Hi, I'm Eva. Thank you for stopping by. I live in Mendota, Virginia. If you like rural life in a country village, sharing decorating and DIY ideas, gardening, local and seasonal eating, food preservation, thrifting, and anything to do with honey, we have something in common.
I’m still working on my 2016 goals. So far, I’ve got my ears pierced and they grew right back up. I’ve lost 11 pounds but still have about 15 to go. I’m on to a new goal. I have always wanted to enter something into the Washington County Fair! This year, I did. And guess what? I won 2nd place.
It started like this…just plain ol’ Concord grapes taken from a neighbor’s vines.
Add in a good friend to work with, and making grape jelly becomes a very good way to spend some time. I worked with Sandy Lester. We both worked on these grapes like we were being paid a gazillion dollars for the jelly. We made somewhere between 75-80 pints. Guess what everyone is getting for Christmas?
Yesterday Mike and I drove up to the Washington County Fair Grounds and I entered one jar of canned tomatoes, one jar of black raspberry jam, one jar of grape jelly and one “repurposed item”. The judging was today, and it was like being in high school and going to see if you made cheerleader (I did not). I could not wait to see if I placed!!
At 5:30 pm today, I went back to the fair and paid the $12 entry fee to get in so I could check on the judging. My canned tomatoes? I couldn’t even find them! My black raspberry jam? Lonely and naked. My repurposed picture frame turned jewelry organizer? Lonely and naked. Crying! My grape jelly? Well, she was wearing a red ribbon!!
Here she is sitting with her friends…other grape jellies.
She doesn’t mind being second place. She’s going to work really hard to get 1st next year!!
If I’d entered ten things, I could have gotten into the fair for free.
It’s fun to live in a rural county in a small town.
Our small river outfitter, Adventure Mendota, got rained out today. We had to return a child’s PFD (life vest) to her grandmother at The Virginian in Abingdon, so we decided to head up to the Abingdon Farmers Market.
I bought bread. It’s actually made in Mendota.
Picked up some treats for River at Barkery & Co. He got right down to putting these away.
Purchased some of my most favorite juice in the world from White Birch. Nicole Dyer owns White Birch and she’s been a strong competitor in the business challenges we were in together. For some reason, I was first resistant to trying these juices. I thought “healthy” would not be “tasty.” No so. I love the Pink Punch and the Orange Dream which tastes like a Dreamsicle.
Went up to the Holston Mountain Artisans shop on Park Street. I bought this small quilted banner to hang on the wall in the guest house. It was made by Laura Bryant and was $12.
I also bought this very special wall hanging which I’ll save as a gift for a child It’s called “Wild Dogs” and was created by Mary Warner of Bristol, Tennessee. It has a story.
Mary Warner is married to a diplomat, and she spends a great deal of time in Africa. She teaches quilting there–I believe it is in Botswana. She asked her quilting friends to send their leftover quilt pieces so that the ladies she is teaching will have fabric to work with. At any rate, this is one of the quilts that they have made. It’s constructed of fabrics that normally would not be used in the same piece — but these ladies “used what they had” and made this beautiful little quilt. I’ll probably never meet Mary Warner, but I hope she learns that I have this special little quilt and I’ll make sure it’s treasured and those tiny stitches are respected and loved.
Here’s another picture…
I won’t give this little gift to just anyone. I’ll wait until the right person needs it.
I am not on this blog often in the summer since we own and operate a small outfitter on the North Fork of the Holston. We’ve been very busy until this week when it rained — much needed rain. We are like farmers — we watch the skies and the weather diligently.
The rain gave us much needed rest and a chance to do berry picking. It was only a chance because I didn’t go. My friend Sandy went and picked the berries. I may go back with her tomorrow. These berries are a treasure. Sandy made the comment that Mike and I are hard to buy for because we have about everything we want and that is true. However, we did not have black raspberries. In fact, I haven’t eaten a black raspberry in over 40 years. That changed this week.
