Blue Yonder

My 15 Minutes

Several months back, I was asked to write an article for our local foodie mag, Edible Austin. 

To say that I was excited would be putting it very, VERY mildly. 

I have loved this magazine for a long time... it's so earthy and tasty and full of every yummy thing that is Austin. What's more, I have, since I was a very little girl, always dreamed that one fine day I'd see my name in print - that I'd have something to say that was worthy of print, that is. 

Now in all my silly school girl imaginings, I  thought it would be on a children's book, or better still a novel... but I'm a (very blessed) mom and that means that frankly by the end of the day I'm lucky if I can string together two coherent sentences, let alone a novel. 

So I figured it would be a while, if ever, that I'd see my name in publication. 

Even after Edible Austin asked for my article, I had my doubts as to whether they'd actually print it. I felt pretty sure that they'd weigh my handful of words against the amazing writers, chefs, restaurant owners and visionary farmers that grace their pages and find me lacking.

So imagine my surprise to find, while standing in line at Whole Foods with three cranky kids and an armful of grocery bags that there's a beautiful, smart magazine with my byline in it. 

And  you know while it's not the great American novel that my eager college-girl self envisioned one day publishing, I have to say, if my claim to printed fame ends up being a small story about family and tradition and the foods that bind us together... well it just doesn't get more delicious than that!

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We're giving stuff away today over at the Ranch!

Small Wonder :: Back Porch Playin'

Well hey and howdy folks! It's been awful quiet around here, hasn't it? 

We were having such a good time romping around the woods with my Granny that we stayed longer than expected. We really needed that... a little slow down, breathe deeply, reconnect time. So thank you for bearing with us. 

There's really nothing like a few days of sitting in the swing, drawing, catching up, sipping tea and watching the kids get dirty to screw a girl's head on straight. I brought home lots of laundry, a dirty car, happy kids, buckets of plants that my Granny swears I can't kill, and some much needed perspective. 

In effort to remember the things I learned in the woods, and to try and hang onto a little of the peace we gained there, I"m going to try to turn down the burner and let the blog simmer a bit. For the rest of the month I'm going to post just one photo and a sentence or two each day ... little reminders (for me) of the stuff worth thinking on, the simple pleasures and small wonders -  a meditation of sorts.

It's going to be a busy month, and I've been so anxious lately about too many things. I need to let go of that and remember the sound of the wind through the pines. I hope that this blog project will help me do that and that maybe it will be a little bright spot in your day too. Feel free to play along if you like!

Today's Small Wonder? 

Little boys eating ice cream and playing Uno on their great grandmother's porch. 25 years ago, you would have found me doing the very same thing (including the peeking that little hooligan in the middle is doing!). My Momo played a mean game of Uno and dished up my ice cream in a coffee mug too - it's one of my favorite memories, and one I'm glad that my men are making their own.  

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We've got new posts up at the Ranch and The Magnifying Glass too!

Granny's Birthday Garden

During the days leading up to my Granny's birthday I wondered... what on earth do you get for a 75 year old? How do you mark an occasion like that? What could you possibly wrap up that would say enough, mean enough? 

I had tried on at least a dozen gift ideas and not one of them felt right. And then it finally hit me. We would do something for her, something that she's told me that she's "been meaning to do" for a long long time. We'd help her put in a vegetable garden. 

I knew that if we could get her started, my aunts would help her tend it. And it would be good for her to have a reason to get outside and work some each day. Plus, with a little luck, a garden will give all of us lots of yummy things to eat. 

So with big plans, we made the long drive to Granny's house. 

Just as soon as we got there, we got to work. We dug and dug. We had blisters on our hands and dirt under our nails. We drank tea in the shade when we could dig no more and then we headed to town for the plants. 

In the end, we put in a 12X12 ft. plot. We filled it with 18 tomato plants, 9 squash, 9 zucchini, 3 kinds of peppers, some herbs and a boatload of onions. 

But the numbers don't really do it justice. 

How can I begin to tell you what it meant to work, side by side, four generations - my granny, my aunts, me and my boys? 

We all told stories. We remembered other gardens, other springs. We taught my boys how to properly use a hoe, how to make rows, and we gave the littlest a job that once was mine - walking the trenches to tamp them down. 

We joked that if the garden grows and the economy keeps on this downward slide, we could set up a roadside vegetable stand. Cute kid faces can sell lemonade, why not produce? 

