Heart's Pride

Wednesday saw Colin and I headed south to Fort Jackson, South Carolina to see Rhiannon graduate Army Basic training. The sun beat down on the sand and pine trees, filling the air with the bright smell of the South. It was a good day and my thrift store dress did me good service. Rhiannon is sharp and I don't have the words to tell you how very proud I am of her. She has worked so hard and kept her chin up through the more grueling parts of her training. We spent two days with her and then we took her up to Fort Lee, Virginia where her AIT training will be taking place.

 We wished we could have taking her back with us to Tennessee for a while but there was little time for it. She was due to report and so we dropped her off at Fort Lee after much goodbyes. Rhi may well we coming home in October and that does our hearts much good. Kieren's birthday is then and it would be wonderful if Rhi could come home just in time for the celebration. Already, I am planning a birthday/home coming feast that is full of fresh, baked bread and I'll put a lovely pie or cake in my glass rose stand.

Now, back at home, I have been watching the garden and our new watermelons growing. The rabbits are on the back half and I have taking out the live trap and baited it. A little more fur and a little more meat will not go amiss in this clanhold, to be sure.

Pleased as punch

Starting August 1st, I will be working part time at Butler and Bailey Supermarket in the Rocky Hill community of Knoxville. I went down to respond to the employment ad last Thursday, filled out the application in store and talked with the store manager. He was very professional and kind, complimented me on my various experience in retail and offered me the job on the spot. He handed me the employee paperwork, W-4, background check and direct deposit form. He told me to call him as soon as I got back from Rhiannon's graduation and he would have me on the schedule for the beginning of August.

I'll start part time and he told me as soon as my schedule opens up, he would like to put me on full time. I am pleased as punch at the state fair.

Financial independence is very important to me. I want to establish credit and good credit at that. It is my ambition that once I am into my forties, I will have established good credit and will be able to then purchase a small house in Knoxville, Tennessee. My intention is to renovate said house and then place the property up for rent. It is a plan that, at this time, is in it's infancy but I have started to make a few steps toward it by playing outstanding debts.

Tonight I will be spicing up ground beer with cumin, browning onions, cooking rice and black beans for something my mother used to make for us often. Black beans and rice was a meal often had in my household when times were tight or mother was pressed for time. Tonight I am making it more for the later reason than the former. It brings me back to a time were I was small and safe under the cocoa brown eyes of my mother's gaze.

The fruits of summer

Summer waxes hot in the Tennessee Valley, here in sleepy Rockford near the Little River. So much heat and sun is a blessing to the tomato farmer; for five days now I have gone out with little Rose to pick tomatoes. Big boy, plum and cherry tomatoes line out window ledge and fill small ceramic bowls . The garden also sports acorn squash; at the moment we have two large ones who are going from light to dark green quickly, hardening as they ripen. There has been raw slices of tomato for dinner sides and cherry tomatoes for quick, juicy snacks. Colin has made beer and is currently working on dark chocolate mead and apple wine. I will be cleaning out a carboy to start my hard root beer, the pyment being all drunk up and Colin already working on a cherry mead. So I will make hard root beer and a quart of Alba vanilla ice cream. After which I will treat myself to the best root beer float on the face of the planet.  

Cherry Tomatoes

Those are some beautiful tomatoes we have. Not just the color but the taste. So sweet and juicy; a true balm to the southern girl's heart.  In addition to tomatoes and squash, the garden is also turning out a metric ton of mint. Last year, we planted spearmint and sweet mint. This year, we have sweet spearmint. Love blooms in the garden. The mint saw fit to interbreed and its offspring is a redolent, beautiful blooming mint. The chocolate mint has spread and I had to prune it aggressively to keep it from wiping out my lemon balm. The carrots, unfortunately, never grew from the trimmings we kept. Gods keep the warm days here; I have two adult squash and five babies growing away on the vine. I want more than anything to grow a lot of acorn squash. When we were first replanting the garden for 2016, I mistook Rhiannon's acorn squash for Japanese pumpkin and pulled the sprouts thinking to prune the population. Only took late did I realize my mistake and mentally kicked myself over it for weeks after Rhiannon left for boot camp.

Sweet spearmint, purple sage and chocolate mint

The kitchen and dinning room are filled with the wild, green scent of herbs. The bouquet of sweet spearmint is festooned with tiny, starlet flowers. I cannot look at it without smiling; what a good bouquet for a bride. The sage is run all green and purple; we added to the lamb stew the other night and it was heavenly. The chocolate mint is begging to be added into ice cream. I might be pressing some into oil soon. My rabbit skins are still well salted and stored in a cool place. I need to flesh them out soon but finding the time and patience for such delicate work is difficult. I have been working on my crocheting a great deal and have added 6 skeins of yarn (Wool of the Andes and Patton's) to the queen sized Afghan I am crocheting for Colin. Gods, give me the strength to keep working on it until Yule. I would love to give it to him, finished in it's whole to keep him warm through the winter.

Opal with her twin girls. We can't wait for our babies to come home. 

As summer spins itself down from Solstice, the time draw near that our fuzzy girls can come home. We get to go pick them up in Oak Ridge on August 1st, the same day Kieran starts her senior year. It has been a long time since this Clanhold has hear the tiny meows of little kittens and we wait with baited breath to hold and love them both. Adoption is the best way you can find your beloved fur babies. 

As I bring this post to a close, I wish all my friends and readers a Happy Independence Day! Enjoy!