Trying to be busy.

It's hard to stay busy when one doesn't know what one's day is going to be like. Today of all days, I am reluctant to go out. I should be receiving a phone call. I've been cleaning for three days. I have very little left to do, and I don't want to miss that phone call. "Just use your cell phone," some of you will say. Sometimes I don't hear my cell phone, and I don't want to miss this call.


So this afternoon, I'll probably run to town and buy some paint and finally get started painting my mural (don't worry--I will open all the windows in the house when I paint). I'm going to paint a couple of trees and then move the furniture in front of them and focus on the rest of the wall. But this morning, while I'm still hoping for my phone call, I'm going to post some pictures from last week. While I'm waiting for my pictures to upload, I'm vacuuming the bedrooms. I'd really like to move all the furniture and give everything a good solid cleaning, but I'm not allowed to attempt to move anything that heavy, even with a furniture dolly (sniff, sniff) The further along I get, the more my hands are tied, it seems.

Most of these are pictures of apple gleaning. This lean guy is my dad. I tried to get a picture of his face, but he very cleverly used the foliage to avoid my camera. Just looking at the spotty sunlight and the over-reaching branches can give you an idea of the atmosphere of gleaning. Think early morning. It is rather like stepping into a forest glade on an adventure. You never know what you might find. For instance, on my right is a little treasure that I wasn't expecting. I've never found a bird's nest while gleaning before, but this time I found two of them.




This lady to the left is my mom. She thought that we didn't need to bring home quite as many apples as we did, but we couldn't help ourselves. Apple gleaning is addictive. Every time we had convinced ourselves that we were done, we would see another branch that we had missed. It's very nearly a sin to leave good apples behind. So after we were done gleaning, she and I spend the next three days (nights actually) coreing, pealing, and slicing apples for sauce. 28 quarts and counting. Of course, one can never have too much applesauce, and homemade is so much better than storebought. We dried some apples too, and of course, they can always be eaten fresh.

Late September is also excellent ballooning weather, and every

year, the town of Prosser holds a hot air balloon festival. Now if you like waking up at five in the morning to stand outside and watch balloons take off into the rising sun, by all means, go to Prosser at five in the morning. I haven't been keen on early mornings for a while. I haven't been keen on late evenings either, but my family went to see this event, called Night Glow. Several balloons are set up in a stadium, and flicker on and off and move up and down in time to some well-known piece of music. I only got to see the pictures this year. Maybe next year I'll have my late night appetite back.

Maybe I'll bake a pie this morning, or call my mother-in-law (heads up, Judi) and ask her about mural paints again. She told me all about them once, but I lost the paper that I wrote her advice down on. I know I don't want oil or acrylic paints. That doesn't really leave much, does it. Hmmm. This could be harder than I thought. I might actually be busy this afternoon. :)