Category Archives: Sunday

Impromptu Sunday Drive

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What a lovely day, so much like Spring.  The daffodils started to bloom at our cottage this week.  The gold finches are molting more each day in preparation for their spring and summer survival colors.  Scripture reminds us not to worry about what to wear and what to eat as God supplies.  “Look at the birds of the air…”  I think Dean and I supply plenty of seeds for the song birds in our neighborhood besides what naturally exists.  Not that God doesn’t supply adequately enough, we just enjoy the entertainment of the songbirds outside our living room window at the feeders.

The mild temperatures warranted an impromptu drive this Sunday afternoon to the Illinois side of the Mississippi River.  We packed a picnic lunch and stopped in the little historic river village, Elsah. We relished the quiet park and tiny town while munching on our sandwiches.  Then we made our way to the river hubbub of Grafton, IL.  Bikers, antique cars, and convertibles seem to take over the town.  We managed to park the car and found a few little antique and gift shops to peruse.  Such lovely art pieces.  I found a garden sign with spring-like embellishments for my arrowhead planter.  Just a matter of another 6 weeks before the houseplants go outside, and Easter 5 weeks away.  Spring-like rains and weather continue this week with a winter return next week.  Well, today I cherished this early taste of spring.

 

Waste Not Want Not and the Hydrangea Tumbleweed

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My Sunday morning pancake making came with a comic note from any neighbor’s perspective, I am sure.  While Dean slept in I made my from-scratch pancakes using an overripe banana left in the fruit bowl.  You know the saying, “waste not want not”.  While cooking the pancakes, I checked the bird feeder.  The song birds and squirrels  have managed to empty the feeders in a matter of two days. It didn’t snow overnight, just cold and rainy this February morning.  Well, those pesky squirrels are hanging all over the bird feeders and has the big one twisted open.  I got our ammo out, the spray bottle of water and open the door to shoot at the squirrels.  They hate it, yet will feed on the bird seeds in the rain!  Maybe a BB gun would more effective, but may scare the neighbors.

As I spray a stream of water their way, the squirrels scatter. One goes around to the hide on the other side of the house and the other runs towards the street. In the corner of my eye I see a tumbleweed going into the street between our car and the neighbor’s car. That tumbleweed is the bloom I clipped yesterday and added to a red wire basket setting on the front porch.  I try not to waste anything, including the dried blooms left on our hydrangea bushes.  They make great fill-ins for floral baskets.  The wind must have blown it out of the basket.  Oh, I smell burnt pancake and run back into the kitchen!  Just a little too charred to suit me, but Dean will eat it. Waste not want not, you eat what is served, right?

I bundled myself with a warm robe before going out into the elements to rescue the hydrangea tumbleweed from the wind and rain.  The rescue was a success!  I shoved it back into the wire basket with a little more force and returned to more pancake making.  Dean awakes to the aroma of semi-burnt pancakes and sausage.  No, the smoke alarm did not go off to awaken him.  As I tell him my morning adventures he selects the YouTube playlist of Gene Autry as well as Sons Of The Pioneers version singing Tumbling Tumbleweeds

See them tumbling down,
Pledging their love to the ground!
Lonely, but free, I’ll be found,
Drifting along with the tumbling tumbleweeds…

We talk of our childhood memories of burnt meals.  This morning pancakes came close to the charred pancakes Grandpa and Great-Uncle Lloyd made for the whole family when going to the family farm in Franklin County.  Dean recalled similar stories of his childhood.

 

A February Welcome

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We got through January with bouts of snow, ice, and cold rains.  But the first two days in February softened up to temps in the 70’s by Super Bowl Sunday.   What a gorgeous and glorious weekend.  On Saturday I opened my eyes in the wee hours like a work day while the first February sunrise greeted me in its pink hues, flirting the Valentine’s Day’s colors.  I had plans to get the house thoroughly cleaned after being away for the 2 weekends previous.  I accomplished that but made the time to pull out the Valentine decorations.  The big Valentine red heart wreath went on the turquoise door.  An adorable welcome!

The neighborhood outdoor grills fired up on Sunday in celebration of the grand weather and football game.  After church, Dean and I went outside for some outdoor chores.  Dean washed layers of salt and junk off the car.  It is spiffy and shiny now!  I sanded a couple of outdoor furniture pieces.  The old metal-framed glider that came with the house and carport finally had a sander workout.  Down to some pretty smooth cedar planks.  A coat of stain and varnish will go on the cedar planks after I finish sanding the metal frame and a coat of enamel on the frame.  Most likely an early spring project after the frame color choice is decided on and more warm weekends.

