I can't believe that April is coming to an end already, that I turned forty-four years old this week, or that eleven years ago tomorrow Jack and I got married.

I guess the saying about how time flies when you're having fun is true --

As I have an extremely early meeting in the morning, I can't linger with a good blog post this evening, though I will make up for it over the weekend.

In the meantime, I direct you to check out our friend Matt's blog - he took delivery of three hives of bees this week and has some great pictures and interesting information --
http://tennesseerenaissancefarm.blogspot.com/

Sunday

I hate to start my posts with the weather report so frequently, but days as beautiful as we've had this weekend deserve some mention.

With the warmth and the sunshine, the past two days have felt more like June than April, and a few of our irises have decided to "pop" in celebration. I noticed new color this morning on one of my trips to return Roxie, the neighbor's chocolate lab puppy, to her own yard.

Two different varieties of yellow iris are now in bloom, and they're just gorgeous, especially the yellow Bearded Iris, which has a bright, rich color and absolutely glows in the sunlight.

The other is a Siberian which has a much more subdued coloring and fewer "frills". These have done a nice job coming back year after year despite the weeds and grass they share their space with. Whenever we're working on the fall mulching, I always forget to put anything on this particular little clump, so they exist without any upkeep whatsoever.

Roxie has gotten old enough to run absolutely wild and has visited us a number of times this weekend. It started Friday afternoon when we were catching a nice evening breeze with our sliding glass door open to allow the dogs to come and go, which is just easier sometimes. Suddenly Roxie was in the house with the rest of the crew, checking out EVERYTHING. I had to pick her up and physically carry her home.

Over the course of the last two days, I've lost track of how many times I've had to do that. Frank has apparently done so much chasing and catching this weekend that he's at the end of his rope. Yesterday during one of the exchanges at the property line, Frank said he needed to borrow the shock collar we tried to use as a deterrant for some of Jimmy's bad behavior when he was younger.

Hopefully it will work, but she's already shown up on the deck wearing it. Twice.

Trillium Transition

Depending on how much light they're getting, our trillium are at various levels of "blush" -- the one at the top of the page only began blooming a couple of days ago, but this one, from a sunnier spot in the yard, is already turning bright pink.

Venus the Brave

Earlier today Jack and I were messing around in the yard, pulling our little maple trees out onto the deck and enjoying the morning in general when Jack yelled one of the handful of words that makes my blood run cold.

"SNAKE!!!"

Luckily this time it was just a nice little garter snake that was way more afraid of us than we were of him. I think he was probably just looking for a nice place to take a sun-bath, but he was interrupted in the process.

The most surprising thing about the whole snake experience was Venus' reaction. The snake was in the rubble of what remains of our firewood area - where we unload, cut, split and stack it, and he hung out for a long time with only his head exposed from between a couple of slats in a wooden pallet. I took a number of pictures, and he seemed unmoving, except for occasional tongue-flicks. Suddenly, he was on "the move", and Venus, who had been motionlessly sunning on the deck, sprang to action, chasing the snake to the area where we normally stack our wood.

We didn't know she could move that fast, but, quite frankly, the most amazing thing was the way she sat there and stared this thing down for at least five minutes. She wasn't afraid and or put-off by the incessant flicking of his fork-y little tongue and finally took off after him, chasing him into the woods.

While I don't believe she's a threat to our wildlife, she does deserve today's "danger kitty" designation.

Tuesday night.

We'll be so glad when we're finished with the cold snaps, like we're currently experiencing, and consistently warm weather arrives for real.

I haven't updated in a couple of days, but to catch everyone up...

On Sunday night Jack and I went to the Taste of Cool Springs event in Franklin/Brentwood, which was great fun. I'd won the tickets in a radio contest on a day when weather was terrible and I was stopped on the interstate with nothing to do but be the first caller with the correct answer to a trivia question.

