Dear Squeamish People: Don't Read This Post (Except Maybe the End)

(there's knitting toward the bottom - if you're squeamish, scroll fast until you see yarn)
I cooked feet. Chicken feet, mind you, not people feet. We had livers the other night, but really that's kind of passe by comparison and so there was no real need to blog it. The only notable bit was that I cooked them in bacon fat, and somewhere a good Jewish mother cried. Feet on the other hand...feet are emotionally charged. They bring out strong opinions. I have strong opinions of my own. Maybe it's because I come from a long line of wise and frugal people who didn't waste. Maybe it's because I grew up in a family well-populated with Depression era women who's sole goal in life was to wring as much meal as they could from the smallest amounts of food possible. When all you young folk start canning and saving your giblets, I laugh a little. In my world, who doesn't can and make giblet gravy and boil necks and bones for stock? Why would you peel the root vegetables when that's where all the good things are? And so it is with feet.
I've been asked about the feet - do I think it's gross? No. I think it respects the animal that I killed to feed my family. If I threw away useful parts, if I wasted things, that would be disrespectful and that would be gross. Don't I think they're dirty? Yes, but often so are my own feet after a day around here. Once they're washed, they are no longer dirty. The same applies to chicken feet. In fact I was amazed at how quickly they came clean.
When we slaughter birds, anything that can be used is used. The blood and feathers make excellent compost additives. The entrails and heads, minus gizzards, hearts, livers and feet are taken well away from the house and laid on the surface where wild animals eat them. It's all part of a cycle.
I believe strongly that animals are here for us to care for and to use. I believe equally strongly that this entails a responsibility on our part to care for them wisely and well, and not waste what we have been given. Chickens have feet. Feet have tremendous nutrients. Waste not, want not.
After viewing some recipes online I decided to begin with stock. Although this recipe for Hot and Spicy Chicken Feet was appealing, I am feeling more like it's a soup day today - obviously fall, a nip in the air and a good breeze, the leaves changing gently from green to gold and orange and red, a little overcast with breaks of sun. The day says soup. Soup begins with stock, and today stock began here,

with chicken feet. Apparently there is more to this than just hucking feet in a pot as I'd imagined and secretly hoped. Although frugal to the point of discomfort, I am also lazy. The preparation is minimal, however,and quickly accomplished. First the feet are rubbed well with Kosher salt - this assumes that you have clean feet. Ours were well-scrubbed before they were put away for later use.

Next the toenails are removed. This is apparently more about aesthetic than necessity. I chopped them off with my super cheap ($3!) and super-wondrous knife from the Asian Market in Hadley. I debated disposing of them, but really I don't think I care if there are toenails floating in my stock, and it all gets strained out later anyway, so into the pot they went. First though, I blanched the feet to remove the membrane. This was a total fail. I suspect I let them blanch just long enough to adhere the membrane to the leg, making removal impossible. I ended up making longitudinal shallow slices down the sides of the legs and feet to help release the goodness inside.

Into the stock pot it all went, with two carrots, an onion, and some herbs. No celery here - Mister Wonderful and celery are old enemies. Now we wait and simmer slowly for an hour or two. Tonight we dine on animals we knew well. It feels good.
In the meantime, I wandered out to find herbs and discovered that I could get away with a late harvest of the perennials. Since I was slacking about this all summer being otherwise focused, I was glad to come back inside laden with sage, oregano and thyme.

Now the kitchen smells doubly good, with simmering feet and piles of herbs waiting to be laid out for drying.
The yarn, Buffalo Gold Moon (yum, yum, yummo!) came for my shawl for the oldest's wedding in October. I have also silver lined E-beads, and a swatch.

I want to start it today but I need to get some work done. I think this will be my weekend project for a while. Once it's done I will write it up, I think. The plan is simple and quick, but lovely with enough bling and drape and halo to gain lots of compliments.
The brilliant Barbara Parry, author of Teach Yourself Visually Hand-Dyeing and shepherd at Springdelle Farm recently asked if I would like to design a sock in her new yarn. I jumped at the chance.

The yarn is lovely - and new so not yet on the Foxfire website - but when it is you will want some. Warm and wooly and delightful with excellent stitch definition and dyed subtly and beautifully in earthy colors - I am smitten.  Madly and deeply. The pattern is finished, but not yet available - I will let you know when and where it is.
Simmering chicken feet, squishy warm wool in my hands, the promise of a tomorrow filled with silver beads and bison down...an excellent day for rest and reflection, I think. may your day be filled with the same.

