Story time

Lots of little stories this week....

The Tale of the Fruit Trees

We had the loveliest pie cherry tree in Columbia.  It was extremely low maintenance and yet it produced fruit every year.  It was sad to see it plowed under by the foundation repair folks the year we moved.  And we vowed we would plant another one here in Saint Louis.  Only, apparently, they are hard to find.  Same with apricot trees.  Our down-the-alley neighbor has a mature apricot tree that survived the spring frosts two years ago and produced a lovely batch of fruits that our neighbor was not interested in so he let us pick them.  I grew up with two apricot trees in my back yard in El Paso and loved them.  We tried growing one in Columbia but it died.  And, they are hit or miss as far a bearing fruit but I was inspired by our neighbor and decided to plant one here with the hope that some years, we would have fruit.  So, in early January, I went to the Starke's Nursery website and ordered a cherry and an apricot tree and was told they would arrive sometime in March or early April.  But, we have had such a mild winter that I guess Starke's decided to ship them last week (Starke's is located just north of Saint Louis) and we planted them yesterday.  High hopes here....

I realize they are just little sticks so they are hard to see but the cherry is in the foreground and the apricot is beside the firepit.  If you look closely, you will see my daffodils in full bloom waaaaay in the back by the garage.

The Tale of the Study Desk

Steve has a special "man cave" down in the basement where he has his model train set up and all his sports pictures hung.  It is also where he does his daily scripture study at a card table he set up.   On a particularly cold day this winter, he decided to move temporarily up to the kitchen table where it was warmer and he was surprised that his back didn't hurt after his studying.  It turns out the the kitchen table is 30 inches high and the card table is only 28 inches.  So, the quest for a better, taller study table began.  We visited the local St. Vincent de Paul Thrift Store a couple of weeks ago and didn't find anything.  Yesterday morning, we mapped out a plan to go looking again at several local thrift stores but when we stepped into the first store, TA DAAAAA, we found the perfect table.  It is actually 31 inches!  It is a lovely little antique desk and it was only $20 dollars.  SOLD!  (I love the wood features on the front) (Linus decided to be in the photos)

The Tale of the Two Closets

We love our little house but two of the closet rods were up too close to the closet shelf which made putting on hangers very difficult.  We bought some wood, Steve made the cuts, I painted them last week and this week, I installed them and now, putting on hangers is a breeze.  You can see from the photo how close it was before....

The Tale of the Two Chairs

Back in Columbia, we had two wooden folding chairs on our front porch.  They were ones we got for free from the law school probably twenty years ago.  We got three.  One is now in our bedroom and the two went to the porch.  But, being in the weather for many years took its toll and when we moved in 2020, they looked pretty bad.  They were still sturdy, though, so I sanded them during the month we hung out in Marsha's duplex before we could close on this house.  Once we moved, they went into the garage and to the bottom of the "To Do" list until last week when I finally stained them black and painted on a coat of clear polyurethane.  They now grace our new front porch.

A Tasty Tale

For Christmas, Elise wanted to give me some gluten-free goodies from the only completely gluten-free bakery in the area, Britts Bakehouse.  Sadly, by the time she got to Saint Louis, they were closed for the holidays and so I got  twenty dollar bill instead.  This bakery sells all kinds of gluten-free baked goods but I feel pretty happy with my attempts at cookies and muffins.  But, not donuts.  And Britt's only offers them on weekends so, as you can guess, they sell out pretty quickly.  Since two Saturdays out of the month we are serving in the temple, I had to plan my trip to Kirkwood for just the right day and time and that happened yesterday morning.  We were there right as they opened at 9:00 and I got four beautiful gluten-free donuts and a cinnamon roll.  YUM!

A Musical Tale

I was in Kirkwood THREE times in twenty-four hours this past weekend.  The other two times were to play in the Saint Louis Civic Orchestra dress rehearsal and concert Friday and Saturday nights. We played two modern pieces by living composers.  We also played the Saint-Saens Havanaise, a violin solo accompanied by orchestra that featured a local sixteen year old violinist who won the concerto competition that the orchestra sponsors every year.   She was an incredible musician and played the piece flawlessly every time she rehearsed and performed.  The final piece was the massive Brahms 1st Symphony.  It was SO much fun to play.  Steve couldn't attend the performance so he went to the dress rehearsal and Emily and Noah, who also couldn't go on Saturday, joined him.  We played in the Kirkwood Performing Arts Center, a beautiful new facility that was state-of-the-art.  

I took these during intermission.  That is my cello, Gertrude, in the bottom left....

The Tale of the Holiday House

On our Wednesday morning walking route, we pass by a house on Leona that goes all out to decorate for every single holiday.  I posted the Christmas decor (remember it looked like Candy Land).  Here are the St. Patrick's decorations.  The little house has been there since Christmas - he just puts up different décor on it, depending on the holiday.

A Tale of Family

We had dinner at Emily and Joe's last Sunday night and here are photos from our time together.  I am so happy to be so close by!

In last week's blog, I mentioned the movies we started watching and we were able to finish "To Kill A Mockingbird" last Sunday afternoon and I finished "Wakanda Forever" Wednesday evening.  We both watched the miniseries "Dr. Thorne".  Well, I watched it more intently because it was a teeny bit like Steve's most unfavorite movie of "Pride and Prejudice".  

Weather has been up and down but it was nice enough for a bike ride one day.  And that is the end of story time.