Every day here in Oklahoma we are seeing unmistakable signs of springtime. The new growth and pops of brights pinks and yellows, of course, but more than that. Stronger signals here at the farm, and they are echoing in my heart.

Our hens are becoming possessive of their eggs. It’s so fun. For many weeks now, the daily count has been holding steady at around eleven, but twice recently I was pecked and complained at for making that collection. And judging from the roosters’ songs, they too have the idea that babies would be a pretty fantastic goal.

Our two horses are shedding in earnest, suddenly. I noticed some shed a few weeks ago, before that ice storm, but they grew fuzzy again, and I have to admit, that brief and light fuzz loss could have been from brushing. What I am seeing now is unprovoked. And voluminous. Also, Chanta and Dusty can often be found with full bellies in the full sun, napping in the middle field. The siesta hours are sacred to them, and I plan to join them in this habit soon.

Meh is less of a napper, for sure; so how he tells me it’s springtime is by swimming in the pond more often. And if Klaus is outside with me and catches sight of this, I am soon greeted by a dripping wet and very muddy but very happy Shepp. He chases that llama like it’s his job. And if he has to suffer through a pond romp, then so be it.

I have barely started planting cool-season flowers in the house gardens and have been cleaning and trimming back everything everywhere else. That can be done too early, I suppose; but it’s not too early and I will prove it. Today I slipped off my denim work gloves and sifted the loose earth with my bare hands. It was warm and silky, almost moist with the perfect amount of crumble. I felt three plump earthworms wriggle quickly through the stuff, thread through my fingers, and race back to the shadows. Springtime.

Following the much-debated Daylight Savings Sunday, this work week has been extra beautiful with so many late sunsets. Two nights in a row Handsome and I have gone to bed early and in the Apartment instead of our bedroom, just so we could watch the very edge of dusk collapse over the pond. Then from our vantage there, we can see the stars take over the sky and enjoy the undulating sandy hills washed in moonlight. 

We have actually heard frog song already. And so many birds, every day.

Finally, say you want about Bradford Pear trees, but the grove next door in front of the Pine Forest is in full solid white bloom right now, and our honeybees are obsessed. I walked there yesterday to collect branches, and the collective hum and buzz sounded amplified. 

Next Wednesday is the official start of springtime. And our nights could become frosty for several more weeks, still.

But I am happy. All of these beautiful details are sure signs to me, of abundant Love and fresh energy. We are surrounded by trustworthy reminders that new life always takes over, no matter how hard and bitter the dead times have been.

I’ll take it slow and easy and let it all unfold with some delicacy. A measure of patience. It’s not my design, after all, nor my plan, just my paradise to enjoy and tend.

I’ll let the Oklahoma winds blow away fear and regret along with the dead oak leaves.

A handful of pleasures every day. And miracles right around the corner.

XOXOXOXO

All of this beauty already, and soon, day by day, we will be tasting the air a bit differently. Everything will be new again.

This blog post is about running goals, skunk spray, and the power of great storytelling to help me keep the long view.

First, running. 

February, already a somewhat abbreviated calendar month, turned out to be a disappointment for running. My total miles were just 112.54, way less than the prescribed full marathon plan, and most of those were pretty easy effort, precious few “SOS” workouts. Also, virtually every mile in February was in sub-freezing temps. Fun stuff!

The month started strong but by the end of the first full week I had some Plantar Fasciitis flare up, painful enough to cause me to miss five consecutive running days. (More below on how I spent those days. Fruitful if still frustrating.)

Once my foot and leg felt better (could have been so much worse!!), I ran easy for a few days, got excited to play “catch up,” and then was homebound by a late winter ice storm. I was thankful for a warm home, electricity, and plenty of groceries (and coffee!), but I sure couldn’t drive anywhere to run. The roads were pretty dangerous, and anyway, our front gate was literally iced shut. (Handsome was out of town, and although I tried I just couldn’t chip or sledge-hammer the ice apart. On the last day of bad weather, some guys from his office came to chip me free, ha! Anyway. Blessings counted every day during what could have been a dangerous storm. But running just didn’t happen.

These two inconveniences cost me almost a week each time, and coupled with building stress over how to spend my weekend hours, I made the decision late February to drop out of the full marathon training. Yes, some miles could be rearranged, but being so near the halfway point in training I didn’t feel confident about that. I felt torn between devoting myself more fully than ever to the schedule, to not miss any more key workouts… and staying available to loved ones on the weekends. It seemed clear I could no longer do both. We have some family stuff going on that will potentially evolve to bigger and bigger stuff, and I also can not enjoy running when I feel guilty leaving my husband at home. It’s just not worth it.

