I’m aching today, but not as bad as I anticipated. It’s always good to make things out to be worse than they might be, that way when they turn out bad they don’t seem as awful because you spent all that time imagining the worst. Kind of like how when my family moved from upscale Lancaster PA to a cabin in downscale Leadmine WV and my mother told everyone what a dump it was and then when they came to visit us they were like, “Wow! This place is totally cool—not at all how I was picturing it! You guys have running water and drywall and it’s downright civilized!”

Or, it’s kind of like childbirth. If you think you’re going to cry and scream and slap your husband in the face and swear at the nurses and die and then you don’t, you feel kind of proud of yourself.

And anyways even if you do cry and scream and swear, once you’re holding that wrinkled little monkey-faced baby all of that doesn’t even matter anymore.

Sometimes it pays to anticipate the ugly.

All that to say, I don’t ache too bad today. But! I still am sore enough that I figured I deserved to take it easy. So we’ve done homeschooling (I called a holiday yesterday) and I ran to the greenhouse (to get more plants to stuff in our overflowing garden—yes, I have a problem; no, I’m not going to do anything about it … except complain) while my sis-in-law watched the kids, and I fed my children Swamp Monster Soup for lunch.

But back to the garden. I thought you might like to see what “getting outside to plant the squashes” means. I first made five hills of dirt and showed the girls how to stuff the seeds in the top of them. Then I hauled a load of straw, a bag of old newspapers, and a bucket of water down to the squash patch and I set about mulching it. I dipped the newspapers—several pages thick—and laid them down in the valleys between the squash mountains. And then I piled on the straw, nice and high.

Shoot. That didn’t sound all that hard. But it did make my back hurt.

(The only problem with my little system is that it didn’t rain last night like it was supposed to and now today is windy and the straw is lifting up and the papers are blowing away. I had to run down to the field to collect the sheets of old news, re-cover the ground with them, and then shovel some dirt on top to hold them in place. After a soaking rain, they should pack down good and stay put. I think.)

When Mr. Handsome came home, I gave him a tour of the garden. He was impressed. Which was gratifying. As we passed by the chicken coop, he exclaimed, “What did you do—plant that chicken?”

I took a closer look. It certainly did appear planted.

But then it stood up and looked at us cock-eyed. So it wasn’t planted after all.

I’m rested up now. Time to go pot my Impatiens and petunias.

I’m shot. I worked in the garden all morning and before that I made refried beans, baked the Dutch Puff, started mixing up an oatmeal cake, and made granola. Once out in the garden I planted almost a pound of green beans (Empress), some sweet corn, leeks, the last of the peas, two packets of flowers, and sunflowers. There’s a lot more to do that I’d rather not get into now.

Planting a garden is exhausting and overwhelming. We are already running out of garden space (I feel slightly crazy when I think of all the food we’ll be pulling out of the garden in a couple months) and we haven’t even planted the three kinds of dried beans, the main crop of sweet corn, tomatoes, peppers, butternuts, zucchinis, and cucumbers.

There. I just went and told you all the other things I have to do. So much for not going into the details.

After feeding the kids lunch and getting Nickel down for his nap, I inhaled a piece and a half (and then some more snitches) of oatmeal cake, still warm from the oven, and my coffee. That brings me up to the present moment. I’m still tired. I have lots of brain energy, but my body is crying out for a break.

Right around now is when Mr. Handsome starts snorting and guffawing at my royal wimpiness. He is Mr. Superman—hauling bundles of shingles up onto roofs (I don’t let him tell me how high they are), carrying sheets of plywood on his head, framing up houses, slinking around in filthy crawl spaces, stuffing insulation in sweltering attics—all the live-long day. And then he comes home and mows and tills and takes care of the chickens and digs holes for my plants (if I beg loud enough) and organizes his barn and, and, and… So when I work outside for a couple hours and then moan about my aching body parts, he has absolutely no sympathy.

But hey, I pushed out some whomping huge babies, so really, he’s got nothin’ on me.

Anyway, I made some raspberry-mint tea the other day and it might be just the thing I need now to help me get my energy back. It’s clean, sweet, and fruity-minty, and it’s red. Red equals energy and fire and power and passion, right? In that case, I think this drink ought to have a corner on the kick-in-the-pants market.

Ah, that’s better. Now I’m off to plant the squashes.

Raspberry-Mint Tea

I threw these ingredients together willy-nilly, but I will try my best to give you some measurements to go on. That means, of course, that I’m totally bluffing, acting like there is a formula to this tea, so I suggest you take a brief gander at the ingredient list and then go create your own butt-kicking drink.

1 cup mint leaves, or 2 cups mint sprigs
8 cups water, divided
the juice of one lemon
½ -1 cup sugar
1-2 cups red raspberries

In a small saucepan, simmer the raspberries in two cups of water. Pour the mixture through a fine-mesh sieve, reserving the juice and discarding the seedy pulp.

Put four cups of water in a different saucepan and bring to a boil. Add the tea leaves, turn off the heat, clap on the lid, and let the tea steep for half an hour. Strain, reserving the liquid and discarding the leaves.

Combine the raspberry juice and the mint tea, the lemon juice, and the sugar. Add another couple cups of water—or ice, if you want to cool the tea faster—and chill.

To serve, pour over ice and garnish with a sprig of mint.

If you ever want to do something daring with your hair, something totally different, but are too timid, take a pair of scissors to your (a willing) child’s head. It’s almost just as good. It gives you a high to see your child with new locks—or not—and you feel brave and daring and like you’re living life on the edge. Is this why people become hairdressers, I wonder? Do they all get a little zip from leaving clumps of hair on the floor? Or maybe I only got the high because it was my own kid’s hair that was falling in satisfactory little heaps all over the tiled bathroom floor.

Miss Becca Boo was genuinely scandalized by Yo-Yo’s new look. “Everyone will laugh at you,” she warned, aghast that he would so casually endanger his place in society.

Yo-Yo just grinned and said, “No they won’t. They’ll make me head of the club. The person with the shortest hair is ruler.”

What? A short-haired club? Either I know nothing of my son’s social circles or he has a vivid imagination. I suspect the later. But hey, I love it that he’s bold enough to make his own fashion statements. He certainly didn’t inherit that trait from me.

Miss Becca Boo also pointed out that he was now a bald-headed baby like the two little boys in Because of Winn-Dixie, an elegant, simply-stated novel by Kate DiCamillo. I don’t think he looks anything at all like a baby with his skanky hair gone (thank goodness)—I think he looks more grown-up and sprightly, like a gnome. Maybe it’s just my mother’s eyes…

Yo-Yo’s hair came off in stages over a twenty-four hour period. First we buzzed it, and then the next day he tried shaving lines into it. Then I buzzed it lower. And lower. He wants it totally bald, but I’d have to use a razor and I’m scared I’ll cut him. I told that to Mr. Handsome. His nonchalant response? “It will heal.”

We’ll see … maybe if Yo-Yo begs. We’ve come this far; might as well go all the way.