The crowd was large, and the food was tasty -- there was a pasta dish we loved, a couple of "sweet things" that are worth doing again and a grilled shrimp served with a tiny scoop of cilantro/jalapeno ice cream and a bit of mango salsa that was inarguably the most surprisingly delicious bite of the evening.

While Jack and I truly appreciate how nice it is to "just stay home", getting out from time to time is nice.

There Will Be Huckleberries

Jack and I have a number of huckleberry bushes scattered throughout the yard; one large one that has berries in late mid-summer and several smaller ones that have never bloomed and fruited before. Earlier today we noticed that two of the smaller ones have put on a few blooms this spring, and they're being worked-over by wild bees.

Our friend Matt the Beekeeper (or apiculturist, from the Latin apis, for bee) has looked at a few photographs I took a few weeks ago when our redbud trees were being swarmed by several different varieties of bee-looking things and clarified that we get visited by both domesticated bees that likely have a "keeper" with hives somewhere and the wild, native variety. While both were active on the redbud, in staking out the huckleberries today, it appeared they were more popular with the wild bees.

Italian Bee (Domestic)


Wild Bee

They were quite oblivious to my presence and weren't aggressive at all.

While the huckleberry blooms aren't as impressive as many things in our yard, we're glad to see them and particularly glad to see them in places they haven't fruited in prior years, because the little berries, which are just a native version of the blueberry, are so very tasty.

Most years we have quite a nice crop on the one mature bush, but getting to them before the birds is a challenge. As tiny as they are, I don't know how anyone would ever be able to pick enough for a pie, much less a batch of jelly. Jack and I eat them straight off the bush or go get a handful in the morning to toss on top of a bowl of cereal.

Jack and I are both entirely too afraid of snakes and poison ivy to trudge to the woods where we know the big brambles of them are. Knowing our luck we'd encounter snakes AND arrive at the patch only to discover that the deer had found them already...

As long as I have a few from the yard to adorn my morning Kashi for a week or two this summer, I'll be a happy woman.

Soup for You!

I made soup today from the fresh ingredients that Jack and I brought home from our grocery shopping adventure in the city yesterday.

This batch of Cream of Asparagus with Fresh, Wild Mushrooms and Spring Leeks is, according to Jack, the best I've ever made. It IS quite good, if I do say so myself, and I highly recommend that everyone take advantage of a wonderful, creamy soup, as this is the perfect time of year to enjoy one.

The recipe I use translates beautifully with any number of ingredients, so I've come to call the instructions "Cream of ANYTHING Soup".

For any who might make this using margarine or cooking spray in place of butter, canned or frozen asparagus in place of fresh, instant chicken broth instead of stock or a fat-free dairy product - you are taking this soup to a place it was never intended to go and might as well open up a can of Campbell's...

Here's the low-down:

Melt a bit of butter in your soup pot at between medium and high - I generally use about 2 tablespoons. While the butter is melting, mince an onion. For this batch today, I used two leeks, which are basically gigantic green onions. Once the butter is melted, notch up the heat just a hair and add the minced onion.

Saute until the onion turns translucent and begins to turn golden with carmelization. Increase the heat to high and immediately add 5 - 6 cups of broth or stock. For this batch, I used two containers of Swanson Chicken Stock.

While it comes to a boil, chop a pound or so (one of those fat bunches from the grocery store) of fresh asparagus into approximately one inch pieces. Because you're going to be cooking it in a soup, you can use the lower part of the stalk, just chop that part a little more finely, once you've removed the cut-ends.

Once the stock comes to a nice boil, add the asparagus (and today I chucked mushrooms in with it) and allow the soup to return to a boil. Let it boil and stir for about three minutes (just keep it from boiling over), then cut the heat to medium and cover. Set the timer for an hour and you're good.

After an hour of boiling, the onions will have all but broken-down and the asparagus is "falling-apart" tender, but for the best cream soup, the next step is essential. Use a stick/immersion blender to break apart the remaining vegetable chunks. Sometimes I'll blend it all-the-way smooth, but other times, like today, I left enough substance to identify little bits of asparagus and mushroom.

