Gypsy Forest

a young Mick Jagger & other bits.....

2012-02-12T14:29:13-06:00

Just popping in for a brief minute to share this with you ....

Can you see a young Mick Jagger in those lips? He was singing Mumford & Sons however..... which is oddly both folk & rock and most definitely Luke's thing. And our thing, we're a little obsessed with their sound. Acoustic rocking out.... this boy loves it. {and thank goodness the amp has a volume button!}

I also thought I would tell you that today is the very last day to sign up for the incredible Whole Food Kitchen class being offered by Heather of Beauty that Moves. Aside from being down to earth, sweet and having exceptional taste in music (hello Ani fans!), Heather is very knowledgeable in the holistic world of whole food eating. The class started a week ago and the recipes shared so far are simple, amazing & nutritious. It's the only time the class is being offered in 2012 and though it is an investment, I think it's well worth it. For honesty's sake I want you to know I'm not being solicited to share this in any way, I have no connection to Heather. I just really love what she's doing over there.

On a different note...... I've decided to open up sponsorship space here on Gypsy Forest. I know this is a touchy subject for some of you, and I truly understand. This was a long thought about decision for me. You can read a bit more about it here. I will carefully choose these sponsors based on what I feel is relevant for this community we share, because you are the real reason I show up here. It is very much my intention to conserve the integrity of this space.... please know this. And you'll get to meet some handcrafters and independent artists as well, which is wonderful too.

I hope your loving the last bits of your weekend. I'm going out to the cold garage to offer some moral support & help to my sweet husband who is sanding kitchen cabinets.... oh my.

Stephinie

long ago milk chocolate curls

2012-02-09T22:27:35-06:00

I dug through the archives for you all in order to properly share this story.

It's a story of milk chocolate curls that met a rather unfortunate fate. We'll begin with cuteness overload, one of my most favorite pictures. Ever.

There she is. My big girl. Three years old in a tie dyed tank top and her favorite corduroy overalls. (pretending to have lost her arms, oh my!) And there are the curls that bounced on her head as she toddled through those early years. I used to put them in high pig tails on the top of her head. Two curly ringlets stuck off each side. Ohhhh, those days. They seem so long ago and like yesterday all rolled into one.

Last week I read this very funny piece over on mamalode. It made me laugh out loud and remember a similar (though slightly less traumatic) story from my past.

One evening while very pregnant with baby number three, I went through the typical bath and pajama bedtime routine with my young two. I had trimmed the ends of Jade's hair and left the scissors on top of the toilet while busying myself with the usual hubbub of getting two little ones ready for bed. As Sam & I picked out stories and loaded a pile of books on to the bed for reading, Jade wandered away from us. I hear her say from the bathroom something like "I do it, I cut."

I ran into the bathroom to see what she had cut. And there, in a pile on the floor were the milk chocolate curls. The scissors had cut through a huge chunk of her damp hair with ease. She was so proud of herself, that girl. Beaming with giant scissors in hand. And me, in all my pregnant hormones and young mama ways.... I burst into tears. "Oh no," I said scooping up the curls as if I might be able to somehow put them back on. I surveyed the damage.... no bleeding... two ears... thank goodness. On the floor however, were most of the curls that once hung from the back of her beautiful hair. She looked at me concerned, no doubt surprised by my emotional response.

I managed to collect myself enough to clean up. Hide the damn scissors. Curse quietly at myself for leaving them out in the first place. And then read the pile of books to the kids.

After the kids were settled I called Joe on the phone. Literally sobbing about the hair cut. He was at a friend's house working on his old VW bus.... and imagine this? He too was surprised by my reaction. He laughed and came home early. "It's just hair," he told me.

Can I please blame most of that ridiculous display on 7+ month pregnant mama hormones? I mean sheesh, that was not one of my prouder moments.

But you know, a piece of it was knowing those baby curls would be gone once they were snipped off. As if my baby girl was suddenly not such a baby. And they were.

