The Queen Takes a Trip

It suddenly dawned on me that I have put off writing up my trip journal because I don't want the visit to end. It's as if once it's written down the trip is over and that paper becomes the sum total of the memories. I suspect that's why I never did write about Jack - his death was so untimely, so unprepared for, I just couldn't write about it or he would be completely gone.

Ah well. If I don't write things down now I will begin to forget them and that's just another way of loosing the trip. We were off to Romania - for a church blessing of the marriage of LD and P - who, though they have been married for almost 2 years, have not been officially blessed - nor sent off in true glorious wonderful Romanian style.  Though we knew it was coming for a year, it somehow always felt too ephemeral to believe in - that we would actually get on a plane and fly across the Atlantic and most of Europe to a land where I didn't speak the language and .. LOL .. was not TheQueen! My biggest fear was that I would remain a quiet little dab of a thing in the corner if I couldn't talk. I should have known better. TheQueen is going to speak no matter where she is. Not being understood never seemed to matter much and 100% of the kind people in this lovely country were patient and generous with me. TheQueen is in love. 

But if I want to hold on to the memories it is time to begin - and begin with Thursday, Sept. 3, 2015 at 12:45 - at the airport in Richmond - Gate B2 - ready to fly to Cluj and Turda and P and LD. We are way early because it is I, Bess the Early.

Which is good since it took us 45 minutes to check in. At the security check I didn't have my drivers license. I had figured with a passport, what other I.D. did I need? But! I hadn't signed the passport.

"I'm not supposed to let you in if you haven't signed it." the check in lady told me, but she also handed me a pen. My first adventure. BD did have his drivers license but he also had notice to sign that passport and time to do it, too.

Once on the airplane we had a 40 minute wait on the runway, leaving us a scant 16 minutes to get to the connecting flight in Newark - and so began one of the few periods of anxiety on the trip. I kept feeling that if I could only get to Munich I'd be okay no matter what other delays happened. But cross that Ocean I really needed to do. Happily, on the whole trip, whenever a plane was delayed, the connecting flight was held up a bit too, so we made every connection with ease and even our longest wait was only about an hour or so on the last leg. I managed to sketch a bit in the airports on the way over but that was the end of my sketching - the rest of this trip was so packed full of sensations and visions and people and experiences I couldn't have settled down to sketch anything if I'd had to. Instead, I took over 1,000 photographs - some of them gratuitous, some mediocre but many of them quite good.

The flight to Newark was made thrilling for me by early views of home - from thousands of feet up - we saw the Pamunkey, the Mattaponi, the Rappahannock - LD even viewed Lowery's Pt!!! My own excitement was so vivid that the girl across the aisle from me thanked me, saying that her dread of flying was eased by my joy. We arrived in Newark at 4:50 with enough time to dash from the shuttle bus to the terminal and then speed walk to gate A30 - maybe a quarter of a mile. We got in line for group 3 and discovered we didn't have to check our rolling carryon.

As we stood in line, who should walk up but cousin JW! I felt a lot better to be with someone with a phone and I didn't even care about timetables or connections any more. At that point I was ready to give it all up to enjoyment. Even if I did have the anxiety munchies and nibbled all the time. LD  is just the opposite. He had no appetite the whole day.

At 6:06 we took off. I like flying. Even its discomforts - tight seats, noisy engines - can't dim the excitement and playful feeling I get when I'm soaring high over the ground. Once in the air, with the lights of Manhattan behind us, I suddenly thought of Mama. I haven't spoken about this to anyone, but the wedding is on the day Mama died. I haven't spoken because people might think this is a sad thing. But, like sharing her funeral with my birthday, I like having Mama along - and on this flight I really felt like she was right there with me. I even sensed that Daddy was nearby, smiling.

By 3:15 we were taxiing down the runway in Munich. I couldn't believe I stayed awake the whole time. I took a walk around the airport and when I got back to the guys and the luggage, there was B! All 4 of us together, flying to Cluj and LD and P and Romania!!

