Back Home in Oriental

I snagged this nice photo of my parents' porch before we drove away from West Virginia.

Adam's been baking breakfast bread a lot since we came come. We now have Peter and Anna home for the summer, and this bread is popular.

While I was at Max and Anne's farm, they gave me a few gourds Anne had grown last season. They're nicely dried.

Dried gourds get this moldy growth look on the outside. Years ago in Iowa, I bought a beautiful swan's neck gourd and dried it, and then threw it away when it "grew" like this. :(

Anne showed me that all you have to do is sand the gourds, and the mold growth comes right off.

So I sanded them and then painted them with polyurethane. They're kinda shiny now.

I like this mottled brown look. Haven't decided yet what to do with them. To cut intricate designs on them I need a special tool. I'm gonna watch some youtube videos. I saved a handful of seeds from one of them, and next year at the farm I want to grow lots of them, design something cool on them, and sell them at the market. Bird houses? Lamps? Hanging gourds? Bowls and spoons?

This old house in Oriental has been sad-looking. Peeling paint, weedy/viney yard, derelict and vacant. At last someone is fixing it up, and it's looking mighty fine. They passed sheetrock in through an upstairs window.

These bright bushes are full of spring right now.

The views here are as wide and comforting as ever.

Welcome to the river.