Month: February 2023

aslan is on the move

/ Rachel Fenton / 3 Comments

We’re currently weathering another winter storm, though this one isn’t as severe as the ones in January. It’s snowing in the foothills, and we had some sleet make its way to us here in the valley. Stuck indoors, cozy while the wind and rain howl, I realized that it’s been a while since I’ve given a generalized homestead update. Be warned: this one will be brimming with photos.

Despite our current wind, rain, and ice, we’ve had a delightfully warm past few days. I always fall for fool’s spring: that brief warmth and sunshine that makes the trees stir to life and the gardeners get excited. All up and down the block, the almond trees are in full bloom. Every February, when they unfold their lacy white petals, I’m reminded of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe: “Aslan is on the move.” As I go on my walks, dark asphalt carpeted with fallen blossoms and leaves peaking out from dark buds, I feel as though Aslan is indeed on the move, driving out winter before him.

I’m itching to finish assembling my raised beds. I have never had a garden of my own: just potted herbs and plants that either thrived or died rather dramatically. So this is a novice’s experiment and I’m taking all of you along with me!

Work on our homestead has stalled some due to weather, work, and generalized exhaustion, but we’ve still managed to complete a few projects. Jake finished paving our front garden path, despite all the rain. It looks lovely, and I’m so glad it’s decreasing the amount of mud tracked into our house. My father also leveled out part of our front yard with the tractor.

We planted some of our trees in our backyard: peach, plum, and almond. Our current plan is to have the majority of our kitchen garden in raised beds in our front yard, where our house shelters it from the wind. The backyard will have more of our fruit trees and some in-ground rows for vegetables we want to grow for preserving.

I planted beet seeds in January and thought they didn’t make it after I saw my parents’ yellow Lab Max scarfing down the top layer of compost on my raised bed. However, against the odds, I’ve had some beet seedlings pop through the soil. I have no idea how many survived Max, but I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

My mother and I started some seeds for our gardens in the beginning of February — a variety of herbs and vegetables that now quietly grow under grow lights in the garage. Sunflowers, oregano, kale, calendula, and so many more.

Our next homestead project is to build the fence for our front garden: my parents’ dogs have a habit of munching on homegrown produce, so I don’t want to plant anything else until it’s safe from them. The fence will also help me keep a closer eye on Michael while I garden: now that he’s steadier on his feet, he’s exploring further and further and faster and faster.

My dad is finishing up the larger chicken coop in time for spring chicks: we will be increasing our flock soon, in hopes we will have a surplus of eggs this summer and enough to waterglass/preserve for winter. Michael loved stopping by to say hi and learn about the (powered down) staple gun Grandpa was using.

We have a few more joint homestead projects coming up: our beehives didn’t make it last winter, unfortunately, so we’re replacing them with hopes of a honey harvest in the late summer. My mom is very excited to get Michael his very own beekeeping suit — I’ll be sure to post pictures when she does.

Also, my dad and I — the Lord and free time willing — are planning on brewing some beer that should be ready in time for Pascha/Easter. He has brewed his own beer before, but this will be my first time helping in a major way and I’m excited to learn the process (and taste the results).

I’ve had a few knitting projects on the needles, but I’ve had to slow down due to hand and wrist pain. I have a few gift knits that are only a few hours away from completion: I just need to sit down and find the focused time to finish them. However, they’re all simple garter stitch or stockinette stitch pieces, and the repetitive motion irritates my hands and wrists dreadfully. It’s quite frustrating.

During a particularly rough day this week I decided I needed a comfort cast-on so I picked up the yarn I got for my Nightshift shawl as a Christmas gift from my parents. It’s bright and colorful and squishy and exactly what I needed to lift my spirits.

As my hands and wrists allow, I’m slowly moving between knitting projects, sewing projects, and my newest adventure: spinning my own yarn.

My dear friend Sarah Gene taught me while she visited over Christmas, and I’m absolutely hooked. It’s like magic: a stick, twist energy, and wool combine to make yarn. I feel like a wizard every time I spin.

