Dairy Daze...and Now Beyond

 In the early 90s, I even forget which year exactly; I moved from California to Oregon.  I stayed with my brother and his family for a year or so. I remember the first shopping trip my sister-in-law took me on was to Fred Meyer in the Gateway district of SE Portland.  Having come from a teensy town in CA I had never been to a super and was fascinated with everything.  For some reason I was taken with this set of melamine (I think) tableware; little plates and bowls...etc.  The fact that it was black was enchanting to me for some reason that escapes me now.  But for my first purchase in Portland I bought a little plate and bowl.  This was back in 1992 I believe, which means it has been 31 years.   Nineteen years ago Gary took a fancy to it and has eaten his cornflakes out of this little black bowl.  (I hauled it out of the dish drainer for this picture; that is why there are water drips on it.) I don't know what happened to the plate....

 OK  Well, the coffee itself isn't exactly archaic, although I do buy it at the discount grocery store, so it might be a smidge past the sell-by date.  I refuse to pay $10 for a bag of coffee.  I think they charge about $3.50 for a bag of Starbucks coffee grounds at the discount grocery store.  And since I like it black that is what I get.  Some people say Starbucks tastes like burnt beans, but that is what I like, so that is what I enjoy every day. In any case; this is how I make it: I have no clue what the correct coffee terminology for this is; drip?  I heat water, not quite boiling, then pour over the grounds.  I do have the Keurig I used at my mom's when she was still around.  She loved her little coffee maker, when she was still able to remember how to make her own coffee. I don't use it though, the pods are super expensive, and wasteful.  I have tried the reusable pods, but they just got grit into the coffee, and that is even gros...

  I have blogged about Gary's sawmill before; quite a few years ago.  He doesn't use it actively any more; just fires it up occasionally to cut stuff we might need, or he might just want. He had bush-hogged down around there and it was looking very picturesque when I walked by it a couple of weeks ago.   And having gotten this far with this blog post, I can't think of another blamed word to write about it.  Haha...  Well, let me ramble around a bit I guess. Gary worked this sawmill quite extensively back in his younger years, even before he did dairy farming, I think.  He might have  had a few cows and still worked it at the same time, but I can't recall if he has ever mentioned it specifically.  At any rate he has many memories from when he was sawmilling.  It makes me remember my dad and how he was a lumberjack back in Northern California in the 40s and 50s, I think.  He never did own his own sawmill, but he sawed down many a tree...

Yesterday evening we had a Fall Festival for the youth at our church.  It was fun.  We had different activities set up in a few different Sunday School classrooms; arts and crafts, a cake walk, apple bobbing, a photo booth,  and a Christmas Card-making stop (the cards will be handed out to residents of the local rest home.).  There was also the S'mores-making campfire out at the firepit (bless the hearts of the ones running that station...it was COLD last night), and the evening culminated in a musical bingo game. The children all had a great time.   I signed up for the apple bobbing activity.  There was more than one person surprised, and relieved, at how I did this because due to COVID-19, and a general overall enlightenment about germs in general, people were grossed out about allowing their children to bob for apples like we did back in the day.  I remember bobbing for apples in a huge tub of water at school, no less. Things are a bit differen...

 Quite a few years back a lady from church brought a few plant starts her daughters had won at a 4-H event.  There were several different types, one of them being a Christmas Cactus.  I was enchanted, because while I had heard of them and my mom actually had had a gorgeous one in California, I had never had one.  So I brought it home and pampered it.   It got quite large and unruly.  The kitten knocked it over several times and broke large branches from it.  And finally this past summer I got exceedingly tired of it and several other plants I had.  I chucked some out the back door, gave some away and gave the original plant back to the mother of the girls who won it in the first place.  Haha But before I gave it away I took the above starts off of it.  I can't remember when that was; mid-summer maybe, I don't know.  In any case I stuck the above leaves into potting medium and kept them warm and moist.  It has taken them th...

 This seemingly Holstein heifer is fondly called "The Sheep."  She is one of our 4 beef/Holstein cross offspring from a couple of years ago.   The last bull Gary had for the dairy herd was a Beefmaster.  He sired some interesting calves.  Two of the heifers were quite black, and fit in with the Angus heifers we purchased awhile back.  Two of them were black/white like this.   "The Sheep," when she was a calf, did indeed look exactly like a sheep.  She was the cutest little thing.   She had a little heifer calf here a few weeks ago.  I am not sure which calf is hers.  All the calves have been quite black; even from the Holstein cross heifers.  They are so cute to watch out in the field. 

 Here is the official definition of where the term; "catty corner", or "kitty corner" comes from per Google: "The term 'kitty-corner' has nothing to do with cats. Instead, it stems from the expression 'cater-corner,' which is derived from “quatre,” the French word for “four.” The term was used to describe the way the dots are placed on a dice positioned at number four, diagonally from one another."  I find this term to be singularly uninteresting, as most word origins tend to be.  Our cat has her own definition.   Smudge has certain places in the house where she likes to sleep.  Those are HER places and if you should be in HER place, woe be unto you.  She will sit and stare at you with an insulted expression on her furry face.  Sometimes she will jump up and try to squeeze you out of the spot. She has several places in the house that she considers her own, and she switches them out every few weeks or so.  In Summer she likes to be on the co...