berry abundance

Our wild berries are ready - when I went out to pick, I filled up my bowl plus more! What do you do with so many but make a pie?

there were more berries than this!

Except that pie crusts tend to get soggy around here - I always make them juicy.

Then, something made me think of Margo's shortbread crust pies. A crust like that would hold up longer. 

Here it is before going in the oven with powdered sugar on top. It came out very well, if a little too sweet.  It didn't last long. But there were lots of berries left.

I made another one today.

mercy with the Savior

There's a wideness in God's mercy,

Like the wideness of the sea;

There's a kindness in His justice,

Which is more than liberty.

There's a welcome for the sinner,

And more graces for the good;

There is mercy with the Savior,

There is healing in His blood.

the value of pain in our lives

"Pain prunes the unessential emotions, ambitions, and illusions, teaching us the lessons we either consciously or unconsciously refuse to be taught by joy. Pain prunes the insignificant details that distract us from what is really important, sapping our days, energies, and spirits."

                                       -  Sarah Ban Breathnach,  Simple Abundance

Henry nonplussed

There's an oscillating fan on a table in the living room; the face of it is metal. The other day this is what I saw -

and there was Henry doing what he often does, looking up - (to his credit, he is often seen looking up!).

He saw something. Then he scrambled under the table

and back and forth, back and forth. Well, after a bit I figured it out - he was watching the light reflecting from the fan turning.

He couldn't figure it out, of course. So, he did what cats often do.

Took a nap.

patchwork skirt

almost done.

midsummer's eve menu

from yesterday:

- lemon-ginger iced tea with honey
- easy and mild pickles
- braised chicken
- fresh salad greens with Tasha Tudor's French dressing
- stuffed eggs
- rye sandwiches with layers of pickle, cottage cheese and rose petals
- strawberry shortcakes

the longest days of the year

I wait for these long-daylight hours all year. What is it about the morning of a hot day, when it's light out before five o'clock, and you know that if you could just be up and dressed that early you could do all sorts of things inside and out before it's too warm, and sleep in the afternoon - if you needed to? Every year, I long to do this. The silky-temperatured air, the birds singing, the cool wet grass calls to me every year at this time and I feel that there's something wrong with being in bed till seven or even six when it's practically broad daylight by then.

I'm not a morning person; I come more alive in the afternoon, and it's hard to make myself go to bed early - a person does need some sleep! (especially persons in their fifties) But every year at the summer solstice I think I should, at least once - get up with the sun. So, I usually do, but once is all I seem to be able to manage.

The weather has to cooperate, of course. It doesn't seem to work as well if it isn't hot - the idea being that if you can't caper about barefoot in the morning grass, there isn't much point to rising so early in a small house with some creaky floorboards, because you don't want to be disturbing anybody. But when it's warmer days, the whole outside just calls to me.

Yesterday, I got up at 4:30! It was going to be a pretty warm day - 85 - but in the morning it was a little too damp and cool to be going out; still, I was glad and found that I could do some sewing because my machine isn't very noisy. I later went to the farmers' market and grocery shopping with a friend, and she kept asking me "How are you holding up?" and I was always fine! That was a surprise; it never seemed to catch up with me.

I really hope to continue this when possible on my days off. It's magic.

Top of the Hill, by Frank Vincent Dumond

glimpse of a porch

on this house ....

on this street

of many inviting houses

and a farmers' market down the middle.

seeds finally in

I've had a raised bed ready for seeds but so much rain has held me up. Now we're in for a hot spell, so today after work, with all my supplies in a basket, I grabbed Dolly and headed outside.

Finally!

For some reason I thought I had more space than I did, so not everything went in.  I know it's late, but I'm looking forward, not back. We'll see what arises.

Then I came in and made a nice vegetable omelet, and felt like a real farmgirl.

eight new patterns

I've been finding very few tops or blouses I like. Often it's the fabric - the jerseys used are thin and cheap feeling even in the higher end places, which must be due to the upsurge in cotton prices. Another thing is the spandex in everything - I've told myself over and over that I'll get used to it, but when it comes in the mail, and I take it out of the package I can't stand that rubbery feeling. Back it goes.

So I bought eight patterns - all for tops - in a recent McCall's sale. I much prefer making skirts, of course, but one must progress.

safe up high

During a vigorous dinnertime thunderstorm, Dolly decided the best place was up. And then she stayed there.

rick rack on

...the right touch.

where is that nightingale?

Yesterday at work Trisha and I were talking about nightingales - this morning I was on youtube looking them up. The cats were on my bed, Dolly buried underneath a quilt, sound asleep, of course.

