COLONY — Jane Ward’s mixed berry pie most likely was snatched up quickly at today’s Kincaid Fair. It took first place at both the Le Roy fair and at Colony Day’s competitions in the last few weeks.
For today’s entry Ward didn’t take any chances and de-seeded the blackberries before they were mixed in with strawberries and blueberries.
“Most people are against blackberries because of the seeds,” Ward said. A food mill helped process the berries.
It’s a first for Ward, who isn’t afraid to stray from recipes.
“I start out using them, but frequently switch up ingredients and amounts,” she said.
At last year’s Kincaid Fair the mixed berry pie won Ward a first place. In 2011, she won first with a gooseberry and green tomatoe pie.
Ward, 72, learned to cook at her mother’s knee on their farm in rural Le Roy. “I can’t ever remember not cooking,” she said.
Coupled with a precocious personality, the aptitude didn’t exactly earn her into the good graces of her high school home economics teacher.
“I told her egg whites whipped up by hand would be thicker than using a mixer,” she said. “She didn’t appreciate that tip, even though my angel food cake turned out better than the others.”
“I don’t think it made her change her ways, but she knew I was right.”
Ward grows much of what she eats, including eggs which come from a flock of chickens in her side yard.
Although her garden has seen better days because of the recent spate of hot weather, it’s yielded an abundance of cucumbers, tomatoes, beans, watermelons, peppers, zucchini, potatoes, lettuce, radishes, strawberries, and okra. Stored away in her pantry are jars of relish, chili sauce, sauerkraut, dilled green beans and cinnamon cucumber sticks.
Birdhouse gourds grow from sprawling vines. “It’ll take another year before I can do anything with them,” she said. “They need to dry out.”
Crafts come naturally to Ward who enjoys her retirement cooking, gardening, quilting and sewing. She also enjoys helping others.
Several times a week Ward helps Wilma and Weldon Goodell who both have suffered strokes in recent years.
“It’s not much,” Ward says of her assistance, which includes fetching their mail on a daily basis, taking Weldon to coffee every Monday and Friday, and driving to Iola to do their grocery shopping and fetch their prescriptions.
Weldon also enjoys riding around town with Ward on her golf cart — the transportion of choice for many residents.
“I’d say Colony has about 25-30 golf carts,” she said, with nary a golf course in sight. “It’s a great way to get around. I recharge mine about once a week,” she said of its battery.
Golf carts are allowed on Colony streets; not so in Iola.
Ward has earned her leisurely lifestyle.
Her professional life centered on manual labor, including stints at the Country Critters puppet factory in Burlington for five years, Wolf Creek power plant for two years, and at Parmely Poultry Farms in Le Roy for 22 years.
She and Jim Ward married young and had two children, Earlene, now 52, and Coydel, 50. They have nine grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.
Jim farmed, worked at a grain elevator and filling stations.
Around 2003, they both retired to a lake house near Blue Mound. When Jim fell ill they moved to Colony, Jim’s hometown. Jim passed away from heart disease shortly thereafter. They had been married 46 years.
Ward remained in Colony where she eventually met Robert Varvel. He passed away in 2009 from bone cancer.
Ward is involved with the Jolly Dozen club and attends United Methodist Church.
WARD ENJOYS the freedom of retirement. She gets great joy from simply sitting on her patio watching the birds.
A diagnosis of Type 2 diabetes in 2005 has slightly changed her lifestlyle. For one thing, she can’t eat the wonderful cakes, pies and cookies she makes for special occasions.
She says it wasn’t so hard to change her diet. “I like sweets, but I can do without them,” she said. “The hardest part is avoiding carbohydrates in general.”
Both her mother and brother, Robert Nauertz, had diabetes. Her mother went blind from the disease.
By growing her own food, keeping active with friends and hobbies, and helping those in need, Ward has a healthy lifestyle.
“So far, so good,” she said with a smile, showing happiness is no accident.
