Check it out at https://kckendricks.blogspot.com/2025/08/i-didnt-expect-this.html
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| outside motion=activated lights |
You do know what mercury has to do with thermometers, right? Look it up, babycakes.
The spousal unit was, to my surprise, happy to hop on the old Husqvarna and mow the grass while I cleaned out the greenhouse, installed a few new motion-activated solar lights, and worked on gardening "stuff." He then swapped out the bucket on the tractor for the Brush Crusher and gathered up a few downed branches. Then he put the bucket back on and added a scoop of garden soil to my cart so I can amend it for growbags, and spread two or three buckets of gravel where we drive the John Deere in and out of its barn. We were busy all day.
And you know what? It felt really good to get a few things accomplished. I'm really glad we decided to get a few more of the outside lights. It's dark out there when Deuce makes his last trip out before bed. Black night, black dog - he literally disappears! Now we have these fixtures all over the place and I can keep an eye on him. Another plus is we won't forget to turn off the outside lights and have them burning electricity all night. Yes, I have done that - but no more!
I put up the curtain screen door today, too. I didn't want to put it up this early in the year, but those big drilling bumblebees arrived today. They don't sting but we don't like them buzzing about when we're relaxing on the patio.
I also hit the step goal for the day without going for a walk. I got all my steps in just working in the yard. Tomorrow may be different. I think Deuce needs a good long walk to burn off some doggie energy.
We're not sure what we'll accomplish tomorrow in the way of yard work, but it won't be on the same level as today. We have plenty to do, but we need to pace ourselves. We're both feeling "old" tonight. Go figure!
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)
I planted my seeds according to the calendar, but I'm starting to think it wasn't a good idea for 2022. The Roma tomatoes look really good, but everything is a bit "peekid." That is to say, it's not looking good. I purchased good seed from Burpees so the sprouts should look a lot better.
One of the starts, the Bodacious** tomatoes, look really ragged, so much so that during my last trip to town I purchased a different variety, Rutgers, and just this morning planted those seeds. I think that next year, I'll give the seeds an extra week or two before planting them. They'll catch up growing quick enough once it's time to get them outside.
The weather surely plays a big part in the health of sprouts and seedlings. We're having a protracted cold, wet, and windy spring. Sunshine has been at a premium. Next year, I'll pay attention to what sort of cycle we're in.
I did add a new shelving unit to my seed sprouting repertoire this year. I don't mind the sprouting trays taking over the floor space in my sunroom office, but it pissed off Loki the Cat. He knows when I'm at my desk and will come to the sunroom door for me to let him in and out. The trays in his way making it so he had to make a leap over them did not make him happy. Pandering to the feline? You betcha! He gets mouthy when things don't please him.
The unit is a good addition, though. It's of mid-grade quality and will disassemble easily to store until next year. Add in that it has wheels and I can turn it every day for the plants and it's win-win-win.
Come 2023, I may purchase a larger greenhouse and perhaps move the seed sprouting operation to it. It's something I'm pondering this year. It would mean planting seeds later in the season and keeping a very close eye on the temperatures inside the greenhouse. We'll have to think about that for a while. I'm not in a rush to spend the money and then discover it doesn't work for me.
This summer, my first being fully retired, will be a learning experience on so many fronts. I hope I'm up to the task.
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)
**4/25/22 update - all the Bodacious tomatoes were a loss**
Last January, I canned vegetable soup and we opened the last jar back in mid-December. In 2021, I followed the Ball Book closely, but this year I went just a tad rogue. I had several small baggies of leftover veggies in the freezer and those, along with a small baggie of frozen diced potatoes, were added to the mix. That's really not much of a transgression. Because I add small bits of beef to my vegetable soup, the quarts have to process for ninety minutes. Beef and potatoes both require the ninety-minute process time so it's all good.
