I think 2013 is going to go down as the Year of Death around here. My fourth friend/relation/whatever died last week and was buried Monday. This one was not as difficult, though, because it was truly her turn to go.
Cloa (pronounced with a long o and silent a) was an elderly lady in our congregation. She and her hubby were unable to have children and since my mom lived so far away, I adopted her as my "mom away from mom" when I was pregnant with Abby. She became "Grammie" to Abby and to the rest of the Wild Bunch.
She and her hubby were relatively active until the last few years, then her health started failing. The last six months have been particularly rough, as she was bedfast, on a feeding tube, and unable to communicate other than "yes" or "no". Her brain was still there, which made it even worse. She's been so sick, for so long, I wasn't sad for her that she passed. I'm not even sure I'm sad for me. I'm just sick of people dying already. I'm starting to feel like the Angel of Death or something.
Dave is sick and I'm at home with him instead of being at HELP, wrangling other peoples' children. And I should be cleaning house. We're having a young married lady from our congregation over for supper before church. She's been here already this week, cleaning out the basement. She actually does this for fun. Aside from that, she's a delightful person but I really feel like the house needs to be cleaner.
And why? Here's the deal: the house can be cleaned but then it will be totally messed up in a fraction of the time that it took me to clean it. It seems like a waste of time, energy, and good juju to bother to clean the house. Sadly, it seems to be important to the majority of society to have a clean house. So there we are. Bleah.
Showing posts with label homemaking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label homemaking. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 25, 2013
Friday, September 04, 2009
Crazy days
I have been feeling pretty crazy here lately and this will probably sound disjointed. David is sitting here next to me. He finally decided that he is interested in words & letters and wants to learn it all NOW. I think I need more coffee.
I've spent the last week or so dealing with this bounty from Friend Hazel:
Friend Hazel went to the Panama Canal with a tour group and asked me to come pick the last of her beans and tomatoes. It took me 3 separate trips out there to get all the beans. I need to go back and pick some more, as there are probably more that are past ready to pick, but I've been trying to deal with these first. Plus I need to pick in my own garden and do other pesky things like laundry, teaching, etc. Those are 2 5-gallon buckets full of beans (and a little bit of thyme, in one of them) plus about 50# of tomatoes. I'm almost finished with the beans. Still have another canning of them. The tomatoes...some of them I made into spaghetti sauce, which I had intended to can. Friend Husband had other plans, so we've been eating on that.
Spaghetti sauce is a messy undertaking. Especially when your dishwasher is broken, which ours is. The girls have been in high dundgeon because of my insistence that they take their turn at washing dishes. They are very spoiled. Except for Sarah, who is a willing worker. Keziah is a willing worker when it comes to dishes...she purely loves to hand wash dishes! I do put her to work but I have to keep an eye on her lest something formerly clean get dumped into the dirty water.
This week was Friend Husband's birthday as well, so we spent Tuesday getting ready for that. He requested vindaloo, curried cauliflower & chocolate lasagna.
While I was getting his cauliflower, I noticed that there were many heads on less than half-price in the produce section. I bought 5 of them and last night, turned them into cauliflower pickles. I do love the pickled cauliflower I get sometimes at the store. I hope these are as good as those. I don't have much luck with pickles. Mine are always soggy.
Speaking of which, I was hunting for more canning jars to can beans and came across some pickles that I had made in 1994. Yikes! They were mushy after I made them, which is why I never ate them. David and I dumped out the contents and the jars are now full of beans. Which I hope will not be mushy.
We got to go visit Friend Gina yesterday. Beforehand, we stopped at the store to pick up a few things (and to look for canning jars, which they did not have...I went to 3 stores yesterday before I got them!). I saw these marvelous donuts. We didn't buy any but I thought they were works of art in the bakery case:
I have a whole lineup of pictures to show, as y'all can see! This week, David also got his head stuck in the footboard of my bed. He and Zi used to slide off the end and slip through the rails. David found out that he has now grown too much to be able to do this. After laughing hysterically, then trying to get his head out, I ran to get the camera and took this picture. He was not thrilled with me. Eventually, he told me how he got into this predicament and I figured out how to undo it. Perhaps he's learned his lesson, at least for now!
Well, that's what's going on and I have to go pick my garden before the mosquitoes get too warmed up and fast. The weather here has been very much like fall, rather than the end of summer. I am grateful. I don't do so well with heat and humidity.
I hope you all are well! Pray for me as I pray for you.
I've spent the last week or so dealing with this bounty from Friend Hazel:
Friend Hazel went to the Panama Canal with a tour group and asked me to come pick the last of her beans and tomatoes. It took me 3 separate trips out there to get all the beans. I need to go back and pick some more, as there are probably more that are past ready to pick, but I've been trying to deal with these first. Plus I need to pick in my own garden and do other pesky things like laundry, teaching, etc. Those are 2 5-gallon buckets full of beans (and a little bit of thyme, in one of them) plus about 50# of tomatoes. I'm almost finished with the beans. Still have another canning of them. The tomatoes...some of them I made into spaghetti sauce, which I had intended to can. Friend Husband had other plans, so we've been eating on that.
Spaghetti sauce is a messy undertaking. Especially when your dishwasher is broken, which ours is. The girls have been in high dundgeon because of my insistence that they take their turn at washing dishes. They are very spoiled. Except for Sarah, who is a willing worker. Keziah is a willing worker when it comes to dishes...she purely loves to hand wash dishes! I do put her to work but I have to keep an eye on her lest something formerly clean get dumped into the dirty water.
This week was Friend Husband's birthday as well, so we spent Tuesday getting ready for that. He requested vindaloo, curried cauliflower & chocolate lasagna.
While I was getting his cauliflower, I noticed that there were many heads on less than half-price in the produce section. I bought 5 of them and last night, turned them into cauliflower pickles. I do love the pickled cauliflower I get sometimes at the store. I hope these are as good as those. I don't have much luck with pickles. Mine are always soggy.
Speaking of which, I was hunting for more canning jars to can beans and came across some pickles that I had made in 1994. Yikes! They were mushy after I made them, which is why I never ate them. David and I dumped out the contents and the jars are now full of beans. Which I hope will not be mushy.