Ladle the soup into mugs or bowls -- just prior to serving, blop in a tablespoon or two of half-and-half and stir with the business end of a chopstick. As an alternative, you can just bring the half-and-half carton to the table, and let everyone add his or her own; or if you're feeling fancy and serving to impress, use real cream in a cream pitcher or serve cream on the side of each serving in a crystal jigger.

This same basic recipe works great for any number of vegetables, and I've successully used it to make broccoli, potato, mushroom and celery soups. It's spring, and the produce departments and farmer's markets offer many possibilities...

Borrowed Beauty

The beautiful pink dogwood at the "top of the blog" isn't ours - it belongs to our next-door-neighbor but is right next to our mailbox, so I carried the camera across the road earlier today when the light was right. I also snagged a couple of pictures of his beautiful native Flame Azalea, which smells like absolute heaven. Not all wild azaleas are "scented", but this one is and wonderfully so.

The native iris in the yard are also a success this year, and I couldn't be more pleased with the way the handful of rhizomes I brought home from the Page Farm and haphazardly planted have become part of our homescape.

We also have a few Firepinks, which are also known as Virginia Catchfly because of the sticky hairs that cover most of the plant in an effort to catch flies and other "undesirables" in their effort to be pollinated by hummingbirds or large butterflies that have feeding mechanisms with enough length to perform pollination. Because of their true scarlet color, they are extremely hard to photograph, but with full sun on my side, I was able to get a decent picture this afternoon.

Please know that this picture does nowhere near justice to the impressive natural of the color of this flower. It is a true and beautiful scarlet - richer and deeper than that of the Poinsettia at Christmas. These flowers are a protected species in many locations - Jack and I quite hastily rescued these from a fence-row that was getting the Round-up treatment about six years ago. According to the references we've read about them, we're lucky that we've been able to maintain them as a perennial for so long, but they're in ideal soil (poor and rocky) and an ideal location, and I believe they know how much Jack and I love them.

I made soup this afternoon, and it turned out fabulously. I will do a follow-up post with the recipe and some general info on making great cream soup...

Is it the Weekend??

It is for me!!!!

I finally got my big stuff done at work, and while there's still plenty on my plate, I'm taking a long weekend to catch some relaxation before flying back into it next week. Jack and I had intended to go to St. Simons for a visit with Jay this weekend, and while those plans have changed, all things considered, I decided to take some days off anyway. Work has demanded a lot of my time recently, and I'm ready for a break and some downtime with Jack.

Jack went to town with me today, because my only reason for being there today was a 90-minute meeting this morning. After taking care of business, Jack and I did some grocery shopping at Trader Joe's and Whole Foods, and we had a blast. I recently won a $25 gift card from Whole Foods in a contest on the radio, so our fancy olives from the "olive bar" and the jumbo free-range brown eggs from "The Farm" in Summertown and the hydroponic basil from Canton, GA were all FREE, as was the .99 reusable grocery bag, designed by Sheryl Crow, that we had them sack our stuff into...

In shopping at Trader Joe's, Jack and I were both struck by the difference in the price of "good" produce there compared to what things cost at our local grocery store. We got a pound of beautiful, fresh asparagus at Trader Joe's for $1.99 a pound that I plan to use in soup tomorrow - when we stopped at the local Food Lion to pick up a few last minute things that we forgot while we were in "big town", the asparagus was $3.99 a pound, and the tips were dried-out.

Jack bought a gorgeous, fully-ripe heirloom tomato for 89 cents - the local produce section offered nothing comparable.

Sugar-snap peas, bagged salad greens, spring leeks and a fresh mushroom medley rounded out our produce selections, and when we compared the prices to what we would pay locally for the same thing, we saved somewhere in the neighborhood of six dollars.

