Dead Sea

One day I noticed my husband was tossing water onto my flowers. I was curious because this wasn’t something he typically helped with. The salt-water softener had a chamber for salt that had somehow collected water. His thoughts were to save money and water by using the saltwater on my beautiful, lush flower bed.

The first year my husband and I were married we bought a true starter house. It had been a rental for years so there was no landscaping. I took great joy in spending many hours digging and clearing a nice sized flower bed in the front. I was so proud of my little piece of heaven. We lived in Central Texas so I needed to water very frequently.

Me: What are you doing?
Him: Watering your garden
Me: Isn’t that saltwater?
Him: (Very happily) Yes!
Me: Have you ever heard of the dead sea?
Him: (Starting to be confused that I’m frowning) No?
Me: It’s a body of water that has so much salt in it that nothing grows.
Him: (realizing that saltwater on my flower bed is not going to work out well) How about we go to the garden center right now?

The flower bed was completely shriveled and brown by morning. Fortunately, my husband was smart enough to have redeemed himself by letting me buy everything I wanted to replace the carnage.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t the only time he’s taken out my greenspace…but those stories are for another day.

Mushroom Mistaken Identity

My parents built a new house recently. I was in love with the color they chose for the dining room. When I asked, my step-mom told me the color was “shitty.” I was surprised that a paint company would call their paint that even though it was brownish. It turns out that my step-mom saw this on the walls of her brother’s house (He and his wife are in their late 70’s). She asked what the paint’s color was and was told “shitty by Sherman Williams.”

My step-mom, being a woman on a mission, a little embarrassed but determined to find the ill named paint color then went to Sherman Williams. She went straight to the counter and said she was looking for the color “shitty.” The clerk acted if he’d heard this request before and asked if perhaps, she was looking for “Shiitake.”

Of course this makes sense now – the bewitching brownish color is shiitake – like the mushroom.

Window Spider

My husband used to deploy for weeks and months at a time when he was in the Army. One of his shorter deployments I had found a spider friend that was living in the window in my shower. Every morning I greeted my spider friend and he happily ate the bugs he caught. For several weeks I watched him grow and we lived peacefully together.

My husband finally came home and his first morning in the shower I hear him YELL and start banging around. With a bit of anger, I yelled through the door, “You didn’t kill my friend- did you?!”

He yelled back, “I didn’t kill a friend, I killed a big spider!” Next time he returned from deployment I made sure he knew what was a friend and what was a foe before he encountered my unusual pets.

Cherry Backstory

I’ve mentioned we’ve moved a lot. If we are moving in the US, we typically drove. One move had us go from North Carolina to Washington State. You can read a short blog I did chronicling our zig-zag drive across the US, (military lifer wife).

Towards the end of our 12 day journey, we were looking for places to stop because we were so tired of being in the car. One quick stop was in Montana at a roadside stand that sold Cherries. At that time, I had never tried Rainier Cherries. So I bought 10 pounds of cherries and split them between our 3 car caravan and continued down a fast and furious and terrifying highway into Idaho.

While zooming down that mountain highway  I learned 2 things about Rainier Cherries

1. I have never had cherries that were that delicious
2. Cherries give everyone in my family ridiculously foul  gas

We were racing down the interstate with the windows open because “cherry bombs” were impossible to tolerate with the windows up! And, unfortunately, they were relentlessly “exploding.” We still love Rainier Cherries. We just make sure we can be outside if we eat several pounds in one sitting.

Grandson’s Gifts

My grandson takes after me and loves to give gifts. Many of his gifts are things he’d really like to have, too. So far my husband has received a basketball, a cane, bubbles, and a snow cone maker with snow cone syrup.
I have received live worms (I loved them), an ice cream scoop, Legos, handpicked flowers and the title “Best MiMi.”
Precious gifts from a precious child! I wouldn’t trade any of them!

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Gigantic Hill

When I lived in Germany I was a lower enlisted soldier in the Army. Lower enlisted also means “not paid very much.” One of my splurges was to get a sturdy wagon that I pulled my two children in around the countryside of Germany. My son was 4 and my daughter was 3 and I could put snacks and drinks in with them and we could walk for free for hours at a time.

