Author: Michelle (page 8 of 15)

I like open spaces. And I love salt water.

Benjamin and I made our yearly trip to Cape Henlopen State Park in Lewes, Delaware with only two intentions— to eat at the fantastic restaurants, and more importantly, to bike Gordon’s Pond Trail.

To ascend onto a boardwalk, that then takes you up among sand dunes is heaven for me. I feel like I’m gliding just above the sand, like I’m shifting along with it. I like thinking about how wind and water formed the dunes, and how dunes help to protect the land against storms. I love how clean the air smells. I inhale the scrub pines and the salt of the Atlantic. I love her deep drum beat. I like knowing that Europe is across her waves.

Open spaces take my worries, and I am grateful, grateful for the room inside my brain for clear, creative thoughts.

Gordon’s Pond Trail begins in the woods, proceeds onto the board walk over the dunes, and takes me into the middle of a salt marsh where there are thousands of birds—ospreys, gulls, sandpipers, herons. On this particular trip a flock of terns flew up and over us as we rode. Beautiful. I love having wings around me, birds sharing the open space…

At sunset I was washing the dishes, daydreaming out the window, when I saw a hummingbird lilt above the Rose of Sharon.

I caught my breath.

He was tiny, only about the size of my index finger. I watched his spinning wings as he bounced to each pink blossom.

Then, he did something I had never seen before…he landed.

The light was dimming. His body was a soft brown silhouette. He didn’t rest for long, but he’s perched inside my brain now, and I will carry him through the winter.

There are ospreys here in the Hudson Valley!

First, Benjamin spotted one flying over our house. Later that same day, we went on a bike ride around the lakes, and he saw one perched on top of a snag. We stopped and stood right below her. She looked at us for only a moment. Then, not finding us particularly interesting, she continued scanning the lake. And just yesterday, as we were getting our coffee, we saw another of these gorgeous birds perched on a tree in the back woods. An osprey in our back yard! She stayed there for quite a while. It was misty out, and I like to think she was enjoying the light rain on her feathers.

Birds of prey take my heart every time.

In Florida, at Honeymoon Island State Park, the ospreys nest in March. Fuzzy babies peep from large bundles of sticks. On many of my trips home, I have stood below giant slash pines listening to their charming voices. An adult osprey’s call sounds like a beautiful laugh, the kind of laugh you make when you’re with a good friend. For me, this call has always been Florida, distinctly Southern. But now I hear it, right in my Northern back yard.

The osprey continues to return to that same bare branch. Yesterday she preened for hours. Thank you for visiting me, Osprey. I know you’re telling me it’s time to go home to Florida. I know. I’m on my way.

It is good to live near a river.

Irvington’s Scenic Hudson Park is a sweet place to watch the sunset. Just the other night, we enjoyed water, land, and sky along with a few other celebrants.

A woman to our left was sitting cross-legged on a blanket, playing a circle drum and a shekere as she sang to the river.

Further down to our right, a group of women were laughing, dancing with one another, and singing, “Hey Good Looking.”

And in front of us, bats were diving for insects above the water, with the Palisades in the distance, and the sky getting pinker and pinker as the sun set.

Perfect.

I have lived near many rivers.

Here they are, and here’s why they are mine:

The Wisconsin River… big water of my childhood, pennies on the nearby railroad tracks, parties as a teen, The Tamarack Pub, fried cheese curds, Miller beer

The Hillsborough River… alligators, paddle boats, swinging bridges, Spanish moss hanging from cypress trees, humidity hanging on everything, armadillos nudging me in the ribs as I tried to sleep in my tent

The St. Croix River… stopping in Stillwater for coffee and writing, hiking in Taylor’s Falls with lovely people, yellow leaves, the crunch of snow

The Mississippi River… crossing from Minnesota into Wisconsin and back again, many times (mostly around 2am, because WI bar time was later than MN’s), dancing to Prince in a pub called The Nutty Beaver, seeing a sign that read “Taxidermy and Cheese,” stepping over the source of it at Itasca State Park, following it down on a road trip, settling by it in New Orleans, the taste of chicory coffee, and music like nowhere else in this country

The Chicago River… an architecture boat tour with my ESL students, looking up at the buildings while sailing under them and a rare blue sky

The Potomac River… The C&O Rail to Trail Bike Path…seeing deer swimming, herons hunting, turtles and snakes basking in the sun, cormorants drying their wings, fighting and winning my first battle with arthritis, falling in love with my bike

And now, The Hudson…hypnotist river, lovely to watch as we ride the train into and out of the city, local baseball games, ice cream trucks, geese, sail boats, a view of the city and the September 11th Memorial, strolling with dear friends at twilight in misty rain…

Yes, it is good to live near a river.

