2nd Annual Good Day/Bad Day Garden Experiment…

This will be my first official good day/bad day garden report for 2010.  I think I mentioned in an earlier post that Tipper, over at The Blind Pig And The Acorn, had put out the call for those of us that wanted to do another experiment with planting according to the signs to get in touch with her and this year we are doing yellow crook neck squash.  She even found a company that sells organic seeds that would send her the seeds to share with those of us that wanted to play in the dirt with her.  The seeds are from Hometown Seeds and you can check out their site online at www.hometownseeds.com.   I had such fun with corn last year that I jumped at the chance to try it out and see for myself how the squash would do.

So here I go with the first report of the 2nd Annual Good Day/Bad Day Farm report.

The plan was for all of us to plant our good day seeds either on the 17th or 18th of May-the best days for planting.  The bad day seeds were to be planted on the 19th or 20th, the good Lord willing and the creeks not rising.  I was able to plant the 5 seeds for the good day squash on the 17th and I also was able to plant the bad day squash on the 19th of May although it did start sprinkling on me while I was planting the 5 bad day squash but I don’t melt and I got them in the ground.

Now for the first photos….

  To the left are the good day seeds.  4 of the 5 seeds came up.  At the top of the photo about 1/3 of the way over from the right is  the first of the bad day seeds. If I knew how to draw on my photos it would help, I know.

This is the one bad day squash that had come up.  These pictures were taken on the 25th of May.

Fast forward now to June 3rd…

Good day squash.  There are four that came up.

One bad day squash.  Notice it hasn’t put out any other leaves yet.

One of the good day squash.

Another bad day squash finally breaking through the ground.

Two more good day squash.  Quite a difference already!

How about a stroll through the rest of the garden in the next day or two?

Promise Not To Throw Rocks…

A couple of posts ago, in Life, Death and Broccoli,  I told y’all that my cousin made me some comfort food, Baked Potato Soup, and several of you wanted the recipe.  She got the recipe from one of her church friends and shared so here it is, but don’t be mad at me because you all asked for it and it is soooo good that you will soon add it to your table on a regular basis.

Linda Brown’s Baked Potato Soup

4 large baked potatoes (if you prefer red potatoes, just the equivalent size wise)

2/3 C.   Butter

2/3 C. Flour

7 C.  Milk (we use regular homogenized mil but if you are a skim or 2% or goat milk drinkers you might try it ‘your way’)

1/4 C.  Green onions

1 C. Sour cream

12 slices of bacon,  crumbled

1 1/2 C. Cheddar cheese

3/4 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. pepper

Melt butter.  Add flour and stir until smooth.  Add milk slowly and stir until thickened.  Add baked potatoes (diced) and green onions.  Simmer 10 minutes.  Add the rest of the ingredients and stir until melted.  Serve immediately.

I typed this recipe in exactly as it was written.  You can, of course, add your own twists like Cuz did with the fresh broccoli from the garden.  And I was told to be sure to tell you all that she bakes her potatoes in the microwave in one of those fabric microwave bags.  That makes for a lot cooler kitchen in the summer and quicker when you have a time concern.  As you can tell from the recipe it’s not exactly diet friendly but every now and then you need to splurge and have some stick to your ribs wonderful soup. 

If you are a potato soup fan, a connoisseur of wonderful, rich stick to your ribs soup…  you gotta try this. 

And let me know what time you’ll be planning dinner.  Ummm Good.

Ever Think About Pet’s Names?

I was reading articles on AOL this morning and one was on talking to vets about things people name their dogs and cats.  I got me to thinking about how in the world do we come up with our critters names? 

Chloe Pearl during a storm.

Chloe “frog-doggin’” as I like to call it.

Who could resist that look?  Probably part of the reason we fight her weight now… 

Back to the subject at hand.  I first saw a picture of Chloe when she was a couple of weeks old.  I had the year before lost my beloved black schnauzer, Sophie (Mae), in a freak accident.  She was only a year and a half old and I didn’t even want to think about another dog.  The fellow that we rented the space for our frames shop had a mini-schnauzer that used to play with Soph and he bred her and he and Carol were trying to talk me into a pup.  I did not even want to see the pups in real life so Carol conspired and gave him my e-mail address and Jerry sent me a picture.  Out of the litter of six pups she was the only little girl, a requirement since I took my dogs to work with me and I couldn’t take the chance of a little boy hiking his leg and peeing on the art work. 

