a hammer in the kitchen at 6 a.m. and things going AWOL

Why would one need a hammer in the kitchen at six in the morning? Those small hours of the day should be spent with muted sounds : socks on the hardwood floor, the clink of the coffee pot meeting up with the smooth lip of a ceramic cup, a slow, fuzzy brain humming as it comes to terms with the day ahead.

There's no need for BANG BANG BANGING!

Or is there?

Now, nothing was broken in my kitchen this morning that needed fixing. I just had a craving. A craving for frozen strawberries in a banana, avocado, apple juice and strawberry smoothie; and the berries were all frozen together in the plastic bag.

Even more satisfying was the knowledge that these particular berries came from my parents garden last summer. The best way to eat a berry is either straight off the vine in July, or nibbled off the edge of a cold hammer in the middle of February. (Don't worry folks, this hammer is for kitchen purposes only . . . like shattering strawberries or even raspberries for that matter.)

Hey! I'm from Minnesota. We have a short growing season.

Next on the docket is the realization that the mittens my mother knit me from her own hand spun have definitely gone AWOL. I didn't lose them, I merely left them on my desk here at studio and they seem to have wandered off.

This is the second time that something like this has happened. My red Koolhaas cap wandered off this past November, I knit myself a new one. But the mittens my mother knit me will not be so easy to replicate.

Here are some images of some jars of her raspberry jam. Admittedly this doesn't take a hammer to apply, but it's also a wonderful treat in the middle of February.