We're in the waiting phase now. Tomorrow morning I'll wash the jars, test the seals, and put the jars on the shelf. It may seem strange, but if a jar would happen to not seal, or come unsealed, you have twenty-four hours before you need to throw the food out. So in the morning if a jar has unsealed, guess what we're having for dinner? Just put the jar in the fridge and reheat it when we're ready. But I don't think there will be any problems. Each jar was bubbling when I pulled them out of the canner and each jar sealed almost as I set it on the counter. There was no siphoning, either.
Canning is both time-consuming and labor-intensive. I don't try to rush through any of it, so from start to finish, this project took five hours. This was the first time I used the weighted gauge "jiggler," which did seem easier than relying on the pressure gauge. The pressure gauge still worked so I was able to determine that the jiggler kept the internal pressure level at ten psi without any intervention from me. I brought the water to almost boiling, put the lid on the canner, and set my stove to where experience has taught me is the "sweet spot" for pressure canning. I allowed the canner to vent a steady stream of steam for the required ten minutes and set the jiggler in place. I watched for the jiggler to start jiggling, which coincided with the pressure gauge reading ten psi. I then set the timer for ninety minutes, and simply monitored all was proceeding as it should.
My only concern was the amount of steam the jiggler allows to escape to regulate the pressure. My canner calls for three quarts of water to be used to process under pressure. I paid a fair amount for the canner, a Presto 23 QT, and I did not want to run it dry. I didn't need to worry. Several inches of water remained when the batch finished.
I doubt I'll ever stop learning about home food preservation. Methods are improved and new products make the process easier. It may not appeal to everyone, but for me, it's a simple country pleasure that reminds me of my roots. And I like that.
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)
The official forecast was for one to three inches, but this weather front was tracking in from the southwest, turning north along the Blue Ridge of the Appalachian Mountains. The spousal unit and I figured it would be more than three, but we didn't think it would be almost seven inches.
Everywhere I look the world is white and beautiful. Before long, when the sun rises above the mountain, it's going to be dazzling. That may not be such a pleasing thing when I go out and hop on the John Deere 1023 to clear the lane. The wind is picking up, too, and this snow is very powdery. It's blowing off the trees in whirls of mini-blizzards.I hear people bitch about snow, how they hate it. They fail to see it as a simple country pleasure. A woman I've known since I was eight years old moved to Florida ostensibly to get away from winter weather and snow. It's a lame excuse. You can run from geography but not yourself. I have a different take on the "barrenness" of winter.
Looking out the windows of my sunroom office, I see the green of many holly trees and the neighbor's pines. The trees stand straight and tall, not slumbering, but preparing. The blanket of snow hides what is happening with the daffodil bulbs and its chill tells the bulbs to get ready. It has brought needed nitrogen which will melt into the soil to feed green growing things. The air has been cleansed of dust and allergens and smells clean. High up in the trees, the squirrel nests are full of little furry bodies that will emerge with the sunshine and race about on those branches cleared by the wind. The snow on the roof will melt and fill my cistern which will in turn water my summer garden. I could mention all the birds, but we have a red-tailed hawk in residence and the little birds, wisely, have mostly abandoned us - for now.No, I don't mind winter or the snow. Snow is the first harbinger of the coming spring, an early emissary we fail to acknowledge as such. I see its promise all around me, a promise it keeps every year. I can't imagine not being here on the manor to accept that promise and reap its rewards. And so I am grateful for the snow.
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)
I bought into the whole ten thousand steps a day thing. That was my goal and I did pretty good meeting it three or four times a week. I figured out a loop around my office building that was over six hundred steps and I did it once an hour while there. Walking the dog and just going about my day did the rest. It wasn't until one night about eleven o'clock that I put the kibosh on getting 10K a day.
No way did I really need to go outside in the dark and walk out to the end of the lane and back just to see the little rocket ship on the Fitbit Charge2 blast off. That's when I knew I was placing far too much importance on a number. Now I consider anything over seven thousand steps, or approximately three miles, a day a bonus.
Really?
Maybe I'm not doing as well with letting go of the numbers as I thought. This week, I got an email from Fitbit awarding me the Nile badge.
