I'm Glad I Didn't Blink

 Strawberry season in my area was very short.  It's not typically a long season, only a few weeks, but this year it was unusually short.  Blink and you'll miss it short.

Partly because of the cold rough winter we had and the deer damage to the strawberry fields.  Partly because Spring was kind of cold.  Partly because Spring was also rather wet, with several spells of flooding all over the state.  And, partly because just as the plants which had survived all that were starting to get ripe berries on them, our weather got hot and humid, then very rainy again.  Like five out of seven days with some sort of rain.  Which made the berries ripen very quickly and then just as quickly, even if they weren't ripe, start to mold.

I'm glad I didn't blink.  If I had, I would have totally missed out on fresh picked local strawberries.

I knew I wasn't going to get any strawberries from the patch in my garden.  The deer and other, smaller, four legged critters had ensured that by eating off the plants just as fast as they began to grow.

I had hoped to do some u-pick strawberries, so I was keeping an eye on the Facebook page of the local strawberry farm.  Unfortunately they, and a few other u-pick places not as close to me, announced in early June that they would not be able to open this year for u-pick due to crop damage (aka deer and weather).

So I watched the Facebook pages of some of the small farm markets that have popped up in the area in the last handful of years.  Pre-picked strawberries wouldn't be as cheap (or as fun to get) as u-pick berries, but at least they'd be fresh (compared to grocery store strawberries from the West Coast) and they'd be those smaller flavor-packed berries that this part of Michigan grows.

When I spotted a post that was only two hours old stating that the closest to me farm market (of the bougie kind) had strawberries in, I practically dropped everything and drove over right away.  The whole nearly 8 miles from this little place here to there I hoped that they wouldn't be sold out by the time I walked in the door.

And thankfully they weren't.  $7.75 per quart later, I walked out with two quarts of fresh local strawberries.  Knowing that they wouldn't keep for long; some all ready weren't looking too firm, I started making plans for how to best enjoy them and use them up.

First up, strawberry shortcake for dessert that night!

Me and Betty (Crocker) got busy in the kitchen whipping up some homemade shortcakes.  Since DH was out of town, I cut the recipe down to only two servings.  Because as much as I like strawberry shortcake, this diabetic girl does not need to eat six servings of it in just a couple of days.

I'm so glad I didn't blink.

I also didn't share, either.  I mean, I couldn't, really, being the only one home and all.

In case you're wondering, here's how I cut down Betty's recipe: 

It says that it makes six servings.  I only wanted two servings, which was 1/3 of a recipe.  So I did some math (ok, quite a lot of math) and got busy translating cups into tablespoons and tablespoons into teaspoons and dividing all that by three.

This is what I came up with, and it cooked up fine and tasted fine with the usual texture of this recipe when made in it's entirety of six servings, so I feel pretty confident it will work for you too if you want to give it a try.

>About a cup of sliced strawberries and 1 teaspoon of sugar per shortcake served, mixed together and allowed to sit for about 1/2 hour while I mixed up and baked the shortcakes.

>1 Tbsp plus 2 tsp shortening/lard

>2/3 cup flour

>2 tsp sugar

>1 tsp baking powder

>generous 1/4 tsp salt

>1/4 cup milk

Cut the shortening into the dry ingredients until crumbly, then mix in the milk until blended.  On a lightly floured surface (my handy dandy Tupperware pastry sheet), knead 20-25 times.  Roll out 1/2" thick and cut with a 3" (biscuit) cutter.  Bake at 450 degrees F for 10-12 minutes.  Cool slightly, then split each shortcake in half and layer with strawberries.  Top with whipped cream.

Thankful Thursday

 Grabbing on to the regular Thursday theme over at Frugal Girl of things I am thankful for this week. It's been a busy week, where I often have felt like I'm just not measuring up to all the tasks at hand. But, as I need to remind myself, that doesn't mean it's been a bad week.  There's been lots of good too even if the good is easier to forget right now than the list of haven't done it yets.

This week I am thankful:

*For several sunny mornings.  Waking up to sunshine puts an extra dose of energy in my tank.

*That I went to the podiatrist and had three spots scraped off my feet.  I have a tailor's bunion on one foot, and several calluses that slowly grow to the point they are causing uncomfortable pressure spots when I walk around.  A few years ago my primary care doctor referred me to this podiatrist for removal of a tiny piece of glass that had gotten into the ball of my foot (and caused a callus where the skin grew over/around it), and that was where I learned that problematic calluses can be trimmed very easily in-office. Doesn't even require anesthetizing the foot and I really don't feel the careful cutting out of the callus as the doctor is doing it.  After months of gradually building discomfort from said bunion and calluses, it feels so wonderful to walk out of the podiatrist's office with (three little divots in my feet and) zero pain.  This is an experience I highly recommend: if you have feet with painful hard calluses, and you have insurance, get yourself to a podiatrist!

*All the blooming trees and flowers right now.

*That it's time (weather-wise) to harden off my tomato and pepper plants that have been growing (from seed) in my living room.  The temperatures are right to where I can move the plants out of the house and let them cycle between the front porch (warm daytime) and garage (still chilly night time) for a week, then another week totally out on the porch before planting them in the garden in late May.  It's always nice to disassemble the little greenhouse and get my living room back to order (and unblock the sliding door the greenhouse sits in front of in time for the warm late spring days that make us want more airflow inside the house.)

*That DH was able to bring home DD1 and Honorary Son's mower, diagnose the issues it was having that made it not run, fix those with just a tune-up, and return it to them so that he didn't have to keep running to their house once a week to mow their grass.  He'd tried repairing it in their yard where it originally stalled out, but didn't have all the right tools there despite Buck and Sixlet 'helping' him out.

