Odd Sighting

I have heard of shotguns in the back of pick-ups but this is ridiculous:

 

Bird Sightings

The robins hatched around May 15 and are getting ready to leave the nest:

There are two birds in the nest and the mother robin flies back and forth all day bringing them food.  I noticed while trying to take pictures of the babies that the mother  has a very distinctive call that makes the babies immediately crouch down in the nest. 

  Other bird sightings include these six ominous vultures on top of a barn:

Recently we went on a bike ride on a local trail.  Since the weather was perfect I expected the trail to be quite crowded  but we were the only bicyclists and these were the only pedestrians we saw for many kilometers:

We also saw this family of geese:

 

Robin’s Nest

Every year for the nine years we have lived here robins have  built a nest on our front porch.  This is not a particularly good place to set up housekeeping since there is an astonishing amount of human foot traffic on the porch.  Most years the robin gives up on the nest pretty early in the game and, I hope, builds  a nest in a more secluded area.  This year the robin decided to stick it out:

This robin can frequently be found sitting on her nest.   She flies to a nearby tree when she is disturbed which is quite often since we keep forgetting she is there.  This spot must have some very desireable feature that is obvious to robins because a nest is built here every year in this exact spot. But only one other time has the robin stayed in the nest until her eggs have hatched.  We were particularly  fortunate that year  because we happened to be leaving the house to catch the school bus just as the baby birds were taking their first flight.  Needless to say we stayed to watch, missed the bus and had to drive to school but it was well worth the inconvenience. Sometimes you just have to rearrange your priorities .  I’m hoping we’ll be so lucky this year.

 

New Additions

It seems that  I know many people who believe that to get the things you want you have to send the thought out into the universe and you will be rewarded.  I am very skeptical.   However, when we decided that we would like to adopt a mixed breed puppy I thought that sitting on the couch thinking about puppies would be a lot easier, physically and psychologically,  than going to the local shelter and  choosing only one or two  dogs.  So I thought very hard about the puppy we wanted.  Although I often appeared to be sitting on the couch drinking tea and staring into space, I was really very busy sending thoughts out  into the universe.  It was hard work and it took hours but eventually  I was rewarded with these: 

I know.  They are kittens.  I seem to be having a communication problem with the universe.

This is Frey:

Frey  was originally named Freya after the Norse goddess associated with cats but the vet told us that our ability to determine the sex of kittens was somewhat limited.  Fortunately Freya had a twin brother named Frey.

This is Fezziwig:

Fezziwig is named after one of my favourite characters in literature. 

If you need me I’ll be on the couch looking like I’m staring into space.

 

Signs of Spring

The maple syrup season has ended. My twelve taps only produced about nine liters this year. There would have been a couple more if it weren’t for that unfortunate burnt sap incident. When we tapped the trees there was still snow on the ground, although not a lot:

Some snow in April took care of that:

As of three days ago we were still getting some interesting ice patterns on the puddles and ponds in the morning:

but that hasn’t stopped the garlic

or this crocus:

It’s amazing how much can happen in a month.

 

Maple Syrup

The sap is running:

Except when it isn’t:

Overall this is not shaping up to be a great year for maple syrup for me.  Between human error – I burned an entire batch while distracted by a home movie – and uncooperative weather – warm nights and overcast days – I am not getting much syrup.  I have managed to squeeze out a couple of liters  and I have enjoyed checking the buckets but so far I haven’t a lot to show for my efforts.

 

Planting Seeds

Every spring I plant seeds because I cannot believe it will work. These are tomato seeds. I have taken them out of the dark envelope they have been stored in since they were collected last year and I will put them in dark soil. I will add water and they will grow. Everything they need to know to become tomatoes is in these tiny seeds. They will not become lettuce or eggplant or petunias, they will become tomatoes . No matter what direction the seed is pointing when I plant it, the roots will grow down and the stem will grow up. How do they know which way is up when they have been tossed around and then surrounded by earth? When I close my eyes and spin around, I don’t know which direction I am facing. I am humbled by a tomato seed.

 

Orange Marmalade – Attempt Two

I made another attempt at Orange Marmalade. The trick is to get someone else to open the cookbook to the correct page so you are not distracted by suggestions of how to prepare and serve a calf’s head. Mrs. Beeton has several orange marmalade recipes but I chose this one:

I chose this recipe because of the line: “Let there be an equal weight of loaf sugar and Seville oranges.” It sounds so biblical.

I like these wrinkly Seville oranges. They don’t look perfect and they are pretty bitter, much like an interesting character in a book or movie. Anyway, through the mysterious magic of chopping, sweetening and simmering they were transformed into:

Marmalade!! This batch is way better than the batch we made last year and infinitely better than commercially prepared marmalade. It takes about three hours to make and is well worth the trouble. Just the smell of the simmering oranges is enough to make it worth the trouble.

 

Orange Marmalade

The Seville oranges are in the store so I bought some to make Orange Marmalade. I consulted one of my favourite books :

‘Beeton’s Cookery’ by Mrs Beeton herself. We used a recipe from this book last year and made delicious marmalade. This book is one of my favourite possessions. After Mrs Beeton’s death in 1861, several books based on her household management book were published. This dictionary of cookery is one of those books. I have spent hours with it. I love it’s old, smooth cover:

I love it’s matter-of-fact title. I love that it is over 140 years old.

I love the information in the book. Where else would I find out how to carve a plover, fry a cow heel and make cowslip wine? She includes Bills of Fare for dinners for 16, 12, 10, 8 and 6 persons. She provides menus for ‘plain family dinners’ . I have never tried these menus but I am very tempted. I would really like to draw your attention to page 104:

It seems that I have been doing this incorrectly as I have not been placing the box of chocolates on a glass plate. However, I have nailed the part about purchasing them at any time. As is usually the case when I pull out this book , I emerged, after two hours, much wiser but no closer to having the orange marmalade. I’ll try again later.

 

Citrus

Maybe it’s just a fear of scurvy but I always start craving citrus at this time of year. I got these lovely lemons:

and transformed them into Lemon and Lime Chutney:

I have some reservations about this chutney because it contains what I think to be an odd combination of ingredients: lemons, limes, salt, sugar, vinegar, hot pepper and raisins. It’s the hot pepper that has me particularly concerned. My concern was not alleviated by the taste I took before bottling it. I’ll give it a few weeks to settle down in the jar before I try it again.