I love that this little festival has taken off in our neighborhood!

In June A and I celebrated our 10th anniversary. It's hard for me to believe it has been 10 years. I consider it such an enormous blessing to be walking through life with my best friend. I can't wait to see what the next decade brings.

We got to visit Abbey's family in Texas in early June, and attended a wedding of a friend that Abbey has known since first grade.

We also go to visit Miami Beach (child-free!). We were quite contented to sit and talk, read the paper, and enjoy coffee: things that are typically difficult to do with any level of concentration destroyed by small children.

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In June we: picked some of the early corn, enjoyed the swimming pool at the local YMCA, and enjoyed many bike rides at local parks.

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Last fall A purchased and planted approximately 400 strawberry plants. Over the winter, A fertilized them, and kept them covered up when we got some late freezes.

 

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In May, they came into full fruition. At it's height, we got 10-12 quarts of strawberries (edit: A says we got 20 quarts on some days). We ate them with breakfast, with lunch, and sometimes with dinner. As I said many times, there is something decadent about eating $5 worth of strawberries (if they were purchased at the store) at one time.

Some mornings I would go out and pick them fresh for my breakfast, which is always a pleasant way to start the day.

Those that we couldn't eat, we gave away, sold ($5 a quart), or froze.

I don't know if A will do this again next year or not, but it was definitely a fun experiment!

A also got her bees last month. They were delivered via USPS to the local post office in two boxes with 7500 workers and a queen bee each. A says that they called her at 7am with a somewhat urgent voicemail: "We have your bees, please come get them as soon as possible!" Her story of standing in line to pick them up and the wide eyes as they were delivered over the counter is pretty amusing.

Overall, May was a great month for gardening. We harvested garlic scapes, French breakfast radishes, and lots of lettuce (some days I took salads to work that were nearly entirely sourced from the backyard).

I can't wait to see what June brings!

We got to visit A's family in Texas, which is always a treat. A's sister was gracious to host us along with our circus troupe of small children and dogs.

We also attended a friend's wedding (our first Indian wedding).

What a fun month! Spring is finally upon us, and despite a couple of late freezes our strawberries are doing quite well! More about that later.

C has been going around the house singing a very recognizable form of "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" as well as counting to five and singing a fairly massacred version of the alphabet.

Our first handful of strawberries came in, and in May I expect we'll get more than we can possibly eat. We're hoping to sell a few to make up for the expense of purchasing and irrigating them.

We had to cover them up one weekend to keep the last freeze from doing any damage.

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But I am happy to report that they suffered the cold with no problems.

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I got to travel to Montreal to PyCon. Next year, if I get to go again, I hope to take the entire family along. It's certainly a beautiful city.

Lastly, we adopted this little guy. We're currently reading "Charlotte's Web" to J, so when we asked for name suggestions, she gave "Wilbur." Seemed appropriate for a pug.

He is 8 months old, and was adopted from a "semi-retired" couple that wanted him to go to a more active family.

Lovely month, even though weather patterns were a bit nutty (snow one day, 70 degrees the next).

We got beehives (bees won't get here until May), hiked at Beaman Park, visited Cheekwood and our old home place (for photos with daffodils), and generally tried to be outside as much as we could when the weather permitted. It's been a long winter! I'm glad Spring is here.

New hives ready to paint...
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Almost finished!
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Enjoying snow on March 3
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Getting out to Shelby Bottoms to enjoy warm weather later in the month.
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I kept meaning to post a 2013 wrap-up, but I believe that opportunity has already passed.

February was fun. We had a few warm days. At one point Abbey stopped by the office and I took the afternoon off to play with the girls at the park (shifting my work until after they had gone to bed). Best idea ever.

A has been working through the book Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons with J. For every 10 lessons she completes, she gets a "prize." At lesson 20, I took her to see Frozen, which was her first theater experience. She seemed to quite enjoy it.

She is about a third of the way through the book now, and it seems she is picking it up quite well!

The first day of March was fun, too. A co-worker invited us to his wedding. Once you hit 30, your cadre of single friends drops off significantly and you rarely are invited to weddings, so the invitation was quite a treat. Furthermore, it was a formal Catholic wedding, which was new to us. I bought a suit for the occasion, which I've been meaning to do for a while now for various reasons.

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Don't worry. This is not going to become a food blog. There's a particular dish we have come to love during the winter and wanted to share. No precious anecdotes other than to say it's the only way C will gobble up kale like no tomorrow. Go to your local asian grocery store and request they stock cane vinegar, if you don't find it. It's delicious. Malty, nutty, sweet and sour. You can interchange a lot of items but this is how we have come to love it.

Cane Vinegar Chicken
adapted from Hugh "Unibrow" Acheson's recipe in A New Turn in the South

2 tbls butter or coconut oil
4 large chicken thighs, rubbed with salt and cracked pepper
red pepper flakes
yellow onion, sliced long
2-3 garlic gloves, diced
1 1/2 cups of cane vinegar
3 cups of water or chicken broth
2 tsps regular paprika
bunch of greens, chopped (spinach or kale)
2 naval oranges or 3-4 clementines, peeled and chopped
mint leaves, chopped (optional)

brown and wild rice, cooked according to directions

In a heavy stock pot, melt your butter or oil on medium heat. Add a dash of red pepper flakes and lightly brown each side of the chicken thighs, two at a time. Remove from the pot. Add the onions and sweat for 5 minutes before adding the garlic for another 3 minutes. Add the cane vinegar and, while using a wooden spoon, deglaze all the brown bits from the bottom of the pan. Add your water or chicken broth and continue cooking until the liquid reduces by half. Add your chicken thighs on top of the onions, skin side up. Cover and reduce heat to low, cooking for another 30 minutes. Now start your rice or egg noodles or whatever starchy thing you prefer. When the chicken is finished layer your oranges on top first and then greens (and mint, if you have it). Cover and let it all steam together for 10 minutes until the greens have wilted well. Serve it on top of your rice.

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