Sunday, lovely Sunday

How pretty the days are now! The dry soil is dampened by last week's rains, the flowers are at their prime moment, the skies are mostly blue. The winds are brisk enough to chase away pesky bugs. The morning walk, with a pail now, so that I can snip spent lilies as I proceed, is joyful. A few photos for you (I'm moderating my impulse to record it all!):

(day lilies? nope -- these are true lilium)

(here, and in the next photo as well, you wont spot any day lilies)

(in other words, it's not all about day lilies!)

(a field of mainly phloxes...)

(even as my work right now mostly focuses on these gorgeous blooms)

I'm done with my work early: animals fed, lilies snipped. That's a good thing, because I have a breakfast date with my good friend who once again is passing through this way.

How I love these loyal old friends! The morning with her is like a gift, really it is. Staying close to people who live far away can be a challenge. Not here, though. Texting, zooming, visiting -- the sacred trilogy that keeps us together!

I'm home by noon -- in time for a "second breakfast!"

Ed proposes a bike ride and I am on board! I get the electric one and he keeps up on his regular old workhorse and we virtually fly together to Lake Waubesa and back around the bike trails that now come around so close to our home! It's a grand way to feel the summer on your face, in your hair. And of course, you feel like you've done some good work with your muscles, even on the e-bike.

And in the evening the young family is here for supper.

(no, it's not raining!)

We haven't eaten together, on the porch for several weeks now. Talk about the feel of summer! This is it!

And so ends a day that has no wrinkles, no smudges, because the good moments so outshine anything that could spoil it for us. Summer time at her best! 

with so much love...

early to rise

Not sure I'm healthy, wealthy or wise, but if getting up early is of help in any of those, then I should be doing just fine. Up by 5 today, out and snipping lilies by 6, done by 8.

My first thought, after plucking the last spent day lily off a stem (yes, I'm tallying in the hundreds by now) is -- what now?? I have done the crucial work for the day! I turn my attention to I weeding and staking and soon it's 9 and Ed is coming out of the farmhouse, still half asleep and asking -- want to eat breakfast before you go to the market?

Of course, I also take photos. The beauty of the early morning, when the night's wet drops are still on the flower stems is just extraordinary. And of course, in mid July the garden is at her best.  Can we agree on maybe a  dozen pics from my morning hours among the blooms? That's reasonable, no? After all, you'll never see these images again in future posts. Each lily bud blossoms only for one day. Here's today's show!

We eat breakfast on the porch, with a view toward the courtyard, where the chickens are enjoying a grooming session on the picnic table. Dance joins us. She truly loves the morning meal rituals. 

And then I zip off to the market. I was hoping for carrots -- no luck there. But guess what! We have our first Wisconsin corn!

And of course, I visit my favorite flower grower.

And I pick up some Door County cherries (the sweet ones) and blueberries and both of these are so delicious that you just want to eat them all up immediately!

After the market, I proudly note that it is still so darn early! And I have done the bulk of my work for the day! Now is the time for us to head out for a longer walk, along another favorite but more distant path -- one that is part of the Ice Age Trail in the Brooklyn Wildlife Area. We're getting just a little of the Canadian smoke, so there is a bit of a haze at the horizon, but still, the walk is beautiful and I am feeling mighty happy, because it has some ups and downs and my knee is not protesting!

(the forest comes first...)

(then the prairie...)

There is enough of a breeze to flush away some of the heat and the bugs are modest (no mosquitoes yet!), so all in all it is a superb set of hours!

Back at the farmette...

... with time on my hands, I attack some of the less pleasant aspects of outdoor work. For example mowing. Typically we just mow down paths. I do the ones that humans use for strolling around farmette flower fields and the front yard, Ed does the paths around the trees we planted out back. But every few months, I mow down the most of the tall grasses on both sides of my paths. I'm convinced that this form of weed control works to keep invasives like wild parsnip and thistle out of those more visible areas and it allows other grasses to sprout. So I mow, even though I am not a fan of mowing and Ed chuckles as I always end with a complaint that the tractor-mower makes me sick. You are the only one in America who gets car sick mowing grasses! Indeed. Polish people don't mow. (Or at least they didn't when I was growing up.)

And before I know it, it's time for dinner. I make the corn. Of course I do! Along with some fish and a salad -- does anyone not love this time of the year for food preparation? There's so much bounty in the markets now! Fresh and honest, all of it!

Of course, "early to rise" should be the companion to "early to bed." We haven't mastered that one yet. Workin' on it.

with love...

moderate

Is there anything in this world that isn't better served with a healthy dose of moderation? Yes, of course, Yo-Yo Ma should not moderate his playing, because he is a prodigy and the more he plays the finer his music and the happier we all are as a result. But us common folk, even with skills and talents, aren't we better off if we let go of an obsessive impulse to do more, to be better, and allow ourselves the pleasure of doing just a moderate amount of anything?

This is what I told myself as I dug into the weeds and spent lilies of our flower fields. I am not going to clean it all up. I wont shoot for making up the 36 hours of needed work. I'll tidy, I'll snip, I'll pull up clumps of weeds here and there, but then I will get on with the pleasures of a fine summer day! 

