Labor Day Showers and Gypsy

Rose and I drove to Hoboken on Saturday and went to Shannon's lovely brunch/shower. We had a great time. We enjoyed meeting Shannon's friends from school and work, and seeing all the faves: Memrie, Miriam, Kendra and Rachel. We enjoyed getting to know Shirley Cook.

Suzi brought Grandma Dot to the shower and she deserves many thanks.

We went back to the hotel, rested and then went into New York and saw Gypsy. Jon and Shannon had gone and loved it. The production was amazing and we both enjoyed it. I loved the old lady strippers. They were just the best.

We got up at the crack of dawn and drove back to Wellfleet so that Rose could get to work sort of on time.

I've been playing YouTube versions of all the Gypsy songs and driving Henry crazy.

I came home to more cucumbers and made more pickles. I'm so done. I've made over 35 quarts of various pickles. I need a break. I put one of the sofas on Craigslist and a couple bought it. While they were tying it into their pickup truck the guy fell into the cucumber patch and made a dent in production, but not enough. Maybe he should come back!

It is amazing how the gardens have changed now that September has arrived. I'm so used to putting things in that I'm not sure how to take things out. There are still plenty of flowers, bees, and goldfinches. I haven't seen hummingbirds this week. The females and young are supposed to migrate now. The males leave early for the Caribbean and are probably sipping fancy drinks with umbrellas in them as we speak. So like males.

CB

end of August blues

Dad/HDA has been working in a dinghy and is almost done. You see the outdoor shop. He had to move it out of the basement before it became too large. He's naming it Tic Tac Two. Any better ideas? During one hail storm he watched as the boat filled with hail. Then Rose told him his convertible was doing the same thing. Where to turn?

His vacation is over on Monday and we are both sad about it. We had a lot of fun this year.

The gardens are winding down and we have had two hail storms which didn't help. We've been canning more pickles. I don't think I'll be able to eat any for awhile as the smell of pickle juice is getting to me. The jar we had was good, though.

The fig preserves are going quickly and I'll have to find more figs or other fruits to make some jams.

Some of our tomatoes were a disappointment. They taste just like the stuff in the supermarket. Round bombs. I've been roasting them with vegetables from the gardens and freezing it as winter glop.

Yesterday, however we made Tomato Jam from the New York Times, see recipe below. It tastes pretty cool, it has jalapeno peppers in it (from the garden) and fresh ginger (not from the garden). The sweetness is odd. We are going to Mgt and Renner's and trying it on bluefish for an early Henry birthday dinner.

We are still making the 'green' drink of the summer (no cases of Snapple or other bottled drinks) of homemade iced tea and frozen lemonade.

Peter just had his birthday and I spoke to him on the actual day in both China and the US.

August 20, 2008
Recipe
Tomato Jam
1 1/2 pounds good ripe tomatoes (Roma are best), cored and coarsely chopped
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lime juice
1 tablespoon fresh grated or minced ginger
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon salt
1 jalapeño or other peppers, stemmed, seeded and minced, or red pepper flakes or cayenne to taste.
1. Combine all ingredients in a heavy medium saucepan, Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring often.
2. Reduce heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, until mixture has consistency of thick jam, about 1 hour 15 minutes. Taste and adjust seasoning, then cool and refrigerate until ready to use; this will keep at least a week.
Yield: About 1 pint.

Later, I have to go water the daylilies.

daylilies and Grandma Dot

Here are the daylilies. There are so many I had to take three different photos. See below



How the "free" daylilies were planted, by my new best friend Frank:




Instead of nap time:
I called Frank before he came and asked if he had a machine to dig a trench. It was too much for one guy to dig. I crawled around and separated the plants and Frank had fun dumping dirt around them and on me.

I've never been so dirty.



Last night after dinner the guys took a Jonathan tour of YouTube:



Rose was around, but not for much. She has been working a lot and had to go to the first of many good bye parties.

We have photographic evidence why Teddy is fat. Now Brady, Kobi, and Fenway will not leave her side.


