Friday morning, my daughter-in-law texted: Random ask, would you and John like to go camping with us this weekend?

The last time I went camping was at church retreat, probably around 2008 or 2009, but that wasn’t really camping since all our meals were prepared — we were just sleeping in a tent at retreat. And before that, my family went camping at Dolly Sods.

When I was a teenager. 

Once.

In other words, camping isn’t in my comfort zone. It’s not even really comfort-zone adjacent, either.

But I said yes almost immediately because here’s the thing(s): 

1) When young adult children ask you out, you go (in the middle years, a big part of parenting involves making the switch from leader to follower). 
2) All the cool kids camp and I wanna be cool. 
3) Doing uncomfortable things makes me feel good.
4) It sounded like fun!

The kids borrowed a 2-person tent from a friend of theirs and loaned us one of their sleeping mats. We split meal responsibilities — they took supper and we took breakfast — and I baked a batch of granola bars and filled baggies with green peppers, dried mangos, almonds, coffee, and granola. My husband printed out a camping list and checked off all the (relevant) things.

I had no idea how it would go. I wasn’t sure where we were headed or how far we’d have to walk, but it turned out to be a low-key, easy sort of camping trip. The walk to the campsite was super short, and the creek we had to ford several times was low. 

We set up camp, went on a short hike to the middle of some stinging nettles (oops), took a dip in the creek, played Rook, roasted hot dogs, visited, and went to bed when the sun went down. (Almost as soon as we got there, I became weirdly nauseated. After I napped, belched a bunch of times, and started to feel better, we figured out that my nausea was probably due to blowing up the mattress pad.)

My husband and I slept only moderately terribly, and the next morning I labored far too long over a few cups of disappointingly weak coffee, though no one pitched a fit. Probably because we were too tired to much care.

And then it started raining, so we packed up our stuff and moseyed back to the van.

^{photo credit: my daughter-in-law}

The rain let up as we neared town, and when we passed the pickleball courts, they were empty!

They’re almost never empty, so we decided to jump on it: we quick swung by their house to pick up rackets and use the bathroom before heading back to the courts for several games, the last of which my husband and I (finally!) won.

Back home, my husband and I unpacked, showered, rehydrated, ate big plates of groundnut stew (vegetables!) and chicken, and then curled up on the sofa with our laptops to research camping supplies.

You know, for when we go on our next venture….

This same time, years previous: a fantastic week, fried, the end, damn good blackberry pie.

Quotidian: daily, usual or customary;
everyday; ordinary; commonplace

The working kitchen.

When the croissants aren’t up to snuff, we suffer sooooo much. (JK!)

Seasonal Meal Rec #1: Bruschetta (tomatoes, basil, garlic).

Seasonal Meal Rec #2: Vegetarian Groundnut Stew (zucchini, carrots, onions, tomatoes).

Seasonal Meal Rec #3: Chef Salad (whatever you’ve got),
with Croutons (stale baguettes, olive oil, everything bagel seasoning).

Caraway Swiss: I am VERY excited.

My latest attempt to beat the heat: premixing granola
and taking it to work to bake in the empty, still-hot ovens.

Resuscitations.

And now their arms are sore.

Soaking up the cuddles: puppy sitting.

This same time, years previous: iced café con leche, the quotidian (8.1.16), a pie story, babies, boobs, boo-boos, and bye-byes, a birthday present for my brother, shrimp, mango, and avocado salad.

^{photo credit: my younger daughter}

A couple weeks ago, after much dragging of feet, my husband and younger daughter finally took Daisy to auction.

^{photo credit: my younger daughter}

Dropping her off kinda broke his heart, and it made me sad, too, but once she was gone, it was a tremendous relief. Bulk-processing milk from two cows, and at breakneck speeds, had been sucking up a ton of my time. 

And then I decided to go one step further and not even make cheese with the milk we do have. For a couple weeks (and maybe even longer, we’ll see), I’m giving myself permission to skip cheesemaking entirely. I skim the milks, saving the cream for us, and then the skimmed milk goes to Fern and Petunia.

 At first, feeding all our fresh, wonderful milk to the pigs felt terribly wrong (it’s hard for me to silence the voice in my head that says I gotta make the most of everything), but it’s not actually a loss. Feeding the milk to the pigs saves us on feed costs and goes towards our future sausage, and when I water plants with the whey (or milk!), the nutrients build up the soil. In other words, “dumping” the extra milk isn’t wasteful — it’s just a shift in perspective. Food production is cyclical, and sharing the milk with the animals (and land) is as valuable as using it up directly ourselves. 

mascarpone cheese

Now that I’ve forced myself to let go, instead of the milk controlling me, I’m controlling the milk. And the best part? Once again I have energy to play! I’m having so much fun brainstorming new, more complicated (to me, anyway, because they’re new) hard cheeses, as well as returning to more recipes that call for smaller amounts of milk and cream, like soft cheeses and ice creams. It’s lovely.

berry cream swirl

(And very delicious.)

***

Daisy’s sale stats: She went for “82 dollars a hundred,” and since she weighed 1470 pounds, so we got a check for $1169, after the fees were removed.)

This same time, years previous: the coronavirus diaries: week whatever, the quotidian (7.29.19), the quotidian (7.30.18), my deficiency, do you strew?, heading north, the quotidian (7.30.12), Indian pilaf of rice and split peas.