One of the plants I’m really marveling over right now is the Ashe magnolia (Magnolia macrophylla ssp. ashei). I have half a dozen in bloom in my backyard, and I must admit I feel almost tortured by their beauty these spring days. You see, I …
Last Sunday night I went for a little walk around town, around my beloved Quincy, and took pictures of a few more of my favorite houses and other buildings. It was a delightful spring evening, and I had fun peering into the gardens, seeing pale, …
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| A ridiculously cute ornament on my Easter tree |
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| And another |
On Saturday, my family came over for an Easter party. I had such a great time. I was so excited for everybody to see my yard and eat the big lunch Rob and I had made with vegetables from our garden. We served up collards, cabbage salad, curried carrot soup, biscuits, vegan mac and cheese, and fried seitan sticks with barbecue sauce.
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| Carl just prior to the Easter party. During the party he hid in my closet. He’s shy. |
After lunch, we had an egg hunt, as we do every year. “Okay, there are 71 eggs hidden!” I announced. “And everybody has to hunt, including the adults. I won’t tolerate any quitting!” (You see, last year Rob and Mom dropped out of the egg hunt after about five minutes. While the rest of us were hunting, they just sat by the pond, cheerfully defying me, chatting about the goldfish.)
I had the egg-hunt prizes lined up along the mantelpiece in the living room. I went on: “You’re competing for the fabulous candy prizes you see here. First place wins these deluxe Lindt Kissing Bunnies, second place gets the Lindt Mini Bunnies. . . .” I ran through the whole line of candy. “And last place gets Elroy and Leroy” (my worst-behaved cats).
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| The Kissing Bunnies |
The egg hunt was a fun if unruly affair. A garden chair was broken in the process, and Mom and Rob kept getting in trouble with me for not cooperating again (Mom was giving all her eggs to Jake, and Rob had simply quit the game and started weeding). Jake was begging for hints, even though there were eggs in plain sight. “Just tell me if I’m getting warmer! Leslie, come on!”
Jake is terrible at finding eggs.
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| The front porch, where several eggs were hidden |
Along with the eggs, there were presents hidden about. These were from Mom for Sophie and Jake. The presents were wrapped in bright blue and purple tissue paper and dusted with golden pollen. I thought the packages looked so pretty peeking out from among the fiddleheads and the tufts of blue-eyed grass.
Sophie won the egg hunt. Jake came in second. After I handed out the prizes, we sat and admired the presents from Mom. Sophie got the neatest things—a little pot of lip gloss shaped like a cupcake, some flower-shaped hairpins, and a little compact with a cover like a cat’s face (the sassy cat was wearing a pink rhinestone collar).
Bunny and Kris and I were exclaiming over the compact and trying on the lip gloss. We were eating jellybeans, too, as we looked at Sophie’s gifts. We were eating them slowly, one at a time, and trying to guess their flavors:
“I bet this one’s going to be caramel.”
“Oh, no! Yuck! It’s root beer!”
I could have sat and talked about jellybeans all day (a conversation about jellybeans is just my speed), but after a while Mom said, “Isn’t it time we dye our eggs?”
The egg hunt had involved only plastic eggs, but Mom had brought over dozens of real eggs for us to dye (and for her to make egg salad with on Easter). We did our egg-dyeing out at the pollen-coated picnic table, and everything was extra fun just because it was spring, because it was finally warm, because the leaves were so soft and new, the color of key-lime pie.
We drew pictures of each other on the eggs—slightly mean caricatures, as we do every year. We call this tradition “making insult eggs.” Every year I draw Rob with his mouth open, being bossy.
Jake started drawing an Epic Face on an egg. “I’m drawing the Epic Face,” he kept saying as he worked. (The Epic Face is some sort of newfangled smiley face, I gather, and it’s big with the kids these days.)
“Do you know what this is?” Jake said when he was finished, showing me his egg.
“The Epic Face,” I said sagely.
“Good,” Jake sighed. “Somebody knows.”
“Only because you said it like 18 times,” Rob pointed out.
