Traditional and contemporary cooking and baking, recipes, organic gardening, self-sufficiency, cottage crafts, nutrition, food preserving, Q&A, fund raising, misc. It started with my grandfather where I spent
many long summer days with him picking wild blackberries or just
helping him in his garden. I spent a great deal of time with my grandfather
but also with my uncle, his son and my mother's b
rother,
who was an invalid. Both had gentle quiet natures. Through and
from them I learned to appreciate nature in many different ways
really quite unavailable to any child not growing up in the country. I was my uncles legs, " get me a drink Jeanie, bring me
some fruit, move my chair into the sun", he'd say. I pushed his old wooden
wheelchair around the yard getting either into the sun or, out of it. Eventually
we would end up on the side of the house where he had a view of anyone coming
down the dirt driveway and where a long stonewall ran the
length of the building. "Look Jeanie, he said quietly, a garter snake sunning itself. Go
get it, bring it to me. I want to see it up close. Two fingers
under it's throat, thumb on it's head, grab it's tail". And so I just
did it. What did I know? I was just a kid . I didn't know girls were
suppose to be afraid of snakes. Up to this day, if I see a snake
and I recognize what it is, I will picked it up to look at it. If I
am with anyone, they make a wide berth around me and look at me like I
just sprouted horns. So before long, I was bringing him 3ft long corn snakes and black
racers to the dismay of ,well, just about everyone. And so began my interest in nature, finding and
bringing anything I thought my uncle would like, flowers,
pretty rocks, wild berries, apples and from our old apple trees,
creeping, crawling, biting, flying things , anything he wanted I
brought it to him if I could and, that included the beautiful
yellow lilies I cut from the neighbors prize flower beds, (got in
trouble for that one but Uncle Mikey said"'go get it so we could
look at it up close.") And so I crept up into the yard and brought
back a yellow Asian lily just like the one I have in my perennial
and have posted here on this fb page. When I look at that
picture I can hear my uncle saying as he pointed out the parts
and function of the flower, " look here, this is pollen and............
Between the ages of 8-10 I did two things for the first time and
I am still doing those same two things today as I did then. First,
I made an apple pie. I was home alone, you could leave kids
home alone then without SS taking them away , and I wanted
to make a pie for dessert. I went out to the old apple tree, found
enough drops to fill a pie shell. I took the lard out , mixed in the
flour, salt and ice water, rolled it out as my mother had taught me,
arranged the apples, then added sugar, cinnamon and butter, fitted
on the top crust, fluted the edges and baked. Also on this fb page
you can see pictures of those same apple pies as I make then today, a little
prettier but the same. At some point, I will show how to make a
pie crust and how to roll it out. It's so easy an 8 year old can do it!!!!!! The next thing I did was plant my first garden, actually, Uncle Mike
and I planted it. " Ask your mother to buy a package of seeds
Jeanie, get a package of portulaca". Rock moss I later learned
it is also called. At the base of the stone steps that led up
out of the yard, the was a small area, maybe 2'x2', my uncle
decided we would plant there. So one sunny day, I wheeled
his chair out to the yard, parked him next to the steps and
stood ready to be his hands and legs. At his directions, I
pulled all the weeds, then with a kitchen fork and large spoon,
I dug up the soil. " I think there will be some good loam under
those trees, he told me, go get a bowl full". Carefully and with
his step by step instructions, I planed our precious tiny seeds. Each day I would wheel his chair across the bumpy yard to sit
and look at our small garden waiting for the first signs of life. "They're dead, I would cry, they'll never grow!" But then
one day my uncle said, "look real close , tell me what you see." I knelt down squinting trying to see something. I frowned. " I see nothing,
only little cracks in the dirt but no flowers!" " Tomorrow
they will be up," he smiled. And they were. Tiny little green tips
pushing through the soil, reaching for the sun. All that summer
we watched and marveled at how they grew and grew blossoming
into beautiful vibrant shades of scarlet, bright orange, yellow and
fushia pink. What a wonderful first garden. It caught my interest
and has never stopped being a source of wonder to me as I have
tried to improve and learn more . My own garden is a reflection
of those early years sitting with my uncle on a sunny day,
waiting for seeds to spout, watching the tiny miracles unfold,
having my uncle teach me to live close to nature, to appreciate
what was before our eyes and all this he did from a wheelchair
with me as his arms and legs. All this was tucked away for many years as I grew up, went
off to college, married, had children and lived in the city but, it was
not lost. One day I found myself with a piece of land where I could plant
my own garden and, it has been all up a bumpy but green hill
since then.. The following posts on these fb pages will show you how a small child and
a great man whose only draw back was his inability to walk, can
influence the way in which one learns to live their life and in turn,
pass on this progression of knowledge to those who wish to live
a simpler and healthier existence no matter who you are or where
you live. No step forward is too small . We never know in the 'big picture',
how our actions effect ourselves and others, this I learned from
experience, but experience teaches us life lessons, and on these
fb pages and on my future more comprehensive website,
I will share with you some of the great 'stuff' I learned along
the way.