We made our way to the check-in, which was amazingly easy - all the luggage got here too - our red duffel and B's massive hard case - a found object he'd had for 25 years and was only now using. As we waited for our bags, the sliding doors from baggage claim to the waiting area would part and we saw 4 pair of arms waving excitedly. This happened several times but at last we picked up our bags and bundled through the doors to so much hugging you never saw so much hugging. R is gregarious and strong, a warm and manly man. M is very tiny and quiet and way prettier than she photographs. She is a little less chatty but certainly not withdrawn. She's full of smiles. and of course - there are P and LD to hug and hug and hug.

We tried to get cash at the ATM machines but neither B's nor our cards worked. No duh - we'd forgotten to tell our banks that we were abroad. so we piled into cars and drove to Turda - LD driving B and J, P driving BD  and me, and M & R straight home to prepare a welcome dinner for us tonight.

The hills tumbled and rolled and spilled all over the landscape. From the air these mountains seemed dry and bare with few trees but of course, with plenty of livestock. Sheep flocks all about and some horses. Corn - Indian corn - was still more green than brown. There were some large fields but also plenty of strip farms - like medieval farms radiating away from a cluster of houses. Between Cluj and Turda, a distance of about 30 miles, we drove through 2 villages!

The houses huddle and snuggle close together - stucco mostly, with tile roofs. Old style houses have pitched roofs. Other newer ones look very 1960's square - Paula says this is the best of 1980's architecture, before communism fell.

The day just piled up with events. Checking into the Vila Adriano I was surprised to see my first seersucker sheets - in fact, there was only a bottom sheet and a duvet cover - in a bright orange seersucker print. Of all the hotels we stayed in, this one had the most comfortable bed for me - though all of them were nice. The couple who run the hotel also run a sofa store in the same building (as well as live in the downstairs apartment) so I'm not surprised the beds were nice. They have a little boy who was All Boy - playing with swords and a battery operated car and always looking with twinkling curiosity at us.

I got a bit of a nap on Friday afternoon and then LD picked us all up around 4. We drove to the A's for a massive 3 course dinner of Romanian dishes. Cheese and salami with a pork breast piece - like a bacon cut - striated, but boiled and meaty and delicious. There was bread and wine and a plate of peppers - some hot, some sweet. roasted eggplant spread - Zucasca - and an egg salad type dish - and more wonderful red wine. This was followed by a broth based soup with peas and sausage. Then came perch - baked to boiling in the oven, with spices and sweet carrots and a slightly sweet rice.

The talk flowed. R and M were warm and fun and everyone was joy filled. There was so much talk you would never guess we didn't speak the same language. R  showed us photos from their family album - the one with pictures of both his and M's parents as well as pictures of them as young people - R in his army uniform, M in her college class. their apartment is small but compact and put together a lot like a boat - where no space is wasted. I was able to use their land line (with unlimited overseas minutes) to call our bank and let them know we were in Romania so we could get cash. Later that evening BD and the guys walked home from the A's and BD got some money. I was driven back to the hotel where I got a marvelous night's sleep - 10 glorious hours - and was never tired or "off" the whole rest of the trip. (unlike adjusting to home - where here, on Sunday the 20th, I'm still falling asleep at 8 and waking up at 4:30).

And so day one of this amazing trip closed with sweet dreams.  

Polishing Up the Past

It's that time again - time to get out the silver and the few good dishes I own and spruce them up for company. I didn't grow up with sterling flatware. Mama was far too practical and efficient a person to want to fiddle around with silver polish - although I remember there was a little jar of Twinkle Silver Polish beneath the kitchen sink. I wonder what she ever used it for. But ours was a strictly utilitarian table. Even when she finally got a set of matching flatware, it was stainless steel and Daddy and I bought it for her for Christmas one year. I suspect it was a particularly uninspiring gift for her but it thrilled my little teenage heart. I could hardly wait till it was my turn.

Daddy is the one who grew up with sterling flatware  ThePrince did too but his mother not only used it all the time, she had also selected a very plain pattern so if it did need polishing it was easy to do.  One Christmas though, she took me up into the attic and pushed a box towards me, saying that this was all the extra bits and pieces of silver flatware from her side of the family and did I think I'd like it as a Christmas gift?  Would I? Is grass green?

She was the only person in her generation who both married and had children and over the years she inherited houses full of stuff. I was on the scene when Mimi's house was emptied out and most of the furniture in that house ended up in mine. In 40 years of marriage I have only ever bought 3 pieces of furniture. I love living with these pieces of the past. Their past is now my past and my present is their future. We have shared a life together that makes me feel very cozy. It helps when I have to dust these curlicued bits of history - and makes housework a little more like caresses. Ditto with the silver - which is of all different designs.

