I didn't write yesterday because Hubs and I got up early, took the pups and headed out. We have come to love our excursions to that small bit between Farmington and Fredericktown. Our first stop was at the berry picking farm. Last day for blueberries, I didn't pick any, we have a lot of blueberries tucked away, although I thought about it. I didn't make many batches for blueberry syrup and that stuff is amazing on waffles. I was simply far too over heated by the time I finished picking blackberries.
It was opening day for them, and as I worked among the vines I was suddenly in the pacific northwest. I have great memories of picking tons of blackberries with my kiddos' back then, making jams and enjoying watching their faces as they ate it on fresh baked bread. Nothing better. We used to spend hours picking them through the sharp thorns of the wild bushes on the land that my landlady and her brother let us harvest from. There was never a shortage for everything from munching on them to making jams, pies and other treats.
Yesterday it was just me, my kiddo's are grown and Hubs takes the pups on an adventure while I pick berries. For an hour I walked through all of the brambles, disturbing birds and bees as they swarmed around me, interested but not bothering me. I hope I didn't disturb any snakes, thankfully none were spotted. The only difference was these are thornless so the pain factor was significantly less.
As I wandered, looking high and low for beautiful ripe blackberries (it is actually a touch early for them to open it for picking as they were very hard to find), I had time to be lost in memories, thoughts, hopes and dreams. That quiet time is priceless.
There were other folks that had gotten there early to beat the summer heat also, and two teenage girls had me laughing for a good part of the time. They were animated and lively. They squealed at the various bugs and shared horror stories of spiders, which both of them seemed terrified of. What impressed me the most was that mixed in with all of the normal teenage chatter, they talked about how much they are working currently. The long hours, few days off, etc and how both of them were thankful to have that morning to pick berries. It was only 730 am on a Saturday morning and they were out there searching for blackberries. The one girl was talking about how her granny was going to teach her to make her favorite jam so she needed to be sure she gathered enough, it was her only day off of work that week, and she didn't want to waste it.
I think a lot of times we give up on our youth. Write them off as being lazy and unmotivated. Listening to those young girls as I was picking, filled my heart to the brim with joy and hope for our future. I firmly believe that if you teach children to do and be they will. They are such little sponges and they long to soak up information and to learn things of value to them.
I often speak about the way my daughter raises her beautiful children. There are times I cringe, because I was taught differently, but I stay quiet and watch in amazement. Her way of raising them is best described as free range by today's standards. My niece raises her boys much the same way.
But here's the thing. They are all turning out to be amazing, wonderful, empathetic, skilled, engaged and loving humans. It's a beautiful thing to witness.
My girl had a run in with a wasp on Friday, needless to say it is bad. Her entire hand and a large amount of her forearm are horribly swollen and painful. Her beautiful girls jumped right in to take care of her. The five year old looked up the kind of wasp, got her ice and pampered mom. The fifteen year old, almost 16, took the mature lead of being the one that mom could rant and rave to while in a mix of pain and terrible frustration. She values her time with her kids and doing the things on her list... this definitely slowed down the doing and she lost time because she fell asleep.
My daughter shared with me, that she and big sis had thought the little one was making up the type of wasp it was, until they verified it for themselves. I mean she just turned 5 at the end of February.
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| my wild child feeding her friend a slice of pizza |
Her kids are definitely free spirits, with a strong sense of self. My friend and I had lunch with my girl and the little yesterday. She doesn't often ask and I always want to grab those moments when they arise. When they came by the house to talk about where we wanted to go, the little decided to check out the garden. She was amazed at all the tomatoes. She is a tomato fiend, and definitely was in heaven to see that Gram had lots of bright red ones ready for picking. She asked me to pick the ones out of her reach and as she stood their eating it like it was a apple we were discussing the huge assortment of tomatoes I was growing and how she would like to grow more next year. She is also a huge fan of pickles, so the pickling cukes that are growing up the wall had her equally amazed.
She ate most of the pickles that I had ready, and I promised her that today I would make her another batch, just for her. She wasn't happy with the fact that she will have to wait two weeks to eat them, but... she is excited and wants to know how I learned to make them. Maybe before the summer is over I will let her help me make a batch of pickles, so she can learn.
She told me she might need to add those to her garden. She created it in her mom's flower garden, as she told her mom, she needed to grow her food. She has all the things she likes to eat growing around the backyard. Last night she took me on a tour of her garden, showing me the tomatoes, watermelons, green beans and the peppers. She's already picked all of her blueberries.
As we sat at lunch this precocious five year old shared with us that she is making lots of money, she loves money and rushes to beat all of her siblings to the chore lists so that she gets the cash. They are going on vacation soon and she wants to be sure she has lots of money saved up so she can "do the things". I almost cracked up. It felt like we were talking to a peer not a young child.
Hubs and I bought lots of produce at the Amish market yesterday. Even getting a few things like "horticultural beans" that I had no idea what they were, but I was game to try something new. I will be canning like crazy the next few days. My friend spent the afternoon helping me shuck beans, they were so very beautiful. Nothing beats spending time with friends and talking. I feel like I completely understand how folks used to gather to make quick work of big chores back in the day.
As we worked through the beautiful colored beans we spent time chatting about important things, trivial things and guessing what color beans each pod would reveal. It was so relaxing and rewarding all at the same time. I'd never encountered "horticultural beans before so needless to say I had no idea what the end result was going to be. As my friend said last night when I sent her the picture of the finished beans, "turned to normal looking beans". Yup, they sure did. They were beautiful pinks, creams and greens before canning. Afterwards, they were simply a normal beige color. I think we will try a can this afternoon for dinner. I want to know what they taste like. It was such fun experiment and exploration into something previously unknown. Who knows, we might hate them. Or we might have just found a new favorite. I saved a handful of the beans to dry out so that I can grow them if we fall in love...
I need to get with it, like I said, I have a lot of canning to do and this rainy day is perfect for getting my chores caught up.... I hope everyone that is getting a rainy day loves it and finds much to celebrate, seems the entire planet needs more of it. And I hope you are surrounded by people that are energetic and focused on their goals. I'm focused on mine....
love and peace...
Good one! 381+
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