So yesterday I got to wondering where is it all those frogs go when the creek’s all but dried up come mid-summer? Seems there’s as many tadpoles as hairs on my head in the springtime, and by April Aunt Kitty’s always saying she can’t hear herself think for all the racket they send up in the evenings. (What does a person thinking sound like anyhow?)

Me and Pilot and Wilbur got to talking about those frogs last night. I’ll admit I was doing most of the talking, but Pilot, he has his own way of making his opinions known. Goats, they aren’t none too smart, but Pilot and me, we just pretend Wilbur’s part of the talkin’ so as she doesn’t get to feeling left out.

See, we were laying in bed sweatin’–the window wide open, but not even a rumor of a breeze blowing through–and while I was trying to explain to the both of them that I loved them a whole lot, but it was just too darn hot to snuggle close, I got to thinkin’ how quiet it was out there. Pretty soon I figured seeing as how there wasn’t any sleeping happening anyway, we might as well work this out for ourselves while it was foremost in our thoughts.

We made it out the door quiet enough–well, except for Wilbur, who kept trying to curl her lips around a genuine dog whimper to let us know she was scared. Let me tell you, a goat wasn’t made to bark, and it certainly wasn’t made to whimper.

We were halfway down the hill and the moon lighting our way just fine when a rustling started up in the manzanita bushes beside us. I may have peed my pants just a little, but it was Wilbur who bolted back up the hill sending up a holler like to wake the dead. Sure enough, it wasn’t two minutes later Ben was on the back porch bellowing at us:

“Tevis! You had better be in your bed before I find my paddle!” Ben’s always saying stuff like that when he gets real mad. I don’t think he even has a paddle, but the idea of it sure is enough to get my hiney moving.

I was still puzzling over those frogs this morning and I reckon I’ll still be puzzling over them come next spring when they show up by the thousands. Now Aunt Kitty, she’d tell you there’s things on God’s earth we just aren’t meant to understand.

If I’m being real honest with you, I have to admit I get a real strong urge to spit in her eye when she says stuff like that.

…Mary and Ellie! Expect an email from me soon, ladies, and happy sewing!

I’ll tell you straight off that Pilot is alright now. If you’ve been worrying anything like to the way I was worrying, well it would just be mean to ramble on and on before letting you in on that.

Truth is, most of the world just kept on like usual and it may be that I’m really the only one who was lost without four legs to follow. I fell asleep over my knitting that night and when I’d finished caring for the chickens and Wilbur in the morning, I picked up the needles again. The whole day passed like that, with Aunt Kitty bringin’ me food I didn’t eat and Ben trying to start a conversation. (It’s a sorry thing when Ben tries to start a conversation, and even on a good day I don’t know that I could have joined in on talking about the bugs that are causing his lettuce to wilt or the whine the truck’s been making.)

I set up on the front porch so I could holler every once in a while and keep my eye out. Every time I called Pilot’s name, Wilbur would come running, wagging her little tail, only to turn away woebegone when she realized Pilot was not coming.

Sometime in the afternoon I finished off my ball of yarn and Aunt Kitty tied on another for me. The day was about gone and Aunt Kitty was just calling me in for bed when I spotted movement on the road.

Here’s what I saw coming over the hill: just the silhouette of a man carryin’ a burden, and the sun a red glow at his back. I stood up, I did, and squinted my eyes. My knitting fell to the floor with a woosh and a click-clack. I raised a hand to shade my eyes, but it was no use. That sun was glued to that man’s back and all I could see of him was the orange line that traced his frame. But that burden– oh, the hope that filled me then!

I fairly flew off of the porch and met him before he’d reached the barn.

“Pilot!” I said, and I said it again. “Pilot!”

When I reached for him, Ezekiel backed up a step.

“He tousled with a cougar, I’d say,” he said.

It shames me to say this was the second time that boy saw me cry. I could not seem to stop myself, though I am sorry for it today. In my defense I’ll tell you that Wilbur did not conduct herself with any more decorum. She sent up wails the likes of which I’ve only read about and imagined, of funeral processions and villages overcome with the black plague.

“He’s alive, see.” Zeke went down on one knee. I knelt there beside him, and Pilot–sweet dog!–lifted his head and nuzzled into my hair.

