Ramping Up

 

 

               We’re ramping up for the end of the year holidays, Christmas and New Year’s Eve.  Thanksgiving is in the rear view mirror and I’m still full!  Ha ha!  Maybe it’s just that all the delicious food is sitting around my waist making my pants too tight?  Oh well! Maybe all the running around preparing for Christmas will remove some of that although part of preparations include lots of treats baking so…..oh well!  We did have a very nice time Thanksgiving Day, as we usually do.  It was weird being without brother Dan; this is the first Thanksgiving without him that we’ve been able to get together with anyone not living here, although he passed away June of 2020 during the shutdown.  We talked about him and told stories also about our loved ones no longer with us, and I think that’s part of any holiday family dinner.  It helps keep their memory alive and gives the next generation an idea of what kind of people they come from.  I think it’s comforting.

               We decorated outside the weekend after turkey day and that always is a cheery thing to do although a cold thing to do.  It was windy that day, too, so the wind chill was probably making it feel like it was in the 20’s. Of course, there had to be a quick run to the corner store for another string of lights and lots of hot coffee and turkey soup afterward to warm up. It was a fun thing to do with my daughter and her boyfriend helping.  A few days later we had a dusting of snow and that was nice, it made the deck tree and lights look pretty and Christmassy, and since it didn’t stick to the roads we didn’t mind it at all.  I wonder if we’ll have any snow for Christmas Day.  I really do like it when there’s a little snow on Christmas morning, but not so much that we need to shovel and our family can’t safely travel to get here.  I guess we shall see!

               I made a new wreath during a caregiver’s support group crafting zoom, and it was fun to do.  I hung it on the door to what will eventually be an office/guest room but is currently a holding room for things we don’t know what to do with.  I didn’t want to hang the wreath on the door because I’m afraid it wouldn’t survive the opening and closing of the front door. I plan to start decorating the inside of the house next week.

               I’ve been trying to get my gift shopping done early, partly because the news about supply chains is a little concerning, but mostly because I do have the time and would rather be able to take my time wrapping and avoid a last minute rush while I’m also trying to bake and prepare for Christmas dinner with my family.  I’m finding that the one thing stores don’t seem to be stocking this year is the candied fruits and fruit peel for fruitcake!  I happened to be in Walmart before Thanksgiving and saw the red and green cherries so I picked up a couple packs so I’d have them, but I wanted more because I also us them in a cookie recipe.  I have one more store to check and then I guess I have to either order from Amazon or just use what I have this year and make another kind of cookie.  It seems curious to me the things that are in short supply periodically since the pandemic began almost 2 years ago. It’s so hard to believe that’s how long we’ve been masking, and arguing about all things covid related, and staying away from others as much as we can while still living our lives. It’s a little bit wearying, but humans are resilient and I guess we’ll just keep on moving forward to the best of our abilities.  What else can we do, really?

I love my door cane, simple yet pretty. It was a gift from a coworker many years ago.

This is the wreath I made with the caregivers crafters. I like it, although it looks a little top heavy.

The light dusting of snow which made the deck tree look like Christmas morning.  My daughter and I made the foil chains as one big long chain when she was much younger.  I recall making them as a kid with my brother Dan.

Autumnal Words and Pictures

 

These mushrooms were growing in all areas of the yard, this particular clump was by the driveway.  I guess all the warm, wet weather we had this fall made them grow.  They're an interesting shape and color, I think.

I made these wind chimes at a Zoom caregivers craft meeting.  It was fun, but the invisible thread we used proved challenging for me.  When I removed it from the bag of supplies dropped off at my house by the moderator I figured I was going to be in trouble.  First, I couldn't find the end on the spool so ended up using a box cutter to slice some to get it started.  Then I had a tough time tying the knots to connect the shells to the ring at the top. I ended up finishing it the next morning after Hillary left because I was the only one not done at the end of the meeting, and despite assurances that nobody minded waiting for me to finish, I declined and said I'd finish in the morning because my eyes were tired which was the truth.  So anyhow I worked on it in the morning and as I'm trying to tie knots in invisible thread my brother, who is a man of many talents and writing science fiction adventure is his current project, was texting me about time travel and how it relates to the characters and the universe he's built for the story collection he's doing.  I think that pretty much sums up our lives--I try to tie knots in invisible thread so things don't fall apart, and he creates new worlds.  Somehow it all works.   

I made this cake because I had invited the above brother's family over for a Saturday afternoon of comfort food.  I made my mother's recipe macaroni and cheese (with just a couple of my own tweaks), her coleslaw, and bought some hearty rye bread because that is how she always served it and my sister in law loves that meal.  As it turned out, her mother passed away from end stage Alzheimer's and other health problems the night before so it was extra nice to be able to comfort her with our company and food.  I sent everyone home with leftovers.  I will include the recipe for the mac and cheese and coleslaw at the end of this post.

I stopped at the library one day on the way home from grocery shopping and took the picture of this tree.  Just because I thought it was pretty set against the blue sky.