This year I thought I'd track down the names of these silver patterns - just in case somebody wanted to make me a gift - or maybe a set came up at auction and the sliver melters didn't hear about it.  Also, since our Thanksgiving guest list will be smaller than in recent years, I am sticking to as many complete places settings as I have - and piecing out the rest in similar patterns.

The Haile/Blakey/Wright silver is the most mixed and unmatched. There are 8 dessert forks in Concord, a 1926 pattern by Wallace so I'm sure they're Mimi's silver since that's about when she got married.

There are 2 groups of 6 spoons - but neither of them match the knives and none of them are in the Concord pattern. There is also the ancient ladle from the Wrights of Greenway. Grandma says it was scraped so many times against the oyster stew pot the lip of the bowl wore down. This piece is about 200 years old now and I didn't even try to track down that pattern. It's what I'd call ... Old Plain Silver ...  as opposed to plain old silver.

That very scrolly fruit sever on the cloth above the ladle is another Blakey piece that so far I have yet to identify. It's the dickens to clean if it ever gets tarnished but I keep it wrapped in silver cloth.

The silver from my side o the family is some of my grandmother's flatware. The pattern is Clermont and it's a 1915 Gorham pattern.  For decades I've lusted to have matching place settings in sterling and for the last 5 or 6 years that Daddy was still in his own house he'd say "There's some flatware in that drawer. If you want it you can have it."

Well. I thought I knew what my parents owned and I didn't need More Stainless Steel flatware so I would always say no thanks. But when we moved him to a senior apartment and I finally opened that drawer and discovered the box held the familiar silver from my grandmother's table I felt like an idiot. I remember he was in his huge ungainly recliner and I sat beside him as we looked at the contents of the box.

"Oh yes. That's the McClean silver" he told me. His father had been Evelyn Walsh McClean's lawyer. Yes. The Hope Diamond Lady. And there are dozens of stories about her - how she would visit and toss the diamond in his lap for him to play with ... She must have been very colorful. Daddy said she gave that silver to his mother and it may be true but - then again - it may not. So I just think of it as Grandma's Silver.

There is also a story about two aunts, a theft and a quarrel and the silverware, but there you have it. Family stories tend to get inflated with the telling, especially if there is some jealousy behind them and besides - I was only about 14 so I may have misunderstood.

All those stories, all that history, all the memories are just the thing for a Thanksgiving eve when beloved friends and family are on their way to feast with us. It will be my delight to spread the table with my old friends, all spruced up, polished and gleaming and ready to serve.

A happy Thanksgiving thought.

It's Reunion Time Again

In fact, it's half way through TheReunion - or even 2/3 of the way through if you count the blissful Friday of prep. And while 75% of that Friday was exactly like every preReunion Friday for the past 20 years, the 25% that was new was almost the most fun of all.

We always book a manicure and pedicure for early on that Friday but somehow I screwed up my scheduling so while BH had her toes pampered I swiftly dashed through the store picking up paper products. That's one of my contributions to TheReunion. The other is footing the bill for mailing out invitations. In return? I don't cook a thing. There is always more than enough food (though I do worry about not having enough, that particular anxiety is all about TheQueen's self doubt, not about reality)

New this year was a convenient appointment I could schedule in Richmond so that BH and I could have lunch in Carytown.






We dined al fresco because while the food at CanCan is simply beyond delicious - it's a noisy restaurant. Besides, inside the music was piped, outside we were entertained with the real thing.

In addition to dining, there was luxury grocery shopping - one more thing to make TheReunion weekend special.

This has been a particularly cranky summer for TheQueen but Saturday morning there was no anxiety about anything. There was some swift and efficient house cleaning since one never knows if there will be After-Reunion guests. There were not - this year - but that only made coming home at the end of the day particularly nice - a squeaky clean house just for the two of us.

There were already cousins in the church yard when ThePrince and I arrived and we were soon spreading out food and photos to share with all. The oldest among us are a group of first and second and third cousins descended from this union:

J T and Hannah Elizabeth Hoskins

The Cousins

But there are plenty more cousins to go around. Cousins who are even from different Hoskins lines. This year we were blessed with a new Hannah!




