When we moved out here, one of the very first friends I made was the mother of my kids’ friends, a freshly divorced, harried, struggling artist about my age. I spent many afternoons that summer at her house, drinking tea and commiserating about new beginnings and talked about hopes for the future. But kids got older and in fits and spurts we fell out of touch. I heard that she’d married her new guy and they moved to Pueblo and were starting a farm, and then I didn’t hear anything for a long time.

A month or so ago, a mutual friend came into the library and just ravedto my boss and me about what she’s doing up there, so I went and looked up her blog, and discovered the farm store! and the CSA! and indeed, amazing stuff. Exciting. And as soon as I started clicking around I came across the farm store opening announcement. So, of course, I immediately decided I had to go!

Because there was just no way we could get up there yesterday, we headed up late Sunday morning, knowing that most everything would be gone, but figuring it would be worth at least getting a look at the farm. We got a fair bit more than that.

As soon as we pulled into the drive, I saw Tammy out in the field, and she ran over and we hugged and squeed and and hugged some more. I oohhed over the baby ducks and admired the chickens, talked about my garden and my work with consumer-side local food, looked at Paul’s experimental planting layouts, admired the very happy pigs, talked charcuterie a bit, and realized I’d already made the decision to put a fall pig on order. I looked at plants – mainly to be polite, because most of what I want to plant I already have, and most of the plants they’re selling are crops I’d rather buy from them later on than grow myself – but I did decide I wanted to take home a chocolate cherry tomato. The only ones left were ones that had been held back from the sale because they had little white spots on the leaves, so Paul told me, “Just take that home and see what you can do with it.”

A little while later, he’d gone back inside and Tammy had drifted back over from visiting with some other folks who had dropped in, and I asked, “So, I know I missed most of the sale, but what do you have left?” She said that there were spring onions to be had, and I said I’d love to take home some onions, so she said, “Okay, come on,” and headed out to the field. So we did! Sat out in the field and chatted and thinned onions until I had a great fat bundle. It was lovely.

Then we were back up to the car, talking about the pig logistics, and I held up the tomato plant and the bundle of onions and asked, “So, how much?” She made a puzzling face and said, “Five bucks.” Done! I put them on the hood of the car and started rummaging through my purse for a fiver, and that’s when Paul came tearing out of the greenhouse. He pointed out the damage on the plant and told her we’d already talked about it and he wasn’t going to charge me for the plant. She looked over his shoulder at my amused expression, made ok-honey noises, and he continued on to talk to their other visitors. I gave her the five bucks. She knew that I wasn’t not going to pay for the plant, and I knew that if it died, she’d give me another one. The intersection of pragmatism and honor.

It was pure delight. Every bit of it. The time with the soil, the ag-science geekery, the spring sunshine, the smell of spring onions permeating the car as we ran the rest of our city errands, but especially the long visit with a friend much missed, and the promise of many more to come. I’m so looking forward to this summer.

This time of year always finds me thoughtful and a little frustrated about the seasonality of food.

It’s difficult, here – I joke that spring in the Rockies is three days of summer, three days of winter, but it’s really no joke. We can get 75-degree spells and blooming daffodils in January, late-season deep freezes in May – sometimes in the same year. So there’s a weird offset between agricultural spring and what I think of as emotional spring, a spell of time every year when the weather is achingly gorgeous and I’m craving soft green-leaved things, but still cooking soups and winter squash and heavy roasts, waiting for the first asparagus and strawberries to hit the market.

Last Sunday I woke up at 6am, looked out the window to see a thick heavy wet snow falling, and went back to bed. By the time I got back up at 8:30, it was all melted away, and by 11, it was sixty degrees. My son, his best friend, and I worked for five hours, clearing flower beds, cleaning up last fall’s leaf litter and turning it into an under-compost layer in the main vegetable bed, doing some outdoor planting and some more seed starts, and making plans for the next few too-short weeks.

One of my favorite salads evokes this time of year – baby greens (the literally very first local food to hit the market each spring) combined with winter-over preserves and just a bit of spice.

Adapted from Raising the Salad Bar by Catherine Walthers

2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
2 Tbsp. olive oil
poultry rub of choice (I like Savory’s Mt. Elbert Blend or original Slap Ya Mama)
4 c. mixed baby greens
1/2 c. sun-dried tomatoes
1/2 c. artichoke hearts
1/2 c. roasted red bell pepper, cut into strips
1/2 c. green or black olives (both delicious, very different!)
1/4 c. minced fresh herbs – parsley, cilantro, and lemon balm are all lovely (or use a bouquet garni).

Heat the olive oil in a medium skillet. Cube chicken and generously toss with rub; sear and then turn down. While the chicken is cooking (or later, if you prefer to cook and then chill the meat) toss the remaining ingredients together. Serve, top with cooked chicken, and dress lightly or not at all.

Light on a whitewashed wall, coming through a western exposure window at four in the afternoon, striking with stunning luminance to ignite a complex golden glow. The “light in Italy” effect, the color of autumn afternoons, liquid gold. I’ve wanted a kitchen, painted that color, my entire adult life.

Well, it’s not quite done, but I know that if I wait for it to be done to post pictures, I’ll never post pictures. It’s a work in progress, and I’ll leave this house for good someday thinking, “I wish I had – I never got around to -” but you know what? In the meantime, I have a kitchen that makes my heart sing when I walk into it in the morning. I’m not waiting for the “right” time, waiting for my life to start, anymore.