A little child’s chair used as a perch on the front porch was a less than $10 purchase at a  French Town antique shop last spring.  It apparently had a layer of paint quickly brushed on it before I bought it.  The paint peeled terribly when the cold weather arrived this past autumn.  So I set the poor thing in the basement and waited for a break in the weather to sand and repaint it.  Sunday was the day to get it started.  A coat of white primer after the sanding.  And then for artistic impression, “nifty turquoise” to match the front door.  My mid-week artist’s project, painting will be a great diversion from this crazy world.

February is obviously a red month.  Why look at the KC Chiefs, the Super Bowl champions!  A sea of red confetti at the game and parades. Oh, we cannot forget Red Dress Day this Friday.  Always the first Friday in February.  Wear that red and be good to your heart.  So the gray winter gets a splash or two of color, and I love it.  The red and turquoise palette suits you well, February!

 

 

 

 

Winter’s Warmth

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Ice hit the concrete sidewalks and streets last Sunday morning, like many other wintry mornings in Missouri.  Looking outside the red twig dogwood glistened.  Dean and I waited a bit for temperatures to increase, and then managed to get to church.  It is an oxymoron, winter’s warmth.  It is what winter does for us.  Brings us indoors after weathering the cold, ice, and snow.  Much like life.  The warmth of home lures us back to comfort and simplicity. “Sitting inside the warm, pleasant kitchen while icy rain beat against the window, I felt the wordless contentment of a horse in a stable or a wren in a birdhouse,” Gretchen Rubin writes.  Another author Dominique Browning contemplates, “the banal moments of the day are the most seductive to me. It is in the lighting of a fire on a cold morning, or in the pouring of wine and the pulling up of chairs to read together at the end of an afternoon of errands, that love really exerts its magic.” 

I miss a fireplace or wood stove to snuggle to in our little cottage, but have little niches in every room of our 4-room dwelling that seduce me.  My favorite room is the kitchen.  “So let’s dish out saucy praise for the place of crazy salads, spicy endearments, whispering souffles, sweetmeats, tender loins, and sticky fingers. That whirring, blending, mixed-up, soul-stirring, juice-dripping, hot-hearted room (the kitchen),” Dominique Browning writes in her book Slow LoveKind of spicy, you say.  That is what cooking in the kitchen does for my heart.  Another weekend snow has developed this afternoon.  Mini cheese-stuffed meatloaves, sweet potatoes, and banana-oat bread will grace our table this evening.  Tomorrow I will chop fresh veggies to saute with Italian sausage for Italian stone soup accompanied with fresh-from-the-oven bread sticks.  A casserole dish of homemade mac & cheese with a bowl of buttered edamame will be Sunday’s dinner.

I have plenty of library books to peruse and a jigsaw puzzle to piece together for this long weekend of winter warmth.  Besides Dean and I have each other to keep the fire going …

 

Mother’s Day Weekend

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My Saturday was filled with caring  for green life, as so many Saturdays and Sundays in the spring time. Dean and I made an early run to the greenhouse as summer like weather was forecasted for the day. Dean mowed the grass while I attended to weeds and watering. Our peas, lettuce, spinach, arugula, parsley, and dill are sprouting. The chive plants are in full bloom. I cut a bundle, and dropped some off to Jack Mac, executive chef  and friend at Chandler Hill Vineyards. He told me how to use the blooms in my cooking this week.  For this weekend I put together a red potato salad snipping my chives and young voluntary dill sprigs into the bowl.

As tradition goes green plants and May flowers fill my Mother’s Day weekend. This year is no exception. Maybe it is tradition from my childhood.  My motherSeeds Quote still enjoys a potted tomato plant and another pot of summer favorites like petunias or geranium. This Mother’s Day I sit on the porch bench surrounded with early morning mist, song birds, and quietness from the world’s busyness. Midnight,  our Labrador joins. He, too relishes the weekly early Sunday morning date with nature. My pots of perennials and annuals complete my sensual needs this morn.

Joined

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Author and teacher Ruth Senter says, “When you are truly joined in spirit, another woman’s good is your good too. You work for the good of each other.”  How often do you feel joined to or work for the good of another?  Do you feel joined at the hip, inseparable, much like conjoined twins with a friend, sibling, or spouse?  When the other is happy, you are and not feeling skated. When the other grieves, you as well yet hopeful for the other.  Goodness is the goal not self-gain.  To witness or live this kind of friendship, it is a gift.

