Lazy W Marie

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

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surprise wedding announcement!!

Have you heard our family’s big, happy news?
Jessica and Alex tied the knot!!

These sweet, smart young people have been loving each other for a couple of years now. They have felt committed and were living their lives as a team already (we absolutely love them together). And on Saturday, January 16, 2021, they said their vows and made it official in a tiny, intimate, purely blissful ceremony right here at the farm.

We really could not be happier or more proud of them both. Since they started dating, life has dealt them a series of violent blows, above and beyond Pandemic. And through it all Jess and Alex have worked hard and pursued their educations, learned each other deeply and rapidly, nurtured their friendships, woven each other into their respective families (we feel so connected to Alex’s family!), and created their own little culture of romance and domesticity. Plus they adopted Bean, ha!

Handsome and I have felt lucky to walk alongside them these past couple of years, getting to know Alex, witnessing their unique rhythms and their powers to overcome hardship. They have done more than survive; they have thrived. Grown and evolved. Made memories together. Lived life fully, as it meant to be lived.

When Jess called me (on January 2nd, two weeks before the ceremony!!) to tell me they were engaged, I was beyond thrilled but not the least bit surprised. Getting married was truly the most natural thing in the world for these lovebirds.

Their Wedding Day was magical in every sense of the word. Despite the January cold, we all felt that unmistakable glow of Love present among us. Sunshine sparkled. The flowers were intensely bright against the dormant landscape. Everyone smiled constantly “from ear to ear” as Alex later observed. We laughed a lot and filled our bellies with homemade Mexican food and lots of decadent cake. It was a real, true celebration of Love. A day saturated in romance and deliberate living. There was lots of playfulness, too, haha! Don’t worry, Alex caught her:

One day soon I will write about how it feels for my baby to be a married woman now, to share this particluar life experience. I suddenly cannot imagine her any other way.

Cheers to the future, Jessica and Alex. Marriage can be the best, most powerful human partnership, especially when it is infused with God’s power. It can be the foundation of all your life dreams come true and can allow you to be of greater service to others, which I know you both value. May you continue your adventures, taking time to nurture the world you create together and discover new and amazing versions of joy. We know you will love each other better and better, day after day. You are beautiful together, and we adore you both (and Bean, hehe).

Lean On Me
XOXOXOXO

Friends, I will be writing more about this happy family event
as the weeks progress, so stay tyned.
We have lots of stories to share in big chunks. xoxoxo

humpday headlines

Hello and happy Wednesday!! Life at the W is clicking right long, and I have a handful of thoughts to share in case you are cuddled up and in the mood to read. This blog post will be like my favorite outfits: Nothing matches, but it all feels right.

001 My friend Christina at Little Sprouts Learning is a genius. This past week she shared a natural solution for repelling the dreaded squash bugs: white radishes! Also this week I was reminded that starting a squash crop earlier than usual can give the vines a jump on their enemies’ life cycles. This strategy is simple, and it could give a bigger overall yield for the summer; we just have to have some late frost protection plans in our back pockets.

squash bugs… the bane of my garden existence… (2014)

002 Next week is Mardi Gras, and depending on how social plans shake out I might bake our King Cake this weekend. Rather than pull ideas from the internet, I decided to lean comfortably on a recipe from a little book I snagged a few years ago in the actual French Quarter, at my favorite used book store. King Cake is lot more like a yeast bread than cake, which means it might scratch this sourdough craving I can’t kick. Also? I am a lot better at baking bread than cake, as the following photo demonstrates:

003 Is it watermelon season yet? If not, can everyone please stop posting watermelon photos online? And can the grocery stores please stop selling cubes of the red fruit in plastic boxes for one million dollars, even though they probably taste like chewy tap water? Ok cool. On a happier note, I have ordered some fancy watermelon seeds for a new patch this year, wahoo!!

3 cheers for free shipping!

004 I want you to come see some improvements we are making to the farm! One visual treat is the east exterior side of the big barn, the side you see just as you pull your car up and around the gravel driveway:

It’s a happy work in progress, and I love it! The mural, hand painted by my favorite white collar-hobby farming-renaissance man, has been here a while, but we recently added that red “W” up top and have started rearranging a collection of miscellaneous signs, hubcaps, and license plates. Soon, those two plastic trough planters will be overflowing with sunflowers, cosmos, and maybe hollyhocks and trailing SPV, and the ground below will be crawling with fruit. This is where I’ll grow watermelons and a pumpkin patch this year. My thinking is that, compared to the front field, this area between the house and the horses gets a lot more daily foot traffic, so the deer are less likely to sneak in and rob us and I am less likely to forget to do the weeding and watering. Bam.

