Dodged the Storm
The skies stayed black for most of the morning. We dodged the storm with no winds and had about a half inch of rain.
The cookie dough that was stirred up yesterday, has now been baked out with a good portion of the cookies in the freezer. It’s kind of an “out of sight, out of mind” thing. With the pending storm, it didn’t get as warm as quickly as they thought for today. With the oven humping at 350 degrees for several hours, I still felt the kitchen was quite uncomfortable by the time the baking was done and all the dishes and pans returned to their rightful place. The official sampler, Dennis, gave a thumbs up as he headed out the door.
In my mind’s eye, I do not know how Lena kept a family of six in baked goods. I looked at the amount of cookies from the peanut butter batch, thinking how long would four dozen cookies last with four kids and a hard working farmer dipping into them for two lunches per day. I kind of remember that there was never a single batch of anything stirred up. If the oven is already hot and the utensils are dirty . . . go for a double batch every time. It was the only way a small container could be hidden in the chest freezer in case coffee company came over.
No matter how my days go, I could never have kept up with Mom, even at the age that I am now and she was then. I have gotten soft. I do continue with the home chores just like Mom did. I take a loaded Swiffer and dance around our floors. Mom had the Fuller Brush wool dust mop that got a bit of the Fuller Brush furniture oil on it to catch dust bunnies. We had to shake the dickens out of it multiple times on a Saturday cleaning binge. No one took shoes off when coming into the house while we were growing up. That’s what Mom had two daughters for. For us, nowadays, the debris is minimal. There are no alfalfa stems or oat chaff that get drug in on chores shoes or in the cuff of the overalls. More than likely for us, it is the evergreen needles that come in under the shoes or grass clippings after mowing the acre.
Secretly . . . I enjoy keeping a home that is tidy. It is not a chore for me. I take as much pride in our home as Dennis does in his yard. We are two fuss budgets, each in our own right. I like that. I like it a lot. Pride in ownership of our home . . . all 720 square feet of it . . . priceless.
What with this last rain and an inch and a half previously since we last mowed the acre, I have a sneaking suspicion as to what tomorrow holds. I will get sprayed down with Bug Soother and we will get it done!