Happy Fall!

Halloween has come and gone and the Caldwell's had a fun one! This was our first year in the new house and we far exceeded our measly record in Montgomery when it comes to trick-or-treaters. According to our spreadsheet keeping next door neighbor we ended up with 99 trick-or-treaters which means we ran out of candy by 7:15. Nice.

We got a lot of compliments on the family costume choice. Little did they know, this is our normal weekend attire!

We had a few "grown- up" Halloween parties so we decided to amp it up a bit and go as a pair of big boobs. It got a bit awkward when we weren't together, just sayin....

Now on to more healthy topics of conversation. Our fall CSA program is in full swing and we have been bringing home some GOOD stuff! Each week we have gotten a dozen eggs along with a variety of fall veggies. So far we have gotten bags of baby lettuces, full heads of lettuce, lots of bok choy, turnips with greens, butternut squash, cheese pumpkin, buttercup squash, some other random squash, and sweet potatoes. We have about 2 more months to go and I am already panicked about how we will survive the gap until the spring program starts up again.

In addition to the normal fall share we opted to get a few apples which our farmer picks up from a buddy of his in TN. Each bushel is about 40+ lbs and only costs $35. That is a steal people! My parents opted for an entire bushel of Granny Smith apples just for themselves and we ended up splitting a bushel of Gold Rush apples with a coworker of mine. So far I have only used them for smoothies, oatmeal and sweet potato and apple soup but rest assured, I have plans for the rest!

More to come!

My Humble Return

I have a few confessions and they are as follows:

1. I have not been blogging out of guilt of not blogging.
2. We forgot to take Boyd's 12 month mustache pictures and I feel REALLY bad about that.
3. I have not taken enough iPhone pictures.
4. We didn't go to the fair this year. Enough said...
5. I have very few, if any, before and after pictures of the not so new house.

Now that I have cleared my conscience and I am have committed to allowing myself to blog even if I only have crappy iPhone photos for visual documentation, the blogging can commence.

Here are a few of the semi-more-interesting photos from my iPhone with commentary.

I have taken on a new hobby, kombucha brewing. Kombucha is simply fermented sweet tea and it's loaded with probiotics. I just couldn't justify spending $3 a bottle at Earth Fare when I could make it myself for pennies. Plus it's fun to say that I brew Kombucha!

Yummy, fizzy, gut-loving kombucha!

Boyd turned ONE year old in August. I feel like it was just yesterday that I was telling everyone that I was pregnant. I suppose that is par for the course!

We may have missed our mustache pictures but at least we managed to take some proper birthday photos. I'm so thankful that his daddy loves to take pictures!

After a disastrous first year and a somewhat troublesome second year. We FINALLY harvested some honey! We were only able to pull 9 frames but they yielded about 2.5 gallons so that should take me through the winter with a little left over!

Tyler and I ran our 5th half marathon last weekend! It was not our worst but certainly not our best. Training with a baby has it's challenges so we are just glad that we made it!

Boyd was less than impressed....

So now that the "first" post is under my belt I hope that I can start sharing a few more projects with you. We have a lot of projects on the horizon so hopefully they will make for some interesting blogging!

Shorts Shorts Shorts

I have been cranking out the shorts! So far we have seersucker, madras and gingham and I'm not done yet! I have found that I can work pretty quickly when I cut everything out and sew everything at the same time.

Plus Tyler obviously supports my "art" because he surprised me a few weeks ago and got me a serger! I mean what a guy, what a stand up guy!

He even got me these cute labels for Christmas last year. I am taking these gifts as small hints that he wants me to start making all of his clothes as well. Think I'm right?

B-boy's 10 Month Photos

The little dude turned 10 months old about 2 weeks ago and what a 2 weeks it has been! Over the weekend he decided it was time to crawl so the madness has officially begun. His uncontrollable waving and kissing has also become pretty entertaining.

He personality is really starting to show. He gets very lively at home but when he is in a crowd he just sits quietly and watches. He has no trouble with adults and will let a total stranger hold him but if a baby comes at him, all bets are off! The chin starts to quiver and the tears flow. I mean he is 30 times bigger than these babies but the second they put a hand on him, he is terrified! Yes, he will probably be THAT kid so thank goodness he will be able to rest upon his good looks and unbelievable physical strength to get him through junior high school! 

His whopping 2 teeth are getting a work out as he has started enjoying more types of food. Last night he ate a mountain of okra despite the nasty slime that comes along with boiled okra. He also loved the spicy lentil and squash curry and sun-dried tomato pasta salad that we had recently. Intense flavors don't seem to deter him. 

