Friday is my favorite day of the week now...

  And this one was particularly good.  We started off the day with a late breakfast of a delicious veggie scramble, with carrots,onions,broccoli and cauliflower and kale and tomato in it. After we finished I cleaned up the dishes while the Mister went out to the garden to start harvesting turnips. He pulled up roughly a dozen plants, cut the tops off and brought me in a laundry basket full of greens. Then we cut them up, washed them, blanched them and froze them. I got 2 quarts of turnip greens off those plants. We have about another 35 or 40 plants. I'm going to try making kim chi with some of them, and we'll feed the chickens some of them and we'll compost some probably. I'll probably freeze at least another 3 or 4 quarts. Then we'll start on the kale.  :)

 After we finished and cleaned up, our plan was to head for the hills of apple country, about 45 miles from here. Calhoun County is our local apple and peach district... a floodplain area of beautiful Mississippi  River alluvium where the best fruit grows around here. It's really beautiful there and we figured we'd catch some fall colors and eat at one of the fish restaurants on the Illinois River for a late lunch. 

   We did actually see a lot of brilliant yellows and blazing reds too, but I never seemed to have the camera out at the right time.  lol

 The weather was a balmy 60 degrees (maybe) and clear and sunny. Really nice after yesterdays drizzly cold day.  After we had lunch we took the slow road back down the river, stopped at a roadside stand and got some pumpkins and apples and then took the ferry back across the river. There was a bit of a delay as the river was full of barges today.

Here's the view out the windshield of our car, we're right behind bicycle lady.

  And here's one of the big barges that went by.  

The Mighty Mississippi was as smooth as glass today.

We drove on down the River Road and stopped for a minute to take a picture of the Piasa Bird, which was recently touched up and is looking good and ferocious. You can learn more about this native American dragon here :http://www.altonweb.com/history/piasabird/

So, all in all it was a good day. We stopped at the big grocery store in Alton before heading home to pick up ingredients for the 4 soups we'll be making at my workshop tomorrow.  When we got home we hauled everything in and dropped onto the couch and watched some telly like the old folks we are.  lol

  Yesterday my son came over and installed the new sink in my bathroom. It was the typical male plumbing job, complete with much swearing and gnashing of teeth.  I told him I usually leave the house anytime the mister is doing any kind of plumbing work. It was a dismal day, grey and cold and rainy. When he finished up (almost) I suggested he take a ride with me to Rural King, where he could carry some 40 pound bags of dog and cat food to the car for me and I'd buy him lunch. So we did, and then hit the Chinese Buffet.  On the way home,. I asked if he wanted to stop in and see his grandma at the nursing home since we'd be driving right by it and he said yes, so we stopped and visited. She looked much better than last time I saw her and had company...2 old ladies that I knew from my former life being married to her son.  I know he has a hard time seeing her like this, she had a stroke and she just wants to go back home to the farm.  And they can't take care of her properly I guess, or they think they can't...so in the nursing home she stays.

Well, it's only Day 4 of NaNoWriMo and I'm already behind in my word count. LOL

 Crikey.

 I should go write some and then go to bed.  It's already creeping up on midnight....sheesh.

  Have a great weekend all!!

Namaste.

The St Louis Cardinals are the World Series Champs!! (even though the whole world doesn't get to play--we don't care)

...and believe we did.....and win they did!!!

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  And thank God THAT'S over for another year. The 6th game , that was a very important one, ran into 11 innings and wasn't over til after midnight. You know those ballplayers were running on adrenaline last night, when they beat the Texas Rangers 6-2.  It was a thing of beauty. I wish my dear old dad had been around to see it--he was a diehard Cards fan.  

 We're not real big on sports in this house. We watch my husbands Packers play now and again...and we might catch something here or there, but mostly...well, NOT. I think he does secretly watch hockey when I'm not home, but if I catch him at it, he acts like it's no big deal.  But we do watch the Super Bowl, or at least some of it. This time we watched the playoffs as well as all 7 games of the series itself. 

 AND IT WAS  *A*W*E*S*O*M*E*

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  I'm having a bit of a domestic engineering day here. The husband and son are finishing the demolition job they started yesterday on the old 1975 pop-up camper that is made almost entirely of metal. The canvas was shot (rotted--for godssakes, it's 36 years old!!!)  and you can buy new canvas for them, but it's about 1500.00 which is ridiculous, since we paid 300 dollars for the darned thing. lol  We got a few good years of camping out of it, and I mended and patched it as much as I could until it was just beyond repair. So...bye-bye.  And of  course the male members are suited to tearing things apart and up and out...so they're in hog heaven. lol  Yesterdays work netted them about 80 bucks at the scrap yard which they split. They were both happy as clams.

