There’s a bad thing in my sandbox

Posted on December 12, 2007 by Donalyn

See this little girl? That is Ellyn when she was 4. I wish we’d had a better camera back then, because prints from a Kodak 126 are not holding up very well. Anyway, the reason we are looking at this photo today is because of the sandbox she is sitting on and what was in it and what that means now.

Ellyn was playing in her sandbox earlier the same year this photo was taken, while I was in the kitchen canning beans [no doubt brought into the kitchen, in a bucket, by Larry ]. She came screaming into the house insisting that I come outdoors to help her because “there is a – a – a – bad thing in my sandbox!” She wasn’t afraid of much so I figured I should go right out to investigate. The “bad thing” was a Praying Mantis and with it’s huge eyes and fearsome claws, I could understand why she was thinkin’ it was bad. But we put it in a quart canning jar and talked about why it was cool and how you don’t get to see them very often, and she decided it wasn’t so bad after all. We saved it for Daddy to see when he got home, and in telling him about how Ellyn had run into the house, we got laughing and “there is a bad thing in my sandbox” has been a family saying for us ever since.

Well there is a bad thing in my sandbox right now.

A chewing, scrambling through the walls, munching on wood, digging through insulation bad thing and I don’t think it is a mouse.

Mice are a fact of life out here in the country. No matter what kind of house you live in, sooner or later, a mouse [or 10] will find it’s way in. It will hold a small, tasteful wedding ceremony with a mouse of the opposite sex, set up housekeeping and start having babies. You never have just one mouse. I don’t have any affection for them, but they don’t bother me that much. We set some traps, dispose of the corpses [this is definitely the editorial “we”, since it is right on the back of our marriage license that Larry disposes of all dead things] and go on with our lives.

There are two reasons I am pretty sure the uninvited guests we are now hosting are not mice. One reason I think that is because they sound bigger than mice. The other is that sooner or later mice always obligingly try to eat whatever we have used to bait the mouse traps and get themselves “deaded”. [an Ellyn word] Not one mouse has so far gotten “deaded” since this latest episode began.

I have been telling myself that what we are hearing in the walls are chipmunks. We have a lot of chipmunks around here. They eat the birdseed off the ground under the feeders and cavort about the back shade garden in a very entertaining manner all summer. Chipmunks are cute. They are not a good thing to have in your walls because they can cause a lot of damage, but they are cute. There is only problem with my theory, a problem Larry is only too glad to point out. Chipmunks hibernate.

What does not hibernate are rats. We live next door to a farm. Farm have a lot of rats. Rats are not cute. I mind rats. A lot. These facts are the reason I decided that the noises we were hearing were being made by chipmunks. If I don’t like reality, I can quite easily convince myself that there are other perfectly reasonable explanations for whatever it is that I don’t like. Larry, on the other hand is a huge fan of reality. If he ever comes up mysteriously absent and I have a nice, freshly dug, 6ft x 3ft flower bed somewhere on the premises, it will likely be because of his ridiculous affection for reality. Or his socks under the kitchen table. Whatever.

Poison is not an option. When you put out poison for rodents, you end up having to burn $379.45 worth of scented candles in your master bath for the rest of the winter. Don’t ask me how I know this, I just know, ok?

After considering our options, [selling the house and moving, moving without selling the house, just me moving], we decided that we will try ultrasonic pest getter-rid-of-ers. Or whatever you call them. Being the careful shopper that I am, I looked on the internet to find out if they work, and if they do, which ones work the best. This was absolutely no help whatsoever. For every person who says they work, you can find one who says they don’t. For every person who says they are a total rip off and waste of money, you can find a person who thinks they are the best invention since the ball peen hammer, which will kill a rat, but with considerable effort. I went away from the internet for awhile to think about it and then came right back and ordered them, because I DON”T CARE!!!!! I want these “chipmunks” gone and I want them gone NOW! Just because Mr. Owner of a Pest Control Company in Des Moines Iowa says they don’t work for him, doesn’t mean they won’t work here, in my house, on “chipmunks”.

And if they are driven out, I will never have to see them at all, which means my version of reality was the the correct one all along. They are chipmunks. They can just go spend the winter someplace else.

Posted in life out in the country | 5 Comments

Pictures from another planet

Posted on December 11, 2007 by Donalyn

A planet called “Summer”

I do love the winter but it is nice to remember what it will look like around here next July.
It is rather strange to live in a place with temperature fluctuations that can vary between -20 and 90+ in the course of less than 60 days.
Right now, we are encased in ice with more snow on the way, so lets look back [and ahead] to warmer days.The same crab apple tree from a post last week.

A reblooming daylily named “Pink Embers”

A favorite daylily – this is “Bountiful Valley”

The back garden – it is a shade bed and part of what I can see when I am at the computer.

The same back garden but a little earlier in the year.

A couple volunteer gloriosa daisies – I didn’t plant these here or in any of the other dozen spots they have decided to grow.

Posted in garden, photos | 4 Comments

Porcupine Meatballs – Lowfat Version

Posted on December 11, 2007 by Donalyn

This is for Louise, who asked me to give her my lower-fat version of this recipe our Mom always used to make. The original is yummy [unless you are Ellyn who thinks that all meatballs made from porcupines are gross] and I think these are maybe even better.