We got to go visit Friend Gina yesterday. Beforehand, we stopped at the store to pick up a few things (and to look for canning jars, which they did not have...I went to 3 stores yesterday before I got them!). I saw these marvelous donuts. We didn't buy any but I thought they were works of art in the bakery case:
I have a whole lineup of pictures to show, as y'all can see! This week, David also got his head stuck in the footboard of my bed. He and Zi used to slide off the end and slip through the rails. David found out that he has now grown too much to be able to do this. After laughing hysterically, then trying to get his head out, I ran to get the camera and took this picture. He was not thrilled with me. Eventually, he told me how he got into this predicament and I figured out how to undo it. Perhaps he's learned his lesson, at least for now!
Well, that's what's going on and I have to go pick my garden before the mosquitoes get too warmed up and fast. The weather here has been very much like fall, rather than the end of summer. I am grateful. I don't do so well with heat and humidity.
I hope you all are well! Pray for me as I pray for you.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
First Day
Monday was our official "first day of school". I have that in quotes because we do work all summer but the "first day" is when we try to get back into the swing of doing a lot of work in a day. It was also Friend Husband's first day back.
Well, in addition to all the craziness which is inherent in the first day back, Mama decides that it would be fun to have a tea party to commemorate the event, complete with company in the form of some church friends. So we did. It was fun but it made a lot more work and worry in the middle of the day. Why I do these things to myself, I don't know.
The folks we invited are friends of ours from our congregation. The little girl was having her first day of kindergarten on Tuesday, but school had started for the rest of the children the previous Friday. So I thought it might be nice to celebrate her last day before school (and to keep her mind off the fact that her sister was already at school, where she wanted to be!) They also babysit a little boy. The twins love Christian, so it was a bonus to have him around.
On the day, I decided that, instead of tea, we'd have lime slushes, my favorite from Sonic. I figured out a way to make them so that they were good and that's what we had in our tea cups instead of tea. Generally, the children don't like tea anyway. It did get everyone pretty sugared up!
See what I mean? Sugar!
Apparently Abby wasn't getting enough sugar because her eyes were closed.
Slushie!
This is what the tea table looked like prior to our sitting down. We had hard boiled eggs (which were supposed to be deviled, but I ran out of time), red grapes, baba ganoush, hummus, roasted tomato soup, & chips. How about that?
Kez loves tea parties.
After the sugar surge, we went outside to swing and play with the dog. I love this picture of Adalyn...she loved the swing!
The look on Zi's face cracks me up. I don't know what she was in a snit about but it's right on out there.
Christian loved Lucy. I tried to give her to him as a party favor but Tonya was having nothing of it.
After the guests left, I went back to canning. I had already finished off the tomatoes, but here are pictures of them anyway.
These are the 20 # or so of tomatoes that Friend Husband and I picked. Plus some green beans. I picked corn last night and we had that for supper. It was good but I was still miffed that, of the many many seeds I planted, only 5 or so plants came up.
But Monday I was working on canning peaches. I had bought a bushel from our local apple orchard (they import them from PA) and had started working on some peach butter, because my beloved sil loves it so much. Here's the peach butter long before it was ready to be canned:
It's more the color of apple butter now, and it's all canned, as of yesterday. Because I hit it in high gear, canned that, and canned some more peaches, just as peaches. So now I have no more peaches to can, but I have a lot of medium syrup left. I think I might have to go get another bushel of peaches...
Here's the beans, tomatoes, & corn from my very own garden plus peach butter and, in the back where you can't see them, some canned peaches. I feel just like Olivia Walton. Except less. Yeah.
JoAnn wanted to see a picture of my new/old desk. Here it is, already covered with papers to grade.
I did get a new lamp because that clamp lamp was just not working. Plus the lightbulb on it, combined with the general gloom of the basement, made it impossible to see my scrapbooking stuff correctly (ie, see the colors correctly). I had intended to get one of those lamps that mimics daylight but settled for a desk lamp with a Reveal bulb, which is closer to the actual spectrum than are incandescent bulbs. The folder on the right side of the desk holds my current scrapbooking project (the tea party books). To the right of the desk are some built-in shelves which have been housing part of our voluminous record collection. I moved some of those records out and put my teacher's manuals and scrapbooking stuff in the cubbies. It made me happy! Here's a photo:
And I guess that's all except to say that Friend Cherylyn got some good news from her recent MRI. They indicate that her breast cancer and lymph node cancer are completely gone! Hallelujah! I know that a lot of you were praying for her, so I thought I'd give you the good news. I've been floating on it for a while now!
Have a good day! I'm way past the time I need to get out and pick more tomatoes! Yikes.
Well, in addition to all the craziness which is inherent in the first day back, Mama decides that it would be fun to have a tea party to commemorate the event, complete with company in the form of some church friends. So we did. It was fun but it made a lot more work and worry in the middle of the day. Why I do these things to myself, I don't know.
The folks we invited are friends of ours from our congregation. The little girl was having her first day of kindergarten on Tuesday, but school had started for the rest of the children the previous Friday. So I thought it might be nice to celebrate her last day before school (and to keep her mind off the fact that her sister was already at school, where she wanted to be!) They also babysit a little boy. The twins love Christian, so it was a bonus to have him around.
On the day, I decided that, instead of tea, we'd have lime slushes, my favorite from Sonic. I figured out a way to make them so that they were good and that's what we had in our tea cups instead of tea. Generally, the children don't like tea anyway. It did get everyone pretty sugared up!
See what I mean? Sugar!
Apparently Abby wasn't getting enough sugar because her eyes were closed.
Slushie!
This is what the tea table looked like prior to our sitting down. We had hard boiled eggs (which were supposed to be deviled, but I ran out of time), red grapes, baba ganoush, hummus, roasted tomato soup, & chips. How about that?
Kez loves tea parties.
After the sugar surge, we went outside to swing and play with the dog. I love this picture of Adalyn...she loved the swing!
The look on Zi's face cracks me up. I don't know what she was in a snit about but it's right on out there.
