Grandparents Visit

Finally, my parents found time in their busy schedules to visit. Yeah, I'm complaining! Mostly because they promised to be here for 4 days, but then changed everything to just 2 and a half days. So I feel that I'm totally within my rights here to kvetch loudly.

I dunno about your folks, but when my 'rents are in town, they tend to be very busy along the gender lines. My mom takes over the kitchen and the garden. My dad takes over the yard and the couch. This, by the way, is not a complaint, but a sincere appreciation.

I mean, c'mon, here are two senior citizens (at least by Kohl's standards) who first barrel down I-95 (Dad's always behind the wheel and he tends to interpret "95" as the speed limit), then unload a ton of goodies (mostly food stuff, but this time also a mattress and a couple of very heavy IKEA bookcases). Then they spend 1-2-3 days working before climbing back into the car for a return trip. But not until they write us a check (I s'pose for time well-spent).

Anyway, this time around Mom brought lotsa plants for the garden, mostly herbs. So we planted those. And Dad spent the morning hours (when it wasn't too hot) cutting down the bushes 'cause that's where we want to put our expanded veggie garden and a fruit "orchard" next year.

We also made shashliki, a summer-time Russian tradition. As most other Russian dishes, it's extremely labor-intensive. This is no burger-flipping! This takes time, skill and patience - from marinating the meat (no store-bought marinade either) to building a fire, to actual roasting.

Consequently, no drinking happens while the process is, well, in process. Here you see my hubby is taking a beer break while chatting with his favorite mother-in-law. And his favorite father-in-law is patiently explaining the finer points of the roasting process to M. M loves this and is all ears. Cooking on the open fire is quite possibly his biggest love (after Star Wars that is).

While M is too little to rotate the skewers, he's contributing to the work process by using some fresh herbs to sprinkl the meat with some white wine (yeah, I know, this sounds weird - white wine with lamb, but it does work).

Another thing we did was picking blueberries with Grandma. We went to Smith's Nursery on a very hot day (after helping Grandpa with cutting down the bushes). Luckily, they loaned us a little wagon for M (it's a bit of a hike to the blueberry field although of course if you want to, you can drive there as well, but where's the fun in that?!)

Archemedes said "Give me a lever long enough and I'll move the world". To which I say "Let my parents visit long enough and I'll finish all my unfinished projects" (which, if you were to take a peek at my to-do list, is way more impressive of a feat than moving the world. For real.)

Last Weekend - Chicken Tour and More

It's almost time for the long weekend and I'm finally catching up with work stuff. So I realized that I didn't post anything about last weekend.

Well, the big news, of course, is that the world didn't end. I wanted to be the first one to know so I stayed up 'til midnight Eastern Time. But then I thought well, what if the Rapture was scheduled for Central Time? So I stayed up 'til 1am. Nothing... So then I thought what if it's on California time, but at this point I felt too sleepy and didn't care much.

We had a long day on Saturday. First, we went on a much-awaited (by me) chicken tour called Henside the Beltline Tour D'Coop which I think is a pretty clever name. I think this is our fourth year going to this tour. It's not just the chickens that you get to see, but other people's yards.

And since most people who keep chickens here also happen to have some kind of veggie gardens, it's of particular interest to me. Also, most families on the tour have young children so their yards are very kid-friendly.

This year M was very interested in petting a chicken. In many of the houses we went to chickens are truly free-range, roaming around the yard. But catching a chicken is not very easy, as M found out. Fortunately, one of the houses we went to had a pet dwarf potbellied pig who just loved being petted.

The next day after the tour we went to pick cherries. I did mention some time ago that I am now on a Craigslist scavenger hunt. I search their free ads almost every day looking for things. One time I picked up about 50 or so magazines, mostly with recipes and gardening tips. Another time I picked up pine logs to edge the paths in the garden.

Then one day I saw an ad that said "come and pick cherries - free". Well, so we did. The place is kind of a drive from us, but we didn't have much else going on. So we went and picked about 8 pounds of delicious sour cherries. Now even taking into account gas money, this is a good deal. Besides, it seems impossible to buy sour cherries around here, even at the Farmers' Market.

And they are just perfect for pies!!! So Chris and M were busy making a delicious cherry pie from scratch!

Strawberry Picking

Ah, finally, it's strawberry picking time. Admittedly, the season has started in mid-April, but with all the crazy weather and M getting sick and all that we are just now getting around to it. So a couple of weeks ago we went to our favorite strawberry place, Smith's Nursery. We've been going there for 3 years straight. It's a bit of a drive for us, 30 mins or so, but it's such a beautiful farm! Yes, it's more than just a big open strawberry field. There are plenty of things to do and see there, from admiring flowers in the nursery to checking up on the goats to having a picnic by the fish pond. There are also two playsets for kids and it's a very lively place in general.

The first thing that M said after he saw the field, breathed the aroma of ripe berries and saw all the bright red berries peeking from under the leaves, was "Let's stay here ALL DAY!" To which I thought "Hooray! I finally get to pick without any hurry". Right... Let's just say that after about 10 minutes M's mantra changed to "Let's go back to the car RIGHT NOW!" My fault really.

I told him not to eat unwashed berries and instead wait 'til we would get to the car, wash them and have a nice little picnic eating berries with slices of fresh bread I took with us for a snack. I think the only three words that M retained out of that lengthy explanation was "picnic, bread, snack". He figured that since we had enough strawberries for a picnic, what was the reason for staying out in the heat any longer?

We did manage to pick 2 buckets of berries though. Smith's has just about the largest strawberries of all the farms we've been to. And they generally smell great and are delicious. But the place is far, as I've mentioned.

So that's why I was so happy when, driving around picking up some free stuff posted on Craigslist, I found a smallish strawberry field only about 20 minutes from us. What's even better, we make it half-way there at least once a week since the Farmers' Market is on the way and Lake Wheeler Park is too. The place is called Porter Farm. And it just might become a contender for the title of the most favorite strawberry patch. It's just a strawberry field, no extras (they do sell some other produce and locally-made ice-cream). But the berries are delicious with a big "D". They aren't very big at all, but exceptionally sweet, even the ones that don't seem to be fully ripe yet. The berries also keep very well.

So both times we picked 2 large buckets of strawberries and I've made various deserts with them. No strawberry-rhubarb crisp though 'cause for some reason this year the grocery stores here don't sell rhubarb. And I'm yet to plant my own (yes, yes, next year).

I also tried dehydrating strawberries and they turned out yummy. Like sweet-tart strawberry chips. I plan on drying more for snacks and granola. I'm also making some strawberry jam, the one that everyone seemed to like so much last year. So we'll be doing more strawberry picking, most likely at Porter Farm (gas prices, you know). But we'll most definitely go to the Smith's Nursery at least once more, that one weekend when the strawberry field is still open and the blueberries and blackberries are ready to be picked as well. Irresistible!

Studying Grossology

This was actually one of the first things we did after getting back from NY. We went to the NC Museum of Natural Sciences to check out the Animal Grossology exhibit (it's still going on for another few days).

I think that what stopped us before was the fact that although the museum admission is free, this particular exhibit is not. And it's not exactly cheap either - $8 for adults and $5 for children. Except, of course, that M is only 4 and all those under 5 get in for free. And so we went.

We got there a bit too early and had a chance to walk around checking out NC flora and fauna. M usually doesn't care, except for the giant whale skeletons hanging from the ceiling. But this time he was interested in owls, especially in the small one that he dubbed "Owly" after Mr. H. Hiram Bish's little Owly. (If you are not familiar with the story called "Pinky Pye", you might want to run to the library right away. M can listen to this story over and over. He then pretends, in his usual fashion, that H. Hiram Bish, the famed ornithologist, is staying over at our house with his Owly. He also tends to call our cat, Xander, Pinky Pye).

But back to the Animal Grossology. It was awesome! Let me list the main attractions there (the ones that M spent most of the time on):

1. The burping and farting cow - M spent a combined total of 40 minutes watching how this mechanical cow moved food between her 4 stomachs. He moved the levers and pushed buttons and checked whether the cow was chewing the cud and lifting her tail in proper order. He called it all "helping the cow digest" [помогать корове пищеварять] and took his job of "digestion helper" [пищеварятельный помошник] very seriously.

2. The Penguin's Pooping Party - the story, as told by a penguin, is short and gross - he invited some zoo animals to his party, but they came, pooped (party poopers, get it?) and disappeared, leaving steaming piles of dung behind them. The penguin then asked for help in identifying those party poopers - a rabbit, a bird, a wild cat of some sort, and an elephant - and matching them to their excrements - 4 walk throughs and countless retells on our way home.

3. Vomit Slurping Fly - a giant fly that talked his feeding habits quite openly and with a New Jersey accent - M listened to the whole lecture, although I think he was fascinated by the fly itself.

4. Transfusion Confusion game - the premise is simple - Nurse Gross has to prepare animal blood for transfusion to various animals (mostly insects, inverterbrate and spiders). But she needs to figure out which blood has to go to which animal 'cause you know different animals have different colored blood (red, white, or blue - very 4th of July, really). Players must help the nurse or else she'll be on permanent bedpan duty. M played this game at least 10 times.

5. A video of a tapeworm travelling through intestines - M watched this video a couple of times without aparent interest, but since then he washes his hands better for sure (and so do I, so do I).

6. Slippery Sea Slide - at the end of the exhibit, there was this submarine for the kids to play in. But it also had a slide shaped like a sea snake (or a sea worm). So you enter the worm's rear end, climb through a narrow twisted passage, then slide down and emerge from its mouth. A very unsettling experience for adults. But the kids - M and his little friends who came with us - loved it.

The exit was, of course, through a gift shop. I considered buying a T-shirt with "World's Most Endangered Fieces" on it, but M wanted a small toy mouse instead. The mouse was tiny (think cat's toy) and very realistic. M held it gently in the palm of his hand, talking to it about this and that. We exited the gift shop and went to see the dinosaurs and talk about their poop (bigger than elephant's for sure!)