Food

A Very Happy Fourth with Appetizers and Dessert

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Today, the weather for the Fourth of July is about as perfect as it can get—sunny, warm but not too hot, with a bright blue sky. Because of my creaky knees—aka arthritis—we decided to simplify our Fourth of July gathering this year and celebrate with an appetizer and dessert party. There will just be two seatings, which means far less running up and down the stairs for me. Tomorrow, my knees will be so happy.

Besides, as my daughter Shannon noted, who doesn’t like an appetizer party? I know I sure do. A little bit of this, a little bit of that. Everything prepared ahead of time so that I can just relax when the guests come. And even though we don’t look like it, Clif and I have gotten to the point where we can’t eat as much as we did when we were younger. A good thing, too, because if we did, then we’d be in real trouble.

Here is the menu: Chopped salad and dough for grilled bread (Alice); devilled eggs and artichoke dip (Jill); a salsa and cream cheese spread, tortilla chips, cheese and crackers, and grapes (Clif and me). For dessert, homemade vanilla ice cream pie with a blueberry sauce and a strawberry sauce (both sauces are also homemade).

The ice cream pie has become a Fourth of July tradition at the little house in the big woods.

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Ice cream pie from a previous Fourth of July celebration

 

A very happy Fourth to all American readers!

Nature

The Gloaming By the Lake

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A couple of nights ago, my husband Clif took these pictures after our twilight bike ride. He’s been taking pictures since he was a teenager and is a very accomplished photographer. (All right. I know I’m prejudiced. But he is.) I’ve only recently begun taking pictures, and he’s helped me a lot.

Anyway, these pictures catch the lovely light of dusk—the gloaming—by the lake.

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Animals - especially dogs, Flowers, Food

Tortilla Pizzas and a Backyard Monarch

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While it might not be accurate to state that Clif and I eat lunch at the little house in the big woods 365 days a year, it’s not far from the truth.  Clif and I live on a tiny budget, and eating at home is far more economical than eating out. The upside of this is that when we do eat out, we really enjoy it. The downside is that sometimes it’s a challenge to come up with different lunches that don’t require a  lot of time to fix and can be made from ingredients we have on hand.

Yesterday I said to Clif, “I’m in the mood for a tortilla pizza.”

As we have never made tortilla pizzas, this was a strange thing to say, but we had all the necessary ingredients—pizza sauce, cheese, and tortilla shells.

However, “All the sauce is frozen,” I said.

As I have mentioned previously, one of the things I love about Clif is that he is always ready for a cooking lark. “No problem,” he replied. “We can microwave the sauce until it’s thawed.”

This we did, and then came the next phase. “How about we grill them?” I asked. “Everything tastes better grilled.”

Clif was agreeable, and we were off. He spread sauce on the tortilla shells, sprinkled a blend of cheese—mozzarella, cheddar, and Parmesan—and out to the patio he went. I followed with plates, drinks, and napkins. We were not going to miss a chance to eat outside.

Ready to go
Ready to go

 

On the grill
On the grill

 

On the plate

 

To borrow from Clif, those grilled tortilla pizzas were pretty darned good—brown and crunchy on the bottom with a pleasing blend of sauce and cheese on top.

As if that weren’t enough, while the pizzas were cooking, the sun went behind a cloud, and I could tell that the lighting was perfect for taking pictures of buds and blooms.

Bee balm with a touch of color
Bee balm with a touch of color

 

Up close with an evening primrose
Up close with an evening primrose

 

A sole survivor of skunks and lily beetles
A sole survivor of skunks and lily beetles

 

But the cherry on the sundae, so to speak, was when a small monarch winged into the garden. No, not a butterfly. Instead, a dragonfly burnished with gold.

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Quite a day at the little house in the big woods.

 

 

Flowers, Gardening

After the Rain on This Last Day of June

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Yesterday and the night before, we got some much-needed rain. Uncharacteristically for Maine, the month of June has been dry, and in some regions there has actually been a mini-drought. Last year was the same, and I wonder if we are entering a new phase with Maine weather.

As a bicycle rider and a patio hound, I love the good weather. As a gardener, I start to fret if it goes too long without rain. Then, when it does rain, I fret for my flowers if the rain falls too hard.  Like most people who grow flowers and vegetables, I want the rain to be just right—a nice, steady, gentle, soaking rain that has enough sense to stop after a day or so. Seldom do we get this, which means when it comes to my gardens, I am in a constant state of fretfulness.

Yesterday’s rain wasn’t too bad, and as the irises have gone by, I didn’t have to worry about them. It did beat down my pansies, but the pansies are getting leggy, and soon I will be replacing them with some other flowers. I haven’t decided which ones yet.

I do love how the flowers look after the rain. Somehow, drops of water make the blossoms even more lovely than they already are.

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Today has the kind of dry, sunny weather that makes Maine famous for its summers. Clif and I will be going on a bike ride tonight, and we’ll be grilling chicken for our supper.

What a fine way for the last day of June to go out. Many of our summer visitors are here. Lightening bugs flash on the window screens at night; the hummingbirds whir to our feeders and then zoom away into the woods; the thrushes sing every night; and the swallowtail butterflies are as beautiful as the flowers they visit.

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All seasons have their beauty, but summer’s is the deepest, the most nurturing. Plants, flowers, insects, birds, and other creatures get their fill of green life during this abundant time of year. When I sit in the backyard and just look and listen and smell, I feel as though I am a part of all that is around me.

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News

Of Hot Days and a Cool Park

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Summer, with its hot days, has finally come to Maine. Since we live in the woods, warm weather isn’t much of a problem for us. We don’t even need air conditioning. A ceiling fan in the hall cools the whole house.

