baked beans

The baked beans made from scratch were fairly successful. I will be playing around with the ingredients a little to get the best taste - not entirely sure about the amount of molasses in this batch. I've put two dinner's worth in the freezer. Now all need to know is several hours in advance that I will not want to cook proper dinner and then I'll have beans for dinner which are not from a can. Though the home made ones really suited being eaten with rice which does make it a two pot meal. Which then counts as proper cooking.

The kefir is still alive. I've been drinking the drained kefir milk each morning.

It stopped raining for a while last night. I transplanted five lettuces from the seed raising punnet into individual pots. They can grow like that on the outside table for another fortnight or so until they are big enough that slugs will not devour them whole in one evening. I weeded a bit in the old chook run where there are still plenty of weed seeds which germinated when I transplanted the bay trees into this garden. Then I mulched with pea straw. The Maori potatoes which I planted all over the place are coming up - mostly in places where I forgot about them and planted something else there as well. I also staked some peas which have grown in the old chook run out of the mulch. Maybe we will get more peas out of this wild batch as we've only had three pods' worth out of all the carefully sown, bought pea seeds which I started off months ago.

I'll be thinking of my Mum's family this week as they bury my Great Aunt Shirley. My Great Uncle Ron died just days before we left for the UK, when we were already in Auckland ready to fly out. I lit candles for him in Ireland where we visited just two months later and I never made the time to let Shirley know this. She was on my list for visiting next time we go to Christchurch. I used to visit Ron and Shirley when I was a student in Christchurch. My brother and I biked around there for lunch one day when he was still at boarding school. Later I got lazy and caught the bus. Ron, a skilled handyman like all of the men in my Mum's family, kindly fixed our student flat washing machine many times. Shirley was a tiny woman, always very neat, who looked after her father in law, my great grandfather, with great love and care in his last days. Rest in Peace Shirley. May your faith give you strength and your presence stay warm in the hearts of your children.

In memory

A terrible thing happened in our small town less than two days ago. A young man of 16 was killed while he was walking along a road, training for the Coast to Coast. Favourite Handyman knew him well. We haven't been home much lately because we've been spending time with others who are missing their friend, son, brother, badly. It runs through my mind often what it must be like as a mother to answer the door to news that your son is dead. I look at my children in wonder at the gift of their lives. The funeral is Saturday. Sometime this weekend we will also plant something in our garden in honour of this young man.

Today is the anniversary of the death of my cousin Lou. Lou's wife Mary is my Dad's cousin and they are a treasured part of our West Coast life. Lou was 88 when he died last year, a prisoner of war in World War Two and a very special man. Today Brighid and I will take lunch round to Mary's and share with her and then we will visit Lou's grave, taking flowers from our garden and also flowers from Mary's garden. I wasn't successful with the plantings of Flanders poppies which I tried to grow in honour of Lou last year. I do remember his advice about planting tomatoes - some of the last advice he gave me - as I potter round the garden in Spring.