1 lb ground turkey
1/2 cup white rice
1 cup chopped frozen spinach, thawed
1/2 cup med chop onion
1/4 c finely chopped sweet red pepper
1 clove minced garlic
1/4 teaspoon onion powder
salt & pepper

Spray an oven safe flat casserole dish with cooking spray. Combine all the above ingredients and form into about a dozen meatballs, placing each one in the dish as you make it. Spoon over the meatballs either a can condensed tomato soup or a 16 oz can of tomato sauce. If you use the soup, fill the can with water and pour in the bottom of the pan. Squirt about 1 tablespoon of ketchup over each meat ball. Drizzle a couple tablespoons of balsamic vinegar around and throw a bit of salt and pepper over the whole thing, along with a sprinkle each of garlic and onion powders. Cover and bake at 350 for about 30 min, remove lid and baste meatballs with sauce. Return to oven, uncovered for about 30 more minutes, basting after 15 minutes or so. If the liquids starts to get too thick, you can add a bit of hot water – you want to end up with a sauce the consistency of a thick gravy. They are done when the rice is done, which pokes out all over the meatballs like porcupine quills, giving the dish it’s name.

Serve along with a green vegetable and some good bread and you have a very quick and easy dinner.

Posted in recipes | 3 Comments

The bread recipe

Posted on December 11, 2007 by Donalyn

Someone emailed, asking for the recipe for the bread I talked about a couple days ago, so here it is, to the best of my recollection.

Whisk together:
1 cup lowfat buttermilk
2 eggs
1 pkg Rapid Rise yeast [any kind will do]
3 tablespoons molasses
1 teaspoon salt

Coarsely grind 1 cup of regular oats in food processor or what have you
and stir those in, along with
1 cup whole wheat flour

stir for a couple minutes and then add more whole wheat flour
until mixture pulls away from the side of the bowl. 1 & 1/2 C maybe

Sprinkle counter with white flour and knead dough for 5-7 min or so – till no
longer sticky. Let rise in greased bowl, covered with plastic wrap until
doubled – an hour or 2. Punch down, form into loaf and place in greased bread pan.
Let rise until it is about an inch above the edge of the pan.
Bake at 350 for around 40 min – it is done when it sounds hollow.
Remove it from the pan & brush a bit of butter over the top.

Posted in recipes | Comments Off on The bread recipe

Hunting down the perfect Christmas tree

Posted on December 10, 2007 by Donalyn

Even though we will not be at home for Christmas, because we are going to Ellyn & Jason’s, we still must have a Christmas tree. A couple years ago, I thought that since we would not be here on the actual day, we wouldn’t really need a tree, but it only highlighted for me that the kids would not be home [E & J do put on one fine Christmas and they know we have an absolute blast down there, but I think most Moms could relate to the idea that it is more fun to have them all come home.] and it was depressing. We do not believe in fake trees around here and you cannot, in my opinion find a good one that someone else has cut. You have to go and cut your own.

One aspect of going to cut your own tree, is that due to an increasing number of people who use fake trees, the cut-your-own-Christmas Tree business has suffered. This used to be an easy little sideline money maker for farmers, so it was not unusual for them to throw a few acres into Christmas tree production and of course the easier way to harvest them is to let people cut their own. But farmers retire and farms get sold to people who don’t know how to take care of Christmas trees. Not knowing how to take care of the trees, we have found, does not deter the new owners from selling the trees that are already there and this happened with our former favorite place, near Ithaca. Nice trees for years, then not great trees one year, then truly strange trees the next year.

So the year when Lauren and Steve were here, we decided to find a new place. One particular tree farm had ads and signs everywhere, so we decided to give them a try. To say that these were not great trees would be an understatement of epic proportion. After tromping over several acres and looking at every single tree thereon, most of which looked like this one, which could not be called a tree at all, but rather a Christmas Shrub or Christmas Mess, we found one that with some trimming and creative decorating could be made to resemble the usual yuletide icon. Since this was also the December with no snow, all of this was accomplished by tromping through mud. Still, it was a good time and despite the challenges we did enjoy ourselves.

We like new experiences though, so after several years of “interesting” trees, last year, we found Cole’s Christmas Tree Farm in a nearby town and it is like Christmas tree heaven. There are trees as far as the eye can see and most of them are perfect.

There are a few problem children scattered here and there.

For the most part though, the whole place looks like this, with row after row of all species and sizes, leaving you with the tough decision of which perfect specimen to choose.

There is always the one that got away – I’ll bet this was the mother of all Christmas trees, the likes of which we will never see again. Someone got to it before we did though, so we will never know for sure.

And because Larry is the person who has to cut down the tree, drag the tree down the hill, tie the tree to the top of the van, take the tree off the top of the van, trim the tree and put it in the stand and bring it in the house, this is the tree he wanted to get:

You will notice that Larry is holding an axe. Now all Christmas tree farms of course, provide their customers means with which to cut down the trees. Usually they are saws, with a degree of dullness guaranteed to prevent lawsuits, should the customers cut off their own limbs instead of the ones on the trees. Larry is a farm boy though and a carpenter; a dull saw is more annoyance than he is willing to subject himself to, so he brings the axe with us every year. And not just any axe – it is a big, double bladed axe. I don’t want to say that he looks threatening at all, but we don’t usually have to argue with the other customers over a tree. Indeed, we rarely see any other customers – just brief glimpses of them as they duck behind trees and snatch their children out of our way. Threatening though he may appear, I am not scared, so after a bit of negotiation, we agreed that this tree is probably a little on the small side.

Uhoh – looks like Lar is losing interest in choosing between 5000 nearly identical looking trees, so I best be making a decision.

This one!

A few swift swipes of the axe and the tree is ready to come home with us.

Not wasting any time at all, Larry drags the tree down off the hill and pays the Christmas tree man.

I was not able to get a photo of Larry tying the tree to the top of van, because I was helping a nice lady jam her tree into the back of her van, so that the trunk ended up in between the front seats. I can’t imagine how she got it back out of there, but I did my good deed for the day.

We will be back for this one in about 5 or 6 years!

Posted in family, photos, winter | 5 Comments