Hello Blog Friends!
It has been a full week in the little world of Day Camps.
The best news came on Monday morning when we were advised that we would be receiving the Grant for which we applied. This gives us a bit of breathing room as we are still trying so hard to widen our constituency and encourage more communities to host the CTM Day Camp programs.
Late last week we also received a third application from a host community. Although this is also good news, I had hoped that, after innumerable invitations sent to prospective churches, we would be seeing a bit more activity. Last year we ended up with 7 communities and are hoping for 10-12 this year and it is still quite early in the season, so I do have hope but apart from “re-reminding” people, I am beginning to run out of new places to contact 😊.
Tuesday I was able to make a start on assembling the quarterly Networks newsletter. As mentioned in my last post, some of the contributors did not meet the March 1st deadline, but things have improved and as of Wednesday afternoon, most of the content had been submitted.
That morning I had a productive online meeting with Michelle, the speaker for our upcoming Mini Retreat. She has been drafting out a schedule and I would like to circulate an abridged version to everyone who has registered since people do seem to appreciate seeing how the event will unfold. We will probably need another meeting to finalise things but, meanwhile, Michelle has agreed to write a short “blurb” that I can include when sending out further invitations 😊.
Of course Thursday largely involved follow-up tasks, precipitated by the previous evening’s meeting. It was so good to talk with the committee although it was a slightly discombobulated session as one person had no WiFi and was only able to join briefly (using her precious data), two others were delayed at work (one of whom never made it), the person leading the opening reflection forgot to prepare anything and another was late joining after needing extra time to put their toddler to bed! However, once (nearly!) all of us were present we had some good discussions and so I was able to send off a stack of emails on various topics and am hoping for some responses early in the coming week.
Today and tomorrow mark the third and final sessions of the Anti-Bias training course, mentioned a couple of weeks ago. So, once again, the weekly Bake had to take place yesterday afternoon as this morning’s session was from 10am-1230pm. Sigh. Oh well, after tomorrow the whole thing will be completed and can be put behind me freeing up a bit of space to focus on preparations for the great festival of Easter. I have already decided which baked goods to make for several special families but I’m still not exactly sure how to craft the containers needed to hold them along with the Pysanky. I have a vague plan of using the thick pages of some old calendars to make shallow “baskets” but will have to do some experimenting in the next week or so, watch for some photos, if the concept proves successful. Although, this weekend, it is cold and slushy outside I have spotted the first snowdrops in my garden, so spring and Easter are now truly on the horizon 😊.
Evenings (except for Wednesday 😊) some more progress has been made on the second of my Swedish socks although, with the completion of one baby jumper I am anxious to start this one for another of the spring babies for whom I want to make gifts. And next week I am also determined to finally sew the tunic from the gorgeous linen gifted to me at Christmas by a kind friend. I have had the pattern cut our for several weeks and Jessica brought the thread when she last visited but I just have not been able to find a block of time to make the tunic, photos in my next post 😊.
Since it is already quite late in the day, we had better wrap things up with our recipe. Last Sunday evening, when our local farmer delivered the offal for Thomason he also dropped off a dozen duck eggs, kindly gifted to me by my dear friend a faithful Pod member, Sue. Yotem Ottolenghi has several great recipes calling for duck eggs. Here is my take on one of them.
Smokey Duck Eggs on Sourdough Toast
- 4 duck eggs
- 1 tsp. chipotle powder
- 4 chopped tomatoes (preferably plum)
- 3 green onions, sliced
- 2 Tbsps. olive oil
- 1 large clove garlic, minced
- 1/3 cup chopped fresh cilantro
- ½ cup thick Greek yoghurt
- Black pepper
- 4 thick slices sourdough bread, toasted & buttered
Heat the olive oil and sauté the onion, garlic and chipotle until fragrant. Add the chopped tomatoes and cook over low heat until the mixture has thickened. Crack the duck eggs into a bowl and whisk lightly with a fork. Pour into the pan with the tomato mixture and continue gently scrambling with the fork just until the eggs begin to set. Place the toast slices on 2 serving dishes and divide the egg mixture between them. Sprinkle each, generously, with cilantro and pepper then top with a large spoonful of yoghurt. Serve immediately. Serves 2