Ring Out , Wild Bells - Poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson
(the first and last verses)Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light;
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.
Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.
Animals
With our dog Cali dying in January we were down to two cats and a tortoise for animals. No chickens, no goats. Seemed strange with so few animals. So we kept our eyes and ears open for the opportunity for a new dog but nothing seemed to come our way until November. Kenny was the last puppy in the litter and the owner was wanting to find a good home for him. Some friends had had him for three weeks but realized that this was not a good time to get a puppy. So we had met him before we knew he would be ours. At first we were all thinking of names for him but there were so many ideas and some people were standing firm so it looked like we would not be agreeing on a name. But since Sarah and Isaac will be spending the most time with him I decided they get to name him. Then the two of them had to agree on a name. A bit difficult but they finally came up with Kendall, the father in the Jonathan Park radio show series. And of course we call him Kenny as it is much easier to call.
Our cat Tabitha just disappeared around the time of the church camp-out in September. She may still show up again. Who knows? And our tortoise, Rex, died in October or somewhere about that time. Soon after she died Micheal and Benjamin found a tortoise, not a Russian tortoise as Rex was, on the side of the highway. They brought her home and we tried to feed her. She didn't eat anything we gave her and her shell was pretty beat up and we worried that she might die on us. So we gave her to some friends that have a number of animals and have some experience with reptiles. They ended up going to a vet and getting some advice. Turns out she eats worms. She didn't touch any vegetables. She only ate some worms they bought and the earth worms they dug from the garden. Her name is Beulah and she now has a good home.
So now we have Spunky, a black and white Tuxedo cat, and Kenny a black and white mix dog.
Garden
I mentioned in the original letter that we had a bumper crop of corn. Michael planted 12 70 foot rows of corn and each row produced 90-100 ears we are estimating. That may be the biggest yield of corn we've ever had. We ate a lot of meals with corn-on-the cob. Benjamin took bags of corn to work to give to co-workers. I took some to our guitar teacher. David took some to his boss and family. The friends who took Beulah the tortoise came and got boxes of corn and canned it. We blanched it, cut it off the cob and then froze many bags of it. We still had more than we could handle.
This year was the first year we had a really great crop of grapes. Last year we had some but the raccoons got them. We were waiting until they were ripe. Silly us! The raccoons beat us to it. This year we made grape juice from the purple Concord grapes first. Yummy! Then the green grapes were ready. Those were good, too. It was very satisfying to harvest and eat our own grapes.
We think the poor crop of onions and potatoes was due to poor soil. We've been building up and amending that area for years but apparently to no avail. Or perhaps the soil make-up is not right for these crops. Research is needed here.
What are we reading?
In October and November I read aloud to Sarah, Isaac, and David Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener". Turns out it's pretty funny when read aloud. Except for the end. I am currently reading Through the Looking Glass (And What Alice Found There) to Sarah and Isaac. This is the book that comes right after Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and often they are put together in one book. We are having a lot of fun with this one.
Benjamin is reading the Ranger's Apprentice series by John Flanagan.
I'm reading Dorothy Sayer's The Five Red Herrings.
Sarah and Isaac are both reading How to Fight a Dragon's Fury by Cressida Cowell-book 12 in the HTTYD series. Sarah says,"It's total epic-ness!" "Crazy, awesome, and fun!" says Isaac.
