A plethora of updates!

I thought I had two things to update in this virtual scrapbook until I downloaded pictures! Let's just say I forgot a few things. So here's a whirlwind tour of the last 10 days or so (the practical and logistical aspects of life and not so much on the emotional aspects of those same 10 days). 

The main fall cover crops are in (with Jason getting most of the credit for that feat!). Next up will be planting garlic as soon as the corn and squash patch is cleared. In the meantime, Jason has been doing a lot of fall harvests without much assistance, so it's probably not fair to show me in the gardens here as I haven't been of much help in that realm in recent days. But I do love chopping up plants and it was time to clear the pepper patch for fall spinach!

The last of the red sweet peppers went into a delicious chicken/black bean/corn soup that Kali made last evening and all the green peppers have been fermented with onions to enjoy over the coming months. 

Kali does get credit for one major harvesting task which was to pick a canner full of autumn olive berries to cook down and make into juice. Between her sleep schedule (she rises late) and the tedious nature of harvesting these little berries, the cooking/canning started late evening. I was in WV by this time (more on that later) so it was Kali's first solo canning project and it's a good thing she is naturally a night owl. It sounds like she didn't land in bed until after 4 a.m. We'll be very grateful for the addition of autumn olive berry juice on our shelves this winter and are eager to try blending it with the white grape juice. It seems the tart flavorful berries are likely to pair well with the very mild and sweet grape juice. Jason noticed in the morning that only one jar hadn't sealed and it was much clearer and lighter in color. He didn't taste it at the time and later learned that Kali had canned a jar of the water from the canner as she wasn't sure if it was ok to have a blank spot in the canner. 

In recent days, all the trombone squash, PA Dutch squash, red flour corn and amaranth have been harvested (by Jason solo). It's not as big a squash year, which is just fine since we are still using up last year's. The amaranth is drying in the garage and will hopefully be threshed out early next week. Jason is happy to see that his white seeded red amaranth is now breeding true, which means the relevant characteristics are uniformly present in the crop.

A week or so ago I had fun making three pies with Alida - our first ever persimmon pie, a sweet potato pie and a delicata pie. They were beautiful and tasty. They just got cleaned up this morning for breakfast!

We also turned off the heat in and emptied out the sweet potato curing room. It seemed to have worked well and the sweet potatoes are now piled high in the root cellar.

Other than the beauty of fall harvests, there've been some amazing skies to enjoy, as well as the color of fall flowers. Here's just a few of my recent favorites! This rose is blooming beautifully in Nora's garden here during her birth month. 

Ok, without further ado, the big Tangly Woods' news: WE HAVE NEW PIGLETS! And you can see for yourself, but we are all smitten. They are so cute and doing so well. Please meet Pink Nose, Black Nose and Auburn:

No, this is not the time we normally get new pigs. No, we didn't need a new project. Yes, we are suckers for good opportunities. Yes, we have too much slop for the 3 adult pigs. So when our neighbor told us he was headed to auction to bid on some American Guinea Hog piglets (our usual breed), we decided it was not something we wanted to pass up and he brought 3 home for us. That meant we had to get the adult pigs' winter paddock ready so we could move them there and then use their pen for the little guys. It needed to happen soon anyway, so it just got an immediate bump to the top of the list. They are happily settled in their new quarters, but I think are less pleased about us walking more often in the opposite direction with feed buckets than towards them!

I promise that I used a lot of discretion deciding what piglet pictures to include in the scrapbook. There are many to choose from!! The girls are doing a fabulous job getting them accustomed to people and associating us with treats. They are quite comfortable around us now. 

And then some other big news of a very different sort: we have gone from 4 legal drivers in our Tangly Woods' household to 5! While Mom and I were in WV this week, Jason took Kali to the DMV for her learner's permit. We noted that, here at 18 years of age, it was the first test she was taking in her life that had any consequences if she didn't pass it. She did! No test driving has happened yet, but it's on the horizon! As I type this Jason is giving Kali a verbal explanation of how an engine works while they eat their lunch. It's a good thing that being tested on how engine works was not part of my driver's test! I still would not have a driver's license... I'm also laughing as Kali was also just asking Jason about various parts of the whole driving apparatus and she is now clear about the difference between the clutch and the parking break. Good clarification before we hit the road!

