Did I just make vinegar?

Well, let me back up. I WANT to make vinegar. I clean with white vinegar all the time (which is not to say that I am cleaning all the time, it's just that when I clean there is a good chance vinegar is involved). Mixed with water, vinegar gets spots off of the counter and out of clothes, cleans sinks and windows, and removes calcium and boron deposits left by hard water. Mixed with tea tree oil, it cleans the toilet and kills mold. Since I actually tried this wonder a few years ago, I haven't bought anything but soap for cleaning. Along with baking soda, I don't need anything else. I love vinegar!!!

Since I attempt to be clean, we seem to go through a lot of plain white vinegar -- which is always packed in sturdy plastic containers. Plastic that never truly goes away. In my attempt to reduce packaging, I somehow zeroed in on vinegar bottles as my first obstacle to lighter living, vinegar making as my first hoped for triumph.

I think I made vinegar.

I followed the directions I found online by some guy who calls himself the Vinegar Man. I already love the Vinegar Man almost as much as I love vinegar. The directions were so easy I thought, "Heck, I can do it tonight."

Here's what I did.

• Found The Vinegar Man's website http://www.vinegarman.com/VinegarMaking.shtml
• Bought a can of frozen juice concentrate with no preservatives (I used apple juice).
• Mixed up the frozen apple juice.
• Measured out what I had left of a jar of Bragg's Apple Cider vinegar (good because it is a live culture).
  
• Poured the apple cider vinegar and an equal part of juice together in a stainless steel pan.
• Put the lidless pan in a warm spot (my oven which has a pilot light lit and is warm).
• Tested it 24 hours later, and it tasted like vinegar!

It's still been sitting there in the oven since last night. I'm a little nervous, is it really vinegar, was it that easy? I guess I'll pour it back into that giant plastic container and save a little for my next batch of vinegar in the old Bragg's bottle.

Could it be that easy?

Did I just make vinegar?

Packaging Project

Ha. After throwing an empty mustard container away (my husband goes through about 1 a month) while simultaneously reading Little House in the Big Woods to my daughter, I got curious about just how much packaging we use. I mean, it's basically paper, compostables and packaging waste we produce, right? (I try to take everything else to the thrift store).

Now I'm starting a month long project. Each week I'm going to gather all my packaging, take a picture, make a list of what's in there. I have a ton of packaging collected after just one day! Then I'm going to figure out what I can do to eliminate packaging in our life. I already figured out how to make vinegar, mustard and Joel's favorite cereal.

Our Daughter, the Thrift Store Model.

But aren't we proud of her. This is the last time, I swear, we allow our tiny tot be in a fashion show. But we couldn't resist, just this once, to have her participate when our local used  children's clothing store asked her to participate in a fashion show. 

She disliked the darling and a tad too big teal coat, but she wore it dutifully for the first run down the runway, carrying a teddy bear. She looked so tiny in the coat, the crowd did one of those collective  "awww" sounds that are reserved only for children when she walked down. 

On the second walk for a later show, she wore a little white dress, again carrying the tiny teddy, and skip jumped all the way down the runway to some sort of techno music. She didn't miss a beat but her little face showed she was focusing much more on the her little skip jump than on anything else. It was darling.

Back Home

When we came home from our cruise (god help me I went on a cruise!)I lay Ila in bed. She woke up and I asked her, do you know where you are? She had the sweetest smile on her face and said sweetly "back home."

My mom is now back home in Reno, and I helped her get settled in, hired 4 kinds of help, mainly to keep the 1 acre of lawn and plants alive. It was a major triumph to help her get some of these things settled. I feel success.

And back home. My brother-in-law Dave is back home. After nearly a year of in and out at the hospital after being diagnosed with AML leukemia (when all he though he had was a bad backache), a bone marrow transplant, graph vs. host disease, sepsis, los of 50 or so lbs etc. etc. he is BACK HOME!!! and doing ok. He's very weak, but he's home, his own (new) home with his wife Jeanne and his son Kyler. God I want to cry.

Back home. Be thankful every time you set a foot in your door. Home is a precious place to be.

The drums of Mazatlan

Markets are a surprising place to encounter music. Who would think, as you mill around stalls of strangely priced goods in a foreign land, that you might have an incredible musical experience? Who would think that a diversion to see something local would result in seeing something wonderfully foreign? When you’re on vacation and hungry for new sights and new sounds, an incredible music experience in a market moves to a new level.

The downtown public market in Mazatlan caters to both locals and some tourists. Fruits stacked in piles, pan dulce laid out in neat rows with wonderful shapes, and hand-embroidered clothing are all temptingly within reach. The smell of freshly cut meat fills the air. Crumbling staircases lead upstairs to mysterious places. Then a sound, an incredible sound. Drums? Yes. Many? Let’s go see.

Through the aisles and stalls you careen, looking for the source of the sound. Whizzing past shops with fragrant leather belts and wallets, shops with handsome men’s shirts, shops with oversize sombreros you go. Towards the sound, the incredible sound.

Around the corner you get a glimpse. Have you seen anything like it before? Do you even know what kind of music it is? Do the locals recognize it? Despite your questions you come closer -- as close as you can come without appearing conspicuously curious.

