My Cup Runneth O'er

Every large bowl and pot I own is overflowing with produce. I even have a cookie sheet loaded with tomatoes. Today's harvest has just about taken over my kitchen: cucumbers, zucchini (drat ... I forgot to get those picked today; I still haven't used up the ones I already picked), tomatoes by the millions, and potatoes are piled high on every counter and table. Bronwyn and I dug up Red Pontiacs and some All Blues -- potatoes -- today. The red ones were easy to see in the mud, but the blue ones were so dark they blended in with the squishy mud. Note to self: soak the potato row early in the day and then wait for it to dry out a bit to avoid so much mud. Bronwyn and I were pretty caked up by the time we called it a day. Guess we will have lovely skin tomorrow from the nearly-full body mud mask. I checked some websites this evening to figure out how to store the pounds of potatoes I've got, and they said to avoid washing them so they don't rot in storage. Great. We already did that with half of the ones we've dug up. To try to compensate I'm going to spread out our defunct trampoline mat tomorrow in the garage and spread the current crop out to cure (I didn't know they needed to do that either). Some of the red potatoes are enormous ... bigger than softballs. I prayed for a bountiful harvest this year and my prayers have been answered tenfold so far. The challenge now is going to be storing the cornucopia of crops in the limited space I have.

I was talking this evening with some friends and one woman commented how there are people who wish for the "good old days" when life was supposedly much simpler, smaller towns, less technology, everything made from scratch. I've thought often about this and how my grandparents grew everything and canned or made it from scratch. They knew how to build or sew what they needed. There's a certain appeal to me in this -- being able to fix it or take care of it myself. I love the independence and self-sufficiency, and perhaps that is why I take on so many of the projects I do. I want to see if I can fix it (put in a new kitchen faucet or install my own new dishwasher or spend two hours with my oldest son trying to put up a ceiling fan in my bedroom -- don't look too closely at the cracks in the plaster, please!) or sew it or make it myself. I want to grow it or store it myself because the prices in the store make my eyes pop.

Once I have tried doing it myself then I take a look at the opportunity cost to decide if it's really worth it to pay someone else to do it. There are some things definitely worth paying someone else to do: canned green beans, for one. I can't keep those picked and canned fast enough. Not mention we haven't eaten the ones I canned last year. Sorry, green beans are out. And I'm done trying to grow my own corn. And if the furnace or air conditioner go out, well that's definitely out of my league. Car repairs? Ha ha ha ha.

There are major repairs I'm tempted to try myself, but frankly, my biggest problem is Time. During the school year there is just too much going on for me to even consider it. My husband already thinks I cram too much on my plate: teaching piano lessons; helping my children with school and chores; car pooling; caring for our home and yard; doing my church calling; caring for a cat, bees, and chickens. What he could possibly be talking about?!! Okay, so maybe I'm a little booked. I am truly striving for more balance. Once the harvest is over.

Do I really want the good old days? Maybe in some ways. More family time and less Stuff pulling everyone six hundred directions. More frequent personal, "real" communication and less tweeting. Less noise, more nature. Fewer preservatives. More acceptance of true feminine beauty. But I have to say I like my power tools and technology to help me along with all of those self-sufficiency projects that make me feel so independent. I appreciate the freedom I enjoy as a woman to do and try all of these things without being told I can't or shouldn't because I am a woman. So I guess it comes down to appreciating the opportunities I have that all come with this caveat: Choose wisely where I will invest my time and talents, making sure my choices are ones that further my ultimate goal of a strong, eternal family.