Tonight we're having pesto. Whole Foods had HUGE bunches of hydroponically grown basil at 2 for $4, so we grabbed one of those. We always have parmesan cheese and garlic, and I'd had a vision of pesto when I saw a fat sack of pine nuts at Trader Joe's for less than five dollars. There are enough pine nuts for the next SIX batches of pesto. Sis gave Jack some high-end and very tasty olive oil for his birthday, and he's agreed to let me use it in this batch of pesto.

I LOVE getting a good deal on groceries and knowing that we're going to be eating tasty food.

In yard news, the little iris from the Page Farm are starting to bloom. They've just started to come into bloom, but I've been able to snag a couple of decent photographs.

The next wave of trillium and wood hyacinth continues to be beautiful --

Flashing Gang Signs

Home-style.

--too cute not to share...

Today's Tulip

I have no idea what kind of tulip this is, but it's one of my favorites and looked gorgeous just after the rain -

This Picture REALLY Needs a Caption --

This is a picture I took of Dudley last evening after his fun afternoon with Lilly and the folks for Easter - it just cracks me up. I first noticed Dudley was wearing Jimmy's back feet like a harness when he started yipping and growling in a dream...

Happy Easter!!!

First of all, I apologize for not getting the Easter post up until the day after, but after church, lunch with the family at Mom & Dad's house and time spent playing with Lucia, I absolutely had to have a nap. I haven't made time for one the last few Sunday afternoons, and I found myself missing the indulgence of forty-five minutes of sheer bliss, under the covers, using as much of the mattress as needed to appropriately sprawl. Once that was over, I was finished!

Church was nice, though I felt more like affiliate-mother/nanny/person-who-entertains-the-baby than congregant this morning, which was absolutely OK with me. Lucia was on her best behavior and once again demonstrated that she self-manages well in big crowds of strangers. She was happy as a clam throughout the beginning of the service, but then the heat of fifty bodies in the church balcony started to work on her a little bit; then she had a wet diaper, so we were off for a "change".

As soon as we stepped out of the church into the sunlight and the cool breeze, Lucia immediately stopped fussing and looked around, smiling.

Her diaper change turned into a diaper change with a snack, as her daily feeding schedule had been interrupted with being at the farm this weekend and having an adjusted agenda. We finished the service standing just inside the open front door of the church. I danced and bounced Lucia to sleep, and she was still asleep in my arms when church was dismissed.

Each year our church does the "Flowering of the Cross", a tradition wherein those in attendance bring flowers from their yards or use those that are provided in baskets at the door to adorn a cross in the front center of the sanctuary. I remember the first couple of years when the cross we "flowered" was three feet tall and two feet wide, made of grapevine and purchased at an arts & crafts store. It's now six feet tall and impressive when complete.

This is one of the more beautiful ones in my memory and certainly one of the most sweet-smelling, as more than three-quarters of the congregation brought lilacs from bushes in their yard. The perfume was "smell-able" in the balcony...

Jack brought camellias from the bush planted by his great-grandmother at the house in McTown, so I added those in honor of the rich history of his family to our Easter Service tradition.

Dad, Sis and Chris brought beautiful flowers from the farm -- lilacs and tulips and paperwhites. Mom has some gorgeous tulips this year...

Lunch was delicious - Mom made a turkey breast and gravy with green beans and rustico-mashed red-skinned potatoes, rolls and salad. Jack added devilled eggs to the menu, while Lucia and Dudley provide the floor show with song, dance and comedy.

Dudley and Lilly had fun playing Smell THIS in the back yard, which is apparently the dog equivalent of the traditional Easter Egg Hunt. Lilly seemed to enjoy having dog-interaction, and Dudley wore his big smile that he saves for special occasions after some romping in the yard and apparently sharing a golden-egg experience with Lilly.

In yard news, the Painted Trillium have started to bloom gorgeously, and we'll have the first of native iris doing their thing within days. What iris we have is some that got started after a hike at the Page Farm - I spotted some that had just finished blooming and peeled a dozen or so rhizomes off a cluster of rocks. I brought them home in my jacket pocket and was cautiously optimistic when I put a few here and a few there and a few around the rock-work Jack did around the graves of Tipper and Tess.