And lots of pretty teenage girls to make the Granddaddies smile.

And what looks to me like some hungry cousins wondering when we'll sing our traditional hymn and ask the blessing. 

The food really does surpass expectations. My question here is - why is it the slimmest slightest cousins are the ones that bring platters full of butter-filled deliciousness? I never saw so many ways to use chocolate and there were spiced peaches, pulled mint candies, and banana puddings as well. Oh yes. and Fried Chicken.


This year we didn't have any of the Warner line with us nor were either of the Eastern Shore Eubanks able to come. The Hill line has sadly died out, though Cousin Thomas will live forever in my heart because he welcomed me so warmly at my first Hoskins Reunion. This was the first time in ages that Cousin Elizabeth C couldn't be with us and I felt the loss. But those of us who could come made everything feel warm, welcoming and joy filled.

And once we were replete with deliciousness, there were photographs to be taken in the sanctuary of the old family church and songs to be sung by the musically inclined.

So, you'd think we were ready to go home by then, right? Wrong. Groups paired off, drifting in clumps, or headed to family homes. We spent our late afternoon with the H's at Hillsborough. One of these days I'm actually going swimming there. Though I took my suit, I kept getting waylaid by fascinating conversations with cousins. 

And so, Saturday closed softly with a quiet green drive home through King & Queen and Essex Counties. Today, some of us will drive down to Mathews to visit with More Cousins Some More because, there can never be enough cousins.

April's New Year's Resolution

April at last. At last. Spring spring spring. So happy it's not winter any more.

Mind now, Spring is taking her own sweet time. The poplar tree has yet to unfurl the tiniest leaf - so it's not officially spring. Maybe today it will be. Surely by the end of this weekend that harbinger tree will have it's mist of gold clouding it's branches.  But 3 days without having to wear a coat is spring enough for me.

We're back from a Birthday Visit with LD and PD in South Carolina. It was a perfect trip - easy driving, no bad traffic, and of course - mountains of happy love from the moment we got there till the moment we drove off. The young darlings took us to the most magical place: Forty Acre Rock 

It's really 14 acres - but what a place - surrounded by several thousand forested acres that we trekked through - complete with caves and waterfalls!

And of course - there's no trip to South Carolina without hunting down Haile landmarks. Here I am, looking like a bobble head ...Lord - that man just can not take a good photo of me.

Here's the Birthday Boy himself - with his second cake. 

I took knitting and actually got a few rows done on my Fiona Ellis sweater but the knitting mojo just hasn't been there this winter. (not much else has either) I did get in some practice sketching though and am getting more confident about putting pencil to paper.

 But I know you all came here to read about my April Resolution, right? It took me a while to decide just what I wanted it to be but then fate - in the guise of an HVAC crew stepped in and made the decision for me. The Guys With Tools are here putting in a Mitsubishi Ductless Heat Pump system here at TheCastle. Here is Unit 1 and though it does feel big - and does feel different - honestly, that wall is so cluttered already - it hardly matters, now. Does it? And warm in winter, cool in summer does have to come at a cost. One aesthetic will just have to move over to accommodate another.

As for the Resolution? Well - first the back story. On the second floor there is a 4 foot knee wall, accessible by 6 cabinet doors. Perfect spaces to cram STUFF and over the years I have done some serious cramming. And for more years than I like to admit I have started my New Years Resolution list with Clean Out The Knee Wall Closets. Three of them have been done. Three are disasters. The Guys With Tools had to get into one of the disaster areas and now all of that stuff is dumped on the guest bed - so no. Nobody is invited to spend the night till I get that put away. So April's resolution will be to restore order to at least one gutted knee wall closet and also the other disaster area that must be shifted in the spare room. That spot where I have dumped yarn bins, family photos, Unfinished Knitting Projects, and who knows what else. The Guys With Tools have to get behind that mess too so, duh. Right. Resolutions by default - but I will be so glad when they're accomplished, so relieved and so proud, that I plan to reward myself with a desk to put in that corner of the room and make it my home office.

And then I will follow Juno's example and crash on the sofa.

