...and after!

Here is my very first batch of crabapple cider butter! I'm so pleased with the result: it's absolutely delicious. I could have possibly been a little more proud, however, had I not spilled 2 jars of this heavenly concoction onto the floor! The dogs weren't terribly enthusiastic about cleaning up the dreadful mess, but between us, we managed to do a good job while the first batch was having their boiling water bath to seal them. So, in my advancing years, I'm still learning lessons: it's never to late to learn; if a job's worth doing, it's worth doing well; and always play it safe! For the first lesson, I found a wonderful Amish recipe, but as a matter of fact, it called for 18 gallons of crabapples! So I put my algebra to work, and figured out the formula!! The second lesson involved the idea of not trying to hurry things up; by taking my time, I would have been more successful, and the last two jars would have remained standing. The third lesson received quite a good grade until excited anticipation sent the last 2 jars toppling...I shall be much more careful next time.

The apples came from the crabapple tree outside the church on Crawford Farm Road. It has never failed to produce an abundance of apples, and is always a delight for sore eyes when it blossoms in early summer. We shall enjoy the apple butter in the ramekin for dinner tonight, as an accompaniment to the chicken we shall cook on the spit outside. Hannah's coming!!

Crab Apple Butter ~ Before The Fact!

The colour of these crab apples is exquisite, and it seems such a pity to put them in a pot with sugar and exotic spices and boil the Dickens out of them! The resultant crab apple butter, however, soon eradicates any pity I may have had earlier. Poured into glass jars, sealed and set on the shelves until Thanksgiving, this is the true beginning of Harvest Home! Let the pickling begin!

Poor knee!

Just look at this amazing flower! One of the few that the darling deer left unscathed. If you look closely, you can just about see a honey bee enjoying his breakfast, packing his trousers with the golden treasure. That's when I thought about bees knees, and hoped that this bee's knees were feeling a lot better than my poor knee, which seems to have conked out altogether! I was on my way to the orthopaedic surgeon, when I noticed the sunflower simply shining in the morning's glory, so I took her picture with my phone, and I'm so glad that I did because the rest of the morning went slip sliding down the hill at an out-of-control rate! The sorebones asked me (quite seriously!) how long had my legs been so crooked!! So I told him 62 and a half years! But I was quick to add that they'd done me right proud for all those years, with no complaints until now. So after a thorough examination of the offending knee, they drew 3 vials of fluid from the knee joint! I can't even begin to describe the intensity of the pain! The needle was fatter than my fattest tapestry needle, and in it went, right into the angry joint. The following cortisone shot was a breeze...in fact, even produced a chuckle! An MRI has been scheduled soon, then we'll go from there. I wish I was a bee!

Bringing harvest home...

This week has been incredible! Beautiful sunshine, renewed energy, and up until today, an almost pain-free knee! I have taken every opportunity to be outside soaking up the Ds, and being productive in the garden. On Monday, I cleaned the oven!! Well not exactly, since, of course, nowadays, they clean themselves. It was exciting because it was the first time I'd ever cleaned this one, and now it's all clean and shiny. On Tuesday, I tootled up to Holland to pick blueberries at the Lionel Fortin patch, and, although the bushes looked pretty picked over, I lay down under the bushes to find them beautifully laden. I picked 6 quarts, and a basketful of early yellow apples, some late raspberries, and Lionel threw in an heritage tomato and others and a couple of cucumbers, which was just fine since Moses has pulled up and eaten all the cucumber plants! When I returned home, I froze 6 quarts of blueberries and 2 quarts of applesauce! I dined on tomatoes and cucumbers and salad greens. So begins my most favourite time of the year: bringing in the harvest and laying it up for the winter months; jam making; bread making; knitting and spinning. Here's a lovely photograph of Lionel helping to fill my basket! He and his wife, Simone, are the very salt of the earth.

Cicada joins us for breakfast!

Out of the blue, 'twas the least we could do,

We invited Cicada to breakfast!

It hadn't been planned for Hannah to land 'pon his back,

So impromptu, ere breakfast!

Tucked hidden away, seventeen years to the day,

He stretched and he grew under bark.

'Til at last he was cooked, and out of there booked

It, though hard 'twas to see in the dark!

So merrily skipping, careful not to be tipping

The cream, she came to set table;

But alas, and alack, landed right on his back,

Which rendered that poor thing disabled!

People weren't that keen, to invite him, I mean!

For unhealthy thoughts 'twould awaken.

But with membranous wings, though he now couldn't sing,

We sat him right next to the bacon!

So thanks for the song that you'd taken so long

To develop, but now you lie still...

Under JP's hydrangea, what could be stranger!

You lie silent on top of the hill!

Rain, rain...

There's no doubt about it: the joy of downpours is certainly growing old! However, having said that, it's always a joy to go into the sunny garden after any such recent downpour, to find everything simply dripping. And so I went this very morning, to find the Black Cherry roses bashed and washed by the 'stair-rods' shower that had descended upon us in the past hour. The sun was blazing now, and their upright mates were happily absorbing the brilliant sunshine, while it was quite plain to see that there was simply no going back for the fallen roses. So I snipped them off, carefully remembering my grandfather's instructions to cut on an angle just above the next 5-leaf grouping down, and popped them into Soe's swirling silver (get it? swirling/sterling!) christening cup that had been her Granny Dot's. What a picture!

Moss Down by the River

Over a month ago, I wrote...and we're back! But I wasn't, not really. I'm not sure that I'm really back yet. I'm feeling pressured to write from all quarters, so I shall write, but it's not from the heart...yet!

This weekend, Soe and Colin have come to stay, and we went to the river in Derby, and marvelled at the beauty of the rushing stream, dyed by the ever-present tannin from rotting oak bark. There was a moss-covered rock...