Here they are.
My mother’s voice comes to me when I see these. When she was a young girl of about 12, she picked a black raspberry from a vine and ate it. It had an ant inside the hollow of the berry and it bit her tongue. Ouch.
I read on the internet (so it must be true) that black raspberries contain 11 percent higher levels of antioxidants than blueberries and 40% more than strawberries.
I made jam with mine. It is so good. I stirred like crazy getting everything just right so the jam would “set” nicely. It has. There’s tons of folk lore regarding raspberries…they are magical. They provide a fertile ground for creative thinking. Ironically, this picture reminds me of an early ultrasound that I see on Facebook for the early stages of pregnancy.
Here’s the resulting prize. I have nine of these and I’ll be making another nine tonight. “You never double your recipe when making jam” are the wise words of Barb Leonard, a friend here in Mendota. I left the seeds in mine, and while they may be annoying for some, they give the jam more flavor. Sandy, my friend who picked the berries, and I compared the jam with the seeds to the jelly that had been strained. The seeds gave an extra burst of flavor.
I can’t wait to share a jar with each of my sisters. I’m thinking about Christmas gifts. When it’s cold out this winter, Mike and I will open a jar and spread it on toast, and I’ll remember the summer.
What I like about blogging is chronicling time. In Mendota, things move slow but we do have change. Some very good changes, but we remain a rural farming community.
It’s such pretty country…
While only a very few tobacco farmers remain, we still have several organic operations, RiverGate dairy, sheep, cattle, and finally, a small vineyard quietly went into place on Friday and Saturday of this week. Here’s The Farmer.
I don’t have a picture of The Farmer’s Wife, because she was cooking and running about, but she is the reason for the vineyard. She wanted some grapevines for grapes for jelly. The Farmer must really like her jelly. She has 1,000 grapevines. I hope she has a lot of jars.
Kevin and Ginger Mumpower own and operate Gingerbread Cooking and Catering and, hopefully, in a few years, they’ll have some grapes ready for the first homemade jellies and food sauces. Ginger’s jellies for our bellies!
The grapevines arrived last week. They are dormant at this time.
Kevin worked with Virginia Tech to determine the soil PH and how it should be amended as well as to determine what grapes would grow best here in Mendota. Everything is ready to go in the picture below.
Each vine was tucked into its place. It rained shortly thereafter.
It’s good to have some help. This is Bill, Kevin’s father in law.
Some help came from East High…and one former Gate City High School (now JMU) fella..
Remember the crates that I found in Gate City at Memory Lane Antiques? Here’s how they’ll look with the tees in them. This is the Canada Dry crate which works well for small t-shirts. I take no credit. Mike thought this up.
Also, long ago...here…I talked about the kayak quilt square Mike was making me. the date of the post was April 27, 2015. It’s done–it’s hanging up on the shop we use for our base camp. It took him one year, but he got ‘er done! Thank you honey!
We have both enjoyed repurposing things for Adventure Mendota’s base camp. Since we have a septic tank, we have to b e careful what goes in the toilets, so we ask guests to dry their hands using paper towels outside of the bathroom. It’s our hand drying station. It’s made of an old sawhorse Mike made, the center leaf to an old table that we used 25 years ago, and we added the Saltville crate that we got at Memory Lane to house the paper towels. We could have used a plastic bin, but it just didn’t seen right.
I’m rolling and folding t-shirts for the crates. It seems like they have multiplied since I started this!
Hi there! It has been such a busy time around here as we prepare for the first days of Adventure Mendota 2016. Mike and I have also been on the fundraising merry-go-round for the Goodson Kinderhook Volunteer Fire & Rescue, Crossroads Christian Academy and the Washington County Public Library. We’ve bid in three silent auctions in less than 8 days. I’ve ended up with a few dinners out, several tickets to the Barter, and a pretty wall piece. We’re now broke.
Last night, however, we got into a bidding fever over these…apple crates from Chilhowie.