I actually cried real, sobbing tears about this!! Good grief. If I had a therapist I am sure even she (or he) would roll her (or his) eyes about that. I mean. C’mon lady.

Anyway. I was deeply saddened to drop out of the marathon two springs in a row, but the decision was made for good reasons. (And maybe I will still run the half!)

The fruitful part of this frustration is that I learned a lot about improving my hip and core strength. It not only helps your current PF flare-up heal; the work can also prevent future flare-ups. I also learned lots about better running form and stability exercises, plus more. Remember how excited I was last year to incorporate dynamic warmups, and more recently, yoga? All these little additions to my wellness routine feel great. And, because I now understand how much running matters to me, these little investments of time and effort are so worth it, big picture. So I’m not too mad.

I will run a good, strong marathon I can be proud of, something with a time goal and great overall fitness. Maybe even this year! Just not this April.

I’m just not there yet.

Okay, I promised you skunk spray.

This part of the story involves Maribeth. For new readers and friends, Maribeth is my friend and beekeeping mentor. She is a pretty amazing human, and I feel lucky to have her in my life.

And her husband Dean? He is a jewel! He can weave any mundane life event into a fascinating adventure worth listening to, though you will never be able to repeat it effectively. He holds your attention hostage with the exact mix of his well worn Oklahoma accent and his utter astonishment at human behavior. He delights in people, you know? And I delight in that! I could listen to him tell any story, about anything and anyone.

Even skunks.

And especially Maribeth. You can feel how much he loves her when he says her name.

Okay.

One Friday afternoon recently, Maribeth and I were headed together to Ardmore for that overnight state beekeepers’ conference. I arrived at her house before she had returned from errands, so Dean and I chatted. Well, Dean chatted and I laughed. He is a lively storyteller! One of the stories he gifted me with was about how the evening before his bride had crossed paths with a pretty sizeable skunk in their goat barn.

Maribeth was skunk sprayed in the most liberal way, which in my mind is almost as funny as her getting stung fifty times by bees. (I’m not a good person. Anything that threatens her natural sense of composure is just funny to me.)

Dean described everything in vivid detail, and the scene was fully illustrated because there was still a heavy curtain of choking skunk spray all over the neighborhood. I had actually smelled it when I pulled in, so strong you might have believed the beast to still be alive and well and not far away. 

It was neither alive nor well at this point, so just imagine how sharp and gagging the smell would have been the night before.

Then imagine Maribeth walking into the house, freshly scented.

As the story goes, Dean was inside already when she entered, dressed in chores clothes and veiled in a green smog of unbreathable ick. He forbade her from walking further into their home in that condition and instructed her to disrobe on the front porch, pronto. She did, and she found new clothes, and she joined him in the living room to search Amazon for a quick delivery of skunk wash or some other magical elixir.

At this point, fair reader, she had only traded garments, not washed up. Dean spent a great deal of effort impressing on me the details of her malodorous offense. A gifted storyteller as I told you, he paused at the right moments to let me gasp with him, and our wide-open eyes calibrated shock in unison. He was incredulous that she had just brazenly sat down in the living room like that!! I gathered there was a marital context here, too, something significant about who had warned the other about that particular skunk, no doubt a Rodent of Unusual Size, whose idea it had been to do a certain kind of trapping, etcetera, etcetera, all crucial to the sense of victory Dean brandished as he said the following words:

“Maribeth you ain’t there yet!”

I died. I died from laughter right there in their gravel driveway, listening to Dean elaborate, and picturing the scene for myself. Dean adjusted his ballcap firmly, apparently satisfied that his audience of one agreed that he had been wronged. She should not have entered the house in that condition. End of story.

My sweet, strong, wildly intelligent, hard-working friend and mentor was bested by a skunk spray so putrid that her devoted husband summarily dismissed her to the shower, having declared in no uncertain terms that, no arguing okay, changing clothes and cutting corners would just not do the trick. She just wasn’t there yet.

So, what does all of this hilarity have to do with running and goal setting, with keeping the long view?

Patience and taking the necessary steps, intelligently. Pretty simple.

This all reminds me to take a deep breath (a clean one, hopefully, with no skunks around) and do what needs to be done, without skipping the necessary work to reach an artificial ending.