Christian loved Lucy. I tried to give her to him as a party favor but Tonya was having nothing of it.
After the guests left, I went back to canning. I had already finished off the tomatoes, but here are pictures of them anyway.
These are the 20 # or so of tomatoes that Friend Husband and I picked. Plus some green beans. I picked corn last night and we had that for supper. It was good but I was still miffed that, of the many many seeds I planted, only 5 or so plants came up.
But Monday I was working on canning peaches. I had bought a bushel from our local apple orchard (they import them from PA) and had started working on some peach butter, because my beloved sil loves it so much. Here's the peach butter long before it was ready to be canned:
It's more the color of apple butter now, and it's all canned, as of yesterday. Because I hit it in high gear, canned that, and canned some more peaches, just as peaches. So now I have no more peaches to can, but I have a lot of medium syrup left. I think I might have to go get another bushel of peaches...
Here's the beans, tomatoes, & corn from my very own garden plus peach butter and, in the back where you can't see them, some canned peaches. I feel just like Olivia Walton. Except less. Yeah.
JoAnn wanted to see a picture of my new/old desk. Here it is, already covered with papers to grade.
I did get a new lamp because that clamp lamp was just not working. Plus the lightbulb on it, combined with the general gloom of the basement, made it impossible to see my scrapbooking stuff correctly (ie, see the colors correctly). I had intended to get one of those lamps that mimics daylight but settled for a desk lamp with a Reveal bulb, which is closer to the actual spectrum than are incandescent bulbs. The folder on the right side of the desk holds my current scrapbooking project (the tea party books). To the right of the desk are some built-in shelves which have been housing part of our voluminous record collection. I moved some of those records out and put my teacher's manuals and scrapbooking stuff in the cubbies. It made me happy! Here's a photo:
And I guess that's all except to say that Friend Cherylyn got some good news from her recent MRI. They indicate that her breast cancer and lymph node cancer are completely gone! Hallelujah! I know that a lot of you were praying for her, so I thought I'd give you the good news. I've been floating on it for a while now!
Have a good day! I'm way past the time I need to get out and pick more tomatoes! Yikes.
Thursday, November 06, 2008
Thursday Thirteen # 86
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And here I thought I was all finished with Thursday Thirteen. Ah well, some habits take time to break. Tomorrow is supposed to be rainy and cold so I knew I had to do a bunch of outside stuff to get ready for fall/winter/rain. Here are some of them. 2. Ran some clothes through the wash and hand-scrubbed the knees of my son's khaki dress pants (3 pair) because they all look like he's an urchin child who plays in the gutters. 3. Climbed up on the roof to get Abby's plane. They made airplanes in Mad Science yesterday, propelled by rubber bands. She shot hers high into the air and onto the roof. After I threw it off the roof, she got it stuck in a tree. I told her she was on her own. I ain't climbing no huge old oak tree. 4. Seeing as I was up on the roof already and our gutters were full of fallen leaves and the rain was supposed to come tonight, I cleaned out gutters. Abby took pictures but I forgot to bring the camera downstairs and I'm too tired to go upstairs to get it. 5. Closed the ladder on my left index finger. And almost closed it on David's head. He gave me a wide berth after that. I told him it was a bad plan to put his head into the ladder when I was closing it. 6. Cleaned the grill in preparation for covering it. For the rain tonight, ya know. Am I beginning to sound like I'm from southern California? 7. Washed Lucy the Wonder Dog. She was not appreciative. 8. Got soaked from the waist down washing the dog. I was also not appreciative. 9. The dog showed her displeasure by breaking her chain and running away. One of the new neighbors gave chase as I stood there debating whether I wanted to or not. About the time I decided to (she has tags on, so the dog warden would track us down anyway), she started running back to the house. I tempted her with a t-bone and finally caught her. And thanked the neighbor who chased her when I couldn't (my Crocs were totally wet and slippery). 10. Pulled weeds in the garden. In preparation for the weather change and rain. Ha haa. Because after the rain soaks in a little, I can till up the garden and be done with it until March. Unless I decide to plant garlic. 11. Pulled tomato cages up and also a few tomato plants. Ate my broccoli crop and found it bitter and lacking (it didn't do well and only amounted to a few little trees). 12. Met the insurance agent at his satellite office to sign my life insurance papers. I can croak now. Friend Husband has money to hire help. 13. Knit about an inch and a half on Friend Husband's sweater. I still love the yarn, I really love the pattern. And now I am very tired. I need to get something organized for dinner. I need to read spelling words to Miss Abigail. I need to shower. Guess which of those will get done? And I'm still lost on my NaNo novel while friends and my daughter are steaming ahead full-speed. Bleah. |
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Saturday, October 25, 2008
A good day for my ego
It doesn't take much, admittedly, to build up my deflated ego. Too bad it doesn't stay! Today, however, has been an amusing day. Friend Gina and I met at Starbuck's to do handwork and talk about life. I have so much fun when we do that. Today she was working on a hat that looks like it could repel rain, the yarn is so dense. I didn't want to work on Friend Husband's sweater, as I've made a mistake in the middle of the cable panel and I needed to be able to think about what I was doing rather than doing something mindlessly and talking a mile a minute with F. Gina. So I brought Keziah's quilt and mindlessly quilted.
At some point in the morning, a small family group of ladies was walking past us to go outside and the oldest of the bunch (who just looked like Grandma to me) stopped to watch what we were doing. I made some off-hand comment to the effect that I was just quilting and she walked off talking with an amazed tone to her daughter (?) or granddaughter (?) about how we were just sitting there and "one's knitting and one's quilting". I thought, "Wow, if that's all it takes to amaze you, come on over to my house! I could use the adulation!"
Then I went to Kroger and spent $50 on $130 worth of groceries. May I just say again how much I love The Grocery Game? I really need to do a stock up because I've been slacking a little with our stocking but I got 8# of boneless chicken breasts, 7# of frozen vegetables, 2# of Italian sausage, 2 cans of soup, some Sudafed, pantyhose, 3 boxes of tea bags, a bottle of chocolate syrup, 2# of lunchmeat for Wednesday's lunch away from home, asparagus, red pears, and red grapes. Oh, and a metal emery file. I wouldn't have even bothered with that but it was free with my coupon so I went for it. Hard to beat free. So that kinda put a spring in my step.
