homemade granola | summerplayshouse

LISTENING: We took a mid week lunch time visit to the Wednesday antique market here in town and came home with a few new (old) records for our listening pleasure. Karen and John have been singing non-stop in our home ever since with a bit of Johnny thrown in as well from last weekend’s yard sailing. I’m still loving playing records in the house and Ellie will even go over and pick one or two out as well, almost daily. She’s been liking Raffi’s Everything Grows and Ernie and Bert’s Rubber Duckie Album (how could she not?)

As for MAKING, I finally got around to making a new batch of granola. We’ve been on a toast and peanut butter breakfast binge for a while and I was itching to get back to my yummy yogurt and granola mornings but couldn’t find the time to get it together. Yesterday was that day and now we have plenty of granola for a couple of weeks at least.

I’ve also been keeping up with a wabi sabi practice I had read about a few months back. The recommendation was “whenever a pebble or small stone catches your fancy, pick it up and put it in your pocket. ” The chapter goes on to talk about arranging these natural treasures inside your home, moving them around and arranging them in an aesthetically pleasing way thus cultivating a passion for the little, everyday, seemingly mundane things in life. It really makes me feel good to find that perfect rock or piece of wood on my daily walks and give it a new life on my windowsill. I’m finding this practice brings me back to my childhood where everything natural was sacred and interesting and it helps me to truly see the beauty in the everyday. I feel a calm, zen come over me when I roll that special rock around in my hand after finding it, examining it over, feeling the grooves and seeing the patterns. And it’s nice to bring a little bit of nature inside and display it like I would flowers in a vase or a picture of our family. A simple yet meaningful practice to include in our lives.

what are you Making and Listening to?

Joining Dawn (after a long hiatus) with MAKING+LISTENING!

This weekend was warm one minute and chilly the next. I worked on getting pictures into frames and up on the walls, Jeff prepared his yeast for brew day, I made some incredibly yummy granola (which turned out so good, it will have to have its own blog post all together), lots of playtime with Ellie boo bear, we had some fantastic sunsets out our back door, took the in-laws to a local brew house and sunday was official Brew Day. Jeff hasn’t had the chance to brew beer since before Eloise was born and he has been itching to do so since we moved into our new home. Well today was the day – and he invited his mom and dad and my family to share in the experience (My mom and dad and sister made it). The weather was beautiful and we all spent the day outside learning to brew. We ended the evening with an early homemade dinner (because that’s the way we roll around here with a six month old- dinners at 4:30). A quick but packed with goodness weekend. How was yours?