25 Years Ago.....

Happy 25th Birthday, Scotty!

1986

You seem so sad, Eeyore."

"Sad? Why should I be sad? It's my birthday. The happiest day of the year."

"Your birthday?" said Pooh in great surprise.

"Of course it is. Can't you see? Look at all the presents I've had." He waved a foot from side to side. "Look at the birthday cake. Candles and pink sugar." Pooh looked - first to the right and then to the left.

"Presents?" said Pooh. "Birthday cake?" said Pooh. "Where?"

"Can't you see them?"

"No," said Pooh.

"Neither can I," said Eeyore. "Joke," he explained. "Ha Ha"

~ Winnie The Pooh by A.A. Milne

No really, though......

Your birthday is a special time to celebrate the gift of 'you' to the world. ~ Anonymous :-)

Hops, Beer and Sleep

In the cool of the spring one of the first shoots to rise up from the ground around here is the Cascade Hop Vine. It can quite literally grow up to one foot each day! Within a couple of weeks the tendrils have reached over the top of the arbor it will branch out and settle onto.
As the days go by it continues to crawl over the top of the arbor and gate.........
Once it reaches the end of the arbor, the fingery vines flop down over the edges and twine around anything in their path.......
By early summer the vine has pretty much reached its full growth, and makes a lovely covering over the gate into the vegetable garden.....
The energy of the plant then goes into making flowers, which become the hops.....

Sometime around the end of August or beginning of September it is time to harvest the hops.....
They cover the top of the vines, hang down underneath the vines, and are plentiful for the pickin'!
My friend Andra happened by on her way home from work the day I was harvesting the hops. So guess what..... I put her to work, too :-) She joined in with a big smile, and the work went quickly.....
We had fine conversation as we dropped the green gems into our buckets.....
.....then poured them into the waiting box.

Sometimes I dry them and store them so I can make things with them, such as stuffing little pillows. Hops have something in them that makes you sleepy.
This year the hops went to a friend of Bethany who makes his own beer. Hops are the main ingredient for beer. Today I cut down the dying vines.....
When you can see the garden gate and arbor again, it is a big sign around here that fall has begun in earnest.....

But now in September the garden has cooled, and with it my possessiveness. The sun warms my back instead of beating on my head ... The harvest has dwindled, and I have grown apart from the intense midsummer relationship that brought it on. ~ Robert Finch

Apples

Fall is apple time. Delicious, crisp apples! We eat apples. We make pies to eat and pies to freeze with fall apples. And we make our year's supply of applesauce.........

Last Friday while she was home, Bethany J helped us sauce the apples. It was so nice to have an extra pair of hands to help with it!
Darrell peeled and cored them. Bethany cleaned out the remaining core and seeds and cut them in halves.........

I cut them into smaller pieces........
Ready and awaiting the cook pot.........
Cooking down..........
The secret ingredient of this year's batch is.............. ta da!

It actually gives it a nice mellow flavor! After it all cooks down, into the jars and canning pot it goes.

We put up 30 pints this year. It always gives me a feeling of contentment to stock our pantry with the shiny jars of newly canned foods :-)

“Moon-washed apples of wonder.” ~ John Drinkwater

The Phantom of the Opera

To borrow a thought from Ryan: My stomach and my culture are satisfied! The old Paramount Theater in Seattle was the perfect setting for The Phantom of the Opera, one of my most favorite plays........

Built in 1928, nothing was spared in building this theater! The intricate finish work is absolutely amazing! The atmosphere it creates is just about identical to the Opera House of the Phantom himself...............

The props were as spectacular as the special effects were cool! The music was beautiful and touching........ I could listen to the Phantom sing all night............ Sensational!

Afterwards we went to the Cheesecake Factory for another tickling of the senses..... this time of the culinary type.
Although we each had out-of-this-world dinners, it was the dessert list that wooed us into Neverland! We ended up sharing just one of the Chris' Outrageous Chocolate Cake plates:

It was a killer! To die for! But next time I think I will try the Black-Out Cake..........

Thank you Darrell, Ryan, Bethany and Jessica for sharing this wonderful day with me :-)

Happy Birthday Scott and Bethany J

Daughter Bethany is home from Spokane for a couple of days. The occasion? We are going to see the play Phantom of the Opera tomorrow at the Paramount in Seattle! But while she is here, the family celebrated her birthday (Oct. 3) and Scott's (Sept. 30).

We had a great dinner followed by both apple pie and blueberry/nectarine pie (the last of the season).
Chase liked the ice cream best ;-)
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SCOTT AND BETHANY !!!