Later

the farm

I held onto my last post for most of a week. Now I have tons of time watching the Red Sox and icing my back. I worked most of Friday side by side with a landscaper. How dumb am I? I called him for help the last time my back acted up.

White eggplant? maybe we could spray paint them. It looks like hard boiled eggs in the garden.


The morning glories are so overgrown we can't see the bird feeders any longer. Tons of flowers on the right, none on the left. The sweet potato vines look pretty meeting in the middle. I almost didn't plant any I was so "over" sweet potato vines.



This is the orphan plant area or the plant hospital. Frank, the landscaper, and I dug stuff up and planted mostly hydrangeas. You can tell when he plants things and when I do. He makes this nice volcano of dirt to hold the water. I dig, add compost and sometimes bone meal, and dump it in. The dogs really want to eat and roll in the bone meal.


This is along the side fence. There are Cape roses, lilacs and Maine low bush blueberries in the volcanoes.


I want more daylilies: There are a lot of transplant daylilies that will grow nicely next year. I try to add a lot of compost so you see dark spots where daylilies will grow. If you look into the back past the fence you will see that Frank planted three Leyland Cypress and hollies. The hollies are gorgeous as a dark green backdrop to just about anything. We only have girls, I ordered a male.

Who ate the haricot vert or French skinny green beans? Bambi or Peter? There are no leaves at all any longer and each day the nubbins get shorter. Bad bunny, bad.




Ben's blueberry bin. It needs mulch over the soaker hoses. Frank filled up the rest in no time. I think I had lugged twenty wheelbarrows filled with compost. We did a few more and it seemed to fill right up. It's cool, I lined the bottom with seaweed, then manure, then compost and he brought a mixture of compost and loam. We transplanted the strawberries that the dogs had tortured to the bin. (Now I have to keep canines out of this perfect digging spot.) The strawberries are complaining, but I'm keeping them well watered and most will make it. Ben wants some flowers and I have some flowering shrubs (Abeila grandflora) for near the bin. I'm not digging anything for a few days.



We have made a bunch of pickles and have had a lot of fun. I'm getting more organized and will have to check to see what the cukes are doing. Henry likes sweet, so we make a dill batch and then a sweet batch. I'm following all USDA, Ohio and Nebraska State canning protocols. Henry said, "Just throw some wax on top." No. For Christmas I want a pressure canner.

CB

Eddie and Chris

I left the farm and the herd on Saturday afternoon and went to Boston to see an Eddie Vedder solo show. It started out slowly, but was just what I always wanted, just to hear him sing. When I go to Pearl Jam concerts everyone sings along. Especially the drunk guys.



I was feeling a bit odd that I drove up and got on the subway. It is always such a shock to go directly from Wellfleet to the city. I'm sitting in the theater surrounded by a million kids that look like Jonathan, baseball cap and all. I felt old and out of place and then Eddie introduced his friend Howard Zinn (who has a house in Wellfleet and we all see him around). I suddenly felt much younger, since he's about 100. Next time I see him, I'm going to tell him we should have carpooled.



Eddie sang an interesting mix of songs, some from the soundtrack from Into the Wild which I haven't liked after a few listenings, but also James Taylor, Dylan, Cat Stevens, Bruce, and more I wasn't sure about. He didn't always sound like "Eddie Vedder". He played the guitar really well, adding a bit of grunge to a folky ballad.



I felt glad I took the trouble to go this concert. It was intimate, even though I was in the nose bleed seats, and it made me smile.


I drove back to Wellfleet on Sunday morning. I spent the day and Monday afternoon went back up to go to the Coldplay concert at the Garden.


The two concerts could not have been more different. I'm not a big fan of the bulk of Coldplay's songs, but I love Chris Martin's voice and dorky sweetness. And as some reviewer said, the guy can write love songs.


I've been going to rock concerts for forty years. Forty. I don't think I've ever been to a concert that was as beautifully produced, staged, and had such incredible art associated with it. Also the sound mix was perfect. The mix wasn't good for Springsteen or Pearl Jam despite the similar seats in the Garden.

