Telltale Tuesday

 Today is a Monday sort of a Tuesday...lol.    I am doing odds and ends of things that need doing...laundry, dehydrating random tomatoes and okra, harvesting the edamame that would have been done days ago were it not for the rain. (Not complaining). lol  I got a little over 4 gallons of pods this time and finished off the bed. Now we can get it all turned over and composted and get ready to plant the garlic and onions for spring.  And I have ordered some parsnips from an online supplier, because I cannot find seed for them ANYWHERE.  And while I was at it, I ordered a Survival tin of heirloom, non-GMO seeds for storing. Just in case. It has a great variety of typical garden foods and was about 40 dollars, which is far less than I spent last year at Baker Creek. When those come, I will plant the parsnips. THEN...I will be done. Planting. For now.  lol

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

  The rains from Isaac have transformed this area like magick. The lawns are green and the grass is growing again...the garden shave been refreshed and the new plantings are doing well. The green beans are 6 inches tall or better. The lettuces are at least 3.  The snow peas are looking beautiful and even the beets are making a showing already. Very small, but present and accounted for. The kale is bright and the carrots are up and the radishes are already a few harvest ready.  I love gardening (can you tell??)  

  Temps are still in the high 80's low 90's...even with the rain...so it is really humid and sticky out there.  I wanted to hang the laundry out to dry today, but the sky hasn't quite given over to clearing yet, and in fact, it sprinkled on me while I was out pulling the edamame plants. So...it's in the dryer today. That's okay. It's so humid it would probably take them 3 days to dry anyway. lol

  There are an awful lot of little icky housekeeping jobs to be done in the next few days. I might just get really motivated and get them done. Especially since after today, I won't really have any garden/canning excuses to use to put them off. My big master bath needs a serious attending to: the big handicapped shower, the shower curtain and liner, the big double vanity and the floors.  Good rainy day jobs.  (cough, ahem)  My big closet needs re-organizing.  The pantries need a little organization too...especially where all the bags of dried foods are concerned.  I have a garage full of gallon sized jars just waiting to be washed and aired out, so that I can sort the bags of dried stuff and get all the  like items in one place. That will make it a lot easier to find stuff. I also need to go through some of the [grocery] canned items in there, and see what needs donating or disposing of.  Some of that stuff is old...and was dropped on me by helpful relatives.  I'm getting a lot better at just saying no to them.  Sometimes.  I also need to get in my bedroom and take that bed apart so that I can clean under and around the back of it. It was a brand new bed  (7 years ago) and I just didn't think about it much. I was looking for something the other day, stuck my head under there and nearly had a heart attack.  Living out here like we do, on a country road, with fields all around us being tilled and plowed and harvested...makes for a LOT of dust. If I had allergies, I'd be dead by now. lol  

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

  The boy isn't working again this week--nature of the business. He's out there right now, grading the big holes in the driveway and filling them with rock.  He's sweating like a pig out there....I told him he'd better be careful, it's hotter than it feels when the humidity is like this. I think he's almost done...it'll be great, as that mess just kept getting bigger and bigger and the Irishman hasn't bothered to fix it the last 500 times I've mentioned it. It doesn't bother his truck much...but it almost swallows up my little car.


   I need to make granola today or tomorrow, and since it's already about 2 o'clock, I'm thinking tomorrow. We have plenty of eggs for breakfast.  The granola bars are gone again too...sigh....and I don't know what to fix for supper, except that's it going to contain tempeh, because I have some that needs using.  I was thinking maybe I'd bake a peach or apple pie too...because I have had a sweet tooth the past few days, and if I don't eat something real, I'm going to binge on Almond Joys or something.  LOL

  And that's pretty much the gist of it on this Monday/Tuesday out here on Honeysuckle Hill. Some work, some play and lots of things to do...never a bored moment. And isn't that just life?? I'm always amazed when I hear people talk about being bored...My life is just SO not ever that.  Frustrating perhaps.   Perplexing maybe.  Exhausting sometimes.  But never, ever in a million years is it boring.

  Thank Goodness.

  Have a great Getting-back-on-track day people....and take extra good care of yourselves.



Namaste.

A day in the life....

Whew....

     Okay,  3 gallons of edamame in the freezer.  Tomatoes, bell peppers, okra and jalapenos picked this morning. Garden is winding down now, and the harvests are smaller.  There's still about a row and a half of edamame out there, and the Irishman will pick it when he comes home.

