Smells like a Steak, seats 35...

The Bird family has entered Americana status...we now own a SUV! Was it really one 18 months ago I was saying, "Of course three kids will fit in the back of the Prius!" Here we are, two cars later, with a Nissan Pathfinder and a car payment! It feel weird to be driving an SUV and buying bumper stickers was really hard! I didn't feel like I could put any environmental advocacy stickers on it! Even though people put them on their Subaru Outbacks and they get WORSE mpg than this thing does.
Anyway, we go it because otherwise Laurelle and Ori were going to kill each other on our next family outing and since I love all my children and would like to keep them alive for a while longer, we needed something bigger. I really didn't want a minivan...most have only *** crash ratings...I really want good crash ratings please!

So everyone sing along:

Canyonaro! Whoa! Canyonaro!!!



So, do you think I need blue hair now?

I'll get back to you on that!

I'm crafty!

I have been working hard on a pair of knitted shorties for Yarrow to wear this summer. I am not a great knitter but I managed to figure out how to do short rows, stitch additions and bind off! Yippee! So I just have to brag! See how perty they are??

In completely unrelated news...another huge pit bull is wandering our neighborhood...not doing so much at alleviating my fear of large dogs...this one isn't neutered either...

Sit and spin buddy!

The saga of the fridge continues...Brice and I decided on a fridge and decided to go with Home Depot becasue they have great 12 months no interest...I'm all about NOT paying interest. This time I do the research and decide on a Maytag side by side fridge that looks pretty much like the one that is sucking right now. We bought it on Monday...delivery today...


OR NOT!


They refused to delivery it becasue they didn't want to roll their dolly through the small "mud puddle" AKA dirt on the side walk, they also also wanted me to sign something that says they aren't responsible for any damage to the fridge or our house....


Do I look like I was born yesterday??


There was not way I was going to sign anything like that, they has been total assholes from the start and I knew they weren't going to be careful with the fridge at that point.
I ended up talking to their boss who was very nice but basically he said that had to go with what the "his guys" say...so whatever...I returned the fridge to Home Depot...turns out GE actually leases the area inside Home Depot to sell appliances, so Home Depot really could care less that I was returning (though the woman who helped me really thought the whole thing was really lame and was very empathic with me).

I went back to Best Buy where they actually have their own warehouse and delivery crew...couldn't get the Maytag though...got Samsung instead with the extended service plan! After the washer issue I will never buy an appliance again without it!

You want me to eat....WHAT??

I am really starting to think about we are eating...we have been almost 100% organic for a few years now, we drink local milk, joined a CSA...yada yada yada...

Enter this book:
Nourishing Traditions

This is all about eating in a traditional way so it is a real mind set challenge! I grew up in a obnoxiously healthy eating household...but I will say we didn't get enough fat...I even think that when my mom got sick she would have been considered to be malnourished she was so thin...the woman was obsessed with not eating fat at all!

Well, this book advocated for using coconut oil (*gasp*), whole milk dairy (*double gasp*) along with butter (ahhhhh). The reasons being that these fats have been replaced in our modern diet with trans fats and hydrogenated oils. So I have decided I am much more afraid of science food than real food. So I started full boar into this thing...step one ferment, ferment, ferment!!!

My first thing was fermented butter...that is right pro-biotic butter! Next I made sour cream and curds (for cream cheese) and whey (for fermented veggies) and I am planning to tackle yogurt this week as well!

Brice is sure I am going to kill everyone and rolls his eyes at my constant vat of dairy fermenting on the counter. This is coming from the guy who is addicted to salty convenience food! I have him on board in mind but not so much in body...ah, you know I will win...I always do!!!

I am also hoping to buy a share in a cow so we can get at least partial raw milk into our diet...our CSA Cresset Farms does them for about 7.50 per gallon...that is A LOT for milk but hey I have always said if you're going to spend money, food should be getting a good chunk of it!

Here is to healthy eating!!!!

Oh and I have to include a link to Cresset here: http://www.cressetcommunityfarm.com/menu.html

If you go to the photos section, you can see Laurelle and I planting leeks while riding on a snazy planting machine in 2005!

WTF???

Right now my son is watching a cartoon on the Disney channel...I have no idea what it is but one of the people talking has the voice of Brock Samson!!!


Who you as is this person....well here you go...he is a crazy federal killing machine with a heart of gold form the awesome show The Venture Brothers



This is not a person who should be in a children's TV show...and of course its not this character.
I love him...but still...its fucking with my head!

BAD LUCK=GOOD LUCK??

