Now with more...er...stuff?

So I've decided to revamp this blog with a new look and a new name.

A little background is that I am not a natural-born Mainer. Having been born in Massachusetts, however, I come with all the sarcasm and coldness of a born and bred New Englander. Our ground is cold and tough and full of rocks and our people can often be very similar. We talk too fast and speak too snidely for most people from warmer climates (and that is of course assuming you get us to do something other than glare at you menacingly like you're trying to sell us a used Pinto). That being said, however, I wouldn't live anywhere but in New England. I take for granted a lot of the advantages I enjoy here, not the least being the accessibility of all the necessities for a simple, natural life.

My husband and I have been married for nigh on eight years (ok, well, more like seven and counting) and have two children to show for it so far. My husband slaves away for his taskmasters doing disability claims (so if you have a broken leg and you talk to some guy named Jon be nice to him, ok?). My children generally run amok and get dirty, which seems to be what they excel at. My eldest will be school age this year and I look forward to sending him off on his own and not listening to the perpetual "HE STOLE MY BINOCULARS!" "WAHHHHHHHH!!" "STOP HITTING YOUR BROTHER!" that seems to occur every. single. day.

Yeah.

I grew up eating a diet that roughly consisted of a bag of sour cream and onion potato chips washed down with Coke and chased with a bowl of ice cream. I consider it a small miracle of genetics or fate or something that I managed to escape both a) obesity and b) type II diabetes (dia-BEE-tus). I may also credit the fact that my mother insisted that we have no access to anything processed, sugary, fatty, or generally appetizing to a child so long as we were staying in her house. My father's house was another story, where my brother and I had free range of a variety of unhealthy, non-Michelle-approved snacks.

That being said, when I married my husband as a budding college freshmen in the land where Macy's is a really crummy grocery store, we mostly focused on the cost and not the quality of our food. If it was cheap, it was worth buying. Fresh fruits and vegetables were good, and appreciated, but certainly not at the top of our list of foods to buy. We never at terribly, but we certainly did not eat particularly well.

Four years, three cats, two degrees and one child later, we left lovely Deseret for our home turf in New England. Yet again, we were more concerned with the price of the food we were buying, especially as we shortly added a home and baby number two to our family.

So fast forward a little more and we have now! Over three years of home ownership later and I've started to get some of this natural living stuff down. I've always loved gardening, I grew up with a mother who had a large and productive garden (a little overproductive in cabbage and parsnips if you ask me...) and I always dreamed of having my own garden. Before we were asked ever so politely to vacate a duplex we were living in with three cats and a newborn so the new owners could live in our spot, I had a nice little garden in Utah that was producing fairly well (let's ignore the carrots that were mostly weeds and the failed corn venture). So, when I finally got my hands on my own piece of land, I decided to try my hand at gardening again.

After year one, I was pretty sure I was ready to throw in the towel and live off of chips and soda again for the rest of my life. Bugs, weeds, weather and fatigue (ok I was pregnant, so sue me) pretty well did me in. Despite all that, I had a decent year and I for some unknown reason decided to try it again the next year.

Year two was much better! I improved my technique and increased my yield. I had the world's largest bumper crop of cucumbers (anyone want pickles? seriously, I think I have a canning addiction...) and summer squash. I was very happy with my garden.

Year three was decent. Some odd weather again caused a few crops to fail, but over all I had a good run of it.

So now here we are at year four.

Somewhere in all that I also managed to acquire: six hens, one rooster, two ducks, and numerous duck eggs that will be hatching in a couple more weeks.

So mix that all together, hit puree, wait a bit and you have: a family of four with seven chickens two ducks and lots of soon-to-be ducklings planning garden number four. Ta da!

Hello!

I promise this hasn't been forgotten! I have quite a bit of updating to do so I'll do that when I get the chance over the next few days. I hope to add pictures and make this a bit more interesting (if anyone out there sees it anyway!).

Toodles!