michigan winter

i love the beach in winter.

orchards and stuff

Every fall we make a trek out to at least two orchards, usually with extended family. Our first stop this year was Robinette's, right outside our city. This is the place we choose to go with just us - it's close and not too elaborate.

We ate pumpkin-spice doughnuts, gawked at the giant apple and went down the wagon slide a few times, like we always do. Although all of this was a first time for Theo!

Normally we'd also squeeze in a hike on the nearby trails, but it was getting late and our boys were wheezy. (The onset of respiratory problems in my children is the only part of fall that I hate.)

We were planning to purchase some cider at Robinette's for a few toasty warm drinks (rum n' cider, anyone?) later on, but with the drought and all the price of cider was ridiculous. Sad. And not just because I won't be drinking rum and cider... more importantly I feel bad for the farmers.

Second stop this year was Fruit Ridge Farms with my side of the family, which we'd done one other time with them. At this one we went the whole nine yards: doughnuts, cider and a hay ride, the duration of which Brett pontificated about his love for the outdoors and the soul-healing, peaceful activities that are often set there. (He whined the whole time.)

We were a little stressed at the beginning of the hayride because Theo seemed fussy, but as long as my dad was letting him jump up and down in his lap, and no one tried to shush him when he yelled for extended periods at the top of his lungs, he was fine. Not sure we can say the same of our fellow riders, but oh well.

You may notice the reappearance of the mini baby scarf, which Theo allows me to put on him, while Jude did not (other than in the hospital directly after his birth, when he was in no position to fight me).

Now the leaves are mostly gone from the trees and we're preparing for winter. I smelled it for the first time two days ago while taking out the garbage, which initially gave me a little thrill. Hoping to milk that feeling into January, but I'm doubtful this will happen.

Happy fall, y'all.

Uncle Clutch

Uncle Clutch let Jude bonk him on the head with a ball.

Uncle Clutch showed Jude how to do magic.

Uncle Clutch taught Jude to say "What's wrong with you?"

Uncle Clutch and Jude were too busy bonking each other on the head to participate in singing "Happy Birthday" to Grandma June.

It was Uncle Clutch's idea to hide with Jude in the woods when Mama and Daddy said it was time to go home.

Uncle Clutch and Jude are best friends now. So if you were vying for that position, you can give up.

Sorry Verses

While I'm in the occasional habit of plugging my family members (at least 85% of you are my family members, or know them, but to be fair)...I need to vouch for my littlest brother's new album, which he made in an old chapel in Nashville with his former high school band. It's called "Sorry Verses", and was released today - if not at this moment, soon. Listen, if you want. (Or you can listen to all his discography - EP, home demos and stuff - here).

The album image is an old photograph of the farm my dad grew up on near Sedro Woolley, Washington. He probably milked those cows every morning. And likely started that fire in the foothills, too.

Grant also covered a Joni Mitchell song not too long ago. Love.



Just so nobody starts getting a big head about this, here's a choice section of a photo taken about 22 years ago. Back then, he couldn't have fit even one of those cheeks into the leg-hole of his hipster hot pants.

I believe that is a nautical-themed onesie. Well played.

Fake Smiling

Best. Snowman. Ever.

Merry Christmas!
Holland, Michigan - 2010

Racy Webcam Images...

Front and side views of The Boopus

Last night at dinner Jude and I sat down to eat our toast and eggs. We weren't saying much, and after about ten seconds of silence he blurted, "Skype. Tyler."

He hadn't seen Tyler on Skype in months, so I don't know what possessed him in that moment to think of it. But of course I texted Ty and we were Skypin' within the hour. Highlight: Uncle Tyler got a couple of nice screen shots of Jude's round tummy ("The Boopus"). This will be gold to him for weeks. It is quite attractive.

The video is short, but worth the seven seconds I would say.