One of the signs of passing youth is the birth of a sense of fellowship with other human beings as we take our place among them. ~ Virginia Woolf

Mate

Mate is an infusion containing stimulants including caffeine, prepared by steeping dried leaves of yerba mate in hot water. Mate is served with a metal straw from a shared hollow calabash gourd. The straw is called a bombilla, and is traditionally made from silver. Modern cheaper ones are made of nickel silver, stainless steel or hollow stemmed cane. The gourd is known as a mate or a guampa. As with other brewed herbs, yerba mate leaves are dried, chopped and ground into a powdery mixture called yerba. The bombilla acts as both a straw and a sieve. The submerged end is flared with small hole or slots that allow the brewed liquid in but block the chunky matter that makes up much of the mixture. It is rich in antioxidants, more so than red wine or green tea. Studies show it can lower cholesterol, protect the liver and maybe help fight obesity.

One morning in Bolivia while at the market with Gabe, we entered into an alcove where a woman was to exchange some dollars for bolivianos. Part of the process seemed to involve social chit chat along with the serving of mate. It is common practice to use the same mate gourd without washing it in between people. Some things concerning hygiene are still not understood in third world countries.

I shared mine with Essie, which I found out later was a social no-no. It was meant to be totally drunk by the person it was offered to. The next morning Essie had explosive diarrhea......... oops........ sure made a cute picture, though :-)

The Bees and the Spiders....

Out in my garden:


Did You Know:

• A bee has 5 eyes. Three simple eyes on the top of its head, and 2 big compound eyes on each side of the head. They cannot focus their eyes because they have no pupils.
• Each of the bees 6 legs has 5 main joints. Imagine having arthritis if you were a bee!
• A bee can fly forward, sideways and backwards, as well as hover in one place.

When the bee comes to your house, let her have beer; you may want to visit the bee's house some day. ~ Congo Proverb

On the kitchen deck:

Did You Know:

• A strand of spider silk long enough to circle the Earth would weigh less than one pound.
  
• A spider web is stronger than a steel wire of the same thickness.


• When its web gets old, torn or is no longer sticky, a spider often eats it and turns the old silk into fresh new strands.

I dread success. To have succeeded is to have finished one's business on earth, like the male spider, who is killed by the female the moment he has succeeded in his courtship. I like a state of continual becoming with a goal in front and not behind. ~ George Bernard Shaw

If you want to live and thrive, let the spider run alive. ~ American Quaker Saying

My fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Wilson, read Charlotte's Web aloud to us. A chapter each afternoon following the lunch recess. I buried my head in my arms on my desk and cried when Charlotte died. I loved that spider!

"I will not be going back to the barn," she said.
Wilbur leapt to his feet. "Not going back?" he cried. "Charlotte, what are you talking about?"
"I'm done for," she replied. "In a day or two I'll be dead......
Hearing this, Wilbur threw himself down in an agony of pain and sorrow. Great sobs racked his body. He heaved and grunted with desolation. "Charlotte," he moaned. "Charlotte! My true friend!" (I felt every heave and sob of Wilbur's.)

Then, a few pages later:

"Good-bye!" she whispered. Then she summoned all her strength and waved one of her front legs at him.
She never moved again. Next day, as the Ferris wheel was being taken apart and the race horses were being loaded into vans and the entertainers were packing up their belongings and driving away in their trailers, Charlotte died. The fair grounds were soon deserted. The sheds and buildings were empty and forlorn. The infield was littered with bottles and trash. Nobody, of the hundreds of people that had visited the Fair, knew a grey spider had played the most important part of all. No one was with her when she died.

Man. Still brings a tear to my eye. All these years later. Good grief! I have to admit that I was never able to read this book out loud to my own children. Nope. They had to read it themselves.

So think twice next time you scream in terror and wallop that friendly spider in the bathtub with a magazine!

Cute Hosts......

While in Bolivia, we stayed with one of my sister's daughters, Kari, along with her husband Gabe and their three cute kids:





Children make you want to start life over. ~Muhammad Ali

Retirement and Friends

Many of us from work celebrated Reba's retirement and birthday yesterday. She is 75 years old, and can run circles around most of us. She went hot air ballooning for her birthday last year. She also goes on hikes with our little 'hiking group' from the hospital. Two years ago my grandkids went on one of those hikes with us, and my granddaughter's remark was something like, "There was this old lady on the hike, and I couldn't keep up with her!" Reba thought that was hilarious, but I could tell she was secretly (or not-so-secretly) pleased. Here she is with Merrily. Such sweet, cute little people! I would squash them if I sat on either of them!

Afterwards, I met a friend who lives 5 hours away, for an overnighter at a hotel as she was traveling back home after dropping her daughter off at school in Canada. She brought the wine; I brought the chocolate stuffed Oreos! What a friend! What a night!

One of the secrets of a happy life is continuous small treats. ~ Iris Murdock