I found a nightingale, nice and loud. Poor Dolly appeared, wide-eyed and disoriented. 

But nowhere could she find that bird. Poor Dolly!

in full bloom

The red rose bush has been there so long that even when I forget to fertilize it

it still amazes.

French hen luncheon plates

Our dinnerware is pretty old, but we aren't tired of it. It came from the grocery store many years ago; it's very New England-y and suits us. Auntie Adeline also had a set, but my cousins convinced her to get something more up to date, so we took hers too.

The problem is, none of it is microwaveable and I find the microwave is most handy for heating up leftovers; otherwise, the food gets mushy and then there are the pots and pans to wash.  I know a man who puts his old dishes in there, but I feel uncomfortable doing it - I want to know that my dishes are made for that.

We have some cheap ones from the supermarket, but for a dollar each I shouldn't be surprised the glaze is wearing off - I've thrown out most of them, although the bowls should keep. But every now and then I look online at dishes to get ideas.

Last week at Sur la Table I saw these French Hen luncheon plates on sale. I could not resist them! The didn't come in dinner size, but I liked these so much I grabbed five.

They came today. They look very well in this kitchen.

jumper almost done

I tried it on today, and it fits! It looked a bit plain so after this photo was taken I stitched some light pink rick rack around in lieu of a belt. I'm going to eschew buttons on the bodice for now - it stays in place fine without them. So, a hem and I'm done!

"the flash"

"sometimes,...it was as if she caught a glimpse of the enchanting realm beyond... 

This moment came rarely - ...but the wonder of it stayed with her for days... It had come with a high, wild note of wind in the night, with a shadow wave over a ripe field, with a greybird lighting on her window-sill in a storm, with the singing of 'Holy, holy, holy' in church, with the glimpse of a kitchen fire when she had come home on a dark autumn night, with the spirit-like blue of ice palms on a twilit pane, with a felicitous new word when she was writing down a 'description' of something. And always when the flash came to her Emily felt that life was a wonderful, mysterious thing of persistent beauty."

                                                -  L.M. Montgomery,  Emily of New Moon

prettiest sheet ever

In between all the usual Saturday chores, I still managed to get the binding on my jumper bodice.

The ends connect at the base of the armhole and I wasn't able to make it happen smoothly on either one. I'll worry about that later, like Scarlet O'Hara.

Dolly in my window, behind that ubiquitous fabric - I still have more of it. It's really one of the prettiest sheets I've ever seen. It's a Ralph Lauren, king sized, and I found it on ebay for sixteen dollars. I've made two sets of long, narrow curtains and a bodice. So far.

God's tenderness

Today we Catholics celebrate the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

"We celebrate today God’s tenderness, God’s loving pursuit. We celebrate the reality that our God enfleshed in Jesus and his deeds and compassion will always, always be the God with a broken, open, wounded heart. And so the invitation is to honestly even joyfully take ownership of our lostness, my very real need for mercy, my desperate need to be found and sought out by Jesus. My sinfulness, my apartness from God can never estrange me from him, but instead, once I beg for his mercy, become a very great, greasy shoot which will lead me right into his broken Heart."

                                                               -  stolen from here

bias binding on a jumper bodice

I've been working on a summery jumper, but do things ever go smoothly and quickly on to their conclusions?  Because I decided to flat line the whole thing, it has taken a little longer, and today I made bias binding because the store-bought one was too narrow and I'm sure I could have guessed that but put it on anyway and then had to rip it off. 

 

Well, that's okay. Why I balked at making the binding, I don't know. I've made binding before, and it isn't hard. And it's of the same stuff as the jumper skirt fabric, so should look very nice. The bodice is from my summer curtain fabric (a sheet, of which I have plenty left).

Let's hope it fits when the time comes.

Heidi

My mother always loved her, and called her "Heidi", but I've kept her in the cupboard for some reason, until now. I was cleaning the living room yesterday and changing out the knick knacks for something different and more summery, and there she was. I put her on top of the secretary.

She's a Hedi Schoop design, and I thought to look it up online. Looks like this woman made lots of figurines, but I didn't see this one. You can put things in her baskets if you want.

Isn't she sweet?

quick pickles

I made this mild pickle recipe from Anna's blog. I did shake the jar every time I went into the fridge, which she didn't seem to do, but otherwise there was nothing to it.

They are surprisingly good and refreshing. Just right for this hot weather, and it couldn't have been simpler.

glorious sunset

in a not-so-glorious photo.

wilting

It's been hot around here.

