Lazy W Marie

Carpeing all the diems in semi-rural Oklahoma...xoxo

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introducing literary saturdays at the lazy w

January 10, 2015

Happy Saturday, friends. Happy end of the week or beginning of the week or however you think of this luscious collection of hours between Friday and Sunday.

Saturdays at the farm are among my favorite times in life, because they usually include sleeping a little bit late with Handsome, our legs braided together and his childhood Snoopy buried between us somewhere in the silky cotton sheets. Saturday means Hot Tub Summit with no time limit and less office talk than during the week (office talk never bugs me, but it’s really nice to see my husband escape it here and there). Saturday means the coffee tastes a little better and we get to watch an episode or two of Rifleman before starting whatever adventure we have planned. (Lately those adventures often include a pretty little nineteen year old young lady who has our hearts forever.) I love Saturdays at the dirt-and-hooves Lazy W.

peekaboo dusty c

Starting today, Saturdays here at the digital Lazy W will have a special purpose! They will be all about excellent reading material. Book reviews, stories about Dinner Club With a Reading Problem (our famous little Oklahoma book club), general chit chat about books and editing and writing, or maybe just a round up of great articles I’ve read the previous week. I’m really excited about this! Because reading is my favorite thing. Next to gardening and romance and coffee and running.

rp_rainy-notebook.JPG

 and warm weather………….

Today, this first such Literary Saturday? The latter of all those ideas. I’m sharing some articles I’ve read that were flat out great and I think you’d love them too. Take a read and let me know what you think, or share in the comments a link to something you’ve read this week you think the rest of us would enjoy!

How to Mine Diamonds by the incomparable Ann Voskamp. This is a long article and one that could have your eyes brimming with tears by the end, but it is so worth it. So worth the investment of time and emotion. Ann (we are on a first name basis, ha!) writes with such poetry and grit, just like in her book One Thousand Gifts. In How to Mine Diamonds she expresses my favorite concepts, “carpe diem” more thoroughly and with more spiritual exactness than I have ever read before. Give it part of your weekend, okay?

Kitchen Sparkle by Joy the Baker. If I have a girl crush on anyone on the internet right now, it’s Joy. And I’m not even sorry. Practically everything she writes, whether recipe or inspiration or just anecdote, is like infusing my day with lemon juice and rosemary. Which is what this particular article is all about. Plus? She lives in the French Quarter. So either I love her or hate her.

Becoming Antifragile by Nerd Fitness. I stumbled on this website recently and have had fun going through the archives. This article back from July is just wonderful. And it’s not just about physical stuff; it points to every good reason we really chase after the physical stuff. The article also includes a book recommendation, so Nerd Fitness gets Lazy W bonus points.

The Place Where You Are Cared For by Edie. xoxo I really love Edie. She always writes beautiful, spiritually enchanting stuff that I pretend like is just for me, because she seems to know exactly what people need to hear. This piece of hers from back in November is on a list of things I have saved because I glance at it frequently. It’s especially valuable to me right now as the farm is more and more becoming a landing spot for our firstborn. Words fail to impart the preciousness of this season, friends. And Edie’s memories help me stay centered. So go read this piece (it’s not too long) and enjoy the makeover she’s doing in her digital space. Really gorgeous!

Okay, there you have it! Literary Saturday, episode #1, complete. I hope you sample some of this here, and I really really hope you share something else worth reading. Sending you so much love from the Lazy W. Thanks for stopping in!!

“Either write something worth reading
or do something worth writing.”
~Benjamin Franklin
XOXOXOXO

 

 

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friday 5 at the farm: photos I didn’t take

January 9, 2015

I’m not alone, right? The best moments in your day seem to happen when neither a camera nor a smart phone is within reach? So in your excitement you try to tell people about it, but it never quite translates. Or you try to go back and reenact the magic but the magic has already dissolved.

This week especially, great stuff seemed to happen around me left and right and then never again. So for Friday 5 at the Farm today, I’m offering you five little scenes that deserve to be immortalized somewhere. On this blog in plain old words will have to do.

Chunk-Hi the Tire Flipper
In the front field are two massive, deeply treaded rubber tractor tires meant for nothing except the buffalo’s entertainment. A few months ago we actually swapped a broken down four-wheeler for them. Chunk-Hi loves these tractor tires almost as much as he once loved that broken down four-wheeler. He uses his thick, curved horns and dense bony forehead to pluck these seemingly weightless toys out of the sand and throw them in great big loops into the Oklahoma sky. He delights in this! Sometimes the tires never even hit the sandy wallows before our split-hooved boy catches them again and flips them back toward the heavens.

