I work in downtown Tallahassee, in the Nathan Mayo Building to be precise, and on my breaks I often take walks along the streets around my office. This is not a a very pleasant area for walking or for human activity in general. It’s noisy …
If you live in North Florida and you’d like to grow citrus, your best bet is to plant a satsuma. A satsuma is a type of mandarin orange that’s extremely cold tolerant and just plain tough. It’s also very productive, offering copious amounts of luscious, …
On Sunday Rob and I picked a whole bunch of peppers to cook up for lunch–Yellow Bells, Holy Moles, Long Slim cayennes, and Clowns. We were so excited by the bounty. We were weighing them and polishing them and taking pictures of them and generally rejoicing in their beauty.
“They’re so shiny and colorful,” I was saying. “Don’t they look like toys or maybe Christmas decorations? They’re prettier than a whole box of glittery ornaments.”
Rob nodded. He put some peppers in a colander and held them under the faucet. “You should take some more pictures now that I’ve rinsed them,” he suggested.
“Oh, yeah,” I said. “I should. They look extra gorgeous spangled with water droplets.” I ran and got my camera . . . and a step stool so I could get a better angle.
Cooking takes a little extra time when you’re in awe of your produce. We spent at least half an hour celebrating our peppers before we finally cut them up and put them in a sweet potato chili. But I guess that’s one of the pretty cool “side effects” of vegetable gardening: You stop taking your food for granted and really start to appreciate it.
Yesterday I made a batch of ginger molasses cookies with a recipe adapted from my favorite cookbook, Screen Doors and Sweet Tea by Martha Hall Foose. Have you all read this fabulous book? It’s full of gorgeous pictures and funny, lovely tales about Southern food …
I took the day off from work today, so to celebrate I made cookies last night. Everything seemed so festive and merry as I bustled about the kitchen, my whole day off ahead of me. Spilled sugar sparkled on the counters, and Buntin sat on …
I changed up my front-porch plants recently. I pulled out the old worn-out summer caladiums and torenia and filled the urns and pots with fresh pink begonias from Home Depot. I wasn’t that enthused at first, but in the last few days the begonias have really won me over. The pink flowers go so nicely with the orange pumpkins on the steps, and with the yellow fall leaves on the mulberry and witch hazel in the side yard.
I love sweeping the front porch on a Saturday morning, then standing back to admire it, watching the little green anoles basking in the sun on the railing. In spring a wren always builds her nest on top of a column or in one of flowerpots, and right now there are dirt dauber nests on the ceiling, and glittering spider webs in every corner (amazing feats of engineering). It’s neat that the porch is part of our house but also a part of nature. Butterflies and moths pass through, and cocoons and chrysalises cling wherever they can–under the railing, maybe, or under a windowsill.
On Sunday Rob and I made a big ole lunch of beer-battered seitan sticks, mashed potatoes, fried kale, cornbread, and vegan macaroni and cheese. It took most of the day to prepare and about two seconds to eat. We feasted (briefly) at our new picnic …
Rob recently built us a new picnic table to replace our old rotten one. It’s really nice—extra big and sturdy, made with all pressure-treated wood so it will last a long time.
On Saturday morning I started decorating the house for Halloween. I got up really early, when it was still pitch-dark, and sat on the couch in the Little House in my pajamas, drinking Coke and stitching up some dumb little ornaments for my Halloween tree–funny felt cats and jack-o’-lanterns with beads for eyes. It was very cozy. An ice-cold Coke makes the nicest breakfast, and Carl was dozing next to me in a soft little nest of felt scraps and embroidery floss. The lamplight turned the room all golden.
I made several cute but poorly sewn ornaments, and then I started decorating the Halloween tree. As you might expect, it was kind of hard with 11 cats gathered around to “help.” As soon as I got a few ornaments hung, June started standing on her hind legs and batting them, knocking them down one by one. Meanwhile, Buntin had climbed into my Halloween storage box and was rooting around in the tissue paper. She kept triggering this dumb talking skeleton and scaring everybody. The cats would scatter in all directions whenever the skeleton laughed. Unfortunately for me, they always came right back . . . to steal glitter balls and traipse along the mantelpiece, tipping over my carefully posed pumpkin people and friendly ghosts.
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| Gourd garland |