I've graduated to a Fitbit Versa2. My first thought upon viewing the email was I would have gotten this a lot sooner if my old Charge2 had not repeatedly unpaired itself and not reported my steps.
No, I'm not far enough along on my journey to let go of the numbers. My whipping out the calculator to figure out how fast I can get to 5K miles was proof of that. I'll report back sometime in August or September. Or not.
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)
PS. I've also blogged about this over at Deuce's Day. Deuce has walked a good portion of the way with me and deserved a badge of his own.
I do not like vans. Not for any reason. Yes, it could possibly be to his benefit but trust me when I say it won't be anything other than a waste of money. It'll be a new auto loan for him and frankly, he's at the point where he almost never drives. We go everywhere in the Charger and he does NOT get to drive my car. So he's looking at buying a vehicle that will sit in the driveway, in the way of all other vehicles, tractors, and mowers, and rarely be used. It's not something I'll be driving, that's for sure. Does this make financial sense? No. But it's NOT my money. If he thinks I'm going to help finance this misadventure, he's very much mistaken. There's a very good reason my money and his money never meet. But I digress...
I do not like vans. Period.
I like Challengers, Chargers, Camaros, vintage and classic Mustangs, MOPAR, and Chevy trucks. It's a short list and there is not a van on it.
This past Friday, instead of doing anything productive, Himself trolled the Internet (or should I start calling it the interwebs because change for the sake of change is hip). He saw a Dodge van at a dealership just north of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. That is over an hour's drive away. It did not please me to go but we hopped in the Charger on Saturday morning and headed out. Yes, I made him fill my gas tank first.
We got as far as Thurmont, Maryland, before his phone rang. They'd sold the van the night before. I'm very grateful they called before we headed up Route 15 and the longest stretch of the trip. I would have been pissed to get all the way up there and then find out the van had been sold. My inner bitch was already on alert, poised for a good opportunity to launch. Thankfully, it became unnecessary.
The drive to Thurmont is scenic, even with the leaves off the trees. Route 77, which meanders through Cunningham Falls State Park and Catoctin State Park, is a dream to drive when you have a car that corners on a rail, which my Charger does.
Being in time for it, we cruised into McDonald's and got breakfast before heading back home. It was a truly lovely morning full of sunshine and blue sky. I was burning his gasoline, and so I took a little drive through Catoctin State Park and ended up driving past Camp David.
I am now recorded on some military satellite, whizzing down the winding road like it's my personal NASCAR road course. I'm sure a bunch of "hidden" cameras were clicking away, too. Should I be worried? Undoubtedly. Big Brother knows all.
Then again, those guys stuck with military vehicles are likely jealous they can't take three-hundred horses deep into a corner and power out the other side without body roll or braking.
And as for Himself? Do THAT in a fucking van.
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)
It looks like I have all the ingredients I need in the pantry to fix Thanksgiving dinner for two. It'll be just him and me again this year, and it doesn't bother me much. The world turns. People come and go. Family makeup changes. We take it as it comes.
We are very blessed to be able to look forward to a traditional turkey dinner. Having worked hard all our lives, we were able to get in this position. I got my first job at sixteen, and Himself was working on a farm by the time he was twelve for a dollar a day. In our families, we were expected to work hard just like our parents and grandparents. So we did, and we did it without complaint. Complaining, or acting victimized, were not options. We were not given or taught those options.
We will give thanks when we sit down at our table because we are thankful. We'll remember those who came before us who taught us to work hard and manage our resources. My grandparents struggled through the Great Depression and survived. His grandparents had even less. And yet they laid the foundations for us to have a better life, and we do.
He and I do not forget how easily it could have been different.
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)
It's become very clear to me that maintaining my country lifestyle has become a lot more complicated. Heck, maintaining any semblance to a "lifestyle" is a lot harder these days. I dragged the man of the manor along on a grocery run today. His takeaway on the experience was, "where's the Gatorade?" That wasn't precisely the point I wanted to drive home with him, but it's close.
