Mostly About Tea

Mid afternoon yesterday . . . I guess we had a few things going . . . Or something 🤪 . . . 

Found this new-to-me tea at the store yesterday and now it's my favorite for now!  I go in spurts.  Last week or so its been Bengal Spice.  Before that, this Chai tea in the nicest nylon baggies - the best boughten Chai that I have found ( and I don't it at the bent and dent) . . . Oh, and a lovely black tea ( most any kind or your favorite brand, I am using all kinds of brands that I bought home from the bent and dent when I didn't really like black tea 🤪) with a drop of lavender and a bit of creamer . . . 

What is your kind is tea these days . . .  or nights . . . I almost always brew a cup at bedtime.

Abundance

It all starts coming in at once it seems and piles up on top of each other . . .  and I have only tiny flowerbed gardens with a bit of fresh veggies!  . . . .Maybe God wants us to experience abundance full and overflowing so that we are reminded of His spiritual blessings that He promises in abundance!!!!

Tomatoes, celery, yellow summer squash, zucchini, basil, parsley, green beans, peaches, apples, sunflowers, strawflowers . . . Harvesting and harvesting and putting up food, canning, drying, freezing and sharing with friends and neighbors.  What an abundance!  What goodness of God! What joy!  What flavors and textures and FRESHNESS!  What gifts!!!

Compost

What do you do with your food/garbage?  What does your compost pile/bin look like? 

I don't remember having a garbage pile or compost bin when I was growing up . . .   I asked mom today and she said that she just dumped her foodscraps/garbage into the garden and it got tilled into the dirt.

I have not always had a garden, as much as I like to grow things.  This year trying to garden on sand, I have come to recognize the urgent need for a large compost bin.

I rounded up some old pallets and had the boys screw them together . . . Though they weren't there more careful about the looks of things so they look at bit shipshod, but it works.  Most of the summer I have gathered grass clippings from a neighbor/ friend ( our grass clippings don't hardly amount to a "hill of beans"), some leaves from last fall from another neighbor who puts his junk wood things to burn in our burn pile ( with our consent), and some straw/ hay (with a bit of horse and donkey manure in it) and a little bit of garbage from our kitchen.  Most of our kitchen scraps go directly to the chickens.  

Since most of the year, things are frozen, I'm not sure how long the garbage will take to break down.  I have never done this before.  The first bin I didn't add water and that was a mistake.  

Yesterday, I started turning it with a pitch fork for the first time.  And by late afternoon, I brought the water hose to help moisten things a bit.  I was so grateful that it is close enough to the outside water spigot that with three garden hoses I could reach where I needed to.

This last (first) bin needed water the most, so I had a helper nearby to run the sprayer for me so it didn't take so much time stopping every few minutes.

Can't wait to use this stuff next year.  

What is your experience with composting?

Perfect Job for Little Girls

Recently, I came upon a nice way to dry small squash rounds.  I do not own a dehydrater. I haven't had very good success with drying zucchini in the oven.  So we are trying this method today.  The girls voiced great delight when I stated what we were going to do.  They love stringing Cheerios even if they don't get to eat them for awhile. This technique calls for you to string a large or medium sized button in between each  squash round to keep them from sticking together as they are drying.

Harvesting Holly Hock Seeds

So I learned something this morning.  I learned the best way to harvest Holly Hock Seeds.  In my eager endeavor to save seeds and keep the colors separated, I fubbed up. Most of them are immature and probably will not work for seeds.  Not that I don't have enough, mind you. I do. But I had this grandiose idea that I might try to sell some seeds at a "craft" stand sometime later.

I'll tell you what I did and then what I should have done and what I will do next year.

Though I am glad I tried . . . Because if I hadn't tried, I probably still wouldn't be the wiser about the best way to do this.  In other words, because I tried. I learned. There is beauty in this though . . . There is satisfaction in learning. There is joy in journeys, truly(as we've all heard about:) )  It is not all waste, though it would be nice to have perfect success the first time . . . I'm sure you are wise enough to know that is not usually the case. 😁

All summer as the Hollyhocks began to bloom, I started thinking about next year's flowerbed and gardens. I said in my mind that I wanted to keep track of the different colors.  I should have tagged them, as they started blooming, because I never did . . .  and then I harvested them and even though I got most of the seed's colors saved, I still didn't exactly know which "mother" plant out there is what color. Grr. So much for procrastinating and then being too impetus about bringing them in right away.

So last evening after being excited about harvesting garden things, I eyed my Holly hocks and decided that today's the day to collect seed.  After being in Oregon and knowing that life out there is "all about collecting seed,"  I was eager.  It was almost bedtime when I grabbed a knife and headed out the door with some bags.  The white grocery bag was for the white Holly Hocks, the large black canvas bag for the burgundy/ dark red ones (which we really, really loved this year), the bread bad for the light pink ones, and another bag for the light, creamy peach ones that I was't sure I would keep. But the pale yellow ones, I cut down to throw away as I don't care for those and I didn't want more baby plants of that color.  My dark pink ones still were blooming fairly well at least the one plant I saw.  There are a few I am too late to record the color of.

I brought them in and stashed them on the island, informing the family who were sitting in the living room that these were my Holly Hock Seeds and "Don't mess with them and mix them up!".

This morning, as I considered my stash, realizing that most of these weren't gonna be very useful as seeds, I pulled up info online as to how people harvested seeds from Hollyhocks.  Ok. There ya go. That is a much better way and now I know.  

So what I learned was that I should have taken a brown paper bag (marked with the color) and holding it underneath the dried, ripe, paper-like seedpods used my thumb to run loose the individual black seeds and let them fall into my collecting bag.

I want to also identify my plants somehow with a tag or sting or colored yarn marking the color of the plant. That would be helpful to me as I have needed to know or wished I had in the past, when I have had plant sales.

So, there ya have it.  A better way.

Here's my eagerly collected stash. 

Zucchini Pizzas

We've been eating these almost every day now . . . The little girls have taken to prepare them . . . Makes me happy!

It is the simplest thing.  And it uses the largest of zucchini!  . . . and it uses all of it!!!  .   . No waste of fiber whatsoever! 🙂

You just slice then about 1/4" think and place them on a cookie sheet or bar plan. Spoon some of your favorite pizza sauce on each circle and then a pepperoni or two or three and top with a bit of shredded cheese. Pop them in the oven at 425 degrees for between half and hour to forty-five minutes depending on your oven and how thick your slices really are 😉.

As some of us love these and others do not, we usually serve this as a side dish unless it's lunch time and everyone at home that day agrees. 

Fresh Herbs and Such

I think I almost enjoy the scent of fresh basil as much as I do a rose!

Trying to preserve herbs for winter . . . 

Today, I am also trying salted herbs . . .