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| Rob and Jake dyeing eggs |
When we had dyed all the eggs, Sophie and Jake started chasing each other and “fighting” in the soft new grass and patches of clover. Jake is huge now, but he’s so cute and dumb that he always loses his fights with Sophie. Here’s an example of his “dumbness”: Every time he tried to kick her, she’d catch his foot and hold it, so he’d be standing there one-legged, smiling in his goofy way, trying not to fall down.
A few minutes after she was done with her fighting, Sophie came up to me and said, “I’m mad at Mommy.” (She was just playing.)
“Why?” I smiled.
“Because she’s always wrong. She thinks I start all the fights, but I don’t. Jake punched me just a minute ago, and I ran . . . because I’m scared of him. Jake starts everything, but then I get in trouble because I’m the better fighter. I shouldn’t get in trouble just because I win.”
“Of course not,” I said, still smiling. “That’s a complete miscarriage of justice.”
We ended the party with pieces of the very special 10-inch, two-layer Strawberries and Champagne vegan cake that I’d ordered from Sweet Pea Café in Tallahassee. It was so good, so pillowy and soft, decorated with fresh strawberries and little pearls of white icing. Sandwiched between the layers of cake was a ruby-red layer of homemade strawberry jam.
As we ate our cake, we talked about cats (another of my favorite topics). Sophie had her iPhone out and she was showing us the pictures she’d taken of Puff (her cat and best friend). He looks so dignified always. He’s all gray with a rather serious expression and noble high cheekbones. He likes to ride in the basket on Sophie’s bike.
It got dark as we ate, and I started feeling sad because I knew the party was almost over. I tried to convince people to have a second piece of cake so they’d stay longer, but it didn’t work. It was time to go. And pretty soon we were outside again, calling, “Happy Easter! Happy Easter!” And: “Goodbye.”
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| Sophie! |
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| A little decoration in the Vine House |
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| And another one. I know—these don’t really have anything to do with Easter, do they? |
Last Thursday night I went to the most interesting meeting. Althamese Barnes, a local historian, gave a presentation to members of the Tallahassee Writers Association about a book she’s writing on Smokey Hollow, a vanished community. …
On Saturday Mom, Rob, and I went to the Old-Timey Plant Sale at Birdsong Nature Center near Thomasville. We’d been looking forward to it for weeks. There were lots of rare and hard-to-find plants, and we didn’t have to feel too guilty about the money …
This weekend Rob and I had lots of fun working in our vegetable garden. We weeded, planted, harvested, and generally rejoiced for spring.
I was most proud of the weeding we did. We got everything looking so tidy. We kept standing back to admire our work and saying, “Now this is a fine-looking garden!” We have neat little “cells” (as Rob calls them) of purple cabbage, white cabbage, Savoy cabbage, broccoli, garlic, onions, collards, kale, carrots, and cilantro. There are so many different colors and textures: the garlic leaves are silvery ribbons, the kale leaves are purple ruffles, and the cilantro plants are bright green plumes.
On Saturday we planted our spring tomatoes: two Romas, two Matt’s Wild Cherries, a Stupice, a Striped German, a Riesentraube, an Amish Paste, a Tommy Toe, a Cherokee Purple, a Sun Gold, a Granny Smith, an Arkansas Traveler, and a Viva Italia. We got our peppers in the ground too: Datil, habanero, Holy Mole, Kung Pao, cayenne, and Long Red Thin cayenne. We amended the soil with lots of compost and a little blood meal.
On Sunday we harvested a white cabbage as big as a bowling ball, some pretty blue-tinged broccoli, some enormous collard leaves, and a bunch of carrots as perfect as Bugs Bunny’s. We spent a while admiring everything (“Now that’s what I call a fine-looking cabbage!” Rob said), and then we went in the kitchen and turned all our bounty into a tremendous lunch. The cabbage and carrots became egg rolls jazzed up with ginger and chili oil. We made broccoli in garlic sauce, sesame tofu, brown rice, and some deliciously oily, salty stir-fried collards that didn’t go with the rest of the meal at all.
