Toddler Harbat is experienced in many things.  Sleeping in a big girl bed is not one of them.  Each night we go in and find her somewhere unpredictable.  Maybe she’s got her feet on the pillow and her head jammed…

We are blessed to live so close to the beach.  From a narrow strip of soft white sand we can look to the Southwest at an impossibly far horizon on a bed of blue that stretches over 7,500 miles before…

Alert! [blows vuvuzela]  There is new site content! [bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzt] I figured since the site is called Handmade, I’d better pony up and make some new site areas for handmade stuff.  For visitors interested in bread, check out the Bread tab…

In the past year or two, our family has been eating less meat.  This is due to our increased awareness of meat quality and harvesting practices, the cost of high-quality meats, and the raising of our daughter as a vegetarian…

I’ve given up buying store-made cookies.  This is no small thing, considering the hundreds, probably thousands, of pounds of cookies I’ve bought in my lifetime.  Along with bananas, cereal, and milk, they were the staple of my years from ten…

My daughter’s growing up, simple as that.  Here’s visual proof: This weekend she graduated to a Big Girl bed.  This is a major change for her, a transition from babydom to freedom.  Now the last vestige of her infancy is…

It’s there, waiting for me in the freezer.  Five pounds of chuck roast from the grass-fed beef CSA.  It’s an expensive enough cut of meat that I can’t mess it up.  No Uncle F$#k-Up this time, no dirt soup, no…

At some point as a parent, you find yourself brushing out the tangles in Toola Roola’s hair.  How does it come to this?  When did I transform from virulent young buck to polyester hair stylist for Hasbro?  It begins with…

Sometimes you have in mind the perfect meal, an effortless combination of the four major food groups that is tasty, easy to make, and nutritious.  And sometimes you open the fridge and stare unblinking for a half minute while your…

Let me paint a picture for you.  It’s been a busy day and you’ve had dinner, done your chores, and are lying on the couch while a TV show about the manufacturing facilities of John Deere combines drones on in…