A few years ago, I tried a tuna salad at a potluck. It was so good that I have never been able to get it out of my mind. I knew that it was probably mayonnaise-based and had tuna, quinoa, and peas in it, but beyond that, I wasn’t sure. I remember it being a simple blend of flavors and textures that seemed genius, but easy. I Googled many times for a recipe that seemed similar, but I never found The One. Even Pinterest has failed me on this one. Time has faded my memories of the particular details of this salad, but never my zeal – I remember eating several helpings and wishing I could toss etiquette out the window and just steal the whole bowl from the table. (For the record: I did not.)

Here is my version. I don’t know if it’s a dead ringer for the original, but I do know that it was so good that I (again) could have eaten the whole bowl. (Only this time, I’m pregnant, and I was eating at home, so I probably could have gotten away with it. For the record: I did not.) Most of my family loved this as much as I did, so I know I did something right.

YIELD: 6 – 8 servings as a side dish | 4 – 6 servings as a main dish

INGREDIENTS

• 1.5 c quinoa
• 3 c water
• 2 c peas (frozen or fresh)
• 2 large handfuls fresh spinach
• 2 6 oz. cans tuna
• 3/4 c mayonnaise
• 2-4 tbsp lemon juice
• A few swirls of extra virgin olive oil (EVOO)
• 1 tsp dill
• 1 tsp parsley
• 1/4 – 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp sea salt
• Black pepper to taste

DIRECTIONS

1. Cook quinoa. If yours is not the kind that has been pre-washed (or even if it is, just to be safe), rinse the quinoa until there are no more soapy bubbles. If you don’t, it will be bitter. Drain the quinoa and bring it to boil in the 3 cups of water; cover, turn burner to low, and simmer for 20 minutes without disturbing. Remove from heat and let sit for 5 minutes.
2. If your peas are frozen, quickly but gently fold them into the cooked quinoa, re-cover, and let them sit to thaw.
3. Make dressing: whisk together mayo, lemon juice, EVOO, dill, parsley, garlic powder, salt, and pepper until well blended.
4. Chop your two handfuls of spinach to a medium courseness, or whatever suits your tastes.
5. Place quinoa, peas, spinach, and tuna in large bowl; drizzle dressing over top. Use a fork to fluff the quinoa, if necessary, and gently fold the dressing into the salad (I use a silicone spatula).
6. Taste and adjust seasonings. I added another little splash of lemon juice and a few sprinkles of salt.
7. Refrigerate until ready to serve. It is tasty at room temperature or cold.

NOTES:

• Steps 1-4 can be done hours ahead of time. Make sure the quinoa has come to room temp before doing step 5.
• Some of my measurements are rather imprecise because it really depends on your personal tastes. I encourage you to start at the lower end of those flexible measurements and add to the dressing after you’ve tried it, but before mixing it into the salad. I rarely measure when I’m cooking on my own, so even writing down these measurements was a bit of a challenge for me. If you try the recipe and have feedback on the amounts given, please comment!

New year, new focus. Since our lower level had serious water issues last fall and needed to be ripped down to studs (or even down to nothing), we are looking at some serious work before this new baby comes in May. We need to put together a completely new bathroom (it’s gutted to the studs, and some of the rotting studs are even gone), re-configure and remodel the laundry room, add flooring for bathroom/laundry/hallway/bedrooms, and paint/refresh the bedrooms.

Whew. Are you tired just reading that? I am.

This will involve lots of plumbing, electrical, construction, drywall, cleaning, and lots of other not fun stuff. But today, I need to focus on the pretty, so that I can ramp up the motivation to get this done.

We will be installing a restored and refinished antique clawfoot tub with shower and full curtain surround. (Found a local guy who will do this for us. Not a DIY for this family.) This makes best use of a space that has a window and allow us to still have a bathtub. I also like that any water issues with a clawfoot tub are immediately visible – the walls, floor, etc. get wet, and you wipe them up. None of this leaky-shower-moldy-walls-and-floors business.