Lovely Lime Frosting

For the holiday the other day I made the ginger cake recipe from May's Country Living - oh, how good it was! It called for a bourbon frosting - I don't tend to keep that around but wanted to make the frosting that goes with the cake. I decided to substitute lime juice.  Ahhhhhhhhh!!! It could only have been a divine inspiration.

Lovely Lime Frosting

Thoroughly mix together one and a half sticks of butter with two ounces of cream cheese. Add two tablespoons of lime juice (which happened to be the juice of one lime) and combine. Then put in a pound of confectioners' sugar and a dash or two of nutmeg. Try to refrain from eating it by the spoonful.

(The original recipe is from chef Edward Lee, who also writes for Organic Gardening.)

flock-swooping in NYC

In Manhattan the other day as we approached Central Park, a large group of birds was swooping up, around, forward and back again, several times; it was so fascinating and I really tried to get a good photo of them. This was the best I could do, but they were closer than appears here. The next day I encountered this passage in the book I've been reading:

"The 'flock-swoop', as I think of it, is one of the magnificent natural sights of the city. And it is a sight that repeats itself daily, even hourly, in every sector of every city - in high-rent and low-rent districts, over empty lots and between skycrapers. Even as I write this, my peripheral vision notices motion: out the great long windows of Columbia University's library the white of the sky highlights a flock of pigeons arcing gracefully south to land on the ledges above the windows."

                                       -   Alexandra Horowitz,   On Looking

This book is so interesting - Alexandra Horowitz goes for a walk around a block in each chapter with a different "expert" - and she learns to notice different things, because everybody's got their "thing" they're interested in, don't they?

"Watching the birds soar, pitch and roll, and feeling happier just observing them, it occurred to me that one of the reasons that it is hard to pinpoint the function of this behavior may be that it is functionless. And the most classic functionless behavior, seen in all mammals and most vertebrates, is play. Might these birds be soaring for the mere pleasure of it, a communal recess run to nowhere in particular?"
                                                     -  On Looking  (chapter entitled, The Animals Among Us)

a day in New York City

Our cousins live there, and Sunday we went to see them.

The train station

and here I am waiting for the train.

We went to Mass at St. Patrick's,

and then headed up Fifth Avenue, my favorite street.

You can walk pretty far in New York without realizing it, and soon enough we found ourselves in Central Park.

Sir Walter Scott was there. (so was Robert Frost)

The Park has entertainers everywhere you turn and they kept us occupied but eventually we hopped on a downtown bus for a delicious dinner at a place called Basta Pasta (go there!), then took a cab back toward Grand Central.

But first my cousins insisted we see Chelsea Market and taste all the flavored olive oils and specialty salts. I splurged on a small jar of Murray River salt, which I later found out is from Australia!

my stylish cousin

Loads of fresh air and smiles. (some photos by my brother)

resurrection and life

Remember me when I am gone away,

   Gone far away into the silent land;

   When you can no more hold me by the hand,

Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.

Remember me when no more day by day

   You tell me of our future that you planned:

   Only remember me, you understand

It will be late to counsel then or pray.

Yet if you should forget me for a while

   And afterwards remember, do not grieve:

   For if the darkness and corruption leave

A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,

   Than that you should remember and be sad.

Remember  -  Christina Rossetti

Martha said to Jesus, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. [But] even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you. Jesus said to her, Your brother will rise. Martha said to him, I know he will rise, in the resurrection on the last day. Jesus told her, I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?

                                                       - John 11:21-26

Memorial Day blessings!

the music lover

listening to Sinatra and Jobim - my absolute favorite collection of hot weather music.

far better than I imagined

I recently put together a quilt top - here it is in strips, before being sewn together. My intent was to use greens, blues and yellows, with a bit of warm pink here and there. As I was cutting I wondered how it would look with so many pea greens next to cooler greens, aquas near dark blues. I had my doubts. But one thing I've realized I'm not good at, is imagining how something is going to look.

Anna has many times exclaimed over the transformation which takes place after quilting - how the whole thing seems to come alive. But I'm already amazed at how pretty this is  - so much better than I imagined!  It's off to the side while I sew something else, but not for long; I look forward to finishing this patchwork quilt.

starting again

Well, the other evening I had big piles of fabric fall down on me, off the shelf. I started to put it back, then just pulled it all down, folded it neatly, and made new piles.

It wasn't the first time. After working all day, it was the last thing I wanted to do. But it's so nice and neat now.  You know how it is - you take pieces down, and before long the whole thing is messed up and looks terrible. So I throw it on the floor and start again. Oh, may the neatness last!