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We celebrated Thanksgiving with assorted Burleighs, Regners, and their allies. Sarah and I started the day by running in the Ferncliff Forest Turkey Trot. Sarah finished sixth in her age bracket, and I finished seventh in mine, behind first-place finisher Malcolm Gladwell. We spent the next nine hours in the kitchen. This year’s turkey, a […]

The Dutchess County Fair offers not only chances at glory, but also cash prizes.

Tomato production is in high gear, and it’s all we can do to keep up. How many BLTs and caprese salads are too many? We will find out. Jen stays hydrated as she tends her garden.

Jen retained her marmalade crown at the 176th Dutchess County Fair. Her peach-lemon marmalade is loved by all. Sarah, debuting in the 18-and-older category, crocheted her way to glory with this beautiful blanket. I eked out the bronze in sweet pickles.

Saturday was perhaps the observable height of the blackberry season. Here, Jen fills a gallon bag with them. Jam will follow. It’s also high season for wineberries, which, although invasive — possibly pestiferous — are sweet, and easy to gather. We collected a gallon of those too.

Flowers tend to bloom, and fruit tends to ripen, all at once. If you miss a weekend or two, you might miss something altogether. This weekend, we had a couple of days of the sort referred to in meteorological circles as stinkeroos. Still, if the fruit is ripe, the jam must be made — and […]

We had a quiet Independence Day weekend. On July 4, Sarah shucked corn while Daisy enjoyed a post-prandial stick. Sarah has been feeling rather independent herself, after the initial surprise of her graduation present. She has named it Stella.

Even Norman Rockwell might have been horrified by the amount of food we had at Thanksgiving this year, including a 21.5 lb. turkey, five pies (apple, pecan, pumpkin, hickory, and coconut), and three kinds of cranberry sauce (not readily distinguished from one another). We had Rinda, Erica, Lew, Geoff, Julie, and Stacey visiting, two of […]

Mid-October is quite late to make hay, but we’ve had a very wet season. Herb Stickle and his fleet of Ford tractors (seen here with bailer, tedder and mower attached) cleared out our hayfields this week. Herb said he made about eighty round bales. Here is a rare image of our interior swamp, in the […]

Today is the day to drop off culinary entries for the Dutchess County Fair. Jen, the defending champion in the marmalade category, entered four categories of jam. We are hopeful for a successful defense of her title. This weekend we had a visit from Lauren Ballback, Babysitter Emeritus to Sarah, and now counsel to the […]