family

Maple Syrup on the Farm

March 10, 2012 Marie 1 Comment

On a cool but sunny Saturday we took a little field trip to one of the local maple syrup festivals. It was a lovely, relaxing drive through the countryside, passing lovely little houses and beautiful waters that will be even more beautiful when green hits the trees, and a lovely day to get out of the house. We even spotted a little pick-your-own blueberry place on the way that I’m planning on visiting later this year once they’re in season.

As it turns out, maple syrup? Not really all that interesting. Which, really, I knew that. I’m not a stranger to things such as this. You tap a tree, you collect the clear syrup, you cook it down, filter it out, and then enjoy it on your pancakes. Not really rocket science (OK, the way they explained it sounded far more complicated… but whatever). However, I haven’t ever actually seen it done in person. And besides, how can I resist a chance to get outdoors and in some woods? On a farm of all places? (My niece made a point to constantly remind me that it smelled like horse poop and refused to believe that it was actually a nice smell to me. Maybe I’m weird and just too stubborn to realize it?)

I wish I could say that I came home with a giant gallon jug of local maple syrup. $10 in your pocket doesn’t get you very far with maple syrup, however. And, thanks to our weather this year (the lack of a real winter, in particular) the syrup production is down so I imagine it’s going to go even higher. Maybe one of these days I’ll get my farm with some sugar maples of my own to tap.

Preserving a family tradition

March 4, 2012 Marie 1 Comment

The pungent scent of vinegar and onions waft through the air. The stove gently ticks and creaks as my thrift store canning pot processes my latest project. It’s been a long time since I’ve preserved anything, and every time I come back to it I wonder why I took any break at all. Especially when I remember how stupidly quick and easy it is.

Today’s preserve du jour is a much needed replacement of a store-bought-now-discontinued beloved favorite: corn relish.

Most people have no idea what I’m talking about when I wax poetic about its perfect combination of sweet and tangy. I don’t know that anyone outside of my immediate family will understand how homemade tacos never taste the same without it. That perfect bite of sweetness, complementing the kidney beans, cheese, ground beef, and salsa so flawlessly. The story, as I’m told, is that the way we do our tacos today came from another family when my mom was a child – corn tortillas fried in vegetable oil until a little crispy, ground beef, cheese, lettuce, tomato, dark red kidney beans, cayenne pepper sauce, and corn relish on top. Since then my grandparents have made them this way, my parents have made them this way, and I’ve made them this way (though I skip the fried corn shells and leave mine soft… trying to be somewhat healthy, after all).

This recipe is my first attempt, and it does seem quite promising. I substituted frozen green peppers for the red, as they were cheaper since fresh aren’t in season yet. Though this substitution clearly lacks the wonderful color the red peppers bring (as well as a bit sweeter flavor). The sugary-sweet vinegar/sugar/tumeric liquid tastes pretty spot-on to what I remember. I’m excited to see how the whole batch turns out later this week and finally have my family’s tacos restored to their full glory.

Breakfast & Yarn

February 26, 2012 Marie Leave a Comment

Breakfast Sunday took a nice little break today. My incredibly thoughtful husband, knowing how much it means to me to have our weekly fare together and also knowing how miserable I’ve been the last few days, decided to take me out for breakfast. No pictures to share, though – I always feel so weird about taking pictures in public. Like I have 50 eyes watching me and judging the weird nerdy girl taking pictures of her food like it’s something special.

Baby camel/merino blend. 20z. 320ish yards. So incredibly soft. Not sure what I want to knit this into. My niece was here as I wound it off the bobbin and said it looked like Rapunzel’s hair when she braided it (she was referring to the movie Tangled). Silly girl.

On a January morning

January 15, 2012 Marie 2 Comments

This is not an every day occurrence. I wish I could regale you with stories of some sort of tradition we have around the house. Or talk lovingly about how awesome eating dinner at the table like an effing adult feels (those moments are few and far between despite drawing ever closer to my 30s – NOT at all how I pictured my life and how I’d feel when I was a kid). I’d like to pretend that everything about my life is how I want it, and how I love and cherish the little things such as a simple breakfast. And some days are like that. Today, dear readers, is not that day.

I do wish, sometimes, that my life was like this every Sunday – homemade bread, fresh-squeezed orange juice (SO GOOD!!), a menagerie of foods to indulge on while chatting with the family about plans for the day, things that need done, etc. If I were living my ideal/dream life I’d be in an old farmhouse with maybe a rooster crowing in the background while things sizzle on the stove, the eggs would be fresh from the coop, homemade breakfast would be at least an every weekend thing, and we’d all sit down at the table together as a family and children would entertain us with stories as we eat. Then maybe we’d all go off on our separate ways, or maybe we’d take a trip to the used book store to pick up some new reading material, and maybe just perhaps a quick stop into the fabric shop to pick up some pretty fabric for a certain child’s new pajamas. And then we’d all collapse back at the house to read, craft, draw, and play. Or maybe we’d pack up a picnic and and go lounge in the sun, children and adults reading and lazing about enjoying a warm, summer Sunday. Or maybe we’d go pick fresh berries from the property and can up a batch of homemade jam, so we can savor the tastes of summer when it’s the middle of winter with a foot of snow on the ground and not a single berry in sight.

It’s all very pollyannaish. I realize that. And maybe it’s a silly dream. I’m a silly girl, sometimes. I know nothing is ever perfect, and rarely do things ever go how you want them to. But a girl can dream.

(It was a very lovely breakfast, even if my family does think I’m crazy for suddenly deciding that we need to start eating at the table instead of in front of the TV. Eating at the table, in my opinion, is a lost art that I feel like I’m desperately trying to foster back to life in our little home.)

Those moments

January 6, 2012 Marie Leave a Comment

I have very few things I know in life. Well, I know quite a bit about quite a little. But what I’m talking about here are those feelings – the feeling of knowing you want to be a chef, or that feeling of knowing you’ll spend your life traveling the world. Some people seem to just know what they want.

I, however, do not share this trait. I never seem to know anything except that I don’t know anything. And any time I start thinking I know what I want, I start second-guessing myself. Talking myself out of something. “Is it really what I want?” is usually the beginning of a very long conversation held between me, myself, and I.

But there are these moments. Moments that, I like to think, occur to those like myself because its the universe’s way of telling me that I’m on the right track. That this is the right choice. The right path. The right direction. For me, its the moments that make me smile and giggle with the tiniest tear in my eye – the moments where my heart feels so full.

This, dear readers, was one of those moments.

To you it may look like just a little sewing project, a little quilt. To me, it means so much more. For my complete and utter lack of planning I managed to make something that turned out not just exactly as I hoped it would look – it turned out to be the very, very perfect size for a very, very special wooden cradle. Which, sometime in the future, will hopefully hold a precious little girl’s very own doll, wrapped up in her very own special little quilt. And as soon as I placed the quilt with the cradle and realized how effin’ perfect it is together I realized that this was one of those moments.