Upper Peninsula

Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan
(Photos by Tyler)

18 months

Some of the best parts about this age so far (sorry, the list is long):

• Jono was driving Jude somewhere the other day and vaguely noticed he was fiddling with his shoe. A few minutes later he turned to look in the backseat and saw Mr. Chunktastic with a sock placed carefully on top of his head and a huge grin on his face.
• "Bapa" (Grandpa G) taught Jude how to direct the choir. Now whenever he hears music his two index fingers pop into the air and sway back and forth to the beat.
  
• He has a good memory now. We went to see our friends Jan and Becky in Chicago a few weeks ago. Jude liked Becky and was calling her "Beck" by the end of the weekend. When we saw a girl two weeks later on the street with long blond hair like hers, he immediately said "Beck". This gives me hope he may remember his out-of-state uncles soon :) He was calling Brett "Butt" while he was here, so maybe when he shows up in a month again we'll hear "Butt" and be proud.
• He can imitate a mourning dove perfectly after hearing one in the yard.
  
• After a week and a half of being sick with an upper-respiratory/ear infection/molar coming in, he stopped walking. A few days ago he finally started up again; now he makes a solid effort to walk in the opposite direction from us at all times.
• He knows most of his body parts now: eyes, nose, mouth, tongue, hair, ear, feet, toes and then the term we're using for his privates (which I'll go ahead and keep private). We're working on "bum".
• He loves to turn light switches off and on and says "off, on" while he does it.
• He LOVES Mona, and constantly prattles on about "Nana" and "good girl" while he rubs his face on her, pats her, and tries to lay on top of her. Poor dog.
• He enjoys a nice couch pillow. Pulls it off the sofa, throws it on the floor, and rubs his face in it, saying "pillow, pillow, pillow".
  
• He folds his hands to pray before we eat. Not because we are especially pious, mind you, since the other night when we finally took a second to glance up at him as we were digging right in, we were reminded to pray by two chubby folded hands and a cherubic look from our son.
• He likes girls already. Especially waitresses. He flirts with them endlessly. Oh boy.
  
• He gives us kisses through the bars above the slide at the park. Too much.
• When we're just sitting around quietly, he likes to suddenly yell, "Mama! Dada!" over and over, looking from one of us to the other with a thrilled look on his face.
• He loves our neighbor Calvin and yells at the top of his lungs across the yard at him whenever he leaves his house.
• He is an interesting mix of strong-willed, decisive and driven, but also cautious, detail-oriented and gentle.
  
• He's becoming more social with other kids. Instead of staring or hiding when they approach, he waits for them to come over. The other day a girl baby walked up at the park and ceremoniously placed her hand flat on his face. He stood there quietly and let her keep it there for probably 30 seconds, then eventually walked away. Weird toddler social rituals.
• He loves bugs. When he sees an ant he says "buck", extends a fat finger, and tries to squish it. He saw a worm in a sidewalk crack the other day and tried to squish that too. We will begin teaching kindness to animals as soon as this stops being cute.
  

Here are a few videos of the little man, as of late:

Broseph II

My brother just came out with his first album, "It Took the Fire". He's put out a few EPs, but this is his first full-length record. I'm biased, but it's quite lovely if you want to take a listen. You can order it from iTunes, or from his website. He'll be playing some of it at South by Southwest (SXSW) soon with artist collective Ten Out of Tenn.

A while back I posted a link to his blog that documented the process of making it. (This is the second shameless plug that has appeared on this blog, in case you're keeping track.)

He's touring Australia soon and playing Sasquatch and Bonnaroo as keyboardist for Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes, a bunch of hippies that make crazy acid music videos and actually play decent music as well. They're big on the college scene right now and played Letterman recently. Here's a video of that performance if you want to watch them float around the stage in super happy fun land.

I think I like them, and may someday join their utopia as long as I can be high solely on endorphins.

I'm happy for you Ty :)

ONE

So the little man is one. I guess we're parents of a toddler now. (What does this mean??)

On his big day the three of us got up together and he opened his present from Ma and Pa. His hair is all crazy in this shot, and he looks disgruntled. (He has a pretty substantial mullet these days.)

Soon after that Uncle Tyler and Grandma G showed up and we all went out for breakfast together at Real Food Cafe. Yum.