Just as Maribeth was eventually allowed back in the living room, at the right time and after she took the necessary cleansing shower, I will eventually run a nice, strong full marathon, something I can be proud of, but not before gaining the hip and lower ab strength I need to do speed work safely. And not before building some other healthy habits organically. 

Also? Keeping your husband happy is important. Family comes first, too. You might get called out. So I will find the right time in life for marathon training. I’m just not there yet.

Thank you to my friend Maribeth for allowing me to share this story. As I hit “publish,” I understand the drama took turns over this past weekend. There are rumors of men’s work boots that have carried the hotly contested stink indoors, something about a newspaper, and quiet moments of victory. Not that anyone is keeping score.

Do the work!
XOXOXOXO

Have you started writing senses inventories with me yet? I love the practice. It’s soothing in the moment and interesting to read again later, long after you might have forgotten the big parts of your day, much less the smallest details.

And January is a great time to start writing your senses inventories, too, because as I look around, so many people are pursuing a version of mindfulness and want to be more present in the moment. One of the best ways to achieve that is to really sink into the many precise details that comprise your life, your months and days and hours and minutes. Float down into it all, press everything into your skin, absorb it into your memory, and write it all down for later.

Journaling doesn’t always have to have a profound scheme. Sometimes all you need is a true and vivid snapshot.

We write to tatse life twice, in the moment and in retrospect. ~Anais Nin

Okay. Here is a senses inventory I took this afternoon. I spent 9 minutes scribbling it down. In those nine minutes my breath slowed, my thoughts drifted a bit more peacefully and I gained a sort of objectiveness about my day. Like I was an observer. Because that’s exactly what I was. And reading back over it kind of made me want to know more about the scene, as if it hinted at a good story.

Wednesday, January 10, 2018, 3:56-4:05 p.m.

See: Eyeglasses on the dining room table which should be on my face. Porcelain bowl half filled with apples in three different colors. A large clean pickle jar wrapped in black and white fabric and filled with fragrant pine and cedar branches. A chilled pothos beyond that. A thrift store disco ball and twinkle lights in the corner. Afternoon sunlight changing rapidly, the streaks of slate blue and gray, gold and silver, shifting and backlighting the oak trees in our south lawn.

Hear: Wind howling. Pacino clicking seeds and murmuring to himself, dipping his beak in water. Klaus sighing and moaning. Another fire truck in the distance.

Smell: Apples. Hay dust. Pine and cedar. Dried sweat from my tank top and running jacket.

Taste: Granola from an hour ago, sweet well water, hay dust, plain chapstick.

Touch: My calves are a bit tight but comfortable, feet happy to be in only socks after a long day in shoes. Puffy winter coat hugging me nicely, especially the stiff straight collar around my neck. The wooden crossbar of my tall chair pressing hard up into the arch of my right foot. Left leg falling asleep and tingly from being crossed too long. Hangnail on my right index finger.

Think: So many house fires this week. Is she warm enough, safe? What has she eaten today? Is Klaus sighing and moaning from contentment or boredom, or maybe exhaustion? How are Bridget and Bubbins? Do they remember us, do they miss us, are they hungry? What do my running friends think of so many beginners joining the ranks? Should I register for that spring race now, or wait a bit longer?  Is it selfish to continue blogging?

Feel: Phantom feeling like I can hug her, and she hugs me back, wearing this coat. Deep sadness that it’s in my imagination only. So thankful, though, for the endless stream of blessings and encouragements. I am so proud of my husband. I hope my sister loves her quilt. Some reconnections lately have healed my heart. Feeling so aware of the gifts of home and health, closeness to God, and hope. Just so humbling. Encouraging.

Okay, that’s it!

Quick side story: That photo above is of my view now, as I type this. The Easter lily is cold and weary and aching for springtime. The two paintings stacked on the far wall of the kitchen are recent creations by my husband. Whether he actually meant for me to keep them is a mystery (he gifts most of his fun artwork to friends), but I loved them so much he would have had an awkward time prying them away, haha!

Anyway. Happy Wednesday! And best wishes with your mindfulness and soaking in of all the luscious details of your life. I am pretty convinced that this practice helps with things we can scarcely imagine or articulate.

Check in soon for a roundup of new recipe ideas and favorite podcasts, a running update, and why I am okay with not being in church right now.

Thanks for your prayers, too! They mean the world to us.

Party on, (Bruce) Wayne!
Party on, Darth (Vader)!
XOXOXOXO

Hey hey, happy Thursday! The sun is out again, both metaphorically and in the actual sky, and it’s all gorgeous. Our week started out kinda rough with some difficult family news, but we have pulled out of the tailspin. Deep breaths. Big smiles.