The archways and floor trim are still to be painted terra cotta, and some other areas of trim (none of them actually visible in these pictures) the same green as the vintage tiling. Some touchup and tape removal remains to be done and the doors of the breakfast nook cabinets still need painted and re-hung – it’s a fussy taping job, inside and out, because they’re six-paned glass-front doors. I’m looking at a mural of a chile ristra on the back of the door into the hall, or possibly on the pantry doors. All of the atomic steel handles and pulls from a mid-50s remodel will be replaced with wrought iron, and I want some kind of big open wrought-iron (probably resin faux) artwork above the stove and counter to break up the vast expanse of butter yellow. The stoneware utensil holder will be replaced by one that matches my beloved Tunisian dishware. There are other small bits of styling to do, mostly adding color. Plenty of work still, and each small improvement will make the whole room come together better, but the essential transformation is done.

I know, you’re saying – wait! The last post wasn’t about the kitchen, it was about the basement studio! Whatever happened to the basement studio?!? Don’t worry, it’s progressing apace. In order to move forward on that project, I needed to move some furniture temporarily into the breakfast nook, which meant getting the breakfast nook and kitchen painted either first, or not for months. I just wasn’t willing to wait. I’m juggling renovations on three rooms at the same time – the kitchen is farthest ahead, the studio about half-done with major work, and I’ve barely started peeling, scraping, patching and prepping the bathroom. And I’ll leave you with this teaser:

On Wednesday morning, I woke up to four inches of snow. It kept coming, all day, topping out at about eight inches in town and upwards of two feet in some of the higher-elevation communities.

And then, as it will do in this part of Colorado, the sun came out and it all melted. It’s gone now, and it’s supposed to be in the seventies again for the first half of the week, but it was lovely while it lasted.

All of my life, I’ve made do with whatever space I could scrounge for art. I just remembered, out of the blue, that for several years I had a studio set up in a bedroom closet, a foldable drafting table hinged to the back wall and a bookcase for a little storage. My studio has been a walk-in closet, half a dining room, a drafting table in the corner of a living room or bedroom. For the past seven years, since I have been in this house, it’s been a 6×8 breakfast nook tucked between the dining room and kitchen.

I have always dreamed of SPACE. Room to work on truly big projects, or several different projects at once. Enclosed space, not shared with some other purpose. Enough storage. Equipment – looms and spinning wheels and easels. Enough space to move around comfortably, or accommodate a guest or family member in leisurely company.

I am finally, finally getting that. The pictures below are my “before” pictures – the tiny room I’m currently in, and the 15×18 half-basement that I’ve just started renovating. The floor will be primered and the walls repainted before the weekend, and then the fun begins – turning a big white box into the workspace I’ve always wished for. There will be more posts, and more pictures as I go. I’m also playing around with Pinterest, on the recommendation of my wonderful best friend; there isn’t much there yet, but you can follow the this project at pinterest.com/edgeofcenter/studio/.

After work on Friday, with an hour and a half of daylight left to us, we just drive off in no particular direction, down an unfamiliar county road, winding up and away between the volcanic foothills rising from the valley floor and the lower slopes of the encircling mountains. The world tilts, seen from a different angle, revealing unfamiliar planes and shadows.

We roll back in to town just as the sun slides under the rim of mountains, out of breath, laughing, entranced, awed.

It’s been a long time since I did one of these. Photography is easier, when I’m just unfurling again after a dark fallow time, than other forms of art – it’s like listening when you’re not quite ready to speak. It’s reconnecting, regrounding.

I have a new quilt in progress in my studio, and a head full of ideas, and some free time, coming up soon, to stretch and play. And apple blossoms.

In lieu of actual content, pretties.

Working diligently on some exciting projects. Not spending much time online. Refining, as ever, the balancing act.

It’s partly about anticipation, but more about process – the active engagement with a thing in emergence, with plans and stages, learning and research, pieces coming together and that moment when the big picture suddenly snaps into focus. The breathless flurry of the end-game, the basking in delight of the thing accomplished, that quiet moment, and then, just before quiet becomes boredom – what’s next?

What’s next is Thanksgiving. Because I really only go grocery shopping every other weekend, real prep work began yesterday. I started a while ago, collecting recipes and restocking my autumn pantry with smoky spices, winter squashes, frozen turkeys, and other signs of the season. But with this weekend’s shopping, active planning kicks into high gear.

This year, I’m doing a “tilted traditional” feast, something I’ve wanted to do for years – all of the traditional trappings but with trendy new recipes, fusion flavors, local-regional highlights. Ten years ago I would not have had the skills to carry this off, but now I think I’m cook enough to rise to the challenge. It’s exciting.

Hors’d'ouevres

Fall Bruschetta
Spanakopita
Baked Brie with Ginger-Lime Spiced Cranberry Sauce
Pumpkin pie truffles
Hibiscus-pomegranate Italian soda and blackberry mead

Table

Wine-smoked Turkey
Michael Symon’s Cornbread Stuffing
Chile-glazed Sweet Potatoes
Fingerling Potatoes (from my garden!) with Smoked Paprika
Broccoli with Garlic and Lemon
Cheddar-Thyme Gougieres and Apricot-Pecan-Blue Cheese Boule
Green Chile Relish and Onion-Mushroom Balsamic Relish
Extra Ginger-Lime Spiced Cranberry Sauce for table
First Blush and Black Swan shiraz

Dessert

Baked Apple Dumplings
Dark-Chocolate-Studded Pumpkin Pie
Gingerbread Flan
Port, brandy, and coffee

the last gasp of my garden – fingerling potatoes, golden beets and roots,
and chard, harvested the morning after the first frost.