My Dash: Adventures with RR in the swamp, the garden, and the blanket closet

RW and I became friends around age 11. I remember the first day she came to primary and the teacher asked her to sit by me.  She was wearing a pretty yellow dress. She, EE, and I had all kinds of adventures together.  We took a quilting class together one summer at the local fabric store. We loved our American Girl dolls and sewed clothes and quilts for them.  I loved being at RW's house. Her mom was always so happy and warm. Her dad worked on a fruit farm and so they had yummy fruit treats to eat a lot. RW taught me to make the now famous "Quick Rolls" recipe that I have been making ever since. RW has two older brothers - the eldest A, hardly ever talked, but was impressive with his pastry making and canoe building skills. The next eldest C, I thought was the sweetest big brother ever, super down-to-earth, always a good listener. RW's family played various instruments and I think she most of all. It's not surprising that her husband is a musician and a Phd.
We were always looking for a new adventure. One day we decided to go exploring in the swamp a ways behind her house.  We found an old semi rotted looking canoe and tried to ride it around in the chest deep muddy water. Of course, it started sinking and we had to climb out into the water and push it back to shore. Our shoes were never the same again after sinking in the muddy bottom. It was a stellar day.  Another time, it was New Year's Eve and we stayed up watching a movie and then just after midnight dared each other to put bathing suits on and dive into the huge snow drifts that we had had fun playing in earlier that day. It was freezing and we rushed back inside to get warm! Another perfect adventure.
We were both big readers and having read a lot of fantasy books we decided to write a fantasy story book of our own. I don't remember much of it except that we each wrote parts of it and never finished it.  She STILL has it!! and she promised to mail me a copy one of these days. She said her kids love it and are begging her to finish it.
I was with her family when they looked at the house that they would eventually buy and move 3 hours away to live in. It is an awesome old farmhouse with a back stairway (probably for a servant) going down to the big kitchen.  It has a screened in porch with wide window sills on which they would eventually display a beautiful collection of birds' nests, wasps nests, and other natural wonders they found while exploring.  I loved when my mom brought me up there to stay for weeks in the summer. There was a big blanket/linen closet that we tried to fit a bunch of us into one night. It had heating vents that we could sit on when we came in from playing in the snow and a huge old great room, probably a ballroom way back when it was built. I am sure that much of my love for old farmhouses comes from how happy I was there with the W family.

They also had a huge garden.  I remember being assigned to go out and squish bugs on the potato plants with RW one morning. We each took two palm sized rocks, pulled the potato beetles carefully in between and smashed them. I remember enjoying it.  I also weeded with her. They had rhubarb, which we made into sauce, but also tried to eat raw dipping the ends in a little sugar. So tart! We picked blackberries and RW tried to show me how to make blackberry jam. We boiled and stirred for what seemed like forever. She told me that blackberries thicken by themselves with just sugar. We did not know exactly how much sugar it was supposed to be though. We kept adding more and more sugar until it finally thickened to an unspreadable mass. We were sad about that, but those were such happy times!