It’s been a pretty busy season so far, what with things breaking down (still!) and running back and forth to feed Hillary at lunch time and just life in general.  I’m still trying to get a handle on all the clutter in the closets and laundry room and other places where it’s tucked away.  I’ve taken numerous trips to the clothing donation bins and soon I’ll be stopping at Goodwill with some household items we no longer use but are in great shape; hopefully someone else can get good use of them!  The patient hoist is dying on us and it was a couple weeks of playing phone and email tag with the repair company to get on the service visit schedule.  They are the only company in our area and the surrounding areas that does this, so they are very busy always, and I did look to see if I could call someone else but no luck so we are praying this hoist doesn’t give out all together before they can come---5 more days!  At any rate, we are gearing up for Halloween weekend which honestly I don’t expect to be much of a thing as our town has a big trick or treating event at the school to keep the kids safe and off the many roads in town without sidewalks.  Still, I bought candy just in case. Maybe this year we’ll have a few more kids, we’ll see.

Mom's Macaroni and Cheese

3 T butter + 1 T oil

3 T flour

2 C milk

3/4 - 1 C starchy water from the macaroni

16 oz block extra sharp yellow cheddar, shredded

1 16 oz pkg elbow macaroni

saltine crackers, approximately 1/2 stack

Cook macaroni according to pkg directions, retaining 1 C of the cooking liquid before draining. Set aside.  Melt butter & oil over low heat, stir in flour and cook together until very light brown. Whisk in milk a little at a time until smooth, cook until slightly thickened and small bubbles appear around the edges; stir in cheddar. Salt and pepper to taste.  Let  cook a few minutes to thicken slightly and add the starchy water, stirring to combine. Remove from heat and stir together with the drained macaroni in a large buttered casserole dish. Crush the crackers and spread over the top.  Bake in a 350* oven 30 minutes or until crackers look toasted and the cheese bubbles around the edges. Serve and enjoy!

Mom's Simple Cabbage Salad

1 small head cabbage

1/2 - 1 cup mayonnaise (depends on how moist you want it) 

1/4 cup sugar (more or less according to your taste)

Shred the cabbage and place in a bowl large enough to allow for mixing.  Sprinkle in the sugar and stir in the mayonnaise. Cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Pizza is Fun!

 

I really like pizza, as I think most people do (I have a brother who won’t touch it, so I can’t say everyone likes it!).   It’s a staple at kids parties, creates long cafeteria lunch lines on pizza day at schools across the land, is a primary source of nutrition for teenagers and college students, and who can say getting with friends as an adult and ordering in or making your own pizza isn’t fun and easy?  There are even pizzas for special dietary needs, whether it is gluten free, vegan, or keto friendly they are readily available in restaurants and supermarkets as well as recipes on the internet if your area doesn’t have special ones easily attainable.  Some regions feature deep dish, some thick crust, some thin crust, and some ultra-thin crispy crust.  I prefer thin crust, as growing up in New Jersey in close proximity to New York City, our region is arguably where the best pizza can be found; it is what I grew up on and is my favorite to this day.

               When I was a kid our family had game night every Saturday and it always included pizza. I can vividly recall watching my mother munching away on a slice of cheesy, saucy goodness and laughing over something someone said or did. It was an important job for one or another of my brothers to go with my father to Dominick’s Pizzeria to pick up our order.  One time my brother Dan dropped the box as they exited the pizza place and so they had to wait while another one was made.  If I went on a sleepover at my friend Joan’s house, we’d have pizza for dinner and then munch on the cold leftover slices in the morning before her mother woke up and made us pancakes for breakfast.   When I moved out on my own, I survived mostly on pizza as it was cheap, delicious, and readily available in the strip mall where I worked at a donut shop.  Sometimes the boss would treat us all to pizza on a busy day, and sometimes we’d all go out for an evening on the weekend and start at Dino’s with what we referred to as a “garbage pie” because it had every topping available on it.  It was so much fun!  When my girls were young we had pizza and TV every Friday night, and they could earn a monthly pizza voucher from a national chain by reading books. When I worked as a lunch lady in an elementary school pizza day was the most popular day for the kids to buy hot lunch and we made trays and trays of square pizza slices.  Later when I worked at the high school cafeteria and pizza was offered every day it remained a popular item likely to sell out by the end of the day.  Now when we get together with friends and family we’re just as likely to order some pizzas as we are to cook for each other.  There’s just something uplifting about that tasty crust slathered with piping hot rich tomato sauce and ooey gooey strings of melted cheese hanging off the edges of each wedge shaped slice.  I’d have to say that it’s the one food I have many happy memories about.

               There are many foods that people associate with good times, but I think pizza is number one.  In fact, I think I might have to have some today, and I bet you want some now, too.  Hurray for pizza!!!

My hubby and me with our long time friends who we've shared many pizzas with over the years.

A tranquil scene from our local park where I went walking one recent morning. It has nothing to do with pizza, but the geese might enjoy some pieces of the crust to fuel their trip south.

Farewell Summer 2021

 

               It was such a hot, humid, uncomfortable summer and I am happy to see it go! I really just didn’t enjoy most of it this year, I was too busy being cranky because it was not weather I’m comfortable in. It seems pretty silly now, but that’s probably because beautiful cooler fall weather is here.  September was another fairly busy month, we had Hillary’s birthday, (she had 3 small parties!), and in those waning days of the heat our air conditioning broke and couldn’t be repaired so we had to replace it.  This has been our year for expensive things needing repair or replacing!

