Ducklings & spices all in a row

Yesterday David and I saw a mother duck lead her 10-15 ducklings across a very busy street at a crosswalk by the park. Luckily traffic stopped and the ducks made it across safely. The mother duck then led her babies right by us (we were about three feet away!). The little ducklings were darling — yellow and brown, and they walked as pairs in a column behind their mother. Cute little ducklings all in a row. I immediately thought of my father (we used to love reading those baby animals themed children’s books together) and, of course, wished I had my camera. It was a heart-stopping, wonderful moment. Yes, I am ever the biologist, but who wouldn’t fawn over baby ducks?!

After that cute story, the rest of my post — about organizing our kitchen — seams trivial, but here goes… I’ve been doing some spring cleaning and organizing around here. One of my recent projects is transferring our bulk spices into something other than little ziplock baggies and identifying them with computer printed labels. So, each time we go through another jar of jam from Trader Joe’s, I set up another spice. Don’t they look pretty and organized?!

When I took the picture on the left I realized that the colors of the cayenne, cinnamon, mustard, and allspice perfectly matched the onion and pineapple gluten-free pizza that I had just pulled from the oven (photo on the right). I didn’t even plan it!