The Waiting Game

Once upon a time there was a girl, a young one, who fell in love with a boy. Not in the way you’re thinking, mind you. This wasn’t a romantic kind of a love affair. This girl fell madly in love on one August morning with a boy much smaller and younger than herself. She was too young to understand then just exactly what this new love would do to her life. She only knew that he was small and soft and smelled like new things. He began to grow, as many small things will. For a long time the relationship was pretty one sided. She carried, he threw. She fed, he burped, pooped, and on occasion threw up. She gave. He took.

It changed a little at a time, slowly, over months and then years. One day he smiled at her. Another day he said her name, her new name, “Mama”, as if he meant it. She still gave, he still took. But the giving was never as hard as it maybe should have been and the taking never seemed selfish, only necessary. He walked when she showed him how. He learned to blow bubbles, wave bye-bye, and from her masterful example he learned to talk more than most humans ever do. She showed him letters and numbers, and he learned to use them. He got very good at writing things like “I hate you Mom!” on pieces of paper and leaving them on the kitchen counter for her to find in the morning. She sighed, and made him his breakfast, and waited for him to grow some more.

People never seemed to understand this boy in the way she did. Some people made excuses for everything he did and said she was too hard on him. Others said she wasn’t hard enough, that she gave too much and he took advantage. She didn’t care so much. She followed her heart, and she waited some more.

Twenty four years went by in the blink of an eye, faster than she ever thought they would, faster than she thought even possible. He left her one day, which was fine in its way because it was time. It hurt a little, but she knew it was right. He rarely called. She worried, she wondered, she checked in now and then to see how he was. Boys, it is true, must find their way in the dark world, and a person once called “mama” isn’t always who they need to shine that light for them. They have to do a lot of it themselves.

She learned more about herself in those twenty four years than she thought possible. Ugly truths, gentle and tender secrets, deep things and shallow. Loving that boy made her a different person in the best and worst of ways. It was painful, scary, joyful, delightful and unbelievably real.

In four days, more or less, she will begin a new wait, and he will begin a new chapter of his life. The tables have turned; the demanding infant has become the young man willing to sacrifice himself for his country. In a uniform she’s not sure how she feels about some days, this boy will stand in front of her and swear allegiance to the country in which she reared him, the one she taught him to love and respect, the one she believes in, way deep down inside. He will become the property of a nation, the servant of a people, the protector of a country and she will be proud and scared. Mostly proud.

When you see him in his uniform in an airport, on your tv screen, in your newspaper you’ll look at him and think, depending on your politics and opinions, that you’re proud, or shamed, or angry, or sad and scared for his future. You will see a man you don’t really know, and you’ll think you do know.

But you don’t. While you see all of that or some of that, and think all of that or some of that, I will see and think only one thing.

Once upon a time there was a girl, a young one, who fell in love with a boy. Not in the way you’re thinking, mind you. This wasn’t a romantic kind of a love affair. It was motherhood. And I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

The Best Part? This Time, No One Died.

We did not start out to become beekeepers. In the beginning it was an experiment in self-sufficiency more than anything else. Could we produce enough of our own food not to starve to death if the food system ran dry?  Gene and I both excel at paranoia, so the whole Y2K thing really got us thinking. Of course nothing would happen on 01-01-2000, and we knew that. But the general panic and paranoia made us ponder a lot of what if's. What if there were no more grocery stores. What if there were grocery stores, but everyone panicked and we couldn't safely get to one? What if you couldn't get romaine lettuce in a four pack in January any more? At the time it sounded like we had lost our minds, and many friends and family lost no time in saying so. Today, they're not so negative.

Two weeks ago some 550 million eggs were recalled for contamination with salmonella. The number of "bad eggs" is around half a billion now. In the wake of this I am hearing bits of information about sketchy management practices, but what's been most alarming is the number of articles and op ed pieces laying the blame on nature - rodents and wild birds nesting in the area - rather than on the unhealthy and dangerous management practices of our country's commercial farming system as it struggles against nature to produce vast and unnecessary quantities of cheap food. I have rodents here. And as for wild birds, well, they're everywhere here. You can't swing a cat without hitting one, and heaven knows that cat would love it if I'd swing him out there so he could catch a few. In one article I read a blurb about "bio-security" that made me think more of a military operation. But I digress.

Then there was the peanut butter recall, and the spinach e.coli outbreak, and on and on it goes; monthly, weekly, daily something happens that brings our attention, momentarily, to our food supply. We may sigh, search our cupboards and refrigerators in panic for potential offenders, then accept that the FDA and USDA know best and go back to our daily lives.
All of these things are developments that have arisen out of our alleged need to control nature to produce cheap food. It's a battle we won't ever win, but we keep trying.
Someone (Albert Einstein, Ben Franklin, Mark Twain or Rita Mae Brown, depending on who you ask) once said that the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome. If that's true, then the food industry has reached all new levels of insanity.