               Part of the air conditioning unit is in the attic right outside the door to Hillary’s room in the dining room.  It’s a tight space, and not a big surprise that one of the workmen doing the installation slipped and sent part of the dining room ceiling crashing to the floor.  Thankfully nobody was injured and he didn’t fall through, and I had already gotten Hillary up and into the living room to wait until time to leave for her day program.  It did, however, leave a gaping hole with gross looking insulation hanging down which my brother referred to as an “attic cat”.  Ha ha! My brother can really be a smart aleck!  So for a week we had workmen in the house.  They were pleasant, and did a great job, but there’s always a mess to clean after any home improvement.  I think I’ll be finding dust for months to come in spite of wielding broom, vacuum, and mop when everything was done.  The chattiest guy was the contractor the HVAC company hired to repair the hole in the ceiling.  He looked like Shaggy from the Scooby Doo cartoons, and had lots to say about any subject that popped into his head.  I learned that his girlfriend is selling her house and moving to North Carolina, but I’m not clear on whether or not he’s moving there with her, or just helping her sell her house here and find a new one there.  He drives his 91 year old mother to lunch every day, and helped an 82 year old friend pack up and move to a senior living community.  His friend seems to be  feeling sad and isolated so he’s (Shaggy) thinking of starting a game night with friends at the 82 year old’s new apartment to keep him socially active and sharp of mind.  Shaggy’s a nice person, and he did a great job doing the repair, but I was exhausted after he left from all the conversation.  Of course, I’d rather have someone like that working in my house than a cranky, swearing under his breath, in a big hurry to leave person.  I didn’t take his picture, of course, but there is a before and after of the hole below.

               It was also Daughter’s Day, which is probably a holiday made up on social media, but it was an opportunity to share a picture of and say something nice about my girls so I figured, what the heck?  That picture is also below.  I didn’t include any pictures of the birthday parties, and by some standards they weren’t really parties, but in our little corner of the world if you send in cupcakes on someone’s birthday that’s a party.  If you buy a little cake and write “Happy Birthday” on it, add candles, have some gifts for the honoree, that’s a party too even if there’s only 3 of you besides the birthday girl.  Also, if you invite 3 more people on a different day, put out snacks, order pizzas and have an ice cream cake and sing “Happy Birthday”, that’s a party too.  So those were Hillary’s 3 parties to celebrate her.  We all deserve to be celebrated by family and friends, don’t you think?

               So I say farewell to Summer and hello to Autumn!  I love the chilly dry air and brilliant sunshine, and the cool rainy days as well.  I can’t wait for all the colors to come to the trees and see that first heavy frost coating the grass.  It’s so refreshing!

                                                             Attic Cat

                                                        Much better!

                            Fierce, brave, and each special in her own way.

Thunder Storm

 

The poem above is a fanciful way of thinking about a thunder storm.  With our recent events of torrential rain and massive, deadly flooding, I wouldn’t want anyone to think I was making light of that.  It was written during a regular old thunderstorm such as we get during the summer when the hot days are humid as well and result in storms cropping up, not during the remnants of a hurricane.  So imagine a run of the mill thunder storm on a hot hazy summer afternoon, and kids forced inside the house by the weather, and that is the context.

Growing up, it was not unusual for me and my younger brother, sometimes my older brothers as well, to be running around outside in the summer in our bathing suits in the rain, splashing in puddles and having a fun time.  I suspect it may have been my mother’s idea to get herself a few moments of peace from her 4 rambunctious kids on a rainy summer day.  We had so much fun doing that! I don’t know if any of my friends did that, but I suspect not since I’d never seen any other kids outside when we were out there playing in the rain.  (I see those memes often about learning to dance in the rain—I think that’s the way I was raised, I don’t need to learn it now.)  At the first rumble of thunder, however, we ran inside to dry off and have a snack.  I don’t know who told us this, or if one of us thought it up ourselves, but we said the thunder was the angels bowling.  I always envisioned the scene with golden haired angels with flowing white gowns and gossamer wings in a white fluffy cloud filled bowling alley having a great time rolling the balls down the alley toward the pins and strike after strike being scored.  I still like to picture that in my mind, after all, why wouldn’t there be a bowling alley in heaven?  The angels have to do something to pass the time, and a bowling party may as well be one of the things they enjoy.  We used to say the rain was their tears (I added the thought of joyful crying instead of sad crying) and in the winter we said the angels had dandruff when the snow was flying.  It’s pretty silly, but we never lacked for imagination in our house.  My brothers and I invented many games together when we were stuck inside on inclement days, everything from lining up the kitchen chairs and pretending we were on a train to one of us being the animal keeper while the remaining 3 were the animals being fed dry cereal from bowls on the floor (I’m chuckling while remembering this), to going into the basement and playing hide and seek.  The one thing we always managed to do was have fun together.

          We’ve had our share of thunderstorms lately, and I get a little pensive and nostalgic when I have a few minutes to enjoy the event.  I hope you get a chance to take a trip down memory lane when something comes along to jog your memory, whether it’s a thunder storm or a bright sunny day that reminds you of a happy time.