At Kroger (which is not the grocery I normally shop), the bagger was engaging people in a game of guessing how old we all were. Bear in mind that I barely got out of the shower before meeting Gina this morning. I was clean, but my hair was not brushed and I had not a bit of makeup on. I scared myself when I looked into the mirror. She guessed that I was 35. Um, no. 37? No. When I told her I was 41, she was amazed. I'm thinking, "You just don't know what 40 looks like, sugar." The cashier was also 41 and the bagger was 23, although I guessed a nice round 25. So, hey, I'll take what I can get...6 years off my actual age? Wonder what I would have looked like to her with makeup?
I came home, heated up some soup and got to talking to someone on the phone who wanted me to qualify for a focus group. I've never qualified for a focus group with this group, but Sarah did and got $50 for it. So we were talking, she was asking questions about Lucy the Wonder Dog and used the exclamation, "cool beans", which I use a lot. That made me happy, just because. Oh, and I ended up not qualifying for anything, but last week in the mail I received 12 weeks' worth of dishwasher gel packs to sample for another consumer group thingy I'm in. Gotta love free dishwasher soap! All I have to do is tell them how well they work.
And so now I'm at the library. Why? Well, because the library was having its Friends sale, where we can get many many cheap (or free) books with which to line our walls and insulate the house. Friend Husband was already there, with the twins and Sarah, and asked if I could please come and watch the twins for a while so that Sarah didn't have to while he was at the sale. So I sat in the rocking chair they have in the corner of the children's section and worked on quilting Keziah's quilt. I got to educate children on how sharp a needle is and what a thimble is. It was fun. While I was doing that, I got to thinking about some famous quilter who mentioned that she hand quilted 3 hours a day and got into a groove with it. At the time I thought, "How can you quilt for 3 hours a day, don't your hands get sore?" Now I think, "Well, you clearly don't have demanding little people hanging around you all the time because ain't no way I could eke out 3 hours of hand quilting a day."
Speaking of the library, I read two books from there recently that I thought were quite interesting. One was Thunderstruck by Erik Larson. I've talked about two of his other books before (Isaac's Storm, and Devil in the White City) and this one wasn't as good as those but it was still interesting. It's wild to me how people can take non-fiction and tell the story as if it were a fictional tale. And I love reading about how they discovered little tidbits of information here and there to build the story. It makes me feel not-so-bad about all the papers and stuff I save.
The other book I just finished this morning and I think it's a newly published book. I picked it up from the other library on Wednesday because it had quilt squares on the front of it. Doesn't matter what the book, if it has quilt square illustrations, I'm there. The name of the book? Stand the Storm by Breena Clarke. There were parts of it where I literally gasped and reread a part of it because I was so surprised by what I read. It is the story of a family of slaves right before, during, and right after the Civil War, living in the Georgetown area of Washington, D. C. I picked up her first novel today while I was perusing shelves. Hope it's as good.
Well, gotta run...have a good weekend!
Saturday, September 27, 2008
My inner earth mother
Way back a long time ago, when I had fewer children and therefore, more time, I was an earth mother sort. I baked bread, tried out all sorts of new recipes, dried my own herbs, etc. I really really enjoyed that, but I do have to say that it took a lot more time and resources (mental) than I have today. But I've been really hankering for some bread like the bread we got at Meijer (on clearance it was $1.79 for a baguette!) and didn't want to pay the price. So I took out my old sourdough starter and got it running again. Then I pulled down the Laurel's Kitchen Bread Book.
Ok, here are my hippie credentials: I own two Laurel's Kitchen books, two Molly Katzen books (the drawings alone are worth the price I paid for them, which was not much), two Crescent Dragonwagon cookbooks, and two Moosewood Restaurant cookbooks. And yes, I have favorite recipes in all of them.
I was and am totally drawn to the idea of self-sufficiency. Except for the work part. If I thought that my labor would actually result in something positive, I'd be all for it. But it seems like the labor I do is undone even as my hands are doing it, so that makes me much less inclined to do anything these days. But a wistful part of me wants to live on a farm, raise animals, spin and weave, and sew our own clothes...You know, basically be Ma or Mrs. Wilder in Little House on the Prairie or Farmer Boy. Alas, Friend Husband does not share those dreams and, in reality, I could see where having to do stuff like that would mean that we'd be hungry and naked before much time had passed.
Ok, back to the point, which was the sourdough bread and Laurel's Kitchen. In my pathetic attempts to eat more healthily, I have been wanting to try to make whole wheat bread again. The problem with my bread is that it is way too dense for most of my family to enjoy it. I decided to read the book and try again. And add onion powder and dill weed to try to approximate the taste of the storebought.
Just reading the book brought me back to the time when my oldest two girls were little. I have more confidence in myself now, but I had a lot more energy then. And I just thought I was busy! I love the way that the books (Laurel's Kitchen and the Bread Book) are written...just like you're hanging out in the warm, cozy kitchen and talking about bread while you make some. It makes me want to be a better person. It makes me want to bake bread. But then there's that time thing coupled with the bread brick thing.
This is going nowhere, isn't it? I guess the point I'm trying to make is that I miss my inner earth mother. She seems to be taking way too long of a nap and I hope that she wakes up soon and helps me out. That is all.
(I'll let y'all know how the bread turns out.)
Ok, here are my hippie credentials: I own two Laurel's Kitchen books, two Molly Katzen books (the drawings alone are worth the price I paid for them, which was not much), two Crescent Dragonwagon cookbooks, and two Moosewood Restaurant cookbooks. And yes, I have favorite recipes in all of them.