The rest of the bathroom will be simple: re-use the old toilet (it’s white and works fine), build a simple vanity to work around all the extra plumbing that this bathroom entails (more on that later, it’s actually quite boring), find some lighting I like, figure out wall finish (I’m thinking board-and-batten wainscot with towel hooks), install waterproof floors. (Never, ever install laminate in a bathroom. Never! Ever! It was so gross!)

More inspiration:

How will we do this – he the graduate student with two demanding jobs, and she the pregnant homeschooling mom who also attempts to maintain the household? Not sure. While we love DIY, we’d totally hire someone in a heartbeat to do all of this, given our time constraints for this big project. But the budget says no. So I’ll just keep looking at the pretty pictures and wait for the bank account to tell us to grab a hammer and mask and go for it!

(Unfortunately, Ellery and Callan puked in the van on the way home from our friends’ house last night, and continued doing so throughout the evening, so it was a bit of an interesting day, emotionally. My stomach is still not back to normal, unfortunately. I miss eating…)

Today, as I was lying on my bed, moaning and whining from my stomach pain, I realized that the baby was kicking up a storm. A storm that I could feel from the exterior, not just the interior. This is notable because I have an anterior placenta, and it took a long time for me to feel strong movement this time. Like, I just started feeling it regularly within the past week. It was very discouraging. But today, I grabbed the closest kid (“Ellery! Come here!”) and put her hand on my abdomen. She gave me a big grin as she felt three strong kicks before she ran off to resume whatever I interrupted her from doing. (She feels better today, thankfully.) So she became the first to feel the baby kick from the outside. Maya came over and tried, and she felt one or two light kicks before the baby was done. Jason was too late; Baby was asleep. But I have faith that he’ll get a chance soon.

Hurray for healthy babies; boo for intestinal distress.

A belly shot in the mirror at my in-law’s, Thanksgiving day, 16 weeks exactly.

Here I am, hanging out at 17 weeks plus, and not feeling regular movement. This bothers me. Even though I know why (I have an anterior placenta this time), it still bothers me. I guess after you’ve experienced loss, sometimes it’s hard not to worry. Throw in the fact that I’m a constant worrier by nature, and there you go. I honestly do pretty well not thinking about it most of the time. But then I do feel soft movement – like the little pitter patters I felt when I sat down to type this post – and I think, “Why can’t I feel this all the time?” It is getting more frequent, perhaps once a day. But by now, I’m usually feeling a lot of movement all day.  I just have to be patient.

The children are being very sweet about the baby. Asher comes up to me several times a day and asks, “Can I hug your baby?” Always “your baby,” not “the baby.” I think it’s adorable.  And he really wants to hug my belly right where the baby is, not me. He doesn’t wrap his arms around my lower belly, but rather wraps his arms around my bump, with his arms making a circle around my front belly. Only the baby gets a hug, not me.

I am feeling much better on the nausea front, finally. I still get nauseous once every few days, but it’s not bad at all. Mostly I’m still dealing with headaches. They’re coming every couple of days still, and they’re brutal. But it’s better than once every other day, or even every day, so I can see that there’s progress.

We will be doing a 20 week ultrasound and finding out the gender, so I’m very excited about that! Can’t wait to know if it’s a boy or girl. I’m thinking girl, but I’m notoriously wrong about these types of things, so probably it’s a boy. I will be thrilled either way, but the girls will be disappointed if it’s a boy. Mostly, though, they just want a little baby to hold and mother, so they have admitted that even a boy will be pretty awesome.