When I set out to see just how much food I could wring out of our quarter acre in Northfield, MA, I may have looked a little crazy and definitely eccentric. Judged against the passage of time and the current manner in which the vast majority of us acquire food, I am beginning to look not just sane, but prescient and wise, too.
Back in the late 1990's when we'd begun focusing on self-sufficiency and food production, my daughter came to me with a great plan. Why, she said, could we not keep bees ourselves? It became her obsession.

She read everything she could get her hands on, subscribed to American Bee Journal, got a ton of catalogs, made lists of what she needed to get started. She explained to me over the years about varroa mites, Italians versus Russians, the benefits of a started nuc over a package of bees. She begged, wheedled, and saved. They would, she said, be her bees. She would manage them all on her own, we would need to do nothing. Anyone ever had a kid beg for a dog? They will, they swear and promise and vow, clean up after it, train it, walk it, feed it. But who ends up doing all of that, usually? We had four kids. We'd been down this road. We said no. No bees. We had visions of her entering the bee yard for the first time, getting stung, and deciding that beekeeping was not for her. We had no interest in keeping bees, although we both appreciated the dangers of Colony Collapse Disorder, chemical inhibition of bee development, ignorance and intolerance in the human population that led to the destruction of thriving natural hives and so on.
Shortly after we moved here she inherited a hive, devoid of bees, from a relative. She also inherited 2 cases of brand new honey jars. She spent some time cleaning up the hive parts in readiness for the bees she knew we'd let her get now - it had been ten or more years of relentless begging and we were ready to give. She and Gene attended bee classes. We ordered a nuc. When the bees arrived we were all excited. On her second or third trip into the bee yard, in a lousy veil that we have since thrown far, far away, ten or so bees got into her bonnet. The colony we now call Armageddon (as in "they will live through it") was beginning to show some of the aggressive attitude that gives it it's name. Being trapped inside a net with a bunch of angry bees centimeters from your face is an extremely unpleasant experience, as I personally can attest. It creates a sense of panic that is nearly impossible to avoid. Your panic creates smells and tension that the bees can sense, and they respond accordingly. You are, obviously, here to kill them and steal their honey and their babies, and they will show you exactly why that's not ok. By the time we got her out of the veil it was pretty clear that she was not, at least not right now, going to be the beekeeper. As I ran for Benedryl and her face flushed deep pink and puffy, and a huge welt rose up on her neck from one sting and developed a rock-hard nodule the size of a golf ball, I decided that really, that would probably be ok. She's allergic to everything. It was a risk we'd taken, and her body's reaction even with a ton of Benedryl on board proved what I'd suspected might be the case. While not allergic in the true sense, her sensitivity to bee venom is enough to make her a bad candidate for beekeeper of the year.
But now what? Now we had bees. And we had choices to make. We could certainly find someone to take them. There was no shortage, is no shortage of people wanting to get started with bees, or already started and wanting to expand. We could call Dan at Warm Colors and report our big fail, and beg for mercy. Or... Or we could take the reins, keep the pollinators, and become the beekeepers.
Mostly we did none of the above. We both thrive on denial and procrastination. Ask my editors. We ignored the hive. We added honey supers when they looked about to swarm. We never went down into the lower parts of the hive, ever. We never did anything you're supposed to do. We messed up everything. Occasionally we'd wander out to the hive and take a look, throwing a super on if they looked nudgy or crowded. That was about it. As the honey supers piled up on top of the hive, and summer stretched into fall, we decided we needed to grow up and try to make this bee thing work. We just made it worse. We took the honey all right. And almost lost the whole hive. Suddenly the balance shifted. Everything changed. I felt an attachment to them in a new way. A few hundred thousand tiny chickens? I think that they became that on that day. it was no longer about this burden of bees we'd been stuck with. It was about our failure, my failure to husband them in a manner that reflects who I am as a person, and who I want to be as a farmer. it was shameful. All of a sudden losing them seemed like the worst thing we could allow. I did what any rational and already overextended woman does in a situation like this.

 I convinced Gene to be the beekeeper. Really, he has the perfect personality for it. Just like a new puppy, or 140 chickens, or a new-used car; sometimes you have to just put a thing in front of him and wait for him to accept it. And he has accepted it.
So this year things are better. We have two hives, Armageddon and a second one that's struggling a bit as most new hives do - Armageddon's success in the first year is not typical, and let's remember that last year was a cold and rainy one. The hive we call New Hampshire (because that's where the package came from) is surviving, and growing. But Armageddon, who taught us so much about who we really are and how we really feel about bees takes my breath away regularly.