Well, one evening this week I was walking up the gravel driveway just in time to see just such an exhibition. It was thrilling. Chunk seemed to know I was watching, which prompted even more enthusiastic efforts. I ran inside to get my phone for nothing, because by the time I ran back outside he had abandoned his toys and just wanted kisses. Or cookies. Which I had not brought.

Geoffrey the Cat Naps on a Saddle
Thursday morning I was walking out of the east doors of the barn carrying a large green tub filled with hay. The air was icy but the sun was dazzling, the kind of brightness that will convince you of warmth that cannot possibly exist. I stopped with my face turned up to soak into my eyelids at least some sunlight and heard a gentle meow coming from the ground to my left. Still holding the tub of hay, I looked down and saw Geoffrey (our gray and white barn cat) folded up neatly on a discarded leather saddle. The saddle was partly collapsed on the dead grass, warmer I’m sure than any other perch Geoffrey could have chosen. I watched him stretch and flick his claws against the felty seat, his slender back a question mark. He meowed at me again and yawned, also tilting his eyelids sun-ward. Then his small cat body nestled itself perfectly in the shape of the saddle and he went to sleep. You know. For a cat nap.

Frozen Pond at Sunset
This particular beauty struck me at least four times just this week, and each time it was so stunning that I’m not even sad about missing the photo opportunities. The sun sets directly behind the pond this time of year, just barely south and west of it, with a ridge of oaks and cottonwoods there on the horizon. So whatever fiery kaleidoscope colors the sky is offering are reflected on the pond’s wet surface there. This week, with so many consecutive freezing days and nights, the pond has been milky-frosty, opaque, with waves and ripples suspended in time. You can easily imagine movement in the water, but it’s so perfectly still. It’s like the fierce Oklahoma winds did battle with the arctic air and lost, bowed out gracefully. The reds, oranges, and pinks of our magnificent sunsets are thrown into so many new textures, it’s really breathtaking. I have felt lucky to frequently be walking past an upstairs window just in time to see all this beauty.

My Best New Salad Invention
Honestly, I could easily have taken a photo of this salad. I almost did, really, but everyone keeps shaming me for being that woman who takes photos of all her food, and I am definitely susceptible to teasing peer pressure. So, trying to cut back. Anyway. The salad.
It was equal parts leafy green lettuce, raw spinach, and parsley. If that sounds like too much parsley, just trust me. It tastes amazing! I could literally feel my blood purifying with every bite. On top of your greens, slice up a small avocado and add just a fourth of a cup of toasted sunflower nuts. Splash the whole thing with lemon juice, add pepper, and enjoy. So good!! No need to use salt because the sunflower nuts are pretty salty already. Delicious and healthy. Enjoy!

A bamboo grove at our beloved OKC Zoo. One of the photos I did manage to take this week. xoxo
A bamboo grove at our beloved OKC Zoo. One of the photos I did manage to take this week. xoxo

My Handsome
He stands there at the bottom of the stairs dressed in a black button up shirt, starched and open at the throat, sleeves cuffed flat below his elbows, and dark wash jeans. His forehead is creased with pain from a tooth ache, and tides of stress, and exhaustion from not sleeping. Because of the tooth ache. And the tides of stress. His shoulders are broad and strong. Able to carry all the weight thrust on him every day, but growing weary. He is tall and muscular, with strong hands that grip me perfectly and green eyes that flash with anger, humor, and passion all at once. Those green eyes also try to hide a depth of loss neither of us ever expected to feel. He is protective, responsible, funny, affectionate, desperate, confident, and a little bit lost in this world. Just a little. But his vision will come through. The toothache will abate. His broad, strong shoulders will catch that one moment of relief he needs to square up again.

He stands there at the bottom of the stairs dressed in black, waiting for me to join him for our morning prayer. He is an innocent little boy and a strong civic leader, my husband and best friend, brother, father, neighbor, son. Past, present, and future all in this gorgeous body and Handsome face I have loved for so many years. And I will love him forever. Come What May.

If you don’t have a camera, friends, 
take pictures with your mind!
Tell me something beautiful with your words.
XOXOXOXO

 

 

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mid-winter farm update

January 7, 2015

Well, friends, we are past the holiday season as well as the winter solstice, and there are only eleven cold, barren weeks standing between us and springtime. So I think it’s safe to say we are mid-winter. Not too shabby. Not too shabby at all. We can endure anything for just eleven more weeks, right? And there is so much to do before then, anyway. So much to enjoy. So many cozy pleasures. How about a little mid-winter farm update? We’ll take a Lazy W tour, starting at the front.

