Stepping on the Book of Knowledge

When I bought my house in 2007 I had a list of things that needed to be fixed RIGHT AWAY. The carpet had to be pulled up, the stairs to the kids' rooms had to be replaced, there had to be more storage in the kitchen, walls and cabinets needed to be painted, the bathroom needed remodeling, and many small tasks. As an excited new homeowner, I got right to work! Then quickly realized that some projects were a bit more involved and/or costly than I realized. The stairs, unfortunately, fell into this category. They must have been originally built by a DIYer with no measuring device or carpentry skills. They are just plywood, even though the rest of the house has hardwood, and are too shallow (but in varying amounts) and too tall. Because they are so bad, they have always been on my list of things to not even try to camouflage, I just needed to get them replaced.

Well, I decided on Friday I had HAD ENOUGH! I don't have the money to replace them and was sick of looking at them. So, I called my friend, internet, and asked if she had any ideas. She was full of them! I found a beautiful technique for a kraft paper floor at An Oregon Cottage blog and that got me thinking... I have been holding on to several volumes of a 1945 edition of The Book of Knowledge Children's Encyclopedia for no reason other than a rampant case of bibliophilism.

I thought the kraft paper idea was gorgeous, but using the same technique with pages from the encyclopedia would be fun and interesting, and make me happy, which is important. :-) I have to admit that tearing that first page was a little hard, but once I got started, it was fun!

Tear and glue, tear and glue, tear and glue... Here is me hard at work, but Paige actually did about a third of them all on her own, plus helped tear and gather supplies when I was all gluey. Levi watched Lucille which was also a crucial part of the process.

I did every other at first so the kids could get to their rooms for part of the day

Deciding on how to trim them since some have a lip, some have a gap, some are flush... I think I am doing this ribbon on bottom and a piece of quarter round trim at the back. 

Here is the almost finished product, I need another coat of paint on the risers and several more coats of polyurethane and the trim, but I think they are great!

Here are the finished for now stairs, they are 1000X better than they started! I decided to go with quarter round trim at the back of each stair and just live with the gaps at the top of some of the risers. I'm thinking about painting the trim on the sides black and maybe doing a fancy treatment on the risers - we shall see...

Stop It!

I am obsessing today about this election and I need to stop! I know that I didn't do everything I could to get my name out, but I'm just hoping it was enough. We will know more in seven short hours...

On a positive note, I did crop a pretty picture for the tv station:

It had to be cropped because it's from my maternity pics LOL

####UPDATE##### I lost heartily, extravagantly, awesomely. Truly skunked. Oh well, maybe I'll try again another time.

Random Pics

The pics above are all from the girls' baptism day taken by our good friend, Kat (below) of the famous FDub family and Kathryn Fishman-Weaver Photography.

Lucille meeting brother and sister

and Aunt Danielle and cousin Sophia

and Aunt Taylor

and Grandma Brenda

and Aunt Kara and cousin Tuesday

City Council? Yup!

I started my run for a city council seat a bit on a whim, to be honest. I wanted to use my extra time wisely and serve my community, but didn't really have a set plan as to how to do that.

 I truly believe that homemaker is an honorable, worthwhile occupation and I derive a great deal of pleasure and pride from running my household and taking care of my children, but I still felt that I should be doing more. I had become accustomed to the homemaker by day and breadwinner by night division and so felt that I had extra time to spend on something, but what? That combination of a desire to serve and an irrational love of politics, coupled with an accidental stop at the City Clerk’s website culminated in a bid for the JC Ward 1 seat.

The closer the election gets the more excited I am about it! I had a lovely interview with Madeline from the News Tribune this week and it really helped cement the idea for me. I loved talking about my city and how I could be a part of making it the best it can be!

Originally, I had this, “I want to win, but if I don’t – no biggie” attitude. That has morphed into a much stronger desire to win. I have backup plans in the event that I lose, but goodness, I hope that doesn't happen! The primary election is now only days away and I am getting a bit nervous, it would be fantastic to win 50+ % of the votes and have my seat decided, but I will take just getting on the April ballot. I’m sure the other two candidates are fine people, but darn it, I would be great at this!

Big Changes in Kolbi-land

My blog is old. It's hard to deny that when even the tagline is so dated:

"Explore the life of a divorced mom of two, homeschooler, midwifery advocate, volunteer lactation consultant, bartender."

Let's break it down, shall we?

divorced mom of two - remarried mom of three

homeschooler - and public schooler

midwifery advocate - yes, but who just had a hospital birth

volunteer lactation consultant - when I have the time

bartender - retired :-)

I could also add candidate for city council, PTO mom, day care provider, and small business owner.

