Fighting Fire with Fire

I'm down in the dumps but, oddly, do want to blog.  But, my mood does not bode well for any chirky posts, so what to write?  Well, it just dawned on me:  fight fire with fire.

I was just trying to organize some of the many digital pictures here on my computer:  putting the "loose" ones into their appropriate folders.  So, in the spirit of bah-humbug, I am going to post all the depressing pictures I can find amongst the "loose" ones.  (All 1,137 of 'em.  Really.  I just counted.)

First, I'm gonna run out and do nighttime chores, though.  Be back in a sec'.

Okay, here goes:

Depressing:  I was supposed to get Tom's passport renewal off ages ago.  Now, I don't even know where his passport is.  It was somewhere . . . here . . . on my desk . . . .  (Nice mugshot, eh?)

Depressing:  This fabric pie carrier was made for me by a dear, now-departed woman.  After it carried this pie, Maisy smelled the apple pie ooze on it, pulled it out of the laundry, and chewed it beyond repair.

Depressing:  During the Christmas snowstorm, our back-up plow truck's (and only other truck) transmission hemorrhaged.  Now we have no back-up plow truck . . . nor any other truck with which to pull the main truck out if it gets stuck.









Depressing:  This was the morning harvest from ONE night's worth of garden slugs who commited Harry Carry in the cheap beer I'd set out for just that purpose.  September '09.





 




Depressing:  While hurrying to get ready for one of the Christmas art festivals, I lit my finger on fire while starting the woodstove.  What the . . . ?!


 
 

















Depressing:  This is how big my broccoli got this past summer.







 





Depressing:  This is the big, beautiful pond I always dreamed of.  It doesn't hold water. 







 



Depressing:  To enjoy the outdoors during the summer here, a bug shirt & being covered head-to-toe, no matter the temperature, is required. 



And, one final depressing note to end this depressing day . . . .




 
Depressing:  Thinking the huge, 4' square pile of ashes you shoveled out of the wood furnace a couple of days ago are cool . . . and then placing the large in-ground, animal-grade "pond" (that you just bought for the ducks & geese and hauled 3 hours home from Menards) over it in order to keep the ashes from flying around in the high winds.  And then going out in the morning & realizing that those ashes weren't so cold, after all.

Mama Pea's Garden

My mom, blogging over at A Home Grown Journal, has been lamenting what she claims is the sad, sad state of her garden. She's even told her readers, "I bet mine [garden] tops yours in being the best of the worst."

Well, I just need to set the record straight by saying, "Are you KIDDING ME?!"


I took these pictures on Tuesday, and you can see one of the little peanuts I nanny for visiting Grandma JJ and Papa Roy (who helped her with her favorite activity: picking [and eating, of course!] strawberries fresh from the garden). But, what you also see is what mom calls "my poor, sad garden that seems to be waging a losing battle this year."

See what I mean when I say, "Puleeze?"


Her "poor, sad garden" would beat nearly ANY other garden out there (ESPECIALLY gardens in this thoroughly not-conducive-to-gardening part of the state).

She and I were discussing soil quality later that day, Mom explaining to me what humus is, the importance of it, etc., etc. (and, no, it's not the garlicky stuff made with Chick Peas - that's hummus). I said, "See!? This is exactly why YOU should be a Master Gardener!" To which she replied, "No! This is exactly why I SHOULDN'T! I don't know what I'm doing: I just wing it!"

Riiiiiight. But, I'll shut up now and let the pictures speak for themselves. ;)

A Wonderfully Lazy Saturday Morning

I am enjoying the ultimate in decadence this morning. In my comfy pink bathrobe and lambswool bedroom slippers, I am nestled under a wool blanket that my husband bought for me one Christmas years before we were married. I've built a crackling little wood fire here in the sunroom while the front door in the main part of the house is wide open, allowing the dogs & cat to come and go at will through their flap cut into the screen door. Beside me is a quickly dwindling cup of coffee fresh off the cookstove percolator . . . and a junky white donut. Ahhhh, bliss. ;)

We had that one miserable-hot week near the end of June but, since then, it's been cool again. Lovely for humans, not so good for the garden. It's 58 degrees outside this morning and just 61 inside . . . which is why the little fire feels so good!

