In the Kitchen

Where I seem to live.
I made some roasted veggies last night.  I've always put the beet greens in the compost if I wasn't soon to be cooking a pot of greens.
I don't know why, just feeling crazy I guess, I decided to just wash them and toss them with the rest and roast.  As you might guess, they got all crispy, while the rest got all roasty and they were delicious.  Even Handy Man commented on how well he liked them. So, another success.

Today I received some sweet art and notes from my second graders.  I had a lot of fun stuff planned for spring.  I sure miss them.

I do enjoy a slow morning, after posting the day's e-learning video and answering mail.

And my violet vinegar is beautiful.

We just sift the joy in each day. Some days reality doesn't quite come crashing in as heavy as other days.  I am now wearing a mask when I take Jimi to his appointments.  My heart bleeds as I watch those folks maneuver in and out of the dialysis clinic.  I so want them to be safe. Of course,  I want it for us all.  

Sweet Little Weeds

Today my Bible study scripture was - For God has called me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction. Genesis 41:52
I'd say we've all been called to this, as in this bizarre turns of events, we're all afflicted.
What does fruitfulness look like will be different for each one.
Today, I am healthy, Handy Man is healthy, Uncle Jimi is healthier than he was, my little Mr. Smiley is loving life, as road crews tear up his road frontage with vehicles that delight and entertain him. My boys are working everyday in the Captain's new business doing roofing maintenance. A great job for social distancing.  Praise God for all that and more.
We know, each of us know more and more, as this virus creeps ever closer to our personal borders, that our affliction can be infinitely worse.   Even if it never crosses it, we are ever wondering, for me mostly anyway, "Will I inadvertently carry it to someone?"  And there is simply no good answer.
So, I'm left with being here, trying to make the best use of my time.  I have always had some dark time anxiety and I am a wonderer and ponderer.  When the sun is up, so am I, going, going, going. When darkness falls, so does my cheer and another fear seems to be waiting around every corner as I overthink every last thing.  Oh my.  Time to have a little talk with Jesus.
So for today-
A friend posted on fb about making violet jelly. That color is just a delight.  I'm a fairly picky jelly consumer- cherry and blackberry preserves being my most favorite, and I didn't have all the ingredients. Of course, that jelly is so pretty, I would enjoy it just sitting in a window.
So what to do?
Should I try sugared violets?
Maybe, but not today, as I still have school work to do and my affliction- videos to make.
What about violet vinegar, for when my lettuce is ready?  Perfect.
One site I read said to be sure and not pick all the violets in one place. Umm, no problem there friends, we have a violet lawn.
So out I went this morning, while these sweet weeds were still dewy.  It was another quiet praying opportunity, praying for each of my second graders, for my people, for your people, for all the people.

I did not wear shoes, or gloves.  I'm a little worried at the amount of alcohol and bleach in our world.  Not much we can do about it, but I can get some good dirt germs on my hands and feet.  Thankfully you can't see bare, dirt stained feet in my teaching videos.

 I pinched a few with long stems to fill my tiny bathroom vases.  I've had these little vases for years and so enjoy filling them with whatever is growing in the yard. They had not yet been sprung from winter.

My reason for decorating and cleaning is usually because someone or lots of someones are coming to dinner.  I was sort of shocked, when I went to get the vases, that Chicken Little, leader of band, was still hiding in the cabinet, with only days till Easter.

So, in their Easter bonnets, the parade came out.

Chicken Little is 24 by the date on the bottom and I'm sure was in Drummer Boy's Easter basket.

For years I got the kids some new decoration in their baskets, much like the ones below, that I made.  Silly me, I thought they would enjoy having items with history and traditions in their own celebrations. Ugh, not so.  Of course, I was blessed with a couple of gramerlings that love these things. 

They don't fail to make smile, even after 24 years, so lead on Chicken Little.