What ever people say about Coldplay, and they say plenty, this concert was joyful and fun. I really thought I got my overpaid StubHub's money's worth. (Don't ever buy StubHub tickets.)

There was a near riot just before Coldplay came out when some people across the stadium took their seats. It was Seinfeld and his wife, Gwyneth and her mother Blythe Danner, Steven Speilberg and Kate Capshaw. Tom Brady sat somewhere else. Fifty people were crazy on top of each other trying to get photos of the celebrities. It was embarrassing. Boston doesn't see that many famous people and that is a lot at once.


Maryann called during the very loud opening act and I told her I was busy. She started laughing and it's great when Maryann laughs. She asked if PopPop Belding was there with me. Bitch.

Later

July

Get over it Peter, there are gorgeous flowers everywhere. The sweet puppy below gets into the blueberry bushes every chance he gets. Yesterday he dug two up and chewed the roots. This morning Margaret was sitting right near the blueberries and he was digging around in them.

I ran out of fruit for my Cheerios and went out and picked blueberries and put them right in my bowl. How cool is that? The first of the morning glories:
My new passion and addiction: Daylilies. I have planted over fifty of them and can't get enough. I want fields and fields of them. I do make sure all of them are cheap, you can order them on the net for $1-3 a piece, but these are from a nursery and Stop and Shop and cost $9 (two for $18 said the Russian guy) and $12. I'm not feeling guilty, I'm not feeling guilty...

The vegetable garden, despite my best intentions has it's problems. The butternut squash has powdery mildew that I think is traveling to the zucchini. The squash may not make it, but Bob said give it a try. There are very cute little squashes. Interestingly, the zucchini is less productive right now.

The lettuce has been cut back to see if the roots will produce. Not sure, but why not try it. The basil has been cut back to regrow. I made three batches of pesto and put them in the freezer in flatten plastic bags. That was fun. I dug around looking for baby potatoes today, but couldn't find any. I'm not exactly experienced at this. I think I have to work from the bottom up instead of top down.

The cucumbers are beginning to come in. They have been delicious. Margaret incorporated them into sandwiches for a ladies luncheon yesterday. Butter, smoked salmon, and cucumber slices on crusty bread. Yum.

I bought canning jars, because there are going to be a bunch all at the same time. Henry wants to make pickles.

Tomatoes are not ripe, but almost.

Green beans are coming in fast and the beets are almost ready to pick.

As I said the jalapeno peppers are not hot and so we are leaving some on the plant to see if they ripen hotter. The eggplant are white. We don't know if they'll stay white or turn purple. What do I know, I bought a set of seedlings at the plant store in Truro?

Best news of all is that Henry begins his four week vacation tonight. He's frantically trying to get stuff done, but is almost there. He had forty patients in four days, and a ton of paperwork to do.

I'm going back home Sunday to trade off Brady and I have some appointments on Monday.

This is too boring even for me, later.

Brady visits and gets busy

Think I'll move the strawberries.

Peter's request: no more plant or pet photos

First a lovely photo of Sueko taken a week ago. She came to dinner on a hot evening. It's a way I can set the table and do the dishes, instead of leaving them all with her. She liked it. Tonight she'll visit Mgt and Renner's house for the first time.



It's almost the end of Ben's visit and we've had great fun. We've been to a pond almost every day, Dyer and Great. He doesn't need more oceans with homes in Cali and NC.

I had planned to plant hydrangeas in the bin but the sun wasn't right. He wanted blueberries and so we planted blueberries. He did the heavy lifting because my back has been iffy.















Brady has been here a week. Even though all three dogs were soaked by the hose, he likes to drink from it.

We've been eating from the garden. We are about done with the lettuce. The green beans are here, and I have a colander full. Some bad animal ate most of the sugar snap pea vines. Damn.
We've eaten jalapeno peppers, as they mature they get hotter. Zucchini has been a hit, I've made sure to pick them when they are small. We aren't tired of them yet. I did plant a new rhubarb, the old one was attacked by cut worms. This one has a nice safe and deep collar on it.

I am waiting for the perfect ripe tomato.