Outside, the first of the peony blossoms opened this morning. Tom's dad, Ernie, had quite the green thumb and always grew beautiful flowers that lined the lawns at both their house in town and out at the lake. When Tom and his brother sold the house in town following Ernie's passing two-years-ago-this-fall, we dug up two of the peonies and one teensy maple sapling from the yard. We weren't sure how they would transplant from the temperatures that they were used to in southwestern MN to northeastern MN, but they've all three been successful. The peonies didn't bloom at all last summer, their first, but I'm glad: seems they were rebuilding their core strength. Anyway, it's a real joy to see the brilliant pink of the peonies, and I always take time to give 'Ernie's tree' an extra look when I cross the front walkway between the two south-facing decks.

In the field around my garden, the Sweet William is in full bloom, and the lupines are beginning to show more pod than blossom. I've seen the Goldenrod shooting up, but no blooms yet.

There's a large bush at the entrance to my garden which I've loved since I found it a couple of years ago. Last year (or was it the year before?), I pruned it in the spring, hoping it would grow lusher and more compact. It worked - the blossoms were thick and tight. Then, the runty little yearling moose we named Morty and only saw for a few weeks, came along and chomped all the blossoms RIGHT OFF. Hmph. But, who knows? Maybe Mother Nature knew best . . . because this year, it is lush and lovely. I haven't lost any of the blossoms (knock on wood), and they are now forming berries. The only problem is that I don't know what it is! My Dad tagged it as an Elderberry, but the one resource I looked at then to identify it as such was definitely NOT accurate. Since then, though, I've found some online Elderberry references that DO look remarkably similar to it. So, Dad may have been right! (I know, should I ever have doubted him?) ;) Anyway, I'll post some pictures that I have of it on my other computer and then you all can add your two cents. If it IS elderberry . . . what can I make with it? Jam? Wine? Have any recipes you'd like to share?

Speaking of jam, the wild thimbleberry production is WAY up this year, and if the berries ever get enough sun and warmth to turn their salmony-pink, I want to pick enough to try to make jam. I know they are generally tart enough that they take a huge amount of sugar, but still . . . . Again, any recipes you'd like to share?

Hang on, my fire needs tending to . . . . (Seems I need to take out the ashes.)

My favorite husband is finally home here at Swamp River Ridge (currently enjoying the flannel sheets that a lazy Saturday morning in bed has to offer). Until last Sunday at 3:00 AM, he hadn't been home since June 20th! Following a week-long house/dog-sitting stint for him, we drove down to Minneapolis on Saturday, June 27th, for the family reunion. Sunday night, we drove back up to Duluth and stayed at a dumpy motel (yes, it IS worth the extra $20 or so for a nice place!) in order to be at the airport at 6:00 AM for his 3-stage flight to Durango, CO. (Duluth to Minneapolis, Minneapolis to Denver, Denver to Durango.)

There, on June 29th, Tom began his two-week "interview" with this consulting firm based out of Houston (and Denver and Aztec, NM where he was). (And, no, we still don't know anything regarding whether or not he has the job. We're guessing that it's dependent on whether or not the company gets this particular contract in Ghana which would take 4-6 men out of "the field" in New Mexico . . . thus requiring replacements, i.e. Tom + a few others. Keep your fingers crossed!)

Anyway, he returned to Duluth on Friday, the 10th, and - after they lost his luggage somewhere in Denver (which, incidentally and we know now, is an airport infamous for losing luggage) - arrived into town just after noon on the 11th (thank you, B. duNord!).

I, in turn, pulled in to my folks' yard just after 2:30 that afternoon, wishing there was the time for a proper hello and "Hi, Honey! How ARE you?" after 3 weeks of being apart. Instead, it was, "Here's a razor, shaving lotion, and a toothbrush. Here are your clothes. Jump in the shower and get changed!" We all had to be at a wedding by 3:30!