August Wrap Up

               I can’t believe this month is nearly over!  It turned out to be fairly eventful what with one thing and another happening. Hillary started back to her day program in the beginning of the month and she couldn’t be happier about being able to spend time with the staff, even though they are new to her and she to them and her peers for a few hours every day.  Of course, there had to be paperwork to be filled out by her doctor before she could go so I was busy with making the appointment and filling out forms and making phone calls but all was accomplished in less than 2 weeks so I thought that was good, all things considered.  For now I am her transportation which keeps me on somewhat of a schedule so that’s not a bad thing.  The down side is that if my van is out of commission she can’t go which is the case today.  Hopefully it will be repaired and we’ll have it back before Monday.  Fingers crossed!  We took a little road trip to stay with my husband’s family for a reunion weekend.  It turned out nice, but the drive up was not.  First the traffic came to a sudden stop on a highway and we were in the left most lane when I saw an 18 wheeler passing us on the median very close to all the vehicles.  My husband was driving and he said the truck had been about 6 cars back and was going too fast to stop so thank goodness the driver had the sense to use the median to avoid hitting anyone in what would surely have been a tragic accident!  Shortly after that, traffic resumed and we saw that the reason it had stopped was because someone broke down on the right shoulder and a tow truck was there with blinking lights which I suppose caused people to want to look.  I never understand why traffic comes to a screeching halt when something is happening on the shoulder but I guess that’s just the way we humans are—curious!  So a couple miles after that there was suddenly the deafening sound of 20 motorcycles except there were not motorcycles or trucks near us.  It was us!  Something to do with the muffler/exhaust system broke, and we were miles from an exit.  Frantically I googled car repair shops in the area where we were, and after asking at a rest stop and then at an information center at the end of an exit ramp we wound our way through a village or two   (sounding like a jet plane by now) to a muffler repair chain.  There we spent 6 hours, on arguably one of the hottest, most oppressive days of the year in their little waiting/office area with 2 local gentlemen who had their cars in for service, and an assortment of other locals there for inspection, and one for a flat tire.  As our van was up on the lift in a service bay, we had no access to the snacks or drinks we brought for the 4 hour drive we expected, so my husband walked to a little shop maybe ½ mile away and brought back cheese doodles and bottled water.  It was the most delicious bag of doodles and water I ever had!  We were thankful that we had an air-conditioned place to wait and a clean restroom to use. The people were very nice, the girl running the office was very nice and adept at calming people upset about not having any appointments available that day or because their service was taking too long.  The most interesting patron was a gray haired hippie and his companion, a well behaved little dog who he said belonged to his granddaughter originally.  The counter girl gave the dog a bowl of water, and the man made small talk with everyone there while he waited.  We were thankful that we had such pleasant company and not someone talking loudly on a cell phone the whole time.  Once we were back on the road, with the van patched enough to drive, the gps took us not back to the superhighway, but along roads through the countryside which was pleasant.  By the time we stopped for dinner there were thunder clouds overhead and the rain began while we were wolfing down our fish sandwiches in the car.  About an hour later we were safe in the arms of family and they helped bring in our things.  It was still stifling hot and oppressive despite it being 9:00 pm and in the mountains, but the weather broke during the night and it was more bearable the next day, which was the day the cousins were coming for a cookout. It was a sunny and breezy day marked by hugs, laughter and chatter, rides on an ATV to see the property, (the host lives on 74+ acres of forest), my husband played the bagpipes and those who didn’t leave after that stayed for a campfire and some fireworks shot off by members of the family.  It was a fun but exhausting long weekend away.  Sprinkled in among the rest of the days this month there were breakfasts and lunches out with my friends and family, a game day, and various projects I’ve kept busy with.  Yesterday the van decided it was time to have the permanent repair made and suddenly on my way home from a trip to Target I sounded like a jet plane again!  Thus the van is in the shop to be repaired and we are staying home for today.  It’s still oppressively hot and humid, but supposed to be better by the middle of next week, which is when September begins!

               If you looked at my calendar it doesn’t look like it was a busy month, but the calendar doesn’t tell the whole story.  At least it went fast—time flies when you’re busy! 

                                                            clematis

                                                            busy bee!

                                         ready for sunset and campfire!

Campfire!
  

July Days

 

                July flew by, and it was more eventful than I expected and am used to.  Last July not much was going on, no indoor or large gatherings and staying home to avoid catching the virus made for a string of lazy summer days spent blowing bubbles, reading, and keeping in touch via texts except for a few times friends or family stopped over to visit on the patio sharing coffee.  This year was different, the weather has not been as pleasant, and more days were spent inside with the air conditioning than out in the hot humid air.  With my family all being vaccinated we are able to gather inside, and we have.  Our most notable time together was my Christmas in July cookie exchange.

