Cooling Down

Slowly, the heat is moving on. We didn't get violent storms, which are often the ticket to exiting a heatwave, but we got a little rain. Enough to make me think the plants are all doing fine.

It's a beautiful day -- one where I have to do more clearing and cleaning and pulling and digging, but it's good work, because in spring, the soil is moist, the plants appear well spaced and moving between them is a cakewalk. 

But all eyes are on our spring jewels -- the crab apples and the lilac, now fully in bloom.

Stunning and full of that fresh fragrance that stays with you for years and years. Who doesn't remember their childhood whiff of lilac?!

One foot in spring, the other seems to be testing summer waters already. Yes, it's warm, but, too, the schedule is starting to break up routines that have been with us for most of the school year. Things are happening! Some family members are returning to work (post maternity/paternity leave), some are planning vacations, some are thinking of upcoming child birthday celebrations. All this in the next few weeks! We are zig zagging between pleasures and gatherings and hefty schedules, mindful of the pandemic (no, it's not over), giving in to the pull of the great outdoors.

Disrupted schedules start today: we're having a family Sunday dinner on Saturday and not at the farmhouse. Don't ask. Our scheduling details are not that important. I'm still cooking, partly here, partly at my daughter's house.

Hello, Sandpiper!

Sparrow, do you think you need a haircut? No I don't!

Daddy's teaching me poker! I love it!

(Dinner)

 

I pull up to the farmhouse just before sunset. Ed is out in the courtyard, gathering shovels and buckets. The trees have arrived! -- he tells me with not a small amount of excitement.

We'd been waiting for them for a while: they're replacements for the ones we planted in the New Forest last spring that didn't make it through the winter. (We'd put in 67 and we lost 14. Considering we'd planted six inch dried twigs with insignificant roots, I'd say we were lucky!) 

 

 

As dusk set in, we put down our tools and headed back inside. Well, almost inside. The tractor mower is out and the meadow trails are disappearing under the grasses and weeds, so I take a spin around the property reaffirming the paths that would be with us all summer long. It's pretty dark by the time I roll the machine back into the barn.

And at home, Ed and I slide into our usual couch time together. If I am here, this never changes. An evening of reading and show watching, over popcorn. And maybe a bar of chocolate. A glass of wine. This side by side time is solid. Keeping to such sweet habits keeps me sane, even when there is so much going on that it boggles the old mind! 

One foot in spring, the other in summer... Hey, need some summer reading? May I suggest Like a Swallow -- just a click at the sidebar will lead you to a preorder form (or, find it on Amazon. No, silly reader, you can't get it yet. June 3rd, okay?)

With love...