To properly set the stage, I was in my early 20s, a newish parent and was far, far from any family. I was also very homesick. At the time, phone calls cost a dollar a minute, there was no internet, and letters took about a week to get to their destination. So, I walked a lot.

One afternoon we came to a really big, steep, downhill road. I was a little tired and came up with the brilliant idea of sitting on the wagon with the kids and coasting down the hill. I hopped on the front, and grabbed the handle of the wagon to steer.

What I hadn’t thought of, was that by sitting on top of the axel, I would not be able to steer. Off we went- just like a rocket! We careened wildly and VERY fast down the hill. I realized, quickly, that I had no brakes, no way steer, and 2 shrieking kids riding terrified behind me.

Somehow (Divine Intervention) the wagon jetted off the road and hit a stone. This caused the wagon to stop, abruptly! I somersaulted in the air and landed on my back in the grass. The kids miraculously stayed in the now still wagon. I got up, without a scratch or a bruise and was able to continue to pull the kids back home. The only scars were whenever I tried to sit or rest on the wagon, my son and daughter would start screaming for me to GET OUT!

Mixologist

My grandson is 10 and knows that he can talk me into buying him almost anything. Fortunately, the “fancy” glasses he likes at the thrift stores are usually really cheap. One thing he likes to do is mix up drinks in the fancy glasses. I came home to one of his mixing sessions and was served a bright yellow drink in a tall, skinny wine glass. He was so eager for me to try it but would not give me a clue to what was in it. I was expecting lemon or pineapple based on the color. I sipped hesitantly and got…no flavor. He laughed and laughed. He served me water with yellow food coloring, every person got their own individual color. Mine looked like urine. I’m not sure if he was laughing because it looked like I was drinking pee, or if he was just proud of his creations. 

Mother’s Day Present

For Mother’s Day, this year, I asked my husband to make me a DIY worm composter out of 5 gallon buckets. I happily filled my worms’ new home with cardboard, shredded paper, food scraps I had collected for a week and a little dirt and leaves. It was a glorious worm work place. We dumped in 4 containers of fishing worms and I was ready to wait for the magic of composting to occur. My intent was to keep it in the kitchen so I could watch the composting process.

A few days prior to Mother’s Day, I convinced my husband that we should put our house on the market. We had our first showing on Monday and I panicked and put the bucket of worms and compost outside. 

The lid was really tight so I left it a little lifted so I could easily add more food scraps. I forgot I had left the worms outside and went to retrieve them the next afternoon.When I went to check on the worms the next day, much to my surprise and dismay, the worms were not working. In fact the worms were gone. Every last worm had fled their work.

So, when the instructions say, “make sure the lid fits tight,” I think they mean it.

Bee Backstory

To pick up the bees I had trucked from Georgia, we had to drive to Zebulon. It’s about an hour from our house. I couldn’t quit smiling- my cheeks were cramping but I was SO excited to get to have TWO bee hives. We drove in my husband’s truck to Sapony’s Apiary just outside of Zebulon and there were boxes and boxes of bees- it was wonderful! It felt like the heavens opened and the bees were bathed in celestial light – ok, actually, it was a little cloudy, but I was “buzzing” with excitement!
Since it looked like it could rain I was considering putting the 3 pound container of bees into the cab of the truck with us. (A package is probably 10,000-15,000 bees in a wooden box, that you can see through) The guys handing out the bees said, “Are you putting the bees in the cab or in the bed?” I glanced at my husband to gauge his reaction of putting the bees inside with us. The look of SHEAR TERROR on his face let me know that he wasn’t sold on the idea of us riding cozy with the bees next to me. Apparently, the bee guys have seen “the look” before and carried our bees to the truck and placed them securely in the bed of the truck for us.
P.S. My husband also must think I can talk in a bee language. He keeps telling me, “Tell your bees to not sting me.” I do humor him and say, “Hey, girls- don’t sting him, okay?” It’s been 2 weeks, and so far they’ve complied. (That and he’s a pretty fast runner)