I’ve acquired a few drop spindles and dyed top/wool and I’ve made two skeins of wonky yarn. It’s uneven and often overspun or underspun in areas, but it’s handmade and it’s mine. I’m quite proud of it.

So that’s our fool’s spring update: slow and simple progress as we wait for spring to actually arrive. But as I said before, even if spring isn’t truly here yet — it is coming. Aslan is on the move.

always we begin again

/ Rachel Fenton / 2 Comments

I feel like I say every room in our house is my favorite — but of all my favorites, I definitely spend the most time in the kitchen. It’s the first place I go to when I stumble out of bed in the morning, and the last place I tidy before I head to sleep.

I love the sage green of the walls — a color both calming and alive. I love the hanging pots and pans. I love our counters, lovingly sealed and installed by my dad and my husband. I love the large sliding door that opens to our porch and invites the breeze to blow through our home. I love the deep sink and the window that looks west over our backyard, and how the sunset trails its fingers down our walls every evening before dinner.

As I said, I spend the greater part of my hours in the kitchen. Putting away groceries, preparing food, eating food, cleaning up after meals, preparing snacks for my little one, cleaning out the fridge, emptying the dishwasher, filling the dishwasher — the list goes on.

However, some days I don’t see the green walls or the hanging pots and pans or the sink or the sunset. I see a never-ending cycle of chores that makes Sisyphus look like a man taking his pet rock for a stroll. No matter how many dishes I wash, more will be dirty in an hour or two. No matter how many meals I make, we will all be hungry and ready to eat again shortly. Every day when I wake up, the same tasks await me.

Much of motherhood and homemaking is cyclical and repetitive: somehow both always changing and always the same. My days all look very similar to each other, but just as I feel like I have a grasp on our routine, Michael hits a new growth milestone, and it causes a domino effect on my previous schedule or routine, and I begin again.

St. Benedict, the father of Western monasticism, has a famous motto I memorized back when I studied Latin in school: Ora Et Labora, which means “pray and work”. All of our work is an opportunity for prayer and beauty and sanctification: not just the parts I enjoy like writing or knitting or gardening, but also the dishes and the laundry and the vacuuming.

I can look at my labor as drudgery (and on my worst days, Lord have mercy, I admit I do), or I can embrace the work, offering it up as prayer and sacrifice and turning it into love. Even the constant and unending chores. Especially the constant and unending chores.

I’ve created small places in my kitchen to remind me to offer up my labor as I cook or clean. Our prayer corner is the eastern(ish) corner by the table. I have icons of Christ and St. Euphrosynus (the patron saint of cooks/kitchens) on the window sill above my sink. I also have a small card with the Hours printed on it: whenever I’m doing dishes, I try to find the closest hour and pray the corresponding Psalm.

Becoming holy is a labor that takes as much persistence as doing the dishes or laundry (if not more). No matter how many times you repent, you will have to repent again. Becoming more and more like Christ takes constant toil in the gardens of our hearts. Our faithfulness in these small, seemingly insignificant chores will translate over to our faithfulness in larger things. Luke 16:10 comes to mind: One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much.

Many of the venerated saints of the Church speak about this constant struggle towards holiness. St. Benedict also says, “Even when we fail, always we begin again”. And St. Anthony of the Desert says, “Everyday I say to myself, today I will begin.” It is here, in the daily struggle and daily choices, that saints are formed.

So tomorrow, when I enter my favorite room in our house and have a dishwasher to empty, meals to cook, and laundry to wash, dry, and fold, may I look at as an opportunity to begin again; taking steps toward my sanctification through work and through motherhood.

little hobbit update

/ Rachel Fenton / 2 Comments

Now that Michael is one, I would rather not chronicle his life by month: I’d like to record the moments and milestones as they come. I’ll be posting updates on our little hobbit as the pictures and life skills accumulate (most likely more than once per month, knowing me).

Michael’s favorite book currently is Moo Baa La La La by Sandra Boynton. He anticipates each animal sound before we turn the page and joins in BOW WOW WOW with gusto. We all have it memorized by now.