The Gatorade isn't at our house. The last time I got him Gatorade, he told me we didn't need to buy it two cases or sleeves at a time. Ha! Now he has none. The price of Doritos chips has gone from $2.50 a bag to $3.48. We now have no Doritos to go along with his Cool Blue.
He didn't comment on some of the empty shelves, but I know he took it all in. I've been telling him for months, but him seeing it for himself was better.
After the groceries were stowed, I sat down at my computer and did something I wasn't sure I should do - I ordered a Harvest Right freeze dryer. Yep. They are pretty pricey.
I've enjoyed home canning this year, and I plan to continue. The freeze dryer isn't to take the place of canning and/or dehydrating. It's to begin having a long-term pantry. Freeze-dried items properly stored can last up to twenty years. I see a definite advantage to having the ability to expand my pantry, which expands our ability to eat healthier. Nothing will take the place of canned apple pie filling, but having apple slices with no extra added sugar to munch on will be a definite plus. Freeze-dried blueberries and raspberries are little candies. Canned potatoes get starchy while freeze-dried do not. This purchase will round out my home preservation plan.
And so now I have a little work to do. I need to rearrange a few things in the basement and create a workstation for the new equipment. I'm pretty sure this will lead to at least one trash bag full of things I no longer use making its way out of the house. We do tend to hoard things when we have space, but we've kept things like an old showerhead. Why? Because we could, which is not a good reason.
The freeze dryer won't ship until January. Harvest Right is shipping five to seven weeks out at this point, so I put down a deposit to get the sale price and will pay the balance at a time to try to have it shipped after Christmas when shipping may be less hectic. That gives me plenty of time to clean out and rearrange downstairs. One of the upsides is I'll be doing the rearranging on my own with no help from Himself, so it will be done my way to suit me.
Is a freeze dryer worth an outlay of $3,000? I guess I'll find out in the new year.
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)
Lemon balm is also a medicinal herb. For my purposes, I steeped leaves in avocado oil to make a skin ointment for this winter. Basically, I made my own knock-off of Burt's Bees cuticle conditioner.
To do this I dried lemon balm leaves and stuffed as many as possible into a four-ounce Ball jar and covered them with oil. I let it steep for four weeks. Then I strained the oil and discarded the leaves, getting about half a cup of essential oil. Because this is a topical product, I added a bit of purchased lemon oil until I had the fragrance I wanted, and then added one-eighth cup of pure beeswax. Then I set a bowl inside a bowl using hot water to passively melt the beeswax. While this was working, I cleaned out the little mason jar.
When the wax was completely melted, I used a coffee stir stick to stir the mix and carefully poured it back into the jar, sealed it, and let it cool. The result is something that immediately made the dry skin on my hands feel softer. I think the oil is absorbed and the beeswax stays on top to seal it in. It puts a little bit of gloss on natural nails, too. It smells both lemony and "green." I can't wait to use it on my elbows and heels.
A darker, amber jar might be a better choice to store the product in, but I didn't have any. Nor did I have a tin available. But since I'll store this in a drawer, away from sunlight, my light blue Ball jar should be fine.
Most recipes for an herbal ointment like this call for olive oil, but I didn't want that scent alongside the lemon. I don't know why grape seed oil won't work with this, either. Any mild oil without much of a scent should work, but you should test it out to make sure you don't have a reaction to it. Same for any herb leaves you use - test them first. The less beeswax you add, the softer the end product, but I wanted a firmer end product, similar to the cuticle conditioner I've used for many years.
So that's my latest experiment here at the manor. Next up, I'm doing a similar project with calendula. Stay tuned.
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)
It was a busy morning!
At first, I thought I'd can the potatoes but after a brief discussion with the man of the manor, I decided to go the diced route. The potatoes were just on the cusp of beginning to go soft so this was a good way to save them. They will make great home fries or even potatoes and eggs.
The cheesecake was done on a whim and is the dessert for Sunday dinner, which will be something with meatballs. I had one jar that didn't seal because I think I tightened the ring down too far. I could freeze that batch, but meh. Let's eat them! As for the jarred meatballs going into the pantry, as the price of ground beef rises, I'll have six dinners at yesterday's beef prices. I have another five-pound pack of ground beef (88/12) to brown off and then decide if I want to freeze it or can it in pints.