Lilies-of-the-Valley

When I was a little girl in Wisconsin, I loved to check the side of our house each spring. I searched for tiny white globes, dainty bells that hung from long, graceful stalks. Once I found them, I’d lean in and take a deep breath.

Ah… lilies-of-the-valley…

The perfume made me dizzy, and I loved it.

The Latin term for these beauties is Convallaria majalis and the buds are called pips. Vallaria. Pips.

Yes, mystic little tinkling messengers of sleep, the lily-of-the-valley.

***

Daffodils

When Benjamin and I got married, I held a bouquet of daffodils during our quiet ceremony.

Daffodils belong to the botanical family, Narcissus. Poets like Keats and Shakespeare have lauded the daffodil. It was fitting that I carried this flower of myth and poesy, because I was marrying Benjamin, and I was marrying my art at the same time.

***

Lilacs

Mrs. Ingeborg Konkel was our baby sitter. My brothers and I loved her. We loved how she said, “Oof Da,” every time she got up from her chair. We loved how she patiently (and sleepily) endured our magic shows and dance performances. Most of all, we loved how she carried salt water taffy in her pockets, made us sliced apples sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar for our afternoon treat, and always had caramel apples at Halloween.

We associated sweetness with Mrs. Konkel, and sweetness followed her into her yard where she grew lilacs. I loved going to those shrubs and burying my face in the fleecy blossoms. I wanted to taste those candy flowers.

The genus name for lilac is Syringa vulgaris. Translated from Greek and Latin, this means ‘common pipe.’ There is a myth about a nymph (of course there is) named Syringa. Pan was in love with her, so he chased her (of course he did). Syringa turned herself into a flowery tree to avoid a tryst with Pan (of course she did). And what does Pan like to play? Ah, the lilac flute…

***

Prairie

Summer in the Midwest meant wild flowers.

My favorites were Shasta daisies, purple clover, tiger lilies, and Queen Anne’s lace.

Daisies grew with the purple clover in the field behind my neighbor’s barn. Tammy and I waded around those happy flowers, careful not to trample, as we picked clover blossoms and nibbled on them. I loved being surrounded by smiley flowers and biting into sips of honey.

If you tie the stems of daisies together, forming a daisy chain, the flowers can protect your child from being stolen by fairies. The daisy is also a symbol in Catholicism for Mother Mary.

‘To live in clover’ is an idiom that means to live a carefree, happy life. Clover leaflets are symbols of the Holy Trinity and considered good luck.

Tiger lilies grew next to our raspberry bushes. Each morning, when I picked raspberries for my cereal, I took a moment to look at the dark purple dots on those bright orange petals. I’d take my sketchpad and color pencils to them. Tiger lilies were one of the first flowers that taught me to really pay attention as I drew, to look closely at colors, to see detail.

It was once believed that if you leaned in to smell a tiger lily, you’d get freckles. Guess that’s how I got mine. Lilies also keep away evil and provide nectar for hummingbirds.

With Queen Anne’s lace, it was the shape and texture that I loved and how those flowers looked different from all the others. They were fun to draw with pencil or ink, and they defined the prairie in all her wild beauty.

Queen Anne’s lace resembles poison hemlock. The crimson center is supposed to symbolize the blood of Queen Anne as she pricked her finger while making lace.  Bob Dylan includes both clover and Queen Anne’s lace in his song, “You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go.”

***

Tropics

When we moved from Wisconsin to Florida, there were new flowers to discover, and I favored hibiscus and night blooming cactus.

Hibiscuses were vibrant, unfolding, and sassy. Symbols of the tropics, they were the flowers that women wore in their hair with party dresses, shawls, and dancing shoes. Hibiscus spoke Spanish. You could make paper from them and drink them as tea. Delicious.

Hibiscus flowers are associated with the Hindi goddess, Kali, and the name may have come from ‘ibis,’ the wading bird that supposedly favored the flower.

