Not the Only Writer in the Family

A couple weeks ago I received the gift of a handmade book.  It's a treasure.  LC made it for me all by herself.  She put my initials on the cover twice--"BM" for my name and "GM" for Grandma even though she calls me Meemaw--and the initials are backwards as is the book.  She's left-handed and writing right to left and the way pages go takes time to work out.  Inside is a picture of the Cat in the Hat and it says on the facing page, "The Cat in the Hat mad a mese."  (psst, she read it to me and it says, "made a mess.")  I love it, exclaimed over it, and think it's brilliant.  She's 4 years old.  "Four and a HALF, Meemaw."  I can't wait for more.






 




All I have to show you today is flowers.  Mostly lilies but the daisies, bee balm, and spiderwort were all blooming at the same time when I went out this morning looking so bright and cheery and like flowers should look, I think.

I also spent some time this morning digging out the weeds growing between the patio blocks.  I sprayed weed killer the other day and was waiting for a not-too-humid day to dig out the corpses and today was the day.

This afternoon I visited Durwood and then came home because my baby brother came over to see me.  His job takes him all over the country so I don't get to see him much.  We visited for a couple hours and I got to show off my garden.  It was great to see him.  We plan to get together more often now that his office is in DePere (5 miles away).

July 19--Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Strawberries.  Such a sensual red.  The berries glowed with the perfect red, ripe and glistening.  You had to be careful not to fill your pail too full or the weight of the berries would crush them all into mush, but such a sweet mush.  It only took the barest sprinkling of sugar to bring the flavor to the epitome of strawberry-ness, the pinnacle of fruit.  It took no effort at all to mash the berries before the cup after cup of sugar was stirred in.  Then the slow heating, stirring so it didn't scorch, waiting until it had boiled long enough to sheet off the spoon.  That was the tricky part to learn.  No store-bought Sure Gel for Grandma, no.  You learned to see and feel the moment when the sugar and the natural pectin from the berries joined together just right so that the jam gelled as it cooled, so that it glistened in the rows of jars like liquefied rubies.

Hm, I wonder if I have any strawberry jam downstairs.  If I do I know it was made with Sure Gel because I never did learn to cook it long enough for it to gel on it's own.  I know that, up in Heaven, Grandma shakes her head every time I make jam.  *sigh*  I do other things right though, really I do.

I learned an important lesson today--Do NOT put your camera into the same pocket you just put three cherry tomatoes into.  Write that down.
--Barbara