MERRY CHRISTMAS !!!

     I hope you and your loved ones have a safe, happy, and sweetly memorable Holiday!

Tiny tip - parchment paper battles...

 

If you use parchment paper for baking, you know it is very simple to line flat pans with it, but if, as in this case, you wish to line a bowl or something like that, it's nearly impossible.  I've found that if I crumble up the paper first, then flatten it, the job is doable.  Another thing you can do if you don't mind the paper being a bit wet, is to crumple it up, get it wet, squeeze out the extra water, and use it that way.  I wouldn't want to do that for the bread in the picture, but for some things, it would work very well, for instance lining a square baking pan to put some wet batter into. 

What I do with BIG thread spools - tiny tip

 

I have been working on some projects for Christmas, and in the course of that, I needed some 100% cotton thread.  The only kind I could find came in a large spool.  That won't work on the spool pin on a normal sewing machine, so you can see what I did here.  I put a rigid (in this case aluminum) drinking straw onto the spool pin, and then am able to put the large spool of thread on there and use it normally.  I realize there are special thread stands you can buy for this, but at least in this instance, it wasn't necessary. 

(Pay no attention to my messy desk, please.)

Last harvest of 2022

     It's been a good garden year.  I had to be gone all of August, which threw a bit of a wrench in things, but even so, I was able to can corn, green beans, tomatoes, spaghetti sauce, green beans with potatoes and sweet pickle relish.  We got to eat a lot of wonderful sweet corn, and dug 140 pounds of Irish potatoes and about a bushel and a half of sweet potatoes. I froze lots of sliced okra, which I enjoy using in soups and stir-fry with rice. My Garden Fairy planted 5 rows of dry beans, and it seems, as she's finishing up shelling them that she'll have about 4 gallons of the beans which are a combination of Navy, Pinto, and Black beans. So, overall, it's been a great year!

Today was my last harvest, as it will definitely frost tonight.  Here it is!

Tiny tip - Rescuing celery

 

You probably already know this...

Yesterday, I discovered that the celery in our refrigerator was getting limp, so I cut off the tips that were drying out, as well as the root end, washed it in cold water, and then put the stalks in a jar of cold water and placed that in the fridge overnight.  This morning, it was nice and crisp again!

Spring musings...

We've waited and waited for the soil in our garden to get dry enough to cultivate and plant.  It finally did and late last week my Garden Fairy came out to help us.  We are not planting as many things this year as we've done in the past.  For instance, I'm not going to plant carrots.  The reason is that doing a lot of hand weeding is hard on my hands as I have some arthritis in them.  Our garden is 75 feet long by 100 feet wide.  This year, instead of "playing" so much, it will be more straightforward.  We both came down with COVID - 19 at the end of February and although we are fine, we don't have all of our energy back yet. That requires cutting back in some areas. The rows in the garden will be far enough apart that our rototiller will easily be able to do most of the cultivating.  

You can see here how we've planted our sweet potatoes.  The ground was tilled, then a ridge was made, 75 feet long.  Next, we planted about 50 sweet potato plants in there, 18 inches apart in little holes that we filled with water and "mudded them in." The last step was to spread some weed barrier fabric over both sides.  I planted about 2 pounds of onion sets up there with them, too, as rabbits hate onions, but they love sweet potato leaves.  Later in the season, I will use "Shakeaway" for rodents.  We get terrible vole damage on the tubers if I don't do that.

Here you can see two sweet little baby apples on one of our two Transparent apple trees.

And here is a California Wonder sweet pepper seedling. I was able to grow all of my own seedlings this year.  I am not sure it saves money, but it does allow me to choose my own varieties to grow instead of only being able to purchase the few that are available locally.

Here is a list of what we planted.  Sweet corn, sweet potatoes, Irish potatoes (Kennebec), green bush beans, okra, sweet peppers, jalapeno peppers, onions, eggplant, cucumbers, zucchini squash, sugar snap peas, paste tomatoes, Rutger's tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, and an heirloom German tomato variety. We hope to put out more sweet corn in about 2 weeks so our season will last longer. Oh my goodness, how we love sweet corn!

In the spring, we plant hope.  We hope for the fruit of our effort. Sometimes it's wildly successful, sometimes it's a bit disappointing, but it's never failed to give us at least some good food. I've been gardening since 1976 when my second son was born.  I remember sitting and nursing him, snapping green beans, and watching the pressure gauge on the canner, all at the same time. That was a golden year for me.  I learned to can, had a fabulous, although rather small, garden, and our 3 oldest children were very young. We rented a house on a farm in Nebraska. Even though I did not have much space in the garden, (it was about 600 square feet) I was able to can 90 quarts of beans!  I also canned tomatoes and made lots of pickles.  I was very proud of my accomplishment. I could write about it until your eyes glazed over, but the memories are precious.

So, now we wait. I look at pictures of last year's harvest and drool. We're still eating sweet potatoes and canned vegetables from last year as well as applesauce and apple butter, as the trees were very productive.  I do love to garden. I'm 72-years-old now and hope I can continue for the rest of the time I have left on this earth.

Happy Spring to all of you Gentle Readers 

Happy Mothers Day!!!

 

Blue Jean hems - an historical perspective.

 For 11 years I took in sewing, mending, and alterations to raise a little more money for us.  My "bread and butter" was hemming blue jeans for my customers.  I was thinking about that this morning and how when I was a girl, we did not hem jeans that were too long.  We just folded the hem up, like this!

This reminds me of the old adage, "The cobbler's children have no shoes."  I will happily hem jeans for other people, but for myself?  I put it off and put it off.  I've finally just returned to my roots.  :)