Category Archives: Gatherings

2026, Business, chickens, crops, education, Farming Update, Gatherings, Nature, Science, Uncategorized

AN OAT-STANDING DAY* 

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This week’s Farming Update from Ben

You know, it was so warm last week, it was so freaking muddy. It was terrible. And I know it’s gonna happen the next time it warms up again. But that’s next month’s problem!

I’ve always found it interesting the clumps of snow and ice that accumulate on the far side of railroad crossings. When a vehicle hits a bump like that and the ice chunks fall off and skid up the road a ways. Newton’s first law about an object in motion I think. It’s kinda cool to me.

Wednesday this week I went to an oat producers meeting. Got another really good free meal! 

It was a very good meeting. Lots of good speakers and interesting topics. I did critique the font of one guy’s slides… I’m such a snob. The meeting started at 10:00, and people wandered in for another hour. And it reminded me how hard it was to get anywhere before about noon  when milking cows and doing chores in the winter. Feed the beef cows, feed the dairy cows, milk, chase the beef out of the yard, let the dairy cows out of the barn, clean the barn, haul out the manure, throw down hay from the haymow, spread out straw bedding, spread out the hay, and put the cows back in when they’re done eating outside. It all took a while. 

Excuse me, can you keep your heads down…

There were 159 farmers in attendance (because the host said now she knew how long it took to get 159 people through the line for lunch.) 

One guy kinda looked like Robert Duvall. 

I wore a peach colored shirt. I was the most colorful person there. A lot of plaid and dark colors. And a fair number of women at this meeting too. 

It was mentioned that 26% of the farmers in Olmsted County planted cover crops last, involving 20,000 acres. 

As one speaker went through his slides, he’d show a field of oats and call out ‘Eye candy!’

*He’s also the guy that said it was an ‘Oat-standing day’.

I saw them in concert back in 1984 just to impress a girl. I Broke up with her anyway.

Several of the speakers, and many of the farmers, are growing a few hundred acres of oats. They talk about their 40’ air seeders and stripper heads for oats and growing 140 bushel / acre oats and I sit there quietly with my 30 acres, and 40 bushels / acre and think ‘You don’t have any deer do you?’ I asked a question if anyone is dragging their oat fields. Crickets. One speaker finally said they do no-till planting. Oh. yeah meaning they don’t have bare dirt like I do. Several said that. One of the benefits of no-till, is being able to get out and plant in March without needing to wait for the ground to warm up and dry out to do tillage before planting, like I do. 

Several of these farmers are responsible for the surge in oat growers. They’re the founders of the oat mafia.

One guy shared his spreadsheet for his crop input and expenses. If input costs are going to be high, and crop prices are going to be low, then we hope for high enough yields to make up the difference. One example was a 1400 acre farm. If he does 700 acres corn and 700 acres beans, expenses will be this much, income theoretically this much, and they’re losing money. However, if they do 466 acres corn, 467 acres bean, and 467 acres oats, they can make some money. Oats cost less than corn to produce. Remember, less yield or a thunderstorm or a lower price and it’s all out the window. 

Jochum Wiersma, from the U of M is always a good speaker. He’s from the Netherlands, and he’s got a bit of an accent, and he is funny, and a very intelligent good speaker. He asked the group if we thought farming was more like NASCAR or a European Rally race? Obviously, a rally. “NASCAR is all left turns, you always know what’s coming.” If it was easy, everyone would be doing it. That’s why farming and raising oats is all about managing risk. 

I took home several good lessons. My crop rotation has been soybeans, corn the next year, then oats the next. Repeat. I do it that way because soybeans add nitrogen to the soil meaning I spend less on nitrogen for the following corn crop. When our son was in high school, he did a report for some class, comparing corn after oats and corn after soybeans. Surprisingly, the corn after oats did better. and I don’t really recall when or why I changed up the rotation order, but it was said several times, DO NOT PLANT OATS AFTER CORN, it’s more susceptible to crown rust disease. And maybe that’s why my oat crop has been so lousy lately. So, we’ll try planting oats on the fields that were soybeans last year. 

I cut down a bunch of dead Ash trees last Saturday. Thirty years ago, I planted two rows of ash trees and some arborvitae shrubs, hoping to create a windbreak in which I planned to put calf hutches on the south side. It turned out to be a pretty wet area. All the arborvitae died off a few years later. The ash trees got to be 40′ tall and were kind of a pain to mow around, now they’re all dead from Emerald Ash borer. There’s a few I’m waiting for a tree company to take down as they’re too close to the feed storage building for me to cut down. I left the stumps about two feet tall for the moment. I’ll trim them off at ground level this summer. 

