Whew. It was a full evening at the homestead-- probably utterly boring for most of you-- but since my blog is called "Stream of Consciousness" that's exactly what you should expect.
I got home from work and said hello to the babies at the door. The mother robin yelled her greeting from the tree (as usual) and threatened my life if I got much closer. All three of them were squirming like crazy and one kept spreading his wings and flapping around. Oooh. Run in for the camera. Oooh look, the first roses are blooming. And one of the lilies. Oooh. Baby birds. Right. Camera. As I approached the nest for our daily photo shoot, suddenly there was a flurry of wings. All three flew out of the nest, practically into my face, while Mother and Father Robin started frantically flying around chirping like crazy. There I was, recovering from the shock, and realizing our babies had just left the nest. I watched them for a few minutes, and was relieved to see that although Curly was hopping around in the street, he had the good sense and ability to get out of the way of that green pick up truck.
Next I lazied around for probably half an hour, thinking I should change into "home" clothes, and not doing anything about it. I ate a bowl of cereal, changed, and headed out for a round of ball. Ball is more fun when it's in the 80's out. The Suze gets tired a lot faster and drinks out of the new (garage sale) doggie pool a lot more. She also doesn't look so pathetic when I call it quits after a mere 15 minutes of kicking the ball.
The Homie (yes, still worth the hype) decides to mow the backyard while I rototill the vegetable garden that I managed to clean out and weed (mostly) over the weekend. It was hot, but lovely. I do love summer. The veggie garden is now tilled and ready for planting this weekend!
Then I went in and sat down and remembered I'm making dinner for some friends who recently had a baby... hmmm. It's after 9 and I haven't figured it out. I googled a recipe for chicken pasta salad, breaking my own rule about not experimenting with new recipes on other people (I always manage to break this rule). Chicken caesar salad it is! I make bread dough for rolls, and set it to rise, put a brownies in the oven, set the timer for the homie, and head to the grocery store for the other stuff.
Sadly, the babies have not returned to sleep in their old nest. I'm going to miss them. Already having serious empty nest syndrome (literally). And yes, I realize I'm a big dork, I don't really care. I liked those guys!
Grocery store. Home. Make lots of this salad. Hey if I'm making it for one household, we may as well have it here too. Put rolls in the oven. Cook the chicken. Don't bother checking that recipe again, just start throwing stuff into the bowl. Mmmm. Now I'm hungry. The house smells like garlic herb rolls, chicken and garlic, brownies. The dog are drooling hungrily at my feet. I finish up, wash dishes, set the coffee pot for morning, sit down at my computer and put my feet up and finally look at the recipe... darn. Totally forgot to steam the broccoli, put it in raw without even thinking about it. Sigh. Some days you just can't win.
But... there is dinner waiting for my friends tomorrow (even if the broccoli is raw)... and for me... and I get to spend time with my sister who I never seem to see enough of (and who I already miss more than I can say-- even before she's moved across the country)... and the whole house fan is pulling the cool night air through the hot house and filling the house with the smell of lilacs... and my bed is calling.
This has been Stream of Consciousness at the Homestead. Join us next time when...
They are five days old today and I can hardly believe the difference!! I haven't looked in the nest in a couple days (see Mother Robin, I am at least trying to be good). Today Leslie and I were walking in and I saw a beak sticking out of the nest and thought it was the mother, but how was she sitting so low in the nest. We looked closer and look at these guys!!! In just a couple days, they have tripled in size, grow real beaks, gotten feathers, and opened their eyes. Crazy. (And yes, still hard to get decent pics because of all the leaves in the way).
I am proud to introduce the new arrivals at the Nichols Homestead...
The babies were hatching!! And everytime I got near the nest, the mother robin sat in the maple tree out front yelling at me to back off. Sigh. Sometimes I can't help myself!
I have a recent addiction... here goes... I LOVE garlic lovers hummus. Love love love it. As in, I am tempted to eat a tub of it per day (though I do try to restrain myself). Anyway, this is a rather expensive hobby as the family size container, a mere 17 oz. is nearly $6 (which is approx. $0.35/oz). Yikes. So today I decided to try making the stuff and see how it is. Naturally I found a recipe on the web, but I changed it significantly enough as I went along that I can't even really cite that recipe. Also, though that recipe was titled garlic hummus, I had to add significantly more garlic to mine. I prefer garlic with a touch of chick pea and not the other way around. So here's my new recipe...
3 c. (1 large can) chick peas
8-10 t. minced garlic (the recipe called for cloves of garlic "crushed" but since I always have minced garlic on hand, I went with that. And doubled the amount).
Put everything into the food processor and make a paste. Yuuummmm. Makes approx. 4 cups of delicious garlic hummus, emphasis on the garlic... (and yes, I may add more garlic next time). 
Pricing-- most of this is a guess, but probably a reasonable comparison.
