Wasp Attack!

   After yet another sleepless night, my morning was spent cutting out most of the summer garden.  The rains have done it no favors as the plants are huge but not bearing fruit.  Tomato plants are not supposed to be ten feet tall!  All was going well with wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow full of debris being hauled to the compost.  Finally, all that was left was to do a bit of weeding.  Mind you, I had been twisting and turning every plant in the garden up until this time.  The weeding should have been a breeze.  Right.

  Five minutes into weeding, I grabbed a handful of errant chives and felt the telltale zap of a wasp sting.  Thinking I had inadvertently grabbed a ground wasp, I actually apologized "I am sorry little lady!  I did not mean to grab you."  But it was not a solitary ground wasp.  Time and time again, I was zapped!  Oh, my.  Stepping back, I tried to find the nest.  There had to be either a yellow jacket nest (in ground) or a paper wasp nest somewhere nearby.

  Five stings later and I found the home of my attackers!  In a non-used birdfeeder, a red wasp nest was highly concealed.  Around it were dozens of wasps just waiting to protect their nest.  Ok, so now that I knew where it was, it was time to go dunk that welt covered hand in some vinegar.  About a half hour later, the wasps were all dead thanks to some well aimed bug spray.  The garden is a safe place once again and I am happy to say that the vinegar worked quite well at soothing the stings and relieving the swelling.  

It Takes Time

  Time is a great healer.  Time is a great teacher.  Time is a great mediator. Time is just about all we need and, yet for some reason, time is so fleeting.  At least in my case, I never have enough of it to do what I want. Perhaps I am lazy and dillydally about all day but I can never accomplish all I had grand ideas to do.  Once I retire for the evening, I plan what needs to be done the next day.  It seems so simple.  Surely, I can reach my goals and then have time for crafting.  It never happens that way. Son says I set unrealistic goals.  He claims that I do not allow myself to slow down and accept what is possible.  Maybe?

  Time, however, does bring about some really good things.  Darling Daughter gave me a bottle of her homemade pear vinegar.  There are a number of pear trees in her yard and as she canned the fruit, it kept nagging at her that she was wasting parts of the pears.  The peels and cores had to be good for something.  She opted to make wine. Letting the pears ferment took time...lots of time. Weeks and weeks passed without anything "good" appearing to happen but deep down in that jar things were developing...growing into something marvelous.  During the process, the pear cores and peels started to change from scraps to something wonderful. A few missteps along the way caused a snaffu. Instead of wine, her pears turned to vinegar but it was an amazing vinegar!  She was happy with the results even though things did not turn out quite as expected.  Like the vinegar, occasionally, it just takes time for us to realize our full potential.  It takes time to grow, to develop and to even learn to accept what we can or cannot achieve. 

  Not only did time bring the vinegar to its full term, it showed me something else.  Darling Daughter has inherited a timeworn trait that has been passed down generation to generation.  It has been drilled into our heads that we should not waste...anything.  "Waste not, want not" reverberated throughout my childhood and then later I repeated it to my kids.  I was happy to see that my daughter has learned that lesson well.  

   

My, oh my!

  I am usually skeptical of  folks who share ideas that claim to be the "best ever".  The idea is usually toted as being "new" or "improved".   Well, sorry.  There are not a lot of "new" ideas out there.  They are merely refurbished at the best.  Still, when a claim is relatively cost free and uses things that I have here on the Bayou, I will give it a whirl. Sometimes things pan out ok but others...well, we won't go there.  The frustration that I had been duped once again by some time-saving bit of brilliance should deter me from "trying just one more".

  I am tying up loose ends for the big opening night of the Fourth Annual Clue Hunt on the Bayou in which I use all sorts of strange items as props or decorations.  Old tools, scraps of wrought iron scrollwork, doorknobs (yes, doorknobs), clocks, and any other odd piece can usually be worked into some bit of interest.  I have folks bring stuff to the Little Bayou House just for this purpose (or just to get it off their hands, not sure which.).  But, today, I found a box of old hinges, escutcheon plates, drawer pulls and other metal pieces that I had saved from way back right after Hurricane Katrina.  In the debris mountain that surrounded the house, were all sorts of once beautiful furniture pieces. While most of the wood parts were beyond salvage, I spent the extra time removing all of the metal pieces.  These were all washed then soaked in oil for a bit and set aside with grand ideas of using them some day.  Well, today was that some day.  

  As I peered into the box, I realized that I probably should have done a bit more to preserve the metal.   Duh...metal has a way of rusting or corroding after being exposed to saltwater.  Even for a clue hunt, these pieces seemed a bit too grungy.  That was when the idea that had been hidden way back into the dark recesses of my brain, pushed aside the cobwebs and came forth proclaiming "I can help!"  Alrighty, then.  I figured I might as well accept that offer.
  
  I had read once that soaking items such as this overnight in vinegar would remove the crud.  Since vinegar is something that I always keep on hand, I felt it was worth a try.  About a cup and a half of white vinegar was poured into a plastic bucket and a few of the pieces were placed to soak.  I did not wait for the recommended "overnight". When I checked (out of curiosity) after about an hour, the pieces were remarkably cleaner!  Wow!  This idea works!  I used an old toothbrush to gently remove any residue and washed under clean water.  What a difference!  And to think it is virtually cost free!  A few cents worth of vinegar did the trick!  I will give the pieces a nice rubbing of oil to help protect my handiwork.

  Now that I know this is a surefire method of cleaning metal, the rest of the box of junk will get a good soaking.  It sure made life easier and made me happy that I am a pack-rat of sorts.  Not only will the furniture embellishments be used during the clue hunts, they will also find refreshed use on the boxes that Son creates.  I am glad that I recalled this as the opening night of the clue hunt is October 1st!  

  So....there you have it!  Get busy cleaning those old rusty tools, corroded hinges and fine finds from boxes of junk!  A simple vinegar soak can work wonders!