And speaking of hitting the road, Mom and I did just that early Tuesday afternoon. We agreed that it was probably the first time the two of us went away by ourselves since my adolescent weekends alone with Mom in my teen years. We did cover some of the same subjects in our conversations this time as we did 30 years ago! This particular trip had a clear focus: sorting and packing in preparation for their final and complete move to T.W. in December. As soon as we arrived, I said, "so what room's first" to which mom replied, "you are a girl after my own heart." We do make a pretty good team on things like this. 

We plowed through a lot of stuff in our 2 days there but also fit in a lot more. Some walks in the fall mountain air, sitting and talking down in the middle of the labyrinth, playing some games, eating delicious meals together, and then taking many moments in our sorting/packing to pause and relive a moment or rekindle a memory. Those were precious moments!

I did offer to take some pictures with sentimental items that Mom was parting with - a trick that has helped our girls part with things over the years. Moving is hard work, as is parting with items that have been with us for much of our lives! Mom did a lot of hard work in those two days! 

It's quite possible our husbands could have packed the car more efficiently and fit a few more things in, but I'd say we did a pretty good job! Half of it went to Gift and Thrift and the other half returned home with us. 

It was good to be reunited with the rest of the family! And that evening the girls put on the new skirts that we had brought with them. Mom's three handwoven skirts (one by her, one by her mom and one by her sister) are now gonna be treasured by these three. These are the kinds of gifts that money can't buy.

And now I must bring this to a close. Terah's birthday celebrations continued after her birthday with a fun biking outing with Emily, Jonas and Ivy last Sunday. And now in just a few minutes, we'll be having an outdoor fall birthdays get together with Aunt Karen and Aunt Sue. 

p.s. I'll close with a fun story: Yesterday at work I was at my standing desk but I felt my left shoe collapse, with no warning whatsoever. It felt very odd but I just kept working. Then when I walked to the bathroom, I realized something was very wrong with the sole of the shoe. These were second hand shoes and I think the previous owner might have known something was amiss (this was the first day I was wearing them). On my way back to my office I noticed a trail of black powdery stuff. The shoe was literally falling apart. I still had a day at the office and then two visits and then multiple errand stops. Sigh! There's basically no one working on my side of the office and so going around in my stocking feet was no big deal. My first stop after work was to see Ezzah and her family (I got to hold her for over an hour and fill my heart full!!!!). I visited barefoot and at the end of the visit, Shama gave me a present. There in the bag were a pair of shoes that fit me! Amazingly while in the heat of labor, she had taken note of the size of my feet and nailed it. What a timely gift!

Terah's 6th Birthday!

This morning as she was getting up, I overheard her say that her birthday had worn her out. She certainly filled the day with just as much fun and attention as she could squeeze into a day. And I believe she is going through a bit of "attention-withdrawal" today - based on the declaration in the background as a type that "someone needs to pay attention to me!" We had to make sure there was at least one family member (ideally all four) that could give her undivided attention at any given moment. Sometimes we had to take shifts to get food made and dishes done! It's a good thing that she is so very much fun to be with. We kicked off the birthday fun with the aforementioned family sleepover in the right room. We watched the movie Wonder and then sacked out. Partway through the night, Jason had to move his sleeping bags out of reach of Alida who was nearly sitting on his head at one point in the night.

As promised, the grape leather I got rolling the day before was done by the time Terah woke in the morning. And it's delicious!! So Terah started her day munching on grape leather and getting to have an early morning video chat with Tala. I took advantage of her being otherwise occupied to scurry around getting some early morning household chores done and starting in on her birthday brunch. Since there was a full container of persimmons ready to process, I added an appetizer of chocolate persimmon muffins to the already full menu! We are all fans of "chocolate persimmon muffin season" which we are smack dab in the middle of right now. Jason did all the animal chores so that both sisters were available to be at the beck and call of their little sister! One of the first games of the day that she chose was hide and seek. It entertained me just to hear the excitement in her voice as I scurried around executing her birthday menu.

I did take a break at one point to hoist Terah into a good hiding spot in our closet. Can you find her?

Some SkipBo and muffins tied her over until brunch (near lunchtime) was ready!

We all enjoyed the potato crusted ricotta spinach quiches, bacon, fruits and veggies, washed down with liquid gold (i.e. grape juice).

