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Monday, June 23, 2008

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

  • Currently Reading
    Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life, Library Edition
    By Barbara Kingsolver, Steven L. Hopp, Camille Kingsolver
    see related
    The weather this week is PERFECT! I was delighted to see that today the high is only in the upper 60s again....wahoo! This comes after the beginning of June being very hot and humid. I'm not much of a summer girl myself, I much prefer the more moderate temperatures of fall and spring. Yesterday Ivy and I took a walk along the wooded path bordering our neighborhood. I was kicking myself for not bringing my camera because we saw several cardinals and robins and I would have had good shots of them. We picked mulberries off a tree and enjoyed the perfect weather, not too warm, just the right touch of cool, light breeze, dappled sunshine.

    Ariana is at farm camp 3 hours each day this week. We also have t-ball 2 nights a week and church is tonight.....VBS is next week.....we never get this busy and it's kind of hectic, but I focus on the 3 glorious hours each day free of sibling squabbling. Plus there's just so many activites to do in the summer; it seems everything there is to do is in the summer and winter is void of very many activities for the kids.

    I am tired....and I feel overwhelmed with things to do.....we have a camping trip this weekend....Ariana's birthday is on Monday....her party is the 28th.....have some Holistic Moms stuff to fill out and submit....need to catch up on the cleaning I seem to be behind on.....Manuel is not coming home this weekend as usual but has to stay in Virginia....am having a hard time finding babysitters for stuff I want/need to go to to get away from it all for a little bit....like the garden party the women's ministry at church is doing this Saturday that I'm really excited about....I need to learn more about gardening....speaking of, my vegetable garden is getting huge....which makes me remember that I'm behind on weeding.....sigh. I need a mother's help.....and money to pay her.

Tuesday, June 03, 2008

  • My (Organic) Garden


    "You can bury a lot of troubles digging in the dirt." ~anonymous



    I am pleased with how my garden is coming along this year. It seemed like it took awhile to get going, probably because it took a little longer to warm up this year. But now we are underway and I am totally excited to take care of my new baby till havest time. :)

    I'm growing (with God's help!! I'm not a big green thumb) zucchini,



    cucumbers (to pickle for Ariana, who loves pickles and used to pronounce cucumber "pu-mumber),"



    broccoli,



    lettuce (just ordered a more heat-resistant summer variety (Batavian) and a cooler-weather variety for fall (don't remember off-hand what it was exactly),



    green beans,



    strawberries, peppers, watermelon (althought my parents just told me that cucumbers and watermelon tend to cross-pollinate and that the cucumbers turn out tasting kind of like watermelon...we'll see!), tomatoes...I think that covers it....I also have noticed some pumpkins growing out of what's left of the old compost pile from last fall's pumpkins rotting in there.

    "Always take a good look at what you're about to eat. It's not so important to know what it is, but it's critical to know what it was." ~Anonymous [And what was done to it or put in or on it I would add!]

    I also have a nice selection of herbs growing: lavender, dill, basil, cilantro, parsely, mint, green onion, rosemary, thyme.




    "When I was a boy in the countryside...people [gardened] for self-sufficiency, for it would not have occurred to them to do otherwise. People were self-reliant because they had to be; it was a way of life. They were doing what generations had done before them: simply carrying on a traditional way of life. Money was a rare commodity, far too valuable to be spent on things you could grow or make yourself...They would have laughed at a diet of store-bought foods." ~John Seymore, in The Self-Sufficient Gardener, 1979 as quoted in MaryJane's Ideabook, Cookbook, Lifebook by MaryJane Butters

    We have several varieties of birdy visitors each day: yellow and house finches, a woodpecker, a pair of cardinals, a blue jay who makes a funny laughing sound. They keep Snowflake thoroughly entertained.



    She definitely didn't like this guy showing up the other night:



    Here's my latest project (you inspired me to sew Lynda! Think I could sell these on Etsy?? ;) ) I got the idea from a book then went to Hobby Lobby and bought the floursack towels, iron-on patterns, and thread and went to work. At first I wasn't satisfied with my work, but I quickly got the hang of the stitch and I am happy with how they turned out! Well, they are not completely done..the "Sunday" towel needs the arm sewn and the flower middles (I need to buy some flesh-colored thread and I had to call my step-mom to find out how to make a French knot) and the "Gardening Day" one needs a bit more too (this pic was taken yesterday). I found this activity to be wonderfully relaxing and found myself picking it up every chance I got. I only bought 2 towels to start with, and now that I finished the second one tonight, I'm itching to go back and get more so I can start another one!


    I love sitting in my nice big comfy chair in the evenings with the window opening, listening to the birds sing their good-night songs as I sew.

    Now I also have my sights on what I'm going to do with all the delicious things that come from my garden. Here http://www.pickyourown.org is a great website, not only for finding out places in your area where you can pick your own produce, but also loads of info on canning and preserving...even ice cream making! I plan to make some yummy gelato and start some canning in the late summer/early fall. I have my sites on this canning set: http://www.canningpantry.com/ball-home-canning-basics-kit.html. I also have a dehydrator so I'll be experimenting more with that. Ahhh the older I get the more I want a farm.

    Mistress Mary, quite contrary,
    how does your garden grow?
    With silver bells and cockle shells
    and pretty maids all in a row.

    How does your garden grow?



Monday, June 02, 2008

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