She didn't miss them one bit though, that girl. And luckily the top hair mostly covered the missing chunk and we were able to pull off a bob style cut. The years went on. And the girl grew up. And then somehow those long ago curls came back in the form of lovely wild waves.

But she was tired of combing them and taming them and she started hinting that she'd really like to cut them all off. (again)

And so she did. Nearly twelve inches. (yes, she donated it)

And much like everything with kids, when you think it's no big deal and you're truly quite prepared. They suprise you. I think she grew a foot when they snipped off that hair. In the matter of minutes she went from looking like a big kid to a very sophistocated young lady. This time catching her dad much more by surprise than her mama.

"It's just hair," I told him with a smile. But somehow it seemed like so much more.

this day had cake

2012-02-08T20:43:58-06:00

A grapefruit flavored cake inspired by this lovely recipe. I swapped the lemon parts for grapefruit parts, cut the sugar in half & added a 1/2 teaspoon of grapefruit oil. Topped with lightly sweetened vanilla bourbon whipped cream and blackberries. I know, I know..... blackberries are not in season or local right now for me. (however the citrus & eggs were!) And was it ever an amazing delicious treat. Seriously. I think cake like this on a Wednesday night is kind of like magic.

With a face covered in whipped cream from licking off the beaters Luke said to me "mama, you just are the best cooker."

He's pretty much the sweetest thing ever.... that boy. Such a charmer.

I've got news tomorrow.... in the way of the big girl & I cutting off all our hair to donate.... big changes... my oh my. See you then.

this leaf

2012-02-08T00:49:46-06:00

I should really be sleeping.

It's after midnight..... the house is quiet. There is a warm cozy bed with flannel sheets and a fluffy down comforter just down the hall.....but my mind is clicking away a million miles a second.

So instead I've made some tea and here I sit.

I've been wanting to share these photos with you for awhile now. I've been taking them over the winter.

Leaves.

I love leaves.

Autumn is the time of year I miss the most about living up north. The smell of crisp air and sound of the wind in the trees or crunching leaves beneath your feet. It took me three years, but I found my autumn in the south. They call it winter here. You have to look hard for it..... but it's there.

These photos got me thinking about leaving. {No pun intended.} Autumn is always like the summer's last kiss before it departs. It puts on one last beautiful show for us. I'm never ready for the leaving. For saying goodbye. I'm always the one with half a drink still left yelling "wait, I'm not done yet.... I don't even know your name leaf...."

Our life is all about leaving. We're nearly always coming or going and by the time we've got one gig figured out, we're halfway out the door to the next. It's what we do..... it's how we roll.

This leaving thing always creeps in. And even though I've done it so many times before, I'm always surprised by it. You'd think it was old hat by now, but no.

We're heading into our last year down here in the south. With no idea yet where the next tour will take us, we're in sort of a limbo. An in-between. I'm trying to soak up these next few months and be aware of every bit that surrounds us. Wondering just what will be the thing I hold the most dear, the favorite memory of this place.

I don't know the names of all the birds or flowers or leaves. I don't know the best shortcuts to get from one place to the next. I'm still soaking in the culture and the food and the people and learning all the time what makes the south the south. Yeah, I don't even know her name. But she's beautiful.... and I love her just the same.

weekend bits....

2012-02-06T14:26:41-06:00

*cleaning out the art cabinet.... I'm a sucker for organizing crafty bits...

*granola with coconut oil & nut butters and a sesame honey flavor, so good.

*the owl obsession is at a whole new level now with these visitors in the oak trees outside... they've been here every day for over a week....

*green salads and green smoothies.... good stuff

*what my table looks like most days at lunch.... just shove the stuff aside and eat!

*hot-cold-hot-cold weather.... we go from turning the heat on to throwing box fans in the window to cool things down. it will be 55 one day and 75 the next

*lego obsession meets fork lift obsession (papa, hide those keys at the shop this summer!)

*wine & banjo.... love

Today I am looking around at the chaos and trying my best to love it. (inspired by this) I started our morning with this song. Thank you Erin!