During the Lenten Friday dinner at Our Lady of Guadalupe in Ferguson, Missouri, my Dean and I saw some lovely bonding between this community.  The whole church celebration of Latino song and dance as well as fish dinner punctuated the beginning of our weekend.  A multi-cultural band of musicians from Mexico, Ecuador, Aruba, and Kenya beautifully entertained the congregation with a Latino instrumental rendition of “Hotel California”.  Later women and children danced in festive colored costume.  Such a memorable evening.

Dean and I are joined at the hip for life. Besides commuting together during our work week, we work and play together on weekend projects. This weekend we secured our plants as the cold set in for 36 hours despite the spring equinox.  We unpacked and sorted more household items.  Pictures, photos, and trinkets are going up, which is the fun part about making a house a home. We crafted a bathroom towel rack made from scraps of recycled barn wood belonging to my paternal great-grandfather and clearance curtain tie back holders.  Our Sunday date to Hermann’s WurstFest included the hunt for an antique shelf or table to house our bathroom towels.  It had to be no wider than 11″ and no higher than 44″, but the length was open since our lone bathroom is long and narrow. We saw a few new furniture pieces at Pier One Imports and Home Goods, but the prices were not attractive.  At one of our favorite Hermann antique shops we were greeted by a special lady friend. We perused the shop’s goods, and she finally pointed us in the right direction.  A repurposed oak bucket bench made into a floor shelf unit.  Perfect.  On the way home from our Sunday excursion we stopped at Home Goods to buy some totes, a big basket, and a metal caddy for storage.  The total price 65% less than what we saw earlier.  Satisfied local shoppers we are!

 

January Blahs and Baking

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I have had little energy the past few days, turning into bed early hoping to feel better the next morning.  Extra glasses of water and hot tea are being consumed.  Tuesday into Wednesday I awoke with my throat on fire, and needed to prop up on double pillows in order to breathe.  The seasonal allergy snuffles definitely became a bacterial infection. My Dean seemed to feel worse than I with his croupy cough.  We stayed home from work, and visited our doctors in the morning.  Antibiotics were ordered treating a sinus infection for each of us. The January blahs indeed.  Naps and cooking shows filled the day.  Bone-in chicken breasts simmered all day in the crock pot, and made a healthy, tasteful stock for homemade chicken & dumplings.  I had heard years ago, homemade stock made with real bone-in meats makes a health-filled potion.  Adding vinegar, wine, or beer brings out the collagen from the bone marrow.  I always add a bottle of beer or a glass of wine to the crock pot.  I coached my granddaughter, Libby with the dumpling recipe and shared with her my secret ingredient, a pinch of nutmeg.  Warm, comfort food filled our dinner bowls by evening.

I do not bake much as the sugar and calories are not needed as I age.  Though I have been so inspired by the CutThroat Kitchen episodes I watched this week as well as the German influences while in Hermann, Missouri last weekend.   In my memory bank, is an old favorite this morning, blueberry-almond kuchen.  While in this rental house I have limited kitchen appliances and spices, as well as my recipe box is still at our home. By memory, I create a blueberry-vanilla kuchen.  No almonds or almond extract in the rental house pantry.  I substitute with a home-brew vanilla extract and use vanilla yogurt instead plain yogurt.  A hand beater and muscles rather than my stand-up KitchenAid cream the low-fat cream cheese, yogurt, eggs, and sugar.  Nutmeg goes in the butter crumb topping for a nutty flavor rather my standard cinnamon or cardamon left at the house.  Sweet baking aromas fill the air this Sunday morning.  Warmth filled our tummies once again.

This last day of January begins with a spectacular sunrise.  Another unseasonably warm day is in store.  Dean and I are feeling much better with a few rounds of antibiotics.  I cleaned and finished up laundry yesterday while Dean worked on one of the vehicles. With the weekend chores completed, we have this Sunday to attend Mass and go play.  An afternoon walk around the displays at the Train Show will help me burn off that serving of Blueberry-Vanilla Kuchen I indulged in this morning.