Sometimes

Sometimes something turns out so yummy, you realize you might have been better off not knowing.
Afraid this comes with a back story. Doesn't it always?
So, a new little Mexican place opened in town and there you could get a soft or corn taco with just the meat, like crispy pork carnitas, and then add your own toppings.
Mostly what you would expect on the topping bar, except for red pickled onions and sliced radishes.  Neither of which I had ever had with a taco.  I discovered, that along with the regular stuff, including my passion for piles of cilantro, I just love those onions and radishes ( two separate species here, not all in one).
Well ,Ol' Mother Hubbard said something about a dish she recently made and it got those crispy carnitas heavily on my mind.
So whilst I was at the grocery I bought all the stuff.
Ahem, except the red onions, which required another set of bleach wipes as I returned to procure them.
I came home and googled recipes and found, oh about a million.  How to do you make a decision like that?  One person swore you only needed to chunk up the pork, cook for a couple hours with salt and pepper, then cook the water out and crisp.
All the rest had various fruit juices and some spice.
It was hard for me to imagine that the fruit juices wouldn't do something more yummy, so I decided to experiment.
Into one pot I put just s and p and into the other a mix of orange, lime and mandarin orange juice.
I cooked them for several hours, took off the visible fat, let them cooked down, watching close and turning frequently to crisp and not burn.
Honestly, I could not tell you the difference.
So, I mixed up my usual cole slaw dressing, and added some chili lime rub I had, sliced and pickled the onions, chopped the cilantro and sliced the radishes and could hardly wait for the Handy Man to come home.
It did not disappoint.  We ate it with flour tortillas.
I had also purchased corn tortillas.  Now corn tortillas are not my favorite, generally speaking, especially not soft ones , ewwww.
But I recall, back in my younger days when a guy opened a Mexican restaurant, downtown, across from the high school. It was a dumpy hole in the wall that Handy Man and I frequented for two things- a cheese corn crisp and a beef burrito deluxe.  The owner had long hair and sat in a booth counting the days take, a pistol by his side.  That restaurant developed into lots more of them in the area, but trust me, they are not the same. Then, you know now, there is a Mexican restaurant on every corner.
Since we had flour tortillas I decided to try a corn crisp with toppings.

Wow, also really, really good.

So, there were still a lot of corn tortillas left and I hated to just feed them to chickens, who are not the least bothered by the their soft cornmealyness.  What to do?  Hmm, what about nachos?  I don't really know why I've never attempted to make nacho chips before.  Probably I didn't need to know how good homemade, warm nachos chips are.  Now I do know- sooooo good.

End of story.

Made a trip to my sad and lonely classroom.  I needed to get all the living things, worms, snails and plants home before they perished.

So very strange to be hauling things out in April.

Speaking of my room, I  must whisk myself off to video land.  

Peace and love and safety is my prayer for you today.

Mining

It was so gorgeous today, I so spent the afternoon mining down at the creek.  Quite mindless in a lot of respects, so it is a good praying place. As I've said, this crazy virus would be enough to deal with, but so many are having a hard time on very many levels.

I found a few things.

We had a great long  teacher meeting today via computer.  We are all kind of laid low to know we won't be going back to our classroom.   The principal would  like us to send in  a picture each week for the facebook page.  Ugh.  I am so not into pictures of myself.  This week's is on reading, so here you go.

So, one week of e-learning down.  

Lord bless us. 

E-Learning = Frustration

I wanted to do my e-learning videos outside- failed in that attempt.  So here is what I rigged up in my living room. Don't breathe hard it will all fall over.

I sit in the wing back navy chair in this left corner and that covered piece of plywood Handy Man just cut is my desk, or whatever. I move that lamp around when it looks too dark.

So this morning I logged on to our school server and sent all my chub winging through the ether  to my students.  What I mean is, I click on homeroom, it opens a message, I cut and paste the links.
Some of them could open it, some couldn't, some didn't get all three, some did.  So I've stayed busy all day answering questions and resending.

