Friday's Fave Five, 4-17-2020

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1. Strawberries are in!!  Mike surprised me with a gallon of fresh ones a few days ago.  I made one of our strawberry cheesecake pies on a pecan crust and it was so good and spring-like.

2. Progress at the farm.  Mike has been down there every day this week, for 8-10 hour days.  He's putting in a gravel walkway and we've had dirt delivered for the foundation of the tractor barn.  That's in addition to several other issues that are being taken care of.  He's been a busy man, but he loves it.  Yesterday I finished all my on-line work by lunchtime, but had several things to do that didn't require internet.  So I ran a couple of errands, went down to the farm, set up a table on the new deck, and got my work done there, watching all the goings-on, and enjoying the beautiful weather.  It was a lovely afternoon.

3. A new lunch idea.  One of the things I'm not supposed to have is pizza - that crust is loaded with carbs.  I've occasionally had it by eating very little crust and mostly eating the toppings.  However, this occurred to me the other day.  These crusts are carb balance tortillas, and the pizza sauce is very low in sugar.  (I didn't know there was such a difference in sugar content of pizza sauces - this is Ragu Hearty.)  Mushroom topping, would have included sausage had I had any browned, and mozzarella cheese.  Of course not as luxuriant as real pizza crust, but a passable substitute.

4. We have blueberries!  These are smaller than they appear, but if things go as planned, we will have more than enough in a few weeks when they ripen.

5. Confidence that our country may begin to open up again soon.  My friend Barbara mentioned prayer for our leaders in her FFF, and I agree with her that they need prayer for great wisdom in this difficult time.

Sweet Note

This is from our former neighbor, who moved away at Christmas with his family to an assistant pastorship in Michigan (their dad was also the youth pastor at our church).  I love this young man (2nd grade) and his two siblings.  When we would drive down our street, if the children were playing in the yard, they would run up to our car (if we had time to stop) to get a hug.  In the past year, their mom would occasionally let them walk up to our house to visit.  I usually knew who it was when I heard the front doorbell ring!  

I found this treasured note once again this morning.  I received it the last day of school before Christmas vacation.  Love the spelling of my name.

Friday's Fave Five 4-3-2020

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1. A finished blanket.  Not sure where or to whom this is going to go, but it's done.  In one way the "wheels" of yarn with four or five colors on each one are nice to use because of not having to constantly change color.  But the downside is that the rows are not even.  I'm not bothered by having some stripes narrower than others, but I don't care for color changes in the middle of a stripe.  It's OK, but I think I've used enough of the yarn wheels for now.

2. Teaching by video.  I am well into the third week of teaching online.  I never realized how my organizational "happy place" was the five stacks of materials, one for each class, on the low bookcase right behind my desk.  Trying to stay organized here at home was quite an effort at first, and very overwhelming, surprisingly so.  But after learning to focus on one class at a time, this week has gone much better.

3. A deck!!  This is the beginning stages.  The tin roof has been replaced on the top, and the floor joists are all in, as well as half of the flooring.  Today the job is to be finished.  This is on the side of the cabin at the farm.  It will be wonderful to have a great place to relax and have meals.  Until now, the only place to have a meal or sit outdoors under a cover was the small stoop out the back door.  That was nice, but the evening sun was always in someone's eyes, and there was very little room to move around.  This is going to be a great solution.

Last Friday's beginning:

And the progress from today!!!

4. More time.  That is the small silver lining on this home-teaching social distancing.  I have never had much time in the spring; the spring break from school has always been somewhat of a marathon to get many things done before heading directly into the huge craziness of the end of the school year. So this has been really nice.  Yesterday I was able to go to the farm, get in the tree stand in the woods, and look for migrant birds (which I was unsuccessful at); then just be there for awhile in the afternoon.  Unheard of during a normal year.

5. The only bread I eat here at home is rye, because it is the lowest in carbs.  Well, with the current conditions in grocery stores, it is hit or miss to get it.  On Tuesday, our store was completely out of what we buy.  I went to another store. . .and got the last two loaves on the shelf.  That's the second time that's happened during this whole situation.  Since it's not really a matter of choice, but necessity, that I have to have that certain bread, I was very thankful to have gotten those loaves.