Farm Life – Page 11 – The Hillhouse

Summer Starts

May 27, 2013May 29, 2013 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Farm Life, Pics1 Comment

Elihu is in the bath, and I’ve snuck away to make a quick post. Spent the day readying our place for the warm months. Raked and rocked the entire garden and set up the bean poles. Planted flowers, cleaned out beds, secured the chicks’ outdoor run, plus a handful of other outdoor tasks. Needless to say I’m a good sort of tired right now. The lilacs have all gone by, so have the lily of the valley. Now we turn our attention to the growing of tomato plants and the swatting of mosquitoes.

Didn’t want Memorial Day to slip by without sharing this wonderful photograph of my father playing harpsichord for fellow army men. He was in his early twenties then. His was the Korean War era, and while he was never deployed, he had been trained for war. When greeted at Fort Dix by a superior he would hear “Private, what is your mission?” to which he was expected to salute and respond “To kill or be killed, Sir!”. When he related the story to me his face took on an expression I’d seldom seen. He looked to me for my shared disbelief and horror. “Can you believe that?” he asked. No, I could not. When he had shared this with his own father, hoping to receive just the smallest show of love or support, my grandfather instead surprised my dad by coldly reminding him “That’s what he was there for.” (This is a time and culture in which my father and grandfather shook hands when saying goodbyes – and also when upon reuniting after long absences. No physical expressions of tenderness between these men in that day and age.!) All pretty horrific from my perspective today. I cannot even begin to imagine my son in such potential peril, not to mention sending him off in such a cold, unfeeling manner. A different time, a different world for sure.

My father took jobs painting the base’s chapel and playing harpsichord for services. I might not be here at all if he’d seen combat. Never know.

Private Robert Conant plays harpsichord (this instrument is now in my living room) for the troops, Fort Dix, 1951

Much of May

May 13, 2013May 13, 2013 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Birding, Farm Life, Mommy Mind, Pics2 Comments

Always too much to tell. A slower pace in the country? Occasionally, but not often. The first half of May has been very busy here. Rather than tell you all about it, I’m offering a photographic retrospective of the last two weeks. Hope you don’t mind – there are quite a few pics here…Starting with a surprise visit one morning by Phil on his tractor, who’d come by to plow our garden. He’s doing it for nothing. Just being a kind neighbor. I told him I felt guilty about his helping us like that, but he responded that Mr. Sessleman had done it for him once upon a time, he was just passin it on. Hope I too am able to pass on some helpful kindness one day.

(This is earliest May – note how few leaves are on the trees, then compare to similar shots just a week later)

I like this shot – tractor, Elihu, goose, all in motion…

Elihu runs down the driveway after the tractor

May 3rd, the fourth graders dance around the May pole while singing (in harmony parts!) and weaving very intricate designs with the colored ribbons. This is a rite of passage for fourth graders at the Waldorf School.

Elihu and Dierdre bow to each other before the dance

Grandma and Grandpa were able to join us…

My mom remembers dancing around the May pole when she was in fourth grade, too!

A nice looking group, these wonderful fourth graders.

Goofburgers!

Elihu enjoys a little picnic with his grandparents

We take a look at the weaving job

Lovely up close

Then Elihu helps carry it off…

Now for a quick family picture…

Before zipping off to catch a duck…

Notice Elihu, to the right…

No bait used – nothing but extreme motivation and a finely-honed technique

Duck time

A fine end to May day!

…and a fine start to our Merck Forest field trip as Elihu chases a turkey vulture across a field…

Visiting pastured sheep, Elihu dashes off in hopes of seeing birds…

The view was gorgeous. All I can think of is how much labor was involved in clear cutting the old growth forests and making them into farmland – at this elevation and nearly three hundred years ago, no less. Boggles the mind.

We visited pigs that lived out in the woods. !

Kids feeding kids.

Too cute!

Now to see the beautiful draft horse

The class sang a song about horses (in a round!) as they admired her

Ben found a B on the horse’s side

Elihu and I head up the hill to the barns in search of swallows

Bingo! Such striking markings and color

What’s this? A pigeon’s nest…

With eggs! Hope mom comes back soon to brood… think we scared her off

We watch the horse get hitched up to her gear. They really do farm with the horses here at Merck Forest.