I have about 6 more gallons already picked, waiting to be blanched and shelled, but this is about all I can do in one day.  My legs hurt from standing at the sink, lol.  I have the beginnings of something pork-ish in the crock pot, with chopped onion and whole garlic (about 8 cloves), and a few spices. It will probably be carnitas, depending on how it looks before I have to leave the house at 2:30.  Cooking is a real adventure at this house lately...lol.

   As for me, I am tired. I have been sitting with MissB 7 days a week, even though it's only 4 hours a day, it breaks my day up and makes it a challenge to get things done. The house looks like a tornado hit it, especially the kitchen. The work counters are clean, and the floor gets swept every day, but the island is where all the jars, just picked produce,  canning supplies, etc., all get stacked. It's right in the center of the kitchen and so of course it's all I see. lol  There are some days when I do nothing but vacuum and dust and stuff, but then I get on a canning/freezing roll and let it go for 3-4 days and it's a nightmare again.  sigh...oh, well.  I have to remember there is light at the end of this tunnel and things are slowing down, at least in the garden. I have 25 lbs of garlic I need to get busy on, and have 25 pounds of beets coming any day, so I'll be pickling those too.  OH, yeah--and okra.  May not get a lot of jars of that though....but any little bit is good enough.  Pickling is a bit easier...a little less muss and fuss.  I'm debating about buying some more peaches before they are all gone...mine are all frozen, but I wouldn't mind having more in the freezer. I still have a lot of bell peppers in the garden...yellow, red, green and ivory...and am hoping the weather will hold up for them to grow a bit bigger and ripen nicely. I want to freeze some of them whole and stuffed with a rice mixture. We'll see. Might just have to freeze them whole and then take them out and stuff as needed.

   The potato beds haven't been harvested yet either. Red pontiacs, fingerlings and sweet potatoes. I think the sweet potatoes will be the very last thing to come out of the garden, since the plants are still lush and gorgeous.

  Re-reading this, I sound like a whirling dervish.

  I'm gonna go throw a steak on the grill and sit down for a nice lunch.

  I deserve it.  LOL

Namaste.

Harvest Home...

  Up early, trying to beat the heat...picked about 30 pounds of mostly Roma tomatoes, which I will grind and sauce tomorrow.  Picked a few big ones too, one of which I cut in to for a bacon and tomato sandwich on Italian herbed wheat bread I made last night. One slice covered the whole sandwich!!!  It was heavenly.

  I dug probably 10 pounds or more of Red Pontiac potatoes,  they are gorgeous. Picked another 7 or 8 pounds of green beans..will can again in a few days.  There was a small amount of okra and several cucumbers. I'm going to chop some of the big cukes today and can sweet relish.  I think I will dry some more of the smaller ones, as I was real happy with the way they turned out.  Picked a few peppers, but not many. The plants are loaded though, and the fruit is glossy and healthy and firm. Picked a few jalapenos too, and will make some fresh salsa tonight.

  And...it's only 10 AM.  lol...

  I have to go to Miss B's  at 1 and stay til 5.  She's been going through lots of old things and "finding" papers she's never seen before. Of course, she has seen them...she just can't remember.  This is really an experience for me, as all my grandparents and parents have died at relatively young ages, and I've not dealt with this up close much. It's horribly sad...she'll have little moments where she suddenly "remembers" that her daughter died in March or that her husband died last month...and she starts to grieve a little all over again...assuming she did grieve in the first place. She is losing herself,  little pieces at a time. 

 The Irishman is gone to a meeting and I stayed behind to work in the garden. I startled (or was startled by) a beautiful huge long grass snake when I was digging potatoes. I finished the one side of the long bed and declined to do the other side. Let the wildlife guy do it. lol  The a little further down, I found a long snakeskin he had just crawled out of. It was still soft. Watching snakes shed their skin is remarkable, if you've never done it, I hope you get the chance. I watched a big rattler go through the process once. I was mesmerized. Rattlesnakes intrigue me anyway...