Well, I looked at the photo and immediately told Carol that she looked like a Chloe but then dropped the subject.  About six weeks later Carol had gone to the shop to do some bookkeeping on a Saturday and she called and said Jerry was up trimming up the yard in the strip mall and had the pups and I ought to come see them.  I told her I didn’t think so and went back to working in the yard.  She called again and said I really, really think you need to come see these babies so to stop her from interrupting whatever it was I was doing I ran up to the shop.

Needless to say, from the photos, I came home with Chloe Pearl Gardner.

Several years later I decided Chloe Pearl needed a playmate.  She was tending toward being sedentary (like her mom) and some days I didn’t feel like getting out and playing so now enters SueSue Marie Gardner… or Suess as I sometimes call her or my little blond schnauzer because she can be a ding-a-ling.

Suess sleeping in close proximity to her ball was a portent of things to come.  Like her momma, when I was a baby, my favorite toy was a ball.  Look at those cute little pads on that foot up next to her face…

 This is probably my favorite bonding picture.  Me in my recliner and Chloe and SueSue curled up with me.

Suess also likes to ‘frog-dog’, here on Carol’s wheelchair ramp was one of her favorite places.

SueSues’s name came about because at the time Carol’s mother was living with us.  She had a hard time remembering Chloe’s name so I thought about it and decided to call the baby SueSue. When Carol was growing up they called her by her middle name, Sue, and I have a sister named Sue and I thought doubling the name up to SueSue would make it easier for Mom to remember. SueSue’s middle name is not only my middle name but I thought it was a fun twist on Souix Saint Marie which is in Canada and I have never been there but I heard of it years (and I’m talking many years) ago and the name stuck with me for some reason. 

So that’s how my current furbabies came by their names and while they aren’t as different as some, they aren’t just the plain old run of the mill Cutie or Cuddles or Lucky, which by the way the vet in the article said don’t ever name a dog Lucky because it rarely is.

How about it friends and neighbors… do you have pets and what are their names and is there a special reason for those names?

Share with me… it’s a good diversion from all that is going on in my life right now and inquiring minds want to know.

I promise if my girls fall out laughing I won’t tell a soul.

Death, Life and Broccoli…

I know that some people that don’t know my weird sense of humor would think that the title of my post is not very empathetic or appropriate but it was the only thing that popped into my head when I started to write this post. 

I got the call from baby brother this morning that my brother-in-law died early this morning.  Believe me when I say that it was a blessing.  If you have ever lost anyone to a terminal disease, while you don’t want to lose your loved one, the last thing you want is for them to linger on and have to deal with a lot of suffering.  I talked to my sis and she was very relieved that he was surrounded by love and family and while she knew that there would some rough times for her ahead,  she was so thankful and at peace with his passing because she didn’t want him to suffer.  Sue, my sister, has very strong belief in God and the faith that Bill is in a far better place and not suffering anymore uplifts her and gives her strength.

The life part of this post? Earlier in the week I had made an appointment to get a haircut today.  It has been rainy and unusually cool for this time of year in Oklahoma the last couple of days and will continue on for this week and I didn’t want to stir from my nice warm bed all cuddled up with my furbabies.  After my brother called to tell me about Bill I knew it would be useless to drift back to sleep.  I made some family calls and then it was time to drive to Norman to get my haircut.  Walter drove me and he, too, got his haircut, we ran some errands and came back home.  I was tired, hurting from the shingles, the fibro raising cain with me because of the weather and all I wanted to do to stretch out on the bed, take my meds and veg out for a while until I walked to the back door and looked out…

Needless to say I had to get my camera and go out to get some photos to share with you all.

The babies… I love having them where I can watch them.

The moms may not be right next to their babies but, believe me, they are ever vigilant.  They have their side of the fence and I have mine and all is right with the world.