I have a renewed interest in blogging as a way to organize and "flush out" my thoughts and ideas before releasing them to a larger market or get them out here so they aren't released at all.  

So let's talk politics: When I told my friend from high school that I was running for public office, she reminded me how behind schedule I am! In our yearbook I, apparently, wrote that we would still be friends when I was president! Ah, teenage dreams! The truth is that I have always had an interest in politics. All those boring speeches and debates? I find them actually interesting! This seat is certainly just a small foray into politics, but it does feel nice. At this point in my life, I'm not interested in an ugly, expensive, exhausting fight for a high profile office, but am very much interested in serving my community. I am also of the opinion that if I do not win this time, then it just means it wasn't the right time and I will try again later. The older I get, the less personally I take things like this. I think the City of Jefferson will be well served by my slightly different perspective, outlook, and energy and am excited to be given the opportunity. 

So, what's this about public school and PTO? Well, funny story. You know how I have always said that we homeschool because it is what best fits our lives and if that ever became untrue we would reevaluate? Turns out, that's true! Levi was no longer enjoying having the hybrid mom/teacher and after several opportunities to work things out, we decided to try public school. He loves it! Well, everything except how early he has to get up! He has done really well academically and socially. I'm so proud of him! I have also enjoyed being able to become active with the PTO. I expected it to look like PTO on TV or homeschool parent meetings. Ha! I was in for quite a shock! There is virtually NO parental involvement, I was flabbergasted by the lack of involvement. There are around 1800 students in Levi's school and I am the only person in attendance at the PTO meetings other than the board members! The silver lining is that I can do whatever projects I want, they are so happy to have me! LOL I am currently working on catering a meal for the teachers and staff during Parent/Teacher Conferences and am so excited about doing this for several reasons. One, the teachers and staff work really hard and deserve a little extra perk. Two, I want to try to get more parents involved. I believe that if you give people specific and simple ways to help, they will want to do more and that should be a top priority for any PTO. Three, I love completing projects and this is a fun way to combine my love of restaurants and mommying while also helping people. Lots of wins here!

Oh yeah, and I got married and had a baby. More on that later, trust me, lots more, you'll be sorry you brought it up. ;-)

Recipe-ish

So, my blog is unbelievably outdated, so I will work on that sometime... for now, I needed a place to post a few recipes more easily than FB, so this is it :-)

This is more of a technique rather than a recipe and it is what we eat nearly every day. You can feel sorry for my poor family and their lack of variety, but no one seems to mind, so "don't fix what ain't broke"

This would be a very typical meal:

*Saute about 1/4 of a large onion (diced) in olive oil at about medium heat until starting to get translucent (5ish minutes)
*Add about the same amount of diced bell peppers (usually a mix of colors) and saute another 5ish minutes.
*Add:
     large can of diced tomatoes in their juice
     1 can kidney beans, drained and rinsed
     1-2 cloves minced garlic
     pinch brown sugar (omit if using fresh tomatoes)
     cayenne pepper or Sriracha (a spicy pepper sauce found in almost all grocery stores in the "ethnic" section), salt, pepper, maybe some Jane's Krazy salt or Colton's seasoning
*Bring to a simmer
*Add 8-16 oz dried pasta (depending on how soupy you want the finished product) and 2 of the tomato cans of plain water or water with veggie soup base or bouillon
*Simmer about 9 minutes, stirring pretty frequently
*Add 8-12 oz frozen broccoli
*Bring back to simmer, adding a little more water if the pasta has soaked it all up
*Eat :-)

 ***********************OR*********************

Cook some pasta in just enough chicken or veggie stock (or water and bouillon) to cover fully (adding more while it cooks if needed, the goal is to have the pasta soak up almost all of the liquid (and flavor). After about 5-7 minutes add a hearty amount of olive oil, juice from a lemon, salt and pepper, bag of frozen California mix veggies (broccoli, cauliflower, carrots), and 1 T cornstarch dissolved in a cup of water. Cook another 2ish minutes and serve, so easy!

 We usually also slice some bread, top with a little olive oil and Jane's Krazy salt and broil it for just a minute until it starts to turn golden.

 We are sometimes fancier than this, but honestly, not often. LOL

Help My Friends Win!

I work at the Pirate with an amazing couple who have a petition for Extreme Makeover Home Edition started for them. Please read it and sign. I didn't start it so I don't have a lot of details about where in the process they are, but they certainly deserve it. Honestly, I never thought about how hard their life must be because they are always so upbeat and happy, they make caring for three severely disabled kids just seem normal. Please read their inspiring story:

The Kottwitz Family

Here is a Facebook event page for them:

Kottwitz Event

Thanks!