FruitFromWashington.com Web Letter Archives**
[This Month's Web Letter]

FRUITFROMWASHINGTON.COM WEB-LETTER
January 2003
Need to Give Business Gifts?
We Specialize in Customized Corporate Gift Packages!

The Month of January Best Buy Special Variety is the Gala Apple - During January the Fruit From Washington.com 15-count gift box of Gala apples is special priced at $17.95 (+ shipping).

Continued Special priced in January is a combination fruit gift box which includes 5 Red d'Anjou Pears and 10 Gala Apples for $17.95 (+ shipping). These Red d'Anjou dessert pears are a taste treat and the Galas are sweet flavored and crisp—excellent snacks for munching any time!

Fruit From Washington January Fruit Subscription Variety is a 20-count gift box of Jonagold Apples. Those who have signed up for the monthly Apple Subscription of our 15-count gift box of "strictly apples" will also receive Jonagold Apples in January! For your subscription order, look for delivery mid-month.

Gift Boxes of premium quality Fruit From Washington Apples and Pears—always a favorite to give or receive! For all phone orders, call toll-free 1-877-AT-FRUIT.

From the FruitFromWashington Mail Bag - "Thank you for providing a pleasant ordering experience and a perfect gift for my parents. I appreciate it and will order from you again in the future!" S.M. - 12/19/02

See other customers' comments about the products and service from FruitFromWashington.com! Find out how you can start your own monthly subscription such as our Apple of the Month, in a 15-count gift box, 6-month subscription order or Monthly 20-count Gift Boxes of Apples and Pears for yourself or for gifts that will be enjoyed throughout the year (also available in 6-month and 3-month fruit of the month subscriptions).

Order rustic outdoor furniture made in Ellensburg, Washington, from our online Classic Garden Catalog* section of our on-line catalog for beautiful retro-styled casual furniture manufactured in Ellensburg, Washington! FFW Manufacturing (formerly DPK Industries) Redwood Outdoor and Garden Furniture is made in Ellensburg, Washington. We offer solidly constructed and beautiful retro-styled Picnic Tables, Garden Cart, and Potting Table that will add a natural elegance to your home. *Free shipping on furniture, UPS Ground to addresses in 48 contiguous states.

It's always easy to buy garden furniture, or gift boxes of Washington grown apples and pears, or gourmet salsas and pepper jellies (See Quinn's Salsas & Pepper Jellies --GOURMET FOODS CATALOG!) from FruitFromWashington.com!

Happy New Year from all of us at Fruit From Washington, Eberhart Orchards and FFW Manufacturing. Here are a few of our resolutions and other thoughts prompted by the New Year—

From Grandpa Dee: Never ask the elderly about their resolutions. As Grandma Barbara said, "Now that I'm 75, I don't make resolutions." As for me, my only resolution which I managed (barely) to keep, was "Stay alive in '45." Not wishing to tempt fate further, I no longer make such resolutions.

We have a WWII army friend who sent us the following New Year message, which although not in the form of a resolution expresses a blueprint for the future, which, of course, is the purpose of resolutions.

For people over eighty diets are OUT
It's only for other people who think they are stout!
For me, life is much too short.
I'm going to eat everything my wife just bought
I don't care where it layers on my frame,
It'll be all MY fault and I'll take all the blame

Live it up folks...those eighty and over.....
Ummm Oh, that ice cream is delicious!!!!!
I just finished eight heaping dishes!!!!
I feel like a lad again lying in the clover!!!
Move over Rover.........
Happy New Year from "Doc" and Peg

From Cory: Optimistically we start the New Year with a clean slate. We make our resolutions: better health habits regarding diet and exercise; more travel in 2003, including trips near and far to visit family and see landmark places in this great country and around the globe; we swear to do more, not less, to become in (presumably) Groucho Marx's vernacular, "a care more" person, not "a careless one"; we promise to repress the bitterness (though not too much) and savor the sweet.

From Bruce: Fresh honey and fresh money in 2003!

From Ben: To study more, play computer games less, and get more sleep.

From Katie: If you have a dream, follow it, if you don't have a dream, find one.

