Quilt fix

I went to a quilt show last month, held by a local quilt guild.  I love quilts.  Especially the old fashioned patchwork quilts made with flour sack patterns.  If I had oodles of time (and significantly more skill) I'd spend a chunk of it quilting.  I've got quilts from my great-grandmother and my mother, and I treasure them highly.  I'd like to think of my kids and grandkids treasuring something that I'd made.

Here's a few of my faves from the show: (click on the photos to zoom)

Now I just need to get oodles of time to do all the things I want to do.

New beds

Because I just wasn't busy/crazy enough, I decided that I needed more raised beds.  It was easy for me to make this decision, because: a) you can never have enough garden space; b) even if you have too much garden space it isn't enough; and c) I'm not the one actually building the new beds.

Cardboard covered with straw covered with dirt.

So my husband, ever gracious, is building me six more raised beds.  Which will bring our total to 18.  I think maybe, just maybe, that may be enough.  Besides, four of our old beds are starting to fall apart, so we'll need to spend time & money (holy cow lumber is expensive!) fixing those next spring.

Today I made the first harvest of the year - chives and asparagus.  Most of the chives will be chopped and frozen.  The asparagus will be grilled and eaten with supper tonight along with pork chops and rice, one of my mother's favorite recipes.

Pond life

Yesterday while at the park I walked out to the old irrigation pond.  This pond was created back in 2007 when the golf course was redesigned.  They dug a 15' hole in the ground, lined it with clay, and filled it with river water.  A wet well with a couple of large pumps was attached at one end for supplying water for the irrigation lines.  A pump down by the river pushed water up the hill to fill the pond when it got low. 

When the course closed in 2017, all the pumps were shut off.  We all wondered if the pond would hold water on its own, and if/how the pond would change now that water wasn't constantly cycling in and out of it on a daily basis.

I'm no expert, but in my mind the pond has done very well.  Cattails and willows along the edge, insects buzzing around, blackbirds and kingfishers and ducks in and over the water.  The loud hum of frogs singing in the shallows.

I could have looked and listened all day.

If I had millions and millions of dollars I'd buy thousands of acres of cropland.  Then I'd dig hundreds of holes and make a hundred ponds just like this one.  Ponds to hold the rainwater on the ground, instead of being flushed into the nearest river by the ever-increasing lattice-work of agricultural drain tile and drainage ditches.  

Farmers like to say they're the stewards of the land, but most of the time that's a bunch of crap.  

Germ test 2022

Doesn't look good for the citron.
 

 

 

Differences

We've got house guests for the next two days.  Hubby's mom and aunt are visiting from Florida.  They came up north to attend a family reunion on Saturday and are making the relative rounds until they head back Thursday.  I enjoy talking with them about their family history. 

Ruth and Alice (Hubby's Mom)

Hubby's grandparents raised seven kids on a farmstead in Zumbrota MN.  Oscar Nelson worked at the local creamery, winning awards for his butter making.  Alice MacIntyre Nelson was a homemaker, breadmaker, jam-maker, etc.  Hubby has fond memories of spending summers at their house, playing with a horde of cousins and wandering wild around the countryside.  At night his grandma would tuck the horde into bed reading bible stories.  Three to eight young boys, depending on who was staying, sharing two double beds.  They'd run up the stairs to the tune of 'Shadrach, Meshack, and into bed you go!'

My father on the stairs.

My grandparents lived in a large house on Lake Harriet.  Despite living just 45 minutes away, we only visited them a few times a year.  Everything in their home was elegant and formal and tidy. We rarely spent the night, but when we did I slept alone in a small room.  I don't remember my grandparents ever tucking me in, let alone reading me stories.  My father was an only child, so there were no cousins to play with.  I do remember playing cards with my grandmother on the living room coffee table, but most of the time I just played by myself with a few of my father's old toys in the sun room.

Christmas, I think?  My father on the right.

I'm sure my grandparents loved me just as much as Hubby's loved him.  Different families, different lives.

Totes herbs

Arugula flowering

 

Parsley

 

Catnip and cilantro.  And weeds.