It’s been near on to two weeks now, and Pilot is starting to seem himself again. I can’t hate that boy near as much as I’d like to, seeing as how he brought Pilot home to me. He said Pilot was just laying on the ground, whimpering, away up the hill, at least a couple miles from home. What Zeke was doing up there I do not know, nor do I much care.

Aunt Kitty says she’s not quite sure what a four-foot girl is going to do with a twelve-foot scarf, but she reckons if I wrap it three or four times around my neck, I may not trip over it too much.

… a little giveaway while I get Frog Creek back in order. We’ve just returned from a little vacation and are so grateful for you being patient with us!

Just leave a comment to this post if you’re interested in any of these vintage children’s patterns.

I’ll choose a winner or two next Monday. Tevis should return sooner!

Did you ever know a minute that felt like a day? Have you ever had a moment swell up so big that it seemed to swallow the moment before and the moment after too?

See, while most of you have been having breakfast when you should, and supper when you should and sleeping through the night, just like you should, I’ve been stuck here in this one awful moment and it’s the moment I learned Pilot was gone. He ran off sometime in the night and every minute he stays gone I feel more sure he won’t be comin’ back.

My mama used to say bad things come in threes. I know that because Aunt Kitty’s always saying to me, “Now you’re mama always said bad things come in threes”– she says that right before she says, “but I always told her, ‘Katy, that’s just horse puckey. Bad things come and go, and counting ‘em up won’t make ‘em come or go any faster.’”

Still, I think my mama may have been on to something. If I’d've been counting, maybe I’d have taken more care.

The first thing came in the night, a peel of sirens that drew near and then faded, but was enough to stir Pilot and have him wet-nosing me till I let him outside. In the morning we woke to a red sunrise and smoke so thick you could taste it. Ben took out the truck and returned an hour later to say the fire was out on government land and should be out before it caused much trouble.

He barely had a toe to ground when Miss Julia from across the creek came high-tailin’ it up the road. She was hollerin’ and bawlin’ out the window and for a minute I thought all my prayers had been answered and that boy Ezekiel had up and died. I had just a moment to feel a smidgeon of regret before I realized that wasn’t it at all. “Cougar!” she was yelling. Then something about “My goats!” Well, Ben was quicker to catch on than me and he had his rifle and was climbing back in the truck about the time I puzzled out her words.

I guess it was the cougar that got me wondering about Pilot, and it was Wilbur whining and walking in circles around my legs that got me worrying. I still hadn’t tracked him down when Ben returned to tell us we better stick close to the house for a few days, seeing as how that cougar was gone by the time he got there. Miss Julia’s husband, Curtis, was away for the week, and that boy was nowhere to be found, so Ben was heading back straightaway to bury the goat the cougar got.

I’ve hollered for Pilot and I’ve walked circles around the house, but Ben won’t let me wander farther while there’s a cougar nearby. He’s done some poking around too, and drove up the hill aways to ask our neighbors to be on the lookout. Aunt Kitty’s done her share of whistling, but about the time the sun was set to disappear behind the hills she came out on the porch and told me to come inside. Food doesn’t hold much appeal when you’re missing someone and soon enough Aunt Kitty dismissed me from dinner. I poked my head out the window and called again.

“Tevis, dear, come sit,” Aunt Kitty said. Sit! How does a person make her body be still when her mind is a frenzy?

“Can’t,” I said.

“You can,” said Aunt Kitty. “Come here.” She patted her hand on the sofa beside her. She was pulling out my needles and yarn. They’d been away since my birthday.

I sat beside her, and she began to sing while I worked,

“In through the front door

around the back

peek through the window

and out pops Jack!”

My hands couldn’t quite keep up with my head, but they made a great effort.

Because we’re still elbow-deep in peaches at Frog Creek…

INGREDIENTS:

6-8 peaches, peeled, pitted and chopped

2 boxes instant vanilla pudding mix (and manufacturer’s required ingredients to make pudding)

3 eggs

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon vanilla

3/4 cup granulated sugar

3/4 cup buttermilk pancake mix

1 cup whipping cream

1/2 cup powdered sugar

First, make the sponge cake:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease and flour a 15×10x1 inch cookie sheet.

2. Beat eggs, salt and vanilla four minutes on high speed. Add granulated sugar and beat at medium speed for 4-5 minutes. Add pancake mix until combined.