Like with the Trout Lily, which was so recently exciting, the blooming of these iris is a big deal in that I've never taken pictures of them before, and it appears that we will have some good ones, including one that has grown through a hole in a rock...

John Wesley (J.W.) Anderson, Sr. - 12/23/1928 - 04/07/2009

Former Mayor and McMinnville Businessman J.W. Anderson died April 7, 2009 at Hospice of the Golden Isles in Brunswick GA following a brief illness.

The son of Marguerite Brown and RL Anderson, John Wesley Anderson was born December 23, 1928, grew up in Downtown McMinnville, attended Castle Heights Military academy in Lebanon, McMinnville Central High School, the University of Tennessee and Bowling Green Business College. Mr. Anderson managed several family owned businesses in his career including The Brown Hotel, a local Chrysler/ Desoto dealership, Hardin Limestone Inc. and operated a branch office of JC Bradford and Company in McMinnville.

Mayor Anderson was first elected January of 1969 in a runoff following the only tie election in the state’s history with both candidates receiving 947 votes. During his administration the city saw significant changes, such as a reorganization of the police department, redirection of downtown traffic on Main and Morford streets and a plan to build a civic Auditorium while maintaining a stable tax base. An avid tennis player since childhood, he was instrumental in the formation of the McMinnville Tennis Association.

Mr. Anderson served on the school board and was a member of the Jaycees, Scottish Rite Masons and Past president of the Rotary Club. He was preceded in death by his wife of 59 years, Joan Dickey Anderson. He is survived by sons, Richard R. and wife Lisa Anderson of St Simons Island GA, John W. and wife Pamela Anderson of Smithville, TN; and daughters Nancy and husband John Prince of Sewanee, TN, Mary and husband Bill Wilson of Knoxville, TN and Caroline Anderson of Nashville, TN. Eleven Grandchildren also survive. The body was cremated and a memorial is planned to be announced at a later date. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the McMinnville Tennis Association, 500 Garfield Street, McMinnville, TN 37110 or Hospice of the Golden Isles, 1692 Glynco Parkway, Brunswick, GA 31525.

After the Storm: Newly-Bloomed

As I said in my previous posting, Middle Tennessee was fraught with bad weather today, and we emerged unscathed. Several friends of ours live in Murfreesboro and the areas in the path of the tornado today, and we have not yet heard from some of them.

Our thoughts and well-wishes are with them.

On a brighter note, we have some new "action" in the yard with our Wood Hyacinths, which are starting to come into bloom.

The Fire-pinks are also beginning to do their thing. Fire-pinks are actually carnivorous and ingest the little flies and ants that pollinate them by trapping them in their little pouches.

These are pictures I took after the rain today --

Murfreesboro TN Tornado Video

I worked from home today, and I'm glad I did, because in consideration of the significant weather that moved through Middle Tennessee this afternoon, I might still be stranded in town due to traffic back-ups.

Jack and I watched the storm track across the area and were lucky that none of the dangerous stuff impacted us. We maintained our satellite television signal and electricity throughout the whole storm, which was nice. Jack did such a fabulous job relocating our dish last year.

This is a video of the tornado that passed through Murfreesboro earlier today that I found via the Nashville newspaper. It's too dramatic not to share.

I believe this dealership is on Broad Street near Northfield, but I'm not absolutely sure.

I have flower and cat pictures to post later, so stay tuned for those.

Paw Paw in Bloom

Jack pointed out that our paw paw is blooming --

We just learned the other day that we need more than one tree for cross-pollination to get fruit, so we're looking to find another to begin the establishment of a "paw paw patch".

Sad News

Jack and I have sad news to share.

His father, Jay, passed away yesterday after having several recent health issues. Jack had a nice phone conversation with his dad just a couple of days before Jay was hospitalized and is glad to know that our last visit with him in St. Simons in February was a good time for all of us.