I'm up way too early. In part, I want to track the progress of the young family's slow return from Paris ( a second necessitated airport hotel overnight, this one in Detroit!), but, too, I'm finding that knee replacement and jet lag are not a fabulous pairing. Sleep is elusive with one, impossible with the both of them. So I'm up. 

I do a lot of cat petting downstairs. Dance and Unfriendly-Snowflake have an attachment to me that verges on being ridiculous, so when I come back from a trip, they like to clamor all over me until things settle down again.

And then I head out to do general animal care. And right away, I start sniping and pulling and filling  buckets with spent flowers and weeds. 

I would say that Bastille Day (today!) is when the blooms start their most fabulous blooming period. So be prepared! You are going to get garden photos! (I mean, if not now, then when??)

I pause after about an hour to fix breakfast. Ed is up and I am hungry!

And then I go back at it.

But after a couple of more hours, I call it quits. Good enough!

I want to go for a walk with Ed1 I don't just want to work in the flower fields!

We ride his motorcycle out to our favorite park trail and everything about the hour we devote to it is sublime. The breeze, the sunshine, the soft verdant trail, the prairie!

Oh, the prairie!

An hour well spent!

In the afternoon, I meet up with my daughter and Snowdrop at my mom's place.

I have some papers for her to sign and my girls take this opportunity to say hello.

And then I bring Snowdrop to the farmette. We have a little more time than usual, so we dont immediately plunge into farmhouse books and stories. Snowdrop picks some fraises des bois and also the raspberries that are quickly ripening on some scattered canes.

We inspect the tomatoes, watermelon, and lavender. They're all lookin' good!

Once inside, before we hit the books, she glances over to see what Ed is watching on his computer screen. I use this opportunity to shift loads of laundry. When I come back, I hear her asking questions about the content -- it has to do with the war in the Ukraine. Ed gives detailed and truthful answers. It's one of those moments when you wonder how early is too early to learn about the less gentle side of human nature.

After a while, I give a little nudge toward a redirect and they happily lose themselves in some computer game they like.

And eventually I return her to her parents and turn my attention toward dinner. 

I dont usually pick up on country birthdays, but today's Bastille Day (in France) coincides with my desire to make French green lentils -- much like the ones we ate at Cafe Varenne on our last day in Paris. Sautee some veggies, add the lentils, broth and seasoning and then serve while they're still a bit firm. With bits of goat cheese and a freshly poached egg.

So I didn't totally catch up with my flower beds. Does it matter? No, it does not. 

with love...

farmette days

How easy it is to slip back into summer routines after a vacation! Well, sort of easy. Look at it this way: typically in July, I spend on average 3 hours a day working in the garden. Not watering -- no, that's separate, depending on the weather. I spend it on pruning, deadheading, clipping, weeding, staking. This is when the garden is at the peak of color and I work hard at keeping it at its best. So, having been away for twelve July days, there is an absence of 36 hours of work. And to my eye, it shows. Tall grasses have invaded the flower beds. Tall lilies have tumbled. Day lilies haven't been deadheaded and I ask Ed -- there are so many blooms now! When I left, there were just a handful. You said it wasn't really exploding yet! He answers -- I didn't want to have you worry that you were missing it...

I have a lot of work before me!

But the weather? It's sublime! I left in a smoggy hazy heat, I returned to pleasant temperatures and clean skies. How good is that!

So in the morning, very early, I head out int to the garden (because you know, jet lag has you wake up at 3, 4, 5 and your body keeps asking "now is it time to get up? No? How about now? Not yet? Maybe now?" until you finally give up on this futile discussion and get going).

Some stuff that caught my eye:

It's really pretty right now!

In my absence, a tree fell down on top of the sheep shed. Ed chopped it up so we could actually access the barn again (it blocked the door where we enter). I notice that. In my absence, too, there was rain. A total of 4 inches for us. That really alleviated some of the tension in the soil, though I doubt any farmer will tell you the drought is over. The rain was once again spotty, though this time we were lucky and got some of the more copious amounts. Our CSA farmers say that in the last two months, they've had just under an inch total. That's miserable!

So okay, I dont have to water the beds for at least several weeks. But rains sure have had the weeds jumping for joy. I pull out a few and then decide that this can be a weekend project. Let's just concentrate on getting most of the lilies cleaned up.

And of course, there are the usual tasks of a return: get groceries. Do laundry. Clean. Bla bla bla. But any writing work, paper work, worky work -- I do these on the porch. Because now is the time to truly believe that the farmette is the most beautiful place on the planet!

Breakfast, with sweet, solicitous, helpful Ed.

And then some more of the same, until it is time for me to head out to Snowdrop's summer camp program for her end-of-week presentations. Yoga and drama. This time she is in a play rendition of the Sour Grape and she plays the granny and she is thrilled!

She comes back to the farmhouse with me and we do our usual.

And toward evening, I take her to a place where her mom and I agreed to meet up for a chat. My daughter wants to hear more details of the trip and I do offer some, but honestly, what you read here, on Ocean is the meat of my travels. Still, it is so pleasant to reflect on a trip that continues to be  "in progress" for the younger family (a hellish return from Paris lasting --so far!!-- two day!), a trip that had all the beautiful memories any one person could possibly store in her head!

And finally I am home.

Reeling from a time well spent. Happy to be home, because, in fact, I do love home.