On April 9th I got the worst phone call of my life. My father hadn’t woken up by his usual 5am time and when my mother went to check on him she found him peacefully laying in bed at our home Tulipwood, having passed away. His heart had just stopped. He was 70. I believe life is defined by a series of signposts. There is life before and life after […]
*UPDATE* Winner announced! Matt Coudriet check your email! You were randomly selected and this amazing grill is coming to your doorstep. Thanks to everyone who entered! You are my favorites, xo. _______ The Prize: Coyote Outdoor 28 C Series Grill (grill, cart, cover, etc) To Enter up to 7 Times: First: Sign Up to support My Quarterly List. That way we will have your info and can get in touch when you win. Then: […]
I had a kind of revelation this Christmas season. I recently went to a caroling service at Redeemer in New York City. Tim Keller, an extraordinary mind and speaker, offered a perspective on Christmas that stuck with me in a way that no other view on Christmas has before. The singing is wonderful at Christmastime. So are the lights. Gifts are nice too. And all of the joy that comes […]
Before I start with this little story, I have to share the news that an extra spot just opened up for the The Bacon Adventure Weekend which is going to be incredible, and the first person to snatch it up gets 40% off using this promo code: secretdiscount Here is where you get your spot: http://girlhunterweekend.eventbrite.com GO! Now… have you ever heard of keets? How about guinea hens? Keets are […]
A little while ago, my dad and I harvested the honey at Tulipwood. My dad has been mastering the art of beekeeping for quite some time now. He had bees when he lived at Tulipwood as a boy and began again later in life. We learned some good lessons about honey harvesting this year that I thought I’d share in addition to showing you how we do it. It’s fun […]
I wish I could have introduced you to my great aunt — Ann Gray. She was Grandma Pellegrini’s sister and they lived in the same house together until Aunt Gray died a few years before I began this blog. She was one of the most colorful characters I’ve known. She never married, which freed up her time for other pursuits. And she had many other pursuits. It wasn’t that she […]
Well, I’ve spent the past week under boxes. It’s not an exaggeration really, since some of the boxes were as big as I am. By the end of it, there was a mountain of boxes in front of my new house. I nice man finally came by yesterday and hauled them all away and the lack of boxes makes me feel decidedly more settled. I even have a smooth surface […]
Not Italian Chicken, as in chicken parmesan. No, I’m referring to Italian Chickens. There is a crucial difference here. These are my strange birds who will fight battles for tortellini. It begins with a boy. I wonder how my younger but definitely more burly than me brother would feel about me calling him a boy at this point? It was early evening, the air was dewy and warm and it […]
Lorenzo, formerly known as Loretta, crossed over recently. He had a complicated life, filled with ups and downs and gender changes. And I think he deserves a moment of acknowledgment on this site, since he has played such an integral part of my blogging life here in the past couple of years. As you may recall, Lorenzo was once Loretta. He/She had quite a colorful life in her first seven […]
We had a bee swarm around here at Tulipwood earlier this week. It all happened very quickly — we were planting vegetables in the garden, toiling and sweating away because somehow we decided it would be a good idea to plant 25 varieties this year. Think it was a cold long winter? We are embracing the sun and got a bit overzealous… luckily, my brother has friends and enlisted them […]