I was and am totally drawn to the idea of self-sufficiency. Except for the work part. If I thought that my labor would actually result in something positive, I'd be all for it. But it seems like the labor I do is undone even as my hands are doing it, so that makes me much less inclined to do anything these days. But a wistful part of me wants to live on a farm, raise animals, spin and weave, and sew our own clothes...You know, basically be Ma or Mrs. Wilder in Little House on the Prairie or Farmer Boy. Alas, Friend Husband does not share those dreams and, in reality, I could see where having to do stuff like that would mean that we'd be hungry and naked before much time had passed.
Ok, back to the point, which was the sourdough bread and Laurel's Kitchen. In my pathetic attempts to eat more healthily, I have been wanting to try to make whole wheat bread again. The problem with my bread is that it is way too dense for most of my family to enjoy it. I decided to read the book and try again. And add onion powder and dill weed to try to approximate the taste of the storebought.
Just reading the book brought me back to the time when my oldest two girls were little. I have more confidence in myself now, but I had a lot more energy then. And I just thought I was busy! I love the way that the books (Laurel's Kitchen and the Bread Book) are written...just like you're hanging out in the warm, cozy kitchen and talking about bread while you make some. It makes me want to be a better person. It makes me want to bake bread. But then there's that time thing coupled with the bread brick thing.
This is going nowhere, isn't it? I guess the point I'm trying to make is that I miss my inner earth mother. She seems to be taking way too long of a nap and I hope that she wakes up soon and helps me out. That is all.
(I'll let y'all know how the bread turns out.)
Thursday, May 01, 2008
May Day
It was a gorgeous May Day here. Not that we celebrate anything different on May Day but I do like to acknowledge the first day of a new month. I did talk about a few worldwide traditions on May Day to the girls but since we lacked a hawthorn bush and a May pole, we were not able to improve our cultural IQ.
I spent part of the day painting trim in my bedroom and part of it digging out my garden and planting a few seeds. Both were quite messy undertakings. Our room has needed new paint for more than a few years. I actually bought the paint a few years ago and haven't yet cracked it open until today. The trim is sort of a dusty purple and the walls are moss green. I think I'm going to leave the ceiling and the door trims white but give them a good cleaning. I thought the ceiling was relatively clean until I climbed up there to paint today and saw the grime. It's amazing what deposits oil heat will leave on everything.
I'm almost finished digging out my old garden and planting it. I'm planting more this year in anticipation of the price of food being outrageous. I might not have much come of it but then again, it might go well, so I guess we'll see. After I dig out and plant the last two squares of the old garden, I'm going to commence to making the new garden.
The summer before last, we laboriously dug out and leveled an area to put our above ground pool. When I say 'laborious", I mean laborious. The clay soil around here is nothing to sneeze at and it was quite a chore to try to get it leveled out as well. We persevered with the happy knowledge that the pool would at last be warm this summer. (The summer before, it was under a big old tree and the water never warmed up from the sun.) After we finished and before we got the pool set up, Friend Husband gave me a "don't kill the messenger" look and announced that we'd have to dig another hole. At our incredulous protests, he answered that the place we'd selected was too close to the chain link fence and it was out of code with our township's rules about above ground pools, even those blow-up ones. I tried to be a good wife and good-naturedly help dig another hole. About the only positive thing I could think that would come of our moving the pool (and laboriously digging another hole) was that I could use the first hole as the basis of a garden when I wanted to expand. This year I'm expanding.
Friend Husband doesn't know this yet. Friend Husband also doesn't know that our room is torn apart so that I can paint it. Friend Husband is out of town right now and I'm furiously attempting to get a million things done (including keeping the twins alive and educating his children) before he gets back. So I've been spending a lot of time running back and forth between the house and the garden.
I've been enjoying my garden time. A big old lilac bush is in the side yard right next to it and it's loaded with lilacs this year. Last year a freeze hit just as the lilacs were blooming and it killed them all. I'm trying to enjoy these extra this year. I also enjoyed the sun and the wind today. As soon as I realized how windy it was, I whipped downstairs to wash a load of towels and then hung them out to dry. Towels are a lot softer line-dried in a stiff wind. They also dried very quickly, which was a bonus since I got them out so late.
I've discovered that I can only multi-task three things at a time. Today I was painting trim, giving Rachel a spelling test, and answering the twins' incessant questions. Either Sarah or Abby came in and asked me a question and my entire brain derailed. Only three things at a time and preferably not that many, please!
I try to wear the twins out as much as possible before supper and this time of year, it's not too hard, especially when we spend a lot of the day outside. They had their bath and a bit of supper and then it was time to hit the hay. They did their usual attempt at stalling (I need a drink!) but I finally got them settled in bed. It was too late for a bedtime book but I did agree to sing to them. Lately we've been doing some tunes from Seussical, Jr., since that's what their sisters recently did and they've got the songs in their heads but David surprised me by asking for something from Fiddler on the Roof after I'd finished "Notice Me, Horton" from Seussical. So I sang a couple of songs from Fiddler (I love all the minor keys in those songs) and then a couple from 1776. By that time, David was snoring and Zi was fighting it, hard. But I'd saved the clincher for last.
Each of the children has had a song that, for some reason unknown to us, has put them to sleep. For the twins, it's "I Am a Poor Wayfaring Stranger". They love that song, I love that song, and I have to sing it to them before they go to bed. I told Friend Husband the other day that, if I should unexpectedly croak, he should learn the words to that song so that the twins will go to sleep. So I cranked out a few verses of that old hymn and Zidy was out like a light. Such power!
Such was our day. I enjoyed it. Nothing really special, nothing out of the ordinary, but a happy day, filled with purpose and a little fun. Hope your day was just as pleasant.
I spent part of the day painting trim in my bedroom and part of it digging out my garden and planting a few seeds. Both were quite messy undertakings. Our room has needed new paint for more than a few years. I actually bought the paint a few years ago and haven't yet cracked it open until today. The trim is sort of a dusty purple and the walls are moss green. I think I'm going to leave the ceiling and the door trims white but give them a good cleaning. I thought the ceiling was relatively clean until I climbed up there to paint today and saw the grime. It's amazing what deposits oil heat will leave on everything.
I'm almost finished digging out my old garden and planting it. I'm planting more this year in anticipation of the price of food being outrageous. I might not have much come of it but then again, it might go well, so I guess we'll see. After I dig out and plant the last two squares of the old garden, I'm going to commence to making the new garden.
