Forgot to send last night:
Saturday, August 04, 2012
Another hot, sticky day. It was hard to find motivation to do anything useful. I went down to the lower garden and was thrilled to find three cucumbers and two yellow heirloom tomatoes. I harvested the marigold flowers for drying. Then I studied A1A2 for a half hour or so before falling asleep in my chair.
Abby has been preparing Marcia’s camp for summer guests and was alarmed to discover that the refrigerator was not working. We drove out tonight with frozen gel packs for emergency cooling and found to our joy that it had gotten cold after all.
For supper we ate yummy leftovers from Max’s birthday party.
Sunday, August 05, 2012
It was a few degrees cooler today but till humid.
Fern’s production was up a quart. This might be because Abby emptied and scrubbed out her water tub. It looked perfectly clear but day before yesterday Abby saw her sniffing it and turning away. Or there might be some other reason. I will see what tomorrow brings.
DD Abby spent most o f the day on tasks related to fixing up her sister Marcia’s camp for habitation. Marcia had left it bare and for sale. It has not sold so she and the family might as well have some use of it. It is right on the lake in a beautiful spot. It has a marvelous garden too.
I worked in the lower garden for over an hour this afternoon tending the peppers and tomatoes. I made dikes around the peppers and carried water to them and tied up the tomatoes a little better. The pole bean leaves were being eaten by something. When I brushed the bush probably 5 thousand Japanese beetles tumbled out of the plants. It was awful. I wished the chickens were there. I am hunting for my traps now. I got too hot in the garden and feel totally wiped out tonight.
I fixed curried Thai flavored chicken with coconut milk, using Friday’s leftover chicken, and a fresh salad of new cucumbers, peppers and tomatoes (not my own tomatoes) for our supper.
We got a light rain for a half hour at dusk.
Monday, August 06, 2012
The heat wave eased off today. Living was easier.
Abby took another flying trip to Rumford to exchange the hat we got for Max’s birthday. She was able to get a size smaller. DS Bret and kids are due to arrive tomorrow and it is Max’s last day before returning to Montana . Tomorrow afternoon will the thhe only opportunity for Bret and Max to see each other. Abby has organized a picnic and cookout at Marcia’s camp at the lake, so much of today was devoted to preparations for that. Abby has made a vast potato salad and I have started beans.
Cousins Holly and Richard popped in this morning with jellies Richard had made from various fruit they picked here a few weeks ago. We had tea and blueberry buckle (made by Richard). The heat had eased enough to permit us to sit on the deck. Also, the mosquitoes have retreated to manageable numbers.
DS Mark made a surprise visit, it being his day off at the hospital. This was a treat. We walked all around the garden and then had a delicious dinner mostly prepared by Abby. We had breaded scallops, salad , couscous and custard. I made the custard on spec this morning knowing it would be needed for something.
Nancy H came this morning and checked the electric fence line. Thanks to the major trimming she did last time there was little to do except for one 100’ stretch that something had torn out. It is a good thing my animals are not especially adventuresome.
Tuesday, August 07, 2012
There were several nervous phone calls and a bit of worry but also some careful planning that paid off for DD Abby’s expedition toPortland . Until yesterday we had been unable to confer with him about his arrival plans from Alaska . He was incommunicado for over a week. What he had not told us was that he and the kidss Roger 14 and Maia (16) had gone sailing on his boat that he keeps at Whidbey Island . This morning I got the following account:
We (Maia, Roger, Bret) sailed out of Oak Harbor on Whidbey island on Tuesday, we got there on Monday, 30 July. We took the Swinomish channel through La Connor, stopping to talk with another Rawson Pilothouse owner, same as our boat, the kids ran along the main street and bought ice creams. We continued on to Anacortes where we stayed the night in the city marina. Hot showers and a meal at a cafe. In the morning I walked in to town to a coffee shop with internet and did work for a couple hours, then returned to the boat, woke the kids and made breakfast. We walked to a couple stores for errands, paid our mooring fees, and cast off.
We crossed Rosario Straits . We anchored at Spencer spit, chatted with a gal there digging her toes into the sand. Ally, just starting as an ecology student at UCD. She's working as a camp counselor and giving sailing lessons. I spent the evening scrubbing the outside of the boat. In the morning the autopilot refused to work, oh well, but it is handy, very handy. We sailed up to 'Olga' where some nice people gave us some onions, arugula and 2 kinds of basil out of the garden they were tending. On the dock we chatted with a retired Englishman named David who manufactured self-steering wind vane equipment for sailboats. I would like to have talked to him longer because his invention was seminal to single handed long distance sailing. We sailed out to Stuart Island . Next day sailed to Friday harbor, anchored, sent the kids in for ice cream and fish & chips while I fiddled aobut on the boat. Anchor became fouled during the night with a dock mooring chain. Long story, but in the end elected to slip the anchor as the safest option. I'll hire a diver to get it back, I'll be $400 ahead. I have an old aquaintance there I met through Tom McGuire by the name of Kurt Schwalbe, the right reverend Kurt Schwalbe, who is a diver. We sailed all day, all about, past Olga up East Sound and finally back to Spencer Spit to anchor for the night, I used one of my 2 spare anchors. I finished my Woody Allen book. Sailed all day yesterday, back in behind Whidbey Island and anchored atHope Island .
