Cold And Alive

Patrice is hosting Chat Number 123 and, after playing along, I'll do a little farm update. I'll admit right now, I'm fairly stunned...physically and emotionally...due to the terribly cold weather so any mistakes, my apologies.

1. How much baking did you do before/after Christmas? Do you get more inspired to bake when temps are cooler? I baked shortbread and carried it around to folks to say "thanks"; I'm still baking shortbread and carrying it around to folks to say "thanks". Good manners are never out of season, eh? I bake all year 'round, especially bread. The only thing grocery store bread is good for is croutons...and that's only if it's sturdy bread and not sliced white bread. Sliced white bread is what Carly and the dogs get for a treat, it can't be beat...a pound loaf of white bread for eighty-nine cents and treats galore!

2. Do you have any food intolerance or allergies? No food intolerance as far as physical limitations but I'm not crazy about liver. There are certain meds I cannot take, due to allergies.

3. When was the last time you were in a restaurant? Mary and I had lunch last week at a local place. It's going to be a while before we return, the place was nearly empty and service didn't exist. Trying to get the waiters attention was like trying to push molasses uphill, he seemed to be oblivious to the fact his tip was, directly, dependent upon his service.

4. What's your favorite accent? Patrice, I'm like you, a myna bird and can mimic folks when I've been around them for a little while. When Dave and I first met, he thought I was former CIA because I used English terms...in hospital instead of in the hospital, and because I cannot pronounce aluminium the American way, pronounce it the English way, etc. It took him a long time to become convinced otherwise...silly goose. -smile- My sheep, horses, dogs and cats understand me and I them.

5. My favorite ___ is ____.  Right now, my favorite thing is being warm...wonder what it feels like?

How cold has it been in your part of the country? At 7 a.m. this morning it was 20 degrees below zero; not sure what it was at 4 a.m. but it had to be colder and with the wind chill last night, it was around 30 below. I did the best I could to get the animals ready; extra hay was set out, Christmas trees were put out for the sheep, Carly got extra meds, grain and chicken scratch while Harry got extra chicken scratch and grain. I'm missing one of the guineas; not sure what's happened to it. By the way, Christmas trees, when stripped of all ornaments and not dyed, make excellent fodder for sheep, not for horses. They love the fresh green taste and some believe it aids in de-worming.

Even with the de-icer, the water still froze and my gloves instantly froze and any time I had to touch a lock, gate or fence, they stuck to the metal. Using Harry's black rubber water bucket (which was frozen solid), I bashed the three inch ice and managed to break enough to increase the drinking area. Tomorrow I'll let the sheep into the yard so they can drink from Carly's electric water bucket. I guess that means the alpacas will come too.

The horses have frozen whiskers and I have frozen nose hairs. TMI, is it?

Sadie is a Rhodesian Ridgeback and has a very short coat; she freezes in the winter so I gave her my scarf as well as her sweater. It helped keep the wind from going down her throat and back; she seemed to appreciate it. When I held it up to her the second time we went out, she immediately sat and waited for me to wrap it around her head.

Carly turns 20 this spring and I figured she'd not make it last night. Even with a wool coat, the temps were nasty and the wind shill nastier, yet at 6:00 a.m., she was at the back porch, bleating for her breakfast. She's a tough old ewe!

"The ancient white house with its steep roof and low eves 

looks like a ship anchored in a still, white sea." 

~ Gladys Tabor ~ 

Tonight is the second night of extremely cold temps but, so far, not much wind. The temps are supposed to get warmer...please God!...and my old bones are going to be grateful. Y'all stay warm and safe.

Blessings ~ heat ~ food ~ safety ~ well animals ~ Gladys Tabor ~

Gladys Tabor, FOLK and laughter

~ Dave, kayaking in Alaska ~

Someone asked me for a photo of Dave kayaking in Alaska; here it is...now if I could only remember who asked...

Someone else asked if I had a copy of Gladys Tabor's cookbook and, yes, I do. I found it this weekend so if you're still in need of a recipe, let me know.

FOLK magazine...are you familiar? No, well then, it's a fine little magazine that's offering a reduced subscription rate until day's end, so...HURRY! Visit here to pay your $12.50 for a year's print subscription...very nice indeed.

Now for laughter: the best medicine...

*Light travels faster than sound; this is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

*A fine is a tax for doing wrong; a tax if a fine for doing well.  (Government employees live and die by this one.)

*He, who laughs last, thinks slowest.

*A day without sunshine is like...night.

*Change is inevitable, except from vending machines.

*Nothing is fool-proof to a sufficiently talented fool.

*The 50-50-90 Rule...anytime you have a 50-50 chance of getting something right, there's a 90% probability you'll get it wrong.

*It's said if you line up all the cars in the world end-to-end, some California driver would try and pass.

*The things that come to those who wait, may be the things left by those who got there first.

*Give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day. Teach him to fish and he'll sit in a boat all day and drink beer.

*Flashlight: a case for holding dead batteries (how true this has proven, time and time again, at my house!).

*When you go into court, you're putting yourself in the hands of twelve people who weren't smart enough to get out of jury duty.

Dave, darlin', when does it get easier?

