Southern Fare for New Year's Day

       Traditional (or " superstitional") food to be eaten on New Years Day in the South includes black-eyed peas, greens, and cornbread.  The practice of eating black-eyed peas for luck is believed to date back to the  War Between the States.  Planted as food for livestock,  the fields of black-eyed peas were overlooked as Sherman's troops destroyed or stole other crops. This gave the black-eyed pea  an important role as a major food source for the surviving Confederates.

     Nowadays, the tradition of eating black-eyed peas on New Years Day has morphed into a number of variations   including:

     When served with greens (collards, mustard or turnip greens, cabbage, whichever grows in the area), the peas represent coins and the greens represent paper money.
      Cornbread, often served with black-eyed peas and greens, represents gold.
      For the best chance of luck every day in the year ahead, one must eat at least 365 black-eyed peas on New Year's Day.   That's a lot of black-eyed peas!!!
      We didn't really follow tradition... We had my famous baked-bean casserole with greens.  No cornbread. Somehow I don't think it will matter "a hill of beans" what we ate today!  Tee-hee.  I am not a superstitious person, and have generally resisted fitting in with tradition, so my menu will have to suffice.
      Oh, we also had rocky road ice cream... d'ya' think that will help our luck and prosperity?

Shalom  Y'all - Twyla
 

Oh, You Romantic Devil, You

This morning's post included a picture of one of the chicken arks. Did you notice the big white cat INSIDE the ark with the chickens? This is CasPurr; he's been friends with the chickens since they were two days old. CasPurr was following Moshe around the yard one morning, as he usually does, "helping" with the chores, when he stuck his head into the ark. Moshe let him go inside, then ran and fetched the camera to capture the moment. The chickens were cool about it, but CasPurr was kinda' scared. I think he was afraid he's have to stay in there like the chickens do... Too funny!

Our life in the country is a peaceful and beautiful existence. We live a simple life. No TV or radio to gum up the works with negativity. We do have the internet, obviously...

A couple hours ago I was outside looking at the plants and visiting with the chickens. I was hand-feeding them greens, which they love. Their favorite is dandelion greens. Moshe & I laugh at ourselves for getting excited over seeing a big dandelion plant, knowing that "the peeps" will love those greens!!!

One day about a month ago, Moshe went out of town for some dental work. That afternoon, I heard his truck turn in the driveway. As I watched him get out of the truck, I saw a flash of something and then he hid it behind his back. "Ah-Ha!", said I. As he came to the back door, I hurried to greet him, thinking, "Oh, that sweet man has brought me a bouquet..." As he opened the door, he said, "Hey, Baby! D'ya' wanna' help me feed the peeps?" And, he swept forth the "bouquet", which was giant dandelion greens. The bouquet was for the chickens. I have since threatened to write a book about these type of incidents and name it "Oh, You Romantic Devil, You".