our organic garden

I'm all for keeping it real on this blog, and I'm about to do just that. Our garden is abundant this year in cucumbers, tomatoes, potatoes and sweet peas. And depending on how I take the pictures, you might just think our garden is well tended. And it sort of is. It gets watered. It was planted. You know, the basics.

But it turns out there is a lot going on at this little hobby farm. And weeding just never seems to be at the top of the list. Which means that our garden is also abundant in weeds. As in, they are out of control.

Tonight we will have 40 relatives here to visit our little farm. The farming relatives. The ones who all have huge gardens and green thumbs and years and years of expertise. And we're going to have to show them our weeds. I have this feeling some of these relatives might just grab a pair of gloves and start pulling. Which would be awesome and embarrassing at the same time.

So as long as the farming relatives get to see the true state of our garden, I thought I'd share it with you too.

So there it is. Our dirty laundry. Or in this case, our weedy garden.

the best meal of the year

Behold the Fried Green Tomato.

I am pretty sure it is my favorite food to eat. I thought about that fact long and hard as I ate them this year. I thought through the christmas menu, the thanksgiving menu, compared it against my favorite soup, even against a caprese salad. And I decided that the Fried Green Tomato wins for top favorite.

And I think I know why: you can only have a Fried Green Tomato for a few weeks of the year. It is a seasonal food, available nowhere unless there are green tomatoes growing.

Not to mention the dipping sauce. A kicked up mayonnaise with extra vinegar. Salivating as I type. I wrote about the dipping sauce back in 2011. And you might remember last year when I paired the food with the movie, which was pretty much as awesome as I had imagined it would be.

While we ate our Strawberry Pie back in June, Rory and I were talking about how delicious the pie was, partly because we picked those very berries, and partly because those berries were perfectly ripe. You can order a slice of strawberry pie any day of the year at Bakers Square, but you're not going to get a pie like the one we ate at the end of June. You have to wait until the end of June to have a strawberry pie that good.

So we decided to only have strawberry pie at the end of June. And a peach pie only in July. And homemade blueberry cobbler with homemade ice cream in August. We got all excited about having one special sweet treat each month of the year, depending on what is in season. (I've googled some mid-winter sweets...custard pie, banana cream, honey pie...just you wait!) And to not eat that treat any other time of the year.

Because food tastes better when it's in season. That should be obvious. But maybe part of the goodness is in anticipating that food all year long. Like my Fried Green Tomatoes.

more jesus

Each night when Elsie goes to sleep we will read three books and then I'll ask her if she wants to snuggle. She always does and it means she turns her body and rests her head under my chin as we rock back and forth and I sing Jesus Loves Me.

Tonight as a stalling tactic, she kept calling out during the song, "More Jesus!" So I sang Jesus Loves the Little Children. And she kept on, "More Jesus! More Jesus!"

I mean, honestly, what is a mother to do?

So I kept on, "Jesus, Jesus there's just something about that name. Master, Savior, Jesus..." and on, "Tis so Sweet to Trust in Jesus...Jesus, Jesus how I trust Him!" and on, "What a Friend we have in Jesus, All our Sins and Griefs to Bear..." And at this point it became a game for me too. A good ol' church-girl challenge. I went through camp songs, hymns, and church liturgy.

It was a really precious moment and a moment I am sure will now be repeated, now that Elsie knows the magic words that will keep me in her room, holding her close, rocking her back and forth, back and forth.

More Jesus!

july at the grovestead

And I'm back! We just returned from family bible camp and had an awesome time. I had planned on blogging while up at camp, but as it turns out camp has its own wonderful pace and I only got my laptop out one time. Which might just be reason number 6,793 why I love family bible camp so much.

But it also meant I went a whole week without blogging! Which is a very rare occurrence for me.

This month flew by and I have a whole lot of posts still left in my head so I thought I'd close this month with a bit of a photo dump. We're in full on summertime here at the grovestead. Lots of animals, flowers, produce, sunshine and weeds. Our chickens are growing, our children are growing, and our garden is growing.

It's a happy season and we're happily soaking it all in.

overheard

Elsie has started calling me, "BahKah." I've tried to tell her that I am her mama a few times, and then I heard Ivar tell her this, "Elsie, only oldults call her Becca. Are you an oldult? No. We are kids. So we call her Mama. Can you say Mama?" Elsie looked right at him and said, "BahKah."

We have been listening to an old VBS cd in the car and one of the songs says, "I'm fired up for Jesus!" Ivar asked me what fired up means. I told him, "Well, when you're fired up it means you want to tell everyone. When you're fired up for Jesus it means you want everyone to know that you love him so much." Ivar told me, "Oh. I'm fired up for these chips. Mama, you should tell all the people that I just love these chips!"

***
And I put these up on facebook, but I don't ever print out facebook like I print my blog...so it's not really a great place to write my kid's quotes. But since I print out my blog, I'll record them here:

Ivar just put on his spiderman glasses from McDonalds and said, "When I put these on I am going to be very grumpy and pretend that I am not hilarious."

Ivar just said, "mom, you remember that movie of the little lamp that was jump, jump, jumping and it smooshed a letter? I want to watch that one again sometime. Maybe we can get it at the library." (he was talking about the little scene that shows before every Pixar movie.)

Ivar during his bath: "And mom, don't get any wetness on my hair. Because then it will grow and remember I got it cut yesterday?"

We were given a children's picnic table and the kids are thrilled. Ivar told me, "now me and Elsie will sit at this little table and the oldults will sit at the big table!" I think that makes me and Rory oldults.

Ivar just said, "Remember when we went to the zoo yesterday and we got a rememberingship so we can go again and again and again?"

Last night Ivar and I were struggling to get his tight pajama shirt on. He said, "It won't go on! Because it is for small-year-olds, and I'm three-years-old!"

the rice county fair

After Elsie's birthday party we decided to go to the Rice County Fair. Our friend Kandi was competing in the Karaoke competition and had made it into the finals. Obviously we had to go and watch! And we're so glad we did. She took home the gold, or in this case, a whole lot of fair bucks! When she started singing the guy behind us said, "well, here's the winner!" She was awesome.

And of all the rides to choose from our kids chose the big slide. Ivar loved it and would do it again in a heartbeat. Elsie held her breath most of the way down and let out a whimper when we got to the end. It might have been just a little bit too big for her: 

elsie slide from Becca Groves on Vimeo.

Then we went and saw all of the animals went home when everyone was still happy. A great night at the fair!

Elsie turns two!

Saturday Elsie turned two. It was two years ago that my delivery doctor said "it's a girl!" and I let out a sob-cry of happiness like I'd never sob-cried before. This girl overtook my heart in an instant.

This past week I hemmed and hawed over what to do for Elsie's birthday. I was sick with a cold, not feeling like a party planner. And as my mom, sister Annika and sis-in-law Lisa will tell you, I changed the party plans every single day. Every other day we were going to a splash pad. The days in between we would celebrate here at our place.

In the end, we had the party here. And without planning it, the party became a garden party. Picking food from the garden, getting it ready to eat for the birthday lunch.

Sonna found the carrots and decided to pick some of them. Rory commented that he probably would have given them a few more weeks, but since Sonna had them proudly in her hand, this was a great day to pick a few. :)

Josie, Mara and Sonna picked sweet peas and then shelled all of them! We cooked them for lunch and they were delicious. At one point all of the kids were shelling peas together. Lisa told me, "there's your party game!"

Jack is 17 and he is awesome. When he saw the eggs in the coop he asked permission to go fry them up. I think this is what happens when you're a 17-year-old growing guy. You see protein and you just have to eat it. Like right now. I was so happy he was so excited to eat our eggs!

And then there's Zina. Zina brought a box of bee keeping gear that her husband had used decades ago...including this hat! (I'll write more about that another day.) Zina saw the flowers on our pumpkins and got so excited to fry them up. She went to work in the kitchen and I'm here to say that I would eat a plate full of these fried pumpkin flowers any day. The flower is sort of sweet and soft. Can't explain it, but they were awesome. And Zina was so, so happy to be making them. She went back for more flowers after her first batch. What a joy!

Mostly this party was awesome because it was so good to be together. I think this shot of my mom and sister sums that up nicely. And this picture has been added as one of my favorite pics of all time. We'll get this one framed asap.

And then there is Kyle and Lisa. Lisa biked here for the party. No kidding. Probably thirty miles. She made it to the outside of town and then called her pit crew to drive her in for the last bit. But if it hadn't been so windy she would have pulled up our lane on her bicycle!

Love this family shot. And especially love that my brother will be here in a few weeks so we can get him in the next family shot!

We had another wiener roast and mom made her chicken salad. And mostly we ate from the garden: lettuce, cucumbers, carrots, peas, pumpkin flowers and two tiny yellow tomatoes.

We wrapped up with cupcakes and presents and got to enjoy the sweetness of Elsie. She seemed so glad and grateful. I don't know how to explain it. She just seemed so happy to be celebrated. She was delightful. It was a super special second birthday.

Introducing our Broiler Chicks

Rory's phone rang this morning at 6 am and it was the post office letting us know our chickens had been delivered. Rory just finished the coop last night so the timing was pretty perfect. When we came downstairs there was a whole lot of cheeping coming out of the bathroom.

Now before we go any further, you need to understand these are Broiler Chicks. Emphasis on the Broiler. As in, their fate will be our belly. We have 6-8 weeks to enjoy their company, and for them to enjoy their sweet life on our farm. Rory has tried to coach me the best he can to not grow attached. He recommended that I maybe don't name the chickens this time. Or take so many pictures of them. Or hold them late at night after the kids have gone to bed.

But I'm already attached. I was when the phone rang at 6 am and I squealed because 30 baby chicks is a very exciting delivery. So I am going to name them, but with names fitting their ending. And to any vegetarians out there, I flat out apologize. I want you to know these birds will be given the nicest life on our farm, in a beautiful brand new chicken coop built just for them.

Without further adieu, let me introduce our newest farm animals:

I could go on and on. But here's the thing. They are identical. And move around a lot. So at any given time, any chick may be called Fried Steak or any other delicious meal to come.

a summertime head cold

I've been down for the count this week with a horrible cold. Elsie has it too and together we are quite the stuffed up, achy pair. It means we haven't done much this week except begin new household programs like the one I made up today: Operation Off You Sister.

We also have watched a new family show each evening, a show we call "Letters!" Letters! is an awesome show with a wheel with numbers a guy named Pat and a lady named Vanna. The show is awesome because people call out Letters, which my kids are both very interested in, and then the letters show up on the board. It also helps that this week is Disney Cruise week, so Micky and Minnie make frequent appearances.

My friend Kandi brought us dinner last night when she heard I was sick. When she dropped it off I kept thanking her, feeling a bit embarrassed, but so, so grateful. She commented that at her other church they always brought meals for each other. I said, "well for sure when someone has had a baby or maybe just found out dire news, but we don't often give meals for the common cold." But we should. I appreciated that meal so much (tonight too!).

And finally...do you see that red and white structure behind the kitten? Rory has been building a mobile chicken coop this week, all ready for the 30 chicks that will be arriving in the mail one of these days. Every package that has been delivered this week has been inspected by Ivar, listening for peeping. We are all very excited for these chicks to arrive.