This Weekend, I Lived in a Castle

 At least, that's what I'm claiming.  We had So. Much. Rain. overnight on Friday that we didn't just have standing water in the field.  No, we had running water all around the house.  

The front yard. 

The side yard.  

The back yard.  

Between the garage and the barnyard (where you couldn't see it because it ran through the culvert that is under the driveway and parking area.) 

Basically, we had a moat around the house.  Which means, therefore, that my house must be a castle.  I'm going with that.  

As a testament to how well the grading we did around our house when building it works, even with all that water--and more that fell pretty much all day on Saturday--we did not have any water get in the house.  Outside, it all drained away from the structure.  Inside, in the basement, the sump pump worked just fine and the water going into the sump never got near enough to the top of the crock to seep into the basement.  Hooray!

I love my castle. 😁👸

Such a Simple Thing

 But it made me tear up.

You see, at church on Sunday, Two-EEs handed me an envelope.  Being December, I instinctively recognized it as a Christmas card before even opening it.  And, when I did open the envelope, there was a Christmas card inside.

And inside the Christmas card was a family photograph of DS1, Two-EEs, Cowgirl, K3, Toad, Rascal, Tractor and Octavia.  That's when my eyes teared up and I almost cried right there in church.  (Being as I'm historically not a public cryer, I sucked it up, but it wasn't easy.)

You see, I've never gotten a Christmas card from DS1's household before.  And not a family picture either.  Never.  He became a 'household' in 2012 when K3 was born and he added her and K2 to himself, making him now an offshoot family unit to my nuclear household.  Prior to that, he was still included in my Christmas card signatures even though, like DS2 at the time, he was living away and not under my roof.

But that household never gave out Christmas cards.  Never took family photos, let alone gave them to others.  And I didn't see it or know it at the time, but that was because of how chaotic and unpredictable and just plain dysfunctional that household was.  K2 was huge into decorating for Christmas.  Inside, and outside.  The blow up lawn decor and everything.  But even thinking about taking a photo with her, DS1 and their children?  No, didn't happen.  And sending out Christmas cards?  Also didn't happen.  Why, I don't know.  I'll never know.  Was it because of her mental struggles?  Her chronic disorganization and inability to concentrate?  Was it because of her drug use?  Don't know.  I do know if it ever occurred to DS1 to write Christmas cards or take a family photo for remembrance, the thought was soon erased by the crisis of the moment.

Makes me sad to think, now, of how crisis mode was a constant in that home.

And now it's not.  Not a constant, daily, way of life.  Now there's calm predictability and organization. Now there's positive things to count on.  There's sharing in responsibilities.  There's group things, and joyful smiles, and family photos.

It makes me cry.  Sad tears for the years that he and his kids (and K2) didn't have that.  All the hard years.  All the lost time that could have been, should have been, happier.

But it also makes me cry joyful tears.  He, and they, have it now.  May they always have it going forward.

Let There Be Light! And Heat!

Back in early November, DH wrapped up two projects that make my barn so much nicer to use.

First, he installed nice bright LED lights in the hayloft.  The picture below doesn't look like much, but trust me, it makes a huge difference when I'm up there retrieving hay to restock the feed room with. 

And, as an added bonus, I discovered--now that we have dark mornings at feeding time--because of the way my barn is built, I can turn on the hayloft lights, turn off the aisle lights, and the horses have nice ambient lighting to eat their breakfast with (and hang out until turnout time).  Previous to having lights in the hayloft I had to either plunge the horses back into the dark again when I turn off the aisle lights (because I go back to the house and eat my own breakfast after they are fed), or leave the aisle lights on (which is way brighter than they need.)  Now I can just flip the switch for the hayloft and there's 2 lights making a nice glow--and using less electricity than the 5 aisle lights do.

Hooray for lights in the hayloft!

 

Second, he installed the heat exchanger (purchased this summer at an auction) in the tack room.  The heat exchanger takes the hot water from the outdoor wood boiler and heats the air like an old fashioned radiator.  

Once he had that all hooked up, he built a nice little box around it to both protect it and to make it work more efficiently--incorporating a cold air return area near the bottom of one side.  The box is composed entirely of scrap lumber: 2x4s, and leftover pieces of pine paneling from doing the tack room walls, plus has a lid made from a piece of plywood left from covering the feed room wall.  Which means the whole box was free free free!

The 'guts' of the tack room heat system.

The fancy box enclosing the guts;

I do still need to stain a few of the boards and the lid.

Note cold air return cutout on bottom of short side.

Now that it's below freezing outside at night, it's really awesome to have a heated tack room that keeps my pipes warm.  Not to mention making it a great place to thaw water buckets and the chicken waterer from the coop.  Confession: I did sort of nag him a little bit to get it done, saying I was not going to haul water buckets from the barn to the basement twice daily this winter like I did last winter (because I wasn't supposed to have to; a heated tack room had been the plan since 2007 when we installed our outdoor wood boiler. . . )

Plus, since the tack room now has heat, I don't have to worry about relocating any liquid or otherwise 'can't be frozen' horse products to the basement for the winter.  It's so nice to just have everything that belongs in the tack room stay in the tack room where I can easily grab it when needed.

And, let me tell you, the horses sure appreciate having warmish bits put into their mouths instead of cold hard steel the same temperature as the great outdoors.

Hooray for heat in the tack room!

I Thought I Was SOL on Broiler Chickens This Year

 When I looked, back in early March, at the website for the hatchery I've almost always ordered my chicks from, it said they were totally sold out of broiler chickens (and fryer chickens, and any other chicken hefty enough to be for dinner) for the 2025 season.  OH NO!

Trying not to panic, I looked at the website for a hatchery I've ordered from once before, a few years ago.  Same deal.  UH-OH!  Now I was starting to panic.

Looking at the websites of every hatchery I'd ever heard of, and some I'd never heard of (desperation Googling at that point), the likelihood of me raising some meat chickens this year was looking very, very grim.  Maybe I could get lucky and find some broiler chicks at one of the farm stores within a 30-40 mile radius of this little place here.

Meanwhile, I decided to try to ration the chicken that was left in the freezer from last year's crop and hope for the best.  

Well, all Spring I've been checking for chicks at the farm stores.  Limited breeds of laying pullets, but zero meat type chicks at any of them any time I checked (or asked about the coming week's chick delivery).  My hopes of finding broiler chicks pretty much hit rock bottom.

At the end of May, looking in the freezer and recounting what packages of what chicken parts I have, I knew that strategy would not get us through until Summer 2026 without having to buy chicken from the grocery store.  Which, after doing that over a decade ago, I knew without a doubt I did not want to be reliant on grocery store chicken.  It's just not the same as homegrown chicken; not the same flavor, not the same texture. 

In early June, I happened to get an email from that one hatchery I'd once ordered from.  In their email, they stated that they currently were having overhatches and that as long as I wasn't picky about the date my chicks arrived (maybe as early as three days from the date I was reading the email!!) I could put in an order for broiler chicks and get on a waiting list, as it were.

Which got me curious if the availability status for broiler chicks had changed at my preferred hatchery, too.  So I got online and looked.  And, hallelujah!!!! They had Cornish Rock cross chicks available for limited dates, the first of which was the next week!  

Quickly, I added the quantity I wanted to my cart, threw in a few Rhode Island Red pullet chicks, and hit submit before the hatch was sold out.  There was a slight possibility that they would arrive before I got home from the Shipshewana trip that DD1, DD2, K3, Faline and I were going on, but, based on previous experience with shipping times via USPS, I figured I was safe to order for the first available hatch.

Just in case, and because I figured I'd be really tired when I got home from that Girl's Trip to Shipshe, I got the brooder out and set up before we left.

Well, guess what!  When we arrived at our hotel in Shipshewana, I checked my email and saw that my chicks had shipped from the hatchery in Iowa while we were driving the 2+ hours from home.  No big deal, as they have, many times, spent a whole 24 hours sitting in Minneapolis awaiting their flight to Detroit.  We'd definitely be home before the chicks hit the local post office.

The next morning, right before we checked out of our hotel and were ready to begin our adventures for the day, I checked the tracking and saw that my birds hadn't gone through Minneapolis this time, but had made Indianapolis in the night and were currently on their way to Detroit.  Hmm.  But should still be fine; I mean, the hub in Detroit wouldn't get them until afternoon, which meant they wouldn't be arriving my way until the following morning. 

Just after  3 p.m., literally 5 miles out of Shipshewana, on our way home (ETA for us: definitely after 5:15 p.m. even if we didn't need any potty stops) my phone rang.  It was the post office near this little place here.  They had my chicks and wanted to let me know so  I could pick them up before the post office closed at 5:00.  They did not want to hold onto them overnight.

UH-OH!

I explained my situation and asked if I had to pick them up myself or if I could send someone for me.  Apparently they would be happy to hand my box of chicks to anyone who showed up and knew they were there.  So then I tried to call DH, but he didn't answer.  Not knowing if he was working from home that day or working in office (which he usually does that day of the week),.now I wasn't sure who to call to run and get my chicks.

DD1 said that Honorary Son was working in the vicinity of that post office that afternoon (he does IT) and that he was scheduled to be done at 4:00, did I want her to see if he would be willing to do the pick up?

Which is how Honorary Son got a message that said "Go to (City) Post Office after work and pick up chicks".  Taken out of context, that is a very strange message to get from your wife.  Rightly so, he was confused and called for clarification.  Once DD1 explained it was a box of day old chickens that was in need of transportation to my house, Honorary Son was happy (I think) to stop by the post office, get them, and drop them off in my house on his way home.

Once we got there, an hour or so after Honorary Son had done the package drop, I plugged in the brooder light, filled the feeders and waterers, and with Faline and K3's help, unpacked the 16 broiler chicks, 4 Rhode Island Red chicks and the one 'free' cockerel chick.  They all seemed to be energetic and healthy, none the worse the wear for their travels.

I think I owe Honorary Son a roast chicken dinner, with all the fixings, in about 7 weeks after these guys go to the processor.

I Went To A Symphony!

On Friday evening, I went to a symphony.  Other than when DD2 was in choir during college, and they performed on the same night as the college's local symphony orchestra, and once when I was really young and went with my parents to a Christmas concert put on by a small local symphony orchestra, I haven't been a symphony goer.  Not that I don't enjoy the music; just too many other things vying for my time and money.

I almost didn't go this time either, but my kids schemed against me and came up with a plan to get me there.  My boys paid for my ticket.  My girls were in charge of transporting me and feeding me dinner before hand.

And so, in the name of a Mother's Day present, I went to the symphony.

DD1 and DD2 came and got me, all dressed up, and took me out to dinner. We'd chosen a nearby Mexican restaurant, and were rather overdressed for the venue, LOL,  But all three of us had a hankering for Mexican, so. . .  

It was a good meal, and I tried birria tacos, which I'd never had before. YUM!  Definitely will eat them again.

Conversation over dinner was good, ranging from trying to plot a 'group' Father's Day present for DH, DS1, DS2, and Honorary Son (would they be amenable to being a foursome for a round of golf if we arranged it?  Not sure. . .) to Faline's goofy picture on her Pre-School Graduation poster to whose house needs what repairs that could be scheduled into a rotating one-weekend-a-month family workday gathering for the summer months.

 

As for the symphony itself, it was wonderful!  I had such a good time.  I made oddball comments based on spur of the moment thoughts in my head in regards to what was going on on stage (like how the guy playing the wood blocks made me think of a defibrillator the way he rubbed them together and then pulled them wide apart to quietly set them down) that my daughters, who have similar senses of humor, totally got a kick out of without being offended by my oddball comment.  The music was terrific, the pianist, who played the entire forty minutes of the concerto by memory without sheet music was amazing.  And the grand piano was absolutely the biggest piano I've seen in my entire life.  (Is there such a thing as a Granddaddy grand piano?  If so, I'm pretty sure it had to be that one.)

It was fascinating to watch the musicians play; their natural body movements during the course of playing their parts, coming in and out of the piece at the prescribed times, made me think of waves lapping on a beach: swelling, breaking, flowing outward to build up and flow in again.

All in all, it was a very special gift, and I'm so grateful to each and every one of my kids (plus my DH who volunteered to make sure horses were taken care of in my absence that night) for giving this experience to me.

Holy Wah, There Was a Tornado!

 Not at this little place here, but a few miles north. We were on the southern edge of all the super strong winds and we lucky to get by with just the nuisance to small limbs down in the yard and a smallish dead tree that fell across the road right by our driveway.  And having no power for about 114 hours (so about 6 hours shy of 5 entire days).

Meanwhile, north and west of us, where the tornado first formed, a nursing home lost it's roof and the occupants had to be relocated, some by ambulance, some by a city bus that was provided, to other nursing homes.  

And due north of us, on the Interstate, semi-trucks and cars were blown around resulting in at least one fatality on the scene and many injuries requiring hospitalization.  It was shut down for almost two days.

To the north east of us, a horse farm lost the roof to it's equipment barn (thank God not the horse barn), many homes were damaged by falling trees, and one farm took a direct hit losing it's century old barn and blowing the windows out of the house.  Many other farms in the direct path lost roofs to their barns, and semi-trucks not on the Interstate but just off the exit onto the state road were also blown over.  There were trees down all over, and power lines laying in yards, parking lots, on major and minor roads. . . It was rather a mess.  For days and days.

DH and I were lucky.  We cleaned up the limbs here, and used the new tractor (and pallet forks!) to push the tree out of the road at our driveway.  We have a generator, and have been using it during the day to keep the wifi on (so DH can work from home), our phones and laptops charged, and the fridges and freezers cold.  Since we are on our own well and septic, with the generator going we also have water and can take showers and use the toilets.  We also have a gas stove, so between that and the grill outside on the patio, we've been able to cook three meals a day and not need to go out to eat.  We are among the priviledged to be set up in this way for emergencies such as this.

DS1 is four miles away to the East.  He also was just on the fringe and had minor limbs down but no damage to his house.  He was without power for about 96 hours.  He bought a generator the morning after the storm and was able to keep his fridge and freezer cold too although with an electric stove he wasn't able to cook.

DS2 is off to the East about 30 miles; he got huge winds and lost a lot of deadwood (and a chain link fence) in his backyard but had no damage to his home or outbuildings.  He was without power for a couple of days; he'd purchased a generator after a big storm this Spring.  He'd also put in a gas line and gas stove this winter when he'd remodeled the kitchen right after buying his house, so he too was able to avoid the need and expense of eating out.

DD1 was in the direct path of the tornado; she is about a mile north and 12 miles east of us.  She, Honorary Son, Faline and Buck were huddled in their larger bathroom during the storm (their house is on a slab).  While they did lose many humongous limbs out of the large trees around their home, none fell directly on the house.  One fell and slid it's outermost branches down the front of the house, bending the fins on the window air conditioning unit in the kids' bedroom but there was no structural damage. They all came through the event safely.  They borrowed a generator in order to keep their fridge and freezer cold, and were without power for about 96 hours also.  They were able to go to the homes of family members for showers and to cook.

We're all glad to have been spared injury to ourselves, and also not have any damage to our homes.  After cleaning up downed trees, and getting electric service restored, we can all go back to our normal daily routines.

I love how the center of morning glories seems to glow with light.  

Just the sort of encouragement we need right now to remind us that God looks after us.

There is light in the the darkness and turmoil.

Thank You to Those Who Saved My Husband

 I've been thinking lately, as I shift through pieces of conversation in my mind, and recall the random comments DH made through the years, that there's a definite reason my husband stands out compared to his siblings (and even many of his cousins on both sides of the family).  The reason is all the people, in his growing-up years, who through their words and actions, saved him.  Saved him from a settle-for life, saved him from the poverty thinking of his youth, saved him from not knowing--let alone realizing--what his potential was.

There was, of course, the grandma who loved him dearly.  Dare I even say he may have been her favorite grandchild of the dozen and a half or so she had?  This is the woman who was there for him, and who encouraged him to continue his education and even gave him funds to do so (in the form of a personal loan, smart woman, that not only gave him needed money for books and tuition and housing that his grants and federal student loan didn't cover, but taught him that he had a responsibility to repay that debt rather than getting a hand out).  She even loaned him money to buy an engagement ring for me when he told her he was thinking of proposing.  Not a lot, nothing extravagant, but enough to get the job done (she thought I was good for him).

There was also the neighbor family, one of whose sons DH was good friends with.  They took him to church with them, they took him on vacations with them, they included him in family events and gave him an example of a home where the parents loved each other and worked together to raise their children. They didn't have an extravagant lifestyle, but rather showed him how to make the most of enough rather than pining for more.

There was the high school teacher who introduced him to the subject of engineering, because DH loved math and had an aptitude for it.  He encouraged DH to look further into what engineering was, and all the types of engineering there is, and by this opened the world to him.  DH went on to study engineering, loves engineering, and has made a successful career of engineering.  Without that teacher to point him that way though, he very likely would have ended up laboring in construction or a factory or shop job like a majority of the men in his family.  Not that those are bad things, but engineering has offered him so much more.  He does construction for fun, rather than because he has to in order to pay the bills. (He also works all year, rather than half the year and then drawing unemployment the other half in an endless cycle of have and have not that is prevalent in more than a few of his extended family).  His engineering career has also afforded him lots of travel opportunities as well as the access to ever newer technology!  He loves to see new places and he sure does get excited about new technology.

There have been others, along the way, who have made positive impacts on him in other ways.  Like the men who raised their children at the time we were raising ours, men who were involved with their kids and through their actions (and invitations for DH and our kids to join them in activities with their kids) showed DH (who really hadn't had an involved father) what to do as a dad.  

And also the work peers who befriended him and guided him and even at times saved him in his career -- like the one who came into a leadership role in another department and years later saved DH from being a victim of headcount reduction in 2008 by insisting that DH transfer to his department, that DH was sorely needed there, and getting the transfer approved mere days before the axe would have fallen. It wasn't a position DH really wanted, nor was it in a convenient location to commute to, but it did save him from imminent job loss and it lead to the position DH then held for 14 years and the promotion he finally got in 2022.

The older we get, and the more years (and generations) I observe in his family, and the comments he himself makes about how he differs from them (in a good way), the more he and I both appreciate the efforts of the people who saved him.  The little (and sometimes big) nudges they gave and examples they set for him.  The way they, without him knowing at the time, molded him into the person he is.

Thanksgiving. . .

 This Thanksgiving, I found myself unexpectedly being thankful that we have more than one toilet in our house. Because. . .

The one and only bathroom (technically, a half-bath) on the main floor of the house, the one company most definitely uses, became unusable around 9 p.m. on Wednesday night when DH decided that would be a good time to attempt to clear a suspected small clog in the plumbing by plungering the main floor toilet. And plungering. And plungering as hard and fast as he could.

Result: 

• toilet leaking around the seal at the floor.  
• Very wet bathroom.  
• Very wet basement directly under the drain for that bathroom.
• Lots and lots of wet towels

Secondary result: 

• unhappy wife (who had spent nearly an hour earlier that day deep cleaning said bathroom and readying it for having 12 additional potty trained people in our home for Thanksgiving Day).  
• Unusable bathroom for Thanksgiving festivities.

Tertiary result:

• wife had to squeeze company-standards-cleaning the upstairs bath (the one our kids used while living at home) AND the master bath (and tidying the master bedroom since that's how you access the master bath) into her Thanksgiving itinerary (with, you know, roasting a turkey, prepping veggie dishes, recleaning the kitchen after food prep, making sure there's enough seating for all the guests, etc).
• all guests had a good laugh when they heard why they had to climb a flight of stairs just to go pee because their Dad/Papa had plungered the toilet to death.

Multiple toilets are a good thing.  I'm thankful we own three.

Grateful, November third Sunday

 (Oops it's Monday all ready.  Forgot to schedule this for publishing yesterday--Sunday)

My gratefulness post today is about how much better my knee has gotten in the past month.  Or however long it's actually been (somewhere close to a month) since DH's last trip that took him out of town for a week or so.  At that point, I was still having troubles doing my own chores and no way could have taken on any of his (like stoking the wood boiler).  This time, I'm probably at 75% capacity in my own heavy lifting, can actually do stairs like a normal person, walk a good 1/2 mile with no soreness or gait issues, AND I stoked the wood boiler! 

I confess, toting and swinging large chunks of wood into the opening of the firebox did cause a bit of pain the first few days, but by the end of the 10-day trip that DH was away for, my knee was no longer complaining about this task.

Physical therapy is coming along. Still doing strengthening and balance exercises, but they are way different and have increased in difficulty level compared to what they were a month ago.  And I'm down to once a week for PT instead of twice.We're getting there!  Hopefully in another month or so I'll be full steam ahead.

Grateful, November second Sunday

 This growing season was kind of rough, with what seemed like a week of heat and humidity without rain followed by a slightly less hot week with a deluge of rain, followed by heat/no rain, followed by literally 3-4 inches of rain in a 24-36 hour period. Repeat, repeat, repeat.  There were many times I uttered the words "welcome to the tropics of Michigan" because of the ongoing humidity and heat.

Having my knee out of whack added another level of difficulty to keeping the garden weeded.  Not only was it sometimes too hot, sometimes too humid (hello potential heat stroke), sometimes too darn wet to even step in the garden (sink in mud to my ankles); bending and pulling weeds really made my knee hurt and swell up.  

So did bending and picking veggies when they ripened.

It was overwhelming quite often (depression high, blog posts low), trying to work mornings, babysit two afternoons a week starting mid-August and still find time to pick, can or freeze the veggies (and sometimes fruits too), plus make meals every day and sort-of keep up with housework.  And rest my knee, of course.  Starting in late July the doctor told me to stay off my feet as much as possible (I laughed and said that wasn't very possible given the time of year).  

Even with all those challenges, it was still a productive year in terms of growing and preserving food. The  cellar is quite full.  

Here we are in mid-November and the bulk of the food producing work is done.   And for that, I'm grateful.  A bountiful season.  A full cellar. We will have lots to eat this winter.

Firearm deer season starts tomorrow.  I'm also grateful for that.  It's time to harvest some red meat.

Grateful, November first Sunday

 Gratitude is actually something I've been trying to focus on for several months.  Seeing several blogs where the author is trying to post each day in the month of November about something they are grateful for got me to thinking more about what I am grateful for.  I know, realistically, there is no way I'm going to manage a post a day for the rest of this month.  But, perhaps, I can do a post each Sunday.  

Here is this week's attempt at that.  Maybe, if I can get through November, I'll try continuing it in December.  Because gratitude isn't something that's restricted to only the month in which we Americans celebrate Thanksgiving.  

This summer, DH finally helped me to get our porch swing from the basement--where it had been stored since our kids gave it to us for Christmas in 2019--up to the garage where I could stain and seal it.  

I had always wanted a swing on our wrap around porch, in fact, that was the main reason I wanted a wrap-around porch in the first place back when we were designing this house in 2001 before we started building it.  Took quite a bit longer than I'd thought to actually acquire that swing, but here it was, in July 2021 sitting  on sawhorses in the garage awaiting my perfectionistic DIY touch.

swing half stained

tilted backwards so I could stain the underside too

Once it had cured and was weather-proof, DH hung it on the south end of the front porch one day while I was away from home.  It was such a great thing to walk around the corner and discover.  The perfect little shady nook that catches a good breeze more days than not.  Exactly what I had always envisioned for spending a relaxing hour or two with a good book.

Relaxation is not a skill that I come by naturally.  It's one that I have to consciously pursue, otherwise I'm constantly chasing after this task and that that need to be done, or helping other people until I'm so tightly wound I can't think straight. Having my swing finally is helping me learn to take a little me time now and then. Even better if I can convince DH to sit with me on the swing, although it's not really his kind of thing.

I'm grateful for this swing, my outdoor relaxation spot.  I'm grateful for DH, who carried it up from the basement so I could finish it, who also put the supports in the porch rafters so it could be hung, and then hung it for me.  I'm grateful for my four kids, who orchestrated the purchasing of this swing (and bought it as unfinished bare wood so I could stain it the exact way I wanted it to look) because they figured that after this many years DH wasn't going to prioritize this particular want of mine.

A Loss

Last week, someone meaningful to me passed away.  Not from Covid-19 (oh, how I'm so tired of that being the assumed cause of death for anyone in the last three months!!), but from the COPD that she had been challenged with for the last almost 20 years.  I may have mentioned her here a time or two as my 'dressage fairy godmother'.

Which is sort of true, but also at times so misleading, as she was quite a taskmaster who made me earn every single thing I gained from her.  She was a perfectionist, that's true, and yet she also was tender-hearted and wished to help others. But you had to qualify!

This post is in her honor. She never married or had children, and is survived by a small family belonging to her brother.  They are one part of her legacy. The other part, from whom her family members are totally separate, is the dressage world and those she touched via her importing and breeding of Holsteiner horses and those that were fortunate enough to have been her students.

Although I knew her for a long time (we met in March 1990), I was her last student.  And how honored I am to be able to say that.  Certainly not her best student, as I know my inconsistency in taking lessons and prioritizing my riding often frustrated her to no end.  But, I did have a family to raise, and a husband, all of  whom  had to come first before my horse(s), and there were times when I was out of the saddle for months at a time trying to juggle things.

It took many years for me to 'qualify' to be her student.  My first lesson with her wasn't until 2001!  She was pretty particular in who she would teach.  No children, and no beginners, for sure.  She preferred students who were devoted to the art of dressage and would take weekly lessons, if not even more often.  As the demands of her farm and her declining health took her out of the saddle, kept her home instead of away teaching clinics-- therefore out of the spotlight-- and eventually kept her from being able to teach regularly, other students moved on.  If I can be brutally honest, that's probably why I, with my on-again off-again riding pattern, even got a chance to take lessons.  First and foremost, she loved to teach.  And there I was, waiting my opportunity to learn.

Out of the saddle, through the years as a barn employee, I learned volumes from her on horse care, various aspects of farm maintainence and management, and horse psychology.  It was a valuable education in itself; one that has opened many doors for me at many other horse farms through the years. 

In the saddle, I learned not just riding theory, but also tons about the physics and mechanics of both the rider's and horse's bodies, and how best to unite them for the greatest results.  I also increased in compassion, as she had been a student of Chuck Grant (for you non-horse and/or non-dressage people, Chuck Grant is known as the Father of American Dressage, being one of the first in the US to train and show in the discipline) and when it came to training horses embodied his mantra of "Ask often, expect little or nothing and reward generously."  She instilled in me patience with my horse, and immediate and generous praise for the littlest attempt at doing what I was (trying to) ask the horse to do.  Because riders, as you know, it's always you that needs fixing first and a horse should never be punished for their unfavorable response to a confusing or incorrect aid.

I wish I had been able to watch her ride more, but in my earliest days of knowing her, when she was still riding and training horses, I was a worker bee, just a stable hand with a million tasks to achieve, and no time to stand around gawking when she was riding in the outdoor arena.  And if she was in the indoor arena, you better not disturb her, even if the world was coming to an end.  Any long-time employee of hers was equipped to deal with Armageddon without interrupting her ride.

The very few times I was able to actually watch her ride, ironically it was on my own horse.  During lessons when I was just so uncoordinated and fumbling and confusing my horse to the point where she would say "How about I get on?"