Jack is writing the obituary, which will hopefully be in the local paper on Sunday.


Details regarding his memorial service will be forthcoming, but we don't anticipate having anything locally for a few weeks so that appropriate plans can be made.

We appreciate your thoughts and prayers.

To cheer me up, Sis brought Lucia for a visit with me today at lunchtime. This is Sis' spring break, and it was nice to spend a little extra time with both of them and get the chance to introduce them to some of my work buddies. LuV was the best little baby you could want, smiling and cooing and making friends everywhere she went. She's growing and getting cuter and cuter all the while. I loved having visitors.

I'm beat, so goodnight all.

More of the Trout Lily

Day two of the latest trout lily has been almost as satisfying as the first.

When I first checked on it this morning, the anthers were almost half dried to fat crumbs of pollen. An hour later, they had completely changed from the soft, tender lobules that emerged yesterday.

I've had a blast capturing the whole thing with my camera and feel lucky to have been able to do so this year - if that makes me a plant geek then I gladly accept the label.

There's a new picture of Venus on the sidebar. She lives under the futon during the winter, and we don't get many opportunities to get her picture, but yesterday she took advantage of the nice weather and had a couple of nice sunbaths on the deck. Some of you have heard Jack and I joke about how she's the fattest cat in our neck of the woods - here's proof.

We think she has a legitimate glandular issue that goes back to before we adopted her. She was extremely malnourished when she crawled out of the woods almost eight years ago - you could see every bone in her body through her thin hair. Her condition was so bad that we fully expected her to die, but she pulled through and is healthy despite her large size. She doesn't eat any more than what would be normal for a cat her age and structure - we know she'd be healthier smaller, but unless we put her in a cage and starve her back to "normal", I don't see her losing any weight. Considering how loudly she screams and the things she does when she has to go into the cat carrier for a trip to the vet or to be boarded, there's no way...

Once again we have severe storms in the forecast, but hopefully they will miss us. We heard a brief weather report a bit ago, and the rain was still to the west of us by several miles, so we're in the clear for now. The rain and storms aren't nearly so worrisome as the colder weather that's set to follow it. There's a possibility of SNOW tomorrow! How can that be?

I'm the first one to mention doing "the snow dance" in January and February, but this is the first full week of April, and nobody wants snow - not even kids who hate school want snow at this point.

Considering how lovely our spring has been thus far and how much young, vulnerable vegetation we have in our midst, the prospect of a freeze isn't something to look forward to at all.

Jack and I are ready to batten-down the hatches if need be, and we have enough firewood left in our pile to stay warm for a few more days. He's making chicken soup as I write this...

Trout Lily - Deux

It's been a good day; a nice day, and I hope that everyone was able to enjoy it in some way - a tasty meal, a fun conversation, a needed hour of sleep you didn't think you were going to get.

This afternoon, much of our enjoyment came from outdoors and the excitement that continues to happen in our yard. The first wave of tulips has come into bloom, so I tiptoed through them several times with camera in hand to capture them in different lighting conditions. The color saturation and structure of tulips, particularly when they're completely open in full sunlight, is spectactular, and tulips are one of my favorite flowers to photograph.

We were also treated to the blooming of our second (and final) trout lily of the season. When I first walked up with the camera, the bud was fat and swollen into the shape of a Chinese lantern. I snapped a couple of pictures, before I could move in for a close-up, two of the three sepals popped open, exposing the fresh baby innards of the bloom. Initially the anthers lay close together in the center, then the stigma begins to move outward to expose the pistil for pollination. Watching the thing change and develop over the course of a couple of hours was wonderful -- seeing the pollinators begin to arrive and the lily flower evolve from the point of birth to young adulthood was a very special thing to experience.

I've added a new slideshow to the sidebar of the pictures I took of the trout lily and the tulips this afternoon as well as a new slideshow of more recent pictures of Lucia that you're certain to enjoy.