Greenbeans and Crown Molding

When it is hot like this,

 steamy,

 humid,

 almost-unable-to-breathe hot,

I know it is that time of year again.

Green beans.

Do you like them?

Do you like them in a box?

Do you like them with a fox?

I think they are okay:

not my favorite;

take 'em or leave 'em.

But not to my Farmer.

He and our three children could live on green beans.

There is usually scrambling over the last helping of green beans.

So when I married my Farmer,

I soon realized that July's hottest days

would be marked by picking

and canning green beans.

I can't say I have always had the happiest attitude
when picking them.

I've had 13 seasons of bean beetles
 
 and their eggs,..
 

and larvae,..

to squash
 
in order to maintain the plants for a longer harvest.


 It's the season of scurrying along a dirt path on a garden mat,

a knee high view of the world around me,
 

spiders racing across my bare feet,

grasshoppers bouncing off my head,

praying mantis bobbing in irritation at my interference

in the search of their next meal.

"A house divided cannot stand,"

Abraham Lincoln so wisely said.

And like it or not,

I'm living in a house where

there

MUST

be green beans.

My husband has a favorite saying when it comes to household fix-ups.

"I'm not a carpenter.

I can't do that."

I ignore this remark.

Everything I've given my "non-carpenter" to do,

he does an amazing job:

like the framing he did all around the porch windows.

(HURRAY for the finally finished painted floor!)

I've tried to run his saws

and hammers

and swung at my fair share of nails.

But I TRULY am not a carpenter.

My carpentry usually gets flung out the basement door

with words of frustrating:

"I can't do this!"

after several failed attempts

and decades of lost minutes.

I don't try anymore.

A few weeks ago,

I measured some places around the house that needed molding

and went out and bought it.

I showed my "non-carpenter" when he got home

what my plans were for him

and got irate rejection of the idea.

But the molding was purchased,

my dreams were in his hand,

and the next Saturday,

the saw was buzzing,

and my molding was attached and beautiful.

He helped my plain, newly painted cupboards go from this:

to this:



Our house is not divided on issues of carpentry and green beans.

I understand this is very likely a broad use of the Bible verse,

"And if a house be divided against itself,
that house cannot stand."
Mark 3:25

but the general idea is there.

 Marriage consists of a man and a woman

two extraordinarily different thinking people,

trying to walk in unison on a path through life.

In marriage there is a lot of sacrificing,

a lot of giving up what one wants to do with "my" time

to meet the other person's needs.

Learning to love something that the other loves

is a choice sometimes:

it's friendship.

Smooches and sweetness are grand,

the rose petals on the road of life;

but in the long haul,

friendship is the soft-soled sneakers

that make that road walkable.

We all have them in marriage:

the greenbeans and carpentry we can do for the other.

It's not always fun,
 

but it's worth it.

Linking up to:

 Between Naps on the Porch: Met Monday



Homestead Revival: Barn Hop


Kellys Korner Blog: Share A Piece of Marriage Advice

and to the fabulous

Easy Home-made Lemonade

Growing up at a camp in the country afforded me many 

adventures and valuable lessons for life.

My parents moved to minister at a Christian camp called

>Teen Haven<

that allowed kids from the cities within a few hours distance

to come out for weekends during the school year

and weeks at a time during the summers.

(I put the link above if you click on the words

so you can see it for yourself if you're looking for an excellent

place to support; the last couple years of the economy's struggles 

has been very hard on their monetary needs.)

My sisters and I were very involved at the camp,

working at the horse-farm (which has since closed for insurance reasons)

in the kitchen,

and helping with general cleaning.

I honestly felt like there was never a dull moment

and we got to see God's "finger-print" 

(as my Dad says)

on lives first-hand.

We got much of the food for the kids

from donations and the food bank.

Two things we quickly learned working in the kitchen

was that if it said that it was "diet" food in any way,

it needed to be removed from the package

and put in another package,

or it wouldn't be touched.

The other was that

most (of course, not all)

outdated food is fine for a while

after the date.

But if the campers saw the date

and it was one day after the expiration,

they wouldn't touch it.

Such is the mindset of most of us, I suppose.

Something magical happens on the expiration date

and the contents immediately turn into inedible waste.

Camp taught me how to recognize foods that were still useful,
even a few days after the expiration date.

I took this valuable lesson with me into my married life:

the local grocery store began giving us their old bread and produce for our

farm animals.

My cheapskate ways came to the surface,

and I began admiring the produce that the chickens were eating.

I was reminded of the prodigal son.

But this was perfectly fine fruit;
a new shipment had come in,
so the "old" produce had been given to us
for animal feed.

My Mom had ingrained in me some of this as well,

as she grew up in a family of seven.
The only bananas they ever ate were badly spotted

that the grocer gave to my grandfather on his rendering truck rounds.
They couldn't afford perfect bananas.

When a case of lemons arrived in the back of the pick up truck my husband 

brought for the "animals"

I snatched it, knowing the chickens wouldn't like lemons much anyhow

and that I had a thirst for some fresh lemonade:
(I just couldn't pass up on a whole case of lemons!
What a way to experiment!)

Using a recipe book I had called
Joy of Cooking,

I tweaked the recipe a bit

and created my own recipe

using a large glass sun tea jar purchased from Walmart.
(I think it holds a gallon).

Here it is,

for those of you who just gotta have that fresh lemonade taste.

First, roll the lemons around under your palm to loosen the juices.

(At this point,

when my son sees the pile of lemons sitting on the counter,

he volunteers to juice them).

He and his sister enjoy this little

 juicer that my Farmer gave me after watching me

manually squash about 50 lemons.

Sweet man.

I have found that 8 - 10 lemons will make a little over a cup of lemon juice.

This is sufficient for a jar of lemonade

(although I usually prefer 1 1/2 cups for the prefect amount of pulp).

I use raw sugar,
which has not been bleached...

so it looks brown.
For special occassions,
when I want the lemonade to look like lemonade,
I will use white sugar.

I've add fresh smashed raspberries as well,
to make it a pretty shade of light purple.

Perfection in a glass
on a hot sunny day!

Here's the recipe:

8 - 12 lemons (or 1 1/2 cups of lemon juice)

1 3/4 cups sugar (more of less, depending on taste preference)

1 gallon of water.

Roll lemons under palm of hand to loosen juices;

juice the lemons.

heat 1 1/2 cups of water and stir in sugar to dissolve.

Pour all ingredients into glass gallon jar and ad water to fill.  (Be sure to ad the hot sugar water

after adding the lemon juice so that the glass will not break if the heated sugar is too hot.  Yes, this is experience speaking).

Stir, cool, and enjoy!

Linked to:

The Saturday Evening Pot

and