Spinach Lasagna

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 10oz. package frozen chopped spinach, thawed and drained
• 2 cups + ½ cup shredded mozzarella, divided
• 1 pound (16 oz.) small curd cottage cheese
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp salt
• ½ tsp black pepper
• ¾ tsp dried oregano (also parsley, thyme, basil, etc.)
• 1 jar pasta sauce (1 lb. 10 oz. size) or 1 quart home canned tomato puree/sauce
• 1 16 oz. box lasagna noodles, uncooked (regular, not no-boil)
• ¼ cup (or to taste) parmesan cheese

DIRECTIONS:

• Grease 9” x 13” baking dish.
• Combine spinach, 2 cups mozzarella (reserving ½ cup mozzarella for later), cottage cheese, egg, and seasonings.
• Layer as follows, three times:
  • Generous ½ cup sauce
  • Noodles
  • 1/3 of cheese mixture
• Top with fourth and final layer of noodles, then remaining tomato sauce, then ½ cup of mozzarella, then parmesan cheese.
• Rinse tomato sauce jar with ½ – 1 cup water and pour around edges of dish.
• Cover tightly with foil. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour 15 minutes. Let stand 10 minutes before serving.

NOTES:

• There are usually 20 noodles in a standard lasagna noodle box, so use five per layer. I had to turn the fifth perpendicular to the other four and break it to fit it.
• Experiment with other Italian-style cheeses, and do try freshly grated parmesan, if available.
• Don’t tell anyone, but I rarely thaw and drain my spinach. I simply throw the bag on the tile floor a few times until there are no chunks, then mix it in with the cheese as is.

The girls are lobbying for a girl, and Asher is lobbying for a boy. Callan is clueless, but he likes to say baby and feel like part of the crowd. He does enjoy babies when he sees them, so I have hopes that he’ll make a very fine big brother.

I was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s Disease early on in my pregnancy and immediately put on a medication to manage it. My thyroid is now behaving nicely, and we may have a clue as to what has caused miscarriage for me in the past. I am just thankful that this baby is growing well. I will likely be on a thyroid medication for the rest of my life, but prayerfully, that will be the extent of my care. The outlook is very good.

We have not made a final decision regarding birth place yet. As many of you know, we have had one hospital birth, two homebirths, and one freestanding birth center birth. My heart’s desire is to give birth at home, and providing that everything continues to go well and my health is stable, that is likely the direction that we will go. At this point, I am continuing care with my hospital-based midwifery practice until we make further decisions.

Enjoy a couple of snapshots from an ultrasound I had on Monday:

(Adapted from The Vegetarian Mother’s Cookbook by Cathe Olson)

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 cups cooked garbanzo beans
• 1/4 cup tahini
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• 2 cloves garlic
• Juice of 1 lemon (about 3 tablespoons)
• Liquid from cooking beans, or water
• 1/3 cup minced fresh parsley (optional)

DIRECTIONS:

Smash garlic through press, or mince. Place first five ingredients into food processor or blender and process, adding bean water a little at a time until it’s smooth and creamy. Stir in parsley (if desired) and adjust seasonings to taste.

We went on vacation last week, and after we returned (9/26/11), I noticed the swans were no longer hanging out at the pond down the road. Gone south for the winter. We’ll see you next March, swans. There are some beautiful white crane-looking birds hanging out in area ponds still, though. I wish I knew what they were.

This morning, we divided and conquered our gardening and harvesting. With frost predicted tonight, Jason took the big kids out to the garden/weed patch/rabbit and small rodent sanctuary to get the last of the tomatoes. They are already pretty dead from blight, but there were still a lot of them left (both green and ripe). I will be canning sauce and green tomato relish (really more of a salsa, and a family favorite) so that we can use our counters and dining table again. We also have potatoes, dry beans, cabbage, and onion/garlic (if they are still out there amidst the weeds) left to harvest. I think those will keep, as tonight’s low is 32 and probably won’t get down that low until morning. But the tomatoes will be all done. And the next few nights aren’t supposed to get nearly as cold, so we buy ourselves some time. I just brought lunch out to the garden, and the kids are having a blast harvesting potatoes. They are filthy dirty and elated at all the delicious looking spuds. I guess they are harvesting potatoes after all. The beans should be “fun” to harvest, as we never trellised them, so they sprawled all over and climbed weeds and fences as necessary. “It’s kind of like a game, finding all the pods, ” Jason said. He’s such an optimist. I would be whining.