His baby babble has become much more sophisticated: Mama, Dada, yes and no, eyes, nose, ball, and “num” (food) are all regular parts of his vocabulary. He mirrors back to us words we’re saying, and he talks to himself constantly while playing — I know he’s getting into something he’s not supposed to when the babble ceases.

We transitioned from a crib to a floor bed, hoping it would help him sleep longer. So far it hasn’t improved much, but it’s easier for Jake and me to put him down and soothe him back to sleep, so I’m calling it a win. I need all the wins I can get, especially now that he’s down to one nap.

His favorite game is Bonk, which is exactly what it sounds like. He gently (and sometimes not so gently) bonks his forehead against ours and giggles uproariously when we proclaim bonk! (Or sometimes ouch). He also adores opening and closing cabinets. It keeps him quite busy at church during the homily.

He’s officially walking everywhere, and prefers walking to crawling. We hear little padding footsteps followed by a loud splat as he loses his balance, often a frustrated screech, then footsteps once more as he gets up and tries again.

Grandpa and our cat Chai are tied for his best friend. Grandpa likes Michael a lot more than Chai does, but she’s tolerant of him and allows him to pet her. He’s remarkably gentle with pets for his age. He also enjoys chasing her with his toy mop (a behavior we’re trying to discourage).

He continues to love music, just as he did in the womb and as an infant. We often listen to music in the afternoons together while playing in his room. Whenever our washer or dryer plays the ditty that announces the cycle is finished, he often pauses and bounces in place along with the beat. He’s especially enjoying Nickel Creek and Chris Thile. Maybe he’ll play fiddle or mandolin when he grows up.

His frustration tolerance is low — if he gets stuck or something is in his way, he displays an impressive lung capacity. My favorite quote from Moby Dick often comes to mind: a bellow “like that of a heart-stricken moose” (Ch 36, for those interested). We’re slowly and surely helping him learn patience. He might be impatient, but he’s resolute and has all the virtues that come with stubbornness.

Being outside in the garden is one of his favorite pastimes. I have to keep a close eye on him to make sure he doesn’t eat the compost or behead one of my seedlings with his trowel, but he loves playing in the dirt with his garden tools. He helped Jake plant a tree, and helped me plant some blackberries.

Currently, he’s a ridiculously adventurous eater. Anything I’m eating, he wants to eat it too. To name a few, he’s eaten kimchi, kombucha, wasabi pea chips, and sauerkraut (and come back for second, third, and fourth bites)

He is a very loved little boy: GG and PaPaw dote on him, as do his grandparents. Living in community has its difficulties, but seeing Michael grow up surrounded by so many who love him is one of the brightest parts.

I watch him grow with a bittersweetness: this walking, talking toddler was my tiny baby not that long ago. I feel like I blinked and he became a little boy.

Even in the midst of the sleeplessness and other challenges motherhood brings, I cherish these beautiful moments and collect them in my photos and in my heart.

my anti-minimalist home

/ Rachel Fenton / 2 Comments

The storms have rolled out and the sun has come back to us. It feels as though there is a whisper of spring on the air. Just a whisper: we still have a frost layered ground in the mornings and chilly evenings with a fast-sinking sun. But the whisper has sparked something in me, and I’ve been planning and preparing my garden, eyes fixed on spring.

Frost on the pieces of my garden box

Does anyone else get a burst of pre-spring cleaning energy in January? I’ve been on a great purge and cleanse, going through each room of the house ruthlessly and bagging things for the thrift store. It feels like a breath of fresh air. There are still a few places I haven’t been able to go through (don’t look at the guest room closet!) but all of our major spaces feel airy and uncluttered. We still have some boxes in storage to sort through, but I’m taking my wins where I can get them.

It’s inspired me to take photos of our little cottage: I spent so many hours planning out each detail, but I haven’t documented it very well! From the paint colors to the arrangement of our furniture, I had nearly every room planned out (when you have to wait five months to move into your home, you find ways of passing the time). I’m planning on writing a piece on every major room, starting with this one: an overview of the cottage.

