Six Grade Camping Trip

Isn't this quaint? It's one of the cabins that my daughter and I, and the rest of her sixth grade class will be staying in for the next three days. It's the annual 6th grade trip and I have volunteered to chaperone. At first I was a little concerned, I wondered what this place was really like. My husband had taken my son a few years ago but neither one had much to offer in the way of description. I remember that the bathrooms were dirty, my son giggles, knowing that fact will freak me out the most. So I Googled this campground and all my worst fears were erased! I mean, who wouldn't relish the idea of settling into one of these lovely little hide-a-ways? I'm certain, by the look of the place, that the local natural inhabitants enjoy the accommodations emensely.

Here goes nothing.

Time to break out the Ritz Crackers, Memorial Day is here! I am hosting a family party this Sunday and so I am up early trying to clean the bathrooms, do all the laundry heaped on the basement floor, plant those dang flowers and get the food together. Of course, there is the GUM stuck on the family room carpet, not sure how to go about getting that off.
Enjoy the Weekend!

 

Two Pots Down, Many More to Go...

Spring Ritual

I don’t know about you, but I have a spring ritual. Part one of the ritual begins simply enough; every year about this time I find myself pulling into the area garden shops or over to the Home Depot to buy flowers. I wander among the bushy rows of annuals and perennials, try and think about what colors I like, which pots I will pull out of my garage and fill. But before I know it I am overwhelmed, bedazzled by all the choices, and I trip back across the black top to my car empty handed.
Part two begins with another stop at a flower selling establishment, but this time I attempt to whip my brain into shape before I leave the house by having a cup of coffee or one of those apple sauces that come in a small plastic cup. I begin picking out colors, load them into the metal wagon provided by the establishment to encourage gluttonous spending, and soon I have a few flats of flowers that I can’t wait to take home and plant.
Ah, but then life intervenes, which brings me to the saddest part of my ritual,
Part three.
This final part begins and ends on my patio, where I place the flats of flowers in a shady spot and water them, promising to come back in a few days to put their crammed roots into fresh dirt. They believe me, these small newly adopted orphans, they trust me to care for them. And I do. On the days I don’t forget about them completely I’m actually rather attentive. Unfortunately this kind of behavior results in a few untimely deaths. This year I vowed it would be different; I promised myself that I would plant the flowers on the day I bought them, but as you can see, my word is not worth much. Here sit my latest acquisitions; innocents all, plucky and sprite. Dreaming only of the roomy pot they're sure awaits them.

Laundry On The Line

I don’t have a lot to say this morning. I am foggy-brained after spending an intense weekend shepherding my son and daughter through science fair projects and final research papers. Thank god my husband knows how to put observation data into spread sheet form, or we’d still be hovered in front of the computer screen mumbling, I don’t know, try this button.
For some reason, the later I get to bed, the earlier I wake up. This morning it was 5:30 A.M. As I lay in bed listening to the birds and lamenting my lost sleep, I heard the wind barreling around the outside of the house and I realized that it was the perfect day to hang my sheets out on the line. So far, only the pillow cases are done, but the rest will get out there as the day goes on. For now, I’m catching glimpses of the wind having it’s way with the pillow cases as I empty the dishwasher and pack the lunches, and I have to say, it’s a good way to start the day.

Today I drove two hours to watch my son perform in a choir competition. It was his last time performing as an 8th grader, next year he’ll be in high school. The singing was wonderful, their teacher has done a fantastic job, but as I sat there watching my son, who looked like he was standing in front of a firing squad, I noticed the sleeves of the boys in the front row. And as I looked over the whole group, I saw that all their sleeves were the same; these boys, tearing through puberty, their bodies coltish and awkward, all of them had shirts that didn’t fit. And it was that, not their voices as they glided through Run-around Sue, that moved me.