Blessings ~ rain - warmer temps ~ one freezer cleaned, now de-frosting ~ Dalton, Kim, Dustin; children I'm keeping for the day ~ a day half done ~

Susan Branch and Gladys Taber

~ Susan's coconut cake ~

Are you familiar with Susan Branch? No? Oh, then you need to hurry along and visit with her for a while. A good long while. She makes the most delightful art into lots of useful, beautiful things and her calendars have adorned my walls for many years; she adds a lot of happy to my day!

~ June calendar page ~

Her calendars are filled with tidbits of beautifully decorated pages, full of useful information. I keep them...always, both for the information I write on them but, especially, for their charming loveliness. The coconut cake photo, above, is from Susan's May 16th entry and was made for a friend. The part I like best...she found the cake pans and the vintage mixer in an antique shop! I don't lust after the mixer, I have a similar one but in black and silver, however I am seriously envious of the cake pans. I adore cake pans that are stacked and have never had any.

~ Susan's stacked cake pans ~

Each pan is a trifle smaller, or larger depending upon how you look at it -smile-, and makes a stacked, tiered cake. I love this! For years, I've been known as the "Pie Lady" because I make pies for community events, suppers, church suppers, for visiting folks, etc. Now, I'd like to shake it up a bit and become known as the "Cake Lady". Come to think of it, for years I've also been known as the "Sheep Lady". People in town don't really know my name but they know one of my titles; how funny!

So, does anyone know where similar cake pans may be purchased? Please... I love making cakes but am not crazy about the cakes that are the same size. I know, I know...just plain silly but there you have it.

Susan and I both hold Gladys Taber in high esteem and we both have a tidy little collection of Mrs. Taber's books. Mrs. Taber was born a day after me, fifty-four years earlier, in Colorado and Mrs. Taber and Susan share the same birth day. Mrs. Taber was graduated at both Wellesley, 1920, and Lawrence College, 1921 and later taught English and Writing at, among other places, Randolph Macon Women's College in Lynchburg, VA, just down the road from Thistle Cove Farm! I'm a big fan of library book sales or thrift store book sections and it was one or the other where I first found Stillmeadow just outside Southbury, CN. Do be aware when you visit the Stillmeadow link, it's woefully outdated. I do wonder if they managed to save it from developers? As Joni Mitchell once sang, "they paved Paradise and put up a parking lot...oh, you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone..." So true and so sad.

Mrs. Taber and a friend, along with all their children, moved from their tiny, for the most part, walk-up NYC apartments, leaving their husbands to work in the city and visit on the weekends. After a while of searching, they found Stillmeadow. Granted, it was in need of a bit of work but the price was lower than market value because the former owner had shot his wife and then turned the gun on himself.

Mrs. Taber wrote in one of her books,  "The furnace was broken but we didn't know it. It had kind of rusted away, we were told afterward. We also did not know how hard it is to manage a Yule log with a dull axe. In fact there were many things we did not know. Even if we had, I think we would have gone ahead just as recklessly.... our basic equipment... consisted of a staggering fortitude and no common sense. But we didn't know it then."

Gladys and Jill, the name in the book she gave her BFF Eleanor, began renovating the house. What they learned, post haste, was "the fatal truth about every sink, toilet, and tub in the house. "Well, one could not expect a man to drain the pipes before shooting his wife," said Jill. "He didn't think of it." "Don't you just love that Yankee pragmatism?", I ask gleefully!

I cannot begin to think how many times I've turned to Mrs. Taber's books for companionship, friendship, comfort, encouragement and to read extremely well written literature. Well, one would expect no less from an English and Writing major, eh? The location of Stillmeadow Farm was in Still Cove, I believe; I wonder if that was in the back of my mind when we found our farm in the Cove in Tazewell, VA? That's certainly one reason we chose Thistle Cove Farm; we had a boatload of thistles, it was in the Cove and it's a farm. I'm so silly and simple! -smile-

~ my Taber books ~

My little collection of books include: The Stillmeadow Road, Stillmeadow Sampler, Stillmeadow Seasons, Stillmeadow Album, Still Cove Journal, Spring Harvest and Another Path. I also have one of her cookbooks which is a joyful addition.

There is a Friends of Gladys Taber Club but, for some quirky reason, the link won't open for me. Frustrating because I'd dearly love to join that small but faithful group.

At your earliest convenience, please visit Susan Branch and plan on spending some time delightful visiting her site, copying her delicious recipes and just plain enjoying yourself. If you're so inclined, sign up for her newsletter, Willard, here. The following quote is from one of her pages:

"Women sit or move to and fro, some old, some young. 

The young are beautiful ~ but the old are more beautiful than the young." 

~ Walt Whitman ~

My gifts to you today are lots of happy, Susan Branch -who graciously said yes when asked if I could use her photos, thank you, Susan!-, Gladys Taber, coconut cake, cake pans and beauty. I need a lot of that in my life; it's been difficult, extremely difficult lately, and each day has been an enormous struggle. Aren't we blessed there are people like Susan Branch and Gladys Taber in this ole frosty world? They spread happy in abundance and bless our lives with their gifts. Thank you!

"But in this season, it is well to reassert that the hope 

of mankind rests in faith.

~ As a man thinketh, so he is ~

Nothing much happens unless you believe in it.

and believing there is hope for the world 

is a way to move toward it."

~ Gladys Taber ~

Blessings ~ happy ~ joy ~ Susan Branch ~ Gladys Taber ~ coconut cake ~ good books ~ a heart that heals ~ a heart that hopes ~

hopefully yours,

Sandra