The summer before last, we laboriously dug out and leveled an area to put our above ground pool. When I say 'laborious", I mean laborious. The clay soil around here is nothing to sneeze at and it was quite a chore to try to get it leveled out as well. We persevered with the happy knowledge that the pool would at last be warm this summer. (The summer before, it was under a big old tree and the water never warmed up from the sun.) After we finished and before we got the pool set up, Friend Husband gave me a "don't kill the messenger" look and announced that we'd have to dig another hole. At our incredulous protests, he answered that the place we'd selected was too close to the chain link fence and it was out of code with our township's rules about above ground pools, even those blow-up ones. I tried to be a good wife and good-naturedly help dig another hole. About the only positive thing I could think that would come of our moving the pool (and laboriously digging another hole) was that I could use the first hole as the basis of a garden when I wanted to expand. This year I'm expanding.
Friend Husband doesn't know this yet. Friend Husband also doesn't know that our room is torn apart so that I can paint it. Friend Husband is out of town right now and I'm furiously attempting to get a million things done (including keeping the twins alive and educating his children) before he gets back. So I've been spending a lot of time running back and forth between the house and the garden.
I've been enjoying my garden time. A big old lilac bush is in the side yard right next to it and it's loaded with lilacs this year. Last year a freeze hit just as the lilacs were blooming and it killed them all. I'm trying to enjoy these extra this year. I also enjoyed the sun and the wind today. As soon as I realized how windy it was, I whipped downstairs to wash a load of towels and then hung them out to dry. Towels are a lot softer line-dried in a stiff wind. They also dried very quickly, which was a bonus since I got them out so late.
I've discovered that I can only multi-task three things at a time. Today I was painting trim, giving Rachel a spelling test, and answering the twins' incessant questions. Either Sarah or Abby came in and asked me a question and my entire brain derailed. Only three things at a time and preferably not that many, please!
I try to wear the twins out as much as possible before supper and this time of year, it's not too hard, especially when we spend a lot of the day outside. They had their bath and a bit of supper and then it was time to hit the hay. They did their usual attempt at stalling (I need a drink!) but I finally got them settled in bed. It was too late for a bedtime book but I did agree to sing to them. Lately we've been doing some tunes from Seussical, Jr., since that's what their sisters recently did and they've got the songs in their heads but David surprised me by asking for something from Fiddler on the Roof after I'd finished "Notice Me, Horton" from Seussical. So I sang a couple of songs from Fiddler (I love all the minor keys in those songs) and then a couple from 1776. By that time, David was snoring and Zi was fighting it, hard. But I'd saved the clincher for last.
Each of the children has had a song that, for some reason unknown to us, has put them to sleep. For the twins, it's "I Am a Poor Wayfaring Stranger". They love that song, I love that song, and I have to sing it to them before they go to bed. I told Friend Husband the other day that, if I should unexpectedly croak, he should learn the words to that song so that the twins will go to sleep. So I cranked out a few verses of that old hymn and Zidy was out like a light. Such power!
Such was our day. I enjoyed it. Nothing really special, nothing out of the ordinary, but a happy day, filled with purpose and a little fun. Hope your day was just as pleasant.
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Thursday Thirteen #81
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1. Change the oil in the mowers. Done. 2. Figure out something quick and easy for dinner since people are scattering in all directions afterward. Done. Tuna's sounding really good to me! 3. Mow the yard. Oh, so done. 1850 calories worth of done. 4. Plant the peas in the garden 5. Feed, water, & bathe the dog. Done. 6. Go exercise at Curves, as per Friend Husband's measured suggestion. Done! 7. Till up the rest of the garden. 8. Call around to find out how much the dirt I need for the yard is going to cost. 9. Do assignments for Rachel and Abby for the next 3 weeks & e-mail to Friend Husband. 10. Write a thank-you note to the Brit who gave me the cool book on Wales last week. 11. Cut out coupons for this week's grocery shopping. 12. Do a couple loads of laundry to hang on the line. Done. 13. Take a long, hot bath and go to bed! What are you doing today? |
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Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Wordless Wednesday: What I've been doing today and a question
Today was the first day this year that I hung laundry out on the line. I so love hanging laundry out. I love the savings of it and I love the way the laundry smells when it's finished. It makes me happy. It's indicative of how very nauseated I was when pregnant that I couldn't abide the smell of line-dried laundry. It would literally make me puke.
So anyway, it's warm and I'm finally inspired enough to hang clothes out (no, nothing in my house gets done without my being inspired to do it...got a problem with that?). Because we are klassy with a capital "K", I have my own homemade laundry lines. I tried to find a picture of Friend Gina's beautiful lines for comparative purposes but couldn't locate it. Since we don't have a gorgeous laundry line in our backyard, I improvised.
Oh yeah, I know my mama's proud.
I also decided to wash the quilts that Friend Husband and I had used on our bed all winter. You might not think that this would be that big of a production, but it is. The main one that we use is ginormous. It almost hits the ground on both sides of our double bed. I call it the "quilt that ate Cleveland". That one has to go into the washer all by its lonesome.
The washing of the quilts necessitates that I clean my porch. No, that was not a non sequitur. Stick with me. When I wash the quilts, I hang them out on the porch railings to dry (unless it's the middle of the winter and someone has just urped all over them). So I had to clean the porch railings and sweep the parts of the porch and front sidewalk that would touch the damp quilts. I also had to threaten the twins and the neighbor urchins that if they touched those quilts I was going to have to hurt them. Severely. The girls learned long ago that you don't mess with Mama's quilts. So here they are, in all their clean glory:
And here are all the urchins in their unclean glory:
Only the brown ones are mine. The other two ostensibly live next door, although they spend a fair amount of time over here.