I'm loving, LOVING this new album... this song made me laugh out loud and another had me all choked up looking at that sweet man I married. Damn I'm a lucky girl. For reals. (and sappy.... totally sappy)

I want to drink red wine and eat dark chocolate sprinkled with sea salt while lounging on this beauty and surfing through Cynthia's quilt board on pinterest. Speaking of quilts..... this is a sweet little story of my own creations. Have you seen this girl's mad skills? I am in love with her art, I'm so looking forward to it coming out in fabric this spring...

And speaking of spring, my mama's birthday gift to me was a spot in not one, but both of these courses. Again.... how did I get so lucky? I'm counting down the days..... they look amazing!! I'm headed to make more granola and a grapefruit cake with whipped cream and blackberries.... because that sounds like so much more fun than helping Luke clean up the tornado in his room.

Happy Monday

exciting little bits....

2012-02-03T17:37:40-06:00

I'm excited to tell you I recently joined this amazing group of handmade artists.....

The Natural Kids Etsy Team

After feeling my way around the group and getting to know some of the other creative shop owners over the last month, I can only say wow. What a kindred group of artists. If you are looking to support eco friendly small businesses you can take a peek at our offerings on etsy. The team website shares a really beautiful seasonal gift guide throughout the year and a collaborative blog written by members of the team. Take a peek at the new Spring Gift Guide or our incredible selection of Shops. I'm so happy to be a part of this group and in the near future I will be contributing to the team blog, so I hope you'll follow me over there from time to time and check things out.

In other shop news, I've added a few new quilts and I'm working on pulling together some tutorials for my bags. Both the sling style and drawstring ones that were quite popular. I'm also considering a reversible skirt tutorial exactly like the one in the shop? What do you think?

I'm celebrating my two year anniversary as a "shop" owner this month, which is pretty exciting. My humble little space also just had it's 100th sale. I'm a little giddy and a lot of bit grateful and so I've decided to offer a 10% off coupon later this month. February 15th-29th. I'll post about it again when it's closer and share the coupon code. {and hopefully I'll have those darn tutorials together by then!}

On another note.... while I know most of you are here for my banter and recipes.... what do you think about post card sets? I've been thinking of offering more grown up items in the shop and this came to mind. I would pull together collections of my photography to share in themed bundles. Outdoors, food and such. I'd love to know your thoughts on this.

Wishing you all a happy little weekend.

hippie cookies that don't suck

2012-02-01T17:30:35-06:00

I've made a lot of really awful hippie cookies.

The kind that taste like dusty oats and stick to the roof of your mouth. The ones that crumble to bits. Or the ones that come out as hard as little hockey pucks and end up as organic dog biscuits. And while I'm typically a go for the gusto, loads of butter, brown sugar & dark chocolate sort of cookie girl..... I've also wished to the hippie cookie fairies that I could maybe find a recipe that didn't, well, suck.

To be a true hippie cookie, it had to have no sugar. The kind of thing I could hand over to the kids first thing in the morning to tide them over while I cook up some eggs & greens. Or finish checking my email. I wanted some good wholesome stuff in it like nuts and dried fruit and oats. And the nuts had to be sneaky because my littlest kids are funny about those.

Inspired by a recipe in this book, I came up with these. They're more like barely sweet little banana muffin bites than cookies. They're moist, but don't crumble apart in the cookie jar. They're yummy. Wholesome. And the kids love them. Really. If your kids like nuts, feel free to add a handful in. If your hubby is not enlisted in the military and can eat hemp seeds, I think those would be good too. (I love hemp seeds. And yes, I think that's a stupid rule.)

Hippie Cookies {that don't suck}

3 large ripe bananas

1 TBSP vanilla

3 TBSP ground flax seeds

3 TBSP water

*optional, 1 TBSP chia seeds

1/4 cup coconut oil

1/4 cup almond butter (sneaky nuts)

2 cups rolled oats (not instant)

1/4 cup oat flour

1/4 cup unsweetened shredded coconut flakes

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup dried cherries (chopped a bit)

*Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Mash ripe banana in a bowl or mixer & add vanilla to it. Melt coconut oil & almond butter in a small pan over low heat. Pour into banana mixture & stir well to combine.