Despite the hurting, both physical and emotional, these sights reminded me of the renewal of life.  That is part and parcel of this thing we call life…

The cycles.  We are born, we grow up, some of us marry and birth the babies that start the next cycle.  We continue to grow and to try to help the next generation learn the things they need to know to get them through the tough times, get them standing on their own two feet and if you are lucky, as Sue and Bill were during their 48 years of married life, they raised their four boys and Bill lived long enough see their grandchildren and celebrate their children’s joy at the birth of their children.  Their grandchildren had the chance to meet and get to know their grandfather and even the little ones will have some memories of their grandfather.  Their grandmother, my sister, along with their sons will keep his memory alive through the multitude of stories that Bill and his brothers and his one sister have lived and told over the years and, believe me, there is a boat load of them and there will be lots of laughter filling my sister’s home and heart again…

Oh, yes… the broccoli…

From the last post…

I picked it. 

And my cousin made her baked potato soup while we were gone to get our haircuts because she knew it is a comfort food for me, but tonight she added a twist to it… baked potato and broccoli soup.  It warmed not only my tummy but also soothed my heartache  for my sister and her family’s loss and reaffirmed that there is still a lot of good left in this life.  And some of it I helped to grow.

I Did Not Fly Away Today…

Although there were tornados all around the area where I’m living, we were all fine.  We had some pretty heavy rain for a bit which means I didn’t have to water either of the gardens. 

Speaking of gardens, would you like a tour?

What first caught my attention after I got back from going to the “doc in the box” was the mommas and babies wandering up by the fence in the back yard.  I had to go get the camera and see if I could get some pictures to share.

Calf 2911 was the most curious about what that white-legged one eyed tall thing was… I liked her hair do. I really like that the mommas and babies are so close to the house.  When the little ones start playing it is very entertaining.

It was getting on toward supper time and several babies were nursing…

Those mamas are very patient I think.  If I had one attached to me that butted my poor little girls as hard as these bump their mamas I would probably be biting the little grubber in the bohiney.

This little shy girl was looking for mama.  All of the cattle are Limousin.   They are low fat producers, a very lean breed, but are also known for being very protective so unless absolutely necessary we keep a fence or a vehicle between us and them…

Meanwhile, to the gardens we go.

This is the backyard garden.  So far there is broccoli, cabbage, spinach, 3 squash plants that were given to me already growing in their pots, some onion and at the far end, red potatoes.

     This is our first almost ready broccoli… about the size of a soft ball.

You all know me… I have to have something for size comparison.  That bare foot wears an 8 1/2  shoe…. when I put shoes on.  This is cabbage (in the center).  Crooked neck squash to the right and spinach to the left of the cabbage.

The beginnings of the front yard garden.  There is about 4 times the space of the back yard garden.  We have planted 12 tomato plants you see here.

To the left of the tomato cages are the second batch of new potatoes that I planted about a month after the new potatoes in the back garden.  We all love new potatoes and I thought perhaps I could extend the growing season…  Far left along the fence are iris. next are onions, next is more cabbage (these are red) and broccoli then garlic and finally more of the new potatoes. Coming towards us from the cabbage are three rows of onion that were planted about 3 weeks after the row on the left.

You know that besides my foot for size I have to show the red dirt.  This was after the storms blew through and the wind picked up the dust and the rain settled it on these huge leaves.

Another red dirt on cabbage photo.

This is the bloom stem of an onion that has been out there for a year or two.  I would have taken more of this but it was starting to sprinkle again.  Gotta think of the camera, you know, because we all know I don’t melt.

Yes, my cousin Carol and I both used this thing.  Her son, Scott, my wonderful second cousin tilled both gardens up real well for us and we use this between rows to turn up weeds and grass… and,in my case, to try to trim up some. I like cookies too much.