 Had another big storm last night..the days have been brutally hot and humid, with temps in the high 90's and heat indexes at 114.  No playing outside in that much, lol.  But the rain and sun have been good for the gardens. We are going to have a stellar harvest this year. That's a good thing, as the pantries are looking a little bare. I need to get out there one more time this morning and pull the seed tops off the big basil plants as they are starting to bolt in the heat. They are about 3 and a half feet high and beautiful. I'll be pulling them up to dry soon. I want to get a planting of beets in this week if I can figure out where to put them. I also need to check the edamame to see if any of it is ready to pick. I know nothing about the times of things on that. A couple of days ago, there were pods. Gotta watch it....

  OK--busy morning and have to run to town for cat food. My kitties are indignant that I've run out of canned food.  I say, let them eat cake. lol

Namaste.

Memorial Day

Achh...a fine day it is to remember those who have gone before us....Said a prayer today for those in the Armed Forces, and had a little annual ritual for my dad. When he died, he wanted his ashes scattered at his favorite place on the planet.. way up in Northern California at a place called Shelter Cove.  My dad was in WWII in the US Army, part of a platoon known as the Blue Devils.  He never talked much about his time in Europe, but was fiercely proud to be an American patriot.  So, every year on Memorial Day, I have a little sit-down with his spirit, somewhere surrounded by trees.   I miss him so much...still.

  It was a good day all 'round. Finished getting the last things in the ground for the garden...mainly the edamame and some horseradish.  I downloaded the data tracking sheet from the University of Illinois, and when it's all grown and harvested, I'll send it back to them. They sent me a lot of different packets of the seed, all different maturity rates and such, I suppose. I'll be meticulous in my observations.  We got everything mulched too, except the green beans. I planted a bush bean this year instead of the pole beans.  The books say to mulch them after it gets hot and dry, so they must be prone to a root rot if you're not careful. Things are looking good out there...hope to get some pictures tomorrow.

  All the kitties got a bath today to stave off the fleas. None of them loved it.  LOL   MIss Molly the Jack Russell Terrorist got one too...she was not happy.  But all is forgiven now that everyone is dry and back to normal...and I for one am glad it's done.

  My back and hamstrings are sure feeling the strain from planting 10 rows of soybeans.  After I got them all planted, I side dressed them with about an inch of beautiful compost. I had no more than picked everything up and it started to rain. We had a good steady rain for about 30 minutes and then the sun came back out and it felt like being in a sauna. yikes!

  Little Bit is sitting here on my shoulder, reminding me of my new goal to be in bed by midnight at the latest.  I don't get nearly enough sleep, and am trying to set some new  patterns to maybe help that. I see the clock creeping up, so I'll say my goodbyes now.

  Namaste.

Feels like fall today...

  But this weather can't fool me. Outside the window of my office, I can see the peach tree that is loaded with blossoms this year after a decent pruning last winter. And the lilac has erupted in blossoms over by the fence.  My Montmorency cherry tree is blooming now too, as well as the apple. The irises and lilies are bigger every day, and the weeping mulberry is suddenly green. 2 days ago, it was 82 degrees. Today is not making it to 60.  Tonight is supposed to be chilly, but then the temps begin to slowly climb back up to where they should be, mid 70's.  We had a short but serious storm yesterday...some straight line winds, but no damage. It got nasty fast. Mother Nature can be swift and vengeful.

  I've pretty much taken the day off today...stayed home and vacuumed and cleaned the little chickies pen. I swept down the front porch, which is full of all sorts of seed pods and such, all being tracked into the house like crazy. Fed the big chickens, fed and cleaned and watered all the cats and dogs dishes.  Wanted to get some laundry done,  but it's gonna have to wait til tomorrow, because I'm not doing anything else today. lol I will be going to my womens meeting tonight at 7.

  Just got an email from the University of Illinois-Champaign/Urbana...they are sending me a full set of edamame seed to grow as part of an experiment to see if I might want to make them a continual part of my gardening.  I'm excited...I love those beans. And the nutritional content is  out of this world..they are a complete protein, have no cholesterol and very little  saturated fat. They are high in Vitamin C, K, manganese and folate. They are a good source of dietary fiber, iron, calcium, thiamin, magnesium, phosphorous and copper.  A good food source for the  subsistence gardener.

   Eating leftovers for supper, so I don't have to cook. I think I'm going to take a shower in a minute and get myself ready for the girls.  I made a wonderful ground turkey/ pork sausage meatloaf for supper last night, with mashed potatoes and steamed broccoli, and the night before that, it was bbq'd chicken. So...the leftover choices are good.  

   It's been a relaxing day ...and not totally unproductive.  Life is good.

Namaste.