*Mix flax seeds with water in a small bowl, set aside while you mix up the dry ingredients. (add chia seeds to flax, if using)

*Add oats, oat flour, coconut flakes, baking powder & salt to a bowl. Mix well.

*Stir up the flax mixture. It will be thick and sort of egg-ish. Add to bananas & mix well.

*Add the dry ingredients to the banana mixture. Mix well & let it sit for 5 minutes so the oats can absorb some of the liquid.

* I chop up the dried cherries because I'm cheap frugal & it helps get a tart bite of cherry throughout the cookie. You don't have to chop them up though. Add the cherries & stir into the cookie batter.

*Lightly oil a cookie sheet with a bit of coconut oil to prevent sticking.

*Drop by Tablespoon onto prepared cookie sheet and bake 12-15 minutes, until the cookie just barely begins to brown. Rotate the cookie sheet halfway through for even cooking.

***details, details*** I used a lightly sweetened almond butter & my cherries had some sugar in them, so these are not totally sugar free. I wasn't stressed about this because it adds only a tiny amount of sugar to the recipe. If however you use an unsweetened almond butter, you may want to add 1 TBSP of honey to the melted oil/butter in the recipe. Raisins or dried cranberries would also be good in this. If you use gluten free oats & oat flour, these would be GF and they are also Vegan.

These are good warm or cool..... enjoy!

wiggly tooths

2012-01-30T21:21:15-06:00

Luke : You know what mama, I do not like wiggly tooths.

me : They feel weird huh?

Luke : It feels like a rotten bee in your mouth.

me : A bee? Like a bee that buzzes?

Luke : No, like a dead one.

I laugh.

Luke : Wiggly tooths just feel bad!

{he was more than happy to wiggle that tooth out in exchange for three gold dollars from the tooth fairy}

This little bitty post sat here all day long..... waiting for me to add the photos and hit publish.

Monday, Monday..... I suppose there is good reason for all the songs written about this day. It's always hard for me to shift back into the weekday rhythm. Especially when our weekend is a rather zoo-ish one. And it was. We ran about and got different kids to different spots for two birthday parties, an art lesson, a music lesson, a play-date, and to & from the bus to campus..... which seems like a lot until you divide the number of activities by the number of children.

It was an unusually busy weekend. But in the mix of it, people still got fed, the big brother home from school was doted upon, no one was left anywhere, and I enjoyed some wine with that cute guy I married. I'm calling it a job well done. Saturday night I even stayed up until 1:30 with that teenage boy of mine. Talking away about life. Surreal is being on the parent side of those conversations.... I still don't know how it happened so fast. And by the way, he came home this weekend after being gone just 3 weeks and surprised us all by officially being taller than his dad. Ahem.

Sometimes within the same breath I'm talking to one about wiggly tooths & fairies, and the other about teenage love. I just sort of pause and think wow. This life is amazing. It's crazy and messy and beautiful and just amazing.

And I'm totally dragging this tooth fairy thing out as long as I can.....

lemon cranberry scones

2012-01-26T08:26:02-06:00

Here it is, the scone recipe~~

I made these at Christmas time inspired by this recipe. I switched things up a bit adding whole grain flour and a whole lot of other tweaks. I didn't mess much with the butter though. These babies have got a heaping ton of it.... and are they ever delicious.

I've been meaning to make them again & re-photograph them because I'm not thrilled with the photos I'm sharing with you. But in the spirit of those last two posts, (here & here) I'm going to just let it be and share it like it is. And while I'd love to hang out & chat for a bit.... I've got a crazy road trip - running errands - picking up our oldest for the weekend sort of day ahead of me.... so I've gotta run.

But seriously, you should make these scones this weekend.

