270
Hi Everyone,
Happy Father’s Day to all you Father’s! I hope that you have had a wonderful day. I was grateful to be able to go to church with my Papa today—I am so thankful to have a Papa who loves the Lord, and has been faithful to raise me in church and to teach me the ways of God.
Our Father’s Day started out bright and early—5:00, so that we could get all the animals fed, moved, and milked before we left for church. To our delight we were actually going to be on time this morning—all the chores went smoothly, and the cows came when called. Then as we finished eating breakfast, Papa mentioned that the milk was a little warm. Mom checked the fridge and sure enough—it was frozen up. So, Mom and Papa took turns using the blow dryer to de-thaw the coils inside the fridge. That took long enough to make us late for Sunday school. We praised the Lord that we had been on time—otherwise we would have been late for church also, and I am the piano player. When we got home the fridge was already about 65 degrees. We fixed lunch, and then we emptied the whole fridge and freezer into ice chests and put them in the walk in cooler and freezer—what a blessing those rooms are since our house fridge likes to freeze up every six months or so. We spent New Year’s Day doing the same thing—and it took us about four months to finally retrieve all of the freezer items from our walk in freezer. Maybe we will be better this time. J I will say that having the fridge freeze over is good in one aspect—it helps you clean out your fridge of old items, and give it a good wash down.
Last week started out pretty slow for me, for I was feeling a little under the weather. I got the cows milked, but then I spent the rest of the day inside while Mom and Steve mowed and trimmed the garden and house yard. My down time was not wasted though, and I found many sit down jobs to do. I can now see the wood on my desk and my hope chest thanks to bookshelves, filing cabinets and the garbage can. It did help that I have planted everything that we need to plant right now, and therefore I could put away all my gardening magazines and notes.
Thankfully I felt better on Tuesday, for I needed to plant the grain sorghum before the rains arrived. Mom and I got the cows milked first thing, and then Steve and I bottled the milk and the kefir. After that we headed to the garden to plant the sorghum, trellis and weed the watermelons, and trellis some of the acorn squash. Mom called us in for lunch before we finished, but that was okay, for I had yogurt to make. After lunch we all worked on packaging eggs. Mom on the other hand spent her day playing—or should I say creating, remodeling, and constructing. (She did help package the eggs though.) A few years ago when a man at our church died, Mom got a few of his birdhouses that he had all over his property. Over time they have started to fall apart, and lately Mom’s creative juices have been flowing and she has been fixing them up—or in this case, using the design and totally re-building it from scratch. All that was left from the old birdhouse was the base and a little bird figurine. Half of the roof and sides had already made it to the garbage can, but the other half was still in tack, but pretty well rotten. So, Mom and Papa went to the woodshed to find a log for the sides, some old wood for the roof, and then to the barn to find some 2 x 4’s for the front and back. Once she had it all assembled then she painted the roof, and the front and back. Since the sides were made from a log—which still had its bark on it, she did not paint them. In the end, the birdhouse is good as new, and as cute as can be.
Wednesday was a busy day with the Crane’s as they helped move some chicks out to pasture—and got caught in the rain. Then they finished packaging some eggs with Steve—they had their own egg party while Mom and I milked the cows. While they finished packing the ice chests in the van for the Jacksonville delivery, stacking a load of feed into the feed room, and gathering the eggs, I got the chance to sit down and have a good visit with my dear friend Amelia (the Crane boy’s Mom). It was really nice to sit down and relax for a little while, since I didn’t have to teach piano lessons. Being summer, I will only teach every other week, instead of every week.
