real housewife vs. reality

My guilty pleasure is the Real Housewives franchise, any of them.  I like to get in my bed and watch it after finishing up a glamorous day in my own life, my reality.

In my glamorous life I was driving to Boston last  to pick up my kids after a weekend with Grammie and Pepe and had a solid 5 hours in the car alone.  This got me thinking of how my life is SOOO much like those ladies on TV.

1. I was driving myself 5 hours (one way) so someone would watch my kids for the weekend and instead of sipping on champagne I was shoving a bag of M&Ms in mouth because I know what you eat on a road trip does not count towards your diet.

2. The 'real' wives go out for fancy lunches with wine all the time.  I take my kids out for pizza after school because I have no groceries and don't plan to shop until tomorrow and we split a chocolate milk because I also forgot my wallet and all I could find in the car was $6 so after ordering each kid a slice there isn't enough money left for everyone to get a drink. 

3. The 'real' ladies get new cars for birthdays, Christmas or because they got new boobies.  My husband thinks he's man of the year when he buys me a new garden hose.

4.  'Real' kids get mani/pedi's with their mom, I tell my kids they need to wear sneakers to school (not sandals) because we skipped baths last night and their feet are dirty and I don't want anyone to see!

5.  I wear jeans and a shirt to pre-school pick up and people ask me why I am so dressed up since my normal uniform is gym clothes.   'Real' ladies where gowns to back yard barbecue's.

6. I have access to a fleet of John Deere tractors and a willing driver anytime if I wanted to go for a ride.   Those other ladies merely have private jets to take them to parties or girls weekend away.

7.  'Real' ladies get paid to argue with people that are ruining their life and fight about leaks to the press, false infidelity rumors and backstabbing.  I have 2 pre-schooler's who, if you ask the right time, have me to ruin their life.  We deal with serious problems like juice in the wrong cup, shorts with itchy tags, a mean, mean mom who won't let the tv stay on all day and that doesn't allow candy for breakfast.   I SHOULD BE GETTING PAID!

8. In reality when my mom friends come for lunch we serve PBJ and everyone brings fruit and carrot sticks while 'real' wives have a chef and duck confit.

9.  'Real' wives spend their days kiss ass....in REALITY I just spend my days wiping them.

10. 'Real' wives are surrounded by people paid to play friends with them for a show.  In reality I have lots of wonderful friends and we all choose to be around one another and our pay comes in the form of wine together, or a run, or phone call. 

it's all about the prep

Most people think fall is the only busy time on the apple orchard but spring is actually almost as busy.  Planting new trees, constantly watching the weather and being prepared to fight off any frost, the arrival of lots and lots of bees to pollinate the trees are just a few of the things that are going on at once.  This year they (my husband and team)  are planting about 14,000 trees.  Each by hand, in perfectly straight rows, in perfect increments.  NOT a job I would ever want to do.    I am just not good at measuring.  Sure, I can do it but fine detail is just not my thing. I have a terrible sense of 'straight' or 'level' and "eyeballing" is my preferred method even though time and time again it's proven not to work in my favor.

 

 Last week I begin planting in my home garden.  This year I actually had a garden plan on paper (thank you Rose Ryan /http://harvesthomeorganics.blogspot.com/, and everything was perfectly measured out so I could get the maximum planting space.  I headed outside armed with packets of seeds, my plan and my shovel.  Then, guilt set in so I went back inside and got a tape measure so I could measure the spots.  Well, it was a 25 ft tape measure and my garden is 33 feet long but it was close enough..right?!   After I marked the center line with 2 sticks I found I began to do the horizontal rows this time using a broken yard stick I found.  It had the first 22 inches on it so again, good enough.   After getting 2 rows done and planting about 30 onions I stepped back to admire my work.   Yeah, not so much.   Straight? Yes, if you tilt your head slightly. Even spacing? That depends on what you consider even.  It looked mediocre at best.  The worst part about all this is I hated it.  It probably really doesn't matter how straight the rows are but it was starting to look like a disaster which means if I continued this pattern for the next 30 feet I would run out of space, mess up my plan and have a hodgepodge.  Ironically, I do love a well kept garden (esp considering my lack of prep).    Thankfully my farmer came to my rescue.    When he got home he took one look at my tools, shook his head and headed to the garage.   He came back armed with a long flexible measuring tape, string, stakes, and some sunscreen.   After we measured the entire garden and reviewed my plan we worked on marking all the rows and he even got as detailed as marking them for me.    As I proceeded to finish up some of my early planting and he moved on to another yard project I began to smile.  I knew when I started he would end up coming to my rescue, partly because knows my inability to make straight lines and because he is all about the prep work and knew I'd be happier in the end when everything fit..nice and straight.  (you should see what happens when we paint, he has tape, rags, dropcloth....I have a brush, a can and maybe a paper towel on hand!!)  For all my laziness when it comes to prep I sure do like admiring my garden midsummer when everything is nice and orderly! (pics later this summer)

 Later that day I thanked my husband again for his garden help and he simply said "it's all about the prep"  and he is totally right.  Our daughter will be entering kindergarten this fall and we just brought her to orientation at the elementary school.   She is over the moon.  In her eyes school can't start soon enough, the friends, the learning, the teachers, the FUN, she just wants to get there NOW!!   As parents we always strive to push our kids to be independent and confident.   We never let them say the can't do something, they must try it first and although this discussion doesn't always go smoothing they usually end up realizing they they can do it and they do like whatever they were so anxious about.    We tell them when things are going to be hard or less than pleasant (dental work, shots) but we also tell them they will be fine and get through it.  I think with kids, like tree planting or garden planning, it's all about the prep.