               It was arguably the hottest, muggiest week of the summer leading up to the big day, and it may sound crazy, but I baked 2 kinds of cookies, as did my sister in law and niece together.  It’s challenging getting my dough right in such weather conditions because even though I have the air conditioning, it affected the texture of my dough.  Lemon cookie cutouts became lemon drop cookies because in spite of refrigerating the dough for 24 hours it remained too soft and sticky to work with.  So I still decorated them with red and green sugar and they were just as tasty, unexpectedly puffy and crisper than I expected.  They were delicious with iced tea and had a very light lemony flavor.  My other batch was eggnog walnut oatmeal cookies.  They are a drop cookie but again the dough was very sticky despite refrigerating it for a few hours.  They were crispy and flat, and very tasty with a slight spicy flavor reminiscent of eggnog and delicious with iced coffee.  We also did a Christmas craft making fans with last year’s Christmas cards.  It was simple to do, (my guests dubbed it a Kindergarten craft), but fun and useful if one is too warm.  They can be hung on the Christmas tree as an ornament or be used to embellish a gift.  Then we did Christmas Mad Libs for a while before ordering pizza to munch.  While we ladies were busy tasting all the cookies and drinking iced coffee and iced tea and making our fans, my husband and brother went shopping at a new hardware store they’d been dying to check out.  We saved them some cookies, of course!  All in all it was a really fun day and we ended it by donning our Santa or elf hats for a group photo.  I think this will be my favorite memory of the summer.

               Although we’re not really back to “normal”, (whatever THAT is), we’re doing more than we did last summer with others and it feels good.  I don’t think things, at least for me, will ever be the way they were before everything shut down but it can still be good.  Maybe better in some ways, and different, which isn’t a bad thing.  It just might take some getting used to.

Of course there had to be a Christmas tree and some gifts!

                             The fans we made and the Mad Libs.  So much fun!

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Here are the two cookie recipes I used, in case now you feel like baking cookies!

 

Lemon Christmas Tree Cookies (5 dozen small)

1/3 cup soft butter           1 cup sugar

1 egg                                   2 cups sifted flour

½ teaspoon soda              ¼ teaspoon salt

1 Tablespoon lemon peel              3 Tablespoons lemon juice

Cream butter thoroughly.  Add sugar gradually, beating until fluffy.  Beat in egg, then add lemon peel. Sift together flour, soda, and salt. Add to creamed mixture alternately with lemon juice, mixing until smooth.  Divide dough in half and wrap in waxed paper. On lightly floured surface, roll out ½ of dough at a time to 1/8 inch thickness.  With floured cookie cutter, cut into desired shapes (I usually use a tiny Christmas tree cutter) and decorate with colored sugar, if desired. Place on lightly greased cookie sheet. Bake at 375* F for 10 minutes or until lightly browned. Remove from pan and cool on wire rack.

**When I made them drop cookies they were bigger and took a couple minutes longer to bake.  I got only about 2 ½ dozen.**

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Egg Nog Oatmeal Walnut Drop Cookies

1 cup all purpose flour          ½ teaspoon baking powder      ½ teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon cinnamon           ½ teaspoon nutmeg                   ¼ cup shortening

¼ cup softened butter          ½ cup granulated sugar             1/3 cup packed brown sugar

1 egg                                        2 Tablespoons milk                    ½ teaspoon vanilla

1 cup quick cooking rolled oats                   ¼ cup chopped walnuts

Stir together flour, baking powder, baking soda, ¼ teaspoon salt and spices.  In mixer bowl beat shortening and butter for 30 seconds; add sugars and beat till fluffy.  Add egg, milk, and vanilla; beat well.  Add dry ingredients to beaten mixture, beating till well combined.  Stir in oats and walnuts.  Chill dough 2 hours; form 1 inch balls.  Dip tops of balls in additional granulated sugar or cinnamon sugar, if desired.  Place on an ungreased cookie sheet.  Bake in a  375*F oven for 10-12 minutes. Makes 36

Purple and White Clover

 

            One recent day I was out walking Hillary up and down the driveway, just to do something besides sit in the house, as our van was in for repairs so we couldn’t go anywhere.  It was a hot day, this being July, and I noticed that we have a lot of white clover growing wild all over the yard.  It reminded me of those slower paced days when my first daughter was nearly a year old and our summer days were spent with the little kiddie pool in the grass where she played and discovered the world, as toddlers do.  I remember watching the honeybees in the bright sun flying from clover to clover, collecting pollen while small white and yellow butterflies floated from flower to flower drinking the nectar they contained.  It’s a lovely memory of easier, happy days when my whole world was right there in my view, no matter what else may have been happening in the world at large. That was a serene time of life.

               When I was a kid our yard had white clover growing in it, too, and I remember making little chains from it, braiding the stems together to make bracelets and garlands to wear like a crown.  My mother said that you can eat clover, but it’s better to have the larger purple kind as it’s easier to pull the petals off and taste the sweet nectar inside them.  She was right!  They used to grow along a dirt road by our house that we always referred to (and still do) as the new road.  That road connected our street with the next one up a hill and was blocked off by phone poles lying across both ends as it wasn’t open for vehicles until the town paved it many years later.  On the sides of that road grew not just the purple clover, but Queen Anne’s lace, black eyed Susan, daisies and corn flower along with other weeds I can’t name.  We’d walk along that short stretch of road with the sun hot on our backs; gravel crunching under our feet whenever we walked to the grocery store or the post office.  Picking the Queen Anne’s lace on our way home and then putting them in little glasses with colored water was one of the best things to do, and exciting to check on them periodically all afternoon while the white flowers lined up on the kitchen windowsill changed to the color in the glass. I’m glad I had a mother who taught me about flowers and growing things.  Our yard had flower beds and a small vegetable patch where we grew radishes, carrots, scallions and leaf lettuce. It’s a nice feeling to grow some of your own food, we spent time together weeding and caring for the flowers and vegetables.  One year we planted marigold seeds in a sunny spot and that year we had monarch butterflies by the dozens, drawn there by the heady yellow blooms.

