By Sally Gracie
Snow melt, so early this year, has exposed the enemy in the garden. Gophers/voles are active in one flower garden, and the war is on. I’ve purchased gas bombs and MoleMax pellets from Katrina. I can’t tell what has been destroyed, but ominous lumps of loose soil suggest damage to plants and bulbs.
As I sipped my coffee at the table on the back porch early Sunday morning, I watched as 10 birds suddenly landed on the serviceberry bush. I didn’t have time to find my binoculars, but I believe they were cedar waxwings. They were crested and had black masks and grayish bodies, but at least one male bird had a distinctive roseate area at his throat. Individual difference? Or did I see some other bird?
How thrilled I am to find that two hellebore (bought at Local 98856 for Christmas 2014) have pushed their white blooms through the leaf cover in the front garden. Our warm February let the flowers bloom at about the same time my Baltimore Christmas roses were the harbinger of spring. Time to plant the tulips I didn’t put in the ground last fall.
If you go to the Children’s Theater Production of As You Like It at The Merc Playhouse this weekend, be sure to have some change to give to the young “Nickel Shakespeare” performers. To challenge some of the kids who don’t have big parts, director/teacher Rod Molzahn assigned them to small groups that, before the play and during intermission, will “do a scene for a nickel” at your request.
“Nickel Shakespeare” actors are: Naomi Carter, Ilo Curtis, Lucy Tobiska Doran, Grace Gonzales, Bay Harmon, Seth Kurtz, Maggie Moore, Anja Sorensen and Emma White. Each performs in one or more scenes, including the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet and scenes from Macbeth and A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Jane Orme is coaching these groups.
As You Like It runs through March 15. Performances are Sundays at 2 p.m., a pay-what-you-can performance on Thursday, March 12, and Friday and Saturday performances at 7 p.m.
Upstairs at the Twisp Valley Grange has never looked more festive than for Saturday’s East Indian Feast (Feb. 28). Each of the round tables was covered with a maroon cloth; flowers in Indian brass vases on Indian fabric squares served as centerpieces. Indian fabric hangings decorated the walls. Those lucky enough to own embroidered Indian garb wore it.
Cooks began in the kitchen on Thursday morning. I visited on Friday afternoon when head chef Kim Claussen and assistant Megan Rudholm were cooking. They were balancing a huge wok filled with balti dahl (a yummy vegetable dish that I enjoyed Saturday evening with basmati rice) on the burners of the stove. All the cookers, pots and pans held gallons of food; recipes were extended to feed the 100 paying guests.
Paula Stokes contributed two dishes: cilantro chutney stuffed bananas, and pancakes called rava uttappam. Other cooks and kitchen workers included Judy Brezina and Jon Hawley (who has lived and traveled extensively in India). Wendy Braden handled the tickets and the phones as well as doing whatever else needed doing. Tickets for the successful fundraiser were sold out by Friday afternoon.
I cleared my plate.
