Reptiles, Crustaceans, and Violet

 

This week I had the pleasure of spending three days with our six year old granddaughter. I brought her to my house early each morning and took her back to meet her mom each afternoon. I knew in advance that we would spend these days together so I planned activities and meals that I thought she would enjoy.Violet was a good sport and humored me and my plans but it was obvious she had her own ideas, which turned out to be a delight.

Violet knows where all of our craft supplies are kept and she had the dining room table covered in paper, colored pencils, markers, scissors, and tape before I had even had breakfast out. She drew tiny little shrimp, lobsters, ladybugs, and crabs. She cut them out with scissors. She drew larger versions of them. She taped them onto paper. She left them outside Steve's office door to surprise him. She put them in paper boxes that she made into little dioramas, and she painted them on rocks. She also painted one special rock with a red crab on it for her mother. This was wrapped up in a box with a red bow. For three days Violet drew lobsters, shrimp, crabs, and lizards. 

I put the "clothespin people" project I planned away for another day. We weren't going to need it. 

Aside from crafting, we played outside and walked through the hayed field up to the tree swing. Violet found a golf ball and asked if she could play golf. Steve found a club and she whacked the ball for a little bit. We picked blueberries, which she ate, we ran errands, and we went to the pool for two afternoons. She swims like a little fish and I could barely keep up. Needless to say, I was dead tired each night and I slept very well.

We had conversations while we crafted. One such conversation went like this:

Me: What shall we have for lunch?

Violet: Well, I don't eat animals, not even chickens.

Me: So what do you like?

Violet: I like steak, vegetables, and fruit.

Me: OK. You can get good nutrition that way. What do you have for lunch at your GanGan's house?

Violet: Hot dogs. I love hot dogs.

 

Violet: I do NOT like Malachi

Me: Is he a boy in your class? Why don't you like him?

Violet: Yes, he takes my hair scrunchie.

Me: Usually when a boy does that or teases you, it means he likes you.

Violet: (wide eyed in disbelief) 

Me: Yes. Boys will look for any kind of attention from you if they like you. Even bad attention.

Violet: (is left speechless. She needs to think about this for a while.) 

Fresh Dill Tzatziki Recipe

 I have found that once dill is sown in a garden, it need never be sown again. If the plants are allowed to go to seed, it will self-sow year after year. To save on space, we have our dill share a bed with the asparagus. The asparagus comes to harvest first, in early spring. Once the asparagus is all harvested, the dill has begun to emerge. To avoid overcrowding, I thin the young dill plants and begin using it. It keeps nicely in a jar of water on the windowsill. We use it in chicken salads, cream sauces and especially in Tzatziki. Tzatziki is a refreshing Mediterranean sauce made from plain yogurt, sour cream, cucumber, lemon, garlic, and dill. It is wonderful on toasted pita chips or on any type of pita sandwich. I also love it on Falafels. Here is our favorite Tzatziki recipe:

Fresh Dill Tzatziki

(Bon Appetit August 2004)

2 c. plain whole milk yogurt

1  12-oz. unpeeled English cucumber, halved lengthwise, seeded, coarsely       

     chopped

1 tea. coarse kosher salt

 ¼ c. sour cream

1 Tbl. fresh minced Italian parsley

1 Tbl. white wine vinegar

1 tbl. fresh lemon juice

2 ½ tea. minced, fresh dill

1 ½ tea. olive oil

1 small garlic clove, minced

Line sieve with 2 layers of cheesecloth; place over deep bowl. Spoon yogurt into sieve. Cover; chill sieve in bowl overnight.

Toss cucumber and 1 teaspoon salt in bowl. let stand I hour. Drain as much liquid as possible from cucumber, then pat dry with paper towels.

Transfer yogurt to bowl; discard liquid. Mix cucumber into yogurt. Mix in remaining ingredients. Season with salt and pepper. Cover; chill 1 to 4 hours.

 Makes about 2 cups

 

Anticipation, Nature Takes Care of It, What's for Dinner

 

1. Christian McBride is a jazz bassist whose music is familiar to my husband but not to me. So, I can't imagine what this assortment of instruments will sound like once the musicians start playing them. The anticipation was fun and the performance was outstanding!

2. Rain showers roll in every afternoon. Tess and I begin a text conversation about whether new plantings will need watering tonight or not. A minute later the rain pours down and the question is answered.

3. A hamburger cooked on the grill then loaded with cheese, tomato, lettuce, pickles, ketchup, and mustard. It tastes like summer.   

All Things Golden

 

 1. A golden day hand stitching on Kay's screen porch with friends. A gentle breeze cooled the back of my neck while I completed my stitches. We enjoy such varied conversations and a sharing of ideas. I always look forward to these gatherings.