Using the tractor and loader I was pushing the trees into a pile, and that’s when a tree branch rolled around the inside of the rear tire rim and snapped off the valve stem. Have I mentioned the chloride fluid I have put in the rear wheels for additional weight and traction? It sprays out when you break off the valve stem. My friends at Appel Service and $650 fixed that on Monday. I put the grapple bucket on the loader and picked up the rest of the trees to move them.

I need to remember, a tractor is not a bulldozer.

That worked much better. Until I got the tractor I over a stump. Not really sure how I did that. Bent a shield underneath…

I parked the tractor in the shop and let it dry off and warm up for a couple days, then I rolled under with wrenches and removed the shield. Trying to bend the shield enough to reach the bolts and I remembered Newtons third law: me on a rolling creeper pushing against a larger tractor…doesn’t move the shield, it moves me. An equal and opposite reaction! SCIENCE!

I’ve had chickens living in the garage again. I chased three out of the rafters one evening. The chickens hop from one rafter to another, and the dogs got all riled up and daughter thought the whole thing was hysterical. 

Chicken!

TALK ABOUT LEARNING TO RIDING A BIKE.

TALK ABOUT BIRDS / THINGS YOU’VE SEEN PERCHED IN ODD PLACES

2026, Family, Food, Gatherings, Uncategorized

Decadence

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This past weekend has been one of fun and simple excess. My birthday is February 1. Son’s is February 10. We decided to celebrate together this past weekend.

Son had arranged a Valentine’s Day treat for his wife in Sioux Falls including a live production of Moulin Rouge at the Washington Pavillion and dinner at a really exquisite Italian restaurant. We watched the 7 year old and the 6 month old while they were in Sioux Falls. We celebrated with birthday cake when they returned after dinner and the musical. They all spent Saturday night with us.

Son and I agreed that we wanted a German/Central European cake to celebrate, and he found a lovely recipe for Schwartzvald Kirschtorte. It was a fairly easy recipe for an experienced baker, and I baked the three cake layers on Friday. Grandson and I assembled the cake on Saturday afternoon after I had made the massive amounts of sweetened whipped cream, excessive chocolate ganache, chopped dark, sweet cherries, and kirsch syrup that completed it. Grandson loves to bake and cook. He really loved licking the spoons. It was a 9 inch cake that served 12 people. The header photo is all that is left after we all had second and third helpings on Sunday. It was a decadent cake..

It was also decadent to spend so much time with grandchildren. Granddaughter frequently fell asleep in our arms after her bottles. She smiled and blew raspberries and cuddled. Grandson was so excited to play basketball and Scrabble with his Opa. He also got to roast marshmallows in our fire pit on Sunday morning. How decadent is that?

What is the most decadent thing you’ve eaten or done lately? When was the last time you took care of a baby?

2026, Family, Gatherings, Uncategorized

High Church, Low Church

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Last month Husband and I became members of the ELCA Lutheran Church in our MN town. It is the church I grew up in, and the church we were married in. We had been members of the ELCA Lutheran Church in our ND town since 1987. Although they are both ELCA churches, they are quite different from one another. Both churches have women pastors, I should add.

Our MN church was founded by Norwegians. The ND church had German and German Russian roots. The ND church is quite formal, with a liturgy sung/chanted by the pastor. There is very little talking as people are being seated and wait for the service to begin. The congregation relies on the choir to lead the singing. The music is quite formal and traditional. It is definitely what I would consider “High Church”.

Our MN church currently has no full time choir since the 90+ year old choir director died and they haven’t found a replacement for her. There is a good organist. People talk and laugh and drink coffee as they sit in the pews and wait for the service to start. We were very much involved with the choir and handbell choir in our ND church, and it is different for us to be in the congregation and not in the choir loft. While the order of service is the same, the congregation is much more involved in the service, and sings very loudly. They also sing in tune, which is wonderful to hear. There is a worship music team that plays contemporary songs, although the old hymns are also sung. It is definitely what I would consider “Low Church”.

I admit I prefer a more formal service and music. One of my favorite memories is attending a very full Solemn Evensong service at King’s College, Cambridge and being seated in the choir loft right next to the baritone section. It was wonderful.

