THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for a freezer stash of sweet green muffins. What's one thing that you're thankful for?

A STRAWBERRY GALETTE

One of my friends loves to cook and bake, whether following recipes or coming up with her own creations, and feeding people the delicious things she makes is one of her favorite things to do. Tonight she brought strawberry galettes, made with berries she'd picked the previous day, to another friend and I at church. They were still warm from the oven, so I had to take them out to our cars because it made our area of the room smell like an amazing bakery. Needless to say, that would have been a distraction during the service. The smell taunted me on the drive home and I cut into my galette about thirty seconds after I walked in the door. So delicious!

ADELMAN PEONY GARDENS

We took advantage of a clear schedule and pleasant weather to visit Adelman Peony Gardens for the first time today. Oh, goodness, it's beautiful! We snapped a quick picture together before heading into twenty-five acres of fields.

Naomi and Tyler both enjoy drawing, so I had them bring sketchbooks along. They quickly found quiet spots to settle in and put pencil to paper.

I don't like to draw at all, but I really love walking and looking at beautiful flowers. So that's what I did while they were busy with their sketchbooks. 

We stopped in their little shop, then discovered a garden area filled with all sorts of gorgeous flowers. So we struck another pose at the end of our visit. 

I couldn't get it all in one shot, but here's most of the sample cuttings in their shop. They're not all for sale each day, but they have a board set up telling visitors which stems are available. They also sell potted plants for people who want peonies in their yard. So many variations!
 

Living in flat farmland isn't my favorite thing, but I always love seeing Mt. Hood rising above all the crops we live near. 

Just a bunch of peonies. 

I planned on taking pictures of my favorites, but I loved all of them. Should have known! There were more varieties than I have here, but it's a decent sampling of all the stunning peonies in the fields. That first yellow one was huge!

I didn't buy any flowers because I already have some in our home, grown by friends with a different peony farm, so I got a fun sticker of the display truck in their shop. 

Such a fun way to spend a little part of our day!

THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for the therapy pep talk flashcards I made from notes I took during my appointments last year. What's something you're thankful for?

MY BRACELET

My great-grandma had a gold bracelet. She died when my grandma was three and eventually my grandma wore it. My grandma passed it to my mom when my mom turned eighteen. My mom died when I was fifteen and I started wearing it sometime after that, although I don't remember exactly when. I quit wearing it for a few years in early adulthood because it was reacting to my body chemistry, lotion, or something by leaving a green mark on my skin. I tried again later and didn't have any problem. I didn't take it off for over twenty years. 

I was reading in bed one night in March and felt my sleeve get caught on the bracelet. Strange, since the bracelet is perfectly smooth. I looked down and discovered it had split. What in the world?! It's lasted over a century, my mom wore it constantly for two decades, I've worn it constantly for more than two decades, and it broke while I was sedentary at the end of the day.

It took a while, but I finally got around to having Sherrie's Jewelry Box look at it. The repair was going to be easy because it was on the seam, which is why it was perfect break, but there was another problem. 

The inside of the bracelet had names engraved in it. A mom's first name, hyphen, her daughter's first and last (maiden) name, from my great-grandma to my mom. The cool thing was that it was hand engraved. The bummer was the engraving had been done right over the seam. I had a choice to make. Leave the original engraving as is, with one name permanently ruined, or have the engraving redone, not by hand and starting just after the seam so the problem couldn't happen again. I chose the latter. I also had the name combinations dropped to make room for more generations, so it's just each woman's first and last name. I also had my own name added, which makes me get a little choked up sometimes. 

Not only have I always had old lady hands with all their wrinkles, but I've also always had man hands that are really wide. (Hmmm ... maybe I have old man hands. Whatever. I don't care. My hands look how they look and do what they need to do.) Because my hands are wide, I never take the bracelet off. It's simply too difficult and painful. However, I haven't put the bracelet on in over twenty years and had forgotten that it's easy to move it that direction. I slipped the bracelet that's been part of my family for over a hundred years back on my wrist today and smiled. I love it. 

