We do not recover the past, we re-create it: an act of dramaturgy if there ever was one. Memory edits things, colors them, mixes cement with the rainbow, does whatever’s needed to make the story work.

María Gainza, Thomas Bunstead (translator), Portrait of an Unknown Lady

Ahhh, March! all those colors. so many blooms. so much baseball (and a little lacrosse). crazy weather. smiles …

Five Favorite Things

1. STRIPES! so much fun knitting it (and using up scraps) and so much fun to wear, too!
2. Out and about with the boys on Mondays – downtown for ice cream on the 5th, and to the park/playground on the 26th.
3. Seeing Francie (Saturday, the 18th) again after nearly six years.
4. Taking Lucy to the ball field. She does LOVE to “go” and the ball field is packed with people to greet.
5. All those colors. so many blooms.

Five Things I Want to Remember

1. Watching the boys’ baseball games, and marveling at how much better everyone seems after their winter break.
2. Daylight Savings Time is an easy way to reset our internal clocks when we “lose” the hour late afternoon on Saturday.
3. The Women’s Service at church … in-person again, felt like a real celebration.
4. Lucy remembered how to climb the stairs and learned how to go down, too. She got so good at the basement stairs, we had to put up a gate there (and I hope we don’t need it for very long; it’s a pain for me and Marc!)
5. We need a good photo from our dinner club (again. for real in April. for sure).

We had our third Go-to Dinners Club on the 26th; Lydia hosted. We were only four (missed Katie & Sara), but the company and food were still delicious.

Polly and Lydia made their recipes as written (Lydia had to source the dried beans from the internet – I think I’d sub canned if I couldn’t find them in the store). I tweaked my recipe a bit: first, I couldn’t find any chocolate wafers for the crust so I substituted chocolate graham crackers, and I mixed the butter in with the crumbs in the food processor; next, I used really dark chocolate (1 bar 70%, 1 bar 75%, 1 bar 80%+) and think it would’ve been better a bit sweeter, I’ll use all 70% next time; I used two large eggs instead of the extra-large Ina always calls for (it was fine); and finally, I substituted a teaspoon of brewed coffee (mixed in with the cream before heating it) for the instant coffee granules in the glaze. The crust was really thick (it’s pictured that way in the book, too); I might reduce the amount of crumbs by 1/6 next time for a thinner crust. I will say it was great as leftovers!

I continued to think about sharing #wordsandwool; I did a better job taking the photos than I did sharing to Instagram, though

and … I made another phenology wheel (thank you Katie for that proper title!) in my Season journal.

I really love having all this data to accompany these posts! I can see the impact of the blue skies (and the rain), and it’s fun to see the days get longer. I did figure out how to track the temps and sunrise/sunset for Alpharetta, so I made that change for April. Also, several of y’all asked about how I drew the wheel. I ordered this simple tool, and it’s easy.

and … that’s March! (just in time for my first trip of April tomorrow) What special memory are you still savoring from last month?