BTW, the quilt on the porch swing is the huge one. I made it my ownself and it took something like 8 years. It's a memory quilt with blocks from folks we knew (and liked) in Columbia, MO before we moved. (Yes, people we didn't like were not invited to participate.) The pink quilt is one that my Mamaw made years and years ago. It's a modified Ohio Star with a Glorified Nine Patch in the center. You probably can't see it but the setting triangles around the Nine Patch block are floral fabric. From curtains. I remember those curtains. Those of you who are quilters are shuddering now. I'm surprised, given how delicate that fabric is, but it's held up well. She had two of them on her beds in her house in Brady. I'm tickled that I have them now.
I also took time to smell, if not the roses which are not yet in bloom, the flowers.
These are from Abby's garden. And the ones below are from mine.
And now for the question. For the last few (five, maybe, hee hee), I've wanted to repaint the shutters on our house. I've cleaned them and cleaned them but I think it's time for a new look. The problem is that the brick on our house is sort of a funky color for brick and I'm not good with warm colors. Here's the house, or at least some shutters:
I was thinking at first about a soft, mossy green (because I love green so and I thought it might look ok) and then an electric blue (because I'm weird that way). But now I'm thinking that something like a barn red would look better. What do y'all think? Here's a Klassy superimposition of the colors for your perusal.
At any rate, all the shutters, the side of the garage, the porch, etc. need to be pressure washed. I think my daddy should pack up his new dog, his pressure washer, and himself and get on up here to help me, don't y'all?
Seriously, though, I'm decorating impaired so tell me what you think about the shutter colors. And have a wonderful Wednesday!
So anyway, it's warm and I'm finally inspired enough to hang clothes out (no, nothing in my house gets done without my being inspired to do it...got a problem with that?). Because we are klassy with a capital "K", I have my own homemade laundry lines. I tried to find a picture of Friend Gina's beautiful lines for comparative purposes but couldn't locate it. Since we don't have a gorgeous laundry line in our backyard, I improvised.
Oh yeah, I know my mama's proud.
I also decided to wash the quilts that Friend Husband and I had used on our bed all winter. You might not think that this would be that big of a production, but it is. The main one that we use is ginormous. It almost hits the ground on both sides of our double bed. I call it the "quilt that ate Cleveland". That one has to go into the washer all by its lonesome.
The washing of the quilts necessitates that I clean my porch. No, that was not a non sequitur. Stick with me. When I wash the quilts, I hang them out on the porch railings to dry (unless it's the middle of the winter and someone has just urped all over them). So I had to clean the porch railings and sweep the parts of the porch and front sidewalk that would touch the damp quilts. I also had to threaten the twins and the neighbor urchins that if they touched those quilts I was going to have to hurt them. Severely. The girls learned long ago that you don't mess with Mama's quilts. So here they are, in all their clean glory:
And here are all the urchins in their unclean glory:
Only the brown ones are mine. The other two ostensibly live next door, although they spend a fair amount of time over here.
BTW, the quilt on the porch swing is the huge one. I made it my ownself and it took something like 8 years. It's a memory quilt with blocks from folks we knew (and liked) in Columbia, MO before we moved. (Yes, people we didn't like were not invited to participate.) The pink quilt is one that my Mamaw made years and years ago. It's a modified Ohio Star with a Glorified Nine Patch in the center. You probably can't see it but the setting triangles around the Nine Patch block are floral fabric. From curtains. I remember those curtains. Those of you who are quilters are shuddering now. I'm surprised, given how delicate that fabric is, but it's held up well. She had two of them on her beds in her house in Brady. I'm tickled that I have them now.
I also took time to smell, if not the roses which are not yet in bloom, the flowers.
These are from Abby's garden. And the ones below are from mine.
And now for the question. For the last few (five, maybe, hee hee), I've wanted to repaint the shutters on our house. I've cleaned them and cleaned them but I think it's time for a new look. The problem is that the brick on our house is sort of a funky color for brick and I'm not good with warm colors. Here's the house, or at least some shutters:
I was thinking at first about a soft, mossy green (because I love green so and I thought it might look ok) and then an electric blue (because I'm weird that way). But now I'm thinking that something like a barn red would look better. What do y'all think? Here's a Klassy superimposition of the colors for your perusal.
At any rate, all the shutters, the side of the garage, the porch, etc. need to be pressure washed. I think my daddy should pack up his new dog, his pressure washer, and himself and get on up here to help me, don't y'all?Seriously, though, I'm decorating impaired so tell me what you think about the shutter colors. And have a wonderful Wednesday!
Monday, April 14, 2008
The Quick Update
It's been a hectic week. I finally did get past the incessant coughing part of my cold and now merely cough enough to wake myself up in the morning. Do-able.
Last week at this time, David and I were on our way to the Children's Hospital ER. He had climbed up on the counter and gotten into my prescription meds. Not good. When I couldn't find 2 of them, I called Poison Control (who I should have on speed dial by now). They were not thrilled. I was told to take him downtown to the hospital so that they could "keep him overnight in case he starts to have seizures". Oh yes, very lovely. One IV, EKG, heart monitor, and a cranky interview with a med student later (I'll have to share that sometime...it was not one of my finer moments), he got out. That would be Tuesday morning. Or afternoon. Or something.
Last Tuesday morning I had a doctor's appointment. She asked me a few questions then looked at the vitals that they always take at the beginning of the visit. "Any reason why your blood pressure should be elevated?" she asked. I told her the short version of the David saga of the day before. She said, "Yep, that'll do it."
Wednesday was the dress rehearsal for Seussical, Jr. I had to finish the 29 costumes for the Whos as well as the costumes for the girls. I finished all but a hat for Rachel's Vlad Vladikoff character. Then it was mentioned that extra hands would be welcome at the enrichment classes so the twins and I stayed allllll afternoon there, lending our lovely helping hands. I had two interesting conversations with teachers there who made comments about the "legalistic" religious background of their family or the family of their significant other. Kinda hard to know what to say about that and what they think of our family and our decisions.
Anyway, Sarah had asked me to take pictures at the dress rehearsal and I'm so glad she did. I took about 150 pictures that afternoon and got hardly any at the performance Friday night. It was fun but man alive, were there many mistakes made. I always get that seized up feeling at dress rehearsals because they never seen to go well. Of course, someone told me that if the dress rehearsal goes poorly, the performance will go well. You never know, though.