This year we harvested 52 pounds of honey. Not without incident, of course, because nothing here is ever simple or dull. Here's what you do on harvest weekend, if you're us:
In order to "steal" the honey from the bees, it's best to get the bees away from the honey. They seem to think it belongs to them (wonder why) and will be quite aggressive in protecting it. There are a few ways to move the bees. Some involve chemicals and fake smoke products, but my favorite involves the use of a bee escape or confuser which allows the bees to leave the supers as they normally would, but makes it very difficult for them to get back into them. The honey supers are lifted and moved to the side. Somewhere in there it's important to drop a full super, just for the effect of the air filled with angry bees. I do wish I had a picture of that. They do not like vibration or loud sound. Dropping part of their house counts as both.
The escape board is then placed between the honey supers and the lower part of the hive, where the queen resides.

In the full hive picture above, the escape board is the white band about halfway down. Everything above that we consider ours - the three honey supers they've been filling with goodness since spring. The duct tape is covering a crack at the base of one of the honey supers that we did not think was large enough to allow bees in and out. We covered it for harvest because they'd indeed been using it as a back door of sorts. Everything below that white escape board we consider theirs, and we continue to spend as little time in their as possible. I have suspicions about Colony Collapse and human interference, so I actively encourage the beekeeper man to let them do their own thing in their own way without rude interference. We can tell, roughly, what's going on by what happens above.
After 48 hours with the escape board in place (or 24 if you don't read the directions because you think you know everything) you return to the hive and remove the bee-free honey supers. If you read the directions. If you didn't, then you go out after 24 hours and discover more bees still in the honey than you'd expected. You spend a lot of time grumbling and insisting it wasn't like that last year, and your husband spends a lot of time shaking bees off of honey frames one at a time while you pop them into a bin under a wet towel to discourage bee interest. Repeat until all honey frames have been removed.Take off the empty supers and the escape board. They'll be ready for you to remove that, believe me.

They were doing everything in their combined and not frail intellectual power to get back into those honey supers.
Give them one super with some empty frames to keep them busy for the remainder of the summer.
Then take your ill-gotten gains, since really you deserve nothing for your two years of failures and mishaps and mishandlings and flubs, and run to the house - or roll in a wheel barrow at a leisurely pace, either will be effective.

Take the frames full of honey into the carefully prepared honey harvest space (as opposed to last years' very stupid garage-with-open-window technique).

Uncap the frames using an uncapping knife - an item which I have learned by negative experience is both very hot and sharper than you'd expect.

Place the frames into the extractor and get someone else to crank it so you can "take pictures". This part I thought was particularly effective.

 Wait. Watch. And wait some more.

Then cheer as you watch the golden-amber flow of honey from the extractor into the strainer and ultimately into the bucket below.

Repeat until all frames are empty of honey. Then take the now-empty frames back to the bee yard and put them on top of the hive. Within 24 or so hours, they will be clean and dry and ready for storage for next summer's hopeful bounty.
Yarn soon. I am still in the throes of book 3 and really don't feel like I can talk about knitting any more than I already eat-sleep-breathe it. For me, posting about bees is a break from work. Soon, when knitting is less like work and more like play it will take a more active role here.
If you're in the Atlanta, Georgia area over this Labor Day weekend, stop by the AJC Decatur Book Festival and say hello! I will be speaking at the Eddie's Attic Stage on Saturday at 12:30. There's also a lot of really wonderful things going on all weekend long; kids activities and readings, workshops, lectures and authors of all kinds. I am very excited to be a part of it, and can't wait to get there!

Do I Knit?

Last week Blue Toe Spinner posted a comment asking if I knit. The truth is...I do. All the time. In fact it's pretty much all I do lately. I am either writing about knitting, knitting, or editing writing about knitting. The things I am working on, however, are for my next book, so I don't like to share them until closer to the book's release. I don't know why this is, it just is. last week I knit 2 hats, a kid's sweater, two cowls and half a shawl. So far this week...well, we'll talk about that in a minute.
The things I post here are things I am doing when I am not knitting, because all of the knitting I've been doing (until today, you'll see in a minute, promise!) has been for this book. So there's been a lot of this gardening stuff.

And there's been a great deal of canning. Some zucchini pickles, then 60 lbs of tomatoes in various forms, and most recently watermelon pickles, which were this morning.

Then there's been some cooking, in this case combining the tail end of last year's canning with a chicken I grew all by myself.

 And today there is this.

