wednesday's words and wanderings and wonderings

This past week I spent a few days working in the yard, cleaning out the flower beds and the rest of the herb garden. I pulled out the already dead dill plant, smiling at the memory of the swallowtail butterfly caterpillar chewing non-stop through one of the plants in a couple of days. I snipped parsley and rosemary for freezing, in anticipation of catching a taste summer freshness in my winter cooking. I let the marigolds go as long as they could, keeping the yellow and gold and orange flowers for last minute pollen gathering for the bees. After all 100+ plants turned brown, it was time to pull them out and turn up the dirt to make space for the new marigolds to be planted when the soil once again warms. Todd raked leaves to cover the bare soil for the winter. Over the winter the leaves will compost and nourish the soil for the upcoming spring. 

We took the yard waste to the Montgomery County waste facility and parked next to a man who was dumping his landscaping debris. Laying next to his flat bed was his red Craftsman wheelbarrow. Memories came flooding back of my dad and his career at Sears and how good the Craftsman tool line was. Back in the day Craftsman was exclusive to Sears. Now you find it at Lowe's, Ace Hardware, on Amazon, and probably other places. After the trip to the dump, I took my car to the car wash. It was embarrassingly dirty plus that impromptu snow storm from earlier in the week put so many wet, mushy leaves on the roads which topped off the dirtiness. 

We are headed off for a little weekend jaunt with some friends to celebrate Todd's birthday. After our trip to Cleveland, I'm not buying any groceries for this week and using up what's in the fridge. I've never made the popular baked feta with cherry tomatoes. I had the basics - the feta and cherry tomatoes - and added some fontina, green onions, and red bell pepper. I used the recipe but with my additions, cleared out a few items that wouldn't have lasted over the weekend. I emptied a box of pasta that had an inch of noodles left and after boiling it to al dente, enjoyed a nice little pasta lunch with that ooey, gooey cheesy sauce.