I am in fact having a really great week of running and gardening. The prairie winds are strong and full of big, stormy ideas for the weekend. And my kitchen smells like heaven for two reasons.

First, I am boiling up a triple batch of sugar-syrup for our honeybees, which this time is infused delicately with a mix called “Honey Bee Healthy,” an essential oils-based product meant to bolster the bees’ immune systems and other fun stuff. It smells like lemon, wintergreen, and something else I can’t quite place.

Also, I just pulled out of the oven a half batch of my favorite cookies. I’m going to share with you guys the basic cookie dough recipe we use here at the farm. It’s fantastically versatile and easy to memorize, and it freezes well. In case you are the cookie dough freezing type? Oh let’s just eat it raw. Much more fun.

Something I groove so hard about this cookie dough method is that, since you are browning the butter, you can make it in a flash. No advance notice needed to soften the butter to room temperature. Because that’s annoying, right? This way, you can have cookies mixed, baked, and cooling on a tray in under half an hour total. I like that. Keep the unassuming ingredients on hand, and you are prepared at all times for sweet tooth emergencies.

Side note: Become an avid runner and you don’t have to call this a “sugar indulgence.” From now on you can call it “carb loading,” or “replacing your glycogen stores,” right? Okay. Onward.

Base Dough for 20 large, thick cookies:

• 1 stick butter
• 1/2 cup shortening
• 2 large eggs
• generous splash vanilla
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 3/4 cup white granulated sugar
• 1 1/2 cups plain flour
• 3 teaspoons baking powder (better results in my opinion than using a tsp of soda)
• heaping teaspoon sea salt (my personal fave, you do YOU)
• 2 cups quick oats
• 2+ cups add-ins

Possible Delicious Additions, use a total of about two cups for a full recipe:

• walnuts, pecans, or almonds (I add cinnamon & nutmeg when I use nuts)
• chocolate chips, your fave level of sweet or bitter (Handsome likes only milk chocolate, weirdo)
• dried cranberries or dried cherries (try adding almond extract with either of these, so good!)
• bits of toffee, peanut butter chips, or even chopped up candy bars
• flaked coconut!!
• pistachios & white chocolate chips (idea from Sandy the Reluctant Entertainer)
• a combo of nuts, some seeds, & dried fruit would make it like granola
• hazelnuts…xoxo
• powdered malted milk along with chopped up Whopper candies (not usually my cup of tea, so more for you)
• The possibilities and combinations are endless!! Like drinks at Sonic but better!!

Method:

• brown the butter in a small pan and let it begin cooling while you gather the other stuff
• mix (slightly cooled) butter with shortening, eggs, vanilla, and both sugars
• stir together then add in flour, baking powder, and salt
• use a wooden spoon to fully incorporate oats, achieving a consistent dough that will be neither sticky or dry and therefore infinitely taste-testable
• stir in your delicious add-ins of choice
• use an ice cream scoop sprayed with non-stick spray to get uniform balls of dough onto a prepared sheet pan
• bake at 350 degrees for 15-18 minutes, cool afterwards (Today I let the cookies sit beneath the broiler on low for about 90 seconds, because sometimes I like that cooked top look and crunch. Otherwise they come out pale more tender, more gently browned. Also yum! But pale cookies are delicate and need longer to cool.)

See? Simple basic pantry ingredients, total freedom with add-ins, fast to pull together, and easy to memorize. The best features of an everyday cookie recipe. And the cookies always come out perfectly tender with little crispy edges everywhere, which make them great for dunking in cold milk.

Since my husband and I like different add-ins, and he is currently not wanting many sweets, today I made only a half batch loaded with walnut pieces. One of my top three choices for this base. Quite against my nature I packed up the other half of the dough to freeze for him to enjoy at a moment’s notice, probably with weirdo milk chocolate chips. 

He does eat kale now though, so we’ve got that going for us. And while oats in his cookies is not his most favorite thing in the universe, he has learned to accept it as a nod to heart healthy eating, ha.

Oh! This a great time to mention that if you want the flavor of the oats but not that much texture, feel free to grind them up in a coffee grinder first. It gives your cookies that chewiness you taste in a Double Tree hotel cookie!

Okay, time to feed this perfumed syrup to the bees, do some ironing, get showered for a fun date night, and edit a really cool project I still have not stopped to tell you guys about! Soon. Soon.