We ate at our little ice cream table out on the screen porch. It was “nappy time” (as Rob says) for the cats. Some were sacked out on the stuffed chairs, while others dozed on the shelves of the pie safe with their long back feet in the air. The wind chimes were tinkling, and just outside the screens, among the wax myrtles, the cardinals and butter butts were flitting about. Every time Rob and I finish cooking our big Sunday meal, we always pat ourselves on the back quite a bit. So in between bites we kept saying, “Now this is good eating! . . . Now this is good living! Pretty good weekend, huh?”
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| Carl |
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| Leroy |
Here are a few more shots of Quincy, my beloved little town. I took them last August, actually, when the gardens around the various old mansions and other buildings were still lush and green. I’m not sure why I finally decided to write about them today. I guess summer pictures just have extra appeal at the cold, dreary end of February.
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| R.K Shaw-Embry House |
R.K. Shaw-Embry House
This massive Queen Anne-style house stands just up the street from Spruce Pine Cottage. It was built in 1895 by Robert K. Shaw, a shade-tobacco planter and insurance agent. (Shade tobacco used to be Quincy’s big industry.) The house looks like Cinderella’s castle, too enormous to miss. It’s a colossal assemblage of towers and balconies, deep porches and gables. Chimneys and leaded glass windows abound. The entire property is ringed by an elaborate red brick wall with wrought-iron gates. Roses lie on the wall, and hollies peek out from behind it. I’ve heard lots of rumors about the house, about what it’s like inside (I’ve never been in it). Somebody told me once, for example, that the former owners used to use the sprawling attic as a roller skating rink.
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| Thomas Monroe-Higdon House |
Thomas Munroe-Higdon House
This house is the centerpiece of King Street, which is itself the centerpiece of Quincy’s charming historic district. The grounds take up half a block. With its white columns and symmetrical design, the house, built in 1849, is classic Greek Revival. The present owners, the Higdons, keep it in immaculate condition. The paint is always perfect snowy white, and the front walk is never marred by a leaf. The surrounding gardens are lush with cabbage palms, camellias, banana shrubs, hydrangeas, dogwoods, magnolias, and live oaks. Fountains trickle, and lounge chairs lie in the shade of a white wooden pavilion in the side yard.
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| Gadsden County Courthouse |
Gadsden County Courthouse
The lovely Beaux-Arts courthouse in the center of town is a testimony to Quincy’s old days of prosperity. It was designed, in 1912, by none other than Hal Hentz of Hentz and Reid, the most prestigious architecture firm in Atlanta at that time. (The firm designed dozens of Atlanta landmarks, including the famous Swan House and Rich’s flagship store downtown.)
The courthouse square is shaded by huge magnolias and live oaks and is often the scene of fun events, like barbecues and concerts. Gadsden is a small county, so I get called for jury duty quite frequently. I’m not that fond of jury duty, but I do like being inside the courthouse. I don’t even need to bring a book to read during the lulls in jury selection; I just sit there and admire the crown molding.
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| Padgett’s Jewelry Store |
Padgett’s Jewelry Store
This building is located in downtown Quincy, just across the street from the courthouse. Built in 1894, it housed a general store until it was purchased by Padgett’s Jewelers in 1979. I love driving into town after work each evening and seeing the huge Coca-Cola mural on the building’s side, and I love stopping at Padgett’s, especially when I’m gift shopping and I’ve given myself permission to actually buy something. In addition to jewelry, Padgett’s sells china and silver and all manner of knickknacks. It’s a thriving operation, pretty much the only one in our largely abandoned (but adorable) downtown. Yet I do think things are looking up in Quincy. I really do. An oyster place called Flookah’s recently opened, and so did a sports bar (L.R.’s).
Well, I wish I had more pictures to share, but these were the only four that turned out. (Pictures are the hardest part of blogging for me.) Oh, and if you’re wondering where I got all the names and dates in this post, they came from “On the Trail in Historic Quincy,” a really cool walking-tour guide put together by the Gadsden Arts Center.