Blueberry-Vanilla Kuchen

Red Geraniums

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This time of year the work day is eased into analyzing aggregate reports, research on other wellness programs, event planning, and networking for the year.  I like the slower pace which last about 4 – 6 weeks in December into January.  It is when I finally have the employee wellness events booked on the calendar.  Yes, forecasting  at least 9 months ahead.  It is much like a teacher and his/hers curriculum planning during the summer for the next school year.  It will be another busy year at St. Louis County, the busyness starting next week with several meetings and a health fair.

Much the same as with the farmer, his/hers planning for the spring and autumn crops is done during the frigid cold months.  My father was a tree farmer, and the winter was filled with book work and ordering of a new stock of plant liners.  My siblings and I would plant 100’s of plant saplings through the spring; lots of hoeing, weeding, and watering in the summer; and  autumn a few more plantings and prepping the pines for the holiday harvest.

I cannot say Deanna Greens And Garden Art has quite the planning of a full-time farmer.  The greenhouse is a hobby of Dean and I’s while we work full-time. Our part-time organic herb and vegetable growing is fragrantly and deliciously rewarding while the beautiful geranium blossoms are pleasing to the eyes.  During Dean and I’s Nashville mini-vacation in December, we toured the Belle Meade Plantation.  Each room in the historic house was festively decorated with period Christmas ware, with the kitchen set in the 20’s.  The kitchen is my favorite room. And there set a terra cotta pot of red geraniums in the windowsill, again another favorite of mine. A vintage flower.

The subzero wind chill has me hibernating today.  I wanted snow, but not this frigid cold stuff. God forgives my absence in church, and He knows my severe allergy to the cold.  Early morn I went outdoors in my pjs, robe, socks, and slippers to let our Labrador into the fenced yard, not realizing just how cold it had gotten over night.  It dropped 30 degrees in less than 12 hours.  My joints have been screaming about it since 7:00am.  The daily antihistamine did not take much of an edge off the symptoms, so I took an extra dosage this afternoon.  Drinking lots of hot herbal tea while I watch cooking and gardening shows, write, and read …

“RED GERANIUMS”

Geranium

Life did not bring me silken gowns,
Nor jewels for my hair,
Nor signs of gabled foreign towns
In distant countries fair,
But I can glimpse, beyond my pane, a green and friendly hill,
And red geraniums aflame upon my window sill.

The brambled cares of everyday,
The tiny humdrum things,
May bind my feet when they would stray,
But still my heart has wings

While red geraniums are bloomed against my window glass,
And low above my green-sweet hill the gypsy wind-clouds pass.

And if my dreamings ne’er come true,
The brightest and the best,
But leave me lone my journey through,
I’ll set my heart at rest,

And thank God for home-sweet things, a green and friendly hill,
And red geraniums aflame upon my window sill.

by Martha Haskell Clark

 

December Sky

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On Sunday morn, I awoke at my weekday rising time of 5 am something. My bio clock keeps ticking on time. Darn it anyway. I join my feline friends in the living room and lie on the trundle bed snuggled under the throw while gazing at the picture window. Celine and Jo are situated on the love seat next to the window, their favorite perching spot. Celine had been there for awhile, dozing from time to time until the tweet of a neighborhood sparrow arouses her. Jo, the single male cat in the house just arrived to the scene after his night of prowling in the house. He cackles at the birdie, premeditating the pounce. Jo, our daughter’s Tabby takes every opportunity to escape to the outdoors. I cannot blame him. Pennylane, known as “Pounds of Penny” snoozes while her sassy plumposity lies on the floor nearby. And Pixie, the eldest feline and Midnight, the dog have not awoke yet, snoring with the other remaining humankind in the bedrooms. I watch the December sky turn from a midnight blue to a fuzzy and fluffy white with a tinge of purple behind the bare tree silhouttes. The silence so clear, a quiet moment with God. Creation speaks as the pastor did at church later that morning. “Trees” written by Joyce Kilmer in 1914 …
BareTrees
I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in Summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

A Lady At Sunday Tea

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Japanese Maple in SnowOur first snow of the cold season came this weekend. I could hear the snow flakes rustle the leaves on the trees. Some of our shade trees had their colorful autumn leaves left on their branches, with a 1/2-inch of snow yesterday and another 2 inches today weighing down the branches. So elegant like a lady at Sunday tea with a white lace shawl over a crimson blouson to break the cool afternoon breeze, our Japanese maple with its red leaves swayed in the wind with a layer of fluffy snow. Birds and squirrels gather under the bushes and feeders for seeds. An early snow for this season, I sure hope it does not prelude a long winter. Time for a cup of tea …