Before you stand five percussionists. Most with drums slung over their shoulders. One with a bell. And the rhythms are complex, multilayered and magically vibrant. As a tourist, you are not the only slack-jawed audience member. Locals are caught in the web of intrigue of this band. You stand there soaking in the brilliance of the rhythms, the loud and beautiful pounding, knowing that just by being in its presence you will be vitally recharged.

The musicians play in a semi-circle, and the audience stands in a semi-circle facing them, creating a loose ball of energy. The drummers do not seem to look at one another, but their playing is intricate, layered and precise. The are communicating through sound to one another. They are foisting a loud gift of sound on those curious and open people who face them, knowing full well that the more fascinating and intense the experience the more coins will be offered when the music ends.
It seems the musicians are not Mexican? Who are they? They are dark skinned and shirtless with soft matted dark curly hair. Their clothes are badly soiled, shorts with weeks, months of dirt on them. They seemed to be some sort of Latin American gypsies, drumming their way through life, seeking out a few coins to move on to their next location.

Then just as abruptly as they started, the music stops. One with a hat comes around and you willing take foreign coins from you pocket. You drop them in, careful to not look too fascinated, not too blown away.

After you return home, you continue to wonder, who were those luminous bits of light wielding drums? And then as you read about Brazilian music in your world music class, it all comes together. Perhaps a ragtag, wayward Samba-enredo ensemble? That is the best answer you can come up with. You will continue to search for the answer to this question because you will continue to remember the brush with the brilliant, hungry music that touched your heart and soul.

Life is what happens...

...when you're not on the computer.

Catching the wind

The months have blurred by with fascinating changes in our little girl. She's such a magical little gal and amuses us every day. She's been going part time to a Montessori daycare (and learning to nap without being nursed!) for the past 2 weeks. I'm thrilled to have a little time, and Ila really likes going there to play!

Funny things Ila's been doing the past week or so:

Throws her head back and howls like a wolf that appears in her book "Papa Papa"

After today's trip to a petting farm, she reminisced about holding a baby kitten by holding her arms in front of her as if she were cradling a kitten. And she demonstrated on both her and my shirt how a calf was nibbling on my clothes.

Finally managed to walk in both of mommy's shoes.

Hides her eyes in a peek-a-boo-esque fashion whenever I mention the name of her cute friendly pal from daycare, Matteo.

Randomly hugs the legs of other moms and dads we're around.

Takes her shoes off after weeks of trying.

Says "yeah" to many questions, including Joel's interrogation. "Do you know the President?" "Yeah." "Have you had tea with the queen?" "Yeah."

Asked daddy to put her in the swing and then said "bubbles." She wanted daddy to blow bubbles at her while she was swinging. She's a bubble maniac.

Sort of says "rise and shine" in the morning when she wakes up (if prompted).

Does double-duty doll care with two cute little sleeping cloth dolls we borrowed from the Toy Library. She covers them with blankets and pats them as she does her other dolls. But "Pip" and "Pap" are always together.

Lady Bird

"Ugliness is so grim. A little beauty, something that is lovely, I think, can help create harmony which lessens tensions."

“My heart found its home long ago in the beauty, mystery, order and disorder of the flowering earth.”

“Some may wonder why I chose wildflowers when there are hunger and unemployment and the big bomb in the world. Well, I, for one, think we will survive, and I hope that along the way we can keep alive our experience with the flowering earth. For the bounty of nature is also one of the deep needs of man.”

“Though the word beautification makes the concept sound merely cosmetic, it involves much more: clean water, clean air, clean roadsides, safe waste disposal and preservation of valued old landmarks as well as great parks and wilderness areas. To me…beautification means our total concern for the physical and human quality we pass on to our children and the future.”

-- Lady Bird Johnson.

Lady Bird Johnson (glorious name) died today. Rest in peace and thanks for getting so many people on the case of beautifying our environs.

You've come a long way, daddy!

Hey Daddy,

I love it when you play guitar! I love to dance to your muzak. I can't wait til you teach me how to play!

Love,

Ungunga


PS: Why am I up so late? Could it be the coffee?

Potty Training Humor

We're not officially potty training Ila, but we have introduced Ila to her little potty. I was inspired by my friend Maura, who put her kids on the potty at 6 months or so and seemed to have an easy time potty training when it was time.

The photo you see is the first time Ila peed into her potty. I gave her a piece of toilet paper and she promptly dipped it into the potty and held it up dripping wet for the world to see.

Humorous anecdote: Ila was running around without a diaper a few weeks ago, and did a tiny poo on the carpet. I whisked her up and set her on her potty which she vehemently protested. So I cleaned her up, thinking "hmm she must be done defecating" (foreshadowing). A few minutes later, I noticed her crouched down near the cat food bowls, with another little poo beneath her. I came over to clean it up and as I looked down, I saw full-sized log in the cat's water bowl. I say that's one smart little cookie, she knows that we poop in the water, so she wanted to, too. I wonder if she understood my explanation that "we don't poo in there, that's Saucy's water cup..."

Summertime at the park

We're lucky enough to have several playgrounds within a 5-minute walk, so many of Ila's summertime hours are spent swinging, playing in the sand, looking at trees and crawling up, over and through play structures. Take a look!