Our 2 year old fridge is apparently the worst refrigerator ever made! It s a GE and the ice marker quite working last summer and I figured it was becasue the contractor who fucked up our house so bad must have dropped it or some such awfulness.

Well, it has started making this stupid, crazy, freaky popping sound. So I am thinking oh great we have to get this stupid fridge repaired becasue of dip shit...

Being who I am, I start doing some research and find out there have been TWO class action lawsuits against GE over this fridge. TWO!!! We missed the deadline to file something and get something since our fridge wasn't registered with GE...by about a month! Deadline was Dec 27 2007. So I am left wondering...should I get it repaired or should we just cut our losses and buy a new fridge? I can't decide...

Click here to read all the wonderful things happening with this fridge

Again...I should not own "cutting edge" electronics! They hate me!!!

But this leads me to my good luck!

I won a custom Crankypants spot! WhooHoo!
If you don't know what Crankypants are, here is a short lesson:




So yeah, they are a diaper cover...but they are so darn cute!!!! I think I am going to do an owl on the booty and do natural, purple, pink, yellow and brown! I suck at designe...I just can't visualize so we will see!

Today is also Laurelle's 13th birthday...there will be more about this later today!

dead babies...why?

Driving to fax something with my husband and kids today, we had to drive past the Planned Parenthood in town and they were being picketed by four old men and an old woman. Al were holding pictures of what I can assume are aborted fetuses.

Ummm...why is that okay?


Can I picked them holding a sign of a child beaten to death by his parent or a child who dies from starvation becasue her parents couldn't afford to feed her? Somehow, I doubt it...

Plus, why the fuck do those old people get off thinking they can even remotely understand the complex decision that goes into having an abortion? Particularly the men...get over yourself buddy! You don't get to any say.

That's one of the things about the movie Juno that pissed me off...she didn't abort the baby becasue it has finger nails? WTF?? Um okay...
I think its a little more complicated than that...having been a teen mom myself and grappled with the same thoughts.
Yeah liked the movie but it was so obviously written by a man...

Anyway...rant over!

I'm just annoyed that we only got a $971 tax refund this year even though we only made 22K since our "investment income" was over the limit for getting EIC...so what should have been $4K wasn't even 1K...gotta love the feds...love screwing the poor folks!


Ehhh...I'll get over it...its only money and we live pretty well...

Oh and Yarrow is walking now! Not all the time but a lot more!

Off to work...that will cheer me up!

And I'm not being ironic...really I have the BEST job!

Want to feel like a really good person...watch this show!

We think we are better than you!


I just turned on the TV after putting both little ones down for a nap (this never happens, BTW) and it was on Bravo...a station I normally lurve...

"The Real Housewives of NYC" or something like that...

WOW! I mean just WOW! Did the producers set out to find the most shallow women possible for this show? I mean come on! $30K on three outfits! Am I just that out of the loop that I think that is so selfish?


Yeah, yeah I know what's it me me, they get to live their life, judge not lest I be judged, blah, blah, blah...Well sorry I can't help but get PISSED by this sort of behavior...its so thoughtless of everyone else on the planet...step outside your little bubble and take a good look around you...we are in this together and you are a big part of the problem...no matter how many times you attend $10K a plate fund raisers for Unisef...

"I love the smell of puke in the morning!"

Yarrow is sick...poor baby! She was up at 4:30 and has been throwing up all day. Luckily Ori seems fine and he actually went right back to sleep this morning and then was in waldorf for the morning so the Goo and I could just be m-e-l-l-o-w....

On a side not, I think I maybe have been over-parenting the Goo to sleep...I stated just giving her a hug after reading books with Ori and laying her down in bed (instead of rocking and singing and cooing for 40 minutes) and she goes right to sleep. Ori was so hard to get to sleep I think I was just in that zone...Huzzah for easy bed times!

So we have had the big PG scare this week!

Yep...you heard that right...the big scare this week! uhhhhh....I wish we had done the V when we had health insurance...I can't wait till the new insurance kicks in so Brice can go get snipped asap! It has certainly concreted in my mind that I am done, done, done having children I took a dollar store test and got a faint line so I really freaked but something like 10 big fat negatives later, i think that was just an evaporation line! I think I would have cried!

We all went back to school this week too! Break was so nice, no driving around, no nap stress, no sleeping stress, no mommy stress! Well, back to the driving, waking up child to drive, missing lunch to sleep etc. nonsence that goes on during the school year.

So we have had the big PG scare this week!

Yep...you heard that right...the big