It was a labor-intensive morning, but it was for a good cause - my pantry.
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)
I'm no more or less spiritual than anyone else, and I don't wear my beliefs on my sleeve (or t-shirt). The main reason for that is I refuse to be sucked into a debate by individuals who want to "explain" to me how wrong I am.
I don't debate. I know what I know from experience and critical thinking. I may not know everything but I do know that nowhere in the religious texts I've read does it say, "Thou shalt be and act stupid."
There is another thing I do know: God removes people from your life for a reason and he only removes people who are holding you back, not people you need.
Knowing this doesn't mean I don't have questions. My best friend for many, many years moved five states away. Was it me who no longer needed her, or she who no longer needed me? The last time I had any contact with her was in May of this year. The last words out of her mouth were, "I'll call you." I'm still waiting on that call.
Yes, I could call her but there seems to be a perverse streak in my nature that wants to see if this time, she'll follow through on her words. It's not the first time she told me she'd call me and didn't. I'm hurt enough by it I worry I'll unleash bitter words on her if I call her.
As for my on-the-job friends, it's my decision to retire fully so I guess I'm walking away from them. It's up to me to develop ways to stay in touch with them and for them to accept the changes and reciprocate. If they don't, I need to let go.
What I fear - well, fear isn't the exact word. What would sadden me is to reach out to someone I've known for years and get only a cursory response instead of the lively conversation of years past. That's probably inevitable when the glue that held the friendships together is dissolved.
Retirement is my choice so I guess I'm being removed from their lives, at least on a daily basis. Perhaps it is my time to step aside.
I'm impatient to have retirement happen. I feel poised on the edge of new adventures in my writing, life at Holly Tree Manor, and in friendships. My writing has been frozen since my writing partner died. I've tried to remain friends with a group of writers but it's not the same as that one friend who wrote so similarly to me it's difficult to tell who wrote what in those books we co-wrote. We truly clicked and I doubt I'll ever have that again. I'm eager to get to where I have the time to write without having to check my work email every twenty minutes, lose focus, and not be able to pick up the story again.
Sage words we've all heard are, "when one door closes, another opens." It's hard to hold internal panic at bay when you see the door closing but you can't see the opening on the other side. You know where you want the door to lead, but what if it doesn't?
And I suppose if God tells me stepping into my future means removing people from my life, I'll have to go with it and not run after them. It's not my master plan, after all.
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)
Lately, my thoughts have also been dwelling on the nature of friendship. I know a lot of people. Social media has extended everyone's circle but those closest to me are still those I've had a flesh, blood, and bone relationship with since my youth. There is time and distance between some of us now, but we can pick up the conversation like that space never exists. My writer friend in Alabama is a prime example of that. Just thinking about her makes me want to charge up the phone and call her. We haven't chatted for far too long, and sometimes an email isn't enough. I want to hear her laughter.
What troubles me these days is the nature of the social media relationship with mental health and the effect it has on friendships. I see social media in its many forms as a valuable tool. As a writer, it helps me promote my books and gives me insight into what people with vastly different perspectives think. (Yes, that gets scary.) The Internet has brought a group of friends to me, people I never would have gotten to know otherwise. I value my modern-day pen pals.
But being in a time of introspection, I wonder if a few of them have become toxic. My life seems to have diverged from theirs. I like to think of myself as mature, but sometimes those ill-advised jabs tossed at me hurt and the sting doesn't lessen. I'm suddenly callused about what I now view as their insignificant concerns. To be truthful, I'm not one to forget a slur even after being tendered an apology. I can forgive because I understand the imperfections of human nature, jealousy being a prime candidate to toss nasty barbs at someone you call "friend."
