Robin's garden

We are not members of a CSA this summer.  Past summers I have posted the weekly bounty on pick up day, as well as photos of the sweltering work days when we harvested strawberries and melons under the blazing sun. I have not missed that this summer.

We are growing dependable things in our own front yard garden like cucumbers, basil, kale, and waiting for the multitude of tomatoes that will appear in August. But I do miss the fennel, potatoes, celeriac, tomatillos, and daikon radish that I got at the farm. I just don't buy them at the store but when they are given to me, I figure out how to cook them. That was fun. Having a garden in my front yard, I enjoy picking parsley, dill, sage and thyme for the evening stir fry but I miss the surprise of walking through someone else's garden.

So when Robin said she had extra string beans that needed picking, I didn't lose any time to visit her in her garden. Readers of this blog have visited there before! So on my way to the bean patch, I came across some other things. Take a look!

Water is boiling! Time to throw the beans in and have some supper. Thanks, Robin.

summer images

middle of nebraska

Who has recently experienced the middle of Nebraska?

 Eliza! and her driving partner, Zand. 

What better way to understand the vast diversity and size of this country than by driving across it?

Nebraska is a very wide state.  

Here is our traveler in our driveway in Lincoln, Massachusetts. 

Soon to be crossing a large part of these great United States and ending up in Lander, Wyoming to drop off Zand and on to Colorado where she will stay with the Boulder McLeans for awhile and then start work in Leadville (do you know that Leadville is the highest incorporated town in the US at over 10,000 feet?)

I received a text today  indicating that they have reached Colorado. 

Woody Guthrie would have turned 100 this year. Who of us did not grow up singing 

This Land is Your Land?

The song has become iconic.  The fact is that Woody was a political activist and there are verses most of us did not learn in grade school.  Hats off to Woody Guthrie. 

But that, my friends, is another story.

more summer at last

summer garden

on the water

Wine

Yes, Don. There was wine. And a crescent moon as well.

island time

A forty minute ride on The Miss Lizzy from Stonington gets us to the "high island" passing the many islands of Merchant's Row in Penobscot Bay. Our family has been coming here for twenty years, with some summers off for travel to other places. This summer we returned to the island that does not change. We got off the  mailboat, walked up to get the truck and drove it down to the dock to load up the week's worth of food we had brought along with a few duffle bags. Life is simple here, you don't need much, but you do need to eat.

One thing you don't have to bring are lobsters. Plenty of them in Penobscot Bay and plenty of boats out checking traps. When Eliza and Zand came out to the island, a lobster dinner was in order! They went to the town pier at five pm, found Jason Barter on his boat and bought 4 lobsters that were a pound and half each. Dinner.

"The fish you eat today, spent the night in Penobscot Bay!"

                                                                Almost done

After a meal like that (lobster coma as it is known here in Maine), all you can do is sit on the porch and look at the view and await the sunset on this almost longest day of the year. Bon Appetit!

Seas of Peace

Want more info? Check out what Carrie and Tim are doing these two weeks on the site for Seas of Peace or on Facebook. That will save me a lot of words! Great photos there as well!