Mersydotes

When I was a very little girl, my mother would put John Denver on the record player, and I would spin around on our blue carpet to "Sunshine On My Shoulders".  It is still one of my very favorite songs, and I thought of it today when I saw little Penny basking in the sun.  I think she would change the lyrics to "Sunshine on my tummy makes me happy"! ~Mersydotes

Seems like this summer's been full of berries- on the patio, at the park- and that's been ok with me! Mama Mersydotes loves berries of all kinds, and she is also an avid and excellent jam maker.  If you can pick it, she can jam it, and nothing in this world can beat her strawberry jam on warm pancakes in the morning or her peach preserves over piping hot oatmeal! She recently ordered a glorious amount of raspberries from some friends who have a farm a bit north of where she and Papa Mersydotes live, and one afternoon this past weekend, we were lucky to join her for jam making. My job was to stir and squish the raspberries and sugar together as they heated up to a boil- wow! did that smell good!  Then into the jars they went, and they are destined for many happy breakfast tables! Thanks Mom! ~Mersydotes

Last summer I made the mistake of only planting edibles on the patio.  This was wonderful and tasty (peppers, tomatoes, cilantro, etc.), but I realized that it was just as valid to plant flowers as it was to plant vegetables and herbs.  Enjoying blossoms and color would also add to the general enjoyment of our little life. So, this year I put out three pots for flowers, and in one of them I planted sweet pea seeds.  At first, they grew like wildfire, but when the vines began to climb, the plant inexplicably dried up and died, having produced just one little white blossom.  Still hopeful that I could save it, I kept watering the increasingly crisp little plant, and I'm glad I did, because it led to quite a surprise!  Our bird feeder is near our potted plants, and sometimes the birds like to sit in the pots as they munch.  The squirrel also loves our patio (and we love watching him!) and he too enjoys the seed, sometimes burying snacks for later in the flower pots. Well,

A few weekends ago, as Mr. Mersydotes and I were toodling around the countryside, we stopped off at an antiques store.  The shelves were lined with teacups of all kinds and colors- little gilded ones, jadite, flowery ones...  We found this little guy sitting all by his lonesome on the shelf, and we decided to take him home with us. I'd seen some really neat tea cup dishes online, and I thought this flowery blue set would be perfect.   All it took was a hot glue gun, and tah-dah!  A lovely and dainty teacup ring dish!  Methinks there will be a few more of these in the near future! ~Mersydotes

There have been several books that I've finished up recently that have been fantastic!  I thought I'd share some of them with you in case you're looking for some really good reads. The first is The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins.  As Britain's first detective story, it is wonderfully suspensful and also filled with complex, hilarious, down-to-earth, believable characters. On a whim, I picked up a three-dollar copy of Eat, Memory which is a compilation of the best food essays from the New York Times .  Every single essay was great, and I've been thinking a lot about my own food memories. A little while back, I was on a Sherlockian kick, and read The Seven Percent Solution for the first time.  What a great pastiche/homage to Holmes!  It was an exciting read and surprisingly faithful to the canon. As soon as I find another great read, I'll be sure to share it! ~Mersydotes (book images taken from Barnes & Noble website)

The days have been getting ever so slightly shorter here, and I've missed coming to visit bloggy land this week as work has picked up its pace while summer is slowing down.  Little Penny, however, has been taking it easy during these dog days.  She always knows exactly where the sun shine falls the best. We've had tiny harvests from our garden, including 9 cherry tomatoes.  It's funny, but even if we buy locally grown ones at the market, the ones from our garden still taste the best.  Ours have a slightly tougher skin and a wonderfully acidic bite to them- compact bursts of essence of tomato.  It must be something about baking in the sun, drowning in the downpours, and warding off the deer and voles and rabbits that make our tiny tomatoes, although few in number, strong in personality. A while back I shared our tomatillo harvest with you, and I'm happy to say that the tomatillo plant is still going strong! I've had a chance to make some salsa verde- it i

Just thought I'd swing by and say good evening. We've been out and about today in the cool, late-summer air.  Everything smelled of sweet grass and rain clouds. Sleep tight, ~Mersydotes

We have some very special guests visiting us this week, and we have been fortunate enough to make some lovely day trips throughout our little corner of the Midwest!  The first one that I'd like to share was our excursion into Amish country. We had a beautiful, clear day with cool breezes, and along with lots of fresh air and the clip-clop of hooves on the pavement, it was a perfect afternoon. We visited many bulk food and dry goods stores filled with friendly staff, gorgeous local produce, and sunlight streaming through the skylights that take the place of electric lamps. There were also several places displaying and selling hand-stitched quilts, and I was enamored of the colors.  Can I share a few with you? What a colorful feast for the eyes!  And I can honestly say that all of these quilt blocks remind me of the countryside filled with rows of corn and beans and blue skies, white clouds, goats, cows, and horses.  Those colors are the

Fact 1: We eat a lot of peanut butter. Fact 2: I like polka dots! Fact 3: Polka dots and peanut butter jars make fantabulous lanterns: Fact 4: We eat tons of peanut butter... Fact 5: ...so with more empty jars and polka dots, I made some vases: Fact 6: Now our patio can be lit up with fairy lights... ...and polka dots and pompoms are brightening up indoors. Fact 7: I need to pick up some more peanut butter! ~Mersydotes