Category: Uncategorized

It’s been a shit week. Between the rice episode (which will go down in history as “Rice-ageddon, the Rice-oning”), the destruction of a loaf of bread by crumbing the entire house (an homage to Hansel and Gretel), Emmett throwing his glasses out the car window where they were promptly run over by multiple cars, and having the police bring the children back home at 7am this morning because they got through 6 different locks designed to keep them in….. yeah, not great. I think they might know all the swear words now.

It’s easy to get lost in the bad. Sure, I’ve been told to expect a visit from CPS, but the kids are safe and unharmed. They had an adventure that will be funny someday. Not today, because today I want to lock them both in their rooms forever and feed them through a slot in their door. But someday it’ll be a good story.

It’ll be funny later that I’m still finding rice everywhere even though I vacuumed it up days ago. It’ll be funny later that Emmett’s lenses are now part of the road. It’ll be funny later that I found a destroyed shell of a loaf of bread in my car.

Today, everything is the worst. And I’m ok with that. Because if you dwell on the bad, you forget about the good.

This week, I cut my hair. As in I myself cut my hair. Because why not, right? It wasn’t the worst decision I’ve ever made, but there’s room for improvement next time (because now that I know I can, why would I pay someone else to do it? That’s not how I roll).

This week, we put together a new desk from IKEA, which is so much better than our old computer desk. Lots of room to keep my teaching stuff organized, and, unlike the old desk, it doesn’t wobble when you touch it.

This week, we installed a new light fixture above the kitchen table. It’s beautiful.

https://iwouldntworryaboutit.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/img_1906-1.mov

This week we bought a new bed, which looks AWESOME (still waiting on delivery).

This morning, I got a phone call that the eye doctor had an appointment cancel today, and they’re fitting us in early for a consultation with the surgeon for Emmett (he has a wonky eye that will likely need surgical correction – our initial appointment wasn’t until November, because they’re booked solid).

This week sucked, but it was also awesome. I need to remember the good parts instead of the bad.

Sometimes being a parent is the best feeling in the world. But today…..

Parenthood is being woken up at 5am by one child who wants to aggressively snuggle and another who wants to sit on your legs and make incredibly annoying grunting sounds expressing his displeasure at not being able to be exactly where the other child is sitting.

Parenthood is putting on the TV for said children so they leave you the F alone and then have both children come back yelling that it’s not what they wanted to watch.

Parenthood is getting up, finding something they both want to watch, and getting them something to eat so they’re quiet while you go into the basement to work, and then listening to them scream at each other about god knows what for a half hour.

Parenthood is coming back upstairs to find one child naked and the other looking like nothing happened and all’s well with the world.

Parenthood is collapsing on the couch and letting child #1 eat goldfish for breakfast while child #2 licks your face and meows while using your own finger to pick her nose.

I’m done with today, and it’s only 8am.

So I just want preface this by saying I’m not complaining about my own life. I’m not saying any of this about any specific person. If you’re a man or a very happy wife, don’t get defensive. Don’t argue. Just read it, internalize it, mull it over, and really think about it before reacting. I know this is kind of a hot-button issue for a lot of people. Also, I feel like I’ve written some kind of term paper for a women’s studies class. Sorry about that. My sources are at the bottom if you care to look into it further.

I listened to a show on Wisconsin Public Radio several months ago that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about. It was about how children learn to devalue women from their parents. I’ve read many of the studies (ok, more the highlights… there are few things I hate reading more than actual “study” literature) that were referenced in the episode, and the whole thing just doesn’t sit well with me.

And then, a few months ago I was seeing a therapist because I was feeling depressed, overwhelmed, dissatisfied and underappreciated. (spoiler alert: you have to make your own happiness – cue the recent changes to my work schedule, the second job, the blog, the side business, and a resurgence of my latent homesteader tendencies). Long story short, my therapist was a big proponent of “Every woman I see is unhappy with their husband’s contribution to the household, but you can’t change him, so you need to either lower your standards or just accept and make peace with the fact that you’re going to do it yourself.” That also didn’t sit well with me. At all.

Did you know that statistically, even when moms work full time outside the home they still do 65% of the household work as well? And according to a multitude of studies, when you ask men and women if their household duties are fairly split, and then actually account for which chores each person does, both men and women think that men only doing 30-35% of the work at home is “fair.” Of course, I don’t have to tell the women reading this, but men think it’s fair because they think it’s actually split 50/50, while women think it’s fair because “I’m just glad he helps at all.” How is this still normal? A big part of the problem is that a lot of what women do is invisible. We plan childcare, plan meals, make appointments, call for repairs, fill out paperwork for school, meet with teachers, pack lunches, etc etc etc. That’s on top of the cooking, cleaning, laundry, dishes, childcare, and all the other things that traditionally fall to women. Don’t get all defensive here, guys. We know you help. You might even think you do half of the household chores. Heck, maybe you actually do. That’s awesome! But social science research shows that you don’t (not you specifically, but most of you).