His party was the next day. In streamed grandparents, great-grandparents, two uncles, and one honorary great-aunt-and-uncle (they've been caring for Jude one day a week since he was born, and he loves them).

We had soup. And cheese. And pumpkin cake. And cider. We mildly spiked our coffee with Irish Cream, and it was very festive. Jude had carrot cake with cream-cheese frosting. I didn't do anything fancy with it. It was still in the pan and I kind of messed up the frosting recipe. But it had a giant red "1" on it, and he thought it was awesome. We had to take the customary frosting-smeared face shots, so deal with it :)

Here's the evidence:

*Sigh*. It's been a whole year since all this happened. Wow.

Have yourself a cliche little Christmas

My blog is in a bit of a famine period right now. I know this. And I'm sorry. But you all know why. I'll take every opportunity to post a little something that might make you giggle. It might make you frown. But either way, it's something you may be able to mull over and ponder throughout your day.

On that note, I recently wrote to my far-flung brothers about what to do about Christmas gifts this year, considering we're all broke. I got almost immediate responses from all three of them.

What I suggested was that it would be a good idea to draw names, and to save even more money, Mom and I thought we might also toss around doing homemade gifts: anything from knitted potholders (see photo: tackiest one I could find) to homegrown canned tomato sauce to a little ditty about your person accompanied by a glockenspiel.

Anyway, since no one in my family (other than Mom) takes any suggestion from anyone seriously, the responses are worth sharing.

Geertsma Family Christmas: Gift Ideas for 2009

1. "that sounds great to me. I already bought personalized m&m's for all of you that say, "live, laugh, love" on them but i guess i can make something too." (Grant)
2. "i've already made embroidered christmas sweaters for everyone so i'm way ahead of the game. love, Tyler"
3. "I'm fine with this. As long as each one of you gets my name... twice. But in all seriousness yes, I'm ok with this. I'm not much of a susie homemaker so I probably won't be making anything myself, but I'm OK with somebody making something for me. As long as it looks and acts like a new car. Brett"

Happy Fall everyone!

Raw milk? Yes please.

As of two weeks ago, we own 2% of one-quarter of a cow (or something like that) on this farm. That means we get some of her milk. I don't know what her name is, but I know she has one. Apparently the farmer couple name all of their girls.

Our brother and sister-in-law Joel and Jessie offered us part of their share and we thought, why not. We get a half-gallon of raw, whole milk from our part-of-a-cow each week. Jessie and I take turns going out there to pick it up and sometimes we go together. We bring giant mason jars and get the milk right out of the tank in the parlor. (I now realize how convenient the milk man must have been. Oh those lucky people living in the 50's.)

It is definitely more "milky" than what I've gotten used to. I've had raw milk before -- we used to drink it right out of the tank at my aunts and uncles' dairy farms -- but we never had it regularly and for the past few years I've been drinking skim along with the rest of urban society.

At first I thought I might have to start working out a lot (which I should be doing anyway). But it is so filling that I actually end up eating maybe half of the cereal that I used to, and for once I don't feel like my stomach is starting to digest itself by mid-morning. It even comes with the cream on top like in the olden days, which I skim off for my coffee. Plus I feel good about the extra vitamins and what-not we're getting out of it.

So, anyway...we're trying to support our local farmers a little better, especially the ones that are nice to their cows and chickens by letting them walk around in fields pecking at things and chewing some good, grassy cud. I get eggs from my co-worker Steve who has a coop behind his house. If we'd lived in Honduras longer I totally would've gotten my own little flock of cluckers. Everyone did it there. My side of the family is super farmy, so I have to represent.

So, I'm curious. Would you drink this stuff? It used to be that people didn't want milk without the cream on top, but I think things have changed :)

We Actually Finished Something

Before:

After:

(one year later)

We painted over the old grey/dark forest green color scheme and got rid of the junky screens enclosing the porch. Then we stuck a baby and daddy on the front steps and a husky in the yard. Wa-lah! (Click to enlarge)

Thanks paint crew: