The thing about birthdays is that everyone you encounter that day that either knows or hears it’s your birthday wants to shower you with good wishes and treats. Having a weekend birthday coupled with your husband being gone makes for an entire weekend of flat out spoiling by almost everyone in your path, especially when they hear your husband is gone for the weekend. Turns out your husband having an immovable work trip scheduled on your birthday is actually a key to weekend full of celebration.
Category: another day in the life
Of Pigs and Rice.
In last year’s quest to perfect biscuits, I discovered how baking with lard was key to not just them, but flaky pie crusts. Lard is rendered pork fat and in order to get the best, unadulterated lard, you need to obtain your own pig fat. Thanks to friends who raise pigs, I was able to obtain a 3+ pound frozen hunk of fat. Continue reading
Same as it ever was, only with a better name.
Technically, I’m not a Girl Scout leader anymore. After 5 years, I’d gotten chewed out enough for a volunteer position that I decided to cut all ties and walk away from the organization. The girls however, were a different story. I’d spent an hour or more, with them every other week for the last 5 years. I consider them partially my own girls. I promised them we’d continue to do something together this year and left it open. I was thinking we’d touch base once a month, maybe do a book club. We got together after school started and they laid out what they’d like to do. Turns out they still wanted to meet every other week, they still wanted me to come up with a plan for them to pitch out the window, so for all intents and purposes, we were pretty much doing the same thing we’ve been doing, only with no organizational oversight and no name. Continue reading
Perspective.
Is the glass half empty or half full? It’s all how you look at it.
I’ve been spending quite a bit of time navel gazing here lately, pondering the greater meaning of life, exactly what talents I do possess and just overall taking stock. I blame the change of season and the start of a new school year for this. Also an upcoming birthday that is bringing along a hint of a mid-life crisis I-don’t-even-know-what-to-call-it-because-it’s-not-a-crisis-as-much-as-it-is-some-heavy-duty-life-stuff, that when I talk to friends about why this is forthcoming, all agree, it’s a pretty damn valid impetus and furthermore, I’m handling it pretty damn good, all things considered. Continue reading
Living in her Pinterest world.
It was Spring Break of first grade where Edie discovered that Martha Stewart was a real person and had her own TV show. Somehow, despite having piles of Martha’s books and magazines stacked all over the house, I had neglected to expose my daughter to all that the lifestyle maven had to offer. This is what happens when I let my child watch television unsupervised. (She discovered Julia Child this way too.) Edie was instantly hooked. Here was someone that understood her. Next thing I knew, she had handed me a materials list because with Easter coming that week, she was going to dye her eggs Martha style.
Tumbleweeds…
I didn’t mean to take a week break from blogging. I’ve been busy puttering about the homestead, but nothing I was up to seemed to make an interesting enough post on its own. So here’s a dump of some of what I did last week. Continue reading
Major mom win.
Edie is a HUGE Taylor Swift fan. When she found out Taylor was coming to play in Charlottesville, she was pretty much beside herself with excitement. Could not stop talking about going to see her show.
And then I found out how much tickets were. Continue reading
Watermelon rind pickles and sandboxes.
Every summer I make a batch of watermelon rind pickles. I know there are some of you out there who think peaches are quite a bit of work – yes, they can behave like assholes as Patience so eloquently put it, but honestly, watermelon rind pickles are a far more pain in my ass than those peaches. Continue reading
Round here.
I went to pick more of the bumper crop of tomatillos the other day and low and behold, look what was peeking out at me. Continue reading
Weekend Tomatoes
I got two great big beautiful boxes of tomatoes this weekend from my tomato guy.
Chicken Wire & Paper Flowers 