So much sun nduring sailing that I finally had to cover my legs with a towel. I gave Maia lessons. After we anchored we took the skiff to the far end of the island, it is a state park, to a rope swing I know and where there is an exposed fossil bed. We collected some momentos, including a bottle of crushed shell sand for Maia's teacher. Roger and i walked back along the island while Maia ran the skiff back. I think that made her feel good, to give her a reasonable level of responsibility as skiffing about on the ocean is a bit spooky, even if an island is near at hand. Roger and I had fun speeding along a game trail through the woods. We slipped a bunch but did not shoot off the various banks into the ocean. Maia picked us up. This morning I pulled anchor and ran us back toOak Harbor . Roger got up and made us all breakfast along the way, he was pretty proud of himself. We refueled the boat, 23 gallons for a week of cruising, pretty damn good; then I cleaned the boat for hours while the kids ran errands. We had a bit of lunch and went to the shuttle, and barely made it, but we did. Now sitting at Seatac waiting for our overnight flight. Abby called and is very excited to be meeting us tomorrow in Portland ME. .
Bret
Abby picked them up as planned following a bus trip from Boston . As many as possible of the family then met at Marcia’s camp in Weld and had a grand picnic and cookout organized by Abby. This provided an opportunity for Bret and Max to see each other. Max has to leave before dawn tomorrow to travel back to Montana .
Wednesday, August 08, 2012The weather today was quite pleasant although hot for garden work. I weeded and tied up tomatoes for as long as I could take it. Abby and the kids spent last night at camp but were back down here before ten to help with chores.
Dr. Cooper stopped in for lunch. I gave him ratatouille with my first zucchini and second eggplant. For the family dinner, which took place here, I served braised lamb shanks, brown rice and carrots.
Abby did all the farm chores today except for milking Fern.
I got in about an hour of writing.
During the afternoon, Bret took the kids to Coos Canyon . Back here, the girls helped out with whatever needed doing. Roger netted a large frog in the muddy ornamental pond (catch and release) and taught the girls how to play poker. Roger also played the piano for a long time. Shireen practiced her viola.
Everyone except me is sleeping up at camptonight.
Thursday, August 09, 2012
The weather remains much the same only a little muggier. The paper says that climatologists say we have so far had the hottest summer on record. I think many of us already knew that.
Even after scrubbing, I noticed that Fern was giving the hairy eyeball to her water tub. Abby changed it out yesterday for the galvanized one. This morning it was drunk down 4” and on their way out the sheep stopped for drinks. For now it looks like they prefer the metal tank.
Sally called to tell me that she picked a bunch of flowering stalks from the edge of her garden inHaines AK . She thought them to be naturalized from angelica she had planted several years ago. Her friend Judy, a naturalist, saw them and said they were deadly water hemlock. So I guess Sally will be doing some plant eradication.
Dear Holly and Richard picked up DD Marcia and my sister Barby in Portland .
We gathered this evening for grilled chicken at Marcia’s camp. But first, Barby and I went down and soaked our feet in the lake. Her feet were a bit swollen from air travel.
All are staying at the lake except Barby and me. About the time we finished eating a thunderstorm began and it is still rumbling.
It stormed violently all last night and continued to rain off and on all day. We needed rain but perhaps not this much. Sally’s oat and wheat patches were ready to harvest and I hope will be able to dry out again. At least they were not lodged.
DS Bret built a railing for the stairs to the carriage house attic. They were a bit scary without one so everyone applauds this improvement.
This was Shireen’s last day of working in the kitchen at Kawanhee Camp for boys, all over for the summer.
I baked one of the hams from Luick’s home reared pork. It was superb, the sort of ham that makes understandable the worldwide fondness for pork products. We all ate at camp again, this time a buffet around the house and porch because of the rain. Driving home in the dark and rain was a challenge. The road is very dark. Fortunately there were few other cars. .
The sheep were still out. One did not come in with the rest. I could hear frantic bleating. A lamb had gotten himself trapped in the calf pen that is inside the beefer pen. The light had burned out in there but fortunately I had worn my little head lamp and got everybody sorted out with the only mishap being that I was not shod for this little adventure and was wearing my white linen pants.
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