All Things Nice . . .

 

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The smell of cedar chests, the glaze of paint,

The sound of organ music in a church,

The tufted heads of barley in a field,

A tiny pool beside a clump of birch.

A little village inn at evenfall

With all its mullioned windows lighted up,

An earthen teapot sitting on the stove,

The pale half shining circle of a cup.

A snowy woodpile out behind the house,

A yoke of oxen bent beneath their load,

A lantern hanging on a wooden peg

Lighting a little pathway to the road.

The clink of dishes and a supper fire

Pale smoke ascending like a warrior's plume,

The feel of moss upon a fallen log,

Clear water running in a wooden flume.

People who are reliable and staid,

Who live in quiet grooves of thought and mind,

Steady to bear the burdens of the world,

Whose ways are wholesome and whose word is kind.

I love an old life nearing to its close

A small face etched with little lines of grace,

Whose eyes are steadfast as they look ahead,

Into the light of some eternal place.

~Edna Jacques, I Love

Aunt Hatties Place, 1949

This poem got me thinking about the things I really love this morning. I love the smell of coal fires and damp. In Chester where I lived in the U.K. that is what you would smell on a cool rainy morning. I also love the smell of woodsmoke in the air, which is what you would smell here where I live on a cold morning. I think the smell of the woodsmoke has a slight edge in love over the coal fire.

I love the smell of bread baking. It reminds me of getting home from school and smelling the smell of homemade bread before we even opened our door. We knew we were in for a real treat.

I  love the smell of MaGriffe perfume (while I am on smells). It makes me think of our mother, all dressed up in her pretty dress, ready to go out to a dance with our father. Both young, both full of dreams. I loved the way her dress would make a rustling sound as she moved about the house in preparation.

I love the scent of kindness that clings to the fingers of those who cannot help but serve their fellow man in whatever way that they can.

I love the sound of leaves as they dance across the pavement on a warm autumn day, a crisp breeze helping them along their way.

I love the sight of pewter laden skies and that smell of snow in the air early in the season and then when it finally begins to fall. Especially the goose down type of snow. It always makes me almost giddy, I love it so.

I love the sight of the tender green leaves as they unfurl on the bare branches of trees in the spring, and those first tender shoots of snow drops and crocus that dare to poke their heads out of the ground.

The sight of a newborn's tightly curled fingers, or the sight of pink toe beans amidst fluffy tufts of fur on a kitten.  

I love to listen to the Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square sing  . . . and I adore the sound of a clock ticking. 

I love many things and the best part about them all is  . . .  they are all free for the taking  . . . 

 

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I fell into bed absolutely exhausted last night after our day out and about. It was nice to spend the time together, but I am finding that I now get really tired if we spend too much time getting in and out of the car and going here and there. I think it is the pain from my arthritis that exhausts me. Mentally I am alert and am game for seeing it all, but the constant in and out and up and about is quite tiring. I would be happy just going for the drive and spending the time together and sitting in the car people-watching while the others do their shopping. I do not think that turning 70 has been very good for me all-told. Between my fall last September and then all the kidney stone drama, I have had a bit of the stuffing knocked out of me.

But I did love the drive through the countryside, across the dykelands . . . and orchards, vineyards, etc. to be very beautiful.

I did not realize that they had so many vineyards here in Nova Scotia. We drove by quite a few yesterday.  So beautiful and green. We stopped at a fromagerie as well, but they didn't have much cheese in house. We each picked up a small picnic sampler. Each pack has a sampling of three of their cheeses in it and I could not resist getting a piece of their five year old cheddar. But they really did not have much on display to purchase.

One of our main purposes of the trip was to go to Sam's in Canning. Supposedly a grocery store filled with lots of specials and good prices on meat. I was a bit disappointed in it to be honest and I think Cindy was as well. We did pick up some bone in chicken breasts at a good price, but the store mainly held a lot of ready to rot produce that I think gets shipped in from places that have stuff to get rid of. Not really my cup of tea. And I am not sure it is worth half a tank of gas to save a few dollars on chicken, but it was nice to spend the time together. That is priceless, so worth every penny.

Eileen pulling a funny face in the back.

Eileen picked up a couple of towel bales at Winner's Home Sense and a couple of cheap mats for her apartment. One for the entry way and one for in front of the stove.  I think she just enjoyed  being out and about with us.  Oh, and she got herself a set of diamond art book marks to do at Michaels. And we all stocked up on the Sprague French Canadian Pea Soups at Giant Tiger in New Minas. They don't carry them at our local Giant Tiger. That is the best pea soup. We got sugar free puddings at Hennigars farm market and some sweet potato biscuits. 

And naughty pots of fudge samples.

The watermelon fudge actually really tastes like watermelon. I was quite surprised. We had the most difficult time trying to pick a place to have lunch. We went to the Cambridge convenience store to get some of the Stonewall Kitchen's Potato salad, but they didn't have any and then thought we would go to Jonny's for fish and chips after only to arrive there and have them tell us they did not do fish and chips any longer as it was too expensive . . .  but they have a fish burger?  Didn't make sense. We left and by then it was almost supper time anyways. But we were quite disappointed that they didn't do fish and chips any more. Fish and chips too expensive?  When all of the local restaurants do them, and we live in an area that is loaded with freshly caught fish.  No, it did not make sense. Not at all.

