BUTTERMILK SKY

Here is a song from my childhood that caught my attention and my heart. Buttermilk Sky maybe one of the first songs that I still sing and it makes me feel so contented. Every time I see clabbered milk clouds up above I return to those days of yesteryear and remember the joy of learning that clouds have different configurations and they can be named. Fanciful names not those boring scientific Latin things.

Buttermilk Sky was written by Hoagy Carmichael around 1946 and I was five years old. I wanted to display a video of him singing but I am so raw at this that the best I could do was one of Willie Nelson which is also wonderful. The Carmichael video for some reason rejected my request, or more than likely I just hit the wrong icon. This technical stuff is not coming easy for me. I will continue to explore downloading a video here and it's bound to happen one of these days.

Music has filled my life and continues to underscore my sense of myself. Hope this works and you can enjoy this fun old song.
Click on 'share' and see what happens.

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STROLLING AND EATING

The bowl I bought this year is front and center. Let me tell you more of what that bowl represents.

This is the 15th year for Cookeville, Tennessee to support Habitat for Humanity in our community with a fun event called 'Cooking on the Square'. Two streets adjacent to the Courthouse are blocked off and the fun begins. I got there early enough on Friday to watch them set up. Recently I blogged about making soup bowls at a friends pottery studio and here

you see boxes full of bowls ready to be set up for display and selling of the bowls. The whole cooking experience is based on Cajun cooking with 50 vendors serving Gumbos and Jambalaya over rice. There was even some Chili which became Cajun I think with a few changes of spices.
The occasion has taken on the flavor of Mardi Gras with costumes and lots of bead necklaces.


Here is one table of bowls. Mine was not displayed in the first set-up so I bought one of these. Tables of bowls were at two different locations so the stream of buyers were able to move along quickly.

We lined up outside the barricades and chitchatted until they turned us loose and away we went from vendor to vendor. We each paid $15 for one of the donated bowls and were able to then go to as many vendors as our appetite would allow. The only money collected was for the bowls, Mardi Gras beads and money donated at the Habitat booth.

There were 50 tents and tables set up to serve the festive crowd. These folks were ladling out Chili and were representing their place of business. All the food was donated by the folks who served it.

Crawfish pie and filet gumbo anyone. Perhaps a little Ragin Cajun Jambalaya or Red beans and Rice. With 50 vendors, the variety of Gumbos was varied and delicious.

Here our friend Lee is serving some Chicken and Sausage gumbo over rice to someone who is already wearing his Mardi Gras beads. I was next in line.

Desserts were also on hand with Charlotte Burke's ( our state senator) perennial favorite offering of Banana Pudding. There were pies and cookies as well.

Find a place to sit between visits to the different tents. Or -------

carry your bowl and eat as you go, finishing the last bit as you get to your next bowlful at someone else's tent. Over the years I think various club, organizations, churches and businesses go to great lengths to serve the very best. Cooking on the Square is certainly a highlight of the fall season community festivals and fund raising events.

Standing, sitting, visiting with friends is a wonderful fun way to support a stellar community activity and a little festive music just puts the finishing touch on the noontime meal. May I present Les Kerr and the Bayou Band brought back this year by the Imaging folks at the medical center. It suited my Michigan heart to record their Mackinaw Island Blues

Wonder who is also strolling today? Lets go on over to
The Quiet Country House and find out.

A ROLLING STROLL

The cat picture is out of sequence and not the theme at all, but I thought I would start with her for the Aww Factor. This is KiKi enjoying the moment.
Today I hope you will ride home from church with us as we take a back road home. Here is the Maple tree that greets us at church. It sits between the church and the Veterinarian Clinic next door. Sure does sparkle.


Actually the colors this fall are more muted than most years, but splashes of brilliance shine out here and there.
You may want to double click the rest of the pictures to actually see more color and if you can make out the tractor above, I think it is a baler. At least I think that is what those circles on it are.

We are headed up the first rise as we go up the mountain.

Here is a resting spot in Dry Valley that has a most pleasant view of the mountain foot hills.

I'm sure the cattle have appreciated the tree left in this pasture where they could find some shade in the heat of the summer. The edges of the woods and the stream you can't see were also taken advantaged of when the sun was fully overhead.

The farmer has cleared the field, I think this year soy beans were grown here. Perhaps winter wheat is next and then corn will grow here.

Oh look, we're home and greeted by the Oak still hanging on to the green leaves for as long as possible. We are surrounded by Oaks which are usually the last to change colors.

Our neighbors like their Maple colors and I get to see them as well.

Flutemaker will double mow and render the leaves into mulch. We are not big on raking and burning, although I love the smell when some of the neighbors burn their leaves.