3. Spread batter in pan. Bake 8-10 minutes, until golden and cake springs back at touch.

4. Loosen edges and turn onto towel sprinkled with powdered sugar. Cool on wire rack.

5. Make pudding according to package directions.

6. Beat whipping cream and powdered sugar until stiff peaks form.

7. Tear cake into bite-size pieces.

8. Spread layer of whipping cream in bottom of trifle bowl. Top with layer of pudding. Add peaches and sponge cake. Repeat with one or two more layers, until all of the ingredients have been used. Reserve whipping cream and a few peaches for top layer.

Store in refrigerator.

Near as I can tell, being thirteen isn’t much different from being twelve. Or eleven. Aunt Kitty still won’t let me flip the pancakes on the hot griddle and Ben still won’t hear of me learning to drive the pickup truck. I even showed him just yesterday how I can reach the pedals and the steering wheel at the same time now, but all he did was shout at Aunt Kitty, who was closest to me at the time, to “Get those keys out of the ignition before she figgers out how ta start it!”

Course, I already know how to start it, but I didn’t figure right then was the best time to say so.

The thing is, I expected to be some smarter at thirteen than I was at twelve. I expected I would finally understand why God made cling peaches even though they’re nothing but trouble and don’t taste nearly as good as a freestone. I expected some privileges too. Thirteen is pretty close to grown up, you know. Ben did convince Aunt Kitty that I might stay up a mite later in the evenings, but I keep falling asleep before I’m meaning to and next thing I know it’s morning and I don’t know the first thing about what happened past my old bedtime.

I followed Pilot all the way to the road today. Aunt Kitty nearly did tan my hide when I got back, but it was worth it. I saw a bright red race car speed by with two girls in the front seat, their long hair whipping like a yellow flag in the wind.

When she was done closing her eyes and taking deep breaths and telling me why it’s not safe for me to go out to the road by myself, Aunt Kitty handed me my apron and told me to gather up some peaches.

“Mind you pick the ripe ones,” she said. Well, the best way I know to determine if a peach is ripe is to take a bite out of it. My tummy was feeling fairly sore by the time my apron was full and Aunt Kitty didn’t say even one word of thanks when I let the peaches roll out on the table. Her eyes scanned the peaches, then they closed for a minute or so, then she looked at me and whispered–yes, whispered, though there’s not a sleeping baby within a hundred miles!–

“To test a peach for ripeness, Tevis, you simply squeeze it gently–” Here her voice rose for a moment and she repeated that word–”GENTLY! If it gives, it is ripe. If it is hard, it is not ripe.”

“Well, I’ll be!” I said. “Want me to get some more?” But she didn’t answer, just stood there shaking her head at the fruit on the table.

I took that to mean no, which was just as well because I had a mind to feel the wind in my hair like those girls in the race car. Ben was busy in the barn doctorin’ up the goats and when I looked, sure enough the keys were right in the ignition like usual.

Now don’t get all worked up about it. I was only going to take that truck to the end of the driveway, turn around and come back. Just far enough to lean my head out the window and feel the wind in my hair. Pilot hopped up beside me and sure enough, Wilbur jumped in too. Well, I’m smart enough to be safe, so I buckled them into one seat belt and me into the other. I turned that key over in the ignition and we all three of us nearly jumped out of our seats at the engine’s roar. Setting my arm across the seat like Ben always does I looked over my shoulder and pressed gently on the pedal. When nothing happened I figured I was being too shy about it. Pilot and Wilbur were looking at me, tongues hanging out the sides of their mouths.

I pressed my foot down harder. That truck thundered so loud Ben came tearing out of the barn, his feet sliding sideways as he turned the corner, barely staying a step ahead of the dust he was stirring up. Turns out there’s more to driving than turning a key and pressing a pedal.

Well, Ben still hadn’t found his voice by evening time. He asked Aunt Kitty to pack a pipe for him and he took himself out to the back porch to set a spell.

While I was watching Aunt Kitty tamp the tobacco I asked her, “How come we have cling peaches when they’re so much trouble?”

“Hmm?”

“You know, they stick to the pit and they don’t taste near as good as a freestone. Why even grow them?”

“Well, they come ripe earlier than the freestones,” she said. “I suppose they make the summer longer.”