Mike bid….are you ready…$185 for these crates. We want to use them to hold Adventure Mendota’s t-shirts. We’re rural…they’re rural…it’s a match. If you are still reeling from the $185, the real shocker is that we didn’t win the bid. They went for $200. Mike was bummed, but I was secretly relieved. Whew! Close call!
However, as we went out to deliver Adventure Mendota rack cards today, I suggested that we stop in a few antique stores in Gate City to see if they were aware where we could find some similar crates. We stopped in the old Hackey Furniture and Appliance Store. I don’t know what it looked like “in the day” but here’s what it looks like today, and it is the home of Memory Lane Antique Mall. Very, very nice folks.
So, I went in…
I left a pool of drool when I saw this. It’s sold, and I’m kind of relieved. It’s hard to explain to Mike why I want something chippy and blue and wonderful. He does not get it. Sorry for the blurry picture. I took this with my iphone.
This is all about hunting crates, but there is one more thing I want to show you. This light fixture was $199. I’m going to look at similar new ones and compare prices. When I redo my dining room, I’m replacing the light fixture and this one would look very good. They were asking $199. I’m sure I could get it a little cheaper. $150??
But the real story here is the crates. I cannot see things in stores like this. Something in the way my mind is wired does not let me find that “needle in a haystack.” If there is a lot of distraction going on, I am…well…distracted. So I walked all the way through and started to leave and then I asked the salesperson if they had any old fruit crates with markings.
Here’s all the ones I passed walking through the store. I’m so glad I asked. This was just the start. We bought 7.
Here’s a few of my favorites…starting with my #1 favorite..it’s from Saltville. This box has so much history. It’s really about the rise and fall of an industry and how it affected a town and the environment. I’m honored to have it as a home for my t-shirts!
I’ve seen fake crates in stores. I do not meant to sound snobby, but really…why get fake when the real think actually tells a story? I’d rather do without than have a crate that doesn’t know how to speak!!! My crates speak AP-PAH-LACH-UN!
Here’s another one…this is actually from California and doesn’t speak AP-PAH-LACH-UN very well, but I couldn’t resist it. My XL tees will go in this one.
And finally…this little Canada Dry sings to me as well. I think it’s singing “I want tank tops!”
Yes, those are my feet.
New topic. Guess how much the Adventure Mendota Basket went for at the WCPL A Tisket A Tasket Fundraiser…$120. I’m thrilled! Each basket is around a book. My book was “A Day on the River” and if you can believe it, the little girl’s name in the book is….Eva!
When we first built this house, we said “everything is to be maintenance free.” We were dumb. There is no maintenance free anything. While it’s nice that we don’t have to paint the vinyl fence, it does require maintenance. Each year following winter, we are greeted with black and green mold on the fence.
If the weeds in the beds were not depressing enough, here’s a close up of the nasty fence.
And another…
I’d looked on Pinterest for some ideas on the very easiest way to clean the fence, and Magic Erasers came up again and again. They do work! However, I have a lot of fence and Magic Erasers are expensive and for some reason, they fall apart on me. The picture below is one taken from Pinterest of a fence as nasty as mine, and I have no doubt those Magic Erasers did the trick.
But, with my bigger vinyl fence, I reverted back to a tried and true method. A bottle of cheap bleach and an old Windex spray bottle. I filled the bottle with a 2/3 bleach 1/3 water solutions and sprayed the fence and then just wiped it down with a wet rag. Here’s the tools of my trade as a fence washer. All done for about $2 plus my labor which is priceless. probably a bargain.
Here’s the instructions:
1 Bucket filled with water and about 2 cups of bleach
1 Rag
Double Gloves. Trust me.
1 Gallon of Bleach
1 Empty Windex House Spray Bottle which you then fill with the 2/3 bleach 1/3 water solution
Water
Working in 10-12 ft. sections on a sunny day, spray your fence. After spraying, wipe with a wet cloth. You are done. Finished. Yes!! I hear my mother’s voice when I do things such as this “you can be poor but there is no reason to be dirty and nasty.” She hated dirt. I’m not that way, but I do want things to be cleaned up every once and a while! On the really dirty parts of the fence, I pulled the plastic “posts” right out and washed them.
