2012 February 20 | Suddenly *Not So* Single Journey

Archive for February 20th, 2012

Our own…Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

Monday, February 20th, 2012

Recently I was gifted with another novel thanks to the From Left to Write Online Book Club. This novel, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, by Barbara Kingsolver. It details a year in the life of her family as they learn to live off the land. And I have to admit…I was a bit jealous.

I grew up with a garden. We always had one. My grandfather did most of the tending. And then he passed away. Ah, but my desire for a garden lived on.

At one point, I lived in my almost dream place. It was a converted barn on four acres of land. It was spacious and allowed me to experience my dream again. I had flower gardens and…vegetable gardens. I grew radishes and cucumbers and carrots. I grew bush beans and peppers. I grew corn and pumpkins. It was a lovely assortment.

When the kids played outside, they could graze in the garden for a snack. When evening came, I watered and weeded. In the mornings, I picked and prepped. We had a steamer. Life was good.

It really was. Our grocery bills plummeted during the summer. Our quality of life rose significantly. And I felt better about all of it…the healthy eating, the healthy feeding, and the healthy living. I was thinner and happier.

Life was better, simpler.

Then we discovered we needed warmed climates for the boy to thrive. He had a lot of respiratory issues brought about because of his prematurity. (Kenna was so early, when she gets out of the hospital we may need to move to South America.) And the move to North Carolina came swiftly and impulsively.

I couldn’t have the vegetable garden in the apartments, but I continued to raise my beloved flowers and make our life pretty. And when we finally moved into a house, I discovered that the home was built on a giant rock…the entire neighborhood was.

This year, however, the husband has agreed to help indulge my need for a more homegrown life. He claims that he will be build me a raised bed. He tells me that he will even build me a greenhouse. And this is more than possible given his newly acquired window stash. (The beauty of installing windows as one of the many services we provide…)

I’m confident this year will be different. And so I ordered seed and plant catalogs. And I reminded him that we have goals for winter this year. And I think we’re ready. We’re good to go. We have a start on our big future. A good start. Soon we’ll be growing a vegetables…and with any luck, our baby will grow like a weed.

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We try to prepare…

Monday, February 20th, 2012

ketcham and kenna 004 Kind of.

S and I started watching Extreme Couponing when I was on bed rest. His contention was that if I started couponing while I was laying around, it might give me something to do. And I liked the idea.

Mostly, I’m a closet survivalist. I don’t go crazy with it, but I love having a stock pile of food. Or…I thought it was a stock pile…until I saw that show…and Doomsday Preppers. Those people have a stockpile of food. And most of the doomsday food looks completely inedible. And so I have to wonder…what’s the point…because if I have to survive on that, I don’t want to survive.

See, now we…we have a point. Our point is that we never want to go through another rough winter again. We never want to struggle that much. So, we’ve already started preparations. I am shopping, smart, and with coupons. Yesterday, I saved $73 with the use of store specials and coupons. Woot woot!

Saving money makes me feel good. I feel smarter…and prepared. And if we keep this up for the rest of the year, we won’t just feel prepared, we’ll actually be prepared. Prepared is good.

Because there are some things in life that no matter how much you prepare, you can’t prepare enough. That’s how Kenna was…is.

See, I knew we were going to have a premature baby. I just didn’t know we were going to have a record setting kind of a baby. That’s what Kenna has been. She’s the smallest baby my OB/GYN has delivered alive. She’s the smallest baby that they have had in the Hemby ICN for as long as they have computerized records…maybe ever. And there was no preparing for any of that.

The closest I came to preparing was reading everything I could get my hands on before before her surprise arrival. The day she was born was actually the first doctor appointment that I didn’t bring my bag to. I thought I was prepared. It was packed. And the funny thing is…when you are in the hospital…there are a lot of things you can do without. You can think that you need all the things on the list that the magazines tell you that you need, but you don’t. Or maybe I didn’t.

I had a c-section. There was no music. There was no need for Lamaze or any other breathing and relaxation techniques. I tried to be pleasant and work the room as much as my suddenly delicate stomach allowed. And S, he amazed me. I don’t know how he did it, but he was everywhere, being everything Kenna and I needed.

I had tried to prepare him. I told him what to expect of a preemie. I had no idea we were having a micro-preemie…one of the micro-est of micro-preemies. Didn’t see that coming. Oops.

And we’ve held it together ever since. S has been super dad. He has shown up practically every day. He is loving and supportive of me at night.

So we face yet another challenge. Kenna may have pneumonia. We were told it’s treatable. There are antibiotics running already. We are waiting patiently for cultures. But I’m not going to worry. Yet.

Follow along on Kenna’s journey.

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