Still here

Yup, still here.
Things have slowed dramatically for winter. Winter will never be my favorite season, but I'm starting to appreciate the down time. :-)
My Winter 2008 cold frame experiment continues. Everything sprouted, and the cold frame does keep in heat. It's getting really cold at night though. So far everything is still in baby leaves. We shall see if I get anything to edible size before Jan. My hypothesis is that the frame will freeze solid in January. :-P
I'm impatient for my seed catalogs to start arriving. I know I've updated my mailing address with all of them at least twice, but part of me still wants to spam their websites with catalog requests until I get one in the mail. :-D
I've got the basic plan for the year already. My community garden plot is going to be 90% root crops. I didn't notice much vandalism this past year, but I did notice the 10 minute drive to get there is quite the hurdle some days. So, I figure if I put my root crops there, it won't matter so much if I only get there once a week. By my calculations I need to plant a LOT more onions, carrots and garlic, so having a space dedicated to only these crops will be for the best. I want to plant at least 100 onions. Dave and I go through 2-4 a week. I think 100 onions would get us by until green onions were harvestable in the next summer. The onion crop I pulled out this year, (42 onions) will run out towards the end of January. The garlic crop might last through Feb. I have plans to up the garlic planting to 50. (Hopefully all my seed bulbs are plantable.) 50 still won't be enough to see us through a year, but it's a small step in the right direction.
The rest of the garden will be mostly container gardening, which will take some planning, but not a lot. I'll probably just wing it.

Yule planning is taking up most of my thoughts lately. The bid for Austerity continues even through the holiday season. That means that I'm trying to make most of the presents, and being careful about how much gets spent. Did you know the average American comes out of the holidays with their credit cards 800$ heavier? My goal is to spend no more than 10$ per person. Maybe 20 on my darling. ;-) So far I have spices that I dried this summer, childrens books, extra veggie seeds and bundles of pictures from the handfasting. Mom and Dad still need to be found something. It always seems like they do so much for me, that nothing seems good enough to give back. It's not the case, and they don't feel that way at all, but it's my stumbling block every year.

In other news, baby is growing well. I've finally started to put pounds on the scale. I feel him kick and somersault every day. Sometimes I can poke him and he'll kick me. :-D Dave and I both talk to him and we can't wait until he joins us in person this spring.
The hunt for a midwife has been most unfruitful. The closest one I can find is an hour and a half away. All the others I've talked to told me they are full. I am really not excited to birth in a hospital. Call me crazy, but I'm healthy, baby is healthy, and I just don't feel either of us needs to be in a hospital for something as natural as birth. Sadly, it's looking like that's exactly where we will be. Dave and I have found a hospital that doesn't instantly raise our hackles, but I have lingering concerns. The biggest is being given no choice in labor positions. The other is being tied to monitors and schedules, with the ever present threat of C-section if me or baby lags behind said schedule. I know Dave will be there to help and that's probably the only thing that's going to get me into the hospital when it's time.
If you've never seen the documentary, "The Business of Being Born" I highly recommend it. It's nothing to do with labor, and everything to do with why American women labor in hospitals. Did you know America spends more on health care than any other nation, but our infant mortality rates are lower than any other industrial nation? And 1 in 3 babies are born by Cesarean in the US. I can't believe that all those C-sections are medically necissary.
Anyway, I'll get off my soap box for now. Watch the movie, Netflix has it, there are places online that carry it.

Stay warm. Stay frugal. :-) Try to enjoy the holidays.