Fast-forward past the large church wedding and the poor woman passing out just as the service ended. She was carried out on a stretcher. "See," I said, continuing to fan myself with my program as I had been all afternoon, my pearls sticking unpleasantly where they lay on my neck, "I TOLD you it was hot in there!" Let's hope she was suffering from nothing more than a particularly nasty hot flash, too, but given her age . . . .

Anyway, off to the 400-guests-strong reception we went. The rented tent had 5 (count 'em, F-I-V-E) peaks, it was so huge! And, allowing for seating for 400 guests, the head table, a small dance floor, an overflowing gift table, and two buffet tables . . . it was necessary! (Also, keep in mind, for comparison's sake, that the wintertime population of town is only 1,500 - 2,000 people, all tolled!)

The food, once we finally gave up waiting for our table to be properly "released" and just jumped in line, was FAB-OO-LOUS, no pun intended. Check out the website of one of my high school girlfriends, Fabulous Catering. (She's catered to some of the famous: Jessica Lange & Mikhail Baryshnikov's daughter's wedding and, just last fall, The Republican Convention. Pretty good for a small town girl who used to cook at our restaurant, huh?!) She came up to do the food, and was preparing it outside on a MASSIVE wood-fired grill. I don't know HOW she got the pounded chicken breast SO tender, but it was melt-in-your-mouth. She said she marinated it all the 6 hours up from Minneapolis, but still. It was heavenly. Word is, too, that she donated her services to the family as a wedding gift. Her folks are dear friends with the bride's parents, and her sister, who made the to-die-for wedding cakes (check her out here), was the flower girl at said parents-of-the-bride's wedding years ago.

Anyway, I digress. The yard in which the wedding reception was held and my parents' back yard share the same acreage. The parents of the groom are dear friends (their two children are identical twins). We figured that we could tell who was who at the wedding 'cause one would be in a tux . . . standing with the woman in white! But, when they were away from their respective ladies, both wearing tuxes, it was still impossible. Tom focused on their different colored sunglasses; I looked for a shiny, new wedding ring. :)

[Again, I got off on a tangent (as usual). Continuing with the story . . . .]

Months ago, the groom's father asked my dad and Tom if they would, as a wedding gift, be willing to ferry guests home / back to their motels, at the end of the night. He didn't want ANYONE drinking and driving . . . and made a speech as such at the beginning of the dinner. In addition, there's a very small Mom & Pop bus company that runs up and down the North Shore . . . who had given THEIR services as a wedding present. So, she (the "Mom" - as the "Pop" just died last year) began bussing folks around 8:00 PM. By this time, Tom, exhuasted from his past couple of weeks and most recent travel, was sound asleep on the couch in the middle room at my folks'. I, in turn, was sound asleep on their couch in the living room. Mom had changed out of her "wedding clothes" and was nearing the comfort of her jammies. Poor Dad was left to walk over, periodically, "checking in" on the situation.

The Mom & Pop bussing company stopped running when the bulk of the guests were throwing in the towel, around 10:00 PM. The remainders were the closest friends and family . . . the die-hards. Dad said that the line around the open bar never shortened, even as the majority of the guests said good-night. Finally, the DJ stopped at 1:00 AM. That was when my dad and Tom jumped into action, using Dad's two, comfy Suburbans that he had prepped just for the night. And, as it turned out, their runs were minimal and easy, both of them struggling to turn down the tips that tipsy, grateful men tried to shove into their hands. Tom ended up with a $5-er that he just couldn't return. ;)

It was a long night, especially for my dad who was kind enough to do all the "checking in", back and forth across the backyards during the evening. But, all in all, it was a special night, and it felt so good to help out friends.

By the time they both pulled into the yard after their last drops, it was 2:00 AM. Tom and I loaded the dogs into the car and headed home . . . flopping into bed at 3:00. Dawn would start breaking in about 90 minutes.

Welcome home, Honey!

Who Has the Time?

Now that summer is HERE, I know I don't hardly have the time to keep up on a FRACTION of the blogs I like to read, so how can I expect that anyone is reading mine? But, for the handful of you who still find the time, here's . . . not much (but it's all that time allows)!

Yesterday, Tom spent the day with one of our dear friends working on a 3-sided storage shed. I stopped by last night around 8:00 PM, and they had just finished.