005 My husband started a Keto diet on January second, and I have a lot of feelings about it, ha. Since March is “National Nutrition Month,” I will save my thoughts for a post then. Until then, light a candle for me. (I am kidding, it’s fine. But seriously. Send haaaaalllp.)

006 Unrelated, or perhaps very related, I have continued on the fitness path of trading lots of miles each week for lifting (baby) weights), and I feel surprisingly great. It’s funny how you have to convince yourself that running less is totally allowed. I am ever so slowly shedding some fat and feeling stronger and leaner, head to toe. What’s even more exciting is that my aerobic fitness is improving, too. I grab faster intervals when I decide to, run more consistent tempo workouts, and finish virtually every run with energy to spare. Zero plantar pain and better endurance, both very good side effects. The slow, slight fat loss is just a bonus so far. I attribute healthier, happier feet to building stronger hips and lower abs. This makes all the difference to mileage goals, for me: Should I eventually commit to a marathon, I could not increase volume much with blistered heels and and screaming plantar. So, for the foreseeable future, baby weights a few times per week will stay in rotation with those glorious, refreshing miles. This has all been really good mental conditioning, too, this constant sense of missing out on how all my running friends are preparing. (Boston and OKC races are right around the corner!)

007 Winter is making a few unwelcome encores around here, but it’s still February, after all, and even an early spring should not be expected until sometime in March. We consciously grab hold of and enjoy every warm, gorgeous afternoon with which we are gifted, and we try to make really good use of the cold, grey days in between, complaining as little as our worn out, heat-loving spirits will allow. Soon enough, as last weekend demonstrated, we will be outside working so long and so exhaustively that this hibernation season will seem far off again and quite foreign. (February always seems so bizarre while we are in it and so far away once we escape. And it’s so short! Weird.) Oh, and how’s this for God having a sense of humor? This morning as we listened to another bitter cold weather forecast and tried to guess its duration, I flipped open my devotional and read this scripture from Acts 1:7, “It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in His own power.” Ha! OK, ok, I get it. We can do zero to affect the weather, and there are greater things at play here. So we might as well just smile and make the most of it!

008 It’s Pisces season, okay? Spring is just so close. Let’s embrace a little magic and fluidity, and let’s welcome our intuition to the fling. What fling? The spring fling, of course.

Despite all the intensity of Pisces season, it’s also one of the most romantic and glamorous times of the year.

mindbodygreen

009 Please go read my friend Katie’s blog update on her garden. She and her husband work together in their Oklahoma City backyard to cultivate a space for flowers, culinary wealth, artwork, chickens and fresh eggs, grandchildren, and gobs of romance. They sound a lot like us, minus the grandchildren, ha! And we hope to accept their sweet dinner invitation soon!

010 What if the entire shade garden could be a spacious, concentric salad garden? All lettuces and kales, radishes, maybe some peas and… What else? Nasturtiums? Pansies? Cabbage! I want lots of food here to mix with the perennial coral bells, azaleas, and hydrangeas. The last couple of summers I accidentally grew too many tall sun lovers near the edge, so they not only visually blocked most of the expanse; they also leaned over dramatically to find the light. It was fun for a while, but it made mowing weird. And it eventually was just… confusing.

011 Have you read the Eckhart Tolle book, The Power of Now? My sister Ang recommended it to me, and I crave some discussion. So good. And much needed in my life. Thanks lady!!

That is it for my headline collection today, unless perhaps you are into discussing pregnancy scares for women in their mid forties? No? Ok, carry on. Have the loveliest evening possible! And don’t hate the cold too much. It really is almost over. Remember we are counting it all joy!! All of it!

“Even when the sky is heavily overcast,
the sun hasn’t disappeared.
It’s still there on the other side of the clouds.”
~Eckhart Tolle
XOXOXOXO

friday faves: snowy, easy beginning to the new year

Such a soft, gentle first few days of this new year. Here are a few of my favorite moments.

On New Year’s Day we luxuriated in having very little to do. The weather was quiet and wintry, but still dry, perfect for a little post-holiday cocooning, and we took the opportunity to relax. It was a much needed pause after so many busy, hard working, extra celebratory weeks in a row. Aside from a trip to stock up on horse and chicken feed for the month, Handsome and I thoroughly enjoyed having nothing to do and nowhere to go. I didn’t even workout on Tuesday, and it felt great.