  We went out for Indian food last night and had a nice dinner of prawn masala and a chicken coconut curry and basmati rice.  Lots of garlic naan and Daal and it was wonderful, as usual.  We went b y our [sort of] local health food store, a great place called Green Earth Grocery and I picked up some baking yeast and spices and a block of tofu...then we went to Mr. Curry's for supper and home to watch the game.  Date night for old people.  lol

  Tonight and tomorrow night I will be staying the night at MissB's. Not looking forward to it particularly, but blessed with the extra money right now. Tomorrow we will go to a lunch at noon for a friends 40th surprise birthday luncheon...hope I am functioning.  I usually can sleep some at her house, but you never know what kind of night she will have. Hopefully it will all go without a hitch.

  Thanks everyone for your kind words regarding my little emotional storm the other night. I did look at obits from his local newspaper, but found nothing. Might look again today. It is what it is and I know that these connections are strong enough to withstand distance and time and situations. And Murr--you're right. They do come and go.

  We had a light frost this morning--cold when I got up. I think it's supposed to warm back up again the next few days. I was thinking since the boys are out working maybe I'd make that potato soup I never got around to yet... mostly because it's quick and easy....

*~*~*~*~Okay. The soup is on, the compost bucket emptied. The floors are as done as they're gonna get today.  Laundry in the dryer is about ready to come out and the washer has stopped. One more load of his nasty work clothes, which will probably wait until tomorrow when I have the clothes he has on now. Gonna straighten up the couches and chairs slipcovers' and call it a day.

  It's a really beautiful fall day out there, 57 degrees and sunny.  High of 61 today.  Think I'll go back out to the garden and pick some more green beans and peas.  

  BTW--Anybody ever freeze greens?? I have some beautiful turnip greens that need to come out of the ground soon and hate to not be able to use all those greens. The chickens will love some and the compost will love some...but I love some too!!!!   lol

   Have a grand day. I plan to....

Namaste.

Independence Days

O. M. G.

  I am loving this new book by Sharon Astyk, called Independence Days: A Guide to Sustainable Food Storage & Preservation.

I'm only about 20 pages into it, and am smitten already.  Absolutely recommend it to anyone who tries to live this life...and especially anyone who doesn't.

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  It's a little warmer today because there are storms lurking about. Maybe not even storms, but certainly rain showers. I took my morning trek around the old homestead and saw that the purple asters I planted a couple of years ago have gone wild...they're all over the rock wall base, coming up in between the spent irises. I have some green beans flowering like mad and picked some kale and turnip greens to feed to the chickens...my girls love them some greens! There are more jalapenos to pick and a late batch of small, but ripe, red peppers.  And lots of green tomatoes...thinking about picking some and frying them up for my lunch

  I have some bratwurst getting thawed from the freezer and will open some kraut that I made last year and mash some potatoes from this years garden, and call it the Irishman's supper. I make a small batch of sauteed kale and turnip greens, with some garlic, olive oil and the tiniest slivers of onions. A little sea salt and some fresh cracked black pepper and it'll be good to go. I'm kinda hungry too...I had coffee, but no breakfast. Slept late because I was up WAY too late playing scrabble online with a friend. So...oh well. It's a lazy kind of a day, and I don't care if I get much accomplished today or not.

  Decided to have a peanut butter sandwich and a glass of milk for brunch, lol. My stomach was growling something fierce... I am not a milk drinker normally.But there are 2 things that I have to have milk with, and those are  peanut butter sandwiches and Oreo cookies.  I have decided to get back on track with my bread baking again. I kinda stopped in the summer, as I usually do because the gardening and canning take up most of my kitchen. And honestly, now that it's getting cooler again, the thought of fresh baked bread really appeals to me. But I think I'm going to leave the bread machine in the closet and get back to making artisan-type breads by hand.  I have always loved to make bread...it awakens some primal satisfaction in me...and until a couple of years ago, I had never used a bread machine. I had one, compliments of my dear husband who got me one for Xmas one year, but I never used it.  I couldn't imagine why he would even think I would want one, when he knew how much I loved baking bread, lol.  But...his man-brain didn't make that connection at all...and he thought he was making my life so much easier. (And probably that I would make him even MORE bread...that guy loves his bread!!)

  Okay. I had better get busy and cook those brats and pick those greens and get myself dressed. I am LOVING this blue robe/gown I bought at a thrift store yesterday...I was out searching for jeans for my husband--he gets all his pants at thrift stores because his work just destroys them anyway.  I found a powder blue Croft and Barrow soft fleece front zippered robe...and having been wearing it all morning/night...yes--even out traipsing through the yards.  I'm hesitant to take it off...lol

  It's Wednesday.  one more day for me to go into town and then 2 days off. On Saturday I'm teaching a canning workshop from 1-5 and then I'm home again.  Life is good...

Namaste.