Now, if your trainer asks to ride your horse, you sure as heck say YES because this is going to be one huge learning opportunity for you, plus your horse gets some high level training that you're apparently not capable of giving right then.  

Every single time she mounted my horse, as soon as she settled into the saddle, you could immediately see the horse's demeanor change.  Not just it's attitude; the horse's body also changed.  Somehow, just by the contact in the saddle, the horse was transformed by her.  I always wished that I could have the same effect.

Many years later, I do.  People now see me sit a horse and are awed in much the same way I was awed.  My seat, my body, now has the feel that tells a horse "okay, listen up, this is what we're going to do!" and the horse is willing and obedient in a relaxed way.

What a legacy she gave me!  

She was brilliant.  Even when her health declined to the point she was housebound and could no longer make it to the arena to give me lessons, I would describe to her an issue I was having under saddle: what I did, what the horse did and felt like, and she most of the time could dissect the problem and tell me the cure. Without even seeing me ride!  

When it came time for me to move on to other trainers, and I wasn't sure how to know who was a good one and who was one not so aligned with the classical training I sought, she gave me some words of wisdom:

Take what you know to be true, and examine new teachers in light of those truths.

In other words, look at how they ride, look at how their students ride, look at how those horses they are riding react, and the proof will be in the pudding.  If you don't like what you see, if what you hear goes against what your foundation is, that trainer will not be the one for you.

While my mentor, my dressage fairy godmother, may no longer be here on earth, just a phone call or short drive away, she will always be with me.  She lives on in my riding.  Imbued with her wisdom of experience, I am also knowledgeable.  My task is to take that wisdom and knowledge, and use if for the good of every horse I encounter, as well as pass along that wisdom to another generation of riders.  

The Big Picture

This week has been a toughie, and it's not even over with yet!  DH has been out of town on a work trip, the Suburban started making a strange and horrible noise and throwing codes so had to go to the repair shop, both of the cars the daughters drive are acting up, we all have places to be at overlapping times in different towns and coordinating vehicles between drivers is a feat. . . Not to mention the worry of 'what if' one of the cars decides to become incapacitated at some inopportune moment nowhere near home.  What if it does so with a teenaged driver?

Stress, stress, stress!!

But you know what?  It's really all little stuff.  Minor inconveniences.  Truly, it is.

For in the Big Picture, today is Ash Wednesday.  A reminder that my life is not so awful.  After all, my sins are forgiven.  Jesus suffered for them, He took them away, and continues to take them away even as I continue to fall into more sin with my weak human nature.

In the Big Picture, having to deal with single parenting and running the homestead while DH is away is just a minor inconvenience.  Having vehicles crap out on you, well, that's nothing, really, when you compare spending eternity in Hell.  My challenges, they are nothing compared to what Jesus went through for me, and for you, on the cross at Calvary.

Because of what He did for us, all the problems we face here on earth are just the Little Picture.  We get to leave them all behind someday, when we join Him in Heaven.

Focus on the Big Picture, and the Little Picture isn't so miserable after all.

Da U.P.

I am thankful for Michigan's Upper Peninsula.  More specifically, I am thankful that I had the chance to live there for nearly two years (Aug '91 through May '93).  The U.P. taught me so much and, I can see now, had a profound influence on my adult life.

It was the first place I moved to when I left my parents' home.  Not just a move to an apartment across town; no, this was a move of 500 miles, to a place where I knew no one other than my DH and my son.  And not to an apartment, either, but to a rental trailer on the outskirts of town.  Our mailing address was a rural route, the post office was in a town that had a different name than the stretch of land on which that rental trailer stood. Which is not uncommon in the U.P.  There are lots of places with "Location" in their name (Superior Location, Boston Location. . .) that are just tiny cross roads without their own post office.  And many places that used to be towns, 100 years ago, but now are scarcely populated, too scarcely to merit a postmaster.

Anyway, living in the U.P. I was exposed to a different way of life than is the norm for lower Michigan.  In the U.P., you need to expect to be responsible for yourself.  Your very life depends on it.  That's not to say that people in the U.P. aren't helpful and don't look out for each other.  Because they do.  Very much so.  But in the U.P., you need to plan ahead, you need to not be afraid of physical labor, and you need to be aware of what is going on around you.  You could be mauled by a bear, eaten by wolves, or fall off a cliff while hiking.  You could drive off the road into a snowbank, you could be snowed into your home by a blizzard, you could be carried off by black flies.

Well, from my personal experience, falling off a cliff while hiking, driving into a snowbank, or experiencing a blizzard-- I've been there, done that, for two out of the three, and came really close to the third-- are much more likely than death by wildlife. Although the latter is not out of the realm of possibility.  The black flies are vicious in season, bears abound (and tend to frequent the dumpster at the grocery store--park in front of the store, not behind!!), and I have seen wolves several times just going about my normal daily activities while living in the U.P.  The majority of carnivorous wildlife runs from humans more often than not.  Black flies being the exception.

Mostly, though, living in the U.P. taught me to not fear snow.  Snow is a fact of life up there, as sure, six months out of the year, as the sun rising in the morning and setting in the evening.  Snow is not a howling monster.  Snow is a blanket, an insulator.  Snow is a friend, making tracking deer during hunting season much, much easier.  Snow is a necessary ingredient for winter fun.  For skiing, both downhill and cross country.  For snowmobiling.  For snow shoeing.  For building snow sculptures as large as houses, and just as detailed as the carved woodwork in most of the old buildings up there.

life size snow sculpture, Jan. 1992

Snow is way easier to drive on than ice and slush.  That is something that people in the Lower Peninsula don't seem to understand.  They go crazy salting the roads to melt the snow off of them, and cars go whizzing into the ditches from lack of traction in the mush.  Snow, properly maintained, can be driven on quite well.  And is, for months, in the Upper Peninsula.

