City girl?


Click on this twice. My sis, me, mom.

I have always loved to camp.

My parents took my sister and I camping in a little pop-up trailer in the 60's. I remember lots of bees at a place called "Valley of Fire". I stood at the base of a huge tree in "Sequoia National Park". I remember the clatter of pots and pans as a bear invaded our neighbors campsite in "Yellowstone National Park". I heard (as a child) you could get water from the inside of a cactus. I wanted to taste that water. I got terrible little cactus splinters in my hands that my mother patiently tried to remove at a campground, somewhere, maybe Tenderfoot, Mom?

As a girl I participated in Girl Scout camping trips.
Later we hung a blanket up against a fence and slept outside in the backyard (remember the ant in your ear, Susie?).

Years later my daughter, my mom our extended family and I, traveled in a motorhome to Colorado and Wyoming. A picnic table anywhere was a great place to fry up a batch of fish and fried potatoes/onions on a Coleman stove.

My daughter and I camped by our favorite lake a couple nights before she got married.

But now... I can't sleep on the floor, need a BATHROOM in the middle of the night, like my coffee ready when I wake up, don't like dirt under my fingernails, really like a hot shower and electricity.

But I do love to camp.

We have babies everywhere! So much fun! Our Amanda had her baby Saturday morning. She is white with beige spots. So don't you think she should be named Freckles? Sophia had her baby 2 weeks ago and yet she has no name. Though Hubster calls her Little Missy. Maybe that will be her name!? Both GIRLS!!! But that means we will have to pay for a wedding some day, wink, wink.

Our pheasants are laying eggs all over their yard. But she sits on them for a day or so then realizes there are eggs over there, and over there, and over there and she doesn't know which ones to sit on!

In our bird house comes the little cheeps of sparrows. Everytime I walk onto my back patio, Mama bird flies away! I feel like I'm scaring a mother from her children!

The garden is more sparse than last year. Though we enlarged it we didn't plant as much. But!... The few things we planted are doing really well. We have already harvested zucchini and squash (I have a love/hate relationship with zucchini/squash). Hubster likes zucchini and squash but I can leave it. I don't get much taste at all. But I am finding pickling cucumbers and green tomatoes. I planted purple, orange, red, yellow peppers. Won't they look so cool in a basket on my island eventually?

I have a tub planted with herbs. It is growing so much. I don't know whether to trim them back or cut, freeze, dry. I could put it in a bottle of vinegar for flavored vinegars. Anybody got recipes for those neat bottles with herbs that seem so inviting?

Have lots of bags of alpaca fleece. I'll try to post more on that soon. For now its bedtime.
...farm living is the life for me! Sanetha