But the fence looks great. Especially now that it’s weeded and composted. Ready for planting some seeds and flowers for spring.
Sparkling white fence and all those weeds are pulled. I’ve been in weed hell, people. Our friend, Jenna, came and helped so there was solidarity. We dug and dug and dug like moles. Piles of weeds. I put newspaper down underneath the compost in the worst parts where I have had weed problems in the past.
Here’s the “before” once more..
And the after.
It has been 8 days since I quit my job. Someone asked what I was doing with my time! While it’s true that I haven’t missed many episodes of Ellen, I have scrubbed the fence, pulled about a million weeds, helped move the compost around, took Muffin for his transformation into a more domesticated, neutered male kitty, done a very small amount of housework and made chili for 14 (which now resides in many containers in my freezer). Oh…and I also came in 1st place in the Existing Business Category and won $5,000 in the Washington County Business Challenge for Adventure Mendota! It’s all been good!
I have always had an interest in the sand and silica mining that took place in Mendota long ago. My grandfather mentioned it here, and later, when I worked for AGC Glass, I was taught how important sand was in glass making. I kinda sorta knew where the mining took place.
I finally got to visit this place. It’s on private property and difficult to get to. It took me a while to mooch my way into getting an invite. I took a lot of pictures and posted three or four on Facebook. What was fun was talking on Facebook with my cousin, Terri Collier McCroskey, and Karen McCormack Quesenberry after sharing the pictures.
Terri’s dad, Ralph Collier, had worked at the Clinch Mountain Silica Sand Mine when he was young. Karen’s grandfather, Cleveland Johnson, also worked there and after breathing in the silica dust, he died of silicosis (a lung disease caused by silica dust) leaving behind a widow and six orphans. Clinch Mountain Silica Sand Corporation operated from 1920 until 1931 at which time it declared bankrupcy.
I was up at the quarry Saturday which is 4000 ft. up Clinch Mountain. Here’s the quarry site and although almost 100 years have passed, there is still evidence of a sand quarry. It was here, in 1921, according to the “Pit and Quarry” trade magazine that the sandy rocks were crushed, pulvarized and screened before being loaded into the tram cars.
The sand is gray and sparkly on this part of the quarry site.
Here’s what the site looked like so many years ago. I found this in an ancient rock trade magazine on Google. It’s the staging area where the sand was moved into the carts that would then zoom down the tram line.
Here’s the same area today. You can see the remains of the stone foundation.
The carts then went down the tram path. The full cart went down which sent the empty cart back up!
From that same magazine I found, here’s a picture of the actual tram. I was so excited when I found this. I also learned this tram must have been busy as it had a capacity of between 300 and 400 tons every 10 hours. Also, even the quarry at the top of the mountain was electrically driven by water power.
So it was a very interesting Saturday. Thank you for reading RiverCliff Cottage.
We have heard from everyone that this was a bad winter for bees, but thankfully, it appears my three hives survived. See for yourself. I started feeding them today. Their enclosure is a mess…I’m going to clean it up and plant flowering seeds out there.
Here’s what I plan to plant…”Black Eyed Susie Vines”. They are also called Thumbergia. Now can you see why I call them Black Eyed Susie Vines? Seriously, who thinks up these names?
The reason I’m feeding the bees is that it’s warm and they are wanting to forage…but there’s not much to eat. Dandelions are one food supply that there are a few of. Do you put weed killer on your dandelions? No…I don’t even want to know the answer.
Leave those dandelions alone. We need them for a few more weeks.
Other news…I’m only working about four more days! I’ll be working full-time at Adventure Mendota this summer! However, that doesn’t start until May so I have almost six weeks off to get stuff done. I’m thrilled.
