Sunday meals

The sleepover continues. Of course it does! We all wake up to a lovely farmette morning. 

Oh, we are lucky with weather! Snowdrop tells me she had a conversation with the weather fairies and this time they listened to her. Well now, thank you. No pouting skies and thunderstorms. No rain either (we could use some more rain, but it was very decent of the weather fairies to hold off on that for at least this one day). Just a mild and sweet set of Sunday hours, where the doors and windows can be kept open to the lily scented air outside.

I do get up very early, before Primrose wakes up. I can't possibly snip off hundreds of spent lilies, but I do tackle a few dozen of them. If the young families look out at the flower fields, they'll see a mostly tidy garden!

The little girl wakes up and we have an early morning meal together.

Both young families will be here for brunch and despite my young guest being with me this morning, or perhaps because she is here, I get ambitious with the prep for it. I'll be making a frittata in a bit, but for now, let's bake blueberry muffins!

And again, my sous chef extraordinaire gets to work: prepare the tin, grate the lemon rind, whip up the wet ingredients, sift in the dry.

(She continues to help as we set the table for the noon meal.)

Because the weather is so good for this, Primrose and I do a lot of going in, going out. In, and out...

And eventually the cousins arrive..

 

 

 

 

 

And her parents return from their little getaway and we are all together and it is grand.

Lingering on the porch after a meal, where you're still nibbling at the leftover muffin or croissant, or reaching for another cup of coffee has to be one of my favorite activities. Really, right on top with all else. And we have the perfect day for it.

Of course, the day moves forward. We can't just stay put. There's beauty in movement as well.

And yes, the younger family has to pack up and hit the road. And the local young family is off as well and all this is okay, because I have this deep satisfaction in knowing that they are all doing well. The difficult year has left its mark and indeed, in many ways it's not over yet, but nonetheless, we are here and together and the youngsters are growing into such good, good kids and that just makes me so very happy.

The day's not over of course! If it's Sunday then it must be family dinner at the farmhouse! Yes, the local guys come over again, this time for an evening meal on the porch -- the usual foods, with the usual joys of eating together, outside again.

So ends a weekend that has all the essential elements packed in to the fullest.

Deeply satisfying. Yep -- happy.

With love...

markets and sleepovers in 30 pictures

When the Chicago young family comes up for a Madison weekend, if the season is right for it, we always go to the farmers market. No surprise there -- I'd been going to the downtown market since my girls were little and the habit stuck. The kids like it, the grownups like it. 

Last summer, of course, there was no traditional market downtown. No one went. We hunkered down and hoped for the best. This year, I tested the market last week. A bit crowded in places, but doable! We'll modify our route and stick to the greens to avoid the snaking stream of people, but it's all definitely doable!

But first, of course, I must tend to the garden. That happens very early. The day is full. I must extend it on both ends!

So what's blooming out there? A whole new batch of day old lilies! 

... and harmoniously with them, other flowers.

("take a picture of me!!")

Breakfast.

Okay, market time!

("I am not asleep! It's just that the light is so bright!")

("now I am asleep!")

Meanwhile, back on the farm -- lunch.

(with a treat from Minneapolis... or Norway, if you think about it!)

And a few minutes of quiet time.

In the afternoon, the youngest couple takes off for a little get away. Just the two of them. Primrose stays with me for a farmhouse sleepover.

Over the years, various combinations of grandkids have had sleepovers over here. There is a little lemon bedroom for them and there are always beds available to fit their current size. The sleepover itself follows a pattern. 

There is plenty of time outside (on this day I suggest a walk to the playground in the new development; to get there, we must pass that field of black eyed susans).

(It's a given that we also make our way through the farmette flower fields...)

There's plenty of time for play inside.

And of course, we make a pizza for dinner. Primrose is old enough and eager enough and talented enough to take part in all its phases:

Done!

Baked. Quickly. At very high heat.

(Dessert)

We stay up too late and watch a movie (Mamma Mia. She's seen it many times and knows all the songs). With popcorn (she is as big a fan of Ed's popcorn as I am).

It's both quiet and irreverently loud. They do things that perhaps they might not do at home. There has to be an element of the unusual after all. (Watching fireflies out the bathroom window way past her bedtime qualifies, no?)

And at the end of the day, when all is quiet upstairs, I sit back and reflect at how beautiful a day packed with family meals and adventures can be. How so many good memories can be made right at home. And how there is a certain tiredness at the end of a day that comes only if you filled all the hours with good stuff. The best stuff. From the first snipped lily to the moment when your little Primrose says good night.

counting

Are you a counter? 505 spent day lilies snipped off today. All on a lovely summer morning, with a promise of work-friendly temperatures all day long. A high of 75f  (24c). Delightful! Breakfast is two hours later than the average, but that's because the garden beckons and I'm there with the flowers and Ed is there with the compost pile and the young orchard trees and before you know it we are close to noon.

These are the weeks of the day lilies. Such a special flower! To me, they look their finest when flanked by a mass of blooms, preferably a mixture of lilies and all the other perennials that do well here. Say a proportion of 40 lilies to 60 something else. At the farmette, sometimes they dominate a bed, sometimes they take a back seat. Well, never actually a back back seat. Just not always center stage.

 

 

 

 

Hey! My trumpets are blooming! They herald the arrival midsummer -- I mean, not the calendar midsummer -- this year, that was 15 days ago (June 24th), but the mindset that I have each year, where it feels like we are as many days into the summer season as we are away from its end. So, mid July.

These majestic day lilies bring out the song in me, but this year, instead of music, I turn to Mary Oliver. There's a reason for it: as I snip off spent lily blooms, I see our resident humming bird peck at the blooming monardas. You can't see him in this photo, but he's there!

When the hummingbird
sinks its face
into the trumpet vine
and the funnels

of the blossoms,
and the tongue
leaps out
and throbs,

I am scorched
to realize once again
how many small, available things
are in the world

that aren’t
pieces of gold
or power–
that nobody owns

or could buy even
for a hillside of money–
that just
float about the world,

or drift over the fields,
or into the gardens...

So beautiful... All of it.

I weed weed and weed some more (two bucketfuls) and then I count the minutes I have left before I must scoot over to my daughter's house. This afternoon, the younger family arrives in Madison again. Here for just two nights, but that gives us bits of three days. Starting right now!

(2 cousins)

(4 are eating fruit roll-ups)

(the young one)

(Primrose is very keen on babies)

We eat dinner at a bier garten. Take out foods on picnic tables, while the kids, restless little beings that they are, romp and jump and romp some more...

... and dance. Because there is music.

 

 

The kids -- now there are four of course, but only three are mobile -- they have the energy of ten galloping horses. I notice that now, when I find myself having the energy of maybe half a horse.

 

Watch, play, watch, until it's time for the youngest and the oldest of us to retire for the day. They go home, I go home. In a handful of hours, the morning will come and we'll be together again. For now, I retreat to the quiet of the farmhouse and within a very brief period of time my eye lids are heavy, my rhythm slows to a crawl and I know it is time to go to sleep.