14 February 2014

Dear You - My Valentine: The First Time I've Acknowledged This Day With Sincerity

In a world increasingly populated by personal opinion, it’s easy to forget the real meaning of blunt, that it’s actually the opposite of cutting and sharp. By definition, it means “uncompromisingly forthright.” Sometimes being blunt doesn’t mean swearing or drinking or saying your kids are annoying the shit out of you. Sometimes it means saying exactly what you feel. Sometimes it means being vulnerable. Especially for us unsentimental types, it’s way scarier being forthright about our warm, fuzzy feelings than it is to muse on less, ahem, acceptable topics. (Exhibit A: the Being Naughty tab of this site)
If we’re truly committed to uncompromising forthrightness about ourselves and our perspectives of the world, we must show all of it. In my case, it’s a letter I wrote to my husband shortly after the birth of our second child. We were on holiday in rural France, getting dirty and exploring the grounds of a magnificently aged chateau and basking in the luminescent sunlight. All of our everyday stressors suddenly were at the bottom of a deep stream, far away. I found myself glowing with love for the man I often take for granted. As anyone with a marriage license and any number of children knows, these moments become sparse when the babies begin to arrive. Especially in those first murky months of sleeplessness and chaos, and especially especially after kid number two rolls around. Quality alone time? Romance? They are things as fantastical as a unicorn laying golden eggs. After a near-magical night out at a fancy restaurant and a wild drive on country roads, I was compelled to capture the way I’d felt that night, that week, to bottle it up tightly, to record it. Little did I know how precious these words would be to me later on, how often I would revisit them, and how effective they’d be in extracting me from some of my darkest hours.
Dear You,
Someday we will look back at this time with longing, this breath-short period in which we are young and beautiful, our children younger and even more beautiful, and the future something intangible, bright. A few days ago I awoke on the arched back of a quiet morning and was filled with such gratitude I could hardly draw a breath. Normalcy for us is something exquisite.
Our chateau is the kind of place where only some of the locks to the outside function, where the loudest noise in the walled garden is bees trafficking pollen from the pear tree to the wall of honeysuckle, only occasionally rivaled by birdsong or the muffled cough of a tractor. I pick wild strawberries in the garden outside our bedroom while our children take their midday sleep, the unfiltered sun warming the spot between my shoulders. The berries, no bigger than marbles, lie hidden under the plants’ squat canopy, candy-sweet and lightly red. I leave no leaf unturned in the pursuit of sweetness. May we always remember to do the same.

13 February 2014

One Candle. Wait, what?

aesthetic fauna // one candle
Yeah. I would have more believed a story involving me and a 6-month coma in the past year than our daughter turning one. I still feel like I have months left to plan her first party. Except it was last weekend. I'm still confused.

Our new place in Amsterdam is, like, a bazillionth the size of our grandly-proportioned living area of our old one in Den Haag. Which meant one of three things:

1. Have the party elsewhere, which means spending a good chunk of change on a day little darling butterbean won't remember. Nope.

2. Invite everyone I had at Julian's first two birthdays (23-27 adults plus the same amount of kids... eek). No effing way. It would've been all Lord of the Flies in here before the candle was lit.

3. Keep the guest list small, invite only people I keep in touch with on a regular basis and really, really feel I know. Maybe I'll piss I few people off. Maybe not. Cleanup=a breeze. Reasonable quantity of food prep. Hmmm... Bingo. 

The stress of planning for ten adults and seven kids didn't even register on my anxiety radar in comparison to planning the Monster Parties that came before. The afternoon was relaxed, gezellig, fun, and I remembered to talk to people and laugh. I am intensely grateful for the love that flowed at the party; it evicted most of my lingering homesickness and reminded me that my roots are real here, too.

And the cake? It was the best I've made in the history of me preheating an oven. Unless I have some sort of cake epiphany in the coming months/years, I'm making this cake for birthdays ever after. You probably already know I have a raging culinary crush on Deb over at Smitten Kitchen, but it just got restraining orderish after this recipe. Seriously. I might have taken more photos of the cake than my child. Yellow cake, chocolate sour cream frosting. Nothing fancy but perfect in every way. Reminiscent of Duncan Hines. People's eyes glazed over when they bit into their slice. Seconds were had.

Also on the menu: cheese straws (also Smitten Kitchen), polenta bites with arugula tapenade + radishes (Food & Wine), and mini feta + spinach pies (Jamie Oliver's concoction made tiny).

Eat up.

xxx+o,
Jess
aesthetic fauna // yellow cake, chocolate frosting
aesthetic fauna // one candle
aesthetic fauna // one candle

11 February 2014

Geographic Polyamory, Part II: The Radiant State

aesthetic fauna // colorado
co
While Wisconsin is a stunner in winter with all that white and home to our kids' grandparents, this girl's got my heart. The mountains in the distance were a constant companion to my daily rovings back and forth across the Front Range. I fell in love with the jagged horizon all over again and had to remind myself to keep my eyes aimed at (least in the general direction of) the road. As much as I hung out drinking chai in my pajamas at my parents' house in the previous weeks, I focused nearly every minute of every day hugging my dearest people, under a dazzling sunshiny sky that pumped out both a decent layer of pristine snow in the middle of mostly 60°F/16°C days. For me, when it comes to weather, dichotomous wins the race. Oh, and I again found it necessary to pee in a terribly public place. Twice. I've gotten so good at it, I'm thinking up a tutorial for you less talented folks. No, seriously.
Okay, enough. What I really came here to do was to show, not tell. About mountains and sunlight, not peeing stunts. Soak it up. The RAYS, peeps, not the pee. 

(This is me stopping, effective immediately.)

xxx+o,
j

p.s. In looking back at photos from this glorious week, I deeply lament how little I actually used my camera . For those of you not pictured, I was too entranced by your presence to think of anything but your face, your magnificence. 
aesthetic fauna // geographic polyamory, part II: the radiant state
aesthetic fauna // geographic polyamory, part II: the radiant state
aesthetic fauna // geographic polyamory, part II: the radiant state
aesthetic fauna // colorado moon

10 February 2014

Geographic Polyamory, Part I: The Frozen State

aesthetic fauna // wisconsin
Our five weeks in Americuh were a 4/1 split between Wisconsin and Colorado, respectively. Since you already sat through me whining about how homesick I am, let me reassure you that I won't do it again here. Instead, I'll give you tour of the good parts, because goodness was aplenty.

wi
I kicked that polar vortex in its icy little crotch with a booted foot, took big bunny sledding for the first time, peed in a precariously public place, cross-country skied into kettles and over moraines, ate my weight in cheese curds and summer sausage (If you live outside the Midwestern US and have no idea what I'm talking about, please go here and order it. Eat it. Thank me later.), found a new favorite beer (multiple thumbs up for Spotted Cow), and instinctively remembered how to drive (and walk) on ice. Fearlessly.

Get ready for snow, kids in uncomfortable sleeping positions, cows, snow, and snow.

xxx+o,
Jess
aesthetic fauna // wisconsin
aesthetic fauna // geographic polyamory
aesthetic fauna // wisconsin
aesthetic fauna // wisconsin
aesthetic fauna // wisconsin