Night blooming cacti were miracle flowers. From our back patio at night, we would watch them come into bloom. It was amazing, and strangely out of place. Flowers like that should bloom in the cool of a desert night, not in humid Florida, but bloom they did, and by morning, they retreated. Quite the show.

There is a traditional Native American story about the night blooming cactus, and you can read about it here: www.southwestfolklife.org/did-you-see-her. This flower has also been called Queen of the Night and Christ in the Manger.

***

MidAtlantic

When we lived in North Carolina, our landlord covered our yard with flowering trees and bushes. We had wisteria, yellow jasmine, gardenias, and hydrangeas.

The gorgeous, drooping lavender blooms of the wisteria were everything Southern- hypnotizing in color and aroma and beautifully relaxed. After the petals fell and scattered, I collected wisteria vines and tried sculpting with them. They were easy to twist into shapes, and I made a corset from them.

Yellow jasmine bloomed in January, and this bright color was welcome during that month. North Carolina does not have a long winter, nor is it particularly gray, but I still loved seeing so much color in a colder month. I picked long stems of yellow jasmine and kept vases of these flowers throughout our house.

I also tried picking gardenias, though I didn’t keep them for long inside. They were perfumy, at first, but as they sat in the water, their scent turned stronger, like skin emitting alcohol. Honestly, this was a comforting smell for me, but I couldn’t keep it throughout my house. Eventually, I stopped picking them and chose instead to sing “Dos Gardenias Para Ti” as I passed by, touching them lightly.

I loved the pom pom and periwinkle of hydrangeas. They didn’t really have a scent, but they filled out a vase beautifully. They felt vintage to me, like they belonged in an antique photograph.

Wisteria comes from the family Fabaceae, and ‘faba’ in Latin means ‘bean.’ Yellow jasmine has healing properties for conditions like measles and headaches. Gardenias belong to the Rubiceae or coffee family, and hydrangeas are associated with peaches, bats, and longevity.

***

Petunias

Petunias were my song flower. I grew these deep purple, velvety petals in hanging baskets on our front porch in North Carolina.

When I was a child, recovering from surgery, my Mom used to sing Arthur Godfrey’s “I’m a Lonely Little Petunia” to me. In the song, a petunia is sad, because she’s in an onion patch, so she cries, ‘boo hoo.’ When my mom got to the crying part, she’d sing it with extra drama to make me laugh. Somehow in doing this, she taught me not to feel sorry for myself and to get through physical pain with a little laughter.

Which brings me to the reason why I am featuring flowers on this post. Yes, it’s late summer, and I have watched a parade of flowers around me since April. My landlords and neighbors have grown many of the flowers listed here and more, and I’ve enjoyed every changing bloom.

But there’s another reason why I am compelled to write about flowers. I may be headed for the onion patch again. I may need surgery for a new hip.

If I do decide to do this, I will not ‘boo hoo.’ And I will change any new scars I endure into tattoos. Just like I did with my first scars. I may get some lilacs, daffodils, Queen Anne’s lace, or petunias…

With a new, ‘bionic’ hip, I may be able to take longer walks again. I will be able to wander, ride a bike for miles and miles and miles without pain. And I could dance again… all with flowers on my hip, flowers on my hip.

Sometimes all you need is a couple of miles.

A couple of miles along a bike trail close to your home.

Tarrytown Lakes Park is near our house, and we are regular visitors. Once we arrive, we unload the bikes and ride a pretty stretch of the connecting North County Trail Way. We pedal through a peaceful corridor, with the lake on one side and trees on the other. The drone of road traffic is distant for those two sweet miles. We yield to deer or chipmunks as they cross this section. It’s quiet, and it smells like fresh water.

Other parts of this trail are too close to the highway. We tried riding in both directions, North and South, and while it was good exercise, it was loud. Admittedly, we are spoiled. We have ridden on a lot of trails throughout the MidAtlantic, Northeast, and South. These trails have always followed water- rivers, canals, salt marshes, even oceans. These trails have woods and wildlife, farms, fields, backyards, parks, campuses, and backstreets in small towns. We are used to carefully crossing intersections at four way stops or roads where the speed limit is between 35 -45 mph, so yes, we are street savvy. But it is disconcerting to be up on a ledge, on a skinny trail, with semi trucks whizzing beneath you at 70 mph. The height, noise, and the lack of space made me feel woozy and claustrophobic.