The way I see it, I’m two bits smarter now than when I woke up this morning. When I shared this thought with Aunt Kitty she just rolled her eyes up to the ceiling and whispered something like, “Lord help us.”

It’s peach season at Frog Creek. Enjoy a taste of our corner of the world:

VANILLA BEAN PEACH SYRUP

INGREDIENTS:

1 vanilla bean

2 cups sugar

5 cups pureed peaches (peeled and pitted first)

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

DIRECTIONS:

Two days before you want to make the syrup, slice a vanilla bean or two in half lengthwise and place them in a covered bowl with your sugar (two cups sugar for one batch, four cups sugar for two, and so on).

On day three (or whenever you’re ready), combine pureed peaches and lemon juice in a large, heavy saucepan. Bring to a boil. Add sugar and vanilla bean and stir to combine. Bring to a boil again and let boil for a minute. (Don’t let it boil for too long or your syrup will be too thick to pour.)

Pour into prepared jars and process in a boiling water bath. (See canning instructions here.)

And now for the WAFFLES… more proof that the old so often outdoes the new. My search for the perfect waffle recipe ended with the discovery of Fannie Farmer’s Raised Waffles, originally published in the 1896 Boston Cooking-School Cookbook (see page 81), and more recently given new life in Marion Cunningham’s Lost Recipes.

FANNIE FARMER’S RAISED WAFFLES

(begin preparing the night before)

INGREDIENTS:

1/2 cup warm water

1 package active dry yeast

2 cups milk, warmed

8 tablespoons butter, melted

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon sugar

2 cups flour

—

2 eggs

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

To prepare the sponge: Select a large mixing bowl. Add water to bowl. Sprinkle in yeast. Let stand for 5 minutes to dissolve. Add milk, melted butter, salt, sugar and flour. Beat until smooth and well blended. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let stand overnight at room temperature.

Just before cooking waffles, beat in eggs. Add baking soda. Stir until well mixed. Batter will be very thin.

Pour 1/2 to 3/4 cup of batter into very hot waffle iron. Bake until golden and crisp. Makes about 8 waffles.

I’m telling you straight off that everything that happened to me on my birthday is Ben’s fault. He came into my bedroom blowing on his harmonica, singing about me turning thirteen and all. Pilot set to howling and Wilbur, who lately has been invited indoors on account of all the whining she does if we leave her in the barn like she’s just a goat, tried to croak a howl out of her own little snout. What with all the ruckus and my eyes still half shut in sleep, I missed most of Ben’s song. Here’s the part that stuck with me, like tarweed on a horse leg:

“You’re a young lady now

no more little girl.

Thirteen years old,

takin’ on the world.”

Well it’s certainly not poetry, but here’s what that song set me to thinking ’bout: By the time she was thirteen, Pocahontas had already saved a man’s life. When Joan of Arc was thirteen, she was listening to the voices of God’s saints and angels. (Now I do hear voices talking to me on occasion, but they’re generally just in my head and it’s usually along the lines of “Aunt Kitty’s gonna know if you sneak another cookie off the tray” or “God heard that awful thing you were thinkin’ about that snooty Mary Coots in church today.”) Now you could say this here’s a reason to stop reading so many books, seeing as how reading about someone else’s life can make a girl so unhappy with her own.

But let me tell you something else I know, and this not from a book at all. It was the night of Aunt Kitty’s thirteenth birthday when she met her first husband, God Rest His Soul. (Just last year I figured out that last part wasn’t actually his name. Apparently it’s something you say when you talk about a dead person.) Now it’s true that Aunt Kitty says when she met him he was driving a cherry red ‘65 Mustang convertible and she didn’t really know what that boy looked like until their third date, but still. Things happen when you’re thirteen!

“Taking on the world,” Ben said, and it seemed like I ought to be doing more than chasing Pilot all over the hillside and tossing feed to a bunch of chickens. How does a girl wake up on an ordinary day and make it extraordinary? I spent the better part of that day waiting for Providence to step in and make something happen, but the chickens just kept pecking at the ground, Wilbur kept chasing her tail and Aunt Kitty kept telling me to pick up after myself. Well it shames me to tell you so, and for the life of me I can’t say what made this seem a good idea at the time, but I decided if Providence wasn’t going to take over then I would.

I ran on shaky legs all the way across the creekbed, up the hillside on down the gravel road leading to the neighbors’ house. Miss Julia was on her knees in the garden with a big brimmed hat covering her face.

