good friends make for good sundays

cake and brent & melissa. that's all i really need to make a sunday a sunday. yesterday was one of those winter days that smells faintly of spring. it wasn't even 50 degrees out, but warm enough, that we didn't need our gloves and scarves. warm enough, that we all started planning a weekend trip to the coast. warm enough that b&m mentioned a place with great outdoor dining in raleigh, for our next visit to them. its funny, isn't it? how we complained and complained of the heat this summer...yearned for winter, and now, barely through january we can't hardly wait to get our swimsuits on again.

i miss the south island

good morning. its saturday and i'm going to market this morning. and then, i am coming home to bake as i am housesitting for my cousin as she has a working oven & a dishwasher. two things that make baking both possible & decadent.

they promise it will be near 50 degrees by the afternoon. and so i will close my eyes as i sit on our front porch with cookies & milk and pretend i am here, back in new zealand, and no longer in winter.

les oeufs

this is all nick. he started backyard farm....in addition to all the big big farm we do day to day. one of the most exciting parts of this is the eggs. our own eggs. we have 17 chickens. 6 laying hens that seem to give us between 4 & 6 eggs a day. they decided a long time ago that they weren't going to conform to the nest boxes nick had made them. so, for a while, it was somewhat of a egg-hunt, to see where they lay. now they have settled in one spot, at the back of the wood shed, and another on a hay bale in the barn. don't tell our egg-sucking dogs where they are.

so we eat a lot of eggs. tomorrow, at market, we will be selling our second dozen. last saturday we sold our first, to a nun. it was perfect.

our eggs are delicious.

antsy in my pants

its chilly. and i'm feeling antsy. but not antsy enough to brave the cold for a run. so, while nick builds bella a lean-to....i'm going to get productive inside on the sewing machine. i broke the needle 3 nights ago, rushing to finish bella's plaid woolrich calf-coat before the ice storm. now i am running to the craft store to get a new one so that i can work on 2 pillows, 1 dress for me for sunday lunch with sweet melissa & family, and the final touches on said calf-coat. wish me luck. i am no seamstress.

i saw this on maura's blog yesterday.

I refuse to give in to that feeling of despair. There is light in this situation. I urge everyone: read up about those who were hurt or killed in this shooting. You will be comforted by just how much anonymous goodness there really is in the world. You read about these people, and you realize that people that you don’t even know, that you have never met, are leading lives of real dignity and goodness; and you hear about crazy, but it’s rarer than you think. And I think you’ll find yourself even more impressed with Congresswoman Giffords and amazed at how much living the deceased packed into lives that were cut way too short.


-jon stewart in reaction to the arizona shootings.

my grandfather, my papa, passed away yesterday. he lived a long long happy life. so full of family and travel and goodness. i miss him so much already. i want to write more about him. soon. not ready yet. i just thought how lovely it was of the paperwhites to bloom for the first time, yesterday morning, the morning he passed.

north carolina may not know snow...but it certainly brews up a good ice storm

2 nights ago we had an ice storm. which would normally be a most unwelcome storm. but nick and i both had the day off. and so we did what all good kids would do on a storm day. we stayed in and babied the fire. we snuggled our indoor and outdoor animals. nick made a lamb stew. i cut his hair. we made sure to go for one little walk. just to stave off cabin-fever. it was slippery. and then we topped off the night with a glass of wine and a stein of beer and two zebra cakes at our local pub.