My part of the harvest this morning was to take Cal with me to the farmer’s market. I love that place. It’s only 3.5 country miles from our house, so maybe a 5 minute drive with absolutely no traffic, and I’m able to stock up on things I didn’t or couldn’t grow this year. I always chat with farmer friends and enjoy a muffin and/or coffee. It was freezing this morning; I wrapped Cal in a blanket in his stroller and stuck his hands in, figuring he wouldn’t keep them under the blanket but it was worth a try. He kept them under the blanket the whole time! For a toddler, that’s pretty amazing. It was that cold. We were on a mission to buy some things we didn’t grow this year: squash, peppers, beets, and even a watermelon. I figured it was the last week for peppers, so I’m glad I got some. Lots of pretty butternut squash on display, and I bought from two of my favorite organic growers.

I used to think that my goal as a homesteader was to never need to hit the farmer’s market. But I’ve since changed my thinking. No matter how avid of gardener you are, no matter how much time you have to tend your plants, things happen. Blight takes the tomatoes, squash bugs decimate your pumpkin patch, mice take the potatoes. Whatever happens, there’s likely another area gardener/farmer at the market who didn’t have that problem. So you buy their’s instead. This was a difficult year, Cal being a handful, and a wet, cool spring that provided rain and wet soil whenever we had a free weekend, so I didn’t plant my pepper seedlings (I let them die, sniff), and we didn’t even plant winter squash. I know. It makes me really sad. I still have a little butternut squash from last year’s harvest – over a year old! That is one hardy squash. I love our butternuts; they taste great and last forever. I know the soil they grew in, I know that they were cured properly for best flavor, and I can make sure they’re stored to the best of my ability. And it’s way cheaper than buying it. But it didn’t happen this year, so I’m happy to buy from those who had a better squash year than I did. I can still make sure they’re cured, and they’ll taste great, even if I had to pay for them.

And it’s apple season! I forgot that that’s definitely one of the top five reasons I love fall. Apples are my favorite fruit, and living in the Fruit Belt means that there’s a lot to choose from around here. Most of it is conventionally grown, for sure, so we do a lot of washing and peeling. And when we u-pick, we only go organic, so no pesticides on the kids’ hands. There are a few organic options around here, thankfully. Organic apples are hard to grow, so I’m thankful for those who do it. We hope to go picking in the next couple of weekends; here’s hoping the harvest holds out until we can get there.

Our own fruit trees are growing, slowly but surely. We have two Asian Pear trees, and they are still small. But one had dozens of flowers on it this year! I didn’t want it to put all its energy toward fruit (at the expense of the roots/tree growth), so I removed all but 10 buds, figuring spring storms would blow some more off. It worked. We ended up with four tasty-looking Asian pears, just enough to try our first harvest without compromising the growth of the plant. Before we left on our trip on 9/19, the four pears looked delicious, but not soft enough, so I left them. Upon returning, they were gone, and I was really sad. I figured a deer got them? But if he did, he left no trace. Weird. Then Jason and the kids went to the garden today, and behold, the four pears were just sitting on the ground! They were so ripe they fell off. And they were in perfect condition – no bruises, no bugs, nothing. Asian pears are known for being extremely pest resistant and for storing well, and I can testify to that now. We immediately peeled them up and ate them for lunch, and they were  THE BEST ASIAN PEARS I HAVE EVER EATEN. It’s true. I can’t wait until those trees grow bigger and give us more! We don’t do a thing to those trees – haven’t pruned yet, don’t spray anything – and so I know this is a fruit that I chose well. (We don’t have an apple tree because I’m pretty sure I won’t take care of it properly, and I won’t spray, so we’ll just be feeding worms and deer. =)