“Where’s that boy?” I asked her, not announcing myself at all.

“Hmm?” she said, looking up at me.

“Where’s that boy?” I said again. She wrinkled up her eyebrows, like she was thinking hard. I curled my lip and said with utmost disgust. “Ezekiel.” Oh how I did hate to say that name.

“Oh,” she said, her brows relaxing and an easy smile spreading across her face. “Check the barn. I think he’s mucking stalls.”

Well I did hate to interrupt him, seeing as how he was right where he belonged, knee-deep in horse poop. But I was on a mission.

Fists tight, I marched up to the barn door and called him. “Hey, boy!”

He ducked out of a stall, shaking that black hair out of his face.

“Come here,” I said with some authority, but still I was a bit surprised when he set aside the pitch fork and walked right over to me.

He was taller than I expected, and maybe a little older too, but I steeled myself and glared up at him and said, “Today’s my thirteenth birthday and you need to kiss me so as I can say something happened other than chickens peckin’ at the ground and me picking up after myself.”

Now, soon as the last word was out of my mouth I started wishing I could swallow them all back up again, but I’m no coward and I stood my ground. I looked down for just a moment maybe, but that was for his sake, not mine. I thought he should have a minute to think about it without me staring him down.

I might’ve jumped just a little when he put his hand under my chin. His skin was rough and scratchy after all, and it probably had horse manure on it. But when he tugged my face up I looked and what do you think I saw? That stupid, crooked grin on his face. Oh, I could see right through him alright. It was all he could do to not laugh in my face right then and there. I slapped his hand away and ran all the way home.

We had chocolate cake that night, just Ben and Aunt Kitty and me. Ben gave me a tiny wooden jewelry box that he’d been whittling away at after dinner through most of last winter. Someday I’ll have something to put in it. Aunt Kitty gave me a pair of knitting needles and a big ball of fuzzy red yarn. We sat side by side in the kitchen and she guided my hands through the motions while she sang along:

“In through the front door,

around the back,

through the window

and out pops Jack!”

We were just getting started on the third row of stitches when there was a knock at the door.

“Who calls at this hour?” Ben said, and rose from his reading chair to open the door. He returned a moment later with a wrapped package. “No one there,” he said. “Just this.” He handed the box to me.

Here’s what the note on top said:

“Happy Birthday Tevis.

Keep this nice and warm and maybe you’ll get a baby hawk out of it.

Zeke”

I don’t have to tell you what was in there, do I? A chicken egg. A plain, old, stupid, white chicken egg. I really don’t like that boy.

(aka the best Chocolate Fudge Cake ever)

FOR THE CAKE:

INGREDIENTS:

3 squares unsweetened chocolate

2 1/4 cups sifted cake flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup butter

2 1/4 cups firmly packed light brown sugar

3 eggs

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla

1 cup dairy sour cream

1 cup boiling water

DIRECTIONS:

1. Melt chocolate in small bowl over hot water; cool.

2. Grease and flour two 9 x 1 1/2-inch layer cake pans.

3. Sift flour, baking soda and salt onto waxed paper.

4. Beat butter until soft in large bowl. Add brown sugar and eggs. Beat with mixer at high speed until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Beat in vanilla and cooled melted chocolate. Stir in dry ingredients alternately with sour cream, beating well with wooden spoon after each addition until batter is smooth. Stir in boiling water. Batter will be thin.

5. Pour at once into prepared pans. Bake in a 350-degree oven for 35 minutes or until centers spring back when lightly touched. Cool layers in pans on wire rack for 10 minutes. Loosen around edges with a small knife or spatula; turn out onto wire racks and cool completely.

FOR THE FROSTING:

INGREDIENTS:

4 squares unsweetened chocolate

1/2 cup butter

1 (1 pound) package confectioners (powdered) sugar

1/2 cup milk

2 teaspoons vanilla

DIRECTIONS:

1. Combine chocolate and butter in small heavy pan. Place over low heat, just until melted. Remove from heat.

2. Combine sugar, milk and vanilla in medium size bowl; stir until smooth. Add chocolate mixture.

3. Set bowl in pan of iced water; beat with wooden spoon until frosting is thick enough to spread and hold its shape.

4. Frost the cake and enjoy!