Sent to the Wood Shed

Yesterday, while Elijah worked his various jobs, I worked on and off organizing his wood shed. which might not sound too exciting or fun, but was. Along with being frustrating and a bit of a challenge. First I spent three days getting nails out of usable wood, maybe a one day job, but hey, the payment here is my son's smile and he'll smile just the same for three days! Then the shelf posed a conundrum. Luckily for me, I have a brilliant make do/can do mentor in my friend Francie, so all the solutions were right there, waiting for me to pull them out of my the air. I'm claiming the mistakes and extremely rudimentary creation and crediting her with the inspiration. At the end of the day, I was happy, the kid was happy and the wood was accessible. Fair enough!

 We drove to town to go to the Friday market. The trees keep wowing me; these are lining the banks of the river. There is a redwood grove along the way. I've not really gotten a decent shot yet because we haven't pulled off. Next time. 

 There is a lumber yard here that is beyond awesome. This wonderful structure is a part of it. The owner is one of those amazing people who opens his world to the people in his community, and also creates...well, just creates! Like this building.  there is so much more... 

Huge piles of sawdust, free. A bin of hardwood bits, free. An art gallery. A nursery, for sale. A little sandwich shop. Even a community garden. Really.

 This is an awful photo of my son grilling inside out burgers, but 

I like the smoke wisp or whatever that genie is, and the one glowing ember of wood. 

He instructed me on the making of the burgers, since he'd be down in the garden working, while it was still light. Here's how you do it. Cook some bacon until it's crispy, take it out to drain on some paper towels. In the bacon fat, saute some garlic. The fat will be really hot, the garlic will cook fast, maybe two minutes.. I used three cloves; we like garlic. Scoop them out of the fat and drain them on a paper towel. Cut up some mushrooms, into smaller than bite sized pieces but not minced. I used crimini's. Saute them in the still hot bacon grease, I'd actually turned the heat off, they only need a minute or so. 

Okay. Make your patties, really really thin (not ridiculously thin, but like the bad hamburger joint style thin). Each burger will take two of those, so you need an even number of thin patties. Fill a patty with the now crumbled bacon/garlic/mushroom mixture, maybe a little more than a teaspoon. Spread it to near the edges. Put some cheese on top, I used pepper jack because I had it there. Put another patty on top, shaping it along the edges to seal them together. Repeat until done. Grill them. Eat. Enjoy. Elijah says the addition of fresh, barely sauteed-in-the-bacon-fat spinach really works well with this;  we didn't have any ready yet to use. But just so you know...

 The same photo taken with the flash, blinding him momentarily. 

What a good Mom I am!

Score of the day was finding a store with four bottles of wine for 10 dollars! I figured if it was undrinkable, we could cook with it. But lo, it's a decent red table wine. Is this a California thing? I thought I had to be in Spain for that sort of deal! 

Today we are going to the Roll on the Mattole, a fun day that benefits the volunteer Fire Dept. here. They just had a pretty big grass fire the day before yesterday. We saw the burn on our way to town...looked too familiar! But today is for good music, games and good eats. Time to get ready!

Have a salutary Saturday! Do something serviceable.