These are part of the things that have kept me away from blogging… well, no not really… I have to keep this part of my life real.  I have been having to deal with bad depression… Several things hitting at once.  Moving out of the relationship and home that I had with Carol for over 22 years this last stretch, the anniversary of the OKC bombing that hit me so close to home that I haven’t yet gone to see the Memorial, the anniversary of my mother’s death 16 years ago that still cuts like a knife, my sister’s husband of 48 years is dying of cancer and just went on hospice last Thursday so we are expecting a call any day now.  Sis is dealing with it a whole lot better than I am for worrying about her and realizing that at age 65 I have no control over any facet  of   my life. Hallie and John losing their oldest son to suicide and Connor, his younger brother losing his sib that he looked up to so much and that brought up my memories from when my oldest sister  died very suddenly of a brain hemorrhage when I was almost 13…

And to add  the kicker, I have managed to stress myself  flat into a case of shingles. Around from my mid-section to my back and that sucks big time. I’ve never had them before but knew folks who did and wondered how grown folks could piss and moan about how painful they were.  There’s even the folk or old wives tale, whichever you prefer that if shingles go all the way around your body they kill you.  Missy, who has had shingles, and I decided today that it wasn’t really the shingles that killed you… you just would hurt so much that you wanted to die…

Got to have good news to wipe out the bad… I received my summer squash crookneck seeds from Tipper over at The Blind Pig and The Acorn and we are going to do the good planting day vs. the bad planting day.  Yep, another experiment about planting with the signs.  Aren’t you excited!  I know I am.  My conscience won’t let me get by without reporting about how the squash is doing so that gets me off games on Face Crack Book as Kim calls it and back to where I belong…  With all of you.  And I am going to make it back.  Depression bores the crap out of me.  About 2 or 3 weeks is about all I can stand of being morose and studying what I can find of my belly button so I’ll grab the bootstraps, get them on and get outside to the garden where the sunshine and growing things bring me back to the reality of how much I have missed by just laying around and studying my navel…

For those of you that have stuck around, you have my deepest appreciation.  I love you all and I apologize for dropping of the blogging world for as long as I have. I promise to try not to ever let it happen again.

A Tribute To CJ Twomey…

It may seem strange to some of you that I would be writing a tribute to a young man I never met yet I feel I know…

When I first started reading blogs I really thought what an interesting thing to do… to be able to sit and write funny stories about your life, your family or whatever thing might come to your mind but I never thought of myself as being able to wade through all the technology I figured you had to learn to be able to write a blog.  I mean I have amassed many stories, mostly funny, some sad, some thoughtful and some downright ornery but I didn’t have the nerve to even think about trying to write a blog of my own until I ran across Hallie’s Wonderful World Of Weiners.

I read a comment that Hallie had made on another blog and it was just irreverent and ornery enough to pique my interest and clicked on her name and wandered into the most incredible, fun loving, and just plain loving family with all the attributes of my own family, just less kids.  While Hallie, John, CJ and Connor loved to tease each other and play jokes on each other the love in their family was very apparent from the first post of Hallie’s that I read.  As I kept reading I learned not only of the love and fun they had as a family I found that Hallie’s twisted and sarcastic tales, not only about the weiners, but also about CJ and Connor, John and Hallie herself drew me into the family.  I read about CJ’s excitement about when he first went into a special program in the Air Force.  One proud Shmoops and one even prouder mom. 

When I feel a kinship with a blogger I tend to go back and read from their beginning of the great adventure into the blogsphere.  Every post I read made me want to come back and read some more and that is how I got to ‘know’ CJ.  He had the most incredible smile.  His eyes just danced in every picture that I saw of him, especially when he was horsing around with Connor.  I could see the love they had for each other. The way Connor looked up to his big brother and the way that CJ returned that love.  Every family picture I saw CJ was always smiling that great smile, not just a posed smile for the camera.  I felt that everything about him was for real, that he lived every moment for that moment. 

I didn’t kid myself that it was all a fairy tale happy world, no family’s world is… there are arguments and fights and tears and groundings but you could tell there was much more happiness and good times than there were bad.  There is going to be such a void in the Twomey’s world, not only Hallie and John with the loss of their oldest son, but in Connor’s world also.  He lost his only brother, the brother he looked up to and admired, his touchstone and his confidante. 

I hope that CJ had half a clue of the many people he and his family touched in his too short life.  We will never know the whys, but one thing I know is the good Lord has one helluva soldier in his heavenly world.