               It’s amazing how just noticing what is right in front of me can evoke so many pleasant memories.  It’s a little like time travel going back in my mind to things I have forgotten about.  I think it makes for a little bit of serenity in what is a stressful time for all.

The months of this year just seem to be flying by.  Each month brings a new beginning.

         I have no trellis for the clematis, it's just growing among the pachysandra.  Things got a little out of control this year!

Oh Summer!

 

               June is almost over and summer is in full swing.  We’ve had Father’s Day and my older daughter’s birthday and now we’re bearing down on the July 4<sup>th</sup> weekend which will likely be noisy with folks lighting off fireworks in the street and in their yards.  Lawn mowers, blowers, power washers and the sounds of road equipment mingle with the voices of children splashing in backyard pools and riding bikes in the heat of the day.  With the daily birdsong, chittering of squirrels and humming of insects flying busily from flower to flower and person to person, these are the elements of the song of summer.  Even the nights are full of sounds with peepers and tree toads, the soft swish of traffic on the highway, crunch of gravel under tires on the side street, and voices floating from patios and open windows as people relax after the heat of the day.

               When I was a kid summer meant days spent mostly outside from morning until bedtime.  Swinging, riding bikes, walking to a friend’s house or to the store with my mother, running through the sprinkler, or reading books for hours laying on a blanket in the shade are all things that filled the hot sunny days.  After dinner was for playing tag or hide and seek with my brothers and cousins, and sipping lemonade on the porch with my family as bugs swarmed around the yellow bulb in the porch light.  I remember one time when a huge bug landed right in the middle of my brother Dan’s belly and my mother said it was June bug, which is a type of very large beetle.  It was brown with shiny hard looking wings and was as large as my father’s thumbnail.  My brother screamed (as did I) and quickly brushed it off his yellow t-shirt.  We used to catch lightning bugs and put them in mayonnaise jars we had punched holes in the lid with nails and filled with some blades of grass and watch them light up the darkness like tiny lanterns later in our rooms.  Of course, if you made the air holes in the lid too big the bugs ended up on your ceiling or window screen because they just crawled out.  I don’t imagine my mother liked it very much when that happened, but I don’t remember her ever mentioning it.  I guess it just came with the territory of raising 4 kids, 3 of whom were boys and teaching them about nature.  Summer nights were filled with the sounds of my father watching TV, the whirring of the window fan, and the peepers’ high pitched singing broken up occasionally by the fire siren and howling dogs.  Our neighbor 2 doors down kept 3 or 4 hunting dogs and boy did they howl when the fire siren went off.  It was an eerie sound in the middle of the night that always gave me a hollow feeling inside.  It seems the summer is never quiet.

               As we move into July and then into August the sounds of summer change, acorns begin to fall from our oak tree onto the driveway and roof in July, crickets begin to sing and locusts and grasshoppers make themselves heard with their nonstop noise that sounds like thousands of tiny wooden beads being shaken together.  I marvel at the songs that nature sings, especially in summer.

Nature Calms

                                  Just a little bunny in the yard. So cute!

 

When I was a teenager I had a poster on the wall in my room of a beautiful woodland waterfall  that said “You will never be lonely if nature is with you”.  The picture reminded me of the time we spent as a family at Tillman’s Ravine exploring the forest on steamy summer weekend afternoons when I was younger.  It was a place my mother loved, with waterfalls, wood plank footbridges over streams, and little pools where lily pads grew and water bugs skittered across the top of the water.  The water was so clear you could see the rocks on the bottom and minnows swimming near the edge.  It was a cool and inviting place on a summer afternoon.  I still love being in a natural environment, and when I’m feeling stressed I often step outside for a few moments and listen to the birds chirping and the wind moving the trees, and gaze at the sky for an instant dose of calm.

               When I think about nature, I am amazed at how it all works.  Somehow it all fits together, and while it can be frightening at times, it’s never boring.  One of the more interesting things to see is the creatures that live around us.  There are plenty of birds and squirrels, there’s groundhogs and chipmunks, and rabbits.  Now and then there are deer in our yard and I’m pretty sure they are the reason I don’t get too many blooming lilies as they find them as well as the lily-like flowers on the hosta to be tasty.  One very early morning my husband went out the door to go to work and came face to face with a huge deer who was probably snacking on the nearby hosta flowers.  Even though he was on the deck   and the deer was in the yard, it was quite a heart stopping way for him to start his day. Encounters with animals are not limited to deer.  Besides the squirrel that tried to take up residence in our attic a number of years ago, there was one who laid on the deck rail shaking his tail in a threatening manner and hissing at my daughter as she tried to leave for a flute lesson.  She had to go out the back door because that critter just wasn’t going to stop.  There were times when I would be sitting in the living room with the door open and look up to find the squirrel sitting on the deck rail looking in at me. We’ve also had birds sitting there looking in, and one of the neighborhood cats used to do the same thing.  There have been times when we were on the deck in the evening and seen raccoons meander along the driveway, and one time a bear came crashing through some bushes between us and the neighbor’s house.  Foxes used to fight outside my daughter’s bedroom window at night and she said the sound they make is awful not to mention frightening in the middle of the night.  There was the carpenter bee who acted as a sentry by hovering in your face as you approached the door and then flew away after a second or two, we’ve had the occasional praying mantis, and of course my arch nemesis icky Vicky the spider and her descendants.  Yes, nature is never boring.