We are now officially bottle-less! He takes a cup when he is at school and I feed him when he is home in the mornings and at night; however I think we are about ready to use up all of that frozen milk that I have been hording for the last 10 months!

He is getting so big and I'm sad to say that we only have 2 more mustaches to go! 

Blueberry Pickin'

The second we moved to Auburn we decided to join a local CSA program. CSAs, Community Supported Agriculture, are a great way to get local, seasonal food while supporting small farmers. Every week we meet our farmer in the old Bruno's parking lot to pick up our share. We leave with a dozen eggs plus about 5-10 lbs of fruits and veggies. 

 It's blueberry season in the south and our farmer has a huge blueberry field so we set out on Saturday to pick our share's worth of blueberries.

 Boyd enjoyed his first taste!

Of course, Tyler brought his camera so our foraging trip became a photo shoot. It sure would have been nice if I had tried a little harder to look presentable. Welcome to real life!

 

PS My face is back to normal. It only took 5 days to look like a human again!

Tales of a Beekeeper

Warning: Graphic pictures below!!!

This, my friends, is what happens when you don't zip up your bee suit properly! I mean all I was trying to do was help them rearrange their house a little bit and they obviously didn't appreciate my hard work! Two little martyrs decided to join me inside the veil of my suit and take their anger out on my face! Everything from my double chin to my forehead is swollen and I couldn't open my eyes enough to go to work yesterday! I'm on day 3 and the swelling is finally starting to subside. 

On top of that, I think I have a queenless hive. UGH, welcome to my life!

The Bees!

Since the human baby has been hogging the blog lately it's about time my other babees, our honeybees, get some face time!

 Flash back: I decided to start this little hobby of mine when I was about 7 months pregnant and obviously didn't know what I was doing. Hence the fact that we had no bees to pack up for the big move to Auburn! My failure didn't deter me and I enrolled in a beginner beekeepers class in the fall where I learned all about the things I was doing wrong!



Needless to say, once the days started to get a little warmer I was itching to bring my 50,000+ babees home! So on Easter Sunday we loaded up the truck and went to Central, AL to pick up our 2 nucs. A nuc, as is a small nucleus colony that has 5 frames of bees including a queen who is already laying eggs. I loaded those 5 frames into my 10 frame box with 5 empty frames and off we went.



We now have 2 happy hives in our backyard and both of them are doing pretty well. Each hive has filled up a box with brood (babies) and another with honey and now we are just waiting for them to fill up a second box of honey and we will be ready to harvest. So far the bees are already doing much better than last year! Knock on wood!

I really encourage you all to support your local beekeeping community. Not only is local honey so much tastier and healthier than the fake grocery store stuff but bees are incredibly important to our food supply. Without them we would not be able to enjoy a HUGE amount of fruits, vegetables and nuts that they pollinate. The honeybee population is shrinking dramatically so think twice before you spray your yard pesticides! And off my soapbox I go!

B-boy's 9 Month Photos

Ugh he is growing up too fast! Yes, I know that is so cliche but he is practicably self sufficient now! He can feed himself with his hands which would work in some cultures that don't use utensils.  He poops without needing his diaper, the bathtub is kinda like a toilet right? He waves and he speaks his very own language that he made up himself. I mean he is a brilliant kid.

 
We went to the doc on Monday and he is 21 lbs 11 oz and in the 80th percentile for height.

He still sleeps from 7:00 pm to 7:00 am with 2-3 pretty long naps.

He is eating pretty well and has started eating a little of our food along with the pureed food that he usually eats. He is a bottomless pit when it comes to eating pieces of mango, cantaloupe and banana by himself.

Only 3 more mustaches to go!!

B-boy's 8 Month Photos

Well month 8 is almost in the books and it has been a fun one! Boyd is still sleeping like a champ, eating 3 meals of solid food, nursing a little less, and definitely starting to show his personality.

He is still not crawling and I'm totally okay with it! Crawling baby = chaos

He is not wanting to nurse as much which has kind of freaked me out because it's taking a toll on my milk production. I'm trying very hard not to cry when I pump half as much as I used to!

He are working on is hand-eye coordination and he is getting used to the idea of putting food in his mouth. He will hold is sippy cup but he refuses to hold his bottle. Lazy....

He has played with the same 5 or so toys for the last few months so I guess it's time to cave and get him something new. OR I could just hide one for a few days and then pull it out and pretend like it's new! Much better idea!

He prefers NBC Nightly News, woodworking shows, and House Hunters International over cartoons and he is currently a vegetarian.

Happy Thursday from Boyd/Borat!