Have I grown through having these Internet friendships? Perhaps. Would I have grown in the same manner without them? Perhaps. I still mourn the loss of my friend author Chris Grover, with whom I had daily email conversations. Would I have made different decisions and followed different paths without my Internet friends? I think that's unlikely. My feet are firmly planted on a path I laid out for myself decades ago and one I've never wavered from wanting.
So why am I frequently troubled by the nature of some of these long-standing "friendships?" Perhaps it's because some of those barbs show a surprising lack of tolerance with my choice to delve deeper into the heritage of my country lifestyle.
And perhaps it's all me. Maybe I have grown and they feel left behind, outstripped. That, too, is simply life. There is no going back, at least not for me.
The Lady of The Hideaway
It's almost a joke here on the manor. Yes, Himself is very handy to have around because there is very little he can't repair once he puts his mind to it. I like that in a man, I really do. But sometimes the time, and the inclination, get away from him and those "promised" repairs do not happen nor will they ever happen.
After almost thirty years, I'm well aware of what will and what won't get fixed.
Today we were in the shed preparing some spray to *murder death kill* any bug living near the patio, and we were discussing the need to tidy-up the implements hanging on the pegboard. The next thing I knew, I had a truckload of junk to take to the dumpster.
I'm not sure how it happened, who said what or what started the de-cluttering, but I'm really glad it happened.
Maybe next weekend it will happen again. #hopeful
The Lady of The Hideaway
_*_*_*_
I could have blogged about the 20th anniversary of September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States of America, but I truly have little to add that has not already been said. If you can't see that tragedy has been compounded by more tragedy, you don't want to know my opinion. If you do see the tragedy of the last eighteen months, then you know and I don't need to tell you what you already know.
This local orchard has been family-owned and operated for a few generations. I like to see that sort of stability. Anyway, I went and bought peaches.
These peaches were, no lie, bigger than my fist. I'd never heard of Bounty peaches, but they looked and smelled wonderful, plus they're a freestone variety. I've since learned they were developed at the USDA peach breeding program at Kearneysville, West Virginia, which is just a tad more than half an hour from the manor.
Once I had the peaches home, I immediately began to process them, canning them in pint jars. I got twenty-four pints of canned peaches and one batch of peach jelly. It was an intense two days but very much worth it.
With so many pints on the shelf, I won't need to can peaches again next year. I suspect it will take two pints to make a pie, but that's okay. I didn't want to process them in quarts and risk opening a jar to have peaches for dessert and not using the entire contents over the course of a few days.
Home-canned fruit is good in the sealed jar on the shelf for at least eighteen months. I personally am not worried about fruit that is jarred longer so long as the seal is intact.
And that's the key to safe consumption. The seal must remain intact. If you take a jar off the shelf and the lid falls or lifts off in your hand, throw the food out and sterilize the jar. Don't risk eating it. It rarely happens, but a seal can fail so be mindful of it.
I'm looking forward to canning apples, but that won't be such as intense process. Apples keep longer than peaches so I won't need to do them all at once. I'll also be putting apples in quart jars. Some of the newer varieties such as Gala are available now, but I want Stayman or Winesap which are older varieties and will, I hope, capture the flavor of my grandmother's pies.
Summer fruit and winter pies and cobblers. It's worth the work.
If you want to learn more about canning, please visit the National Center for Home Food Preservation at https://nchfp.uga.edu/. This is your preserving bible.
The Lady of The Hideaway
My foremothers always had abundant patches of Black-eyed Susan. It's a hardy, free-seeding plant and gives a lovely pop of bright yellow to the August flower garden. Back in the day, I was given a baggie full of seeds and told to simply scatter them on the ground. I did and the next year I had lovely flowers.
These days, I'm down to one plant but now I have hope! For the first time in years, the deer have not come in close enough to eat the buds before they flowered. I have hope of harvesting a crop of seeds to scatter over the manor.
Black-eyed Susan may be an old-fashioned flower, but I like it. It comes back every year and spreads on its own (usually). Maybe I'll get lucky and end up with a patch to rival that of my grandmother.
Old-fashioned? No. Black-eyed Susan is the stuff of memories living and blooming today.