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Onion Backstory

I don’t like onions. I don’t like their taste, their texture, or the way my eyes burn like fire when I chop them up. I try not to use them, but sometime things just don’t taste right without them. I will often just use a half of an onion instead of a whole onion for a recipe and put the other half in the refrigerator in a zip top baggie. My refrigerator is magical and always grows that half onion. For a few days I’ll ignore that it is sprouting. Once the stalk is straining in its plastic confines I start to feel bad that it’s trying so hard to live. A baggie in the fridge should not hold growing things, so I plant it outside. Inevitable the thing keeps growing. My zombie onions just grow and grow. I am thinking of putting in a new bed so I can free up some space that I can grow something I’d really like to have.

Germany Backstory

One of my favorite things to do with my young kids on the weekend was to walk down the steep cobbled streets to the bakery. We lived at the top of the hill and the town was down a fairly steep hill. The bakery was about midway down.

We would buy delicious pastries and take an easier route home through the cemetery and park. It took longer but we’d eat our pastries in the cemetery and play in the park before heading home.

It sounds morbid but it was beautiful. Many of the graves had eternity candles, all were well tended and most had flowers growing that made it a peaceful place to walk through and admire. We always stopped at a very ornate tomb that was decked out in black and gold because we had decided that Dracula was buried there. Pastries, flowers, and a playground – it was a beautiful way to start the weekend.

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Trip to Baltimore Harbor

Backstory for the Trip on the boat in Baltimore Harbor. This grand trip was part of my homeschooling efforts while we were in Aberdeen Proving Grounds, Maryland. I really thought it would be a memorable experience. Turns out it was, but mostly for the wrong reasons.

This was just a few months post 9/11 and many organizations were offering things to military families. The Army post linked us with this conservation group to give marine biology lessons to children of the military. This group would take children (8 years old to 16 year old) out for a few hours into the harbor and teach science things. I thought I would drop off my 8 th grader and 6 th grader and they could learn science stuff while my husband and my 2 year old and I would hang out around Baltimore until they were finished.

My children (tweens) did not want to wear their jackets and it was misty, chilly (50’s) and a little windy. I forced my son to take my husband’s jacket and forced my daughter to take mine. Apparently, not everyone showed up for the tour and the boat captain invited my husband and me to join the boat ride. (I hate, hate, hate being cold or rained on). I politely declined since I didn’t have a jacket and the captain politely offered me a moldy rainwear outfit to put on (Think bright yellow bottoms and oversized top that reeked of decay). My “mom guilt” go to me so I boarded the boat, donned the smelly, moldy rainwear and headed out into the Baltimore Harbor.

One of the first things they told us was to not let any of the harbor water get on us because it was highly toxic and bad for your health. (WHAT??!!) I laughed because I thought it was a joke and the lady told me sternly, “SERIOUSLY! Don’t put your hand in the water- it’s dangerous!”
Okay, so I’m in toxic water, in moldy raingear, with 2 antsy tweens and a 2 year old that is a little blue, because she’s cold, and we’ve got a few hours to go to be finished. Surely, I could keep positive for a couple of hours.

About 30 minutes into their presentation, it started to rain. Not just a drizzle but like actual pouring down rain. My tweens found the other moldy raingear and my husband hid away is the bottom of the boat with the 2 year old trying to warm her up (my husband does have a super-power- his belly generates A LOT of heat!)

After the rain lets up a bit they do tell us some very interesting information. One was about the project they were working on to try to clean up the harbor. They were using oyster beds to siphon out the toxic stuff in the water (it worked, but took a few years). They described different marine life that was local to the area (but don’t eat it- it was in poison water). And they really did stop and have us imagine Fort MacHenry being bombed and Francis Scott Key writing the Star Spangled Banner as we watched the American flag wave in the breeze. It was deeply moving but I was still cold, hungry, smelly, and wet.

Once they dropped us off back in the Harbor we rushed to Barnes and Nobles, which was just a few blocks away, and bought pastries, hot coffee and hot chocolate at their Starbucks. Anytime we talk about this trip someone always adds, “The hot drinks were the best part of the day!”