My granny was so moved by our gift. My boys were so proud. And me - I was just filled up. I was glad to be there with aching hands and stiff legs and the knowledge that one day my men will turn over a spade of dirt and the smell of it will take them right back to this day. All over again they will be boys, red dirt between their toes and pines towering overhead, surrounded by love. 

I don't know if our garden will grow. I hope so. I hope that we'll be sitting on Granny's porch eating tomato sandwiches soon. 

But even if those plants don't produce any veggies at all... we have harvested so much. 

The View From Here (and a winner)

At this moment, I am sitting at my kitchen counter. Purple light, like smoke, is drifting over my countertops, winding across the floor. 

My men are sleeping still (yay Daylight Savings time!) so the only sounds are the desperate love notes of returning birds and the whir of our attic fan. Last night was the first time this year that we've had it on and it has not lost it's magic - it's rumbling hum still lulls me into the kind of sleep that leaves me surprised to wake again- sheet marks on my cheeks and vague memories of dreams that were more like visitations. 

We spent our weekend cleaning, making ready for a new season.

The windows were open and the house smelled of lavender and baking bread.

Old songs drifted from the radio to let me dance, for a little while at least, with people who left me too soon... my Popo and Momo twirled around my kitchen singing Wildwood Flower. In Your Eyes brought sweet memories of a boy that I once loved. I wonder if he hadn't died too young, would his babies have had their Daddy's red hair and easy smile. D'yer Maker played, and for a couple of minutes, I was the girl I used to be and sometimes, in my better moments, still am - all hope and passion, driving with the windows rolled down.

 

There was good food and family,

grubby little hands pressed into mine, new drawings on my refrigerator, heads bowed and thanks offered because really, we are so very blessed. 

It was a simple, perfect weekend. 

A gift. 

I want to thank you all for the gift of your encouragement too. I have received so many comments and even more emails full of one thing - hope. So many of you have stories of hard times that led to peace and fulfillment. It is good to be in such company. And it is good, REALLY good, downright neat, to hear that so many of you are following your passions. I'm going to be sharing some great stories here over the next few weeks, so stay tuned. You will be encouraged!

And now... I owe you a winner, don't I? 

With all the favorites, budget-friendly tips and shop recommendations, there were a grand total of 93 entries in our Little Alouette giveaway contest. 

The great and powerful Random Number Generator says that #83, Marybeth takes the prize!

Congratulations Marybeth!

To Marybeth and everyone else, I hope your week is off to a great start. I leave you with a thought that a dear friend passed on to me from Andrew Sullivan of the Daily Dish, 

"If you are inevitably going to end up in the poorhouse, you

might as well get there by chasing the wildest of your

dreams."

Grounded

We're back!

We had a wonderful time, but I came home with a cold, and I've been no end of whiney ever since. 

Me and my green bottle (NyQuil) are inseparable these days. 

Despite the crummies though, I always have this grounded, solid feeling when I come home from the piney woods. 

My ancestors lived out their lives there. They were born, raised, had families, grew old and died, all along a little stretch of highway. It does me good to walk their ground and know, remember, that I'm a part of a bigger story. 

My boys got to visit a natural gas rig where my uncle works.

If I were to list for you all my family and friends that have worked a rig... well, it would be a very long list indeed. Just about anyone in east Texas could say the same.

Hard hats and dirty boots, hard work and calloused hands, they are a part of my history, and now a part of my guys as well. 

I think it will be a long time before they forget the noise, the awesome height of that rig. They've passed a million of them, rolling down the highway, but it is another thing to be up close, to hear it breathe. 

On the day that we visited, they had laid enough pipe to dig down 10,000 feet - something my guys could not begin to wrap their heads around. 

After the rig we did something my husband does not understand at all. We visited the cemetery. 

It's just this thing that we do. 

I guess it might seem scary and weird, but in a way, it's really comforting. The names on all those stones are the same ones that populate my memories. They were the names that circled over our dinner tables, wound through our holidays. Pena, Posky, Luna, Martines, Cloudy... those names have echoed through our woods for nearly 200 years, and it feels good to walk among them.To see them carved in stone, it feels sort of tribal. These are my people. 

We laughed and played cards and caught up and then we travelled the long road home. I unpacked and found myself laughing and crying over our laundry. My boys have clearly taken up their place in this family... their jeans were covered in red dirt - the dirt that my family has plowed, drilled, danced upon, built a life upon, the same dirt under which they rest, even now. 

It is a part of my men too, as are the dreams of so many before them - to dance, and to laugh, and to love. 

What more could you ask than that?