I Love Spring

Dogwoods, Redbud and spring green!



Ya Know How I know

It's Spring.. the inside is a mess.. the outside is a mess and I'm surrounded by things that needed to be done yesterday!!

The outside.. I've got 11 tomato plants in the ground and two zucchini so far. I've got more tomatoes but not sure how many? I've got peppers that are not quite ready to go out in the big world. I was going to mow the weeds but found the mower out of gas! I really, really need to mow at least around the beds and trailer cuz the ticks are ALIVE and well! I hate ticks! They creep me out! Throughout the winter I lay all my cardboard in between the beds. Everything cardboard, cracker boxes, cat food boxes, cardboard packing boxes.. in the spring I cover it all with grass clippings and you never know the cardboard is there. Until I do that it looks like a dump. I don't really care but it really bothers my husband! It serves to keep the weeds down though. Various 5-gallon buckets sitting around some with horse poo some that use to hold horse poo. I did empty the water out of the empties and turned them up side down so the misquotes could not use them as nurseries.

Meanwhile inside.. I've decided to start a quilt for my brother as a Christmas gift. I've got lots of totes filled with cotton fat quarters sitting every where. I've pulled the kitchen table into the living room and it holds my iron, my sewing machine, a cutting mat, and cutter, various rulers and marking tools, more fat quarters and two buckets filled with seeds that will be planted next week. The kitchen is clean but only because I have a load of chopped onion in the dehydrator. Wash needs to be done, carpets need to be vacuumed and we won't even talk about dusting. I did put all the books I had piled on the end table next to my bed away .. no time for reading now.. It's Spring!!

Fun.. Fun.. Fun



Nesco Dehydrator



Five med/large grated dehydrated potatoes with green onions on a 12" dinner plate



Chives about half done in the dehydrator

I had intended to can most of the garden this year. My goal is not using the freezer for preserving our food. After playin with the dehydrator yesterday and today I think I will be drying a lot of things. From what I have read there is more nutrition in the dried food as opposed to canning.

I re-rehydrated some of the potatoes for last nites dinner and honestly I could not tell the difference in taste compared to fresh. I see this as a way of making more fast "slow" food. Also as a way of saving space which I have very little of.

I've heard you can dehydrate meat, eggs and even milk but I have a lot of research to do before I try that! Also properly dried and stored dehydrated food lasts a long time, serval people said 30 years, I take that with a grain of salt? I still have a lot to learn but this really looks promising and I'm excited about another way of storing our food.

If any of you have tips I would love to hear them!

Meat & Bread

I canned up the rest of the venison I had in the freezer yesterday. This is the second time I’ve canned meat and it was a LOT less stressful than the first! I reviewed Jackie Clay’s instruction (Jackie Clay) and got all my stuff set out and ready (I failed to do that the first time so there was some scrambling). It went very smooth and quick. I did have a jar break which made a big mess and I’m not quite sure why that happened but I’m not stressing about it. I ended up with 9 pints of meat. One of the jars did not seal so I made BBQ out of it for dinner and it was wonderful. So I got to add 8 jars of meat to my little pantry.

While I was waiting for the pressure canner to do it’s thing (75minutes) I made a loaf of bread, actually two loaves but one was devoured for BBQ sandwiches.

Today I will be going through my tomato and pepper seeds to see which will get a place in the garden. It’s time to get them started! The broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, and leeks did fairly well in the compost but I think I will add a bit of perlite to it for the pepper and tomato seeds.

I’m curious what kind of bug year it will be. I don’t think the lack of winter is going to be a good thing! I’ve already got cabbage worms munching out on my Russian Kale that grew all winter. I think I’m going to do a fall crop of cabbage, kale, broccoli and cauliflower. I think a latter planting under row covers (which I’ve never used) is the only way I’m going to get any yield!

Wishing everyone a fruitful day!!





More Books

Added two new books to my book list. 

The Holistic Orchard and Mycelium Running. I've read the first chapter of each and both are very interesting!

I have two peach trees, two pear trees and one apple. I also have two pecan trees, which are too young to produce. All of the fruit trees have bad problems. The peach produce really well, loads of peaches but chock full of worms! Yuck! The pear produce very small fruit and not many of them. The apple has never given us a single fruit. My husband's boss keeps telling me if I want fruit I have to spray. I finally told him if that were my only option I'd just chop them down. The thing is he doesn’t get much fruit from his apple even with his spraying. So.. I'm putting all reading aside and concentrating on the Holistic Orchard. I imagine it's much too late to get any fruit this year but maybe next?

I have three more books that will be here tomorrow and that will be the end of book buying until I get caught up. That will prolly happen next winter!

It's Coming

Spring will be here soon!

The first daffodils are blooming...

The layer of ice on the pond is finally gone..

Seeds and Soap

Only about half of the seeds I started last month came up, or so I thought. When I watered them this morning I found a slug munching out!! It must have been in the compost I used. So I got him out and re-planted some of the seeds that I thought did not come up. My son told me to sterilize my compost but I didn’t want to take a chance on killing my good organisms. Such is life..

I will be starting more seeds today, mostly medicinal herbs. I have been studying herbs for healing on and off for about 20 years now. I think it’s time I quit reading and started doing. I know there are a lot of reputable people selling dried herbs but I prefer to grow my own. As with veggies and meat and eggs, if you grow your own you know what you’re getting.

I placed another seed order. I have 164 different packs of seeds. That sounds like an awful lot but.. some are cover crops, some medicinal herbs, quite a few veggies and then there is seed I will be planting for the chickens and rabbits. So not really a lot of seeds.

I’m getting ready to make my own soap again. It’s been a few years since I’ve made any. Not fancy molded soaps, not melt and pour, not funky colored soap, just good bars of soap made with my infused herb oils. Honest and earthy slabs of soap that are actually good for your skin. I first have to find my folder, which contains my recipes and notes.

While I’m waiting for it to warm up a bit outside I’m going to get the first thing on my to do list started..bread.