Food hoarding?

I ran into the grocery store on Saturday at noon to get supplies for having our friends Corey and Shawna over for dinner. Shawna was an AOII with me, and Corey's the guy who got DJ into brewing beer. 

Exciting sidenote: Shawna is 18 weeks pregnant. Which is SUPER exciting for them. They're also selling their house in hopes of building a new one next spring. Which is EVEN MORE EXCITING to me. Seriously. You could give me the option: have a baby, or put our house on the market and build/ remodel a new one? I'd pick the house options. Don't get me wrong, I love our current house. I'm still house-fluffing it even. But... redesign stuff? squeee!

But back to my point, which is: holy shitballs, veggies are so much cheaper in the summer!!! I know, this isn't news to anyone, really. But I've paid $2.50 for a red bell pepper in January. Saturday? They were $.79 apiece! I bought four of them, despite only needing one for the salsa I made. So cheap! So yummy! 

That reminds me, I need to go home and slice the remaining three up for take-along-to-work veggies. 

And now, with this veritable cornucopia of cheap, delicious fresh veggies around, I'm trying to think of ways I could buy up a bunch of cheap fresh veggies in the summer and... hoard them for the winter. No, we're not of the mindset that we should have a three-year supply on hand for the coming Last Days. We just like good food, and I prefer to not pay out the ear for bell peppers during the winter. 

And part of me likes playing old-timey housewife. But I'm not dressing up in a hoop skirt to do it, like those reenactors you see in Virginia City. Those people are just grown ups playing dress up, and when thy subject their kids to playing dress up too, it's wrong. Borderline child-abuse. No kid wants to come back to school and show and tell that they played "ye olde timey shoppe" with their parents all summer. That's a recipie for getting beat up on the payground. 

Speaking of recipes, this post does have a point. Hopefully will have hoard-worthy veggies later this summer when all the tomatoes and peppers in my garden come in. But what if I don't? What if I'm in Europe when all the bell peppers ripen? 

And how the hell can I hoard them for winter use?

I don't know how to can things, but I'd be willing to learn. 

We have a food dehydrator. 

I could make a LOT of salsa. 

Can I freeze bell peppers? I heard once you can char them on the grill and then freeze them?

I think I'll be spending some time with the googles this weekend. And the MSU extension office! 

The baby thing

I noted the other day the seeming explosion of pregnant people, both in my life and on the internet. Seriously, every time I turn around someone is knocked up.

I'm 27, soon to be 28. My husband is 32, soon to be 33. We've been married 6 months. We're both healthy, sane and intelligent people. But when it comes to the "when to have the first kid" question, we're both all over the place.

I've been in my job 3.5 years. At times, I love it. Occassionally, I wanna just quit and be a stay at home mommy who can bake cookies and garden.  I'm lucky to have both a mother and mother-in-law who worked outside of the home while having children; neither of whom are pressuring us to have kids.

So I suppose much of the angst I feel about it lately is due to the baby boom going on around me.

I feel good about where we're at right now as a family. Married, with a dog, dual incomes, a mortgage that allows us to travel and save substantial amounts of money for big purchases. Our relationship is solid, the dog is good, and well... I feel like there are a lot of things I want to do before I'm *ready* to have kids. Travel more. Europe. Beach vacation. New vehicles. Mexico. Not spook at spending more than $100 on a new purse. You know, entirely selfish pursuits.

On the other hand, I hear stories of people, like us, who are healthy, having a hard time conceiving. Stories like that worry me. I mean, things happen when they happen, or when you drop the cash on some serious medical intervention. I'd feel... angry at myself, maybe? if we spent too many years selfish and as a result had a hard time getting prego.

So shit. I don't know what the right answer is. And I'm only half of the equation about this Great Big Thing on the horizon.

I do know, though, that we're keeping the goalie until we get back from Europe, at least. I'm not having a baby until I go to Rome, and I'm not walking around Rome needing to pee every hour.

A growing appreciation

I have 12 friends and acquaintances having a baby between September and May; 10 of which are boys. A number of them are sorority sisters of mine, and we all joke about the AOII curse: you will have a boy first. Then maybe a girl. But most likely another boy.

Sunday I helped host a baby shower for my "little sister" in the sorority. I got really lucky with my "littles"; both are women that I admire, wish I could be a little like, and grow more fond of every year. I'm grateful to have them in my life.

Sunday evening I was telling an older woman on my Board,  who was also in a sorority in the 1940's, that I'm realizing more and more the value of being an AOII. Jane is in her 80's, but that woman is a firecracker who drives a number of initiatives in Bozeman. I want to be her when I grow up.

I told Jane that during the baby shower I recognized the incredible, diverse group of friends I can call on at any time for advice. Women who are professionals with terminal degrees, women who are successful business owners, girls who are already mothers or becoming mothers, and alumni who are older than I am, yet treat me as an equal to call when I have a question about grown up issues.

We're not planning on having a kid for a while yet. But after the death of a sorority sister in September from a baby-related item (postpartum psychosis), I recognized how important it is and will be for me to have a crew of local friends to call on for help, commiseration and advice. I'm grateful for them.

People in Montana make fun of sorority girls. Yeah, sometimes it isn't all fraternity parties and charitable events. It means living with 30-40 other women your age, one of which is guaranteed to be a flat-out biatch. But here's the secret: there will always be a biatch in your life; best to figure out how to deal with them now.

The long term benefits continue to amaze me: close friends who can pick up right where they left off, a small understanding of human tendencies, an appreciation for organization and the support of over 50 women who will help the moment I ask.

Jane understood exactly what I was saying; for her being a Greek woman meant that when she moved with her young family to Wisconsin, California, Washington DC and Bozeman, she could contact their alumnae group and have an instant connection to a place and people in that place. It means, for an elderly woman, having friends to lean on as others pass away, and a connection to who she was as a young woman unfettered by disappointment or burdened by an ailing body.

I'm grateful, too, that being in a sorority gave me the ground work to have such intimate conversations with women two generations older than me. Women who treat me as a friend.