It’s days like today that make me so happy to live here. Yes, the house needs work, and it’s not a style I would have chosen, but this land – it’s amazing. The turkeys are getting nice and fat, roaming around and eating grass and bugs, and the chickens are pecking through the dirt and roaming the woods, some looking tasty enough to eat (soon, soon). The garden harvest, even in a year when the garden was largely ignored, is abundant and delicious. The eggs we get, though few due to molting, are so flavorful and full of nutrition that I don’t think I can even return to store bought eggs. I’m so happy about the choices we’ve made and the blessings that God has given us.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 cup milk, heated to lukewarm
• 3 TBSP water, heated to lukewarm
• 4 TBSP honey
• 1 TSP active dry yeast
• 7.5 oz (1.5+ cups) whole wheat flour
• 7.5 oz (1.5 cups) bread flour
• 3/4 TSP salt
• 1 TBSP butter, cut into small chunks

DIRECTIONS:

• Add ingredients to bread machine pan, in order listed. When adding butter, spread chunks evenly between the four corners of the pan.
• Set machine for 1.5 pound loaf, whole wheat cycle (if available), medium crust.
• When bread is done, gently remove from the pan to cool on a rack. Wrap in a towel to slow cooling if a more even crust is desired. Brush crust with butter.

That’s it. I always watch the kneading after the first couple of minutes to see if the dough needs more flour or water, because bread is very easily affected by humidity, temperature changes, different flours, etc. I also scrape the sides with a rubber spatula if it seems to need it, too. This isn’t technically a whole wheat loaf, but it does the trick on a busy day and tastes about as good as bread machine bread is going to get. Enjoy!

Oh yes, and yesterday, we started a gut-to-the-studs remodel of our lower level bathroom. The one we were not planning on remodeling (beyond paint). This is what happens when WORMS CRAWL OUT OF YOUR ROTTEN WALLS. You can bet I ran straight for the crowbar and cancelled any fun plans for the holiday weekend. (And to be honest, I handed the crowbar right over to Jason, who donned his super special hazmat mask, taped off the downstairs with blue tape and polyethylene sheeting, and got to work. Thanks, honey. We miss you.)

It’s complicated, but essentially, the bathroom shares a wall with an under-the-stairs utility space that houses the well tank, water softener tanks (three, it’s kind of a complicated system), and lots of copper pipes. This area was drenched, all the tanks and pipes were sweating, and the water was seeping under to the bathroom. That part is all condensation. We bought a dehumdifier, pipe wrap insulation, and bubble foil (for the tanks) and plan to go to town with the duct tape to cut the condensation. We have fans blasting, too, and the water issue is greatly reduced now.

But like I said, it’s complicated, so there’s more. The previous owners of our house did some very terrible things in the name of DIY (and are the perfect example of what DIY should NOT be), and basically this whole bathroom was shoddy from the start. The prefab shower was leaking, and everything around and underneath it ended up moldy (which we discovered after we started yanking things out). Some of the studs are moldy, not much, but we might have to replace/sister in something to get rid of the mold there. Everything else that was moldy is yanked out. The drywall in half the bathroom and the entire ceiling is gone, too.

The new plan: clean up the water and mold, clean it some more, run the dehumidifier and fans non-stop for a while, and take a deep breath. We did not budget for this, so there really isn’t any extra money for a new bathroom, but with a family our size, a second bathroom is very handy. So we’ll see what we can scrap together. We may use the pedestal sink we bought for our upstairs bathroom remodel (*sniff*), re-use the toilet, and buy an old cast iron clawfoot tub and have it re-finished.

The first thing we will do, however, after cleaning up all the water and mold, is INSTALL A VENT FAN. The previous owners never did, and we put it off because we don’t use that bathroom very often. It will have to vent out the front of the house, which is not exactly in line with my exterior decor plan, but whatever.

So, that’s what I’ve been up to this merry Labor Day weekend! How about you?

(School is fine. Great, even. We’ve been at it for two weeks, in preparation for a vacation that is coming up, and the girls are loving it. The boys are…challenging. Especially that “baby” of mine, who is nearly 20 months old and is SO MUCH TROUBLE. I feel like I say that a lot about Cal, but gosh it’s true. So mischievous, that one.)