Bee Friendly Seeds

Thank you for all your love and enthusiasm for baby #3! I feel overwhelmed and grateful for the joy and anticipation this baby is surrounded by already. I've been feeling okay, on the whole. But come dinner time, I'm sort of done with the whole day. Lately my hobbies have included a lot of television viewing while laying still on my side. And it is from this sideways look at the world that I have seen my husband run circles around me, back and forth from his computer to his files to the yellow chair and back to his computer.

He's got a new venture up his sleeve, and I think the fact that I have been so very unproductive has made his incredible productivity somewhat of a marvel to me. I've heard him on the phone with seed suppliers. I've watched him open packages with all sorts of envelop sizes and samples. I've seen his spread sheets for pricing out postage. I've helped him with the art and design mock ups for his packaging before he hands it all off to an awesome artist next week. I have heard him on the phone sorting through permits and licenses. And I've seen his plans for packaging and branding. He's on the phone with vendors asking if the seeds are organic.

And in the meantime, I have watched a whole lot of Downton Abbey.

Rory is working really hard on a line of Bee Friendly Seeds. He's packaging eight different seeds that are all beneficial for honeybees, as well as other pollinators.

A few weeks ago when I had the flu, I was watching youtube videos of Wendell Berry, our favorite farmer-author. He was being interviewed for a morning show and was telling of his environmental work in Kentucky where he lives. The guy interviewing him said, "what is the solution to the water quality in the Kentucky river? Do we need more regulations on mining?" And Wendell slowed way down and shook his head. And he talked about how big problems can never be solved with big solutions. It's what got us into big trouble in the first place. But the only solution for big problems are small solutions.

It's pretty well known by now that we have a big problem with honey bees and other pollinators that we are greatly dependent on. One of the factors is the loss of wild food sources from mono-crop farming. The bees are looking for food, and it is hard to find. Our small solution is to get more people planting the right flowers to help the honey bee.

Bee Friendly Seeds is our small contribution to a much bigger problem. Last year Rory was looking for a few of these kinds of seeds but some are obscure and they were hard to locate. He went to different nurseries and looked online. After a lot of effort, he was able to track some of the seeds down. Our hope with these seed packs is that they will all be in one spot, easy to locate, easy to access and then easy for everyone to plant their own bee friendly flower garden.

We're really excited about these seeds. Honeybees have become a big deal for us. And we're so thrilled to get to do our small part.

our growing family

babytres from Becca Groves on Vimeo.

We are overjoyed with this news. We are twelve weeks along as of today and due at the end of September. A few have asked if we were trying and yes, we were trying. :) When the baby comes Elsie with be 3 and Ivar will be almost 5.

About a year ago we were watching America's Funniest Home Videos (all four of us get a kick out of this show) and there was a clip of a daughter announcing her pregnancy this way to her parents, faking the picture and actually taking video. I filed it away for when the time came and I'm so glad I captured these reactions. Hilarious.

Another favorite moment was after I called to tell my brother and his family, I received an email from my nephew, Simon. He wrote, "Hi!!! Currently, I am very excited about the new baby." That's been my favorite line for weeks now. Currently, I am very excited, too.

We wanted to tell the Groves cousins when we were all together so that Ivar could share the news. The adults all knew but he was so excited to share. We hadn't prepped him at all on how to say it, he just stood up and told the room:

after the combines from Becca Groves on Vimeo.

Oh I laughed so hard. At some point I had given him the timeline that first the snow would melt, then the farmers would plant the corn and then the corn would grow over the summer and then the corn would turn yellow. And about the time the combines would come to harvest the corn the baby would come. But that was weeks earlier. And here, he had pieced it all together and made such a sweet and special announcement, "After the combines come out, we are going to have a new brother or sister baby." Hooray!

food update

I haven't been talking much about my Pretty Much Paleo eating plan partly because writing about food is a little weird, and partly because I discovered Carbone's deep dish cheeseburger pizza and the discovery caused a full on Paleo rebellion. 

But as I stated when I first wrote about he eating plan, the sincere ultimate goal with this eating is to: get back on the wagon. And I have been doing that this week. It's not perfect. But I'm finding little "cheat foods" that feel like a treat even when the rest of my family is eating pizza and pasta. For one, I have found that the Byerly's Tomato Basil Soup (in the frozen section in a box) is a great meal for me when the family is eating pizza. It's a fatty soup, full of calories, but no grain. And it feels like my own treat while smelling the goodness that is pizza.

I also have been making peanut butter balls with oatmeal, raisins, honey and protein powder to have on hand all the time. They're delicious. And helpful for when I'm hungry and hangry.