2. A mourning dove is nesting in the butterfly magnolia tree right outside our bedroom window.  She lets me peer out at her through the window. She is so well hidden that I can only see her profile, her golden brown feathers, and her perfectly round, black eye.

3. Daughter #4 and her husband are getting ready to move into their first home. It is an adorable 1930's bungalow located only a few miles away from us, in town. She sends me a photo of the brightly painted, green front door. She says her inspiration came from the colors at Goldenrod Kisses in York, Maine. That is a worthy, embraceable memory of a place we briefly called 'home'.

A Change of Weather, Night Tunes, Swimming

 

1. A change in the weather pattern has taken us from a very parched April to a lush May. I can hear the vegetation singing with joy for the deep watering.

2. I am surprised to hear our resident mockingbird singing his/her heart out at eleven o'clock at night. Do they ever sleep?! It sounds louder at night when everything else is darkly quiet. When I wake up in the morning, all the birds have joined the tune.

3. I got on the bandwagon and joined the water aerobics class last June. It is so much fun! We are literally a bunch of old kids splashing and moving and having fun...with a purpose. We are back in the outdoor pool until October. It is even more fun splashing in the warm sun. It makes me feel young and carefree.

Appalachian Trail Hikers

 It is that time of spring when the northbound Appalachian Trail  hikers pass through our county. They are hiking their way from Georgia to Maine, covering two thousand, one hundred and ninety-seven miles on foot. We often see them resupplying at the supermarket or resting against their backpacks on the sidewalk of the Outdoor Trails store. This week, we hosted two hikers at our house whom our daughter referred to us. I drove down to the supermarket to pick them up and brought them back up to our house. The weather had become rainy and they were all too happy to have an overnight respite, a warm shower, and a home cooked meal. In all of our interactions with through hikers over the years, we have found them to be polite, kind, and very interesting people. They are adventurous and happy. We admire their spirit for undertaking such a huge task. The qualities in these fine people always reinforce my faith in humanity.

Meet 'Styles' and Night Watch". Their trail names are given to them by other hikers for a particular reason and that is how they are known for the duration of their hike. They were a delight to host and we wish them Godspeed on their adventure.

 

Blue Ridge Ruggers 2024 Workshop

 My two friends and I completed our two day workshop for our rug hooking group with great success. Everyone was pleased with the box project we created. The looks of joy as everyone hooked and chatted gave me great pleasure. It is deeply satisfying to inspire creativity.  

We meet again in June and we will photograph the finished rug mats with some of their respective boxes. 

Fat quarters of wool

Wool cut into 1/4" strips ready to hook

 

 

Happy hookers!

Tutorial on how to transfer a pattern onto linen backing for those who have never done it.

Blue Ridge Ruggers

Alternate Universes, Where We Are Now, What Is Next?

 It seems that time is speeding ahead faster than I can keep up! I swear only yesterday I was ice skating and making a snowball and today I am planting a garden on a day that is too warm. I definitely lost March and April to some obscure place in my mind and it has been futile to try and recoup those lost months. It is time to get out of my head and just "do".

I attended a hand crafting retreat in Maryland last weekend that was purely fun and inspirational. The artists that were vending are so creative and kind. I spent much of the weekend on hand embroidery and applique but I also found gorgeous pieces of hand dyed wool from Katie Kriner at "The Bee and the Bear" to use in a rug that I have in mind to make. My friends and table mates were fun to be around and made for a lively weekend. One evening, we got lost trying to get out of a restaurant parking lot and I laughed so hard I had to beg my friend to stop circling the place or I would surely die laughing.

 I regrettably had to turn down an invitation from Audrey to accompany her, Tess, and Violet to Cape Charles this weekend.  There is just too much to do in the garden AND I have a workshop to run that begins on Monday for our rug hooking guild. We have overnight guests staying here for the workshop and  the rooms upstairs need freshening as well. So, I spent last evening getting seeds and peppers into the ground and potting flowers. Thank goodness it stays light outside until 8:00pm.

I am very excited about the rug hooking workshop. It has been months in the planning and we have a nice project lined up for our members. Kay's husband is a wonderful woodworker. He crafted lovely boxes for us that we then painted and antiqued. We designed seven, simple hooked mat patterns to fit on the lids and packaged everything up as a kit. It includes a box of their color choice, a piece of serged linen, transfer fabric, and the patterns. Lunches will be catered and we have a fun game to play along with door prizes. Hopefully I will have time to sit and hook and enjoy the company of so many talented ladies. We have almost every member of our guild attending with forty-three women signed up!

Life remains busy after this weekend but we will cross that bridge when we get to it. 

We offered the boxes in four color choices. They are a great size for storing all sorts of things.  I will use mine for storing seeds packets.