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We had to say goodbye again today. My uncle lost his battle to lung cancer; today his family laid him to rest.
He was very well loved, and many, many friends and family turned out to honor him and love and support his family. I remember staying with my cousin in the summertime as a younger gal, and how welcome he always made me feel. Like my dad was of me and my brother, he was demanding of excellence in his kids, and their biggest supporter, and their biggest fan. They made him so proud, I know.
Well, I have hope that it wasn't necessarily goodbye, more of a 'see you later.' But we miss him here, and the loneliness is painful. I feel for my cousins, losing their dad, and I didn't want to have to see anyone else go through losing their dad, let alone at so young an age.
So we cling to hope, and move on the best we can. My aunt and my cousins are in my prayers. I was always so grateful for the love and support and prayers of all my loved ones when my dad passed away, and I know that's what carries us through. Another encouragement I have is that Jesus doesn't require us to endure anything that He wasn't willing to endure, and even experienced grief at the death of His dear friend Lazarus. There's a promise in there, too: just like Lazarus, there will come a day when our loved ones are raised up again, and we'll all be together again, with Jesus. Now that's something to look forward to!
This photo is sort of unrelated, but I like it so I'm putting it in tonight. Next time there are fireworks, Frenchy gets to see them from above.
The black raspberries are a bit late this year, but what they lack in punctuality, they make up for in abundance.
This morning I made an Independence Day brunch for the six of us, and Mom and Pop in law stopped by to show us their take of black raspberries. Just in time, as it turns out, to join us in our brunch, and so they contributed some black raspberries to have on the whole wheat waffles I made.
Last night Andy and I picked just over six quarts, so I got two quarts of juice from them for making some jelly! One of my most favorite things to do . . .
The other day I picked peas. I planted a bunch in an earthbox on the deck, and then as an afterthought, we stuck in a couple short rows in the garden, in between cucumber plants. So the other day I got maybe a pint, which only seemed like a couple of mouthfuls, so I stored them in the fridge.
So today I picked peas, and got just over another pint, so altogether a generous quart, and we had fresh peas with our spaghetti for supper. Very, very tasty. I'm hoping to get a fall crop in, and plan on planting many, many more rows. Perhaps we can put them in where the green beans are now, and plant them when the beans are done . . . if not, I will FIND SOMEWHERE to plant them.
We have tons of blossoms on our cucumber plants, and our tomato plants are huge. The green beans are setting blossoms and are starting to form teeny little beans. Our potato plants are doing well, and are onions are pretty decent. The spinach is done, and tomorrow I'm going to see if the beets are pickling size.
E2 was helping me with chores on Friday. I sent him out to feed the patriarch of our herd, Golly. Golly's first doe born here has been quite the milker this year. Ginger is giving over 8# a day, so we are quite pleased with 'Gollinator the Pollinator.' So back to the story. E2 took Golly's food out to him, but before he could get all the way out to Golly's house, or 'The Love Shack' as we call it sometimes, he came charging back into the barn and said, 'Mom! There are chicks - baby chickens - out under Golly's house!' Sure enough, one of our Silver Spangled Hamburg hens had sneaked off and hatched a brood under Golly's house. With the threats posed by the roosters, the other hens, the one-eyed cat that has been hanging around, the skunk we have been smelling at night, raccoons and other things we are blissfully ignorant of, we adopted them to the mud room. There are a nice dozen chicks, and we are hoping that they are hens. Time will tell . . .
The stormy weather seems to have settled down. The clouds were pretty neat last night, though.
You've heard about the flooding already, I'm sure. And the tornadoes and various other severe weather events that have been in our area. My brother-in-law said it best: This weather in 2008 is like an abusive, drunken husband. It beats the living daylights out of us one day, then the next is all repentant and lovey-dovey. The weather this week has been as near to perfect as it can get; small consolation, I'm sure, to the folks who are having to salvage their lives and homes from the muck and the mire in Cedar Rapids and Iowa City, Columbus Junction and on down the Mississippi.
By God's mercy we have escaped harm from the weather so far at Amon Eruanna. The garden is doing great, and the green beans we had to replant, due to a varmint mole, are all up and growing. A blessing in disguise, as it will extend the season and I will have lots to can.
I'm hoping to wander out to the timber to get some black raspberries here in the next few days. There is not much that is better than black raspberry jelly.
I've been working on some beaded blackberry socks the past few weeks, getting a row or two in now and then. I wasn't going to use the beads, but I can't get the pattern to work without them, and now they are really growing on me. Wish I had more time for them, though. They are made with Tofutsies yarn, which is awesome because its made from soft wool, Soysilk, some other fiber, and chitin, which is derived from the shells of lobster and shrimp and such, and is naturally antibacterial! Not that my feet stink, mind you . . .
Little Ginger kidded this afternoon, a little buck. Since its mom and dad-in-laws anniversary today, they got the privilege of naming him, and so here we have "Doc." He looks really similar to Piper, we think.
I've been learning about cheesemaking, and have made some chevre and also some different flavor combinations to add to the chevre. My favorites have been garlic and chive, and pineapple and walnut. The garden, children, kids, grass and weeds have all been growing. Not much else to add at this point . . .
Spring is in full swing at Amon Eruanna. Hubby and I have been busy, he tilling and I planting. We have planted zucchini, tomatoes, peas, radishes, onions, spinach, beets, chinese cabbage, cucumbers, potatoes, green beans, lettuce and carrots. Quite a bit of the cool weather stuff went into earth boxes on the back deck, along with a couple of cherry tomato plants and two jalapeño plants and one habanero plant. Hubby tilled up a patch in the barnyard and put a cattle panel fence around it. E1 planted gourds, watermelon, pumpkins, cantaloupe and let me stick in a few winter squash plants in her patch by Shep's pen.
Also, we removed the landscaping gravel from the little bed south of our front porch and put actual dirt in there, nice barnyard mulch and black dirt . . . the good part being that we were able to preserve and keep that nice climbing rose bush in the process. I want to plant a climbing honeysuckle vine on the opposite side to compliment it, and the children have all picked out a plant from Reha's greenhouse to plant in that bed as well.
Of course, before the past week's flurry of tilling and sowing, there was the call of the timber and the precious morsels to be found there, more valuable than truffles around these here parts. We found some little grays, which we incorporated into a sauce for a tender venison loin that we roasted. The big yellows were dipped in home-cultured buttermilk, flour, and fried in canola oil and butter. Oh, yummy!
All of this pictures in this post are of the wildflowers and choice fungus that can be found in our prairie and woodland here at Amon Eruanna. I took a couple of blissful afternoons to take it all in while 'shrooming.