I hope, as we discover more about our new area, that we find more quiet places to ride. In a future post, I will highlight the Aqueduct Trail, which we have yet to fully explore. We know parts of this trail do have the qualities we look for and more. We’ve walked on it for a bit, and the old growth trees along the Aqueduct are beautiful. Until then, we will pedal from one end of Tarrytown Lake to the other, and back again, enjoying those sweet couple of miles.

Little notebooks.

My grandpa, Gene, always kept one in his shirt pocket, and I was fascinated. Of course, he kept a pen next to it too, clipped to the edge like a fish hook. I saw him write things down, but I never learned the content. In my childhood brain, I imagined that he drew pictures in his little notebook. He and I used to write letters to each other, and we somehow created a tradition of signing off with drawings. He often drew a character looking over a fence saying hello to me. Unlike Kilroy from WW II graffiti, Gene’s guy wasn’t a man with just a face and an elongated nose, he was a boy with a whole body. Sometimes my grandpa closed his correspondence with flocks of geese or a landscape. I always looked forward to my grandpa’s letters, and I was especially fond of those drawings. I wonder if anyone in our family had the chance to read his notebooks after he passed away. I hope someone did.

The small notebook is a bit like a writer’s security blanket. Years ago, when I had first moved from Florida to Chicago, I felt pretty homesick and almost regretful of my decision to uproot myself for art school and live in a big city with a freezing climate. I hadn’t made any friends, and I hadn’t met the boy-in-the-apartment-next-door who would later become my husband. I was lonely and scared, and my Dad came to my rescue. He sent me a little notebook. I still have it. It’s red and glittery, a happy journal. He wrote in it, encouraging me to fill it with one positive thought each day. It worked. I filled it, and by the end, like some sort of magic, I was adjusting to grad school, making friends, and talking to him about this guy I met in my building.

Little notebooks.

My brother keeps them too, and his are the best. He sent one to me a while ago, and I’ve dog-eared pages containing some real gems. It begins with:

“Greetings,

If you are reading this then I probably don’t have to explain what this experiment is, and at the same time I might as well claim the experiment a success. Redundant misspelled bullshit and all, I’m determined not to scratch whole paragraphs and as few sentences as possible, if for no other reason than it uglies up the page.”

Heh heh…Like me, how writing looks is important to my brother.
My journals are messy compared to his, especially the one that I’m quoting from right now. He did it. There isn’t a single scratched out word for 80 little pages.

It goes on:

“Currently it is 7:15 a.m. on Tuesday, and being Tuesday morning, I’ve got Marcy! (his favorite dj from Tampa’s best radio station, WMNF)…kick ass harmonies…’I’m a hot knife. He’s a pan of butter.’ Fiona Apple! Marcy always delivers.”

Later, he moves from his radio listening spot to a picnic bench by a lake. He writes:

“Behind me the wind is forcing dried up confessions out of a palm tree. Waves slapping against the dock have a ‘glup’ quality to an inconsistent beat, the harmonica right next to my left hand wants to bend a few, and I so wish to go home to a drunken piano. Wouldn’t it be cool if Tom Waits paddled up in a canoe right about now?”

Yes, my brother, THAT would always be cool.

And I’ll end with this sparkly nugget of his…

“I grew up in rural south central Wisconsin. Our two neighbors were each about a quarter mile away. A small family hog farm straddled the hill to the North and an even smaller dairy farm stood sentinel to the South. Our yard notched an acre out of a rectangular corn field that worked like a filter from the more pungent of the two farms, either that or the smell waifed over us, because it never got that bad. In fact, most of my olfactory memories of growing up don’t offend, even the frozen fish on the ice, cow shit, or a chain saw in action. I couldn’t have asked for a better sense of place, except possibly for a little less proximity to the road, which of course directly relates to the high pet mortality rate. But one of my earliest memories is of a busted streak around the house when a car went by and honked. Why my brother and I tried to run around the house naked I can’t remember, or how we planned to get back into the house unnoticed, but at any rate, I clearly remember getting yelled at for our heroic bravery.”

Little notebooks carry stories.

And here’s to the words within them!

I am not from here. I moved to this area about six months ago. Before here, I spent nine years living in the MidAtlantic, growing accustomed to the tidy, evenly distributed seasons, each one claiming its own three-month quota. And before the MidAtlantic, I spent twenty- five years migrating between the Midwest and Florida.