On the trail to the car everyone fills the ‘elevator’ tree

Nora and I are having mint chocolate chip! This girl’s amazing – she used a balled up piece of tin foil from lunch to make a baseball, and found some sticks… within minutes she’d started a full-on baseball game.

We’re at the local Battenkill Dairy – our ice cream was made right on the premises. All of it. !

Ah, the apple trees…

And the flowering Quince, too

Look who’s returned one week later to till! Thank you Phil!!!

While Phil works, Elihu picks violets..

and picks…

and then makes ‘Violet Angels’ in them…

Next on the agenda, some Cinnamon fiddleheads from our woods for supper. They’re fuzzier than Ostrich ferns (and slightly more toxic) and take a lot of prep. Mainly why they don’t work well in restaurants.

Cleaned and washed

Boiled, next to be sautéed in butter

We actually really liked them.

Onto the Saratoga City Ballet’s Spring production of Alice in Wonderland. That’s our friend Freya in the middle…

and this is our friend Mahogany

Here’s the only boy in the whole group. He is good. !

Love the en pointe thing. So much harder than it appears.

All three Waldorf kids afterwards. Mahogany and Freya are in seventh grade.

We went out for ice cream after the show (Atkins diet took a week off) and it was positively snowing white apple blossoms!

So pretty

A few hours later and it’s our annual birthday dinner at the Wishing Well!

In short order Elihu was playing along with the pianist in the bar

Elihu’s very favorite dish of all: Frogs’ Legs. ! (I think he’s playing drums on the table with their little leg bones. !)

Yeeps. I’m trying them too. And they’re actually very delicious. And no, not really like chicken.

The pic above our table (Saratoga is a racing town.) This is pretty incredible, huh?

Happy 60th birthday to us!

Thanks for singing!

Yay! A picture of the two of us taken by someone other than me. !

The Wishing Well is an old-world joint. Lots of wood, mounted moose heads and such.

Elihu gets a good-night smooch from owner Brenda Lee (with whom I’d sung ‘Exactly Like You’ earlier in the evening – when I requested it and the pianist had – gasp – never heard of it.)

Good-bye WW – see you next year! (We love the place, but must note that our fiddleheads were better than theirs and that the escargot was not good. Wine not cooked off, not enough salt or butter, and gritty. We’re very forgiving, but it was a lot of money for a not so spectacular dinner. But it was fun to actually hear a person playing the piano. Plus I have learned that I cannot casually drink a martini these days. I got fairly loaded on nearly nothing. Times are a changin’.)

This has been our wonderful month of May so far…

Flip Side

May 8, 2013November 16, 2013 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Farm Life, Low Vision Life, Mommy Mind, Pics5 Comments

Made it to the other side. I am now one of those ‘other’ people on the planet who walk around ‘being older’, as if they were completely unaware of it! Naw, I suppose they’re aware. But what’s a person to do but march along the mortal path, make mistakes, learn the best one can… and grow older? Today, as I sit to create the quickest of posts, I have hit a particular grouping of keys which has just inverted the image on my monitor. !! Being a no-nonsense woman of action (and 50 years experience!) I simply picked the silly thing up and turned it upside down on my desk. And so there it will stay until I have some time to figure out how to ‘right’ it. Literally. But for now I will accept this as a metaphor for the second half of my life: it aint gonna be like the first half. Some shit’s gonna change. My world is gonna get turned on its rear… (and in a good way, I proclaim!) But until that time…

I’m here tonight to very quickly share some pictures from my birthday yesterday. It was a warm, breezy day, full of sunshine and without one single cloud in the sky. From my duties as recess monitor at my son’s school to a birthday gift to myself of an oil change and car vacuuming, some chicken smooching, a surprise visit from my childhood friend Sherry and her daughter Katy, and then a lovely birthday dinner with mom, dad and Elihu – complete with surprise new gas grill on the porch! – the day was about as perfect as a day could be. Let the photos commence…

My final portrait as a woman in her forties, thanks Elihu. Hey – I was pregnant with him in this same bathrobe!

