Dinner

Aren't some days just so like this?

Strawberry recipes 1 and 2

Our strawberry patch has begun to produce fabulous, beautiful, delightful and oh-so-delicious berries. This may be the summer of the strawberries at our place.

One day the boys came in exclaiming, "Mom! We found five!" Everyone gets one but mom.

The next day it was, "Mom! We found 12!" Everyone (including mom) gets two!

The day after that came the cry, "Mom! We got 30! Can we make a pie?" Um, not quite, but we can each have five berries sliced over whipped cream. Okay, I confess, it was just extra creamy Cool Whip, but it was still good. And by the way, that right there was recipe number 1.


This afternoon the boys picked a scant quart, and yes, we made that pie! It was delicious. Here's the quick and easy recipe we used so that it would be ready right away after dinner.

Quick Strawberry Pie

1 c flour
2 T powdered sugar
1/2 c soft butter
1/8 t salt
1 1/2 c water
3/4 c sugar
2 T cornstarch
1 4-serving pkg. strawberry jello
2 c slice strawberries

Heat oven to 350. Mix together flour, powdered sugar, butter and salt and press into a pie plate. Bake for 12 minutes or until edges are golden. Cool.

Combine water, sugar and cornstarch and cook until clear(ish). Add jello and mix well. Combine with berries and pour into crust. Chill until set.



Stay tuned to find out what else we end up doing with strawberries this summer. Have any great ideas? Please share them!

The curse passes on

Oh dear. I did it now. I fell victim to my own childhood sympathies for inanimate objects and have now validated those sympathies in my children.

Here's how it happened.

The boys made sand art ducks at today's street fest. They filled little plastic duck containers with layers of colorful sand, popped on a lid and voila, masterpieces were created. But the sand settled somewhat, allowing the colors to shake and shift. The three eldest were diligent to carry their ducks home carefully to preserve the distinct color striations, but Elijah had no such concern. His duck arrived home all one color -- brownish-blah.

Now here comes the part where I learn without a doubt that these are my children -- no switcheroos at the hospital.

Isaac and Luke were in tears over Elijah's poor duck that was doomed to a miserable existence of brownish-blahness. I understood completely. I recall finding a sad looking stuffed animal at a garage sale and begging to buy it and bring it home so that perhaps it wouldn't feel so terribly woebegone -- because stuffed animals have feelings, you know. Apparently sand art ducks do, too.

It took me many years to get over this irrational attribution of feelings to lifeless objects. I'm not certain I'm completely over it yet. Sometimes I still feel bad for toys left in storage.

So rather than trying to reason with my two overly-sympathetic boys, I blurted out the only thing that I thought would have comforted me as a child had I been in the same situation.

"The duck wants to be whatever color his owner wants him to be. If his owner is happy with his color, the duck is happy."

And of course it worked. I knew it would. But now I have verified the fact that toys have feelings! Augggg! I'm afraid I've cursed them to a lifetime of guilt for every toy they someday donate, sell or throw away!

And so the curse passes on to the next generation. Maybe, being boys, they'll outgrow the extreme sentimentality and properly teach their children that toys don't have feelings. I can only hope. It was more than I could do.

Down a Long Dirt Road

Several miles off a North Dakota state highway, down a dirt road traveled only by farmers and ranchers, sits this church, long left to the prairie elements and wildlife.

It first stirs inside me a feeling of adventure, of discovery. Other than the neighbors, scattered as wide as the rolling hills and buttes, who has laid eyes on this building, this testament of faith? Even the sight-seeing ghost-town hunter would likely never find this spot, completely unmarked except by the building itself.

As I peer inside, questions greet me from every corner. What kind of merriment was had here? Weddings, certainly. Baptisms, potlucks, worship, of course. Likely funerals, too. Who were these people who prayed here and sang here? What became of the people who built it, with their weathered faces, rough hands and faith that could survive the prairie elements? Why did they leave, and where did they go?

At first, there seem to be no answers here. Only a tattered Christian flag, crosses on the walls, and broken windows are left of what was surely once a vibrant and useful church. Sadness at what has been lost begins to subdue me.

But slowly the story -- patchy and lacking particulars -- begins to show itself.

The Spirit who stirs the perpetual prairie winds stirred the hearts of would-be pioneers to leave home and family for this vast and relentless place. He provided faith and food for their souls and bodies. He enabled them to construct a house of worship in a barren place, much like the Israelites in another strange and harsh land. And today, as the evidence of his care and their faith stands broken by the wind, I believe that He holds many of them in his hands.

Those who seek him will still find him here. His door will open as easily as the battered and broken door unsuccessfully latched with a length of rusty wire.

I leave, not with mere excitement, nor sadness, but with comfort. Comfort that when I am as broken and worn as this building, my God will be here still. Peace that my life will tell the story of His love and faithfulness, even after my body's usefulness is exhausted. I know that he who enables me now, will never abandon me. He will hold my soul forever.

Quick Takes

1. Thank-you, Dad and Mom DW, for the birthday gift of two blueberry bushes and a pot full of non-blooming beauties for the picnic table centerpiece. I quite enjoyed the greenhouse shopping spree!

2. The garden is planted! Yea! Corn, beans, tomatoes, carrots, cukes, cantaloupe, pumpkins and flowers are in, and the potatoes planted last month are finally coming up!

3. How is it that I, with my "less is more" philosophy, have at least ten times more bathroom stuff than Wade? Perhaps in the bathroom, more is more?

4. Grammar question: Is it proper to say we are cannibalizing the deck for the fort? Can a fort "cannibalize" anything other than another fort? Or are they similar enough that the saying works?

5. Check out this bottle of syrup, or more specifically, the lid/spout.

Cute enough idea, until you start pouring and your children notice, "Hey, it's puking on my pancakes!" Good grief.