I really, truly love our home. It’s not finished and it’s not perfect: the bathrooms are waiting to be tiled, the dishes and laundry are rarely clean at the same time, paint touch ups are needed, and so much more. But it’s ours. It’s full of light and laughter and love, despite the darkness and tears that sometimes creep in from our broken world.

My main hope for my home is that it is a place of rest and a place of beauty. I don’t care about trends or aesthetics or the newest appliances. I think about the homes I loved in books — The Last Homely House, or Mr and Mrs. Beaver’s dam, or Redwall Abbey, or the Burrow, or Green Gables — and that is what I want for my home. Beauty and rest and warmth and welcoming hospitality.

Yet somehow, the comparison game sneaks in and needles me. I confess I spend too much time on Instagram. It’s the last social media platform that still has a grip on me. It’s a wonderful tool: I’ve connected with some amazing friends and learned many different skills from it.

However, I’ve also fallen down rabbit holes looking at perfectly curated houses: neutral nurseries with wooden toys and not a hint of gaudy plastic to be found, or large kitchens with perfectly organized pantries, or living rooms with books sorted on their shelves by color.

My house — with its overfull bookshelves, baskets of yarn and fabric and thread, half-completed quilts and knitting projects, canned goods, and empty mason jars — does not compare. No one could ever accuse me of being a minimalist.

Especially being a fiber artist/hobbiest (knitting, sewing, and embroidery, just to name some of them), I will never have a minimalist home. I have baskets full of wool that waits to be formed into sweaters and shawls, and boxes of bright cotton floss ready to mend holes in jeans and add flowers to t-shirts, and so many more supplies. I have my tools too: spindles, a swift and ball winder, a sewing machine, cutting mats, scissors, needles, and books on all sorts of crafts from knitting to quilting.

(And don’t even get me started on my book collection. That’s a whole different can of worms.)

Minimalism has been popular for quite some time, and at first glance, it seems like a great thing. After all, we live in a society that likes to glut itself with stuff. Isn’t having less stuff a good thing?

But the minimalism that trends on social media and appears in celebrity mansions doesn’t promote less stuff. This “Instagram minimalism” is just another form of consuming.

Instagram minimalism gets rid of things for the aesthetic of it, and there is an underlying attitude that you can go out and purchase what you need when you need it — there’s no need to have extra of anything on hand. As long as the shelves are clean and clear, it doesn’t matter if you get rid of things that still serve a purpose or could be useful later.

As a side note, I want to be clear that I’m not arguing against simplicity. The attitude of simplicity is one of making do: mending and making and learning to live on less. Simplicity is a virtue; minimalism is an aesthetic.

And while I’ll constantly strive to cultivate simplicity, I’ve given up on achieving minimalism. In fact, I’ve begun to call my aesthetic “anti-minimalist” and see my home’s unique beauty because of its joyful collection of things — not in spite of them.

Our kitchen will always have preservatives, canners, drying herbs, and bread proofing on the island. There will be bags of scraps in the freezer for broth or for botanical dyes. I might have too many mugs and too many dishes, but instead of seeing it as clutter, I see it as a reserved place for any guest who might happen to stop by at dinner time.

Our guest room will always have extra linens and blankets, and store my yarn and other tools for making and mending. Instead of seeing the shelves overflowing with skeins and fabric as clutter, I see the raw materials for making things to wrap my loved ones in warmth.

Our living room will always have bookshelves stacked double, and art and icons on its walls, and muddy garden boots by the door. Instead of seeing the overflowing bookshelves as clutter, I look at them as worlds contained in pages, stories to love and to share. The art supports artists that I love and enjoy, and sometimes displays the works of my own hands. The icons remind me of the communion of saints and bring Paradise into our home.

To anyone else who has given up on minimalism, who has stores of skeins or books or preservatives or whatever other items bring you joy — you’re not alone. My home not minimalist either. It never will be. But it’s still beautiful.