It is a comfort to be back in my childhood congregation. There will be choir that sings Palm Sunday and we will participate in that. There used to be a handbell choir but not enough players at the present time. and there was quite a lot of excitement expressed when I mentioned that Husband and I were ringers. It may be only a matter of time that we are church musicians again.

Even if you don’t believe or attend, are you High Church or Low Church in how you live your life?

2026, Food, Gatherings, holidays, Uncategorized

Bottoms Up!

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Most of my friends and acquaintances know me well enough to know that New Year’s Eve does not find me out drinking and partying wildly.  The only time I’m up at midnight these days is if I need to make a trip down the hall in the middle of the night. 

I have only been drunk twice in my life.  The first time was when I was living in Northfield during the summer between what would have been my junior and senior year.  I was working at Ole Piper Inn and went to a party with my co-workers.  I hadn’t really had drunk much prior to that and there was a lot of mixing of different kinds of alcohol.  I woke up in my bed but don’t remember how I got there.  Keys were in my jacket pocket and the car was in the driveway – luckily nothing amiss. Thank goodness the party was only about 10 blocks from my apartment.

The second time was at a work party at the bakery in Milwaukee.   No memory loss this time (I remember the bus ride home from the bakery QUITE clearly) but I felt so awful the next day that I wished for memory loss.  It was after this horrible hangover that I decided that overdrinking was just not something I wanted to do. 

I’m not a teetotaler but I rarely have more than a glass of wine or one mixed drink.  It’s not hard as the taste of alcohol isn’t my favorite anyway.  Not imbibing much was a little challenging with clients over the years but nothing too awful.  The pressure that many people experience for not drinking in social settings hasn’t happened much to me; I’ve found that if I don’t call attention to my beverage in a party setting, most folks don’t even notice that I’m nursing one glass of wine for an hour or that I’ve switched to a non-alcoholic option.

All this is coming to mind because in addition to the New Year, I finally gave in and let the Medicare/BCBS home wellness visit happen last week. It was easy enough, no invasive stuff and only took about 30 minutes. The nurse practitioner asked me all the same questions that the doctor asks every year at my usual wellness checkup.  When he got to the “how often to you drink alcohol” question I hesitated after saying “one or two” and he immediately filled in with “a day?”.  I laughed and said “no, probably one or two every two or three months”.  I had hesitated because I was trying to decide between two to three months and three to four months.  He clearly didn’t believe me.  I reported that I had just had a glass of wine the Saturday before at my party but that I couldn’t even remember the last time I’d had any alcohol.  Maybe Blevins back in September? 

He did write down 2-3 months, although I’m not sure he really thought that was the truth.  Oh well.

Did you party last night?  What makes for a good celebration in your opinion? 

2025, Gatherings, Music, Uncategorized

Community Music

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I know that November and December are very busy seasons for musicians, but I have been astounded by the number of musical performances by local musicians since we moved here. When I grew up here, all the music was in the school and the churches.

In the last two weeks there have been musical performances by a variety of groups downtown in stores, in outdoor public performance spaces, and in the Palace, the old Vaudeville theatre. They performed in the snow storms. The music ranged from classical, folk, and rock. Children and adults have been playing and singing all around town. The school is having concerts.

Next Sunday, there is a big concert of a variety of musicians at the Senior Center. We bought tickets to attend. I signed Husband up for guitar lessons at the local music school. Is this typical for small town Minnesota? Our ND town was extremely musical, but not like this.

What is your favorite holiday music? What would you like to perform or hear?

2025, Family, Food, Gatherings, Uncategorized

Soaking Up The Ambience

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We have been in our new home for almost a month, and find the community and people friendly and accommodating. We spent the last almost 40 years living among ranchers, oil workers, and people descended from a Black Sea immigrants. The latter are somewhat short and Roman Catholic. Now we live in an area settled by Germans, Norwegians, and Dutch immigrants. There are lots of Lutherans and Dutch Refomed here. There are lots of tall, blondes here. The Lutheran Church we attend and that I grew up in was founded by Norwegians. It was surprising when we attended last week to hear the loud and intune singing from the whole congregation. The local high school here had to start a new men’s choir this fall since so many of the boys wanted to sing. This is a very musical community.

Husband and I are amazed how often the city puts out street sweepers and machines that suck up piles of leaves that people have raked into the street. We usually just ignore the leaves. Husband felt compelled to rake since everyone else was doing it almost every day. He blames the Dutch influence for this street cleaning obsession.