I’ve known a variety of weather as well as some climate extremes. I’ve driven in hurricane weather, white-knuckled and praying, as water whipped up from the river below threatened to wash out the bridge beneath me. I’ve huddled in a basement listening to a tornado whine as it jumped over our house taking the neighbor’s barn roof with it. In 2012, the windows of my seventh floor apartment rattled violently when a derecho thunderstorm flew through D.C. at 85 miles per hour. I had seen all kinds of spidery lightning in Tampa, but I’d never seen bands of vertical lightning. The elements put on quite the show that night.

I’ve witnessed the spectacles, so I’ve learned to respect Mother Nature, especially on her inclement days. Now I don’t drive unless the roads are dry and skies are clear. I prefer regions that cancel everything, when just an inch of snow falls, to places that shovel and salt their way into another must-be-productive day. I remind friends that we are animals, spouting proclamations and rhetorical questions like: “We don’t see the other creatures out battling storms, do we? No. They head to their caves and nests until the whole mess is over.” My friends laugh, pat my head, and remind me of things like technological advancements and evolution.

Maybe they’re right. Maybe we are advanced. Or maybe all the heightened weather talk has desensitized us, so we are not fazed by icy highways or foggy back roads. Lately, we seem to hyperbolize and even glamorize the weather. When I was young, I don’t think our snowstorms were alphabetically named, and I don’t recall any kind of weather being referred to as an “event” of apocalyptic status. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe I have weather amnesia. I don’t remember.

I’ve known dramatic weather, but I prefer to recognize other aspects of our atmosphere, which despite their consistency, seem to surprise and annoy us. These predictable shifts are significant in terms of how much we talk about them and how they can physically affect us. I am referring to moisture in the air. It happens every summer in many parts of the country, and it is Florida almost all year.

Being Midwest born, I am supposed to crave seasonal changes, be tolerant of gray skies, feel irritated in temperatures above 75 degrees, and especially hate humidity. None of these are true for me, and I can place the moment when I knew that a subtropical climate was my favorite.

It was early September 1983. I had just stepped out the door of our new home in Florida to go to school, and I felt it. Gone was the crisp, cool Wisconsin morning. Here was muggy, a muggy so muggy I had to breathe differently. I knew I was supposed to hate it, and I’m sure I complained to my parents like a typical, uprooted teenager that it ‘just didn’t feel like fall,’ but there was something else, and I haven’t shared this with anyone until now… I was excited.

The mugginess felt mysterious, thrilling, primordial. It was time travel. I felt like Holly Marshall from “Land of the Lost.” I was ready to meet some Sleestaks. I did miss my Wisconsin woods. Thanks to our generous neighbors, my brothers and I had hundreds of acres to run around in, so yes, I was MidWest homesick, but my parents were smart. They knew the best way to get us to appreciate our new home was to take us into the swamps for a paddleboat ride. I didn’t see Sleestaks on that excursion, but I saw my first alligators in the Hillsborough River, and this confirmed it. Florida was outside of time. Everything about the swamps was enchanting, green, alive, and growing. Even in the shade it was humid, and I loved it. I loved how it felt to swim through the air, how loose it made my joints, and how easy it was to sweat.

Humidity isn’t usually listed as a top favorite weather condition. Unlike me, most people hate to sweat unless they are trying to do so. Humidity may cause personal discomfort, but it is necessary for the overall good of the planet. Humidity, or water vapor, “is a key agent in both weather and climate, and it is an important atmospheric greenhouse gas. Without water vapour we would be 31 °C colder on Earth” (npl.co.uk). We need humidity for balance. “Due to its properties, water, as humidity in the air, stabilizes our climate and prevents large extremes of temperature” (aweimagazine.com). We need it. It’s important.

Still, when it’s humid, people complain. People also complain when it’s rained too much, snowed too often, or been too cold or too hot for too long. We are all a bit like Goldilocks. We want to have that third, perfect bowl of porridge, all the time, but there is no such thing as perfect soup or perfect weather. Perhaps complaining gives us a sense of camaraderie. Not being able to control the weather may make us feel helpless, but complaining about it puts us on a more even playing field.

Humidity is a leveler. It forces everyone to move slower. It makes us feel lazy, like doing nothing but allowing the air to sway us into a nap. Being unproductive is not valued in our culture, and people who must move slower are regarded with pity. I should know. I am 48, and I walk with a cane due to arthritis. Part of my every day experience is reassuring people that I am indeed ok. I often feel tempted to mirror their expressions, to make them see how worrisome they look, as they scurry, phone to their ears, hands cupping some beverage, walking as fast as they can to their destinations.

