pieces and bits: the third week of lent

Blessed Feast of the Annunciation today! 

We had a glorious Greek Independence Day weekend, with services and flag raising and parades and dancing and more. It’s a weekend that we are aware of all year, knowing the tremendous amount of manpower and organization and coordination that goes into making all the events happen.  It's all worth the trouble, just to see everyone proudly parading in their authentic regional costumes. Is there anything cuter than small children dressed in foustanelles and tsarouchia?  No, I don't think so.

I shot some video of the tsoliades who traveled to our parade all the way from Greece.  My boys have been marching like them all week.  Benjamin Franklin Parkway is like a wind tunnel, so please pardon the background roar.  And also pardon my thin, high version of the Greek national anthem.  Can you tell where I forgot the words?

On Sunday night, Fr. G and I collapsed on our bed, too tired to do anything but chat about the weekend.  All Monday we rested, as though recovering from a brief, but intense, illness.  He and I took the littles to one of our favorite local haunts, and while we sat on a log reading (and knitting), T, G, and Little M splashed in the icy creek.  I hoped to snap some photos of my favorite ephemeral wildflowers, but we were too early.  The sun filtered through the bare gray tree branches, and we crunched through a carpet of brown, crisp leaves.  There was very little green.  Spring is on its way, but March is still March after all.

There's some very exciting gardening news chez Pleximama, although none of my family agrees.  The peony bulbs, planted so long ago that the date is lost to the mists of time, are sprouting!  Maybe, just maybe, one day in the future I'll have bouquets of homegrown peonies on my May table.  Sprouting, too, are the bleeding hearts I thought I killed last summer.  All of the new growth, along with the arrival of a recommended book, has inspired gardening dreams here.  Stay tuned!

 

I'm working on a Sayer top in some Cloudborn Pima Cotton DK I got last summer on the cheap.  Can you believe it's the first time I've knit a garment in pieces since...maybe 2008? I'm a little rusty, but so far, so good.  I love the drapey fabric this cotton makes, and will share all my mods once it's finished (and warm enough to wear it).  

On the menu:

~ Greek Potatoes and Lemony Tahini Sauce + Baked Trout + Chimichurri + TBD vegetable (Annunciation!)

~ Georgian Red Bean and Walnut Soup

~ Cabbage, Potato, and Cannellini Soup (again)

~ Gigantes with Rice