Technicolor loveliness

Despite my love of all things green, I have the blackest thumb and the ability to kill even a plastic houseplant. I long to grow something more edible than a petunia, but I've yet to succeed.

For some reason, my gardening ineptitude reminds me of a story I read the other day about a mother who yelled, 'dinner's ready,' to her kids, only to have her son say, 'but I didn't hear the delivery guy ring the doorbell.'

The Vance girls dig a carrot (and dig it right out of our neighbor's garden (with permission.))

Today, this rather amazing woman named Jill invited the girls and I to Harvest House, an idyllic farm just down the road, (that's about 15 minutes in Montana time.) With the cool of fall, the start of school, and the conclusion of my sabbatical just around the corner, our free-form adventure felt particularly poignant, and our relaxed pace especially technicolor in its loveliness.

Harvest House farm

The farmhouse

One of the barns

Some crazy happy stalks of something

A proud bean harvester

Jill

Lydia, one Jill's three little people.

Our harvest went from beanstalk to pickling jar within the day.

After a few hours, the children grew bored of climbing hale bales, harassing chickens, and eating beans, so we headed over to Jill's house, where new delights awaited:

More evidence of the strange trampoline phenomenon.

And finally, an explanation! 'It's cheaper than a babysitter.'

The hot midday jumping session motivated the little people right into the cool creek.

Good stuff.

More good stuff.

The kind of stuff that makes everything feel right, even if it's only for a moment.