This summer, here in my newest place, there have been some humid days. I relish them. I am also looking forward to fall, because I know the trees will dazzle me. But come November-ish, I know I will feel the coming of cold and gray, and I will book my ticket to the wet green landscape, the swampy clime that soothes me.

Stillness.

A beautiful word by itself on a page.

A way to evoke and sharpen your senses.

I’ve been spending time in stillness lately, and it’s been a good summer…

In my backyard, I’ve observed a wood chuck/ground hog/whistle pig/ land beaver. Apparently, these are all the same animal, just with differing, regional names. I had never heard the terms ‘whistle pig’ or ‘land beaver’ before, but I’d love to travel to wherever they use these words.

“Yeah. Got a whistle pig in my back yard.”

“That land beaver’s been eating all my clover.”

Heh heh.

Our fellow pops from his hole in the hollow log, scuttles over the rock wall, and belly flops into the neighbor’s vegetable garden. He surveys the landscape for humans and then proceeds to eat the eggplants. Our neighbor has put up a fence to try and keep him out, but I suspect Chucky Whistle will find an underground route and resurface.

I’m still. Waiting.

In a recent conversation with my Dad, I shared that I’ve been watching fireflies in our backyard. He said, “You remember how you used to catch them?”

I winced, hoping that I wasn’t too cruel as a kid.

“Oh no,” my Dad reassured, “you always let them go. They were just your temporary flashlights.”

Temporary flashlights. Nice.

My Dad went on to say, “Remember how it was whenever we went out? Sitting still was an unspoken mandate. Lying down in the grass and waiting for the stars to come out. And if you held out your arm and stayed quiet, the lightning bugs would land on you.”

Lightning bugs.

In Tampa, where my Dad lives, thunder storms are common and the lightning is fantastic! There’s something poetic and powerful about imagining a little kid with lightning bugs on her arm, so many together that they’d make their own storm.

I sit on the steps and wait for them to come out. One by one they do. Far away. Close. Far away. Closer.

Unspoken mandate. Be still.

My neighbor has gorgeous lavender plants, and thankfully, wild bees are pollinating them.

I love watching bees wiggle and get dotted with all that pollen. Once they are ‘full,’ they fly in the direction of the woods behind our house. I hope there’s a hive out there. I hope they stay happy and healthy.

One blossom to the next. And the next. And then off into the woods.

Sit still and watch. Woodchucks, lightning bugs, bees.

Sweet summer time.

One night, long, long ago some college dorm mates celebrated a blender. This was no ordinary blender. A father had rummaged for it at a flea market, bartered for it, got it cheap, and given it to the mates as a party gift. This blender had made a long journey. It had a story, so to honor it, the kids made margaritas.

That tequila-inspired night, they schemed about making skirts from the ugly plaid curtains in their rooms. Yes, they were thinking of themselves as Marias from “The Sound of Music,” because, brilliantly, their dorm was named after the Greek letter, Mu, as in Mu-sic. How funny they were. How well they were spending their brains in college.

The witty did not end there. No, there was more. As they sipped their spiked, sugary lime juice, one of them said, “ I wish this could be a popsicle. Hey, we should make margarita popsicles!”
A fellow dormie ribbed, reminding her, “Ah, alcohol doesn’t freeze, but we could make margarita slushies.”

So the fearless students made their happy big gulps, stole the curtains for a future performance, and all was well.

Many more sober years later, the inquisitive popsicle lover, while not inventing a formula for freezing alcohol, did succeed in discovering some recipes for refreshing frozen treats. Here are some of her discoveries:

Pina Coladas (Sans the Buzz) Popsicles

1 8oz can of organic coconut milk
organic pineapple juice (equal parts to the coconut or to taste)

Blend and pour into molds.

Cherry Almond Popsicles (tweaked from a Real Simple recipe)

1 cup frozen organic cherries
1 cup organic vanilla almond milk
splash of cherry juice

Blend and pour into molds.

Horchata Popsicles (tweaked from a Real Simple recipe)

1 1/2 cups organic vanilla rice milk
5 T organic half -n-half
organic sugar (to taste)
1/8 t cinnamon

Blend and pour into molds.

Happy summer and enjoy!