Weekly Update: 3.23.24
A chill wind blew out of the northwest, scattering puffy white clouds across a deep blue sky. Green streamers danced from posts set up around our will-be garden, as Celtic music blared from an outdoor speaker. Even nature seemed dressed for St. Patrick's Day, with the rolling green fields stretching out to the tree-lined horizon. While we always make Irish food for the feast day, we have never done anything else -- until this year, when our brother Jeremiah decided to surprise the family with our own Highland Games competition.
The fun began with everyone receiving a Gageland Highland Games T-shirt and blue face-paint, a nod to our Scottish heritage. Jeremiah proceeded to instruct and referee several traditional highland games -- a foot race, sheaf toss, hammer throw, caber toss, and tug-of-war. Most of us were sorry excuses for competitors, as we had never even heard of some of the sports. Still, we had lots of fun. Levi and Grace shared the trophy as the top male and female competitors this year.
We worked up quite an appetite, so it was nice to finish the day with our Irish stew and mini-soda breads. We have made Irish soda bread for years, but this was the first time we experimented with personal sized loaves -- small enough that we could bake them in our air fryer. They turned out perfectly. We whipped them up using our beloved Kitchenaid stand mixer, which we recently retrieved from our storage unit.
For dessert, we sampled a pistachio ice-box cake recipe we found online. The pudding portion was delicious, but the layered wafer cookies were a nasty, soggy mess. Thankfully -- that wasn't the only sweet treat we made. Bonnie-Jean made some Irish potato candy, and Grace and Jeremiah made sugar-free Irish cream.
The rest of the week was very ordinary. We continued digging rocks out of our garden site -- a task so slow-going it would be discouraging if it wasn't so pleasant. We worked on installing the bunkhouse drain system. Our mom headed up some spring cleaning and organizing in the build site. We made a trip to our storage unit to clean, organize, and pick up a few things.
We sisters, along with our mom, carved out some time for self-care. We tried the viral Listerine foot soak to deal with our calluses. We didn't expect it to turn our feet blue, however. Thankfully, most of the blue scrubbed off. My toenails are still the sky blue color I painted them as a teen in the 90s, but I do have to say -- my feet are softer than they have been for ages.
It was a productive, well-rounded week. We are looking ahead to a lot of festivity, as we have four birthdays, an anniversary, and Easter in the next two weeks. We are combining everything into two celebrations. This weekend, we will have a birthday party for our dad and oldest niece, Chloe. Today, when we aren't working on the house, we will be wrapping presents and prepping for a birthday dinner -- steak and potatoes requested by our dad, as well as stroganoff and radish cauliflower salad requested by Chloe. For dessert, Chloe wanted banana split pie while our dad will snack on a freezer pound cake (a personal favorite of his). Making time to celebrate can be a discipline out here, but it is one we always enjoy. The excuse to put away the power tools and do some cooking feels like a treat in itself. I'm so thankful God gave us a life with rhythms of work and rest, of holy seasons and ordinary time. Such variety is one of the many blessings we can hardly keep track of these days.