Impossible Chesseburger Pie

I’ve been reading a great book by Laura Shapiro called, Something from the Oven; Reinventing Dinner in 1950s America. The main focus of the book is how major food corporations steered American women towards convenience foods and baking supplements. This wasn’t an easy task early on because most women felt that using these mixes and pre-prepared foods would be cheating. I’ve been thinking about my own cooking habits and the recipes I choose, and I realize that all the clever promotional work those companies did over 40 years ago is showing up in my own kitchen. I routinely pour Campbell’s, Cream of Celery soup over chicken, make a tasty dip by mixing dried onion soup mix into sour cream, and how else would you make Tuna Noodle Casserole if you didn’t use Cream of Mushroom soup?
Of course, not all the promotional recipes given out during the 50s and 60s stood the taste test of time. Shapiro relates that “Harriet Hepplewhite, the Happy Housewife” gave a recipe for, “a new salad made with marshmallows, cherries, nuts, figs, dates, apples, mayonnaise, candied orange peel, chopped eggs, and whipped cream…”
I often use the recipes found on the labels of cans and the back of pasta boxes. Last night I made Incredible Cheeseburger Pie from a recipe that I got off the back of a Bisquick box, and while everyone ate it, I could tell by the way they picked through it that they thought it looked scary. Hey, snap out of it, I wanted to say. Just be glad I’m not servin-ya slices of Spam glazed with orange marmalade and flambeed peas!

Mother's Day

Ah, the joys of being a new mother. I remember them fondly; my hair was always wet because I never had time to dry it, sweat pants and t-shirts were my high fashion choices of the day, and my hands always looked ghostly due to the hourly application of Desitin ointment to tiny bottoms. But it was a time of cocooning as well, existing, at least for a little while, in a world that belonged to just me and my children. So as my son graduates from 8th grade and my daughter from 6th, I find myself missing their minute, sticky hands, and their toothless smiles. If I had some advice for Mrs. Trump, as glamorous and dazzling as she is, I'd tell her to kick off her shoes and enjoy this time with her son, because time really does fly as fast as they say it does.

Now and Then

Cuttin' the Lawn

Can I get a drum-roll please? This Saturday, for the very first time, I cut my back yard. OK, this may not be thrilling to you, but for me it was an introduction to the finesse and strategy it takes to mow a lawn. My husband had already cut the front yard and had just begun the back when inspiration pulled me from my school reading and I bounded over in freshly manicured toes and flip-flops and took the reins from his astonished hands. I was flustered at first because I couldn’t seem to push the mower, but then I figured out it was due to the thick zoysia grass that makes up part of our yard. It’s so thick, that it feels like you’re trying to push through a shag carpet. But after struggling through that section, I sailed along haphazardly, making triangles, edging the garden; I even took to running across the yard, pushing the noisy sputtering contraption ahead of me.
I found myself enjoying the work my legs and arms were doing, imagining that with all the pushing and heaving, they were sculpting themselves into perfect Uma Thurman replicas. I fell into a meditative zone, wondering how that checker-board pattern appears on all of the golf courses, which led me to speculate about the patterns a lawn mower could make in general, and perhaps, if one was really handy, a paisley design could be achieved with strategic raising and lowering of the blades.
I began to feel a little cocky, hoping my female neighbor friends would see me hard at work and be impressed with my yard cutting skills, but it turned out that only my daughter witnessed the event. I think her taking a picture makes the occasion, at least in her mind, some what awe-inspiring.

Scorned Kitty

Since I’m home for at least half of every day studying, reading and writing, I spend a lot of time with my cat, Sweetie-Pie. She follows me from my computer to the kitchen table to the bathroom; anywhere I go she’s sure to show up a few seconds later, quietly curling up as close to me as possible.
But our days of bliss have hit a snag. The weather has been beautiful here and so I have been traipsing out to my patio with my laptop and books. Sweetie-Pie takes this as a sign of complete rejection and sits at the window crying like the little match girl. When I do happen to come in to get something, her pitiful crying act vanishes and instead she displays the wrath of the scorned kitty. She bats at my ankles and climbs whatever piece of furniture is closest to me in order to swipe at my arms or back, running away if I try to pet her.
It’s only 7:30 in the morning now, and as I type at the key board Sweetie-Pie has squished herself between my back and the edge of the chair. But the weather forecast is calling for lots of sun and warm breezes, so you can be sure, that by the end of the day, I’ll be on Sweetie-Pie’s hit list again.

May Day

Do you all know what this is? It is a beautiful, plastic and aluminium clothes line and it is brand-spanking new. Now don't fret, I never put my unmentionables out on display, but I do love to hang my sheets and towels out in the warm summer air. The smell that settles into the cotten just can't be had from a dryer sheet or a cup full of Downy in the rinse cycle.
I haven't broken it in yet, that might have to wait until the weekend, but you'll be seeing me here soon, clothes pins hanging from the edge of my shirt, a basket of wet towels at my feet just jumping to get up on the line.