She liked the brunch but was getting pretty eager to open a present. To add to the entertainment value, we hid her presents this year so she could have the fun of finding them AND opening them AND enjoying them. It also gave Alida an enjoyable way to contribute to the fun of the day - she was the "present hider!" Terah was pretty excited about an Elephant and Piggie activity book (she's actually working on it right now). She was cute kissing most of her presents - a sign that she liked them. And she expressed thanks many times for the gifts. I still think her very favorite presents received were the coupons for spending time doing things with her. We're glad she likes to be with us!

Some book reading and house playing got us through brunch clean up and then she was ready for a raucous game of "kidney beans" (what she named the game sardines where one person hides and then as others find them you join them). I was the last to find the family in the laundry room, but the first to find Terah hiding in the stuffed animal bin. It it definitely a spiced up version of hide-and-seek, and one I enjoy more. Though I don't mind regular hide-and-seek if I can find a comfy hiding places and sneak in a few moments of quiet solitude. :) Kidney beans is much more active and less comfy depending on where you have squeeze in to join the hider. Once this game lost it's thrill she was ready for the next thing.

One of the things I was most eager to give to Terah was her own copy of The Rabbit Listened, a book Tala had that quickly became a favorite. 

She decided we should play Save the Whales but she lost interest before we saved them all. It's so funny how I have to do a little internal talking to myself to not get uptight about not finishing what we started. She was ready to move on and there was absolutely no reason that we needed to get to the end of the game. We played long enough to enjoy a macaroni and cheese snack and/or a funny cake pie snack and/or a pumpkin pie and pumpkin pie ice cream snack.

Then some birthday card sharing, where it was pointed out that I had not yet made her a card. Oh dear! I still haven't!!!

I was then very grateful that she was pretty easily convinced to take a little hike up the woods' trail behind our house so we could a) get some fresh air and b) take clippers to the overgrown sections due to our lack of utilizing it over the summer gardening/food processing months. Even if she was doing ok without much fresh air, both Jason and I were showing signs of afternoon drowsiness (which often hits us hard on days when we aren't as active). Once we got out there she was super into it. She was finding hickory nut shells and when we got to the top, we hid a few presents for her to find (strategically snacks that could be enjoyed up there under the tree canopy). I got to grab a few snuggles on the blanket while the others hid them.

The fun was paused temporarily when she turned her ankle and needed some comfort and assurance that it would heal and she would feel better soon. The conversation then turned to needing to process out loud how she was taking care of her ankle and a blow by blow status report of how she was able to move it and what still hurt. By the time we got home she was showing me how she could do little, not too enthusiastic, hops. She has reported that she is back to normal today.

We concluded the fun day by making homemade pizzas, playing Golf and Mexican Train, and opening the last present. She was so excited about her new sun hats that she didn't take the one off for more or less the rest of the night. By this time Terah had more or less glazed over and was starting answering "what do you want to do next" with very lackadaisical response. So we snuggled up together to start a new PBS series, Native America. It had nothing to do with how interesting it was and everything to do with how tired we were, that Terah, Alida and I were all sacked out before it was done. What a fun day we all had celebrating our now favorite 6 year old in the whole world!

One of my most memorable moments of the day was when we were up on the hill and I was snuggled up by Jason and commented how I was loving being there with my favorite person. I was corrected that I had some other favorite people with me and I was happy to modify it to say how much I was loving being with my four favorite people. Terah quickly corrected me and said, "it's five." When I asked how she figured, she quickly noted that I should be included in my favorite people. She seemed genuinely perplexed by my "I'm working on that one" response! As I've reflected back on that moment, I find myself thinking about how babies do come into this world so endlessly fascinated by and curious about themselves. I love that moment when a baby discovers her hand and turns it over slowly just taking it all in with intense interest. And they normally start out quite ready to state their needs with a sense that their needs are worthy of attention and of being met. I'm really grateful that to date Terah is still very into who she is and curious about all the ways she is growing and changing and loves to be with herself. May that never change! 

Grape juice, delayed celebration, and a first for Terah!

It's the eve of Terah's 6th birthday, but we are very much in Terah's birthday "season" as this gal is stretching out the birthday celebrations (i.e. attention) as far as she can in both directions! So I'm gonna knock out this post before we enjoy one of the birthday menus she came up with (that spilled out beyond the bounds of October 11th!). None of us seem to mind, as we are eager to celebrate Terah's spunky, sweet, tender, funny self!! She got to start the fun a whole week early when last weekend Emily, Jonas and Ivy spontaneously invited her (only!) to go mini-golfing with them. It was really special for Terah and about half a dozen times she commented to me how sweet of them it was to include her in that outing. They even brought a piece of Ivy's birthday cake for her to enjoy before donning her mask and heading out!