Front Field:

The bachelors (Chunk our buffalo and Chanta and Dusty, our two horses) are doing great. They are faring very well in this cold weather, having grown nice and fat as well as quite furry ever since, well, since around Labor Day weekend. We’ve been periodically buying extra bales of “free choice hay” to keep them constantly fed and warmed from the inside out, and since the truly frozen days have been few and far between, keeping their trough filled with clear water has been a totally manageable chore. We may have to swing a sledgehammer to break the ice once in a while, but it seems like every time the water level drops, the temperatures are just high enough to open the faucets. The Lazy W has seen far worse winters than this.

 

f5f dusty shades

 

When Jocelyn has time to visit the farm she makes sure Dusty gets some exercise, which I love to watch. She is so confident, and he is so playful. You can tell just by watching them that they love each other dearly. If she parks her car in the gravel driveway between his field and the house, he whinnies and bellows until she relents and walks over to him. (Such a tough sell.) She is teaching him some basic footwork here and there, and he is teaching her that he prefers bareback rides, no saddles please and thank you very much. All of this, of course, always results in extra cookies from me, whether she approves of my methods or not. : )

Yard Birds:

The geese are still patrolling these nine acres noisily, with unfathomable angst, honking and strutting with their wings extended like sky gliders forever anchored to the earth. Duck Duck in particular has put on an obscene amount of winter weight. He is barely recognizable now, no longer the fuzzy yellow baby we rescued in summer! But to a goose, at least to a goose who’s never heard of Norwegian winter feasts, this new-found obesity is excellent news. Duck Duck struts around the farm waddling his fat belly and shimmying his thick, flightless wings. He and Momma Goose laugh haughtily when I go out back to run miles against whatever sugary indiscretion I have most recently committed.

By the way, Duck Duck the adopted Canadian Goose is the main character in our first children’s book effort! I am so excited about this. Really excited. But I think he knows how excited I am about his story and is using it against me, like, emotionally? Instead of showing any appreciation? Geese can be very manipulative. Most people don’t know that.

 

??????????

 

Despite the cold temperatures our Lazy W hens are laying consistently. I am so grateful for this, because their eggs are absolutely divine. Heavy, yolky, delicious. And such pretty brown shells! I collected seven eggs on Monday morning and found one of them to have hairline fractures. Really beautiful. Not crushed, but frozen apart like burst pipes. I know! Frozen eggs. Completely edible. I couldn’t resist pressing my thumb against the vulnerable spot.

 

egg cracked

 

The Middle Field

This is the only sad news I have to report this week.

I may or may not have written this for you here, though I’ve whispered it to visitors, but I have for a while believed our young female llama, Dulcinea, to be preggo. Just judging from her behavior with Romulus (or, more to the point, his behavior with her AHEM), her increasing appetite, growing midsection, and overall neediness with Handsome and me but aversion to Meh, I was placing little bets with myself that she would give birth before Easter 2015.

 

dulcie in snow

 

Well, unfortunately, she couldn’t keep her little baby that long. We walked out to the barn this past Saturday morning to discover that she had delivered her very first baby far too early, and he did not survive. I’m glad she took herself to the warm barn for delivery at least. The tiny, clearly premature cria had exactly the colors and markings of Seraphine, our recently deceased matriarch of this gorgeous llama clan. Seraphine would have been the new baby’s grandmother. The cria was absolutely precious and so fragile looking, so thin. Dulcinea had expelled the placenta in tact and was not too bloody herself, only swollen, but also sad and ravenous. Once Handsome had removed the little thing for burial, she looked and looked and sniffed for him, crying in a way I’d never heard from her. It was incredibly sad. So we feed her heartily and give her as much affection as she would accept. Though needy, Dulcie had grown skittish since her coming of age. Ever been through that, ladies?

Life goes on. Death is certainly a part of life, like it or not, and we may never get all the answers we want or understand exactly why we have to endure so much of it. What we can do is continue to earnestly love those who are still here, those who are in need of what we can offer.

So that’s my mid-winter farm update! Thanks so much for visiting. We certainly collect more joy here than sorrow. More beauty than work. And that is why we stay.