Prepare them for what's to come.  Yes, shelter them from bad things they don't need to know about (crazy bombers and shooters) but prepare them for life.  We need to let them know some things will be really tough and sometimes they will get their feelings hurt or won't be the best at a certain activity.  We also need to tell them they can do it, they are strong, smart, a good friend, capable and most importantly, when things don't go their way that they will be just fine.  It's all about the prep.

Part of my prep is timing my activities to sync with when someone will come home to catch me..and then help :)

little things

The past few weeks in my tiny town have been a bit of a roller coaster.   A young family had to say goodbye to a husband, father and all around great guy after a courageous battle with cancer.  As our community came together in this terrible time of loss it has also caused all of us to look at our own families a little closer and hold them a little tighter.  We all get so busy doing our day to day and running from here to there we often miss the simple things that happen every day.

One of the perks of being married to a farmer is that there is little travel involved so we are able to have dinner together many nights (except during harvest!).  It's a simple thing that I have never thought much of and mostly appreciated because it meant there was another referee at the table with me.   Our dinners usually comprise of talking about our day and our plans for the next day.  I knew this was a good habit for my kids and hoped it would pay off when they become tweens and teens that don't want to tell their parents anything.


Last week we were skiing and my little guy and I took a break to get a snack.  As we sat down at the table in the lodge and I doled out the goldfish he looked up at me and said "so mom, how was your day."  He said it with such sincerity and with a genuine interest in my response.  It was at that moment I realized how important our family dinner chats are and what they are teaching my children.

 Whether it a family dinner, a car ride ritual,  or a bedtime routine I think we all need to remember that all those 'little things' we do mean a lot.

life of a farmer

There has been a lot of buzz about the "farmer' super bowl commercial which got me thinking of my own farmer.  I have said before what my husband does is fancy farming but it's farming none the less.    Almost everyday, in every weather is he outside taking care of his crop.   He works very hard, every day and sometimes I get numb and forget to notice all the weight he carries. 

Winters are spent making sure his team trims almost 250,000 trees (all by hand) before the spring comes.  They do this every day, in every kind of weather, snow, rain, wind and just plain COLD.   

Once they make it through the winter spring rolls through Central New York.  This is one of the most critical times on an apple farm.  This is when the buds begin to grow, flower, get pollinated and eventually become the beginnings of fruit.    Of course none of this happens magically.  You need sun, rain, plenty of bees and temperatures that above freezing.  The month of May is carefree time for most families, spring is in full swing, summer is on the horizon, people being mowing the lawn and playing outside.  In our house May can be very stressful.  May is beautiful, sunny, sometimes warm during the day and can be very cold at night.   At each stage of bud development they can only tolerate a certain level of cold before they become damaged (damaged bud =damaged flower or no flower which affects the apple).  This means that checking the weather is an hourly occurrence along with studying wind maps, jet stream and a bunch of other charts that I still don't understand.    Usually, the most beautiful clear sky days bring on the hardest nights. 

  On a night when there is going to be frost my farmer spends his day prepping the farm by checking his wind machines (tall fans that keep air moving so cold can't settle into the valley) laying out smudge-pots and checking all his thermometers to make sure they are accurate.  The next step is to get to bed. He comes home and tries to go to bed right after dinner because he know that before long he will be back up headed to work.   He will wake every hour and check the temp and when it starts to get close to his critical point he calls in in troops who all probably wake their wives while they try to get out of the house quietly at midnight.  Together this army works through the night trying to keep cold air out and flowers in tack.  Usually after this there is still a full day of work to put in the next day because you spend all your time the day before prepping and you need to keep on your normal schedule of spring work so you don't get behind. It's an exhaustive process that thankfully isn't every night and is normally only about a month long. 

When spring turns to summer concern of frost is a distant memory and instead water is a concern.  Trees that don't get enough water have small fruit, weak fruit. 

Summer becomes fall and full harvest begins.  Apples get picked everyday in every  kind of weather.  While harvesting your crop you are also worrying about selling it.     Will it be good enough? Will there be enough? Will it store well? Will the price hold?    The tricky thing about farming is that you spend all your money (on prep, labor, supplies) before you sell anything all in hopes that you do everything right, mother nature cooperates and you have people that want to buy your product.  To stay it's stressful at times is an understatement.

Farming is certainly a labor of love.  It's not a get rich quick scheme but it is providing my children with experiences and memories they will have forever and that will make them into better adults.   They will know what hard labor is, they will fear it and respect it and I bet they will love it just as much as their dad.