Husband was excited to find Aquavit in the local liquor store. It was impossible to find out west. He went full Scandanavian by getting lingonberries and pickled herring, both easy to find in the stores here. We also have a local brewery that makes a German type beer that Husband likes. We rolled and fried 75 sheets of lefse last Saturday, so we are ready for a SW Minnesota winter. I draw the line at lutefisk.

How are you influenced by your neighbors? How comfortable are you singing aloud in church or other public settings?

2025, books, Fantasy, Food, Gatherings, Mysteries

When the Moon Hits Your Eye..

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If  you don’t like this post – it’s Jacque’s fault!

As those of you in Blevins know, I sometimes like to bring something for the potluck that aligns somehow with one of the books we’ve read or is a favorite of the author.  Walter Mosley got espresso chocolate brownies.  Louise Penny got miniature croissants with chocolate sauce on the side.  For the book Broken for You by Stephanie Kallos I was very pleased with my cupcakes adorned with shards of “glass” – made by melting Jolly Rancher candies and then breaking it up into sharp-looking pieces.

This month I was in the mood to do something fun but wasn’t sure what to make.  I didn’t think I’d get an answer in time from John Scalzi about his favorite food and I figured the only way I would find out about Mary Shelley’s favorite would be if she communicated from beyond the grave.  Not my cup of tea.

I decided that moon pies would be fun, except that all the commercially available moon pies have gelatin in them- that’s why I haven’t had a moon pie since I was a kid.  So I headed to the internet and found a relatively straightforward recipe using marshmallow cream.  Marshmallow cream is easy to make but purchasing a jar of marshmallow cream from the grocery store is even easier.  I made the graham biscuit dough, rolled it out, cut it with a crimped cutter and baked.  That turned out to be the easy part.  Marshmallow cream is incredibly futzy to work with.  First I tried to pipe it from a pastry bag, but getting the cream into the bag was just about impossible and having a star piping tip was worthless as the cream settled into a star-less blob anyway.  I abandoned the bag and just used a spatula but at this point had cream all over.  I had to put the sandwiches in the freezer for a bit and then I started the chocolate.  I was really having trouble just dipping the whole cookie so I switched to icing the top and the sides with a spatula instead.  I had chocolate EVERYWHERE (think both hands, handle to the double boiler, the counter, spoon, the spatula, the floor….).  I had to use my teeth to pull up my sleeves at one point.  There’s something to be said about having stuff made in factories with enrobing machines:

But in the end, it was very satisfying to make them and they turned out to taste great… quite rich so if I ever try this again, I’ll make them smaller.  Of course, we’ll have to read another book about the moon!

Tell me about a favorite book and what food you would bring to represent it to a potluck!

2025, Family, Gatherings

Marry Girl Cake

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My next-door neighbors’ son is getting married right after Christmas.  He met his fiancée when he was stationed in Taiwan a few years ago (Marine).  They moved here early last year after he retired; yes, that’s right, you get to retire from the Marines when you’re 30 if you join up right after high school.  He’s attending the Carlson School of Business for his MBA and she’s working in financial planning. 

Zander and Nina will be getting married in Taiwan, where her family still lives.  Apparently there are quite a few “traditions” that weddings incorporate in Taiwan, even in this day and age.  This is from their wedding website:

The wedding ceremony then will begin with a “bride pick-up” ceremony (迎娶), where the groom arrives at the bride’s home with music, groomsmen, and playful games. After the groom complete the “mission,” they travel together to the groom’s house. A tea ceremony follows, where the couple serves tea to elders in exchange for blessings and red envelopes.  The evening ends with a lively banquet, sometimes held outdoors as a traditional 流水席 (Liúshuǐxí), filled with delicious dishes, toasts, and laughter. Of course, mostly seafood in Taiwan.

Another tradition that wasn’t listed on the website was the sending out of engagement cakes – see the photo above.   YA and I are not invited – obviously it’s a small number of folks heading to Taiwan from the US the day after Christmas for this wedding.  This doesn’t bother me – I would have been shocked to be included and we couldn’t have afforded it anyway.  But it was nice that my neighbors brought us over an engagement cake (called “marry girl cake” in the past) which are sent out by the bride’s family to announce the upcoming nuptials.  I looked up the label to find out it was a red bean variety but then YA translate-googled the Chinese ingredient list and found out it also has pork.  So we got to admire it, but didn’t eat it.