Now don't get too excited, because I am not sure what it is yet. Sock? Glove? gauntlet? I don't really know. Heck it could be a mitten for all I know. For now it's a pair of rich and luscious tubes in Spirit Trail Fiberworks Sunna (75% Superwash merino, 15% Cashmere, 10% Bombyx Silk, 100% amazing; color Vireo). Whatever it becomes it will be self-published as a pattern for sale on Ravelry and hopefully via my website as a .pdf (we're working on it. It should not be taking so long, I know, but there's so blessed much going on around here that it's impossible some days to breathe it seems).
Also, Toe-Up 2-at-a-Time Socks is now available through the Crafter's Choice Book Club. This gave me a good giggle because they sent me an email asking me to join, and when I clicked through to see what they had for knitting books, I was greeted with my own book, right there under "Bestsellers"! Now is that good for the ego or what?
Having exorcised my excess energy on starting these amazingly beautiful Sunna babies up, it's time to return to the new book for a few days. Stay tuned - once this book is put to bed for a while I'll be right back at it. I have plans. I want to do some more self-published patterns; a bit of a change from working for other people for a while. Not that I don't love other people. I do. But I want some me time - just yarn and needles and time to play.
And about those Sunna tubes. I am willing to take opinions. Socks? Gloves? Gauntlets? Wristers? I just cannot decide!

So About that Blog I Have...

Summer here is chaotic at best, insane often, frequently over the top and always unexpected. This one has been no exception. A coyote comes every time I let birds out and eats them, sometimes before my eyes and always before I can react. We did our first slaughter of birds for resale. We've done it twice now and we're getting much better at it. The birds are not like the ones in the store. There's a difference in the meat that you can either handle, or not. I love it. I am working on the new book most of the time and inserting canning tomatoes, chicken killing, coyote watching, seeing family, gardening and life-in-general in the cracks. There are not a lot of cracks. So pictures I think for now, since it's been so long. Knitting...someday! Closer to completion of this book I will start sharing bits of it. I don't like to share while I am in the middle of the thing. It feels not right somehow. I am not sure how. Just not right. So you get life, in brief.

The hawk who harries my birds. One of, I should say. Momma had 2 this year and has managed to keep both alive.

Thud that was. He is now gone. In the end I could not eat him and in spite of my protestations against waste, he went to the coyote or some other wild thing.

Young birds on range with supervision - we've had a coyote here eating birds faster than I can grow them. I spend a lot of time bird-watching, and not the wild ones.

I think I keep chickens just for this. I love to watch them being chickens.

Armageddon. Three supers full of honey, and the extractor due here this week. The honey shall (I hope) be mine!

Beans. I love beans. I have a new (to me) variety this year called Lazy Housewife which seemed right for this year. Good call. Prolific. Stringless. Tasty. What's not to love?!

The tea jug (formerly used for racking wine), just because I like the handle.

Aidan, my Ninja Grandson. No really. He is. He's almost invisible.

 April, granddaughter, non-Ninja, all innocence.

Aidan eats corn. Somewhere there is a picture of him on this same deck eating corn, but he's about 5 years younger.

April looking pensive, or curious, or just young. Or just perfect.
Hope your summer is wonderful!

How can I Blog without any Pictures?

I can't. So I went and took some just for you.
Summer is in full swing here, which means things are insane. The Armageddon hive bees have filled three supers, or nearly filled three supers, so there will be a mid-summer honey harvest very soon. Meanwhile, the baby chickens aren't so much "baby" any more, and some of them will soon find their way into the Featherman Special and others will be laying soon. The Fayoumi and Lakenvelders who are the smallest of the batch were the first to crow and the first to run out the door to the fresh grass once I opened it. They are tiny and indomitable. The bigger birds hang back. I love this about chickens, their personalities and tastes and attitudes. And yes, I will still eat them. Some of them are jerks, which makes it simpler. A tiny cockerel who's flying at your legs and attacking your boots at 6 weeks or age is asking for it, and I can oblige.

This was a couple of weeks ago, their first box of veggie trimmings from the kitchen of New Fortune (my current favorite is the Greenfield Roll - light and perfect for summer!), which they attacked with great relish and vigor, as did their olders and betters

The hens still are a mess. Although two roosters for 32 hens should be within a range that might make life good for the hens, it is apparently not a good ratio for these two particular roosters. They spend a lot of time fighting over hens, and even more time on hens. But the hens put up with it and even encourage it at times, so if nothing else I am respecting the natural behavior of the animal. Chickens reproduce. It's not a glamorous act, but they have a job to do. Candles and wine have no place in the barnyard, unless the farmer and her husband are having dinner on the deck.
The garden is ridiculous, with garlic already in the mudroom waiting to be laid out to cure tonight, green beans already in the freezer and more to come.