A birthday tradition; I dig up perrennials from abandoned farms. How wonderful to share the beauty of these pink daffodils once enjoyed by old-time farmers Mr. and Mrs. Meunch, both now many decades gone. But their garden lives on here at the Hillhouse!

The girls are always close by to greet us

Elihu almost always has to get a proper smooching in before school

I just LOVE this fourth grade class. They’re making a fort. Lots of great ideas in this ambitious project.

They fight, yeah, but they work together really well too!

Dierdre’s got her own window!

Ok, one crazy shot allowed.

Sherry’s 50th is the 16th. We’re next door neighbors and have known each other since we were 4. !! Sherry remembers all the crazy stuff we did together in the high school and college years. I don’t. I have to ask her to tell me the stories. !

We brought our own balloons – it was just lively enough

So few of us together, must you stick out your tounge, young man?

Mom was hell bent on actually lighting fifty candles. She did it!!!

No mean feat blowing em all out!

Elihu says goodnight to grandpa

We’re not sad or mad in this pic, just tired… plus the flash is hard on Elihu’s eyes. Goodnight all!

Thank you all for a wonderful day! We felt your love and good thoughts coming in from all over.

Sending you hugs and kisses right back. May each one of us know the love of friends and family on their birthday. !

Mid April Pics

April 14, 2013April 15, 2013 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Birding, Farm Life, Mommy Mind, Pics4 Comments

Been busy. I try to keep us an underscheduled household, but even so we always seem to be doing something. Even our down time seems to include little surprises, like a dead robin to examine up close, a quick smooch of a goose, a nice moment with a glider on a windless day…

The birds enjoy the very last bit of snow on the property

He had to be coerced at first, but at last Max succumbed to a good long embrace

Best eight bucks we’ve spent in a while

Poor thing – traveled so many hundreds of miles only to be hit by a car

Here she is up close

Elihu admires her wingspan

You can see why they’re called brown-headed cowbirds

Hmm. This guy seems to be feeling the excitment of spring…!

Mama did her biannual cleanout of the junk drawer

Skidmore College’s Taiko drummers

Elihu takes a turn

That was fun!

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I just want to thank Joe for all his kindness in helping me get setup on my new (refurbished) computer. I’m up and running again and it’s all thanks to him! If you live in the Saratoga Springs area, I encourage you to use J & D computer repair!

Spring Day

April 11, 2013April 11, 2013 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Elihu's Room, Farm Life1 Comment

Another post by Master Elihu. It seems the apple has not fallen far from the tree…. see?

I wake up in the morning, and it’s early spring and the ground is carpeted with flowers. I walk outside and see grasshoppers, hopping from flower to flower. A robin flits in front of me and lands on the ground. Listens, then pulls out a fat worm and flies away to his nest. The call of a hawk above me makes me look up; a red-shouldered hawk is soaring above me. He circles and circles and climbs so high that he is just a dot in the sky, then he’s into the woods and comes right back up with a fat rabbit which he then carries to his nest. A chicken, startled by the hawk flying so low overhead struts up to me and clucks a few times, hopping up the stairs, she looks at me inquisitively, as if to say got food? I reach down to the inquisitive hen, stroking her head. ‘No I haven’t got any – but if you go over to the coop there’ll be some.’ She struts away and a whole flock more of chickens comes up to me and asks the same question to which I give the same answer. Grabbing a stick just in case the mean rooster decides to attack me, I walk out to the coop to enjoy my big flock of hens. Red, brown, white, and black they hop up to perches, flutter from nesting box to nesting box, some quarrel about who gets the majority of the food and some simply just sit and enjoy the warm sun. It’s a nice spring day indeed, I think to myself as I watch a small frog hop from leaf to leaf. And I am sure there’ll be many more to come.

With that, I think I shall sit down and enjoy this one as best I can.

