Blueberry-ing

Yum, don't you just love the taste of fresh blueberries? The kids and I, my eldest daughter and her kids, and some friends, all went out to the blueberry field today and picked gallons of berries!! Of course, we had a discussion on whether they should have weighed us first, but this place is so cool, they don't even stay outside to wait for you! They have a scale, a money box, and a sign, all based on the good old honor system! Who does that anymore??
We were talking about how many berries each of us had eaten. Some people eat one at a time, others, ahem..eat all they pick, and my philosophy on blueberries is.. When you're standing there in the field, the birds are chirping the sun is pleasantly shining, and the berries are big and wonderful, the berries should only be eaten by the HANDFUL! Eating one or two here and there is ok for frozen, or even for when you've gotten back home with your buckets, but definitely in the field, they should only be eaten a gob at a time.
Not to get off the subject, but blueberries eaten one at a time in the field, would be like...ok, one of my other favorite things in the whole work...Roake's footlong hotdogs! We've driven to Milwaukee to get a Roake's dog. Would a person ever drive from Clatskanie to Portland to get a regular hot dog??? NO WAY! I would so love to have that recipe Roake's uses for their coney sauce. It's one of those tradition type things. My oldest kids grandmother ate at Roakes when she was a teenager! She is now in her 70s! Then I learned about them, and of course, my kids love them. They would be on their list of favorite foods in the top 10! So, it's like generational thing!
People have gotten teary telling me how important my Finnish Cardamom bread is to their family's holiday tradition, and I can believe it based on how much I sell them LOL! Why does food do that to people?? I think it's kinda Biblical, the fellowship people have around food, you know?
So, anyway, the blueberries! They are going into the freezer, at least this batch. I told one of my twin sons that he needs to pick 365 cups of blueberries, since he likes to eat a cupful every night right out of the freezer! But, we'll be back out for more in just a few days. First, I have to clean Grandmas windows tomorrow, then Friday, it's bake all day for a craft fair at the Clatskanie Bluegrass Festival. Then, back to get more blueberries!

Recent Finds

I was thrilled to get these couple tables, found them in an old house of a Finnish family. Can't decide, do I want to keep, or do I want to sell, you know how that goes! The size of the cream table is really wonderful, and I love the taller-ness of it! That's a corner shelf on top of it that I'm going to do something with.
The wood stained on has some neat design, too. It does have a glass top on it, but I'm going to take that off. It does have some character. I think the wire one once had a handle on it, like a buggy, but it looks fine like it is.
I'm still pouting about the bicycle I missed, but here my 3-wheeler. And I think I may still get another to replace the Schwinn I'm pouting about.

Anyone Need a Scale????

My MIL is needing/wanting to sell her scale, I believe it was a candy scale. It was licensed with USDA until a few years ago, when they sold their feed store. This thing is huge, heavy, and neat!!! No way will I try selling it on the internet, I watched my BIL lift it and it about killed him, so it's not shipping feasible. I wouldn't mind inheriting it, but where would I put it? Anyway, if you are in Oregon or Southwest Washington, it would be accesible w/o shipping. Take a look!

A Day With Faye!!

We were expecting to have a couple friends coming, so we thought we'd have a light lunch, then we were going to some other friends' to take a look at all their primitives. That didn't work out, so, you know, we called the kids in and had veggie pizza, fresh-off-the-tree cherries, a few chips, and raspberry lemonade. Yum, that was good.
We didn't want to pass up the visit with Faye, that we were taking our friends to experience (and Faye's house is an experience), so Kristin and I dished up some lunch to take to Faye,and went on ahead for a wonderful visit. She let us take some pictures while we were there. She has the most wonderful ideas, and she is very generous to let us gawk! Thank you Faye, for your hospitality!!
But, I digress! On our way to Faye's, out here in the country, we passed a couple kids with a lemonade stand. So, of course, we had to support the local shopkeepers!! OK, I think it was more like kook-aid or something, but oh well, I try to support lemonade stands.

What's for Lunch?

So, what do you think? I thought it was pretty! My daughter Kristin, came over this morning, and while I was finishing with some of my jobs, she made this great pizza! Veggie Pizza! She found a new crust recipe, added a few things to it, and gosh, now I need to get that recipe from her!

Our County Fair, is a Great County Fair!!

Kristin (dd) and I took the kids, mine younger ones 13, and twins 9, to the Columbia County Fair yesterday. Spent ALL DAY, well, all day and night actually! We got there right after it opened and just about closed it down. I'm still tired! When we first got there, they were have a benefit plant sale, and was it ever WONDERFUL!! I was making a joke that after shopping there, I couldn't afford to take the kids for the rides! But, the deals were so good, that I couldn't pass them up.
The Columbia County Fair has been having a lot of money problems for funding, and out of the generosity of Means Nursery, in Scaapoose, they donated a huge amount of very nice quality shrubs and flowers to sell as a fund raiser. It was wonderful. I got ornamental grasses, in a purple color, for a buck! God a really neat tree-type of bush that was really knarrly and on a variegated burgandy/green color, can't remember the night right off, but it was in a big pot for $12!! Tons of petunias in the big pots, 6 for $1. Many, many different varieties of shrubs, and of course I needed one of several! Guess what I'm doing today???



The fair was nice. I was a little dissappointed in the amount of entries in the canned foods, etc., but the baking was really great! I didn't see a lot of sewing, wonder why I missed that??

The animals are always great, and the kids just had a blast looking at all of them. And of course, the rides! My mind was whirling later, as I spent the whole afternoon trying to keep and out for all these kids going different directions with the arm bands on (23 bucks!!!) ready for every ride they can go on. We had a great time, spent way too much money, but, you know, it's the "experience" of the fair! It's encouraging to see people actually still farm, too!