From Regan: Happy New Year 2003. Best wishes to you in the new year. May your resolutions be achieved with ease. For my resolution, I resolve to act as if I am more than a consumer, but a citizen of a democracy. If you have the same inkling here are two sites that could help. Peace. Click for link to Independent Media Center, and Center for Digital Democracy.

"I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set I go into the other room and read a book." - Groucho Marx

THOUGHTS ON FAMILY HISTORIES
The past disappears so quickly, sucked into the interminable quicksand of time. The present is full of a barrage of seemingly random noise, like a TV with bad reception that obfuscates the past. Or without the "noise" we all may see the same past, like a "Ken Burns" documentary--so valuable in bringing a time long past to us--letting our imaginations run with the aural and visual input collected by meticulous researchers and brought to our living rooms. But the personal connection may be missing.

Each of us has the opportunity (and possibly even the responsibility) to record our own family histories -- leisure time, video cameras, telephones and e-mail can help. It is an opportunity to ask our parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles about their lives--where they lived, what they did for fun, their transportation, work, food, travel, clothes! You see nobody else's history is quite like your own family's.

We have a small collection of photos on the FruitFromWashington web site that documents the time when we were building our orchards, now several decades ago. I'm researching some family history in the 1930's -- have been talking to my dad about his family's life during that period and Ben recorded a conversation about those times with his Grandpa during Thanksgiving break. I've found the Library of Congress' American Memory - Historical Collections for the National Digital Library to be helpful in providing images of life during that the Great Depression. I've also found the Prelinger Moving Picture Archives to be a fascinating source of film that dates back to the early part of the 20th century. (It might be a hassle to get the right 'players' on your computer to view these films but the effort is definitely worth it.)

Histories being developed as 'community' efforts may build on histories of many families and individuals. Two fascinating examples are: Indivisible - Stories of American Community and the Veterans History Project. KE, 1/4/03

"Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside a dog, it's too dark to read." - Groucho Marx

Looking for art projects to do with kids? See the directions for painting Winter Trees that Sophia compiled recently. She states, "This project can be done using a number of different techniques to create scenes of bare-branched trees (and some of those ever-present fir trees) in a winter landscape. The way I see it, there are several goals. Having fun is right up there! Keeping the kids busy (in a creative and useful way) is a close second. Not spending too much money on kits and tools is definitely on my list! Plus, the cool thing about this project is that there is no dilemma about what to do with the final product. Throw away the experiments that didn't work and trim the ones that did. You (or the kids) can glue the nice looking paintings to card stock for holiday well-wishing and thank-you notes. Or mat them and frame them for the wall. Read the steps and hints, then take a look at the examples." For directions, illustrations, and a look at some more finished paintings, see our Kids' Activities Page!

"Time flies like an arrow, but fruit flies like a banana." - Groucho Marx

Now and then, at Fruit From Washington.com, we receive correspondence with one who has found our website and discovered that something there conjures up an image or memory which strikes an emotional chord. Last month we received such a message from one whose own personal memories of Ellensburg and Kittitas County go back half a century or more. With her permission, printed here is that correspondence.

Dear Katie and All Y'All* --

I want to share with you a note from my dad, inspired by a postcard I sent him from your iCard pages -- specifically, from the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul (top row, 2d from left), chosen for all the times I remember sitting in the backseat of our Ford, driving from Ellensburg to Yakima (along the "old" highway, the most beautiful drive in the world!) and hearing Dad hold forth about the beauty of the river, where was the spot he and his buddies had last put in for a little duck-hunting from the rubber raft, how Joe the black Lab shook half the Yakima River all over them when he clambered back into the raft after retrieving the ducks, what fun it would be to be in that train, which do you suppose is the better view -- up here looking down at the train? or down there looking out at the river? Lots of story-telling went on during those drives up and down the river, half a century ago.

And, thanks to your gift of postcards, here is a gift from him -- a story I hadn't ever heard. At 85, he's busily doing the family genealogy and trying to write a memoir; I find that if I ask a question just the right way (or send an innocent postcard!), he produces family literature so spontaneous and touching, IT will become the history while his formally structured memoir will be background.

