I'm probably not the first to observe that we live our lives running in circles. Perhaps this isn't a bad thing. There is a certain predictability to it all. Take, for example, weeds (and yes, please do take our weeds!): we're battling bindweed here at the farmette, both in the vegetable garden and in the newly established flower field. If you first saw it you might think - pretty! Sort of like a white morning glory. Maybe we can live with it! Well no, we cannot. It grows underground, develops long vines that wrap themselves around anything in sight and eventually you'll see more of the weed than of the crop or flower you planted. And it's nearly impossible to eradicate.
This isn't the first garden foe. Three acres is a lot of land and invasives have a fine old time in it, spreading, multiplying and creating a nuisance for someone like me -- who likes to control growth, at least to some extent. Creeping charlie nearly smothered our raspberries until we established a perimeter and vowed to religiously pluck it if it crossed the imagined borders. Last year, a lily of the valley (so pretty! until it's not...) nearly destroyed my path-to-front-door garden. Violets are always entering every piece of open space (so pretty! until they're not...) and don't get me started on burdock, thistle, bramble... oh, the list is not short!
And so I focus on an area and work on whatever pesky nuisance is trying to dominate it and I try not to think about the new orchard (it needs our weed control NOW!) and the rest of the tomato plants (they need to go into the ground NOW!) and the peas, beans, and melon seeds and and and...
I do this every year and I can't imagine anymore living in a place where I cannot do this every year.
And now you know what I attended to immediately after breakfast (which is on the porch)...
...Our gorgeous, imagined, planned and executed porch with the glass roof and huge panels of fine screen -- a screen created for Florida homes (it can withstand hurricanes)! The porch is my summer place of respite and it is a vital part of life at the farmette (where summer mosquitoes abound; we live close to wetlands).
From the get go, I've wanted a door from the kitchen straight to it and from the get go Ed has balked. When I re-raise the issue of that door, he'll immediately jump to my assistance with passing dishes through the window, proving how unnecessary a door would be and we do this for a while, until he forgets, or I'm in a hurry and then we go back to me carrying everything clumsily through three sets of doors and I begin to raise the issue of a direct porch entrance all over again.
Ed, come on! Roll over already!
The cheepers continue their beautiful parade through the farmette, pausing only to eat the bread I throw them...
And then it's time for me to take out Rosie and head for Snowdrop's home.
Ah, Snowdrop! How you blossom each week, each moment of your life!
(Who, me?)
I take her for a walk...
... around the small lake and we take in together the magnificent views of the big lake...
The sun is warm. It truly feels like summer. Could it be that just two months ago, the landscape was cold and brown?
We're back at Snowdrop's home. Tummy time? Yes, we have a few ounces of play left inside.
Ah, but the little one surprises us! Quite suddenly, she pushes herself up, up up up...
...and rolls right over onto her back.
And because no one can believe what just happened, she does it all over again (giving me a chance to take the above photos).
I was going to give this post a different title, something like "everything in life is circular." But when I sat down to write, the image of Snowdrop hoisting herself up and then pushing herself over to her back made me reconsider. Because even if it all seems like a repetition of past events, a little one's set of days is not just a redraw of steps taken by other babes, past or present. Snowdrop, just a day short of four months today does something unexpected and I shake my head -- say what? You did that?You are uniquely wonderful!
Back at the farmhouse, the cheepers come running when they see me coming toward them. I have a few stale doughnut pieces to give them. Oreo hangs back. He wants the food, he worries about the squirt gun. I go up to him and give him a chunk of a blueberry cake doughnut. He grunts, then throws himself at the unexpected bit of treat on the ground.
Repetitions? Maybe. But the combinations and permutations are never the same. In growing things -- be they plants, chickens or babies, you learn that nothing is ever predictable, nothing feels boring. All the more so if it's your garden or your grandchild. I say -- hey, she rolled over today! You say -- big deal... I say -- oh, indeed it is!
This isn't the first garden foe. Three acres is a lot of land and invasives have a fine old time in it, spreading, multiplying and creating a nuisance for someone like me -- who likes to control growth, at least to some extent. Creeping charlie nearly smothered our raspberries until we established a perimeter and vowed to religiously pluck it if it crossed the imagined borders. Last year, a lily of the valley (so pretty! until it's not...) nearly destroyed my path-to-front-door garden. Violets are always entering every piece of open space (so pretty! until they're not...) and don't get me started on burdock, thistle, bramble... oh, the list is not short!
And so I focus on an area and work on whatever pesky nuisance is trying to dominate it and I try not to think about the new orchard (it needs our weed control NOW!) and the rest of the tomato plants (they need to go into the ground NOW!) and the peas, beans, and melon seeds and and and...
I do this every year and I can't imagine anymore living in a place where I cannot do this every year.
And now you know what I attended to immediately after breakfast (which is on the porch)...
...Our gorgeous, imagined, planned and executed porch with the glass roof and huge panels of fine screen -- a screen created for Florida homes (it can withstand hurricanes)! The porch is my summer place of respite and it is a vital part of life at the farmette (where summer mosquitoes abound; we live close to wetlands).
From the get go, I've wanted a door from the kitchen straight to it and from the get go Ed has balked. When I re-raise the issue of that door, he'll immediately jump to my assistance with passing dishes through the window, proving how unnecessary a door would be and we do this for a while, until he forgets, or I'm in a hurry and then we go back to me carrying everything clumsily through three sets of doors and I begin to raise the issue of a direct porch entrance all over again.
Ed, come on! Roll over already!
The cheepers continue their beautiful parade through the farmette, pausing only to eat the bread I throw them...
And then it's time for me to take out Rosie and head for Snowdrop's home.
Ah, Snowdrop! How you blossom each week, each moment of your life!
(Who, me?)
I take her for a walk...
... around the small lake and we take in together the magnificent views of the big lake...
The sun is warm. It truly feels like summer. Could it be that just two months ago, the landscape was cold and brown?
We're back at Snowdrop's home. Tummy time? Yes, we have a few ounces of play left inside.
Ah, but the little one surprises us! Quite suddenly, she pushes herself up, up up up...
...and rolls right over onto her back.
And because no one can believe what just happened, she does it all over again (giving me a chance to take the above photos).
I was going to give this post a different title, something like "everything in life is circular." But when I sat down to write, the image of Snowdrop hoisting herself up and then pushing herself over to her back made me reconsider. Because even if it all seems like a repetition of past events, a little one's set of days is not just a redraw of steps taken by other babes, past or present. Snowdrop, just a day short of four months today does something unexpected and I shake my head -- say what? You did that?You are uniquely wonderful!
Back at the farmhouse, the cheepers come running when they see me coming toward them. I have a few stale doughnut pieces to give them. Oreo hangs back. He wants the food, he worries about the squirt gun. I go up to him and give him a chunk of a blueberry cake doughnut. He grunts, then throws himself at the unexpected bit of treat on the ground.
Repetitions? Maybe. But the combinations and permutations are never the same. In growing things -- be they plants, chickens or babies, you learn that nothing is ever predictable, nothing feels boring. All the more so if it's your garden or your grandchild. I say -- hey, she rolled over today! You say -- big deal... I say -- oh, indeed it is!