In order to have snow, there must be cold.  Cold also is not to be feared.  Cold should be respected, and met with adequate preparation, both in terms of heating ability (often wood--many native Yoopers talk of "making wood", which is cutting and splitting and stacking firewood in the seasons before they need to actually burn it) and in clothing that is right for conditions.  Warm trumps fashionable.  Then again, U.P. clothing is it's own fashion.  Ear flap hats and plaid flannels are a must.  Big, clunky boots with thick linings, yes, got to have them!  Face masks for the windy and coldest days, and thick gloves.  Bibbed overalls with linings.  Snowmobile suits. And that's just to go to the grocery store or the school bus in December!  During a real windy and cold snap, say, in January, you might find it advantageous to 'grease' your face before going outside in order to protect any exposed skin from windburn.  When I first moved there, I thought the person who told me to rub Crisco into my cheeks was kidding.  They weren't.  And it helped.  So, grease your face if you need to.

Cold enables ice skating and ice fishing.  Luge run building.  Both winters that we lived in the U.P., DH iced down the snowbank that continually grew all winter at the house-end of our driveway.  He crafted a track in that snowbank that was just the size to fit DS1's sled.  DS1, being 2 and 3 years old during his winters in the U.P., would climb that snowbank (which sometimes reached eight foot tall), jump on his sled, and fly down the iced track.

DS1 at 2yrs old, going down his 'luge run'

  We even had a cat that loved to ride on the back of his sled and experience the luge for himself.

DS1, at 3yrs old, and our cat, at the end of a luge session

It's been over 20 years since DH and I moved back downstate from the U.P.  The engineering jobs might be down here, but our hearts have remained up there.  We often find ourselves at odds with the mindset and lifestyles down here in the lower part of the Lower Peninsula.  We don't subscribe to the panic when the weather man says "Snow!  Wind!  Cold!"  We just plan to stoke the wood boiler twice a day, make sure all our warm winter gear is ready to put on, and watch out for all the people on the roads who have no clue how to drive in snow.  There is always food in the cellar and freezers, no need for daily (or weekly!) store runs.  And on nice clear, frigid, below zero 

winter weekends, we head out to our woods and "make wood", keeping ourselves warm by cutting and stacking the downed and dead trees that will heat our home in winters to come.

Homemade Sausage!

Today is the last day of firearm deer season.  It is also the last day of November, and my last thankfulness post.  Honestly, I'm a bit thankful for both!

Deer season is a long haul, trying to squeeze in my normal work hours plus daily household/homesteading chores and still find several hours to sit in the woods and hunt.  It is two straight weeks of running hard and no sleeping in, not on Saturday, not on Sunday.

We could just buy more beef from the grocery store, and skip deer hunting all together.  Would be easier.

But not nearly as interesting, as healthy, or as good tasting.  Not to mention all the cool nature-observing stuff we'd miss out on by not sitting in the woods for 45-105 hours each November.

Plus, if we didn't deer hunt, didn't depend so heavily on deer season to provide us with the majority of the red meat in our diet, we wouldn't now be the happy owners of a sausage stuffer!

Two years ago we started making our own summer sausage.  First, using a boxed seasoning mix (and casings) and the stuffer attachment for a Kitchenaid mixer.  That worked, but not optimally, and took a long, long time.

Last year we tried again with the boxed mix and casings, and the stuffing tube that came with our meat grinder.  A little bit faster, but still time consuming.

Attempting to use it to make hunters' sticks, with casings we bought from our local meat counter (they sell hunters sticks, and were willing to sell us a sleeve of their casings when DH asked) was a big FAIL.  Oh, they tasted great, but we didn't have a small enough stuffer tube to use them with.  Ended up trying to stuff the casings using my cookie press.  2 cups of meat at a time.  Lots of air bubbles from refilling the press frequently, lots of frustration trying to hold the casing tight on the smallest end of the press, lots of grumbling.  More than a little marital strife.

This year, we  skipped the boxed spices and casings, instead purchasing casings in the two sizes we desired, and using my inventory of bulk spices to make our own recipes.  DH also went and bought a real honest to goodness sausage stuffer.

It holds 15 pounds of meat at a time, an entire batch of summer sausage or hunter's sticks.  And it came with small, medium, and large stuffing tubes.  Summer sausage size, bratwurst size, and hunter stick/hot dog size.

It stuffs casings quickly, cleanly, and easily.  No more grumbling, no more marital strife; only happy faces and lots of deer sausage!

batch of hunter sticks, stuffed and ready to cook

Sunrises

I see a lot of sunrises.  Nearly ever day of the year, I am up early enough to see the sun make it's daily appearance in the eastern sky.

You'd think it would get old after a while.  That once I'd seen a few hundred sunrises, I'd have seen them all.

But it doesn't.  Get old, that is.  Sure, getting up early every morning gets tedious and there are lots of days I'd much rather sleep in.  But the sunrises themselves never get ho-hum.  They are always changing, never the exact same color scheme often enough to get boring.

I'm thankful for all the sunrises I get to witness.

September sunrise at the horse farm

over the field at this little place here

foggy sunrise over the field

crystalline sunrise over the field

sunrise from the deer stand, Nov 15, 2013

November sunrise through the bedroom window

spring sunrise over the marsh

sunrise at the horse farm,

plane jet trails making a cross

another sunrise at the horse farm