Do you use the almanac to plan your garden?

On Tuesday and since, in stolen moments, I have been curled up with the 2019 Farmer’s Almanac. My gardening dreams are brewing again, and this year I plan to follow the moon more diligently than before.

For now, my indoor plants are growing well. The paper whites are still blooming and perfuming the living room. Potted rosemary, Christmas cactus, purple heart, and pothos are part of the fun, too. Sadly, I think mice have eaten my seeds in storage.

thank you Jess xoxoxo

Another book I’m loving this week is How to Be a Good Creature by Sy Montgomery. Jessica gifted it to me for Christmas, and it is gorgeous and wholesome. The book jacket, as you can see, is beautiful all by itself. I may end up framing it. She told us that the artwork is what first caught her eye. But the content … Oh my gosh. It’s a thick collection of casual essays about a woman’s lifelong love of and relationships with various animals. Really nice, if occasionally painful to read.

Wednesday was a wonderful mix of good things. I did some housework and fed everyone then grabbed 9-ish easy miles just to shake out my legs. It was the final day of Christmas break for my nieces, so I took them to our Oklahoma City Zoo for a few hours. We also had snacks and hot drinks at McDonald’s afterwards. We were numb from the cold but happy. My heart was so full listening to them, hearing them talk about their favorite animals and school and upcoming sports. They talked about their big brother who is at Basic Training right now. These girls show such sweet affection for each other and are both beautiful and unique. Close in age, but very different people. Though the family at large gathers frequently, I don’t spend enough time alone with the kids, so yesterday was a gift. As all children do, they are growing up quickly. It seems like the more we love them the faster they grow.

Kenzie & Chloe beneath the Asia exhibit prayer cloth walkway, OKC Zoo.

For most of Thursday, Oklahoma was cold and soaked, the front of a true winter storm pouring over us with heavy rain and sleet. But by nightfall we saw thick, clean, heavily textured snow falling in unbelievable curtains of white. Like an ocean of shredded cotton balls being showered on us, and just as quiet and comforting, too. When the sleet had begun, the farm was already saturated from recent rains, so by the time snow arrived, we were still nice and cold so all of it landed and stuck to every surface. Just unbelievably gorgeous. We took a moonlit walk (RUN) to see everything. Klaus lost his mind with happiness.

A little while later we were inside with the fireplace going, sweating every little power flicker honestly, and heard Meh making some bizarre noises. We checked everyone, they were fine. He was just not in the mood for Chanta and Dusty to share his hay that night, so we tromped around rearranging gates until the horses had their own separate, dry shelter with lots of hay to keep their bellies warm. Have you ever heard a llama scream? Ha! I was glad for the chance to see all of this in the dark.

I have also felt very thankful for good quality galoshes, jeans, and gloves to do my chores, ha. And the horses were very thankful that the core of a round bale of hay was provided. I think it must taste better? They get so excited. That unwrapping always makes me crave cinnamon rolls.

night snow, moonglow, & flashlight path

This morning Klaus and I walked around for the first time before daybreak. Then Handsome and I soaked up the first pastel moments of sunrise from the hot tub. Narnia, truly. Such a stunning way to begin a work day.

Yesterday, the pond was a high, glassy, unwelcoming winter mirror. But by this morning, the slush was frozen solid and drifted with pure white snow. After chores, I walked around for an hour holding back tears, it was so beautiful.

Throughout the ice and snowfall, our pines and red cedars have all knelt closer and closer to the ground, soaked to their bones and heavily burdened. We lost some big branches; we almost always do in winter storms. But we never lost power, and the farm smells like fresh pine form all of the torn lumber. And in the bizarre absence of wind we are enjoying, except for the gentle rainfall, everything has been so quiet. I know this word gets used a lot, but everything feels magical. Otherworldly. Those heavy-limbed trees lean forward and in on themselves, creating spacious little ice rooms, natural interior dome shaped shelters with red-orange pine needles for carpets. The warm color of the bark and pine needles on the ground contrasts against the blue-silver landscape and gives the illusion of candle-glow.

I hope your new year has begun in surprisingly beautiful ways. I hope your hard work is being tempered by pleasure. I hope you make meaningful connections on purpose and trust that Love is working on your behalf in a million unseen ways. Thank you for checking in!

“But very quickly they all became grave again:
for, as you know,
there is a kind of happiness and wonder
that makes you serious.
It is too good to waste on jokes.”
~C.S. Lewis, The Chronicles of Narnia
XOXOXO