Yesterday morning, there was nothing here but the four corner bases. They built the ENTIRE thing ALL . . . IN . . . ONE . . . DAY. Nothing was pre-made. Impressive, huh? 'Course, I told Tom that HIS problem is now that I've seen just how fast he can do a project like this, it should hardly be ANYTHING for him to pound together my greenhouse! ;)


The bugs (blackflies & mosquitoes) are HORRIFIC this year. I think we all anticipated (i.e. desperately hoped for) a "good" bug year since it was such a cool, late spring, but NO SUCH LUCK. I'm heading out soon here to work in the chicken yard and then the field garden, and I'll either be dousing myself with 100% DEET or covering myself in unbearably hot, non-breathable bug netting. What a choice - between the lesser of two evils.

Tom, meanwhile, is having what should be a typical Sunday: puttering around on odd jobs. He's already fixed the side door entrance light and the piece of gutter that fell off the roof. And pounded together a couple sections of crop covers for the field garden (to keep birds, chipmunks, etc. from eating the good stuff).

And now, I'm off, too. I got the pepper plants in yesterday. Today will be the broccoli & red cabbage & tomatoes (thanks, Mom, for starting all of these from seed!!). Tomorrow, maybe, I'll get to the onion sets & the potatoes. I'll get a couple of hours in on outside chores, and then I think we'll head to the lake 2 miles down the road. Fresh fish for dinner??

60 Days 'til . . . .

Today is the 25th. Of October. But it's the 25th, nonetheless. Know what that means? 60 short days until Christmas. AAAAAAAAAAAGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Then, KAPUT! Another year's come and gone, and I wasn't even ready for it to begin with! (How's that for a defeatist attitude?) As the cross-stitch sampler in the kitchen of my childhood read, "Someday we gotta get organized." And, I know they say that "some" of these days are "none" of these days, but still . . . that's what I strive for. Eternally, it seems.

Anyway!

The approaching deadline of bad weather did get me out into the yard yesterday for the bulk of the day. I planted ALL of the perennials I had to get into the ground save the 13 mums and 7 (or so) hostas that I need Tom to dig the holes for (they're in an area with what I expect to be SOLID ground). I hauled all the carnations and bulbs inside to plant. Even though the carnations were sold with the perennials, their tags indicate that they're annuals . . . so I just didn't want to risk it. A search of their website gave no further information, unfortunately. So, I'll see what luck I have with them here in southern-facing windows for the winter. And, I'm going to force the bulbs with the double intent of enjoying aromatic, beautiful blooms in the dead of winter PLUS being able to give them away as Christmas gifts.

I got a good bit of yard clean-up done, too. You know how some people wage war against dandelions? Well, my enemy is the dried, HUGE, ugly, MASSIVE stalks that summer's blooming Evening Primroses leave behind. Don't get me wrong, I really enjoy these plants in the summertime, but when they dry up and go to seed in the fall, they get U-G-L-Y. So, I pulled about 1/2 of them yesterday. It's satisfying work to see the yard getting cleaned up, but the stalks are 4 - 5' tall and grow in a wide-spread clump. (I.e., they're not easy to work with.) After I loaded them into the wheelbarrow (load after load, mind you), I trucked them up to the wood furnace and shoved 'em in. And, ahhh, what a satisfactory sizzling and popping they made! ('Course, the plants also dropped about a zillion - yep, I counted - minute seeds on their way to incineration, so there'll be plenty more plants to pull next fall.)

There had been the lightest of light mists coming down during the day yesterday, but it started raining in earnest by the time Tom got home. So, it felt good to lie in bed last night hearing the rain - knowing that I'd gotten the bulk of the fall planting done. And, in reality, the moisture will help soften the soil for the last holes we need to dig for the mums and hostas.

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I've started making jewelry (I know, in my spare time!), and this is my first attempt at earrings. The stone is lapis. I'm happy with 'em. Eventually, once I get the long-promised Chicken Mama Originals website up, these (earrings/jewelry) will be there for sale, too.

