afraid sometimes of "going to far" without the context of being together with you, in-person. 

If we could have some tea, I could look you in the eye, know that you aren't so scary & share with you all kinds of things.  But no.  This is why I had turned off the comments, actually.  So that I could connect at a more personal level with email.  But Tif has convinced me to turn them back on. (So be nice!)  I'm trusting that the same forces that have me source, love & support blogs that belong to folks utterly different than me will be at work here, too.  I did start this blog as a reciprocal "thank you" to all you crafting mamas, after all.

So I thought I'd share some images from Yosemite.  There's such a sense of white there, between the vastness of the sky, the shock of El Capitan's cliff face, the waterfalls, & Half-Dome's lunar granite, that I was shocked to discover how little actual white is in these pictures.    The color is missing, but the quality of the color is there.  When I close my eyes & breathe in, I can actually feel the space & the crisp fill my chest as though I'm still there.  In a clear cloud of misted lakes.

color week - white

How about this very Californian grub & his friends moving into my silk worm pod from China?  There used to a single, teeny-tiny hole in it.  And now.  Well you can see they've been busy.  It's kind of like re-fashion or recycled habitats at a bug level.

We're playing a little color week over at Noddyboom.  I love that it starts with white - the one color that is all colors.  I used to think that was black, but no.  Black is the absence of color.  Isn't it odd that you can come to both the same way?  But those are the technical definitions, I'm told.  Like everything else, it's good to question...Play with us!

monday :: white

tuesday :: yellow

wednesday :: purple

thursday :: blue

friday :: brown

We had a lovely surprise trip to Yosemite last week, when one of our dearest friends, Ibrahim, married Yasmina, possibly the most graceful & humble lady I've ever met.  Her greatest wish in this life is to be an offering.  A testament to who they are, they told us Tuesday that they were marrying on Thursday, and we arrived to a full wedding.  They were originally going to propose & be married at the top of the Himalayas last year by their mentor, Sadhguru, during a long meditation retreat.  I believe the Chinese government denied entry to their entire group.  So in honor of that image, most of their guests were dripping in beaded & embroidered Indian saris, tunics, dresses & jackets.  A photographer's dream, & of course my camera battery ran out the moment I arrived.  One day I'll have to share it all here.  The boys wanted to know why "everybody was being peacocks?"  The answer?  For fun!

  They were married at the Chateau du Sureau,  which was designed to look like a castle.  Their guests were seated in a circle, a tight  community that calls themselves The BLOB - Be  Love or Bust.  Ibrahim & Yasmina made their  promises in the center of this group, were  married by 4 of their closest friends, & then each looked at every single friend who had traveled to be with them.  The invitation for each person there was to stand for their marriage, to witness, hold &  contain their promises.  This is a wonderful use 
 of community, no?

 They did send us this picture - so evocative of my mood that day.  Happy to see so many friends I haven't seen for years (it was a Santa Barbara + Los Angeles crew), & feisty at being the only one there with 3 young children.  Much more like little dressed-up monsters in an antique castle setting.  These cute teenagers in French Maid outfits kept coming over to fetch our boys so we could be alone with the grown ups. They offered pasta, fruit, movies, a life-size chess board.  But they also were seeing aunties & uncles for the first time in years, & had no intention of missing any of it.  They spent the evening swiping LED candles from the patio & hiding under our table.  And sharing bits from a forgotten baking sheet of truffles sitting on the bar.  

And such interesting conversation.  What a self-expressed group. But another time, when there's pictures...

number trees

We've been working on a bit of subtraction action around here.  The kids love workbooks, but I have a hard time believing they "really do the job."  If there isn't some drawing or making involved, then mama thinks it doesn't count.  They enjoy subtracting in their heads, when collecting change while playing bank or store.  And this is great.  But as their main educational support, I need color to keep from falling asleep.  When I first tried to line up double-digit subtraction in a vertical format, ie,

    34

-    2

_____

= 32

I was kicked off the learning table.  "Yes, And, you're not really making sense, SO, please let us just do this!"  For some reason they could do the problems horizontally, though, as in

34 - 2 = 32.

I happen to believe this lacks juice & drama, though, which in turn makes me start shooing them away from the learning table, to more interesting things, like, wood-stacking & fire-making.  So these trees were my next attempt.  Bingo! 

We keep the 10's on the left side of the tree, & the 1's on the right.  They color in the leaves, using a different color for the leaves that will get subtracted.  They totally got it.  The next time we do this, I'm going to put longer branches on the left, with 10 leaves to each branch.  And we'll make short branches on the right, each holding just a single leaf.  It won't look as balanced, but I think it will really drive the point - that there's 10's & 1's, home, & make it easy to illustrate estimating. I'll show you when we get there!

nursing wearing baby loving

this guy reminds me of d.  lucky baby.  when free was an infant, he made it clear to everyone possible that he was a guy's guy.  it surprised me every single night as he would call out for his daddy, d would put him on, & they would head out to look for la luna.  a couple of times i went along & got to see the whole process, free look around, studying whatever was in sight, then d would point out la luna, they'd admire her together & free would look up into his daddy's eyes, smile, coo & snuggle his head into d's chest.  mind you, i would be right there, & that sweet baby had no interest in seeing whether or not i had noticed that moon. within seconds he would be sound asleep.  it's been like that for years.

nursing wearing baby loving from urban organica on Vimeo.

the other night i was nursing real to sleep & free sat on the floor fiddling with the camera.  generally he takes pictures of his thumbs.  he knows how to use the camera, but he "likes pictures of thumbs."  being four, now, he figured out something new.   i don't have much to remember these moments, save for the fact that i was there.   lucky mommy.  (i'm not the only one who considers any whinehouse for lullabies,right?)