Have a most beautiful Thursday, whatever remains of it. Thanks for stopping.

“Think what a better world it would be if we all, the whole world,
had cookies and milk about three o’clock every afternoon
and then lay down on our blankets for a nap.”
~Barbara Jordan
XOXOXO

What a weekend. What a week! What a week before that, all wrapping up a pretty incredible December. Christmas 2016 has been particularly magical and exhausting in the best ways.

Truth? It’s been that kind of year for us. One mammoth joy after another, one long stream of hard labor following a workload we had though might break us (but didn’t), then more. Plenty of surprises, some steadiness, lots of prayers answered and trust fulfilled. All of it loosely French-braided into a beautiful, hopeful, satisfying, thrilling, humbling life. This has been a year for the books, and at the same time it feels a lot like a really great warm up. We are happily poised for the new year and cannot wait to share some exciting stuff with you guys.

But first, some Christmas notes. It was so amazing.

We have become acquainted with a local group called “Jedi OKC” who organizes not just fun social events but also some heart-warming charity efforts, too. Our early winter has been full of excellent time with these folks. Below is a good part of them dressed up for a local theater premier of Rogue One. My husband is Kylo Ren. I love this photo so much, haha! In the coming months I’ll share more about his new part of our life. We are pretty excited.

I told you that Jocelyn surprised us, right? That she just pulled up to the farm one day, ready to celebrate Christmas a whole week early, and basically made my heart explode? She spent less than a week in Oklahoma but visited the farm (including one fun coffee-and-shopping trip) several times. We opened gifts, ate lots of homemade food, made Tiger Butter together, enjoyed technicolor sunsets and horse time, caught up with each other, met a couple more of her friends, and just gave thanks day and night for her happiness and strength.

Then she made it back “home” to Colorado and has since been caring for an injured friend, working triple shifts, and feeding and loving her dog Bridget like a pro. We are so very proud of her. We miss her, and we miss her little sister so much for different reasons, but we are happy and thankful.

Side note: Klaus thought that week was all about him and Bridget.

Then we had a few quiet days at the farm to finish apron orders (thank you to everyone who made this sewing season amazing!!), do some low-key partying with friends, add sparkling farm decorations, and shop for final gifts. 

Klaus going for a stick fetch on our frozen pond.

Handsome and Klaus and I all traded surprises here and there, cleaned the house one final time, then prepared for another very special visitor…

Genevieve!!

My baby sister spent an extra long Christmas weekend at the farm, and all of the Lazy W residents thoroughly enjoyed every second of her being here. During her stay we ate well and frequently (two recipes coming soon!), talked long and late about things both important and not so, and laughed a lot. Gen and I went running together a few times and compared all kinds of opinions on workout gear and healthy eating. Handsome and I once again gave thanks for the happiness and strength of another precious young woman in our life. 

The three of us visited our Grandpa Stubbs and drove to the City for a double dose of family fun. Our sister Angela’s kids were all together and provided the clan with a gorgeous Christmas carol music concert. Dante plays the trumpet, and the little girls are both learning the violin. It made me cry.

Have you heard of the board game called “Telestrations?” Yeah. Find it and purchase ASAP. You’re welcome.

It’s like a cross between pictionary and the old-fashioned telephone rumors game. Genius.

We hosted a spontaneous slumber party for all the local siblings and our sister Angela’s kiddos, and it was perfect. It was the first time in many years that so many of us slept under the same roof. Pretty cool. Then Mom, Dad, and Grandpa Stubbs joined us at the farm for brunch the next day. I loved it.

Shenanigans, basically. 

Side note: Klaus thought this past week was all about him and either Gen or the nieces or maybe him and my Dad and Grandpa Stubbs. 

He’s not wrong, he’s just self-centered in the sweetest way, ok? This dog has lots of love to give and needs as much in return.

Our long holiday weekend with Gen was awesome. Truly. We miss her a lot.

As I said before, the whole month of December has been one for the books. Magical and meaningful, love-filled and happy.

So we are luxuriating now, soaking up all the good vibrations of a December well spent. A holiday season that rewarded and nourished us. We feel well fed and strong, ready to face the end of the calendar year with fresh energy for January. 

Thank you for being here, Gen! Thank you, Mom and Dad, and Angela, and Jocelyn. Thank you to our friends and Jedi OKC and everyone who contributed to the feeling of joy and lightness lately. We cherish you.

“What is making that meow sound?”
~Genevieve Michelle Dunaway, age 33
XOXOXOXO