So how does this affect kids? What do they think when they see mom working and dad relaxing? Mom gets home from work and makes dinner, does the dishes, does a load of laundry, and cleans the living room. Dad gets home from work and turns on the TV or sits on his phone. Obviously I’m generalizing here. No, this is not a rant about my own family life. There are days when I do the same thing. This is a societal issue.

I know it’ll sound like I’m making something out of nothing or overreacting (typical woman, right?), but this unequal distribution of labor makes children view women as subservient to men, which means they’re undervalued as people. Hear me out here. No, this doesn’t mean that children don’t value their mothers. Obviously. But when dad’s comfort is put above mom’s (which is clearly the case when mom is still working after a full day of work and dad is relaxing), then how else can a child interpret it than to assume that dad’s comfort is more important than mom’s, therefore dad is more important than mom. When this happens, men aren’t even usually aware of it. It’s probably happening more often than either of you actually realize. A dentist appointment is clashing with your vacation – who calls the dentist to reschedule? Most of the time, dad doesn’t even know there was a conflict because he relies on mom to take care of it. Did you know that, on average, women with young children enjoy half as much leisure time on weekends than their husbands? When women talk to men about this problem, men often get defensive and are quick to point out that they’re doing better than their own fathers, so what’s the problem? Here’s the problem. Women compare men to themselves, and men compare themselves to their fathers. We are using completely different benchmarks for what is “fair” and “normal.”

So how do you avoid falling into the trap where mom does everything and dad does (comparatively) very little around the home? For many families it’s a problem that gets worse over time – the more you do, the more is expected of you. For parents, it frequently starts with the birth of their first child. One of the only biological differences that’s been actually proven between the genders with regard to parenting “instincts” is that while men and women are equally responsive to the pain cries of infants, women are biologically more responsive to fussiness cries than men are. This seemingly small difference snowballs over time into women being the first (and therefore the primary) parent to respond to any need of a child that’s not perceived as “urgent” by the father. Which means, over time, that most things fall to mom. Even in this supposed age of equality, where women can “have it all,” mothers remain almost solely in charge of the endless managerial care that comes with raising children: securing babysitters, filling out school forms, sorting through clothes that no longer fit. We need to stop confusing cultural habits with nature – it’s holding us back. It’s not a mom’s natural instinct to sign permission slips for school. It’s learned behavior for both parents that mom will take care of it. This has a long-term impact on kids and how they view women, both at home and in society as a whole. Don’t get me wrong – men have their own traditional household chores as well: household repairs, oil changes, lawn mowing. But the traditional “manly” chores need to be done weekly, monthly, yearly – not daily. Women are placed in charge of the ongoing, never ending work of the home. Millennial men tend to have loftier goals of equality in their home lives, but statistically they just aren’t sticking to those ideals once they have children.

Most women (again, every family is different, but we’re talking about the statistical “norm” here) will report that while they’re cleaning, folding laundry, washing dishes, he’s just sitting there. We know he’s not doing it on purpose. He has no awareness of what’s happening around him. We might ask him about it and he gets defensive. What are kids supposed to think when their dad is playing on his phone while mom scrambles to put everyone’s shoes and coats on? It’s not hard to predict which parent’s person-hood those children will conclude is more valuable. Current research actually shows that its men’s attitudes about marital roles, not women’s, which are ultimately internalized by both their daughters and their sons. This finding is a testament to kids’ ability to identify implicit power, to identify whose beliefs are more important, and therefore worth adopting as their own. When power issues are raised between couples, studies have shown time and time again that they’re most often framed not in terms of how husbands need to change, but rather how wives do (“You didn’t ask me for help” “I can’t read your mind” “You should be more assertive”). This is the domestic equivalent of “She should have dressed more modestly.”

We need to, as a society, be more aware that male dominance is still our cultural norm. Our culture’s devaluation of “women’s work” has left men with little incentive to shift into less-traditional roles at home, even as women have become more successful outside of the home. The only way to overcome it is to acknowledge and examine male privilege in the household. Privilege is invisible to those who have it, which is what makes it so difficult to change. So I’m asking you to all make an effort. Look at your spouse. Both of you. What are you doing? What are they doing? Chances are, if you’re a man, you need to make a conscious effort to increase your participation in the more laborious and chore-like aspects of family life. Men can pack backpacks and suitcases, they can find backup babysitters, they can restock groceries, plan meals, purchase birthday presents, and schedule doctors appointments. Don’t get defensive if she’s mad that you’re not helping. If your response is “If you needed help you should have just asked!” then you need to check yourself. If she has to ASK you to do it, it means that YOU EXPECTED HER TO DO IT. That’s the problem.

