Lazy Daze

As summer draws to an end, my mind rewinds all the warm weather activity we've had this year:
Days at the lake with friends and family whiling away the hours
watching the beauty God has created in each sunset

or planting flowers in our garden in the only sunny spot in our yard (lots of shade trees)

or trying a new piece of garden art

or playing/picnicking with grandchildren

seeing the sights in the mountains,

or sitting on the pier enjoying the soft breezes
or attending the Cary Lazy Daze Street Fair complete with pirates
or simply making an observation while waiting at our local car dealershipor seeing my first bloom on our yellow butterfly bush!

God has given us such a beautiful and full world to enjoy! I hope your summer has been equally as fascinating.

Summer Fun!

This will be a full week of fun! Tomorrow our granddaughter, age 6, and grandson, age 2, will arrive for a 2 day visit. Then on Thursday, my mother, sister and I will take an adventure in the mountains of North Carolina for 5 days.

We love staying in our little cabin by the river. Often times even in the summer we can keep the windows open for all or part of the day. We sit on the veranda in the porch swing and have blissful thoughts just listening to the birds and admiring the lovely flowers growing all around us.


Being familiar only with the female side of the spectrum, having had no sons; we have had a real awakening with all that a boy can do in a flash :)


He is constant motion and investigation with a yen for the mechanical. It is fascinating to us to watch how his mind works as opposed to a girl. If I didn't already know there is a difference, just watching him and comparing his behavior to his sister at the same age definitely points out major gaps between the sexes. Isn't it wonderful?!


When our grandchildren visit, everything revolves around them as much as possible. We have tea parties, treks through the woods, we make pizza, we play in the flour, we bake, we cook breakfast together, we explore the fish in the little yard pond, we ride the tractor, bikes, and wagons, we visit the farm, and local wildlife museum near the state lake in our area, ride the tractor/lawn mower, pick blackberries, fish at the lake, or just play in a plastic pool in the yard. They are easily entertained with just our being together doing simple no-cost activities.


Some of the quiet activities are card or board games, coloring, playing with the marble chaser.They could spend hours with the marble chaser. We have to have some quiet, indoor time since it gets so hot in the afternoon here.

I look forward to updating our girl trip to the mountains also.

What I've Been Up To Lately

Last week, I canned 28 pints of sweet pickles with cucumbers from our garden. I use the recipe found on Mrs. Wage's Lime packaging. It works beautifully everytime making crisp, flavorful sweet pickles. Also, we've had an outstanding crop of yellow squash due to the perfectly timed rains recently.

The potatoes are producing nicely also. Husband Gardener will dig those "officially" in about another week. He has been pilfering the potato vines for over a month--digging a few here and there for those delicious first fruits of the summer. We thoroughly enjoy the creamy new potatoes. Their peels just scrap off without much resistance.

My wonderful husband was raised in a family of 8 who depended on "saving" everything they grew in their garden. Therefore, he plants gardens (yes, plural) large enough to supply vegetables for many, many people. There are only the 2 of us in our household, but we canned 70 quarts of green beans last Saturday! We have about 65 quarts from last summer's bounty still residing in the pantry!

When our daughters visit, they always do a little "home shopping" from our pantry and well-stocked freezer as we have blackberries, cherries, pecans, peas (2 kinds), corn, bell peppers and butter beans there. All 3 households of us still don't use all there is in the pantry and freezer each year!

We are fortunate that Husband Gardener loves growing things. Now if I can just get him to temper his zeal with a little self-control. Oh! Besides the garden, he has over 15 laying hens that I have to figure out who to give all those eggs to every week. Last week, I dropped a dozen off for my doctor at the Cholesterol Clinic in my cardiologist's office!

The chalk board above tells the saga of our garden. All this above and counting! This week we'll probably freeze corn. There will be butter beans in July for sure as we just had rain today. I look forward to tomatoes by the 4th of July!

Well, you know where you will find me for the next month. Stay tuned. I'll be updating the "tote board" from time to time.