I did get this cool photo of a bicycle outside of a shop in Canning though. I loved the color of the building, and the flowers in the basket. There were also lots of picturesque old homes, and really bad potholes. I think we finally found somewhere that has worse potholes than we have here in our home town.

It was a lovely day out together though, despite not being able to get our fish and chips, and the Sam's disappointment.  That's not really why I go. I go because I love to spend the time together. Family times are the best of times and getting to spend time with my two best friends is priceless.

 

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Everywhere was super busy yesterday however, what with it being pay day and the last day of school. Lots of school ending ceremonies and people out and about.  The traffic was crazy. Kudos to Cindy for being such a great driver. I think we were just the other side of Kingston when all of a sudden the rain just pelted down. You could hardly see in front of you, it was falling that heavily. Any thoughts we might of had of stopping for an Indian quickly dissipated as weren't nobody getting out of the car for any reason! By the time we got here to Middleton, however, the rain had pretty much stopped, but there for a time it was ridiculously heavy. There was no need to water the garden last night.

One thing we have noticed, and I remarked on this, was that June was not as hot and humid as what we are used to experiencing. I can remember going to High School graduations and sitting in a sweltering gymnasium along with all the other parents. This year has not been too bad at all. Not even when it rains. And (knock on wood) the ant problem has not been much of a problem either, not so far at any rate. Always a bonus!

 

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The Mole waggled his toes from sheer happiness, spread his chest with a sigh of full contentment, and leaned back blissfully into the soft cushions. "What a day I'm having!" he said. "Let us start at once!"

"Hold hard a minute, then!" said the Rat. He looped the painter through a ring in his landing-stage, climbed up into his hole above, and after a short interval reappeared staggering under a fat wicker luncheon basket.

"Shove that under your feet," he observed to the Mole, as he passed it down into the boat. Then he untied the painter and took the sculls again.

"What's inside it?" asked the Mole, wriggling with curiosity.

"There's cold chicken inside it," replied the Rat briefly;

'coldbeefpickledgherkinssaladfrenchrollscressandandwichespottedmeatgingerbeeflemonadesodawater---'

"O stop, stop," cried the Mole in ecstasies: "This is too much!"

"Do you really think so?" enquired the Rat seriously, "It's only what I always take on these little excursions; and the other animals are always telling me that I'm a mean beast and cut it very fine!"

~Kenneth Graham, The Wind and the Willows

Oh how I loved reading this.  I do think that there is a bit of each of us in these characters from this beautiful story. I have always loved humanized animals in stories anyways, going back to my Peter Rabbit days, but this just sounds so much like me and my love for picnics and bountiful spreads of picnic foods, and the like. It made me think of the days when we used to take the children to the Drive-In movies on Friday or Saturday nights. I think that they thought we went there just to eat, not to watch the films. We always brought a picnic hamper full of sandwiches and snacks. (Food that you purchased at the Drive In was always super expensive.) We would go early and park near the front by the swings, etc. The kids would tire themselves out on the play equipment a we watched them enjoying themselves prior to the movies starting and then we would retire to the car and much away on the picnic and snacks as we enjoyed the movies.  They could never stay awake for the whole two features, and I confess I struggled with it as well. I have many happy memories of those occasions however.  I hope that they do as well.

 

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I was sorely tempted to pick up some fresh strawberries yesterday. They looked so nice and smelled so good, but they are still close to $7 a basket and I just can't bring myself to pay it. Not yet anyways. And yet, I had no qualms about spending $8.99 for a small pot of fudge scraps. I know  . . .  it beggars belief. Priorities people! Priorities!  We had to see what the watermelon fudge tasted like, and were not disappointed! Even if this morning I am questioning my wisdom and wishing I had bought the berries instead.

I hope that heavy rain we had did not pelt the berries in the fields into the ground and drive the cost of them up even higher. Then I really will be questioning my wisdom.

And with that I will leave you with a thought for the day on this, the last Saturday in June . . . 

☾ ° ★° * 。  

• ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ • •。★★ 。* 。
° 。 ° ˛˚˛ * _Π_____*。*˚
˚ ˛ •˛•˚ */______/~＼。˚ ˚ ˛
˚ ˛ •˛• ˚ ｜ 田田 ｜門 ★

*Let us be grateful to people
who make us happy;
They are the charming gardeners
who make our souls blossom.
~Marcel Proust

In The English Kitchen today  . . .  Boston Brown Bread Toaster Cakes/Muffins.  I often make the cornbread toaster cakes so the other day I thought to myself, why not try making Boston Brown Bread ones. We were ever so pleased with the way these came out.  Thoroughly enjoyed they were! Thoroughly enjoyed and such a simple make. We enjoyed them with ham, baked beans and some of that Pizza Salad I made the other day. Delicious!

I hope that you have a lovely weekend. May it be filled with family and love and small bits of fudge . . .  and if you are blessed, some tasty fresh strawberries!  Whatever you get up to, don't forget! 

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And I do too!