We've had more than a few dinners culled from our own garden, which makes me very happy. I lost all berries to chipmunks, moles, and either a fox or a bear, I am not sure which. Whoever it is, they sneak in the night after I say "Tomorrow those will be ready for picking!" The currents and gooseberries just never had fruit, which stunned me. They were so prolific last year. It's an odd year. Not odd and moldy like last year, but odd in new ways. My Bee Balm is tiny, and the roses just never had flowers. But the peach tree wants to topple under the weight of it's offerings and we had our first cherries (4) and first apricots (2). We were very excited. We also have our first hazelberts, maybe 4 or 5 of them. These trees are all young, so any productivity is a shock.
Last night I rode to Northfield's farmers market, since I'd missed my own for a Natalie Merchant concert (a worthwhile event to be certain). I saw Kristin and Julia with their freezer full of lamb (yum!) and the folks from Coyote Hill Farm and Chase Hill Farm and a lady sitting under an umbrella selling raspberries for $3 a pint, and a few other vendors scattered around. I bought a pint of berries, of course. I would have bought them all but that seemed excessive.The Northfield market also has live music and they open the church kitchen and cook up burgers and dogs, or salads, or ice cream by request. It's a longer ride, but a more entertaining experience than the market in my own town. I miss living in Northfield, and I think I would go back in a heartbeat if we could arrange it. I grew up there, I reared my kids there, and I miss it most of the time, in spite of their abject stupidity in removing the last remaining gas station from town.
And I am writing a book. No sweat. Did I mention the part where I neglected to look closely at my calender and managed to not realize I had a deadline in July? Oops. One sneak peek. This is a scarf that will be in the book; the yarn is Lorna's Laces Pearl which I am unbelievably in love with. Love love love. The drape is amazing, it runs through your fingers like butter.

In other news, or in the interim while you want for more scintillating sneak peeks into the new book, I knit a sock for someone else. The pattern is written Toe-Up 2-at-a-Time.

The yarn is Black Bunny Stella, which is sparkly with silver (mmmm) and very, very ballet pink. Super-girlie sock, perfect for farm chores I think.
The yarn came from Dye Dreams for me use to design for their Four Seasons sock club. October shall be my month. I had to choose a color from one of these.

I did, but I am not telling you which yet. You can guess or wonder, as is your wont. More will be revealed.
I bought Very Expensive Firewood.

This is a mushroom log; an oak log that's been drilled in spots and filled with shiitake spore. It has so far produced 3 mushrooms. It's not in it's final home yet, so really I am not expecting a lot. And it was so bloody hot the last couple of weeks I am surprised it's even trying. 98 degrees and mushroom culture are not compatible.It's in a shady spot, but really should be further into the woods I think.
Mostly my life revolves right now around this:

Two bins stuffed full of yarn, stacks of reference books (apparently I was Knitting in the Old Way recently? Or just scrounging sources for percentages on which to base a sweater design, more like) and stitch dictionaries, every circular needle I own and...a wooden hand. Not really sure why that's there. And my remotes, so I can watch things like Shakespeare plays over and over and over while I write and draw and swatch.
There are moments in the process of composing a book that I come to despise it, question my sanity, ponder my future, contemplate a return to nursing and wonder if I just gave back the advance could I be done now? This has happened every time, just as it generally does with patterns. I have adjusted to it and make allowance for it now. In the beginning it scared me. Once the patterns are written and put to bed I can relax again for a while. Until the next book, or next flood of produce or honey or eggs, or the next chicken or human canine crisis.
For now it is errand day, and there are eggs to deliver and dog and cat food to be obtained and chinese food veggie scraps to be retrieved for my starving chickens (not really, but like the dogs they regularly think they are).

Virginia: A Weekend.

In which I reveal just how much of a wine, food, and yarn snob I have become, teach a great group of knitters, and manage to have the best day in spite of sunburn and heatstroke.

This is how much junk a woman writing a book thinks she needs to bring on a working weekend. Go ahead and guess how many of these bags actually were used while we were there.

I know I am going to forget some important things, but I need to get the basics down before I forget! We left home Thursday morning and drove to Front Royal, VA. I had wanted to stop somewhere in PA to spend some time - there are so many roadside attractions and factory tours scattered in Pennsylvania. In the end I narrowed it down to the Utz chip factory in Hanover. I have a thing about factory tours breaking up long drives. They get you up and moving after hours of sitting. You often learn things you did not know. And if you're very lucky, you get a snack thrown in for good measure, like at Cabot and Ben & Jerry's. This was my plan. Drive a lot, stop in Hanover, and finish our journey to Front Royal.

Somewhere along route 81 in Pennsylvania, however, we entered a dangerous time-space vortex. Too-frequent stops combined with heavy traffic resulted in us missing Utz by minutes. This was made up for by the amazing beauty of the Blue Ridge. Truly, I could live here and be happy. We headed on to Front Royal and checked into our hotel, a Hampton Inn. Mister Wonderful loves a good Hampton Inn, and even the not so good ones. This is a good one. We asked at the counter for some ideas on where to get dinner and headed out. We chose the Main Street Mill in downtown Front Royal. What, I thought, could be better than a local restaurant in an old feed mill?