 

 

http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0003122414564008
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/jomf.12189
https://www.bls.gov/tus/tables/a6_1115.htm
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1005574724760
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4568757/
http://www.springerpub.com/couples-gender-and-power.html
https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-soc-070308-115920
http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2015/11/04/raising-kids-and-running-a-household-how-working-parents-share-the-load/
https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/230545?journalCode=ajs
http://www.kathleengerson.com/books/the-unfinished-revolution/

My 3 year old has the memory of an elephant (assuming said elephant has a very selective memory).

Today, being the tired, cold-addled, multitasking mother I am, I forgot to put my wallet in my purse when I left the house. We went grocery shopping, at which point I realized I had no money. They had to suspend the transaction so I could go home for my wallet. Not great, but not the end of the world. Except now Madeline won’t stop reminding me with what I can only interpret as a 3-year-old’s version of condescension. Imagine everything that follows is being said with one hand on her hip, and the other being waved at me in an “I can’t believe this is happening” fashion.

“Mom, you didn’t bring your money. The store needs the money for the groceries.”

“Yeah, I know, I forgot, but it’s fine. We have the groceries now”

“But you can’t forget the money, Mom. You can’t.”

“Yeah, but I did, and it’s fine.”

“Mom, you gotta amember the money for the store so you can give ’em the money.”

*sigh* “Yes, I know. I won’t forget next time. You can remind me, ok?”

……an hour later…..

“Mom, you can’t be forgetting the money all the time.”

You know when you read about historical figures and they have about 15 professions on their resume? Lawyer, surveyor, farmer, inventor, diplomat, author, candle maker, printer, pharmacist, postmaster, explorer. Nowadays when someone asks “What do you do?” you’re supposed to answer with just one thing. I’m a pharmacist. Except I think that’s seriously boring, because that’s not really what I do. Sure, I pharmacist from time to time, but when I think of my identity, I don’t think “pharmacist.” So what do I do? What do I want my Wikipedia page to say? Sure, pharmacist. But that’ll be at the bottom.

Casey
Mom, wife, homemaker, urban homesteader, baker, amateur chef, do-it-yourselfer, teacher, entrepreneur, seamstress, yarn enthusiast, soap-maker, gardener, and yes, pharmacist.

Any one of those is enough to be an “occupation,” but why tie yourself down to one thing? How boring is that? Keep adding to your unofficial resume, and keep life interesting.

People with atopic dermatitis, that’s who. For real, though, I’m just majorly itchy all the time and that’s the worst. But you know what’s not the worst? Making my own soap. My skin likes me more now, and, as a bonus, it’s seriously fun and easy to make. Want to try? You should.

I’m not going to get too much into the complicated business of how each type of oil is different and why you might want to combine different types, but if you want more details shoot me an email. To keep it simple,

SOAP = FAT + (LYE + WATER)

Easy peasy. So why is it so scary? It’s not difficult, and special equipment isn’t really needed. Lye is the part that seems to freak people out. It’s why I wear gloves and safety glasses during the “dangerous” parts. But it’s seriously no more dangerous than working with bleach, and most of us use that without any protective equipment at all. Back in the day, lye was extracted from wood ash, but now it’s readily available online or in your local store next to the drain cleaner. It’s only dangerous when it gets wet, so DON’T GET IT WET UNTIL YOU’RE READY, AND ALWAYS HANDLE IT WITH GLOVES AND SAFETY GLASSES. For real. Nobody wants chemical burns here. But seriously, don’t worry about it. It’s fine.

Basic steps:

1. Gather your equipment.
2. Measure your ingredients.
3. Melt the fat.
4. Mix the lye solution.
5. Let them cool down.
6. Mix together.
7. Pour into a mold.
8. Wait 24 hours.
9. Cut.
10. Wait until “done.” (3-5 weeks… sorry) 

    How easy is that? The whole thing (minus the final waiting period in step 10) takes maybe a half hour from start to finish. Keep reading for more details about each step.

