Derpy Boys

These are my derpy boys.

Sure, I've got lots of cute pictures of them, but sometimes it takes a few tries to get a family portrait done right.

facial contortions

It's cherry season in Ontario... they're just ripening, those first few trees. The sours first. Then the sweeter varieties.  We're still just getting the US sweet cherries at the grocery store and I've been eating them by the bucketful. I think I'm also dosing myself with some form of penicillin, I forget to put the bag away into the fridge and occasionally as I stuff another handful into my mouth I notice there's some fuzzy crap growing at the stem.

I'm eating them anyway.

I also just brushed my teeth, so there's that awful thing that happens when you combine toothpaste and fruit. Face puckering and mouth smacking.

I'm eating them anyway.

There's this "half a tree" that grows around the corner from here. For the past 10 years I've been picking berries from it. It's overshadowed by some other scrub trees (hence it being half a tree) in an empty lot.  There's this ongoing conversation with the man who lives across the street who insists that we only get a good crop every other year. This is year three of what promises to be an AMAZING crop.  He says the tree goes thru a cycle. I don't bother to point out the "last frost date".

Year three of an early last frost date, no late surprises killing off the blooms.

I'm changing my walking route every day now to check on those berries. This year I want to try some sort of preserves... not just eat gallons of them daily for the week, so I've got to be prepared! Maybe I'll even freeze some and make some kick ass pie for next spring's pie off.

I'm going to drown myself in cherries.

Thursday confessionals

I have fond memories of the candy we used to buy as kids.
I think that's a thing in every generation right?

One thing we used to buy when we'd go camping or to the cottage was that MacIntosh toffee caramel stuff. Like a thick strip of tooth breaking sugar wrapped in a plaid box- green and red. It had scores marked into it so you could presumably break of a chunk and enjoy it. I think our parents bought it because they knew we'd have to gnaw for hours on the thing in silence... in fear of ripping our teeth from our head.

I found some at the dollar store yesterday. I was so excited... I'd forgotten about the part where my teeth would become trapped in the effort to enjoy it. I got it home and bit in and.... got stuck for a few seconds.  So I tried to snap off a piece. And just bent it.

The grown-up brain parts in me kicked in... I grabbed the cutting board and knife that was sitting on the counter and chopped that sucker up into enjoyable bites... sure, it shattered and the pieces adhered to the cutting board, but who cares? I'd won.

I spent all day yesterday savouring little bites of the stuff, prying the pieces off the cutting board with my fingernail or the knife. SO GOOD!

Last night I absentmindedly picked the last of the flakes off the board and popped them in my mouth while I talked with a friend. The last piece didn't melt.

It just... sat in my mouth.

I tried bending it with my teeth, maybe it was just a little more dried out than the others?

Nope.

I spit out the offending piece into my hand... to discover it was in fact a dried out piece of raw chicken from the previous night when I'd used the cutting board....

I promise to wash all my dishes from now on and not leave them on the counter.

It was totally meant to guilt people into coming to one.

June 12

Thursday confessional, I think everyone should go to a house concert at least once in their lifetime.


 Ok. Here's the confessional part, I think people who would rather go to a big stadium show once every few years vs catching amazing acts in a tiny venue on a regular basis for a fraction of the cost are... well.. kinda lame.
Not that this is meant to guilt someone into going to one. This is just my confessional.

1,740

In case anyone's counting.

I've been limiting much of my posting on facebook to Thursday confessionals.
It's time to bring them over here.... yeah, I know I said that last month. But this time for real.

June 19th, 2014

Thursday confessional, yesterday a bird crapped on my head. Kim wiped it off for me and I told her I was going home to have a shower. I lied. I spot washed it and had a nap instead.

Still

Summer is finally here.

Late night walks with the dog are so much better than those past without one. I need to remember that when I'm complaining about him.

My town is asleep. Monday night at 12am.

I haven't seen a car or heard another person's foot falls in nearly 30 minutes.  Eerie.
A train grumbles and rattles it's way across the bridge.

I can't tell where my skin ends and the air begins.

The air doesn't move. Hot. Damp. Perfumed.

Lengths of my hair that didn't get caught up in my elastic are curling into spirals.
I reach up and pull on them, feel them bounce back. "Boing"... I even say it out loud. Thank you Ramona Quimby age 8, I'm never going to outgrow that joy.

We choose the side streets, overgrown sidewalks and alleyways, detour to go under low hanging trees, stop and smell every flowering bush, inspect yardsale leftovers... walk with the eyes of toddlers because the whole town is sleeping and we don't care.

TEN

Whoa.
Know what the funniest part is?
For the past few years I've written my blog-o-versary post months before the date... setting it to automatically post the morning of.

Ten years ago I was planning on heading back to Africa. I was heading to Togo in the fall to work with Wycliffe bible translators as a home schooling teacher for a Canadian family.
Ten years ago I was frustrated with email newsletters that had a tendency to bounce back and not send to anyone. Ten years ago I decided that I'd write here instead to keep my "prayer ninjas" up to date with my adventure.

It's been a lot of things over the years, a prayer journal, a venting ground, a record of loves and losses and growth, a safe place for me to try out putting my words down. I've seen my writing style change, my writing habits change, and my purpose for writing change.

To those of you who have stuck around for the ride and offered encouragement over the years,  thank you.  To my "internet friends" whom I wouldn't know without this tool, I'm so glad we have technologies. To those who've popped in and out helping my stat counter climb, thank you!

So. Ten years.
Can we do ten more?

Journal

Dear diary.

Really.

So I've been trying this thing where I DON'T pull out my phone at every event/thing that I'm doing. Trying to further my "not be busy" resolution. Actually, trying not to feed into the thoughts that life is busy "look at me and all the cool things I'm doing".

Except I've noticed two things...

1) people still seem to think I'm really really busy doing awesome things. These are generally people who have children and or other family type things going on. I dont have those things. So if I'm not out doing something.... I'm laying around reading books and drinking beer. Or watching Netflix and drinking lemonade. Or all those at the same time.

2) if I'm not recording fun events to some sort of social media platform, I have no record of it... and it'll be lost to me soon. Come on brain, let's work on those retrieval skills shall we?

So, I'm back here. Recording. Like with those piles of old journals from the years before ...oh crap. I missed my own blog-aversary didn't I?

*continuing to type but hanging my head with the shame and laughing at the perfection of it*

Here we have it, a point by point recap of the past week, in no particular order.

-toooooooo much work
-a random trip to hamilton for the kloetenanny (fantastically fun company and great event)
-did NOT meet any single men due to my own stupidity.
-a visit to my library from another little library curator (they left a special little postcard in the library with their charter number on it)
-a house concert in my backyard with Ian Foster.
-a hike where I forgot which trail we were taking. .. resulting in mamma Mel learning she can indeed breastfeed and hike at the same time.
-my dog got hit by a truck at the beach... after he chased it for nearly a kilometer
-sang and played at a fundraiser for the player's camp program.
-campfire with people who are dear to me, baring witness to their boy getting tipsy for the first time.
-ordered the hitch for my trailer.
-celebrated father's day.
-read 2 books
-made some music with a friend
-ended some uke lessons for the summer
-booked a new uke student for the summer
-got pooped on by a bird while out for tea.

And a million other things.

Now I've got to go figure out what to do for that missed anniversary.
Sheesh.