Earliest Spring Pics

April 2, 2013April 3, 2013 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Birding, Farm Life, Mommy Mind, Pics1 Comment

the biggest egg we’ve had yet, a double yoker, of course

a ‘fairy egg’ on the left. Wow. !

found this bottle in the old dump on a walk in the woods. A ready-made terrarium growing in the snow!

Easter morning sunrise

the Easter basket

some Easter smooching

a fine morning walk down the field on Easter morning…

a view of Braim road from our hillside woods

so this is where the fox lives!

a lightening strike burned out the inside of this tree

so Elihu gets an idea…

he made a little rock wall by the tree

kinda sweet, huh?

mommy and son rocks

painting a plane model he got in his basket

watching a pair of brown headed cowbirds at the kitchen feeder

a little DS before supper

mom carves the Easter ham

Mom worked hard on Easter dinner all day. It was delicious, of course, and especially enjoyable because we sure don’t get meals like this too often. A fine end to a fine day.

Bunny Belief

March 30, 2013March 31, 2013 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Farm Life, Low Vision Life, Mommy Mind1 Comment

We’re at that time when I can’t be sure if the holiday magic will hold any longer, if my son will truly believe, one more time, that gifts have been magically delivered as he slept… My son is so thorough in his thinking, in his reasoning and internal deliberations, that it seems impossible to me that he can truly still believe. And yet he does. Yesterday, as we sat cuddled on the couch, I made the mistake of telling him not to get his hopes up for anything big on Easter. (My goal was to plant some doubt so that the appearance of the Easter bunny would have even more of an impact. Not a good choice.) He burst into tears and told me not to say such a thing. “I want to have hope, mommy. I’m just nine years old, don’t take away my hope!” he told me. I was instantly very sorry I’d said anything at all. I was also struck by how much his comment seemed to imply; there seemed some foreshadowing in his remark of the adult reality that lay just around the corner. He must know, I thought to myself, but he’s still holding on…

On most most holidays and school breaks Elihu stays with his father. This past year was my first Christmas here at home with Elihu, and tomorrow will only be my second Easter here with him. I had wondered about the Easter bunny’s visits to Dekalb. I want to have some consistency, and it seems that the Easter bunny keeps many different methods and traditions in different households, so as we made our weekly drive to deliver eggs yesterday I asked him about it. Seemed fairly similar to my experience growing up. There were some differences, but I was relieved to know the bunny wasn’t in the habit of delivering handsomely wrapped birthday-worthy gifts because the Greenfield bunny had made no such preparations. (The Greenfield bunny is quite satisfied with several finds; a hand-crafted, dark chocolate bunny from the local candy shop, some wooden airplane models and a small bird puppet. The eggs, on the other hand, proved challenging as Master Elihu knows his eggs by shape – each hen has her signature style – plus dying an already dark egg is tricky. I couldn’t use the few white eggs we have, as Cora’s eggs are also very distinctive. A dilemma. Ended up drawing designs with sharpie on the most generic-looking medium brown eggs I could find. Since Elihu sees no color at all this seemed a good choice.)

A little anxious that everything be in order, I arose early today and went to my secret hiding spot in the basement to do an Easter basket inventory. Because of Elihu’s vision, he’s not good at spotting things. I’m continually surprised at how quickly and easily visiting kids will see things that I’ve stashed ‘out of sight’. Because color offers Elihu no clues (bright green plastic grass for the basket, for example) and since things beyond ten feet don’t register much, my job is made much easier. As I retrieved my goodies I felt completely satisfied that it was all still perfectly secret. I was happily surprised to see that I’d saved a few more things in the months leading up to the holiday (when on a budget one must plan ahead) and was very satisfied to see that it made a tidy looking cache of loot. Pretty too. I even got myself a single hyacinth bulb and a nice new ceramic vase for it at the dollar store – just to show the bunny had something for me too. That would further support the case that I had nothing to do with it. Might be over thinking it, but it’s probably the last such time I’ll have to do so.