We do have to plan on when to go for bike rides, though—the heat of the afternoon can be a bit much. Yesterday, Clif and I went late morning, and with the temperature in the mid-80s, we both decided we should have gone earlier. Still, one of the things about bike riding is that there is always air moving around you as you pedal, which is great in hot weather but not so good in cold weather. (Oh, I have had some cold rides.)

Clif and I have made good progress with our biking, going to the end of Memorial Drive, about an eight-mile round trip. Our next accomplishment will be to head up Beaver Dam Road, with its long, long incline that could be dubbed Misery Hill. In past seasons, we have found that going up Misery Hill on a regular basis makes us strong enough to go up most any hill in the area. This is a good thing as central Maine is not exactly flat and has plenty of challenges for bike riders.

“When do you think we’ll be ready to go up Misery Hill?” I asked Clif.

“Sometime in July,” he replied.

As the saying goes, time will tell, but I, too, am optimistic that we’ll be strong enough to tackle Misery Hill sometime in July. Then, it will be on to Route 17, giving us about a fifteen-mile round trip ride.

When we got back to our car at Norcross Point, there were lots of people enjoying the water and the shade on this hot day, and I snapped a few photos.  It seems to me that the pictures I took could have come from any time—now, when I was young, and even further back.

Somehow, during these jittery times, this gives me comfort.

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Food for Thought

Feeling the Jitters

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After hearing the results about the Brexit referendum, I’ve been feeling jittery. I hope all goes smoothly and that there are no major upheavals in Britain or Europe. Or the world. We live in a very unsettled time, and there are many reasons for this—overpopulation, climate job, mechanization, even container shipping, which has allowed the cheap transport of goods from far away where the labor is even cheaper.

In Maine, when I was a young girl, factories were booming, and many of my relatives were able to make a decent living working in those factories. Today, the factories are pretty much gone, and the state’s largest employer is Hannaford, a grocery store chain that has mostly part-time workers who are paid low wages and get no benefits. Indeed, nearly one-third of the people in Maine earn less than $12 an hour, with about 23 percent making under $10 hour. Try supporting a family on that. Even with both parents working, it’s a tight, tight squeeze. (Nationwide, the story isn’t much better, with Wal-Mart being the country’s largest employer.)

With “austerity” being so much in vogue in the developed world after the financial crash of 2008, I expect many people in other countries are also feeling this squeeze, and people who are squeezed do not make the best or the kindest decisions. Immigrants and the poor become  scapegoats, and before you know it, things get really ugly.

So it’s no wonder I get the jitters. The gardens help.

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So do friends—thanks, Judy and Paul, for coming over—and drinks on the patio.

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Onward we go, toward fall and our own elections, where the best we can do is vote for the lesser of two evils.

Thank goodness for the garden, the patio, friends, and, of course, drinks.

Flowers

First to Bloom

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The irises are gone, and just in time to console me come the evening primroses. Soon my garden will be a burst of yellow, brightening the yard at the little house in the big woods. The primroses always bloom in time for the Fourth of July, a special treat for the celebration of our country’s birthday.

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Flowers

Farewell, My Lovelies

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IMG_3430This has been quite the month, quite the year, for irises. They have bloomed with a profusion that gladdens the heart of this iris lover. But now the gardens are down to the last two blossoms. These lovelies will come again next year, I know, but although I cherish all the flowers in my garden, irises are my special darlings, and it always makes me sad to see them go. That is the way it is with flowers, of course, and perhaps that’s why we love these ephemeral beauties so much. They are both permanent and not permanent, coming up year after year—if we are lucky—and only lasting for a short time.

Much spiritual practice, however unintentional, can come from tending a flower garden.

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Flowers

No Matter the Weather, Always Bring Your Camera

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Yesterday, the weather forecast for the afternoon was cloudy in the morning and rainy in the afternoon. However, now that Clif is retired, we have a lot of flexibility in our schedule.

Therefore, “Let’s go biking in the morning before it rains,” I said.

“Good idea,” Clif replied.

We went late morning, and as we were gathering our gear—helmets, gloves, water bottles, we both noted how gray the sky was.

“Doesn’t look like a very good day for pictures,” I observed.

“No, it doesn’t, ” Clif agreed.

“Still, I’m going to bring the camera because you never know.”

Also, our wee wonder of a camera fits nicely in my bike’s front bag, so carrying it is no problem.

As we rode, the sky became even more overcast, but as we passed my friend’s house and gardens, I noticed her peonies were glowing in the dark green foliage.

“On the way back, I want to take pictures,” I called to Clif.

“Right!”

We rode on, and I am happy to report we pushed ourselves to go to the end of Memorial Drive, which meant pedaling up a fairly large hill. Yesterday was the first time this season that we did this, and although it was hard work, we both made it without any problems.

A few years ago, when I was in really good shape and we had a choice of going up a big hill or turning around and heading back, I used to say to Clif, “Let’s go up that hill for the fun of it and then turn around.”

I hope I am saying this again by the end of the summer.

On the way back, which was glorious downhill much of the way, we stopped at my friend’s house to take pictures of her peonies. I wasn’t optimistic, but this is what I got, which reinforced the notion of always, always bring your camera.

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My friend, of course, will be getting a card made from this picture. I’ll also make a card to bring to our library, where I have a little stand with my cards, and I donate the profits of the card sales to the library.

When we got home, we had no sooner put away our bikes then it started to rain. We were pretty pleased with ourselves and our good timing.

Best of all, later in the day, there was an opportunity for another picture, this time on my very own front deck.

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Another lesson: Always be ready with the camera, even at home.

 

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