               The weather is another aspect of nature that fascinates us.  We talk about it, have channels devoted to it, complain about it, and celebrate it.  It seems to defy explanation at times, like how it can be pouring rain from dark clouds at my house, yet I can see that just about a half mile away there is a beautiful sunset over the lake.  Rainbows are always amazing and social media lights up with pictures everyone takes of them after a big rainstorm.  Likewise if there is hail on a hot summer day you can see many videos and pictures in your newsfeed.  When it snows in places that usually don’t get it, or someplace gets snow measured in feet instead of inches it is newsworthy, as well as ice storms which are terrifyingly dangerous yet beautiful in the sun when they finish.  Who can resist a picture of fog as it lifts off a body of water, or a deep blue sky dotted with white puffy clouds highlighted by sunbeams? We can hear the rumble and roll of thunder in the summer or even in the winter during a snow storm. Weather and nature continually changes and keeps us on our toes.

               I find time spent contemplating my immediate outdoor surroundings to be a good way to take a little mental break from the stresses and worries of life.  Wondering how it is birds can fly, butterflies and bees know where flowers full of nectar are, and squirrels remember where they have buried acorns they collected months before can take you out of yourself for a few minutes.  You might never get the answer, but that’s not really what’s important.  What’s important is to get a little vacation for your brain, feel a part of something bigger, and find momentary peace.

Letting Go

 

      I’ve said good bye to many things this past year, as we all have due to the pandemic.  I think what I miss most is the routine of the weekdays.  Since I was (still am) unable to work as Hillary has no day program to attend, we have no set routine like we did when I had to get her ready to leave the house either for the bus or to drop her off before I went to work.  I miss the routine of finding a parking space, and saying “good morning” to my coworkers, then rushing through errands after work and getting home in time to change, knock back a cup of coffee, and welcome Hillary home.  There is no reason for rushing now, no sense of urgency to my time.  It was nice at first, now it makes for a long day.  I miss how things were, but I doubt I will be doing all that again.  Things are and will be different; it’s one of life’s adjustments.

               In addition to saying good bye to coworkers, I lost my Aunt Audrey and my brother Dan; we laid their ashes to rest this month, my aunt with many of my cousins present, and my brother with just my remaining brothers and our children and spouses gathered at the grave.  I have yet to delete either one of them from my contact list on my iPhone.  I just can’t bring myself to do it.  It’s hard to say goodbye to people who are important in our lives, people we have spent our whole lives loving and knowing were there in the background most of the time, but still there. I have pictures and my memories of them, but if you’ve ever lost anyone you understand it’s just not the same as having them here on Earth somewhere.  I will miss having the possibility of seeing or speaking with my aunt ever again and sending her cards, I will forever miss my brother at the Thanksgiving table because we always were seated next to each other.  I miss his sense of humor and his intelligence, and reminiscing about our childhood with him.  He was a gentle soul.

               We all have dreams that we have to let go of, and ones that have to be altered.  My childhood dream was to be an artist.  I loved painting, drawing, working with clay and doing crafts, and thought I was going to go to art school when I grew up.  I remember one year for Christmas I got a table top easel, a huge set of watercolor paints and brushes, and watercolor paper.  I spent many hours painting landscapes and pictures of the sky.  I also had pastels and charcoal pencils and a sketch pad. I loved drawing horses, learning how from a book, and I used to look out my bedroom window at my little desk and sketched what I saw.  There was a little wooden shed across the street and I remember sketching that.  I wish I still had those pictures, but once I grew up, they were put aside and eventually discarded.  My dreams changed from being an artist to other pursuits such as getting married and starting a family.  I still sketch from time to time, and every once in a while go to a paint and sip event.  I still enjoy playing at being an artist; it keeps me in touch with that childhood dream.

               Life changes, and changes us in the process.  The things that happen around us help shape who we are, and to some extent how we are.  I think our memories and feelings of nostalgia enable us to remember how we were and how far we’ve come.  Saying “so long” to the past and reaching for the future moves us through our lives which always seems to me to be bittersweet.

Love Of Reading

 

    Here's an eclectic little collection of some of the books I have.  Three were written by my younger brother, a few are by people I count among my friends.  The small books were given to me either by my daughter or a friend who moved away several years ago, and of course there are a few Dr. Seuss just for fun!

               I know I’ve said it before, but I love reading.  The one good thing about the pandemic and staying home is that I have had lots of time for reading books!  Since the library reopened, I’ve been able to take out stacks of books to enjoy; before I got my new glasses I was taking out the large print editions because it was straining my eyes so much with the old prescription.  My new glasses mean I can read any size print without getting a headache or blurry vision from eye strain.  I don’t like audio books, I prefer to put my own spin on the words, hear the character’s voices in my head and not someone else’s interpretation.  I also prefer turning actual paper pages, so I’m not a fan of reading on a screen.  Although, when Hillary was hospitalized for a month last fall I read a lot on my phone.  You can’t really cart a bag of books around the hospital when you’re caring for a loved one who is quite ill and gets moved from one department to another with some frequency.  So reading on my phone was better than nothing while she was sleeping in between doctors and nurses trying to heal her.  I have some favorite authors who I go back to from time to time, sometimes rereading books because I enjoy them so much.  I also like to try new authors, and occasionally a new genre.  Sometimes I learn something new, or get a new perspective on things.

