"Mountain Vegetable Gardens - A Fairy Tale"

Our evenings of early sunsets and freezing cold temps are finally changing over. April is always temperamental, throwing us enough days of sun and warm to trick us into pulling out our sandals and shorts. We made it through winter without the epic snowstorms of the recent past. And per usual we endured the dark and cold by bingeing dark-themed tv series. A few of the kids kept pleading with us to watch "Severance". I'm a huge fan of all things dystopian, we gave it a whirl; and after the first few slightly confusing episodes, became hooked. Now we wait with bated breath for a fourth season; and while we wait, we are now becoming hooked on "The Last of Us". Perhaps unlike comparing myself to the curated highlight reels social media and other genre's of tv portray, I like to watch these end-of-the-world scenarios and say to myself, "We've got it so good! No zombies hunting us down, and so far no one has tried to clone me or make an A.I. robot version of me." It's all seems so very far-fetched, that the shows are pure entertainment, though sometimes a bit gory as one would expect ridding the world of zombies might be.

The grocery stores garden departments are starting to fill up with the seasons first offerings. I grab a cart and head straight to the dairy section. My method is that if I fill my cart with the most perishable items first, there won't be room for the zillions of plants that need to come home with me. "Sorry guys, there's just no room for you in my cart this time!" is what I chant to myself as I stroll past the eggs, then the yogurt, and if I'm being really disciplined, I'll get a pint or two of ice cream. If you know me, you know that melting ice cream is something that just spins me out. Ice cream should be so frozen solid that you can barely put your spoon into it. It's one of my life rules. But on this particular day this last week, I could hear the little green sprigs crying for me from the opposite end of the store. "Take me home with you! Pick me! I'll be so much happier with you than here wondering if anyone will give me a drink of water today!" And so forth and so on. They say, talk to your plants. So I do. Who am I to say they can't talk back? Forgoing the ice cream aisle, I wheel my cart swiftly through the sliding doors of the garden department. My senses come alive. The warm musty smell of the indoor plants wave hello and I nod at them knowing they've had lots of play time at our little cabin the last few months. Straight through the next sliding doors the neatly arranged tables of flowering annuals, perennials, and little starts of the seasons first tomatoes and herbs beckon to me.

I realize that only a handful are deer-resistant; and of those, the chipmunks will likely have their way with. I'll have to be strategic with where I put my plant pots. Someday I'll have a secure green-house, but for now I'll settle for a little parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme. And some succulents. I loaded the trunk of the car with my three bags of plant babies and headed back up the mountain. It seems to be turning greener by the hour.

Saturday was supposed to be nothing but sunshine. I told Dave that I planned on spending the whole day playing outside in the dirt. There is nothing quite like the soreness of using all the little muscles you haven't used for months on end and then putting them into high gear for an entire day. It's my mode of operandi. I do it every year; and every year I'm that much older and wonder to myself why do I torture myself. Why can't I spread out the fun over days instead of playing until the sun is gone and I have to go inside and clean up, knowing full well that the next couple of days my back will ache and my hands will be so sore. Worth it. I dig in the dirt, and my mind drifts to my four-year-old self. Having asked my mother for dishes to play outside with, she'd give me a few sturdy, non-precious items. A tin pie plate, an old spoon and knife, a small metal mixing bowl and measuring cup. I'd pour a little water on the patch of yard that was bare and scratch up enough dirt to make some smooth mud. The grittiness of the mixture made an oddly satisfying sound as I stirred it around in my bowl and transferred it to my pie tin. Leveling the "frosting" as I'd seen my mother do with my dull table knife, then decorating it with bits of ripped up grass or a few dandelion flowers, I'd set it in the sun to bake.

Slowly standing up and stretching my back and neck, I stood back to view my project. "I'll need just maybe three to five more little guys to put in those last few pots..." I asked Dave if he'd blow my dirt mess off the deck so I could go start a bath. Dang. I didn't buy any ice-cream.....oh yes....the plants....I'll just make some. It's not Sunday dinner if you don't have ice-cream. That's the law. Soaking my soon-to-be-sore muscles, I started thinking about all the things I was wanting to make and bake the up-coming week. One of the perks of adulting is getting to play in the dirt, and also getting to bake but with food and not dirt.

The next day, Dave took me to The Ballerina Farms new little farmstand not too far from us. I bought some protein powder to re-stock and also some eggs (and how am I supposed to crack them when they are this beautiful), and some whey lemonade. Now I'm not really a girl that cares about drinking much of anything other than water or milk, but I have no words sufficient for how delicious this lemonade was. I will be back for more very soon. It's the perfect drink after a long day of digging in the dirt and making mud pies, or sourdough bread or whatever floats yer boat.

I figured out the perfect homemade vanilla ice cream. And as is the law of the ice cream, it freezes so hard I can barely scoop it with my poor sore arms.

A few homemade pieces of cookie dough mixed in and a drizzle of olive oil and a tiny sprinkle of fleur de sel over top and it's almost enough to make me never purchase store bought ever again.

The ice cream calls for four egg yolks so.....have to get a pic of these beauts. No chickens for me because chickens up here equals hawk, eagle, bob-cat, or cougar food.

Prepping for Cinco de Mayo calls for long-fermented sour-dough tortillas.

And fajita type things.

I always tell Dave that if the end-times ever came, we'd be just fine because all we need is our buckets upon buckets of wheat and my sourdough starter. He says I sure talk about the end times an awful lot. I'm not obsessed; I just don't like the fleeting thoughts I have of not having food (ice-cream), or my pillow.

About a week ago, while taking a late night bath, the cabin started to shake, and that now-familiar loud rumbling sound got louder and louder. I heard Dave's footsteps upstairs, so I knew he'd heard and felt it too. By the time we met up by the fireplace, it had stopped. The bird feeders were still swinging from their branches; Freya hopped up onto the back of the couch to look out the window, likely distressed that we were distressed.

When we first moved into the cabin we noticed this teeny tiny wooden cottage nailed into an oak branch. It survived being knocked down when a lot of dirt and trees were being pushed out for the addition. Several months ago Dave saw it on the ground and put it back up on the deck. I like how it looks a like a little replica of our tiny cabin. I think I'll make a little fairy garden out of one of the pots, something to work on with the grandies when they're here. I even have a few old dishes they can use to make mud pies.