Thursday...what happened Thursday? Oh, yeah, Friend Husband was supposed to get a scope down the throat to check on what's going on with his esophagus. I had asked him to move it because the children were getting my cold and I didn't want to saddle dear Friend Gina with snoofly twins. We valiantly tried to catch up on schoolwork.
Friday was Performance Day. From long experience, I didn't even try to do any schoolwork. We went to the store to get some makeup for the evening (the children are advised to wear stage makeup so that their little faces can actually be seen). I found some cheap eyeliner and bronzer, which made me a happy little camper. Also, Sarah seemed to tolerate my application of the eyeliner better than my application of the eyeliner pencil, so that was a relief.
About two hours before the girls were to be at the venue for a final run-through, Zi came down with erp all over her dress. I rolled my eyes, got her upstairs and cleaned up, and called Friend Husband to report the event. Since she was running around, eating fine, and not feverish, he was inclined to just take her and hope for the best. Which was what we did. She ended up being fine.
Ah, and the performance! The children did a marvelous job! When I first heard that they were doing this play I thought, "Oh great, this is going to be the one that tanks." I'd never heard of it before. It was a very high-energy story with a large ensemble, which is tailor-made for our group. Sarah garnered many compliments for her portrayal of the Cat in the Hat and Gracie (not my daughter, but a girl they've been in the program with) stole the show with her Mayzie, as we predicted she would. It was big fun.
And Saturday felt wide open after all the running around and commitments that we had in the previous days. It wasn't, but the work was different so that was nice.
We had some delightful visitors at services on Sunday morning (Jack & Norita Cutter and I think their son and daughter-in-law).
And here it is, Monday again. Sarah went off to work with Friend Husband to have a confab with a writer person he knows at school. We missed her. We didn't get a lot done today. So I'm running around, trying to do my Suzy Homemaker routine (don't ya know I'm not June Cleaver, by a long shot) and get supper ready.
I've missed everybody but haven't felt inspired to do anything but goof off when the day's work was done. I thought about just closing the blogs down entirely but figured I'd regret it in the end. It's a weird time of change for me right now and I feel very unsettled, trying to figure everything out. So please continue to bear with my weirdness. I hope it'll all work out in the end.
Last week at this time, David and I were on our way to the Children's Hospital ER. He had climbed up on the counter and gotten into my prescription meds. Not good. When I couldn't find 2 of them, I called Poison Control (who I should have on speed dial by now). They were not thrilled. I was told to take him downtown to the hospital so that they could "keep him overnight in case he starts to have seizures". Oh yes, very lovely. One IV, EKG, heart monitor, and a cranky interview with a med student later (I'll have to share that sometime...it was not one of my finer moments), he got out. That would be Tuesday morning. Or afternoon. Or something.
Last Tuesday morning I had a doctor's appointment. She asked me a few questions then looked at the vitals that they always take at the beginning of the visit. "Any reason why your blood pressure should be elevated?" she asked. I told her the short version of the David saga of the day before. She said, "Yep, that'll do it."
Wednesday was the dress rehearsal for Seussical, Jr. I had to finish the 29 costumes for the Whos as well as the costumes for the girls. I finished all but a hat for Rachel's Vlad Vladikoff character. Then it was mentioned that extra hands would be welcome at the enrichment classes so the twins and I stayed allllll afternoon there, lending our lovely helping hands. I had two interesting conversations with teachers there who made comments about the "legalistic" religious background of their family or the family of their significant other. Kinda hard to know what to say about that and what they think of our family and our decisions.
Anyway, Sarah had asked me to take pictures at the dress rehearsal and I'm so glad she did. I took about 150 pictures that afternoon and got hardly any at the performance Friday night. It was fun but man alive, were there many mistakes made. I always get that seized up feeling at dress rehearsals because they never seen to go well. Of course, someone told me that if the dress rehearsal goes poorly, the performance will go well. You never know, though.
Thursday...what happened Thursday? Oh, yeah, Friend Husband was supposed to get a scope down the throat to check on what's going on with his esophagus. I had asked him to move it because the children were getting my cold and I didn't want to saddle dear Friend Gina with snoofly twins. We valiantly tried to catch up on schoolwork.
Friday was Performance Day. From long experience, I didn't even try to do any schoolwork. We went to the store to get some makeup for the evening (the children are advised to wear stage makeup so that their little faces can actually be seen). I found some cheap eyeliner and bronzer, which made me a happy little camper. Also, Sarah seemed to tolerate my application of the eyeliner better than my application of the eyeliner pencil, so that was a relief.
About two hours before the girls were to be at the venue for a final run-through, Zi came down with erp all over her dress. I rolled my eyes, got her upstairs and cleaned up, and called Friend Husband to report the event. Since she was running around, eating fine, and not feverish, he was inclined to just take her and hope for the best. Which was what we did. She ended up being fine.
Ah, and the performance! The children did a marvelous job! When I first heard that they were doing this play I thought, "Oh great, this is going to be the one that tanks." I'd never heard of it before. It was a very high-energy story with a large ensemble, which is tailor-made for our group. Sarah garnered many compliments for her portrayal of the Cat in the Hat and Gracie (not my daughter, but a girl they've been in the program with) stole the show with her Mayzie, as we predicted she would. It was big fun.
And Saturday felt wide open after all the running around and commitments that we had in the previous days. It wasn't, but the work was different so that was nice.
We had some delightful visitors at services on Sunday morning (Jack & Norita Cutter and I think their son and daughter-in-law).
And here it is, Monday again. Sarah went off to work with Friend Husband to have a confab with a writer person he knows at school. We missed her. We didn't get a lot done today. So I'm running around, trying to do my Suzy Homemaker routine (don't ya know I'm not June Cleaver, by a long shot) and get supper ready.
I've missed everybody but haven't felt inspired to do anything but goof off when the day's work was done. I thought about just closing the blogs down entirely but figured I'd regret it in the end. It's a weird time of change for me right now and I feel very unsettled, trying to figure everything out. So please continue to bear with my weirdness. I hope it'll all work out in the end.
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