The Lady of The Hideaway
My grandmother always canned peaches. It didn't matter if she still had a few jars left over from the previous year, when the peach harvest was happening, peaches were processed. My grandfather had a couple of dwarf peach trees, but there were problems when he'd only bring in a few peaches at a time. Processing just two or three quarts of anything at a time is labor and time-intensive. I don't like to preserve anything if I can't fill the canner.
That's a problem I won't have. Having been an eyewitness to what the deer can do to fruit trees, I never planted any. Nor will I. If you'd like to read The Apple Tree Story, it's over at Between the Keys. True story, too, and it explains why I won't bother with fruit trees.
But back to the question of the day. Do I go to the orchard and get a bushel of peaches? I can make a batch of peach jam, peach pepper jam, maybe a peach chutney, peach pie filling, and plain peaches. If I do it this year, I'm likely set for peaches for the next two, possibly three years. We're told that home-canned foods are good for eighteen months, but the truth is it lasts longer if the seal is intact. Would I stretch it past three years? Probably not, but two years isn't a problem for me.
I'm leaning towards doing peaches. It'll add variety to our winter menu, something we desperately need. We're like most people in that we gravitate toward the "easiest to cook" menu. I want to do better and better needs to include peaches.
The good news is I won't need to try to do everything today. There's time to join Himself for a cup of coffee before I head out to the orchard. I want to make a few phone calls to see which storefront has what variety and for how much. I know I want a freestone variety and not a cling. I think my grandmother preferred Red Haven, but there are newer varieties out there.
Home food preservation is a brave new world to me. My grandmother would be amazed at the changes in our foods and the shortcuts we now have to "putting up" canned goods.
For better or worse, peaches, here we come!
The Lady of The Hideaway
Keep our distance. Right. Some family members are idiots.
The reunion was held at a local park that has a nice pavilion. It's covered but not enclosed. A light, persistent breeze kept us cool and I wondered did it blow the germs away from us or did it bring the germs to us? Such a wonderful musing to have on a Saturday afternoon.
With my husband's limited mobility, if I'd declared I wasn't going, he could not have gone as he would not be able to get there on his own. His youngest brother would probably have seen his power chair loaded and unloaded, but I'm not sure Himself would have asked. The man does exhibit stubborn pride at the wrong times.
In these uncertain times, having the reunion could be considered an acceptable risk. We need family. We don't need family who are careless about respecting individual space and I did observe some of that. One of my sister-in-laws is the driving force behind maintaining the reunion even as participation waned in the pre-Covid days. Insisting everyone form a circle and hold hands for prayer, something responsible church leaders avoid these days, was foolish of her. (We did not join in this.)
The fact that Himself declined to be part of the prerequisite poker game told me how uncomfortable he actually was. Dealing with my own ambivalence about going probably kept me from seeing his. As he has become the family Patriarch, he felt pressured to go. Once there, he refused to be cajoled into staying too long even though he may not be able to attend many more reunions as his health continues to slowly decline. I get it. He needed to see his family and that made a short stay an acceptable risk.
The Covid-19 pandemic has everyone thinking differently about family, about personal safety, about personal rights. The government is likely to soon require us to show our papers - proof of vaccination. And now we are learning that even being vaccinated isn't always enough as reports of "breakthrough" cases are increasing daily. We have perhaps accepted a poison into our bodies that will prove to have little protection as this virus continues to mutate on its programmed path.
Do any of us approve of the way the world is turning? I fear some holding positions of power do. If I'm lucky, I have another twenty years in this world. I pray we can keep anarchy at bay that long. To do that, families need to stick together even to the point of risking serious illness.
Yesterday really brought it home to me just how scary the time we're living in is.
The Lady of The Hideaway
Guess who "won?"
Seriously, I whipped his ass. I suppose now he'll stop nattering at me to go plink with him.
#men
The Lady of Holly Tree Manor
PS. Note to any copperhead living nearby - I will find you. There is nowhere you can slither to escape me and Walther.
