Bounty

1. Something that is given generously. 2. Liberality in giving: generosity. 3. Yield, especially of a crop.

 My neighbor and friend, Mary, has a booth at several farmers’ markets. She sells her family’s products from McCauley Brothers’ Olive Groves. At the end of the day vendors pack up to go home. Many of the farmers have produce that is at the peak of perfection and will not last another day. Exchanges and gifts are given rather than throw produce away. Mary brings some vegetables and fruits home but she can’t eat all that is offered. Lucky me – Mary calls on her cell phone when she is nearing home and asks me to meet her at the end of my driveway.

I’m going to enjoy an ear of Brentwood White Sweet Corn for dinner tonight, along with a salad of heirloom tomatoes.

Last week Mary brought me a basket of strawberries.

They smelled wonderful but I couldn’t eat a whole basket so I made a small batch of refrigerator strawberry jam. Now I can enjoy the berries for two weeks when I spread the jam on my morning toast.

Dining out

 Don’t those people at the round table look pleasant? They are. They are my relatives. My brother-in-law Butch and his wife Virginia drove down from Nevada City, and my son Davis and his wife Toni came up from San Jose. Jess and Sylvia drove east from Oakland and we all met at Cap’s Oak Street Bar & Grill in Brentwood last night.

We had a lot of catching up to do. I missed the family gathering in Nevada City in July because the memorial service for my friend Bev was held on that same day.

Toni brought a quilt she had just quilted for Sylvia. The quilt is going to be given to a young foster daughter of another cousin this Saturday. The quilt is just darling with its flip-flops and suns. Sylvia is going to put on the binding today. I admired the fun, bright colors Sylvia had used and the marvelous quilting Toni did on her long-arm machine. (You can click on the photo to see more details.)

Toni

The food was great and I was treated to my dinner. Thank you all.

Hot and cold

I could not jam any more stuff in my freezer so I had to defrost the refrigerator today. It’s been two years. The hair dryer is a handy tool. The old method of putting a pot of hot water into the freezer was very slow. I now have a clean kitchen floor because that got all wet today, too.

Now I have to go shopping to fill up the freezer again. I tossed a lot of old stuff that had been in there too long. I’ll cook up some more freezable meals so I can enjoy no-cooking nights. I love leftovers. My marinara sauce looks tempting. I need a big carton of vanilla ice cream.

The sky looked interesting tonight so I snapped a picture.

Morning watch

I sit out on the new landing in morning and Blackie watches the world wake up.

Peripatetic posies

A nice idea that missed its target. A bucket of birthday flowers was supposed to surprise my son Davis at his desk yesterday. However, I messed up. I ordered the bouquet on Tuesday from a Redwood City florist for delivery on Wednesday at his place of work.

I called my son yesterday to wish him a happy birthday. We chatted for a while and I sort of hinted around about a delivery of something. That’s when I learned that his office was in San Jose, not Redwood City where I’d sent the flowers. His company has several Bay Area locations. I’ve never visited him at work and somehow I’d missed the fact that he had moved to the San Jose office twelve years ago. Oh dear. I had to tell him about the surprise flowers so he could call the other office and let them know they were coming to the wrong place. There is a courier service between all the offices so I am sure he will get the flowers today.

It’s the thought that counts, I hope.