I wish I’d had the chance to meet CJ and his family in real life but I feel like I knew him and I know that every time I’d see jet trails in the sky I’d think of an airman nicknamed Shmoops… and now every time I see a jet trail in the sky I’ll say a prayer for strength for his family to get through this horrible time to the time when, although the sadness will never go away, that the Twomeys will be able to laugh and tell stories of the Shmoopy man of Twomey land.

If you’d like to know more about CJ you can go to Hallie’s blog, The Wonderful World Of Weiners and read the tribute to CJ written by two close friends of the family by clicking on this link:

Wonderful World of Wieners

CJ, thank you for the joy in your smile that made me smile and may the good Lord hold you and your family close and soothe and protect you all and give them the strength to keep on going after this huge loss.

Helen

Mom… I Couldn’t Wait To Tell You…

About the experience I had the other day.  You know that I’m living at cousin Carol’s now since December and that Walter is there also. We are all three doing as well as can be expected and we all get along great so we know that you and Aunt Mack are looking down on us smiling…

Enough of that for now, we can catch up on that later.  I had the most incredible experience of my life, next to being with Sarah when she had her girl.  Carol’s boy Scott was up at the house to grab a bite of lunch as he does most everyday.  He had a fellow helping him, fertilizing a pasture about a half mile or less from the house.  Anyway, Dusty called Scott that there was a heifer that was a first timer that was in labor and he could see the front feet of the baby and nothing else.  Scott thought he better go check on her and I asked if I could go.  I jumped climbed into the backhoe with him and off we went and in my excitement I flat forgot to grab my camera because we left so quick.  I’d get out and open the gates for Scott and then close them after he was through them so the other cows would stay in their own pastures.  Sure enough we got there and little momma was laying down and all you could see was two tiny little hooves.

Scott, knowing she was a first time mother to be decided that it would be better to drive her back up to the barn in case the baby had to be pulled so he started herding her with the backhoe along the fence line to get her to the gate that would put us in the pasture closer to the barn.

He was doing great until she got into a place with some trees and brush so I got out and he told me which wire was the hot one and I went in after her and drove her out and then just kept driving her while Scott went and opened the gate so she could just go on into that pasture just east of the barn.  I was doing pretty good slapping and flinging my arms and hollering, “Get going little mama!”  until we got through the gate and headed up towards the barn area and she decided to go up the side of the dam where the big pond is and I knew I had to get up there to keep her from turning back towards the east end of the dam.

I’m here to tell you momma that even though I quit smoking over ten years ago I was sucking for air by the time I scrambled up that dang steep side of the dam to keep driving her towards the barn and not let her get turned around and heading the other way.

Scott was driving around the long way and I was gasping for air and trying to wave at him to hurry around to the south side of the pond to help me out.  About the time that crazy heifer decided she’d wade through the skinny end of that pond, Dusty was driving his tractor up, still with the fertilizer dispenser on it  and I hollered at him that I didn’t mind herding that heifer on foot but I was not going to do the same short cut that she did because I knew the water would be too cold.  He laughed at me and went on around where he could cut her off and get her headed back on up to the barn…

Scott could tell that she was in some trouble and had said that they might have to help momma out and pull that calf since it was her first.  Finally we get her up in the pens and about the time I got the heavy gate shut and headed up to see what I could help with Scott hollered for me to go get the long chain he had on the floor of his back hoe.  Now mom, I’m 65 now and way out of shape and I’m gasping for breath but I turned right around and climbed over that gate (mostly because I wasn’t sure I could lift that heavy sucker again), climbed up into the cab of the backhoe thanking the good Lord that there were hand holds I could use to pull myself up with, saw the chain that Scott had asked for and made my way back out and pulled that long chain that felt like a hundred pounds out and was just dragging in behind me because I didn’t have the strength left in me to pick it up and carry it…

I got back to the gate, stopped and looked at it and said no way was I climbing that again so I skinnied under the gate thanking the Lord that it was pretty dry mud and cow patties, got up and headed towards where Scott was and about that time Dusty got there and he took the chain for me and I was able to stop, bend over and try to suck some air into my burning lungs.