Rose is at a music festival in New York State. It must be awfully hot. http://www.campbisco.net/artists.html

I've done no knitting to speak of and was "off" due to the all star break. I even read a few books. No Red Sox, no knitting.

That's about all for now. CB

Fourth of July weekend

Potato Leafhoppers

The devil is in the potato plants. I found a spray that is considered OK for organic farms. But reading the MSDS sheet was scary. I checked Sueko's plants and she has these bugs too. I'm conflicted.

Let the garden go to hell or spray the hell out of it? Just what I never wanted to do. They say the spray is made out of chrysanthemum blossom extract, but why do you have to wear a respirator and a full body suit?

Can you see the little tomatoes on the left?

We saw the Diving Bell and the Butterfly last night. We only watch movies when the Sox play a day game. Dad never likes movies as much as I do, or he is more a critic than I am. I like French movies, beautiful women and hapless men. The hell with Dad, it got 94% on Rotten Tomatoes.





Sueko had cucumber blossoms and I was jealous, and this morning I had them too.

We went to Fourth of July dinner at her house and it was too much. She looks so frail and the house is falling down around her. We left her with all the dishes to do and I feel awful. Mgt, Renner, Mattie and a couple from New York City were there. The woman is involved with documentary films at NYU and Mgt and Barbara had interesting conversations.

Mgt is just back from St. Petersburg and had wonderful stories. She brought me the best gift ever. Youk is the smallest, Varitek next, Pedroia, Manny, David. We thought Pedroia should be the smallest.

Speaking of Red Sox: Johnny Damon's "catch" yesterday was cool. I sent you the link already, Jon and Pete. http://boston.redsox.mlb.com/media/video.jsp?mid=200807043063364

At Joanna's graduation party a couple encouraged me to grow zucchini because it is easy and rewarding. I love the flowers and remember my Italian friends eating the deep fried flowers. Maybe I can give the eight billion zucchinis to Lauren at Hatch's.

Dad and I built another raised bed, this one for hydrangeas and clematis and roses. It is bigger than our bedroom.

Later

Catch up

I haven't written in the blog for a month because it seemed so "bloggy". I couldn't find my voice and certainly didn't want a magical/spiritual/look at me blog voice. I've thought a lot about this and decided that this blog will simply replace my long Sunday morning letters to Peter. Other family members had asked to get those letters. They can jump in as they wish. But this will be a private blog for family and close friends. No "DH" (dear husband) for Henry. Just talk.


What I want to do now is catch you up on the "farm" the Cape gardens and the "herd" the two dachshunds.


Vegetable gardens: Last fall I cleared the area in front of the house. (I've found that whenever I clear brush I end up at the doctor or ER with bug bites and so I'm leaving brush clearing to our almost ex-President.) Hank and I measured all areas of the yard last summer and this gets the most sun. In the fall I built up organic matter in the lasagna garden method. Settie helped too. http://ourgardengang.tripod.com/lasagna_gardening.htm



This spring I built up the beds each time I planted rows of seeds or seedlings by adding three cubic yards of compost purchased at the garden center. I have five more cubic yards waiting to be shoveled, hauled, and shoveled again. I also have broken down hay from Mgt and Renner's construction site.



We have regular compost too, but more about that later.


Now how boring is the photo on the left? But look at the garden a month later.

But all is not perfect in paradise. The potato plants I have been so very proud of have a pest. They laugh at my organic solutions. The photo at the top of the post is a potato blossom.

I haven't decided what to do yet. I may just wait and see what happens.

It was bad enough losing half of whole rows of radishes and basil to Mr. Peter Rabbit, but this is harder to deal with. The potato leafhopper may actually be faster than Mr. Rabbit.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/05/garden/05animals.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=peter+rabbit+must+die&st=nyt&oref=slogin

Flower gardens took second place to the vegetables that had to go in, but we have had fun making some beds right out the back doors.

This has andded a new dimension to the house and how we live. We have had amazing birds and squirrels and lots to see. We told Renner that the birdbath is our waterview.

Later. CB