Thursday Family Dinner Night

We switched our Wednesday Family Dinner Night to Thursday.  I've made chicken enchiladas, green salad, refried beans, Spanish rice, apple crisp, chocolate pudding and vanilla ice cream.  Except for the ice cream everything was homemade from scratch...and most raised by me!  I had everything I needed to make the ice cream except TIME.  My days are just not long enough...

In the Garden

I spent today in the garden just doing the watering.  It's suppose to be in the high 90's and low 100's until the weekend.  I don't have a drip system in my garden beds, that will be ANOTHER Winter project.  I'm glad it's still hot: good news for the sweet potatoes and maybe some tomatoes will ripen.

My Basil Is Still Doing Great!

Chard, Peppers and Marigolds Still Going Strong

Marigolds and Zukes in the Barrel

Organic Mushroom Compost Grows Great Gardens and SURPRISE: Mushrooms!

The New Planting of Root Crops and Flowers

Snaps for the Bees and Cauliflower for ME!

Sweet Potatoes and Celery

Sweet Potatoes and Petunias

Poor Sad Little Tomatoes

Cabin Weekend

We had such a wonderful weekend.  We sewed, ate, talked, laughed, read, napped, watched movies, talked more and laughed till we cried...I am so lucky to have such great friends!

My View From the Deck



6 Napkin Burgers and Limpy Fries at the OutPost!








My Sewing Corner





Paula and Nancy with the New Camera                   

 


Renaissance Outfit Number One




Paula with a Beard!




Paula's Sewing Corner!




Nancy helping with the Outfit




Me Sewing




The Queen of All!



I'm Outta' Here!

I'm rushing around unpacking the truck of garden *stuff* and reloading with cabin *stuff*.  I just can't wait to get up there...it's Fall and it will smell soooo nice...piney, cool, crisp, smokey: YUM!  Just having a few days with my friends, great food and good movies: gotta' love it.  Paula emailed me she's cut out 40 corsets!  I haven't done ONE!  Hopefully I'll catch up with her!

Am I Done Yet?

I managed to make 4 pints of vanilla chocolate fig jam, 3 pints of apple lemon jelly and the roasted tomato basil soup is on the stove waiting to be jarred and processed...whew!  I keep thinking I'm almost done canning for a bit and then I think of something else.  I have so many peppers in the garden...I chopped and froze a couple gallon bags of bell peppers...now I need to do jalapenos and what's left of the pablanos.  I'm going to roast some of the jalapenos and the pablanos and can them when I get back from the cabin.  I need to do more apple sauce too. 

My sister in law sent me a couple pictures of her new chicken coop...I know what my husband and boys are going to be doing for Mom as soon as harvest is over...I am so in love with her coop!



Tomatoes and Figs

I just love my Farmers Market.  Monday I came home with a lug of Early Girl tomatoes, a couple pounds of string beans and my favorite Heirloom cherry tomatoes, some Fuji apples, pears, 20 pounds of worm castings and 40 pounds of popcorn old maids for my hens...pretty good haul if I don't say so myself.

I have the last of the figs bubbling in the pot for the last of the jam.  Vincent, Leah and I cut up the tomatoes and put the Early Girls in the oven to roast and the Heirlooms in the dehydrator.  I'm going to dry the string beans too.

Tonight was Family Fun Night...we had a fresh taco bar/ Spanish rice/ tortillas and hold on to hats: Spumoni ice cream...it was way noisy and loud! And we decided to change the day to Thursday.  DIL Sarah and Les's fiance Teryn have Al-a-Non on Wednesdays and we want to support them...



Rain

Today I woke up to a wet deck and garden...we got rain...a tiny bit of rain...warm rain.  I wanted to pull the tomatoes and the rest of the melons...but I have Hank and he wouldn't let me.  I want to get the lettuce in and I want to plant the brocolli and cauliflower I got from Griff's, but I didn't get that done either...I feel morose...sad...tired.

I wrapped and froze the enchilada casserole: 8 full meals!  I added the turkey soup and beef stew to the bulging dining table (I still am working on the food storage room).

It's the TV.  I had promised myself no tv until 5 p.m. but I couldn't/wouldn't do it...I can hardly believe how easily I slipped back into the TV habit...I will start again tomorrow...Monday.  It's so amazing how much I got done in the few days that the TV was off...TONS DONE...clean, organized, managed house...loved it.  Now Alicia is back from Mexico and I am being irritated out of my home...I need to work on that.

Les and Teryn brought my cord to the sewing machine...so tomorrow I will clean it and set about doing some sewing.  I will pack up the sewing items that will head to the cabin with me this weekend.  I will plant my lettuce and pull my tomatoes...it will get done!  NO TV!