A PEACEFUL & PRODUCTIVE DAY

This morning Michelle and I met for a walk around Molalla River State Park (she'd been there before, I hadn't), did some shopping at The Book Nook (first visit for both of us), and enjoyed a delicious lunch outside at Wayward Sandwiches (I'd been there before, she hadn't). It was a perfect way to spend a few hours! 

Sidenote: The book and puzzle were bought used from The Book Nook. I'd read The Eleventh Trade before (it's great!) and we love Dowdle puzzles, so Plymouth (never done it before) came home with me. 

Silas and Natie came over later in the afternoon because he wanted to split firewood and we just happened to have plenty that needed to be split. The two of us spent a chunk of time working together, him splitting and me stacking. So thankful for the help!

 

BOOKS I FINISHED - MAY 2022

The Enchanted Hour: The Miraculous Power of Reading Aloud in the Age of Distraction, written by Meghan Cox Gurdon

I've gotten out of the habit of reading aloud to my kids over the last few years, but I know it's really valuable and want to make it a priority again. Filled with evidence about how important it is for brains, relationships, and how we look at the world, this book was like a long pep talk to get me back on track.

p. 17, Eighty-five percent of kids who get into trouble with the law have poor literacy skills. Seventy percent of prisoners in state and federal institutions are in the same predicament, as are 43 percent of people living in poverty. < snip > Imagine how the world would look if every child had stories read aloud every night. 

p. 108, Schoolwork, sports, friends, part-time jobs, and the hydra-headed temptations of technology will try to crowd out regular reading. Don't let it. This is a battle worth winning.

p. 150, So it goes. Youth is inattentive. It thinks itself something fresh, full of energy, spirit, and insight. It feels that no one has ever cared so much, felt with such intensity, or realized truth with such exquisite clarity. Youth may have no idea that it is wreathed in ghosts, informed by ghosts, held up on the shoulders of ghosts. When we read aloud from the literature of the past - and all literature is the literature of the past - and when we share artistic traditions, we are not merely giving children stories and pictures to enjoy. We're also inviting a measure of humility, gently correcting youth's eternal temptation to arrogance. 

p. 167, There's a broad temptation to view the past through the prism of our contemporary attitudes and taboos - and to find its people shameful and wanting. We believe ourselves to be so much more enlightened; but, then, people always do.

p. 168 (quoting Walter Edmonds accepting accolades) The present is important, but today will be yesterday in less than twelve hours, just as a little over twelve hours ago it was an unpredictable tomorrow. This present that some of us get so het up about is less than the wink of an eyelid in the face of time. The past is as alive as we are."

p. 168, The ways that people live and think have altered, often for the better. Still, we are wise not to assume that of all the human beings ever born, we just happen to be the ones who've got it all right.

p. 172, We do children no service in cutting them off from transcendent works of the imagination, even if it means introducing them to troublesome ideas and assumptions, and to characters we would rather they not admire. Like life itself, literature is unruly. It raises moral, cultural, and philosophical questions. Well, where better to talk about these things than at home? The human story is messy and imperfect. It is full of color and peril, creation and destruction - of cruelty and villainy, prejudice and hatred, love and comedy, sacrifice and virtue. We needn't be afraid of it. It's foolish to cover it up and pretend history never happened. It is far better to talk about what we think of these matters with our children, using books as a starting point for the conversation. 

p. 175, To defend classic literature is not to defend prejudice. It is to argue for sympathy, and an openness to the past as well as to the insistent present. It is to recognize that as we judge the people of former times, so shall we be judged by future ones. Attributes of our contemporary life that we think unimpeachable or unavoidable will be held up by generations yet to come as evidence of our limits, our stupidity, our profligacy, our lack of vision. 

The Sunday Potluck Club, written by Melissa Storm

I decided to spend my post-nap Sunday afternoon reading and it turns out this book that coincidentally has "Sunday" in the title was just the fluff I needed. Friendship, grief, and romance combine in this fairly predictable novel that reinforces the importance of honesty, transparency, humility, and loyalty. 

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