               Recently I read an older book about 500 years of American history.  It began with how people first appeared on the North American continent.  The most surprising thing I learned was that there was such a thing as giant beavers!  I never heard of them before, they roamed the continent from Florida to Alaska along with mastodons and sabre tooth tigers during the ice age.  They know this because of bones archeologists found.  I had no idea, and when I told my husband, he was not surprised and immediately found a picture of them online, as if it was something he looked up every day.  It seems as if they were about the size of one of our current black bears.  What I found frightening is imagining how large and sharp their teeth would be, and what large dams they would build.  Can you imagine the size of their flat, wide beaver tails?  Wow! The rest of the book didn’t offer much insight into anything else it discussed—the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby, JFK’s assassination, the disappearance of Amelia Earhart, and the story of the Mayans among other mysteries of history.  It was interesting and nice to step away from my usual diet of murder mysteries. 

               Currently I’m reading a book that was my mother’s.  It’s “James Herriot’s Dog Stories”, a collection of his short stories having to do with dogs he encountered in his veterinary practice in Darrowby, England.  It’s a book I’ve read before, and it’s a comfortable positive group of stories that is perfect with my morning tea at the beginning of the day.  I’m also working my way through “The Pen Commandments” by Steven Frank, which is a guide for beginning writers but I’m using it as a nice way to review basic grammar and writing techniques.  It’s not as dry as a text book as he illustrates his points with stories from his classroom and students.  It’s good to pick up when I have a few minutes.  I have a book in my next to be read pile that I just bought, it’s a thriller by an author I am unfamiliar with—Paula McLain—and the title is “When the Stars Go Dark”. I can’t wait to have time to start it, maybe this afternoon.  I love the delicious anticipation of a new book to read!

               Reading has always been a pleasure for me, and a favorite way to spend some free time.  Losing myself in a book is also like a little vacation for my mind and a great way to step away from some of the everyday worries we all seem to have as our constant companions. With nice weather finally here, I can combine it with spending time outside—perfect!

        Some flowers I planted in pots, and my little collection of garden friends that I keep on the shelf on the deck rather than in a garden since we garden in pots because it's less work.  Yup, a little lazy here!  I like to relax on the deck with a book and a cool drink on hot summer afternoons.

May and Mom

 

         Here it is the middle of May already! This year the months seem to be flying by at breakneck speed.  This month is busier for me than I’ve been in a year.  We had Mother’s Day, we’ll end with Memorial Day, and in between I have 2 funerals to attend, (first for my aunt who passed earlier this year, and second for my brother who passed last June---dying in the pandemic doesn’t lend itself to gathering together in a timely manner to celebrate the life of a loved one), and my niece’s college graduation which will be live streamed so friends and family might watch.  So, there are a mix of good and sad events; a bittersweet month.  It is also the month my father passed 24 years ago, and my mother’s birthday. It is on my mother’s birthday that we will be celebrating the life of my aunt, her sister, who was the last of the 7 siblings to go.  I’d say, though, that overall the focus this month is on Mother’s Day.

         When I think of my mother I think of her shoes.  My mother always wore loafers for every day running around whether it was doing chores around the house or walking to the store for bread, milk, and the daily newspaper, or playing a game of softball with us kids.  For church and things such as PTA meetings she wore low dressy heels, and later when she returned to the work force she wore the heels as well.  She didn’t wear sneakers, as far as I can remember, until I had moved out and started building my adult life, when she took up walking for exercise.  When I see a pair of loafers it takes me back to my childhood, and one particular softball game.

         We lived across from the “new” elementary school which featured a large field in front with a crushed white stone path running down one side of it for all the kids in our end of the neighborhood to get to the school.  It is in this field, usually as the sun began to set in the summer, that we had our little family softball games. My 3 brothers, my mom and dad and I were all the players.  I remember it as being fun and laughing a lot.  This one particular time my mother was in the outfield and one of my brothers hit the ball into the air and it landed on my mother’s face, knocking the lens out of her glasses.  It must not have been hit very hard because I just remember my mother laughing, holding her hand over her eye and looking down saying that she lost her lens.  I’m sure that was the end of the game and we retired to the porch for glasses of her good homemade lemonade, (a pitcher of which was always in the refrigerator during the summer), after my father put the lens back in place.  We had so much fun together, and my mother wore her loafers through it all.

         I think that the greatest gift my parents gave me is the ability to laugh, and happy childhood memories. In May, and especially on Mother’s Day, I like to remember those good days.  Some of my favorite family pictures are ones in which my mother is laughing.  That’s how I remember her, always.  

This is my favorite photo of my family, taken the Easter before my first child was born, although it is absent my husband.  My sister-in-law is to the left of my mother, my 3 brothers and I on the right and my father in the chair. My brother who passed last year is the tall one on the right. I love this because we are all obviously laughing at something, probably a smart alecky comment one of us made.  My mother is full out laughing.