Yeah. He’ll be ten in a month. It’ll be over soon. At least it can’t last too much longer. So, as with Christmas this year, I approach Easter with the same emotions, the same tender nostalgia. I will savor it all. Every surprise, every laugh, every egg. And Elihu’s right, having hope is important – especially at this time of year. After all, isn’t that what Easter itself represents – apart from any religious significance? The renewed life of springtime and with it, hope… And belief, yes, that’s important too, cuz I know this Easter bunny sure is happy that one certain little boy still believes.

Mo Sno Photo

March 19, 2013March 19, 2013 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Farm Life, Low Vision Life, Mommy Mind, Pics1 Comment

What fun we had today! Haven’t heard Elihu giggle and laugh like that in ages. And the best packing snow I remember in a long time… yay! Here’s a mini album of our afternoon outdoors. (The way I’m making such a big deal about it you’d think we don’t play outdoors much. Yes, sadly, that’s actually true. !) I’ve included a few extra shots in order to give folks a more complete vision of our property. In an unintentional nod to ‘Where’s Waldo?’ our goose Maximus makes a cameo in more than a few shots.

the view of the sledding hill from our piano

a closer look

Elihu, fittingly, is using a goose quill in place of a plastic stylus with his DS

the sledding hill is just beyond the pine trees to the SE

here’s our grand Beech tree

and here’s the king of the hill

and who’s this?

he can’t be all bad, he’s wearing red sunglasses and an aviator’s cap

smiley fellow

the run has been made, now to enjoy

movin now

picking up speed

and it’s a fine finish just shy of the pricker bushes!

it’s a long, long walk back up

the most enjoyable exercise I’ve had in years

going in now

coming around the South side of the house

beech tree to left

around the corner now on the West side of the house

on the front porch (facing North now), eating snow

the view from the kitchen window, our tiny bridge visible at the far left.

We love our little corner of Greenfield. And it’s just so pretty in the snow.

Mo Sno

March 19, 2013March 19, 2013 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Farm Life, Low Vision Life, Mommy Mind, PicsLeave a comment

Seriously? Yesterday the talk was all about the big storm headed our way. As I looked out over the barren, dry-mudded schoolyard from my new post as recess monitor, it just didn’t seem likely. Things were looking so hopeful, so almost spring. I scoured the perimeter of the fence looking for tiny pips of new growth to back up my case. Nothing yet. But still… I couldn’t bear to think of starting over. My son and his pals had even managed to chip away at the huge mound of surviving winter ice until it was a mere blip on the blacktop. Things were just now getting so close…

I checked the live radar images last thing before getting into bed. It showed us to be already covered in a great swath of front – but outside there was still nothing. I held out a tiny bit of hope. But I remembered that one of the teachers at school hadn’t taken soup orders for the next day as he was that convinced we’d have a snow day. And apparently this guy always knows. Hey, I myself understand that we’re not out of the woods. I know we’re fair game for snow here til the end of April at least. But I went to bed hoping against it anyway. I really do love the beauty of snow, and I think it’s kinda silly when folks who live here find such entertainment in grousing endlessly about how much they hate it, but just the same…

Up in the middle of the night, all I had to do was glance outside to see the expanse of garage and coop roofs glowing white in the dark to know it had come. And this morning, after a quick 6 a.m. check online to confirm the homebound day for myself – I went easily back to sleep and didn’t wake for another two hours until I heard the engine of Mike’s plow truck shoveling its way down our driveway. I got up and donned my apron, tall boots and farm jacket in time to wave him a thank you before going out to open the coop and shovel some ground space out for the birds. It is pretty, I think to myself as I look around. May as well enjoy it.

I’ve suggested to Elihu that we make use of our hill for some sledding. Can it really be two years since we’ve gone down the hill? Seems a bit much, but it’s true; Elihu doesn’t really like being out in the brightness, and I sure can’t blame him. So this is a major detractor from enjoying outdoor play in the snow. In fact, my best memories of playing in the snow are of at night, long after sundown. It’s only then that Elihu can finally relax and just enjoy himself. But tonight is a school night, and his school play dress rehearsal is tomorrow, so there’ll be no late night snow play today. I’m going to find his oversized wraparound sunglasses (broken though they are) and insist on going out. We’ve got a great swath of lawn that is so much fun to sled down, only problem is the patch of pricker bushes at the bottom (another ‘problem’ is that mom must first ‘carve’ out the path – a grueling job that can take a good sweaty and panting half hour. !). We call the run our ‘Calvin and Hobbes’ hill. You gotta bail just when you get to the bottom. It’s kind of a pain in the butt, but the comic element is strong and (almost) makes up for the inconvenience.