A lot could have been better. The last time we were in this area which was three years ago we ate at Jalisco, a Mexican place in town, and I wish we'd gone back there. The food at the Main Street Mill was indifferent; the sort of standard if a bit unhealthy fare that fills you up and doesn't make you sad. But the smell of cigarette smoke was overwhelming. It carried into the side of the place where smoking is not allowed, and really made the meal unpleasant. You know that feeling when you've been on the road all day, and you're hungry, and the idea of getting back in the car and moving to another location just overwhelms you? That's where I was. So we stayed. I wish we hadn't. I did find a pamphlet describing a walking tour of Front Royal, though, which gave me an idea. I am notorious for early rising when traveling, like the sound of the chickens in my ears is there promptly at 5 even if the birds are miles away. I decided that we should get up early and walk the 2 mile tour before heading to our next destination.
On our way back to the hotel we stopped for adult libations and a bit of a snack and I saw a thing that I haven't seen since Katy's 80's birthday party...which in no way suggests how old Katy is or might be, or may have been.

 Right there in the cooler, a whole shelf of it in a wide range of flavors and everything! Mr. Wonderful chose Corona instead. Good decision. Am I the only person who remembers just haw bad these things are? Like festered fruit punch? Apparently I am.

In the end, I slept a bit more than intended and we walked a bit less. On our slightly altered early morning tour we saw the Millennium Sundial, erected in December 1999.

Notice anything...unusual about this sundial? If you do, please share it in the comments section.
We also saw this really amazing log house.

 Built in 1788, the Petty-Sumption house amazed me in it's longevity. For an old loggie with big thick chinking, that's a long life!

We stopped at the Daily Grind for some coffee (me) and some weird lemon frozen thing (him). Loved this cafe and wanted to move in. They had chairs and tables, some really nice window-seats, tables out side and even a meeting room in back! I did a bit of shopping at the Blue Ridge Hospice Thrift Shop on Main Street. I love thrift shops of all shapes and sizes, and I really love hospice work. In order for them to be there when we need them, they need support. Shopping in their thrift shops is a great way to give them that support and save yourself a dime or two. This shop even has a "man room" with "fishing poles and stuff". Perfect.

Mister Wonderful was not distracted for long by the "man room", so we headed on to our next destination - a visit with Jenn Tepper-Heverly at her lovely home to talk about her amazing Spirit Trail Fiberworks yarns for inclusion in the new book. Dyers have my awe and respect. What they do astounds me. It's not just the color. It's about choosing the base yarn that those colors will inhabit, then choosing the colors, and then - most importantly - replicating those colors over and over again with some level of standardization. I just couldn't do it. But Jenn does and she does it so very beautifully. I cannot say enough about these yarns. The base yarns are just amazing and the color is perfection. Might I particularly enable - I mean, direct your attention to Birte, which must be owned (I am currently swatching it and I am so in love), and also Penelope and Sunna either of  whom I would have an affair with. Dyers are also generous people. You'll find Spirit Trail yarns in the new book, and in another little project I dreamed up on my way home.

Jenn took us to the lovely Gadino Cellars and introduced us to Stephanie and Derek their amazing wines. Well, really Stephanie's parents' wines. Someone, somewhere other than Massachusetts should join their club and tell me all about it! I loved the meritage Imagine, and the Cabernet Sauvignon. I wish Massachusetts allowed shipping of wine. I want to be a Persono Molto Importante. We left the area happy and contented, with wine in the back seat protected from the sun by yarn and water bottles and buried under a mound of suitcase and headed for the coast. I anticipated that we'd arrive in Newport News at around 5:00pm. What I had not anticipated is the desire of locals and tourists to head for the coast for Father's Day weekend. We rolled into our hotel lobby with just enough time for me to brush my hair and teeth in the lobby restroom before heading to Coordinated Colors in Yorktown, Virginia. I'd promised to be on-hand for 7pm for a book signing and I arrived just in time! And look at what greeted me?

A shop sign with my name on it - my very first one! I signed some books and met some great knitters at Sherri's shop, and spent some time petting her adorable chocolate lab DeeDee, and then we headed off for dinner after a very tiring day in the car. I wanted to be well rested for the morning's class.

I got up early the next morning and Mr W dropped me at the shop before heading off to find a good bike ride.This made me a little edgy - love the man but really navigation is not his strong suit, and the temperatures were predicted to be around 100. But look at my distraction (there's more distraction that got cut off on my left and right, but my phone is only so wide!) -

 These were a great group of students. I know I say that a lot, but really they were. We had a good day, I think, and I hope everyone left happy!