I love your apples enormously, but I treasure your library/gallery (it is so much more than mere "website"). I can always spend wicked amounts of time wandering through its rooms. I was a little girl not quite five when we moved to Ellensburg, and we lived there only six years, but my heart is there forever in that valley surrounded by those soft sage hills. So I am deeply grateful that this pied a' terre, as it were, is hosted by the incredibly warm and talented and generous family that you all are. Thank you, and with great respect,
- M.T.L., Arlington, Virginia, 12/06/02

P.S. And I recommend Love Among The Ruins and In the Bleak Midwinter by Robert Clark; The Human Stain by Philip Roth; and (I'm sure you've already got this one) Breaking Clean by Judy Blunt.

* On the Eastern Shore of Maryland, near here, one addresses an individual or a few people as "Y'all" -- it takes "All Y'all" to include everyone.

Subject: THANKS Date: Fri, 6 Dec 2002

HEY MARCIA,
A big thank you for the Thanksgiving card. I failed to download it the first time around. Must have left out a letter or number. The train is coming out of the tunnel just north of Yakima & heading up the track next to the river going north. Your grandfather Towne worked on that RR track when he was a young squirt in Yakima. They were replacing some of the wooden foundations of the bridges along the track with concrete. They had to carry water up from the river to mix the concrete. Mixing was done by hand on a platform of planks. One day I saw what I thought was a piece of petrified wood that Dad was using as a sharpening stone. "Yes, that is petrified wood. It came from one of the bridges along the Yakima River." Holy cow! How I wish now that I had saved that piece. Also I wish I had written down the stories he told me when I was young. But, what does youth care? Too busy worrying about how I look, etc. So thanks for the picture. I wouldn't have remembered the story of the wood if you hadn't sent the picture. I have printed it to keep a while. Love & Hugs Dad

"If you stew apples like cranberries, they taste more like prunes than rhubarb does." - Groucho Marx

Household Hints - Still relevant today, although written decades ago, are Success Secrets for serving salads excerpted from The Art of Cooking and Serving, by Sarah Field Splint, Editor Food Department , McCall's Magazine, Published by the Procter & Gamble Co., Cincinnati, 1927 (p. 138-139). See more from the culinary queen of the 1920's, Sarah Field Splint.

1. Include at least one salad in your menus every day.
2. Keep a supply of fresh, carefully washed salad greens in a clean cheesecloth bag in your ice box.
3. Do not discard the outer leaves of a head of lettuce or Romaine. Shred them and use for the foundation of another salad.
4. Chill thoroughly all ingredients used for salads, such as meat, fish, vegetables and fruit.
5. Apples, bananas and pears turn dark after slicing, so prepare them at the last minute. Or cover them with French dressing or lemon juice to prevent them from discoloring.
6. Don't think you have to make up a fresh supply of salad dressing for every meal at which a salad is served. Any of the dressings...except those to which whipped cream is added, will keep for several days, if kept in a covered jar in the ice box.
7. Don't put the dressing on salad until immediately before serving. It wilts the greens.
8. Be particular about the appearance of your salad. Remember many of us "eat with our eyes."
9. Vary your salad course frequently by using crisp shredded cabbage instead of lettuce for the foundation.
10. Don't always use the same dressing on the same salad! Dress up an old salad with one of the new dressings....
11. Don't think salads have to be elaborate to be good. Any of the following are easy to prepare and delicious served with an appropriate dressing: hearts of lettuce, watercress, chicory, Romaine, shredded lettuce and endive, sliced pineapple and cream cheese balls, sliced cucumber and water cress, stuffed celery and hearts of romaine, shredded cabbage and peanut, grapefruit and orange.

Mountain and Valley View Lot in beautiful Kittitas County, Washington —

Webmasters - We hope you'll consider linking to our site. Choose from our link graphics or text or create a text link to a FruitFromWashington.com page that's pertinent to your site.

** Editor's Note: This Web-Letter is in the FruitFromWashington.com Archives. Availability of products may have changed since publication.

FruitFromWashington.com Web Letter Archives Index

Shop Online for Fresh, Mountain Grown Apples and Pears Shipped to Your Home or Business 

D.R. Eberhart & Associates, Inc. P.O. Box 877, Ellensburg, WA 98926
You May Fax Your Apple Order Form To: 1-509-968-4340

March 29, 2005

Copyright © 1999-2005 D. .R.. Eberhart & Associates, Inc. All Rights Reserved