As I write this, Elihu is uncharacteristically engrossed in his recently rediscovered (as in a half an hour ago) Nintendo DS. He’d been so nonplussed with it this past year he agreed to trade it with a friend for his erector set. Fareed intervened, and there was a tiny bit of drama as the mother of the friend (who’d already surrendered his aforementioned erector set but had not yet received the DS ) got a bit upset with me. As she’s a friend, it was upsetting to me too. I’d just wanted to hand over the DS and be done with it. But Fareed insisted we keep it. Now I’m kinda glad he did. It’s a cute and fun little game. My son is not the type to succumb to a video game addiction (no, he’s already addicted to flight) so I don’t worry at this. In fact, it makes me happy to see him happy. Cute little soundtrack too. (It’s still new to me, might not be so cute in a month.)

So the snow day begins. By now, on a usual day, breakfast would be long over, the dishes would be washed and put away, the eggs cleaned and sorted, and I’d be at my desk busily knocking items off the never-ending to-do list. For some reason snow days just throw me completely off and I’m hard pressed to get anything done at all. So I’m letting myself off the hook today and I’m just gonna go with it. All the way down the hill.

Fiddling Around

March 17, 2013March 17, 2013 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Farm Life, Mommy MindLeave a comment

It’s been a fine weekend here at the Hillhouse. On Friday we enjoyed a visit from the girl twins with whom Elihu had grown so close months ago. Their moving away this past fall broke Elihu’s heart (see the post “Heartsick” from November 2012) and being able to spend an afternoon with them gave my son joy as he hadn’t known in a good long while. The following day we were still coasting on that great feeling, and we celebrated with a bountiful breakfast of fruit-filled crepes, oh-so-good bacon, and deviled eggs. Elihu requested the deviled eggs, and in that we have no shortage of eggs around here, and no one to justify it to, I made a good dozen of em. (Strangely, my Atkins diet even allowed me to enjoy some, albeit in moderation). We were both enormously contented and sated after our decadent brunch. So I began the clean-up with a happy and light heart, as Elihu retired to the living room and began to play his violin.

Usually, Elihu will choose to play his recorder when he’s in the mood for something aside from the piano or the drums. And he’s actually gotten quite good at it; he can play chromatically as well as play a handful of different scales. He began to learn the chromatic stuff in an effort to duplicate a blues scale. It was a good motivation; now he’s off and running. He hasn’t played the violin so much lately, so this is nice. I hear him go through his modest beginner’s repertoire; just a bit beyond Twinkle Twinkle, he’s off into the territory of Cripple Creek and Old Joe Clark. (I smile to myself as I recall my brief stint with banjo lessons years ago. I remember learning the iconic Boil Them Cabbage Down – as taught by the equally iconic Bob Gand at the Village Music Store in Deerfield, Illinois). What a sweet time this is, I think to myself. I know my son is growing up, but I also know he’s still a young boy. Sometimes he’s so smart, insightful and articulate that it’s often a bit difficult to realize that he is still so young. But he is still little. Still not ten. Still believes… And while the world is becoming more real to him each day, there is still some magic present in his experience which only belongs to the very young. He’s not quite there, but change is underway. This too will be a memory before long. I try to focus on this moment. I breathe in, I pause, I try to suspend time as best I can…

As I stood at the sink, my hands in the warm, soapy water, I looked out over the lovely pastoral view outside my window. I listened to Elihu making up sweet little variations on his violin, and I sank as deeply into the moment as I could. We were two happy people with nothing much to do, except just to be… A perfect day just to fiddle around.

The Hillhouse

The Journey of a Mother and Son

Category: Farm Life