Long Live The Mess!

Beauty is a messy business, isn't it?! Fresh bouquets from gardens and fields spill petals and bugs.Food prep spills, splashes and dropsbefore the delight of dining!(hopefully LOTS of food prep happening today for thanksgiving dinner tomorrow...In Canda we celebrate thanks-living in October)And wow! the mess that we can make while enjoying dinner!(esp. when children are present. ahem.We love blaming messes on children, don't we? 😅💖)And in the daily course of chores and joys,From indoor to outdoor we go,and even though we kick off shoes on the mat inside the doorwe still somehow trail lots of outdoor in.In the summer road dust, (Because our windows are bigand we live in farming country with lots of tractor traffic!) in the winter, furnace dustand wood stove ashes, but we are cozy!Isn't it great?!!The whole mess of a full life aka happiness!coffee spills and all! Before we can enjoy this... This.... Before we can enjoy this... (recipe below) This...Midst lots of eager, curious, happy helpers/tasters!And one MIGHTY mess!! Oh! isn’t beauty worth its messOr joy its price of griefIs not the bloom of happinessSo worth the tattered leaf?The petal that falls from the stemThe crumbs from bit o’ cakeAre they not worth the diademOf stars strewn in their wakeLike teardrop, bittersweet, unfurledUpon the cheek, soft kissedBefore the door shuts on a worldOf mayhem turned to mist © Janet Martin Veg Soup recipe...I tweaked this recipe to my likingomitting corn and adding black beans.Also besides precooking the black beansI mixed everything raw and water bath canned it,steaming each canner full for 3 hours(in case you would like to try it!) From the old Mennonite Community Cookbook