Today I worked on a few more.  Surely not my favorite way to teach.
Before we went our separate ways, I sent the kids a packet to make a pocket book about Ireland, as well as to write a letter to their future child- Dear Child of Mine, to chronicle what is happening during this siege with Covid-19.  Some of their work is coming back to me via e-mail and it makes me smile.

In between answering e-mails and resending video links, I work outside. Today was work in Mom's garden and trimming Kaye's rose.  Suddenly this song came back to me. I don't recall how very long it has been since it even crossed my mind, but she liked it because of the part that said, "and if it be thy will Lord, to go across the sea," as Pete was a far off in the war.
lyrics jesus use me don't refuse me

Our Chief Medical officer at the local hospital has sent his first missal out still asking for compliance with social distancing.  That is Handy Man's doc, well one of them. I really like that guy.  It is so nerve wracking though to hear when Uncle Jimi's appointments go right on.  He has three tomorrow.
I wish he could have had that "stay at home, nighttime dialysis."  Lord give us strength.


Smile on Smile

Busting Out

I've been checking on my Virginia Bluebells every couple of days.  I am pretty crazy about all flowers. I love me some dandelions, but this plant really ranks up there with me.

I see those tightly closed buds.  Another day of warm sunshine and what will we see?

 A bit more open, come on, almost there.

Beauty

I was digging through all my stuff to see if I had any seeds I'd stuck anywhere. I found these cool gardening tools from Gwen that I forgot I had.  Love it.

But, alas, no dirt.  Well, the dirt place has a drive through, so Handy Man went and got me some more, along with some grass seed. 

 We'll see what comes of these old seeds.  I just love watching things grow.   This bed got the lettuce, kale and chard.

 This got the rest. Pink flowering barley grass?  Okay.  Look at the difference in the color of the dirt.  Wow. Well, all of this will be topped with bunny poops.  That will help I hope.

I decided I better take pictures of which daffodils are where so I can share them with anyone that will take them. I do not have a green thumb, except in the case of daffodils.  I gave piles of them away in the fall and it looks like I never dug a one.  

I added a couple of new little jewels, compliments of Gardner E. to my wildflowers.

Thank you Lord for these pretty days and help all those sick folks please. 

The Illusive

Today, my hunt at GFS, Kroger and Target yielded these finds.

I must be out of the loop because why would you only package and sell one roll of toilet paper?  I never thought about it because I've never considered buying just one roll of toilet paper.  And look at that dainty little package of tiny toilet paper rolls. Who knew? I picture little sweet old ladies buying little sweet packs of toilet paper. 

As seems to be my wont, this led me down a thoughtful trail of my childhood.  I don't ever remember my Mom buying a ton of toilet paper, ever.  There were nine people in my family.  Perhaps the fact that there was only one bathroom somewhat limited occupying that space frequently, but why would we have needed less than we seem to need now?

I tried to consider what might be different.  For one, kids would leave in the morning and not come home till  lunch, then back out till supper, then back out till evening. Who knows where restrooming was  taking place.

For two, people did not drink like they do now.  I can't even recall when there was such a thing as water bottles.  When we went to Corbin, my mom cleaned out bleach bottles to carry our drinking water in. Which garnered a few looks, let me tell you  In school, you got a drink at the water fountain after recess. 

Lastly, I think in softening the feel on our tushies  they sort of blew up toilet paper to take up a lot more room, so we don't get near as much.

Until I graduated, one of my best friends still used an outhouse.  They had indoor plumbing, but when we were outside, we used the privy.  My grandpa also had an outhouse we used while we were playing outside, which we did a lot of, as my granny wasn't the sort you cared to be cooped up with.  In said outhouse there was in fact a Sears and Roebuck catalog and we used it.

Any other thoughts as to the why of things?

Pile on the smiles-

Then there is Auntie G-Lou.