Gene arrived promptly at 5pm to pick me up - one thing about traveling with him, there's no hanging around, no dawdle or delay, no chit-chat. He's pretty punctual. I said my good-byes and we headed out to find food. The other thing about traveling with him - I'd had a late lunch, but he'd had a bike ride. Food isn't an option. I "made" him get Thai, which I love and he does not, but dislikes less than Indian which I also love and he does not. (see if you can make sense of that.). He ate it and did not die. I ate it and was happy! We retired to the hotel in Newport News for one last night before heading on to Chincoteague.

The next morning we got up early and headed up toward the island on the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel. I love this thing. I think it's the feeling of being sort of in the middle of the ocean but not that I like. And I know it's a bay but it's still cool. And I love the history of it. The entire project, including the expansion from 2 to 4 lanes that opened in 1999, has been done through the sale of revenue bonds. No federal, state or local money has been used. I think that's amazing.

We headed up the Delmarva peninsula and I was sadly reminded that not all chickens get to be spoiled like mine before they are turned into freezer-stuffing. We passed a large Perdue plant. gene commented that he didn't notice a smell. We saw grower houses, the ones with the blinds and the big fans, five or six at a time in rows. A couple were open to the light because the birds had already made their journey to the plant and to the supermarket shelf. We saw this Perdue truck, used for hauling live birds to slaughter, making it's way north, devoid of chickens.

Gene saw some going south fully loaded, but I missed it. I've seen them before and I am glad I missed it. Then we came to the Tyson plant, and oh man the smell. It was awful. I wondered what the locals think - how can you ever get used to that smell? Do you ever get used to it? Or do you discover which Yankee Candle fragrance is best for covering the smell of rotting meat and stock up? Ick. I wanted to come home and hug my chickens.

I was glad to get to the Good Part of this trip. I forgot about the chickens for a while and here's what the next 24 or so hours looked like, more or less:

Bike riding in the Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge. Or I guess this is bike-stopping-for-a-picture, really. This is midway around the Wildlife Loop. We also rode the Woodland Trail, Beach Access Road to the beach, and the Swan Cove Trail from the Wildlife Loop side out to the beach. All told we rode about 12 miles. It was really hot. There was some cooling off along the way. Nice of God to put the ocean right in the middle of the ride. I appreciated it. Riding in salt water wet gear is really no different than riding in sweaty wet gear, except that for a few minutes you feel a little cooler!

There's a lot of beach. Not as many people as I expected, but this is "just" beach - no dogs, no canteen, no snack bar, no fried clams, no beer, no shops.
For "lunch" we left the refuge and had ice cream at the Island Creamery, then went back to the beach for a while.

I really want to spend a whole week here. A day isn't enough.

We checked into our hotel, and rested and cleaned up, then headed to Bill's Seafood Restaurant for dinner, where I had - in a huge personal rules violation fueled by too much sun and a glass of wine (Layer Cake Shiraz) - surf and turf.

Very yummy. The seafood is local, we were told, sourced from a fisherman in town. I can't believe I ordered this, but man was it good. The tail was huge. Gene ate more than half of the lobster, but when he saw how rare the filet was I lost his attention entirely and had to leave a bunch behind. The thing was still mooing up at me. I have a rare beef problem. Well. Problem is a relative term. We skipped dessert...

On the way back to the hotel we stopped at the Roxy theater where Misty attended the preview of "her" movie in 1961.

I stood in her hoof-prints. I am going to assume she didn't actually sign her name here. We would have seen a movie if it had been of interest - sadly it was the new remake of the karate kid and not really our speed.

I sat (sort of...look, it was a long day. A little schlump is expected)in front of the statue of Misty based on the beautiful illustrations of Wesley Dennis that appear in the original Misty books. By the way if you don't know who Misty is, get thee to a library or Amazon or something, post-haste. Find Misty of Chincoteague by Marguerite Henry. Follow that up by procuring every one of her horse-crazy tomes, preferably reading them aloud to some curious, precocious child and see what happens. For added value, throw in some Thornton Burgess, Laura Ingalls Wilder, and a smattering of Howard Roger Garis and watch what happens. If the kid turns into a tree-hugging chicken-farming knitter, don't come crying to me. We walked past the house where Misty of Chincoteague was written, which is lovingly maintained as a B&B. Then we went to sleep!
We got up early the next morning for one last bit of beach before turning my wee wagon northward.

First we navigated through a flock of thoughtless pedestrians who were just all over the place. The moved out of our way and I got a picture of them to share.

 Early morning on Assateague.

A visitor, who landed and really requested that his picture be taken and then....

left us.

Out the window heading onto the reserve.

After a bit of wading and no real dipping (turns out I am too old for diving into the chilly Atlantic ocean that early in the day after all) we headed back to the Hampton Inn and Suites and bid farewell to my buddy on the pier.

I promised him I'd be back. And I will, soon!

Between TNNA and this trip I am worn right out. It's going to take me a few days to recover. I think there will be a lot of napping involved...