Thursday was go to town day—after we milked the cows, bottled the milk and took care of the green beans. Last month we canned about 100 pint jars of green beans, but three days after we canned the last batch Mom found out that she was allergic to green beans. That was pretty discouraging, and we just left the beans on the counter—which made for a shortage of counter space when we needed to cook our meals. Mom was determined that Thursday would be the day that those bean jars were washed, labeled and tucked out of sight in the cabinets—to be shared with company, and in hopes that Mom’s allergy will not last forever. Then as soon as lunch was over, Mom and I headed to town to do a lot of shopping. We had necessities to buy, window shopping to do, gifts to buy, and some treasures to claim at Goodwill. Mom found a nice find—since I was about 8, we have had the same dishes. My siblings and I broke many of them, and replaced many of them with our own money. At Goodwill, Mom actually found a service of 7 in the pattern that we have. Each piece was either $1.99, or $.99, and then at the check-out counter we found out that they were also 40% off. Now that is a deal! Our other finds were a bunch of baskets—I have had a soft spot in my heart for baskets ever since I was a little girl. My favorite store as a little girl was the World Bazaar—for they had lots and lots of baskets. Some of my baskets have history in them—like the one Mom asked me for as a child so that she could have a flower arrangement made in it for our kitchen table, and we still have it and I use it on the table in the spring. Then there is the gathering basket that I use to harvest the fall and winter greens—it was the basket that housed the flower arrangement on the casket when my Papa’s mother died. I have a few baskets that I use to gather the spring veggies that came from my Mom’s mother’s funeral. I have a basket from a friend, and a tiny little basket that was my Easter Basket when I was 14 and spent Easter weekend with my Aunt Patti. I have always longed for some type of rack to hang baskets from, and one of the cutest ideas that I have seen is an old ladder hanging from the ceiling with hooks on it. I told Mom the other day that it is time to turn our old wooden ladder into a piece of art. That is honestly the best place for it—for we have learned from too many experiences that old ladders crumble and break when you are in the worst predicaments. Once in our old house Papa was trying to get a desk up into our attic—half way up the ladder broke, and Papa fell to the ground with the desk swinging over him. Thankfully the desk was well tied and attached to the pulley in the attic. Papa was not hurt that time, but when he and Mom were building our wood shed, he ended up with a torn rotator cuff when his Grand-father’s old wooden step ladder crumbled under him just as he and Mom were lifting up the center rafter. Papa came crashing down to the floor head and shoulder first, and got knocked out, while the rafter came down and penned Mom’s arm on top of the wall. Thankfully when Papa came to, he was able to climb up Mom’s scaffold and pick up the rafter to release Mom’s arm. The incident ended with Mom hiring someone to finish the shed, and Papa recovering from shoulder surgery for six weeks. So—you may agree that the best place for antique ladders is hanging from the ceiling as a decoration to store one’s basket collection on.
Friday we milked the cows and then spent a few hours in the garden before lunch. Carry has been with us for two weeks—and this was her first chance to work in (and see) the garden. Summer rains have begun, and the weeds are growing fast. While there is still a lot of beauty in the garden, you do have to look past a lot of weeds to see it. I have learned this year that the garden is in its prime around the weekend of Mother’s Day—everything is at the stage of perfection then. The flowers are all blooming, the vegetables are growing nicely, and the weeds are able to be kept at bay. After we toured through the garden accessing everything, we decided to weed the new rose beds. When the weeds begin to grow, it is hard to decide which section to tackle first—so you pick a section that would suffer if fresh air isn’t allowed in soon. After lunch Mom went back to the garden, while Carry and I made yogurt. Then I worked with Carry at the piano. She took keyboard at school, and wants to learn more.
Saturday was one of those “impossible” days. We had to leave for a Baby Shower at 12:30, but the amount of things that we needed to do before hand was “impossible”. First things first—we ate breakfast, and then we headed out to milk the cows. After milking we bottled the milk and the kefir, and then I had to get the Gainesville order packed. To slow things down, I had orders for some spice jars, but I had messed up the labels when I printed them a few weeks ago—and I had never got around to printing more. Now I had to print labels, finish the receipts, make a kefir drink for Papa and me, and assemble a pot of stew so that it could cook while we were gone. I flew around like a chicken with her head cut off—but at 12:45 I was ready to walk out the door, and had it not been for some road construction that we ran into in Trenton, we would have made it on time. As it was, we were only a few minutes late. The shower was lovely, and we had a nice time. On our way home we took a few detours looking for an old cemetery and trying to locate a woman whose family dates pretty far back in Fort White. My great-great grandparents used to live in Fort White in the late 1800’s. My great-grandfather was born while they were working at a phosphate mine there in Fort White. Actually, when his mother got close to her due date, she hopped on a train in Fort White, Florida and headed to the Woman’s hospital in Savannah, Georgia to have the baby. That is all the history we know, and we would love to know more, but finding someone who would know is hard.
I was glad when we got home Saturday night, that dinner was in the oven. That helped make the rest of the evening go very smoothly. I hope that you have a wonderful week, and that you take time to enjoy the summer.
Serving you with Gladness,
Tiare