A Heart Attack Christmas (long post )

Not me - but my darling BD had one. Not yesterday but last Friday night. Or Saturday morning rather, about 4 a.m. he woke me. He was in pain and it wouldn't go away. This, alas, is heart attack #2.  I didn't hesitate - but was up and dressing within seconds.

I must say - if you have to have a heart attack, 4 a.m. is probably a good time - there's no traffic on the roads so you can drive fast, there's nobody in the ER waiting room so you won't pick up germs or have to wait ... not that people having heart attacks are made to wait in ERs anyway - but it's nice to be breezed on through. We are lucky in that our local hospital has a crackerjack cardiac ER team - though this is a tiny rural hospital and they don't actually do heart surgeries. They have a helipad and there is a medical transport system too. But they got him on prep meds before he left our local hospital and his cardiologist was waiting for him at the ER in the bigger city hospital 37 minutes away.

Even more wonderful - I had forgotten that a cousin of ours is on staff in the ER at the city hospital - and she was there waiting for me when I got there - quite a bit more than 37 minutes later. I was slower not just because I didn't have a siren, flashing red lights nor the skill to drive faster than the speed limit. I also had to get a cell phone. I'm not much of a phone caller. I  am easy to find in one of two places - at home or at work. My life isn't a cliff-hanger life that needs instant access. My only child is grown. Good news can wait. Bad news will keep hammering at my door till I finally answer. And I have never liked using a telephone ... period. Even when I was a teen I didn't like to talk on the phone.

But I needed one Saterday. So before I left to follow the ambulance I went to our local Walmart. I said to the girl at the electronics department "My husband is on his way to Richmond for heart surgery - I need a phone - I don't want to spend a lot - can you help me?"

Oh boy.  Could she ever. With the most tender manner, with gentle but sincere expressions of sympathy, she took me over to the rack, picked out the $15 flip phone, suggested I get the unlimited minutes card, opened the box, set up the phone and handed me my security code and new phone number while I stood at the check out counter.  I was set to go.

I didn't get her name then but yesterday I went into the store and she was working the same counter again. When I told her that my husband was alright a smile as big as the sun spread across her face and she let out a "Yes!"  This time I asked outright what her name was. You can be sure I am sending a letter to the store manager AND to Walmart headquarters. This is outstanding service. She deserves to have her great big heart recognized.

And DID you know McDonalds has an egg WHITE mcMuffin? only 240 calories! Yeah. Me neither. I'd already scooped up a bag of apples and a cluster of (thank God) ripe bananas in Walmart. All I needed was some protein.

At the Bigger City Hospital, while the ER registration people were trying to find out where my husband was, the door flew open and out strode my cousin MSS - who works in that hospital's ER! I'd forgotten. She'd already been in to hug BD and now she was on the look-out for me. Talk about comfort. whew! It was as if ... now I knew MSS was on hand everything was going to be alright.

And in fact, everything was alright - considering it was a heart attack. The staff was tender - I know - they're trained to be - but I still appreciate it so much. And the wait was not too long. And BD was awake enough for me to hug and kiss both before he went in and as they wheeled him out of surgery. He was pretty dopey. He'd had a lot of morphine. But he knew me and was not frightened. And the hour passed with me in the waiting room trying to figure out how to use the phone. And then using it. And calling loved ones, including some other medical cousins who were ready to rally troops if anything was needed.

The wait was not too long. About an hour - and they whisked him down the hallway past the CCU waiting room so I had a chance to run out and give him hugs and kisses. Once he was settled into his room I could sit by him and touch him and just be so glad that he was alright. In fact, he was pretty alert, though he said he felt pretty high. By mid-afternoon, though it was obvious that sleep would be his best friend so I left him in the good hands of nurses and doctors. "I want a tree when I get home" was the last thing he said to me.

I hadn't eaten anything since 8:30, though, and by then adrenaline was about all that was keeping me going - and that meant I craved sugar. S U G A R. - well - and starch. So I stopped at the Kroger on the way home - the one with the sushi chef - and picked up some California rolls. But what I really wanted was gooey sugar. I wanted something rich; something that spoke Mama Loves You. I didn't want a package of 12 something-gooey-sugary mama-loves-you. I just wanted one. But neither did I want something ordinary - no Oreos for me.  I poked about the store looking for a single item - but in all the time I hung in front of the bakery counter, not a single employee offered to help me.

