getting ready

It'll be a busy weekend, a modestly busy week after, followed by another busy weekend. (Notice lots of busies in that sentence? Yeah.) I want to attack some of the work that needs to be done in advance of this and so this morning I give myself a motivating speech (not out loud) and get to it.

But first, we walk over to take a look at the tomato patch. We have been having problems with a fungus that seems to appear when you have hot and humid days hitting your plants early in the summer. We think the tomatoes will survive, but it's not a given. 

We check on a few of the planted trees. Most are sprouting leaves, so that's good. While we're here, Ed bravely pulls out wild parsnip plants. They will grow back, but at least the offending stalks wont be rubbing against any child who may find her or himself running through these fields.

July: I see it as a lily month, but you could also call it the black eyed Susan month. Fields of them are blooming just to the north of us!

Back in my own flower fields, I snip off spent lilies left and right. And of course, I take note of what's blooming. There is no way you'll escape looking at multiple garden photos here in July. Absolutely no way. You're not into flowers? Come back next month, or better yet, in January. In July  -- you get the flowers.

Next job for me is to mow down some paths, and mow down the remains of the raspberry patch, and mow down a route for the kids toward that black eyed Susan field, and mow down an extra parking space out front, and mow down anything that is offensive or that portends of prickly seeds in the future. Spare me please picking that junk out of my hair come late summer and fall! So I bump around on the tractor mower for well over an hour and of course that just makes me so ill, and I wonder how it is that people pay to go on a carnival ride when all the bumping and spinning surely feels awful! Or is it just me? 

No matter, the farmette lands are looking good and I tell Ed that this is the first time since I've moved here that I feel we've gotten a grip on all the problematic corners and stretches of farmette land. I mean, we're not in control of it by any means, but at least we're in partnership, working toward something still a little wild, but lovely and accessible to all forms of life -- child, beast and aging adult.

Breakfast, with those best peaches and other summer treasures.

Part two of weekend preparations includes dusting and vacuuming. Ed and I split that job, which means that I do my bit early and he does his tomorrow but who cares. The house will be more or less clean soon.

Next comes pre-baking. Meaning I have more than one thing I want to bake and though I want everything to be fresh, there are some things you can do ahead and noone will even notice and these cookie cakes are it! (Besides, they need many hours in the fridge before the last step -- icing.)

Call them rainbow cakes. Or Pride bars. They come from someone whose newsletter (full of good recipes)  I read religiously (Adam Roberts -- the Amateur Gourmet). I know I'm a few days behind in acknowledging or celebrating Pride Month, but that's okay. We support our communities every day, including in July! And honestly, aren't these going to be just so pretty for a forthcoming meal that will include kids, who, after all, love rainbows? Please tell me that you actually can see that it's yellow, orange and pink layers -- made colorful by veggie dies, with orange marmalade in between. You can tell, right??

(about to put the third, pink, layer on...)

Evening. Ed had asked if I wanted to play frisbee out on the frisbee disc course. We haven't played for nearly two years! I hesitate. I'm so terrible at giving that thing any great distance! (Usually his sails twice as far as mine.) Still, it's so rare for Ed to push to do something beyond the boundaries of the farmette that I agree.

After I'm done baking!

Well now, those rainbow cookies take forever to prepare. It doesn't help that I have just two quarter baking sheets, when the recipe calls for three layers. It's 6 o'clock before we finally head out, frisbees and all.

The disc course is just one or two miles from us and on this day of perfect weather, in the late hours of the afternoon (or is it early evening?), it is beautiful. Prairies, woods, wetlands. Distant cornfields. 

 

 

As in the past, we both take off our shoes and play the game barefoot. The clover is thick and soft, the breeze is perfect. My game hovers between moderately bad and medium awful (6 throws on a 4 par basket, but the 4 par is really for the wimps, because I see many a muscled person bringing it in at 3), but it doesn't matter. It's a stunning time to be out playing.

But dinner is very very late.

(late evening at the farmette: still with dabs of sunlight!)