    1. Gather your equipment. You will need a saucepan. You will also need either a spatula and/or an immersion blender. Immersion blender (also known as a stick blender) gets the whole thing done within a couple of minutes, but a spatula will work too if you don’t mind stirring for a while. You will need a digital kitchen scale. Finally, you will need a container to hold the lye and water mixture. This will get HOT, so don’t use anything that will melt.
    2. Accurately measure your ingredients. You need fat of some sort (coconut oil and/or lard are excellent options for your first batch, but it can be as complicated as you want), lye, and a liquid to dissolve the lye in. Water is the standard option, but you can use something else if you’d rather (in this batch, I used apple cider vinegar to help condition my hair, as I was making this to use as shampoo). How much of everything should I use? Check out this handy lye calculator to determine how much of everything you’ll need (or email me if you need help figuring it out).
       
    3. Melt the fat. Pretty self-explanatory. Mine took a little longer to melt completely because I added a bit of beeswax to make the bar harder (I don’t want it melting quite as fast in the shower).
       
    4. GENTLY pour your measured lye into your water. Make sure to add the lye to the water, and not the other way around. The last thing you want is water splashing lye into your face. WEAR YOUR GLOVES AND GOGGLES FOR THIS. Stir to dissolve all the lye. Keep your face away from this. It’s going to get crazy hot and it’ll release some gases that you really don’t want to breathe in. It’s not “open-the-windows” bad, but don’t stick your nose in it. Mine is a funny color because of my choice of liquid. If you use water it’ll be clear or slightly cloudy. You can see on the sides of my container that the liquid is steaming. This liquid will give both a heat AND chemical burn, so keep your goggles and gloves on until this liquid is out of the picture.
       
    5. Let both products cool down until you can comfortably touch the outside of the container and saucepan with your bare hand. They can be warm, but you don’t want them hot. You want them roughly the same temperature.
    6. Put your saucepan of fat in the sink (this is just to avoid splatter and keep your kitchen clean. SLOWLY add the lye solution into the fat. We don’t want splashing here. Now is when you break out your immersion blender and start mixing. Or you can use a spatula or whisk if you’d rather. As you mix the solution it will start to turn a creamy white color. Once you see what’s called a “trace,” you’re done! Basically, you’re looking for something the consistency of pudding. When you move the spoon or mixer across the pot it should leave a “trace” of where you moved through the liquid. This is when you can add in any fragrance if that’s something that interests you. That’s it! You just made soap!
    7. Pour your soapy goop into a mold of some sort. I’ve used Pringles containers in the past, but I recently got myself an actual soap mold (things are getting serious over here). You can use pretty much anything you want that’s water-tight. Just make sure you use something that you can get the soap OUT of. A silicone muffin or bread pan would work great, but if you use a glass or metal pan then there’s no way to get the soap out (or if you use something like a Pringles can, you can tear it apart to get the soap out).
    8. Wait approximately 24 hours before removing it from the mold. This gives it time to cool down and set up. If you remove it too early it won’t hold its shape and you’ll have a real mess on your hands.
    9. Cut into bars.
       
    10. Now we wait. How long? Until it’s done. That’s not terribly helpful, is it? I use what’s called the “cold process method.” This means that I mix everything together, and then let it sit until the excess water has evaporated out. It has the shortest hands-on time, but a long hands-off time. It usually takes 3-5 weeks before it’s “ready.” There’s another method called “hot process,” which is where you mix everything together and then cook out the extra water. This requires more hands-on time, but it’s ready to use almost immediately. I don’t want to do that, because these children really want to get covered in lye. I’m not ok with that, so I make it as fast as possible and don’t mind letting it sit for a month. It helps to turn the soaps periodically, to make sure they can dry out evenly. I probably turn mine once a week (maybe more if I want to poke them a little – it makes me feel like I’m doing something).

It’s important to note that all materials used in this process must be made out of glass, heat-proof plastic, or a NON-REACTIVE METAL (this means we’re avoiding aluminum, cast iron, and copper). Stainless steel is fine.

It’s seriously easy, and fun to customize. You can make it more moisturizing, you can make it organic, you can add coffee grounds for a delightful smelling, exfoliating experience. You can make it customized to your exact skin type. IT’S AWESOME, AND YOU SHOULD TRY IT!

Or, you can shoot me an email about what you’re looking for in a bar of soap and I’ll have it customized to your specifications and ready for delivery in 1 month. How cool is that?

And yours can, too! Some people use candles, some use air freshening sprays or plug-ins. I’m using simple things I had laying around the house (though I recognize that most people probably do not have these things sitting around).

Madeline was skeptical at first. I mean… dried lemons? Who dries lemons? Someone who bought lemons impulsively and then immediately realized she didn’t plan on making anything with lemons, that’s who (though I also dried the lemon that’s been hanging out on my lemon tree for the past year because I’m sick of looking at it). Rosemary is fresh from my indoor “garden,” though I plan on drying some sprigs to make some more ready-to-use home scent packets. Vanilla is homemade (because of course it is). I fished out a vanilla bean and used that, but you could also use a teaspoon of extract or a piece of an ordinary dry vanilla bean (no need to use up a whole bean on this).

