Ch. 2: In which Huntress kneads a break & laments a cursed fig tree
Saturday, April 5, 2025
This is the amount of dishes that pile up at my house before noon:
That’s because the dishwasher is still full of clean dishes from the night before.
I really despise washing dishes. I’ve said for years: “Give me a garden hose and tell me to water every square inch of the yard by hand and I’d do that over dishes.” I’m baffled that every person manages to use three bowls and utensils each every morning.
I’ve tried paring the dishes down to just one place setting per person so we would be forced to either wash them immediately after use or reduce the amount of dishes used. Well, that didn’t work. I just ended up with a dishwasher only halfway full by the end of the day, which made me feel like I couldn’t run it. It has to be full or it’s a waste!
So now I just embrace the dish pile. Mr. H volunteers to wash a lot and I’m thrilled about that. Leaving them on the counter overnight if there’s writing to be done or beauty sleep to be had is a character flaw I’m working through.
But it’s not just disdain for the chore that keeps the dish pile high. It’s interruption. Sometimes I bargain with myself to just wash/load 3 dishes every time I walk by the sink to get it done. But that’s sort of like pouring water into a bucket with a hole.
But the other option is to plow through the whole stack and, if you’re a stay-at-home mother to small children, you know as well as I do there is no task that can be completed start to finish without interruption during business hours (which run from approximately 6:30-9:30; sorry, I am not up for dishes after a 15-hour shift).
So I must devise clever schemes to dissuade the Lilliputians from making requests for extended periods of time (i.e. 15 minutes).
Kneading Breaks
One method I infrequently pull from my bag of tricks is a new batch of play dough. (Which takes more time and dishes even as I’m trying to create an inverse relationship between time spent and the number of dishes?!) But, oh, they love it and it gets the job done. I only make my own play dough now cause I have bags of old flour that need using and it just seems silly to buy it.
This time I got a really wild hair and decided I won’t just make one lazy Himalayan salt colored lump, noooo, I will make a rainbow of colors! (I also have a giant bag of old salt that needs using.)
So, even while needing a break to get something else around the house done, I kneaded to breaking instead because I was not prepared for the amount of kneading that would need to be done to successfully merge food coloring with a stiff dough. But half way through I had already invested so much into it, I went ahead and finished making all the colors.
I am happy that I did it. I just hope they will wait a few weeks before they start mixing the colors together.
If that wasn’t enough, a couple days later I thought well, hey, let me make some bread! And that took almost as much kneading as the play dough. Another labor-intensive project that seems to keep the kids fed and happy. Nothing fancy, just a couple loaves of white bread.
I tried sourdough a few years ago, but never could get the hang of it. Plus it’s like taking care of a pet and that gave me anxiety. I want to start making all our bread products from scratch cause store bought bread products are some of the worst trash you can consume. And even store bought flour is bunk (so I’m learning only recently—and this coming from someone who only buys top quality organic King Arthur flour). Intentions are to buy a grain mill in upcoming months and milling it fresh.
If you aren’t hip to this info yet, here’s a great place to start: Only Real Bread.
A Cursed Fig Tree
I’ve gotten a spring garden up and running. I’ve neglected to take pictures of it yet, but it’s currently full of trivial little side dressings to a main dish—I’m wondering if we will even get to eat any of it before the bugs start kicking in—but it’s something. So far we have:
Bok choy (thanks to Dad’s farm)
Arugula
Cilantro
Broccoli (again, thanks to Dad’s farm!)
Walla walla onions
The most productive thing in our yard is a creeping thicket of elderberry canes. Which are absolutely beautiful when they bloom. (The neighbors mistook them for unruly weeds last year, albeit, beautiful weeds.) And they produce enough berries to make at least a pint of elderberry syrup, which I am proud to say is a medicinal staple I have managed to keep stocked for many years now.
Meanwhile, this fig tree that I’ve been growing for about seven years has not fared so well:
No, I did not get trigger happy with the pruning shears. In fact, it was the first year I commissioned Mr. H to actually properly prune it. Probably the reason it has never produced or seemed to grow more than half an inch is a lack of pruning.
He watered, he researched and pruned with care, we were inspired to think perhaps it would be the first year we would see signs of production. It was a labor of faith as there was almost nothing left of it when he was finished.
Woe, that the proverbial judge of twigs should come along and take an ax to the root of the tree. I came through the gate to check on my little fig and found one of my boys standing over it with the clippers: “I didn’t know you were growing it.” *SHRUG.*
And, like Jacob stunned at his marital misadventure, I groaned that I must endure another seven years of servitude to enjoy the fruits of my labor.
Easy come, easy go, I guess.
The Weekly Inventory
A new addition: At the conclusion of each weekly home journal, I want to include a complete list of the foods (or other items) I made from scratch or improved upon during the course of the week, harvests, and other various homemade accomplishments.
A few years ago my closest friend and I were discussing how we just wanted to throw off the convenience and consumer mindset and fill our homes with everything hand and homemade (or thrifted and repurposed), whether that’s clothes, food, needful things around the house, gifts, etc. A weekly inventory helps me see that I’m making strides toward that goal (because I forget as quickly as these items are consumed that I really am doing things around here).
This week’s inventory:
Homemade play dough in a rainbow of colors
2 loaves of white bread (no more buying bread if I can help it!)
From-scratch meatballs (50 made, 25 frozen for later)
From-scratch pancakes (an improvement over frozen store-bought)
A whole, organic roasted chicken (an improvement over buying a cheap in-store rotisserie)
3 quarts of chicken broth made from the carcass and frozen
As I was wearing myself out kneading bread to an overture of screaming kids, I saw one of my neighbors drive by out the window. Always in the kitchen with a view of the road, I see all the neighbors running back and forth all day long. Starting with the school bus lights at 6:15am and coming to a close when the car pulls in from work.
I’m the only person in our neighborhood who lives with kids underfoot 24/7 with almost no breaks. And it’s exhausting. I watch other parents send their kids off to school each day and think of the time they have to work in peace while I work hard to come up with ways to entertain mine so I can write a few paragraphs without interruption.
But you know, kneading that bread and having those passing thoughts, I wouldn’t switch places. I’m not rushed in any way. I’m not pressed for time. I may be kneading play dough and bread to keep my kids busy so I can squeeze in a few minutes to complete a written thought or beat back the tide of dishes (which wouldn’t be there if we weren’t all home all day every day), but the point is: I can. I have time to make the best food for my family from scratch while busier beholden peers must rely on fast and processed food to keep up with schedules. I have time to make play dough instead of trashing old ingredients and buying more plastic and chemicals like petroleum.
I have no deadlines, no external pressures or accountability, no reason to hurry or peel out of the neighborhood early in the morning. I get to start my morning slowly, making pancakes instead of packing lunches. I get to drink tea and walk through the garden while the kids jump on the trampoline or bring me a lady bug. I don’t have to wait til Saturday or an hour at dusk to host such precious moments. Even if the time I have is loud and busy, I get to make play dough cause I have loads of time.
And I suppose—I know—that’s worth losing a fig tree and developing a little temporary carpal tunnel syndrome.