And finally, the snack above was brought to ecfe today, and I literally drove straight to Target to buy my own. In the past I haven't loved roasted red pepper hummus. But paired with these little cheesy gluten-free rice crackers, something awesome happens. For the record it still tastes "healthy"...but it also tastes a whole lot like velveeta rotel and corn chips. It's a good treat and I'm thrilled to have a new snack/lunch option in my fridge. 

impulse buying

I took the kids to Cub Foods today to buy tulips and daffodils. When we were checking out Elsie told me, "we forgot food!" But we went specifically for flowers. We are at that part of the winter where springtime flowers really do a world of good for morale. While I was picking out my daffodils ($2.99 for 10!) I saw an older man and felt compelled to say, "Are you married?" And he said yes. And I said, "You really should buy your wife some daffodils today. They're a good price and she'd love it." And then he looked at me funny like I probably didn't need to be talking to him about his wife or about daffodils. And when I walked away I thought to myself, 'with a confused reaction like that, that guy really should buy his wife daffodils.' Later I saw him at checkout, flowerless.

Then we went to Target. I should mention that the wind today is biting cold. It sucks your breath away. And even though the forecast looks great for the weekend, the few days we have to make it there feel like sucker punches (-9 tonight!). I got my kids in the store and then proceeded to impulse shop like only a mother at Target in the dead of winter can. We found new sunglasses for the kids. And a baseball cap for Elsie. Elsie got a new headband that has flowers all the way around that is adorable and will be worked into an Easter outfit. They had raincoats and matching boots and umbrellas for little girls that made me swoon, but I did have the good sense not to go completely overboard. The truth is, I could have bought the whole store today. Which probably would have helped Target during this sad time of layoffs. But it would have meant a lot of explaining when I got home. Instead I made sure the kids were good and excited to show dad their new sunglasses and hat and headband before we have the next budget talk.

We're going to make it to springtime. My sister is inviting her neighbors over next week for an outdoor Welcome Spring Chili Feed and Bonfire. I love that idea so much I might to have to steal it. We're almost there. We're so close. Daffodils will help us in the meantime.

a day in the life

At 9:00 this morning I decided I was going to get the kids out of the house and head to the zoo. At 9:48 we were loaded in the car and driving down our lane. At 10:30 we arrived at the zoo, and by the time we put our coats in a locker, found the mini-potty for everyone to "just try" it was announced that the 11:00 bird show would be starting shortly.

We had a huge owl swoop over our heads and the kids were mesmerized the whole time. When the show was over we went to the cafeteria where we got 20% off today because it was member day. I got Elsie chicken strips, which was a huge mistake because upon seeing Ivar's corn dog she suddenly realized that's what she actually wanted. Ivar insisted on helping pump the ketchup into our ketchup cups and together we ate our lunch with all the other moms and tots who decided they had to get out of their house today.

It was as we walked up towards the tropics trail that I started listening to the words coming out of other mom's mouths. I first heard one mom, "nope. you said you wanted to bring it in, so you need to carry it." And I wondered how many times those words have been said aloud. Then I heard another, "You need to change your attitude. Because the rest of us are having a nice time and you are the one choosing to have a bad day." Towards the top of the ramp I heard another mom say, "we're going to go to the bathroom first, just to try." I had just said those words myself an hour earlier.

We walked towards an enormous sand box, set up for just the last week and I saw a dad pick up his kid and wrestle the boy's socks and shoes back on telling him it was time to head home for naps.

I ran into friends at the sandbox and sat with them on a bench where we discussed cathartic topics like how much we loathe cleaning the kitchen after every meal. Then we moved on to how little motivation there ever is for bath time. Because it is a fight to get the kids in the tub and then a fight to get them out again.

I want you to know I am not writing any of this in a foul mood. In fact, today I felt downright amused. Encouraged, even. Today I felt a sweet kinship with every other parent at the zoo, and it made me feel very much validated. We're all saying the same things. We're all working really hard to raise good, awesome kids. We're all just as impatient and dog tired as the next person.

I got our coats out of our locker and went to buy the trail mix Ivar had been asking for since we arrived. We were in the cafe area just in front of the penguins when Ivar tripped on my shoe and his trail mix went flying across the floor. And the boy came unglued. He threw a tantrum bigger than I have ever seen. There was rolling and screaming and inconsolable crying. From my end there was comforting words, then firm words, followed by angry words and then threatening words. In the midst of it, Elsie kicked my mocha on the floor, spilling half onto the carpet, and a nice dad came and set it upright for me. The whole while there was an older couple with no grandkids that actually turned in their chairs to watch. That's not in my head. They just starred. And I realized the absurdity of the moment, how we were one hour past nap time and that this whole episode had very little to do with m&m's on the carpet and much more to do with an overtired little boy. But it was epic. Ivar finally pulled it together, Elsie announced that she had to go potty and as we left I said to the couple, "you didn't know you were getting coffee and a show, did you?" And they sort of smiled sort of not.

And we left to find the mini-potty.

Again, none of this is written in anger or embarrassment or shame. I'm just amused at all the work and patience and care that goes into parenting. We got home and Ivar got the chills on the couch. He's got a fever, aches all over and now I've got a sick boy up in his bed. No rest for the mama. When I tucked him in I said, "Buddy, you have to sleep. Sleep is the way your body heals so you can feel better." And I wondered how many parents have said those words to their own kids.