Now I am going outside dressed in three million layers of warmth to feed and talk to our menagerie! I hope your day is cozy and productive. I hope your animals, if you have them, lend you some of their magic today.

Hang in there.
Winter is halfway over.
XOXOXOXO

 

 

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Filed Under: animals, daily life, Farm Life, weather, winter

Dinner Club With a Reading Problem strikes again xoxo (and a biscotti recipe)

January 6, 2015

This past Saturday night our famous little Oklahoma book club, affectionately known as Dinner Club With a Reading Problem, gathered again for food, fellowship, and more fun than a small group of women might legally be allowed to enjoy. It was technically not a book discussion dinner, as we are between titles; we were just in withdrawal from not seeing each other over the holidays. We missed lots of pretty faces, but those of us who were available all met at Seri’s house, which is not too far from the farm. (Bonus for me!) She served us a really luxurious shrimp boil dinner complete with potatoes, smoked sausage, and corn on the cob. The rest of us brought appetizers or desserts, keeping well to our chosen moniker.

We never go home hungry.

We also never go home sad or bored or feeling alone. This is a really special group of friends, and we are increasingly grateful for each other. Also? We are increasingly grateful for each other’s strict discretion. RIGHT, LADIES?

 

What happens in book club stays in book club.
What happens in book club stays in book club.

We also enjoyed thick cucumber slices topped with creamy cheese and tomatoes from Kerri (pictured above kissing the elk with me). Homemade peanut brittle from Tracy. Pillowy soft banana bread DeLana brought from a church fundraiser, and a massive veggie tray provided by Steph, which included a weirdly spicy (and addictive) roasted-something veggie dip. Who brought the crab meat dip? And those cashew clusters? Oh man! I am hungry again.

I took two edibles with me Saturday night. One was an appetizer inspired by Smitten Kitchen. It was basically sweet grapes and salty olives roasted together with some spicy stuff then served with plain ricotta cheese and stale sourdough slices. It was pretty good! but I overcooked it all just a bit and really preferred the combination raw. Dressed with good olive oil and a few spices, the salty-sweet grape-olive bites were super delish, juicier.

Okay, the second edible I contributed to our fun dinner party was an accidental biscotti worth repeating. It’s not like that little cranberry-almond number from November (the base is different) but is, I guess, true enough by definition in that it was baked twice. So, close enough? Anyway here  it is, in all its three-recipes-mashed-together glory:

“Fancy Chewy Dark-Chocolate Browned-Butter Oatmeal Pecan Biscotti”
chewy, crunchy, sweet, & filling
also healthy… because of the oats, nuts, & dark chocolate? : )

What you need:

1/2 cup shortening
1 stick butter (melted & browned)
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
3/4 cups granulated sugar
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon baking soda
big splash of vanilla
2 cups quick oats
1/2 cup pecan halves
1 bag of dark chocolate chips

What you do:

This is easy! It’s basically just cookie dough, baked twice, with a couple of extra steps in the middle.

  • First, brown the stick of butter in a small skillet. (Don’t cheat and use the microwave! You’ll need this buttery skillet again soon.) Let the butter cook till bubbly and brown then remove skillet from heat. Let it cool while you gather everything else and preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
  • In one large bowl, cream together the shortening and butter then mix with one cup of the flour plus all the sugars, eggs, vanilla, and baking soda. This is the nice, thick beginning of your dough. Add to that the quick oats and the last half cup of flour, mix well.
  • In that buttery skillet from a few minutes ago? Pour the pecan halves and toast them a little bit. Just scoot them around long enough to become fragrant and glossy, not change color. Add these pecans along with the bag of dark chocolate chips to the cookie dough and stir to mix well.
  • Okay, as with any biscotti, just form the dough into a flat, even rectangle on a cookie sheet. No greasing is necessary since the dough is so buttery. The thickness is up to you; just remember that it spreads out a little in the hot oven. Bake for about 20 minutes then allow it to set up a bit at room temperature. It needs to be firm enough to cut.
  • Now using a large, serrated knife, cut the rectangle in half lengthwise then into maybe half-inch strips. Or however you want! I like to plan on dipping my finished biscotti in a cup of perfect coffee or glass of icy cold milk.
  • Flip the once-baked strips onto their cut sides and put the pan back into the oven for another fifteen minutes or so, or long enough for all the edges to become crispy. Not burned, just cooked and crunchy. Don’t worry; it will still have a nice tenderness and chewiness, thanks to all that butter and oatmeal.
  • Once the twice-baked slices are out of the oven, let them cool completely. Done! See? Easy. And so delicious. The next morning I may or may not have eaten two of these with perfect coffee, despite having sworn off further carb indiscretions after our fun Saturday night.