They drove the momma to be up in a chute like tight space between a couple of gates and Scott put the chain behind her so she couldn’t back out, he went into the barn and came out with a bucket of water that I assume had some antiseptic in it because of the color of the water, what looked like a choke chain for a large dog but about 3 foot long. Dusty brought up a pole like contraption with a winch on one end in case they couldn’t pull the baby by hand. 

All this time I’m asking questions and Scott is being very patient and explaining things to me and kinda getting a laugh at this greenhorn but he knows I love to learn so he wasn’t laughing too hard at me.   Time he got all this stuff together, mom, that baby had pulled his feet back in but even I could tell that the sack had broken and they needed to get him out of his momma.  I said it was a bull calf because he was being so stubborn and in the end I was right.

Anyhow, Scott said, “Who’s gonna hold her tail?”   I immediately volunteered because I wasn’t quite ready to go fishing for feet… I grabbed ahold of her tail and held on for dear life because I remembered from childhood’s hours watching Scott’s granddaddy milk and getting angry and tying a cows tail to a post in the barn where he was milking her and she was swatting at flies and caught Uncle Bud upside the head with a nasty, crappy tail and he was not happy so I wanted to make sure that I held on so the same thing wouldn’t happen to Scott.

He splashed some of the antiseptic water around her nether regions, looped the ends of that long dog choke collar looking chain around each of his wrists and he carefully went in fishing for feet.  He got them out and slipped the loop of the chain around each little foot and he and Dusty, both being strong, stout lads, each had a handle that they hooked onto the chain and proceeded to pull on those little feet with every labor pain and they both ended up sitting on their butts with their feet propped  against fence posts for more pulling leverage and were pulling strong and steady when Dusty looked over at Scott and said, “You are gonna catch this baby, right? ‘Cause I sure ain’t!”  Scott had to laugh at that for sure. 

Those strapping lads weren’t making much headway so they rigged up the calf puller.  It is essentially a contraption on a long pole that butts up to the heifer’s backside with a strap that goes over her back and at the other end of the pole is a winch with a cable that has a hook that hooks onto the chain around the calf’s feet.  Scott had Dusty on the winch, I was holding onto that tail for dear life and Scott went fishing again to make sure the baby’s head was in the right position and he had Dusty start cranking as he was trying to work that head out of the cow with out having to cut her.   Dusty steadily cranked with each labor pain and Scott managed to work that baby’s nose out and wipe out his nostrils and he had Dusty keep on cranking and a minute later out pops the calf past his shoulders.  Scott took the tail from me and pulled the heifer over on her side and got everything unhooked and momma took over as soon as Scott pulled the baby the rest of the way out.  It was so awesome! 

This little guy was all grungy and still had half the birth sack on his back and back feet but he was breathing and alive.  And I got to see it and even help (a little).  I was so excited I was walking about 3 feet off the ground.  I borrowed Scott’s phone and called Bro and my Cuz answered and I told her where my camera was and would she or Bro run it up the road to me so I could get some pictures of the mom and the baby.  When I went to the house I was telling them all about it and I’d head to my room and think of something else and go back and tell them about whatever else it was I thought about.  Several times I did that and they were laughing at seeing me so excited about helping (sort of) birthing a calf.  I told them that if I’d had a heart attack and died it would have been worth it helping to get that critter into this world, safe and sound with no ill effects on mom or son from having to be pulled. 

All I could think of was I wished I could call you and tell you all about it because I knew you would be so excited with me and for me getting to experience this renewal and regeneration of life.  So I decided to write this novella to you because it has been a while since I was so elated about something that I wished I could call you and tell you about whatever it was that was so very special.

Even though it will be sixteen years in another almost two weeks since you died there are things that happen in my life that I so wish I could call you up or stop by the house and share them with you.  I know you are always with me and I always carry you close in my heart.  I love you, momma, and miss you so much sometimes that I just need to do something like this to feel I’m sharing with you.

Love from your baby girl…

Helen

P.S.  That little bull calf… I called him Ornery Cuss because he even started out as a pain in his momma’s backside.  I love you momma.