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Oh, and finally, I should address the fun new addition to this blog: our (for the under-25 crowd) avatars or . . . as I prefer . . . animated cartoon "selves"! They took a long time to make (especially the first one), but ohmygawd they were fun to do! My excuse for taking the time was that it was one of my 'recovering from being sick' days earlier this week. I think I got Tom spot-on (hee hee!), but I had a harder time with myself - especially my face. But, since I used an animation that keeps my face moving, you can't really tell. I'll have to work on improving that.

I have to say, though, that in doing this, I realized that this type of computer "toy" is DEFINITELY geared for the younger set! What were my two hints? Well, first, one of the "themes" you could choose from was '30+ Avatars' (cough, cough, splutter!). And, the second was that there were 5 body types to choose from for women, and the one I chose was THE HEAVIEST! Hahahahahahahahaha!!! I wanted my cartoon to be as realistic as possible, but this was the heaviest I could make myself! Oh, lordy . . . . (And so then, equally as scary, keep in mind that the four sizes other than the one I chose were smaller, small, teensy, and near-skeleton!) Ah, yes . . . .

Okay, onto checking account balancing and finishing the indoor carnation & bulb plantings.

Big Things = Busy, Busy!

Well! I'm sorry. We've been SO busy lately! As my pregnant girlfriend recently wailed, "I haven't even had time to cut my toenails!" (And, while my toenails aren't growing like hers are with the extra large dose of naturally-occurring hormones, you get the idea!)

Despite only having three posts so far, I'm loving Mama Pea's 'A Home Grown Journal' blog. Her most recent post - which, for her, may have been just a chit-chatty blurb about her strawberry patch - was a gardening lesson for me as I was reminded about pinching off the runners and blossoms the first year and mulching with this or that.

So, in order to update you, I need to go back in time to one cold morning in April when I went out to do chores. With the mash barrel nearly empty, the resident (chicken house) mouse had not been able to get out once he'd gotten in! While he'd had plenty to eat during the night, I think he was also plenty happy to see me come to rescue him! What a cute little guy! (Hmm, I wonder if he's the one Miss Kitty killed and ate last night?)

This next picture is from the beginning of April, too. Tom installed the only "real" interior door we have in the house: on "his" closet - the one in the utility room. And, even though I love Tom's handmade doors that hang throughout the rest of the house, I have to admit to a new favorite "sound": that of this closet door as the latch snaps into the jamb . . . a feature which none of the other doors have. Unfortunately, the dumb dogs still aren't used to the sound of a door closing IN the house and so tend to bark madly at the "intruder" every time Tom or I close it. (Sigh.)

A little (very little) more house progress took place mid-April when I began painting the sunroom. The first picture here is of the primer (the blue-grey color), and the next picture is of the "real" color - the green. The primer went on SO well, and I got really excited about the whole process.

But then, the green went on fairly poorly. It was gloppy and will DEFINITELY require a second coat. Such a disappointment after the ease with which the primer had been applied. The primer is a different brand than the green paint, and so I don't know if that's causing the difference or, maybe, the age of the paint. We bought the green paint almost two years ago and the primer just last year. But, never having been opened, paint doesn't go "bad" that quickly, does it?

Two Minor Notes of Interest

I picked and ate our first tomato today. It was a hanging cherry tomato that my mom started for me. Yummm! And, for those of you keeping track of such things, it's about 1 week earlier than my first tomatoes were down at Hastings-on-the-Lake.

And, good information to know about future dog breeds we might add to our furry family: Tom had a friend fly him down to southwestern Minnesota this past weekend to visit his dad, and so I took care of the friend's small horse . . . I mean, dog. Point being, said dog is the most massive Yellow Lab I've ever seen, but a short-haired dog, nonetheless. I tried to take all the dogs down to the river Saturday evening for a cooling swim, but the big galoot got NAILED by the horse flies. We didn't even make it halfway down the driveway before I realized it was a hopeless (and miserable) situation for him. So, be forewarned: no short-haired dogs with exposed underbellies in the bug-infested north!

(TJ, thank GOODNESS you and the four-legged kiddies missed horse fly season! And you thought the blackflies were bad! The poor pumpkins would have been carried away!)