Chewing has changed for this kiddo as she officially has a hole in her mouth now and is enjoying twisting her tongue to fit sideways into the hole. I did the honors of pulling it. She was pretty excited!

So knowing the next post will be a "Terah-exclusive," let me just share a few other scrapbook-worthy items here. I'm going through "Ezzah withdraw" right now as it has been a number of days since I've seen her - I was thankfully able to swoon over a little video sent today. We don't have many baby things left anymore except a few things that we are sentimental about that were Nora's. I got to see Ezzah use Nora's ladybug tummy time mat for the first time. She wasn't super impressed but I imagine it will grow on her! The girls and Jason got to come along on one occasion so they could meet her. There was a lot of baby adoring happening that evening!

On the home front, harvest days have shifted from 3 days/week to 2, which is a welcome change. And slowly the number of things being harvested regularly is dwindling, also a welcome change. What I thought was the last big canning was the day that I harvested all the hot peppers and chopped up the plants. It made a batch of green hot sauce and one of red, large enough to fill both canners! If you want to try Tangly Woods' hot sauce, let us know. We are hoping that this will last us two years so that next year we can fill that slot in the garden with paprika peppers. They didn't do much where we planted them this year so we are flush with hot sauce and won't have any homegrown/dried red paprika this winter. Next year is the year to remedy that! Since our harvests and the food processing that comes with that are slowing up a bit, we were able to get in on a last cider pressing next door. That actually netted a small canning project, as we brought home enough cider to can two loads. I'd never done that before and any apple fragments in the cider more or less turned into gelatinous pectin in the canning process. Interesting!

So, as often happens, just when we we're "done" canning for the season, we learned that our friends had a bunch of grapes from their vineyard that were going to "go to waste" (or to animals, when they would be perfectly good for humans). Another friend went and got a carload. So yesterday, thanks to a second juicer from a neighbor, the Tangly Woods' team pulled off processing over 70 quarts of grape juice and then a canner load of grape sauce. There's a dehydrator full of grape leather going to wrap up that project. The canning shelves have truly never been so full and have never had so many colors and a diversity of foods on them. I also pulled out the very old boxes full of jars that Samuel had given us from their barn years ago. I thought about and missed Samuel as I chipped off dirt, soaked them, scrubbed labels off and filled them with liquid gold!

It was really a full-family project and the girls kept at it at rates appropriate to their age and ability to stick with a task. We started the day with a yummy brunch (another one of Terah's birthday requests) complete with steaming fresh grape juice! We took a break in the evening to make a run out for birthday balloons (a present from Kali to Terah that has already been a bit hit - she and Alida are playing with them as I type this!) and to Smiley's for birthday ice cream. Of course it feels much more "worth the drive" to pick up ice cream for her bday if we also get ice cream cones for all of us while we are there. :) We came back and saw the new day in wrapping up the juicing and canning of the sauce. While a "big day" it was a really good day!

And here we are at today! This morning I got way in over my head in the kitchen - cleaning up from yesterday's canning and finding places to tuck the jars of grape juice, making cheddar cheese and making many rounds of dishes with my cooking/baking! Due to happily being at a birth on Jason's bday morning, I never made him the birthday brunch I had planned. Finally today I fit it in. The girls were in on it and we were even able to surprise him as he was thinking any special cooking at this point was about Terah's bday. So he got his funny cake pie and mushroom and sausage quiches (and we enjoyed them with him!). While making pie crusts, I also made a pumpkin pie with roasted delicata squash that we dug into for an afternoon snack!

After downing half the pie, we all headed up the hill together since it looked like the rain was going to hold off. Jason was going to fix a bench placed at the top of the hill by a tree planted in Samuel's memory. It's one of my favorite spots on Fruit Farm Lane and a place the younger gals have hardly been. They didn't want to come down, even when the sky started spritzing at us! I think it was the combo of the location and the undivided attention of the parental figures in the family who had stopped moving for a few minutes! Like I say about many things, I could stand doing that more often!

Ok, time to get the pasta cooking and transform the living room into our family bedroom for the big birthday sleepover tonight. Eager to lavish love on our littlest! I was pretty eager to welcome her into our family and now can't imagine life without her. 6 years ago right now I was starting to think I might get to hold her in my arms before too long!