This morning P suddenly woke me saying my name over and over with greater numbers of exclamation marks after each repeat. Then he leapt out of bed. The kids were already up and it turned out that when we did some gift wrapping last night, we had left some receipts on the kitchen table. Our daughter had found one and was saying to her little brother “Hey! This is a receipt from that toy shop we like! And it’s from this month! It might have our Christmas presents on it! Luckily P intercepted at this point but the kids were on high alert for more clues. Never under estimate the learning rate or the intelligence of your children! The older they get, the smarter their parents have to get. It’s a rough ride. LOL.
Yes, it’s Christmas Eve. A relatively mild forecast of 30 degrees today and so far pretty smoke free. P has already been on the roof of the new car port, adding flashing between it and the garage and is working on plumbing it in to the rainwater tank. We moved the potted blue berries closer to the house so that I can feed them my tea leaves and coffee grounds. Apparently blue berries love acid. They are currently looking very sad and withered. Let’s hope they survive long enough to benefit from our belated TLC.
Yesterday we stewed 2.3kgs of apricots (from the larger tree) and a bit over 1 kg of cherries. We didn’t grow the cherries. I bought more than I intended to (thanks to the charming interplay of the two young men selling them) at the Farmers’ Market and then our local grocer gave us 2kgs to thank us for our regular custom. The ones from the grocer are fatter and less pocked so we are saving them to eat fresh. This morning P has picked another 3kgs of apricots from the smaller tree.
When the grocer gave me the cherries, I was so grateful and pleased but a little guilty alarm went off in my head. I have been thinking of swapping most of my custom back to the farmers’ market. The biggest reasons are that the food there is more local and fresher. And the organic produce at the market is unusually affordable! But the thing that really motivated me to make the effort of going out early on a Sunday morning is that the local grocer wraps nearly all of his green leafy produce in cling wrap. The grocer is a family owned store and, as the father grows elderly, the three sons are taking it over. They are lovely people and the shop has been there for as long as P can remember (he has lived in this area all his life). Perhaps I should tell them about why I am taking my business elsewhere. My parents don’t have a big choice of shops in the closest town to their property. There is basically one big IGA and market days. Mum makes sure she lets the IGA know her feelings about plastic. She believes if she lets them know they might change. I think she’s right but I struggle to confront the grocer, especially because part of me wants to shop mainly at the market anyway.
It’s easy to have principles. It’s challenging to live by them. It’s even harder to talk to other people about them without sounding judgmental or rude.
Wishing all readers a lovely Christmas Season and all the best for 2020! Thank you for taking time out of your busy days to read my ramblings.
Out of the Cave 