the next day

I'm helping Snowdrop finish up her morning shower routines. As always, she notes the scale in the bathroom and steps on it. 

I'm 53.6! How much do you weigh, gaga?  Obligingly I step on it and we look at the somewhat higher number. At her age, more is always better and so she tells me, as if to cheer herself at how far she still has to go -- that's okay, gaga, someday I'll weigh more than you!

I think about this: it's true that she is on the tall side of the equation, but still, it's not a given. So I challenge her: maybe not... you can't tell for sure.

Of course I'll weigh more: like, when you're dead!

I laugh at this and still push back: my soul may way a million pounds! This is a tease and she knows it.

If that were true, you'd be a million pounds heavier now. You do have a soul, don't you?

Never argue with a seven year old.

Snowdrop is sleeping over at the farmhouse with her mom and they are up early. Both have to be at their respective places today (camp and work) by 9, but this extra time in the morning is precious: moods are great, the sun is out, the air is wonderfully cool. 

She goes out with me to feed the cats and cheepers. On the way to the barn she asks if we'd named all the Bresse hens yet. 

Just Bold Beatrice. I tell her. 

Can I name the others?

Sure. I explain to her that we weren't naming them if they were going to be eaten, but that butchering of the exquisitely marbled Bresse hens is getting remote. They have sweet dispositions and are graceful and low maintenance. We like watching them move around the farmette lands. 

How about Serene Cindy, Calm Carol and Magical Mary?

You got it. The chance of them appearing on our plates just took another sharp dip. 

We eat breakfast on the porch. Leisurely. I let her bring a book so she can linger afterwards...

And then it is time for me to drop them off and, yes, return to the farmette to snip lily heads. It's later in the morning -- the light is different, the air is getting warm.

And I like the change! No one should stay in a gardening rut!

The rest of the meals are a confusion of second breakfasts and early lunches and snacks and who knows what else. Eventually I coax Ed into taking out his saw to cut down some dead branches out front.

It's almost like lily snipping, but on a grand scale: everything looks so much better once the finished stuff is cleared away.

Dinner? Well, we have that chicken we purchased from One Seed Farm. A nearly six pound bird, acquired so that we could talk to the farmers for a few minutes about raising broilers. We got good advice that we probably will never use! Still, it's wonderful to taste their own free range broilers. Kind of felt like Thanksgiving!

And we do have some new stuff coming to the farmette pretty soon. Stay tuned: we're about to move France around the corner and introduce Mexico! Curious? Keep reading in the weeks to come.