The leaves that gather in front of the garage will be blown into the woods. They blow back out sometimes and it becomes a dance of Falling leaves and man with blower. The leaves in front of buildings remind me of winter in Michigan and the huge drifts of snow that would pile up in front of the barn for the kids to use as forts and tunnels.

I wonder who else strolled today. Why don't you head on over to Aisling's invitation to stroll, I think I will. See you there.

STROLLING TO A DIFFERENT DRUMMER

Come with me down this lovely drive to join a group from our church who enjoy the fun and spiritual uplift of drumming. We had every intention of bringing on the night by the light of a campfire with our foot tapping, hand clapping and enthusiastic drumming. We had an assortment of percussion instruments and were ready for fun.

Alas and a few drats we were confronted by rain and a deep chill. We said a fond farewell to the wonderful scenery and the night air and went inside.

The enthusiasm was not diminished and we thrummed, drummed, clattered and rhythmically raised a joyful noise. The vibration of drums reaches into our souls and asks us to remember that everything in the universe has a rhythm or vibration.

Stomping, clapping and shaking rattles or seed pods must have the earliest beginning with ancient people who reacted and responded to the vibrations of those things. Trial and error has brought us to modern percussion instruments. But I think we still react to the energy of drumming with the same focus and enjoyment. When you hear the drums summon you, don't you want to get up, stomp, whirl and dance for joy. I sure do.

Just for fun, why don't you dance on over to Aislings blog to see what other walkers and dancers are doing today.

p.s. Sorry this is a late entry to the Sunday Stroll, I tried every which way to Sunday to get an audio of our drumming. For some reason the video is silent, it is just not effective. Had you seen and heard, it would have inspired you I'm sure. I can say that with authority since you'll never know.

DIDN'T IT RAIN, CHILDREN

The lyrics to the old song by Roberta Martin keep running through my mind and I can't help but sing:

Didn't it rain, children

Talk about rain, oh my Lord

Didn't it fall, didn't it fall

Didn't it fall my Lord

Can't you just hear Mahailia Jackson singing in the background.

I look for blue up above and all I see is grey, not even a gathering of clouds, just grey skies.

Every morning for a week now I have gotten up to see and hear a downpour. Here you can see the run off is tapering down some but it continues to rain a misty spritzy steady dampness in the air.

The French drain in the front of the house is filled to overflowing. It's job is to take the water away from the front of the house which is lower than the road out front and send it to the end of the house and around in the drain to the back where is can continue on down to the creek. But every morning it has been overwhelmed because the ground just can't absorb it fast enough.
I'm singing all the rain songs I can think of, because I don't have the authority to turn the sprinkler off.

It looks like one of the effects of the rain is to bring down the leaves. I guess I can add Autumn Leaves to my repertoire of rain songs.

We learned a new song in choir at church that seems to be timely. It is based on Isaiah 55:10-11.

Let the Word of the Lord fall like the rain,

let it nourish our hearts while our spirits remain

in the warmth and the glow of God's glory and power,

let it fall like the rain in our worship this hour.

Words and music; Stan Pethel

SUNDAY STROLL - LEAFING

For the beauty of the earth,

For the glory of the skies,

For the love which from our birth

over and around us lies:

Lord of all, to Thee we raise,

this our hymn of grateful praise.
Folliott S. Pierpoint

Look up, look up and see the handiwork of the original artist.


Almost gone, already.
Don't forget to look down and around.

What variety, what delight in looking and enjoying the sights and sounds and smells of autumn.
Thanks for walking with me for a little while.

To keep the wanderlust of your soul happy head on over to

The Quiet Country House for more strolling.

MADE ANY BOWLS LATELY

I had a good time last night at the Ceramic studio of good friend Marilee Hall. I would love for you to click on her name and visit her studio. It is a joy and a delight to visit her while she is working. Last night was an adventure for several of us because we were going to learn to make a bowl out of a slab of clay. We were a crew of volunteer ceramic artists and want-to-be's that are making bowls for the annual Habitat for Humanity fund raiser. There are clay artists and their students all around Cookeville, Tn. also making bowls to fill the need of this very popular event called Cooking on the Square. The donated bowls are sold for $15 each, then the owner carries the vessel to each of the volunteer cooks serving gumbos and other Cajun foods where they receive a helping of that vendors offering. The bowl can be refilled at as many tents as one cares to visit. Bread, drinks and Banana Pudding are also donated and served to the hungry crowd. You take your bowl home and add it to your collection from previous years. I have several soup bowls that serve many uses around the house. Habitat for Humanity does very well and we all have a wonderful time on the last Friday of October.

These were my try at bowl making. A little raw, a little primitive, a lot of prompting from Marilee, but a good feeling of having done something useful and worthwhile.

These are some other bowls waiting to go into the kiln and be glazed, not sure what order. I think fire, glaze and fire again, I should have asked.

The hearts on the lower shelf have been glazed so just imagine the clay above as shinny.