All I want is a buttermilk biscuit with honey

Confession: Mike and I have been doing a food detox for the last couple weeks. No carbs, no sugar (or sugar substitutes), no dairy, no legumes, no ingredients you don't recognize. Only fresh fruit, veggies, and meat. It's both torturous and simple. The torture comes when I douse Jude's steaming whole-wheat buttermilk biscuit in honey or slather peanut butter on his perfectly toasted bread and then smear on a huge dollop of home-made peach jam. (He looks at me like: "Mom, geez, just give me the dang sandwich...and back up a few inches while you're at it.) I almost get close enough to snort it. As if it would do any good in my nasal cavity. (Pull it together).......I love how it has forced me to realize how many carbs and sugar I would normally eat, as I am passing up chocolate cake with dark chocolate ganache frosting and Halloween candy and pizza and and and. And. I also love how it has forced me to be a little more inventive in the kitchen. Prior to this cleanse, I had not made my own almond milk. And I am enamored with almond milk from scratch. I blend the almonds up with a few dates and then steep the milk with a vanilla bean. I would guzzle it by the gallon. And Mike and I made some ice cream last night by steeping coconut cream with a vanilla bean (vanilla beans have changed my life) and then blending it with some dates (running it through the ice cream maker) and THEN topping it with roasted almonds and raisins. It may be that it was tasty because our brains have been deprived and desperate for a sugar fix. It's possible. But I'm willing to embrace that. On the savory side, I made some rockin' cauliflower "mashed potatoes" with roasted garlic and macadamia nuts. And gravy without flour. And a pork loin covered in prosciutto and stuffed with kale, shitake mushrooms, and apples on a bed of roasted apples. And I like making dressing for salads out of cashews. And I like poached eggs. And avocado with just a little sprinkling of sea salt. And I guess Halloween candy isn't really worth it (although I'm sure the chocolate cake with ganache was...). The point is. I'm glad I know I have a little self-control and that I can be a little inventive in the kitchen. And so help me, I better be sleeping better, bubbling with energy, and have the skin of a baby's bum by the end of this thing. Confession over. Time to go nibble on a picture of a buttermilk biscuit with honey.

The Real Thing

While in Montana, my grandparents regaled us with stories of living in the rural west. My grandfather was a cattle rancher for the majority of his life, and my grandmother a rancher's wife. They drove straight to Montana following their honeymoon, a move my grandmother had not anticipated. She thought she would be much closer to her family in Utah, much closer. It must have seemed a daunting change, to go off into the lone and dreary world together, to carve beauty out of an empty stretch of brush, to make the desert bloom. I miss the ranch: my grandmother's rose gardens, the piles of muddy cowboy boots in the foyer, the white shag carpet, crystal lamps and light blue couches in the "pretty room" that epitomized finery to me, the narrow, bumpy, dusty roads and the sudden appearance of the big white house and green, fenced yard of the ranch on the horizon, the cows roaming and mooing, the coyote calls at night. I love thinking about how my grandmother used to fend off the cows with two by fours while my grandfather administered medicine to the calves. Or how she used to have to reach up into the cows' uterusi (the plural of uterus?) to get the calves out because her hands were the only ones small enough to get up there and unhook their legs. Or how my grandfather worked from dusk til dawn working the land, solitary work, every day. I miss the ranch. Very much.

A Wild and Secluded Scene (run rampant and boistrous with Bunnells)

This past week, Mike and I took a trip up to Montana with Britton, Tom (Mike's brother), Anne (Tom's wife), and Anne (Mike's sister) (Yes, Jude and Gabe have three aunt Annes). Bless our relatives for taking us in, motley crew that we were. We spent the first day in Glacier National Park, frolicking in the woods. There is something about the mountain air. Can make a person giddy.

Tom found a rock that looks like a brain. Brain rock.

Gabe's contemplative sweater

Britt and Jude

Me and the contended Gabester

Anne striking a pose

Puppy and Mr. Eyelashes

Jude has been modeling with his puppy lately. He feeds his puppy, changes his puppy's diaper, kisses the puppy's "boo-boos," wipes up his puppy's spit up, breastfeeds his puppy (yes, shirt up and everything), has the puppy pick a book for nap-time, sits his puppy next to him on the couch to watch "boom-de-aye" (The Aristocats), swaddles his puppy, rocks his puppy to sleep, etc. It's pretty adorable. So, when I was taking pictures of Gabe the other day, Puppy had to get in on the action too. And then, of course, so did Jude.

A swaddled puppy receiving some kisses

Man, do we love this kid.

Chubbers

Gabe had his two month appointment this last week. And we were not shocked to hear that he is 14'9 pounds. Yes, our own chub-chub is in the 97th percentile for weight and the 94th for height. Jude was 16 lbs. at a year old, which explains why he constantly fell in about the .5th percentile. So, having a chubby baby is foreign to us. Albeit, delicious. I mean, look at those rolls! You could lose a newborn in those rolls!