Now - ordinarily I would call this bad customer service but the truth is - gooeysugarmama-loves-you food was probably the WORST thing I could have put into my system right then.  The crash that would follow would be exhausting. so the Healthy Eating Fairy must have been fluttering around keeping all the bakery staff away.

I worked my way home, stopping at each place I needed to stop - canceling the standing rib roast Christmas dinner order, letting library staff know what was going on. Once home it was phone calls all around, mostly  to give loved ones the Good News that he had literally flown through surgery and then to let them know that LD and brand spanking new daughter-in-law, PD had scrubbed their honeymoon plans and were on the highway north. Of course - I had not had time to get the house ready for company and I scrubbed and dusted and vacuumed till 10 pm - hooray for adrenalin - and was asleep by 10:01. The Darlings were here by nightfall and surrounded me with love the whole week long.

The next day we all piled into the car, along with some rope and the small tree saw and took the back-roads route to the city, past a spot I'd been scoping out for Christmas Trees. We picked a good one, noted a place where we could pull off the road and committed it to memory ... because it was raining and we knew we'd not get home before dark. The visit with BD was a delight - he was so vigorous and looking so good. He was still in CCU but only because there were no empty beds in the regular part of the hospital. In fact, I think he only spent about 4 hours in a regular room the whole time he was in the hospital. We stayed long enough to catch up with cousin M and the whole troupe of us took him for a walk up and down the halls. It was a real entourage with nurse, mobile monitor, patient and family.

CCU visiting hours are limited so we left around lunchtime, visited my mother who was alert and delighted to meet PD and had some lunch. After a second visit with the patient we left the city, Christmas Tree bound. We always take spruce pines - essentially trash trees that sprout while the real crop trees are still young. They die out deeper into a forest but along the road they often grow pretty tall. We also always at least try to ask the land owner first, and, in fact, this year BD and I had already checked with the owner of a particularly good spruce pine collection that was, unfortunately, too far off the road to search when we were short of time and it was dark. and raining. It was also chilly and a little windy and even though we knew were to pull the car off the road - in the dark it was a little hard to find the tree. Once we located the tree it was short work to snip it off at the base but as we were walking back to the car I told LD that if I saw headlights coming I was hitting the ground.

We got home with our tree and though I was so sure I didn't have the energy to put it up, much less decorate it - all that happened. Many hands, I suppose and continued adrenalin flow buoyed us up. But it's a good thing we did get it up because the next morning, on Monday, BD said he was being discharged that day! By then I was beginning to crash - and would have taken a nap except we had so many phone calls coming in I never could fall asleep. If I hadn't been so tired I would have argued that no way would a man who'd just had a stent put in be released 48 hours later but ... it was so. When we got to the hospital I spoke with his cardiologist who said "I looked at his heart - he really should be sicker than this - but every test says he's ready to go home. It's a mystery."

And so.

And so our holiday plans shifted a good bit - but in the long run - they were improved. If this heart attack was on its way (and it was) I'm glad it happened the way it did - with lots of fast care ready to step up and fix things. And nothing important was lost, except a visit from Frances ... which will happen at the end of January. Most importantly - we have our brand new Daughter in Law, who fits into the family like a rose fits into a stem. We had presents under the tree. We had beloved cousin plus a New Friend over for Christmas dinner - which was the first one in years where we didn't all have to sprawl on the floor with dog heads pillowed on our distended stomachs. We had walks in the crisp blue air. We had carols on the CD player. We had a day of board games. We had visits from more family. We had it all. Everything you want for a Christmas bubbled in TheCastle.

The Haile family has been truly blessed - even the poor patient - because we dodged this particular bullet and I think we'll better armed against any others lurking up ahead. Life is good - especially when it is your loved one's and it's spared.

Hug your loved ones close today. Put aside petty issues. Settle the big ones. Know that - beyond anything else in your life - loved ones are the most precious gift of all. 

Let The Festivities Begin

And so the Holiday Season begins. Of course I have been Thinking Holiday since Labor Day because after all - that's when the celebrations roll in thick and fast. There are no birthdays in August and we're all tired of the heat and wish summer would end. So even if it's still hot in September We (probably only TheQueen - hence the royal "we") are glad to begin the time of monthly Monday Holidays at last. And then, there is The Birthday. And one begins to think about presents in September if one is a knitter. And when the days grow shorter and the winds blow out of the north - one must think about cleaning the house before company starts showing up. And if one has dogs - one might get some help. But one might not. Yes yes. It's a dog's life around here - especially when Mama's at work all day. 