After careful consideration (and some overenthusiastic sniffing), she approved of the combination and authorized its use.

Well that looks gross. I’ve been simmering it (low heat on the back burner) for about 5 hours now and my house has smelled amazing all day. I’m keeping the lid on so I don’t evaporate all the water, but the smell is still making it out to the rest of the house. It’s like the best candle ever. It’s bright and fresh, but earthy. There’s a warm depth to it, a mild herbaceous quality, and a subtle sweetness. I can close my eyes and it feels like summer.

And the living room smells less like poop, which is what I was really going for.

Lemon, Rosemary and Vanilla Simmering Scent

2 slices of lemon (fresh or dried)

1 sprig of rosemary (fresh or dried)

1/3 vanilla bean, or 1 tsp vanilla extract

Add to roughly 3 cups of water in a saucepan, and place on a back burner on low heat. Leave the lid on. Check it periodically to make sure the water level isn’t dropping too low. Alternatively, you can put everything in a small slow-cooker and let it go.

There are probably as many ways to start and keep sourdough as there are people who make it. I, like most people, think my way is the best way. This is my sourdough, who has yet to be named. I’ve been neglecting raising him for about 5 months now.

He’s like a pet that doesn’t mind being ignored. I feed him whenever I remember, and occasionally he provides me with a delightfully tangy loaf of bread. You know. Just a typical pet/pet owner relationship.

So what the heck IS sourdough, anyway? It’s weird, is what it is. You’re basically trying to catch and raise wild yeast and good bacteria. The bacteria creates acid as a byproduct (which gives it the tangy flavor), and the yeast makes bubbles that makes the bread rise.

Want to try it? There are a bunch of “recipes” out there for making a sourdough starter, but the easiest way is to mix equal amounts of flour and water (start with 1/4 cup of each) and then wait. I keep mine in a Tupperware container on the counter with the lid sitting on top but not locked in place. A starter is alive and it needs to breathe, and it also releases gases as it grows, so you don’t want it to be airtight. Give it a day or two, and take a look. You want to see some bubbles. If there are NO bubbles, you can add a pinch of yeast to speed up the process. Add more flour and water (equal amounts) again. Feed it like this whenever you feel like it.

Sometimes I feed it a lot, sometimes I feed it a little, sometimes I forget to feed it for days and days. I feed mine all purpose flour, bread flour, rye flour and whole wheat flour. Whatever strikes my fancy at the moment. The changing makeup of my starter keeps the flavor complex and interesting, but you can use whatever you want. Don’t forget to add an equal amount of water at each feeding (it’s ok to eyeball it once you get a good feel for the proper consistency). Feed it a lot the day before you want to use it to make sure it’s happy and ready to go. If it’s too active at room temperature, or you only want to use it very occasionally, you can keep it in the fridge and only feed it every week or so (though it can probably go quite a while longer between feedings if you forget). Just bring it back to room temp before using it.

How do you know when it’s “good”? Take a whiff. It should have a weird, yogurt-like, kind of boozy smell. If it smells BAD, throw it out. The bacteria we’re looking for don’t smell bad, which means you’ve grown something else. As far as consistency goes, you want it bubbly. It’s like a spongy, thick batter.

“I’ve heard you need to throw half of it away every time you feed it…what’s the deal with that?” I have literally no idea. I’ve done a lot of reading on the subject, and it just doesn’t make sense. Apparently you’re supposed to keep the same volume of starter on hand at all times, and throw out a scoop when you feed it with a scoop each day. That’s silly. I don’t do that. Just keep feeding it a few spoonfuls every few days until you have enough to bake with. I usually use up 75% of my starter each time I bake, and then I begin the slow process of regrowing it.

You should give it a try. It’s weird, but good. Kinda like me.

…but I’m totally not. This conversation actually happened.

“MADELINE!!!”

*looks up, definitely startled*

“What do I keep telling you?!!”

“….one thing at a time.”

“No, the other thing.”

“…be nicely.”

“No, the other thing.”

“… … …I gotta calm down”

“No, damnit Madeline, about the table”

“…I don’t know.” *shrugs*

“We don’t eat the table, Madeline. I just said it. We don’t eat the table.”

“But I’m so HUNGRY” *wails in anguish*

“You have a bowl of cereal right in front of you. Cereal you asked for. Eat it.”

“But I’m hungry for the table!!!”

*mom bangs head on table repeatedly*