 

cookie coffee new sticker

Incidentally, the most recent book we discussed was a true crime story, Stranger in My Bed by Michael Fleeman. Our group gave it mixed reviews. The next title we’re working on is a relatively new release, Goldfinch by Donna Tartt. This one is long, so we are happy to have a little extra time to have read around the holiday season. I’m really enjoying it so far! Feel free to read along and share your thoughts here when I post a review late in January. We’d love that!

How about you? What have you been cooking lately? What is on your book shelf? What does your little tribe of friends do to stay connected? I bet it involves food…

“Nothing would be more tiresome than eating and drinking
if God had not made them a pleasure as well as a necessity. “
~Voltaire
XOXOXO

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Filed Under: book club, Dinner Club With a Reading Problem, recipesTagged: biscotti

marathon monday: shifting gears

January 5, 2015

Happy New Year, and happy running! Is any new fitness program on your agenda this month, this year? If so, I hope it’s part of a gentle, realistic, healthful mindset for you, something that serves you well in many ways, not something that lords over you and makes you miserable.

Because you’re awesome and don’t need a big ugly guilt trip. xoxo

At the start of this recent holiday season I mentioned that marathon training was starting again and that I’d chosen the Hal Higdon Intermediate 1 program to get me ready for April. Week one was really good, and I felt great and was strongly motivated. Mileage was right on the mark.

Theeeennn… It was Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day, and time for family and cuddling and watching movies. I had much better things to enjoy than running alone. Then I tried to get back on track (err, trail) and the weather turned nasty. Quite nasty most days. I can make excuses as well as anybody, but these bumps in the schedule were true obstacles. Family and safety first. Thank goodness this is happening early in the 18 weeks, when I have lots of time to make up for it.

So… Taking the same loving advice I would give you, I’m neither giving up nor accepting the guilt trip. 

I just looked again at the schedule to see how badly I’d slipped behind. As it turns out, things could be much worse. No towels have been thrown in! But still… Looking at the next few weeks of weather I don’t see things improving much; so I’ve simply regrouped and shifted from Intermediate 1 to Novice 2, which is a program with the same number of weeks but slightly lower mileage. There’s a real mental benefit to not feeling quite so far behind. If over the next month or so I feel stronger and life opens up a bit, I may step it up. We’ll see.

Current Plan:

For now? I’m doing short runs plus strength on Mondays and Wednesdays. Longish runs (they are still pretty short this early in the program) on Tuesdays and Fridays. Cross training on Thursdays. Taking the weekends off so Handsome isn’t too lonely. That will likely change over time, too, or from week to week depending on our social calendar.

Our Talking Tree, filled with sleepy guineas, on a day so cold the air around us stayed bluish gray.
Our Talking Tree, filled with sleepy guineas, on a day so cold the air around us stayed bluish gray.

A question for you:

Speaking of all this cold weather, and by cold in Oklahoma I mean temperatures between 15 and 38 degrees, how cold is too cold for you to run outside? My friend Norma asked me this on Facebook recently and it got me thinking. Apparently the world boasts some pretty hard-core runners who will lace up for miles in sub-zero temps. I MEAN REALLY. haha

I don’t mind bundling up quite a bit, and rain itself doesn’t bother me, but if it’s both cold and wet I rethink it. Or if the winds are blowing down our pine trees, making it too hard to climb hills, I tend to give it about half an hour then reevaluate. What about you? I am so curious.

Thanks for stopping in, friends! I wish you all the best this week, whatever your goals are. I wish you just the right measure of challenge mixed with a deep personal motivation to overcome it. Happy first full week of this new year!!

If you want to live, you must walk.
If you want to live long, you must run.
~Jinabhai Navik
XOXOXO

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Filed Under: daily life, hal higdon, runningTagged: Marathon Monday

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Hi! I'm Marie. Welcome to the Lazy W. xoxo

Hi! I’m Marie. This is the Lazy W.

A hobby farming, book reading, coffee drinking, romance having, miles running girl in Oklahoma. Soaking up the particular beauty of every day. Blogging on the side. Welcome to the Lazy W!

I Believe Strongly in the Power of Gratitude & Joy Seeking

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Lazy W Happenings Lately

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"Edit your life freely and ruthlessly. It's your masterpiece after all." ~Nathan W. Morris

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