But finally that weekend before Thanksgiving dawns and when you are very very lucky - family arrives. This year we have both LD and P - who is ready to teach us how to dance the Hora. 

Callie - the graceful one, the feminine - wants to learn how to dance too. TheQueen obliges. 

Today is Turkey Shopping day and since I slaved away all day Thursday cleaning house - yes, the rugs and upholstered furniture were shampooed - I will take the weekend off from chores and save any housecleaning till more guests are closer to arriving. Instead I will untangle the holy mess Juno made of my Christmas knitting - or maybe I will even cast on that oatmeal Aran sweater. I finally realized that I am utterly in love with the cabled  hat I knit 2 years ago and want to use that same super easy, evenly repeating, pattern to make this sweater. I can wait for another time - and another yarn - to knit the complicated sweater residing now in the recesses of my mathematical Left Brain. There will be photos. This is not gift knitting - it's for mememememe.

And So

At TheCastle we're shouting "Let the festivities begin!!!"

Gold, Gardens and Gamboling

After a quick lunch back at LD's house we headed north (sort of) to Kershaw to find the Haile Gold Mine. I'm not up on the genealogy but I do know that after the Revolutionary War some Hailes went to South Carolina and we always like to claim that they're kinfolk. Hey - it's the south. Who cares if it's true.

LD had been to the mine sometime last winter and brought us a souvenir as well as the sad news that the mine has not been in the family for a looong time.  So much for long lost inheritances.

Still - the name stuck and left quite a legacy from a road


to a Church 

After poking about the mine and chatting with the guard on duty we headed back into Hartsville to explore the Kalmia Gardens . Built on the site of the Thomas Hart (Hartsville) house - where he raised 8 kids on this spacious porch - and environs.

It's a beautiful garden, initiated by the daughter (-in-law) of another Hartsville family -  "Miss May" Coker. In Hartsville, everything is Coker. Coker real estate, Coker College - Lots of civic minded Cokers who left a real legacy for local citizens and tourists alike.

This is one of my favorite types of outdoor garden-isn landscapes - the boardwalk through wetlands. I could spend a life time traipsing around these shady reflecting swamps and streams. It's all about, green and black and freshly moist smelling.

The gardens are now maintained by Coker College.

 Here is TheQueen with LD peering at our reflection in the black swampy water.












These boardwalk paths went on forever.










                                              There was even an

Complete with students!

 Even though the gardens are not particularly large - 35 acres is big enough to get lost in - especially if they're threaded with waterways and shaded by tunnels of greenery.









We couldn't see it all though we traipsed about a good while - and took it easy too on smooth wooden benches and mossy stone seats. It was just all lovely and peaceful and meditative.

Back home there were hungry dogs who wanted to bark and dance and play some more. Dinner was Mexican and More Cake. Bedtime came early for TheQueen who had walked 10 miles by the end of the day. Just enough to make sleep delicious but not too much that she wasn't ready for more on Sunday.

We went next to see some of the countryside closer to Hartsville. It's very different from home - even the parts that aren't exactly the Sand Hills are very sandy. The narrow strip of farming land that runs down the middle of SC butts up to the Sand Hills just a few miles outside of town. Autumn flowers were rank with morning glory blossoms and 5 kinds of legumes!

There was also beautyberry blooming everywhere.... well. I guess they weren't blooming but they were beautifying anyway. Beautyberry is native from Virginia south to Florida and in parts of the country that have a similar climate. I love it and always intended to plant it in my (now defunct) garden. Maybe it's time to act on that intention, though. Maybe.

We discovered a Ghost House too - can you find it in this photo?











This was a walk that included dogs - Happy leaping field dolphins sniffing the air as they explored each new tempting scent. We knew there was a long drive ahead for this little white pup and we wanted to wear her out if we could.

All too soon it was time to wave goodbye - weep weep - but this is just our FIRST visit to the little white house in Carolina. We'll be back. Till we are, we'll have these photos to remember. Bye bye William. See you in October!