Lemon Cranberry Scones

1.5 cups fresh cranberries

1/2 cup light brown sugar

zest of 2 lemons (meyer if you can find them)

3 TBSP fresh lemon juice

1 cup whole wheat pastry flour

1.5 cups unbleached white flour

1 TBSP baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

12 tablespoons chilled unsalted butter

1 egg

1/2 cup milk or half & half (I used milk)

extra flour for rolling

Heat the oven to 400ºF and prepare two baking sheets by lining them with parchment paper or lightly coating with oil or butter.

Beat the egg & milk together, set aside. In the bowl of a food processor, chop the cranberries lightly & pour into a separate bowl. Add brown sugar, lemon zest & lemon juice to the cranberries.

Wipe out the food processor so it's nice & dry.Then add the flours, baking powder, and salt. Pulse once to mix. Cut the chilled butter into small pieces and add to the flour in the food processor. Process until fine and crumbly. Pour into the cranberry mixture bowl and gently combine. Stir in the beaten egg and milk. * the secret to really good scones is to not over-mix and leave little bits of butter in the batter*

Sprinkle the counter with flour, and dump the dough out on it. It will be very wet and sticky. Gently roll out, liberally flouring and cut into desired shapes. I did squares because it was easy. Use a spatula to gently lift the scones onto the pan. Bake until the edges are golden brown and the top is just barely beginning to brown. 15 minutes or so.

Makes 12 large scones.

EXTRA STUFF~~~~

*if your batter seems too moist to roll, you can add a little extra flour 1 TBSP at a time.... don't overdo it though, it will interfere with the tender bite of a good scone. You could also chill the dough for an hour or so.... if you're patient. Which I'm not.

*if you don't have or don't like cranberries, leave them out!

*if you happen to be a lemon addict.... add a 1/2 tsp of good quality lemon extract to the cranberry mixture and/or a bit of finely chopped candied lemon peel.

*I think ginger would pair nicely too. Some candied ginger on top and either fresh or ground dried ginger in the batter.

*I really have to go now before I think of something else....

and now.....

2012-01-24T12:59:35-06:00

Wow.

I wasn't really sure what would happen on Friday when I shared that post. I wondered if perhaps a mass exodus would un-subscribe and run fleeing away thinking I was either crazy or certainly far from the image in their minds. But then you all just surprised me in your sweet little ways by sending tons of love in your comments and emails. Thank you.

Of course, I'm also trying to figure out how the heck I follow a post like that. "Here, have a lemon scone recipe." That doesn't really work does it? I mean, lemon scones are good and all.... but it's just sort of a trivial follow up to pouring a piece of your soul out onto a computer screen and receiving such love.

All those courageous words you shared had me thinking these past few days. Over and over you told me that you wanted to spill your own confessions. Say it like it is. Be brave. Many of you told me you struggled with feeling good enough... and I think this is what blew my mind the most. Why, as women, do we have these unreal expectations of what we should do? Of how people should perceive us? Why do we spend so much energy being "good"? We cook, clean, volunteer, work a job, raise kids, help our friends & family, and so much more. But we don't make enough time for us. And worse, we put on a facade all too often. You know, we play nice.

I think some of getting things done & taking care of business is unavoidable..... but self care should also make that to-do list. Taking a tiny speck of time to ourselves every day. Sharing coffee or wine with people that make us laugh until we cry. Writing, painting, gardening, meditating, cooking, playing music, or whatever makes your heart sing. We overextend and we give so much that we have little left when giving to ourselves. We're spread so thinly that we lose the joy of living in this moment.... this beautiful life. What the crap, right? I mean why is this such a common thread in our culture?

I want you all to know. You totally and completely freaking rock. For reals. If you can get up and walk through your day with love in your heart.... you are doing it right. I don't care if you pour your pasta sauce from a jar or make it from the garden.... in the end no one is going to give a shit about the pasta sauce. Nobody is going to care if you dusted. The love is what's gonna count. Don't be so hard on yourself. Be brave. Be courageous. Be real. We can be and do and love so much more as a tribe, as sisters. And I am grateful and humble to have you be a part of mine.

With Love,

Stephinie