Weddings are way down on my list of favorite things.  Way down.  Too much pomp, too much emphasis on the day and not the life afterwards, too much expense, too much “it’s the bride’s day”.  My first wedding was pretty much run by my mother; I made a few key decisions but she took care of everything else.  It was too big as far as I was concerned but at least it was very low key.  My second wedding was at a table at Good Earth; the judge joined us but didn’t stay for lunch.  Our witnesses were our waiter Philip and the waitress Sarah from the next section over.  The restaurant gifted us with a little centerpiece and comped our dessert.  Even though the marriage didn’t go the distance, I’m still happy with the memory of that wedding day.

YA will not expect a big flashy wedding from me… if she ever ties a knot.  I’ve been sending her psychic messages for years…. just one word…. “elope”!

Any good wedding stories?

2025, Business, Family, Food, Gatherings

Super Mercado!

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I’m pretty sure that not too many people see grocery-shopping as an exciting activity.  Well, count YA and I as the outliers.  For some reason over the years, we have cultivated grocery-shopping as an activity we like to do together.

Our favorite is Trader Joes.  We especially like to go every couple of months when the new round of items hits the stores.  We go through the Fearless Flyer that TJs sends out and highlight stuff that looks good.  Sometimes, if I just want a couple of things, I don’t tell YA that I’m going to Trader Joes; if she comes along, it will triple the bill at the register.

The spot where Rainbow Foods used to be in the Hub Shopping Center near our house has been empty for seven years.  A couple of times there were signs for temporary spots, like a Halloween store, but they never materialized.  When construction started to happen almost a year ago, we were both excited to see what was happening there and then doubly excited when we found out it was going to be a Mexican market, bakery and taqueria.  Unfortunately, it took WAY too long to open, so I had put my excitement on the back burner.  Finally, about a month ago, it was clear from the trucks in the parking lot that progress was finally happening. 

The grand opening was this past Saturday.  Prizes, giveaway, samples, a bouncy house, mariachis and native dancers made it a big party.  And it was CROWDED.  The opening was at noon and we arrived at 1.  Thank goodness for my bad knees and temporary handicap parking placard; we would have had to have parked in Iowa otherwise.  And forget getting a shopping cart.  Luckily YA and I didn’t have any big shopping plans so we just used a big bag that we had in the car.

Lots of nice-looking produce, a massive dairy/cheese aisle and two bakery sections, one with cakes, pies and then the self-serve bakery aisle …. I don’t even have the words

There were plenty of mainstream items alongside the Latino foodstuffs you would expect to find.  A big endcap of Mary statuettes and a long row of Mary and other religious paintings above the front windows.  They even have a Currency Exchange office.  The taqueria was doing a bang-up business, as well as the deli.  The tortillaria, where they will make fresh corn and flour tortillas is still in the works and should be open in a couple of weeks.  You could see that area and the machines waiting to get set up.  Since I’ve quit making my own tortillas, I can’t wait.

Anyway, YA and I had a fun time.  We picked up a few items that I needed for a soup I wanted to make but didn’t partake of any on-site food – just too crowded, even for us.  But my guess is that in the next few weeks, as the hoopla dies down, this will be another grocery shopping venue that YA and I will add to our events catalog!

If a tomato is a fruit, does that make ketchup a smoothie?  Any good grocery shopping stories?

2025, Family, Food, Gatherings, holidays, home, Kids, Uncategorized

Thanks

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I have purposely chosen to not write about Halloween today, as it seems to me we have enough horror and fear around us. Instead, I wanted to let Baboons know what I am thankful for right now.

First, I am thankful to all the Baboons for putting up with all the posts I have written over the past several months about moving. I am sure they were getting pretty tedious to read. Moving is over, and now we are getting settled and organized. Not much more needs to be said about it.

I am also thankful for the increased time with our son and his family. We saw them yesterday in Sioux Falls and I got the best smiles from our 3 month old granddaughter.

Thanksgiving is four weeks away, and our son has requested a particular brined turkey ala Alton Brown, homemade French bread, and various other side dishes. Son and family, along with my best friend, will spend Thanksgiving weekend with us. I am so excited to cook in our new kitchen.

Finally, I am thankful that the court hearing Husband was to testify remotely at yesterday was settled on Wednesday afternoon. He had done a parental capacity evaluation on the parent in hot water with a central ND county. Now he is officially done working.

What are you thankful for these days. What are your Thanksgiving plans?