Mom Visits and Cloth Diapers

So it was a good but busy few days last weekend. My mom came down to visit (my folks live 3 hours away) and since she is retired she got to stay more than just a short weekend. She got to come with me to both my local ob and my Maternal Fetal Medicine appointment in St. Louis. We had a good time, she got to hear the heartbeat and see the baby on the ultrasound, firsts for her. My mom was pregnant in the late 70s/early 80s so it wasn't stuff she had access to back then.  But there is one thing that she had that we still have and have even improved upon, cloth diapers.

Since it was hot as hell this last weekend we did not spend a lot of time outside of the house doing stuff. Instead it was a lot of discussions about plans for the baby, showing her things on online registries and decluttering the guest room. I mentioned that we were considering cloth diapering. Immediately she said, "Why on earth would you want to do THAT?" Considering that was pretty much all she had with us I understood. So I proceeded to show my mom what I have learned so far... that some things have changed in the last 40 odd years.

Now to be completely honest, I have little experience with cloth diapers. I vaguely remember them being used on my younger brother. I tried to change his diaper when I was three and accidentally got it stuck in the toilet trying to clean it.  Then disposables became available and more affordable and I really didn't see anyone with cloth again until I was in my 20s. At that time it seemed liked it was some hippie, earth mama, old fashioned thing that were ugly and bulky to boot (I was pretty naive and judgy in my youth). As I got older my thoughts still clung to the convenience of disposable diapers, every baby or toddler I babysat or had a hand with used disposables, but more of my friends were starting to cloth diaper. Just none that lived close by me. I was starting to understand the cost effectiveness part of cloth diapers. Disposable diapers are expensive and you're literally throwing that money into the garbage, that irritated me to no end. It also appealed to the greener, more self sufficient life I wanted to lead.

I've found with cloth diapers that things have changed. Yes there are still the flats and prefolds of my infanthood but there's also improvements in the fasteners, the covers and the new types like All In Ones, All in Twos, Pockets, Hybrids, etc. This, this is where my head starts to explode. Sometimes, especially for a person with anxiety, too many choices can be a bad thing. But everyone I talked to, all the groups I joined on Facebook, all the places I looked at online said the same thing: Try a few of each type out to see what will work best for you and the baby. A friend of mine who cloth diapered is giving me what she used. During one of my insomnia attacks I found a local woman who had about 60 prefolds, a mix of sizes, for $10 total. I jumped on it. It's the first thing we have actually bought for the baby! I figured if I didn't use them for cloth diapers or boosters I could use them for burp cloths and cleaning supplies at the very least. I will need to get some covers and some snappi fasteners and learn some folds for what I got. I do want to try a little of everything. Since I'm not working I will have to try to build my diaper stash slowly. With the different sized prefolds score I feel like I may be halfway there. Maybe that's just me being completely naive.  We shall see.

Gardening and confession

So the weeding is coming along...slowly but surely. We had wicked T-storms and wind last night but I didnt think much about it outside of it was raining. We didnt do our normal garden walk this morning and when we did get out there we found many of our plants had been knocked around or down. One of my jalepenos that was NOT blown around looks like it is just up and dying. Not sure what is going on there..It looks like it's drying up or something. Everyone else in the row was doing good. Forgot to get a picture. I will remedy it tomorrow.

We have lots of things finally flowering and actually have the beginnings of edibles!!! The herb patch is going well. I harvested a lot of basil and some thyme and they are in the dehydrator as we speak. I have some actual watermelons thats getting bigger and round. The cantaloup and honeydew have massive flowers. The spaghetti squash is massive too. I have picked a few jalepenos...no worries about salmonella here lemme tell ya! And I found out that the cayenne peppers aren't cayenne...which sucks. The peppers seem to be coming along very nicely besides that little snafu. The corn is coming along as well as the pole beans...though I need bigger poles next year. The cukes are doing great and Bill harvested a small turnip and declared it divine. The bush green beans seem to be struggling. I think thats due to the beetle attack. The tomatoes are massive flowering but not much fruit. I am going to go through and pinch some of the flowers off so the plant can focus on bigger fruits. Only one type of lettuce came up. A few carrots have survived and sprouted. The gourd patch is growing but not flowering.

I do have a confession. We used Sevin dust this year. Im not comfortable with that at all but a decision had to be made and Bill kind of made it for me. He has promised that if I can find something else that actually works against the japanese beetles that tried to invade then we will do that next year. He felt his hands were a bit tied as well. We haven't used any pesticides on the garden til now. Haven't even used fertilizer. Quite honestly I feel like a fraud and am disappointed. People I've talked to round here don't seem to get why Im a bit upset about it. With the exception of two people, they saw it as completely normal. Those two thankfully didnt try to stone me or anything, they said that I should just focus on next year and plan, plan, plan.

Im a little wired tonight so I will probably post later but I need to get a shower. So to wrap it up I do have some questions for you guys. Dill - How do you usually harvest yours? Also, what all can you use Texas Tarragon for?

Pictures and lists

Here are the pics I promised...First we have the loads of canning jars from the auction.

Next we have th plans for the property mapped out...not to scale but the garden IS suppose to be bigger than the house lol! Followed by the seed starter trays and the bag of seeds/bulbs that I have now thanks to a loveable, hyper and somewhat inpatient Bill.

And lastly this is me chilling at the local Denny's at 2am after a rough day at work..Thanks Lelu!
Ok and now for the list

All the vegetables that we are planning on planting

(thanks to Tammie and a super hyper Bill)

black cherry tomato

hybrid white eggplant cloud 96

Rosa Bianca heirloom eggplant

Striped cavern tomato

Nantes carrot

National pickling cucumber seed

few pinches each of Butter head lettuce and Romain lettuce

Garden peach tomato

pinch of tendercrisp celery

Jarrahdale pumpkin

Grandma Mary's paste tomato

Jubilee orange tomato
Green onions

Sweet white onions

Green pepper mix

Pepperoncinis

Straightneck Yellow Squash

Roma tomato

Leeks

Poblano peppers

Jalepenos

Cayenne

Cannonball gourd

Dipper gourd

Loofa gourd

Bush cucumber

Radish

Cantaloupe

Spinach

Bush green bean

Pole green bean

Turnip

Sindara lettuce

Cauliflower

Sugar snap pea

Birdhouse gourd

Spaghetti squash

Zucchini

Honey dew melon

Watermelon

I'll have a green, green, Christmas..errr Yule yeah :)

So in our household most of us are Pagan, except for Teen she's figuring it out herself which is fine. But anyways yeah we celebrate Yule, Winter Solstice. I came home early partly because Im still battling this wicked sinus infection and partly because I really wanted to give Bill his gift. We get his boys tomorrow to give them their gifts but I could not wait and pestered the hell out of him to open his. So we decided to open our gifts...save one that Teen could open while her brothers are here.

So I got what are in my opinion THE best gifts a girl who is dying to go "Green" .....6 canvas totes, that I can also embroider, a new hobby Im trying out, and 4 recycling bins!!! He got me my recycling bins!!!!! So now here I am happy and giggly as all get out. I am going to print off signs for bins and recycling will commence immediately! He doesn't think that he got me anything special!!! Silly boy made me almost cry. He has no idea how special this is, that its an enormous show of support and a huge gesture of what he wants our future together to encompass...silly boy.