edge effect

More field pictures

2008-09-17T10:15:00.004-04:00

More field pictures. These are from yesterday. We have a wetland mitigation sight next to a small goat farm in Northern Lancaster County. And the owners don't mind if we visit with the goats.

This goat was a little ominous. He just kept staring though the window.

See the giant spider? Sort of in the middle of the picture? It is hard to tell without something for scale, but it was enormous. Yuck. Some kind of fishing spider but there was no way I getting closer to tell which kind. The thing had to be close to 4 inches across. My co-worker thinks I am dramatic and am overestimating the size. It sure seemed huge though. And it freaked me out that it was that high up in a plant that I easily could have brushed past. Usually they are around rocks in the stream bed. I don't like spiders at all.

Field Photos

2008-09-15T11:09:00.004-04:00

Last week I had a lot of field work to do for my job. Tiring but good. Here are some photos.

The first two are from Fairmount Park in Philadelphia.

I am 38 years old and I never noticed that the inside of a black walnut looks like a heart. Now I see them everywhere.

An orange shelf fungi. You could see this from a mile away, it was so vibrant.

A giant piece of conglomerate. Conglomerate is a sedimentary rock and you don't often see pieces this size. I think it is part of the Pottsville Formation found in the Anthracite regions in Eastern Pennsylvania. Zoom in for a closer look. That is my field book for scale.

Checking in

2008-09-03T09:59:00.007-04:00

So lately I've been feeling like my horizon has disappeared. And I'm somewhere in the horse latitudes. I feel adrift with no sense of if I'm moving forward or backward or standing completely still. Not necessarily panicked or anything, but a definite sense of "I'm not where I want to be at this point in my life". So I haven't been blogging. Just lots of taking stock and thinking.

But here is an "I'm okay" post and thanks for all the emails and comments of concern. I just got back from 2 weeks at the beach, which was totally awesome. And I pretty much know where I want to be now. I just have to work up the courage to make the trip from here to there.

For some reason I'm into lists lately. Well, that is a lie. I've always been into lists, they help keep me sane and organized. I mean lists for no reason.

Things that have been making me smile lately:

tomatoes - because who can really be glum when eating a bowl of tomatoes with fresh basil and thick balsamic and good olive oil and salty olives?
banana pudding - I had for the first time a sour cream banana pudding made by Connor's Market in Buxton, NC and it was one of those moments when you eat something and everything gets all shiny and tingly and I think I actually laughed out loud because it was that good. Hard to believe, but it was. Banana Pudding! With Nilla Wafers! They only had it one day out of the week and the nice lady behind the deli counter shared her recipe, so I'll try my hand at it soon.
The Republican Party imploding.
A sign on a conservation district building on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.....it said "Keepin' it rural since 1963." haha. keepin' it rural.
Little girls in kayaks that swore they would never, ever get in a kayak. Let alone check a crab trap or reach down into an underwater grass bed to pick up a scallop.

So I'll keep in touch. And thanks Pete, I had forgotten all about Mr. Hartman. I am power!

Much better

2008-06-04T09:54:00.005-04:00

Yay June!

April and May were soap-opera-ish months and I am weary of drama for awhile. I'm going to put my nose in the dirt for a few months. Actually, until frost.

Thanks for all your kind words. Last week was a bit weird but I think I'm all better now. I'm still sad that things turned out the way they did, but there really isn't anything I could have done to change that. Nothing is gained by me dwelling. It is what it is (I say this so much lately).

And while it does annoy me that there was no spectacular, thoughtful birthday gift from the husband, the lack of did enable me to purchase a new dress and two pairs of spectacular platform sandals which I will show as soon as the come in the mail. God I love these new free-shipping mail order shoe places.

Behold my volunteer foxglove. I love foxgloves. I want a whole big sweep of them. I have wasted I don't know how much money buying foxgloves and planting them only to have them grow about a foot tall and die. So two years ago I stopped trying. I gave up. Foxgloves just did not like me. I had one remaining foxglove that limped along that summer. It dropped seed and last year I had several volunteers pop up. They were healthy all summer but had no blooms. I left them alone. This year this beauty suprised me. It has to be at least 3 feet tall. So I try not to look at it too hard or fuss with it too much. One of the other ones also had sent up a spire but that one succumbed to a fat yellow hen that was too lazy to walk around it and instead walked over it. You just can't have nice flower beds with chickens.

And my newest friend. This toad has decided to live in one of the flower pots on the front porch. He is there every day and then climbs out (the top of the pot is adjacent to a step) and is on the flagstones every evening. This pot has pansies and johnny-jump-ups in it so I'm not sure what he'll do when I change over to something a little more heat tolerant. I will keep his needs in mind though. Something to shade him during the day and keep him cool. Perhaps some big leafy sun coleus?

ves

C'mon June 1st!

2008-05-28T11:37:00.008-04:00

Boy am I glad May is almost over. I have not really enjoyed this month. Memorial Day weekend was busy. I cleaned and cleaned and cleaned some more and then planted and planted and planted some more. And I'm still not done. But at least all of my tomatoes and peppers are in and lots of seeds are planted and there is basil to brush past and strawberries to ripen in the sun.

Late Memorial Day afternoon I finally got to sit on my clean front porch and have a beer and know that I got a ton of stuff done.

Monday was also my birthday. I turned 38. I didn't really want to, but apparently you don't get a choice. I am not enjoying getting older. Not at all. And I don't really enjoy birthdays anymore either. It doesn't help when you don't get any gifts from your husband and the only card from him makes a sarcastic comment about your housekeeping skills. Thanks. I know. I am whining. I can whine if I want. The only saving grace was that I bought myself two huge ferns and found the first homegrown strawberries of the season. So my pity party happened while I was also eating awesome strawberries over the kitchen sink.

I was kind of glad to get to work on Tuesday morning. And then I opened an email from my cousin that let me know my father had died over the weekend. Somewhat surreal sitting at work and opening an email that tells you your dad passed away. Now this dad hadn't wanted anything to do with me for the last 20 years and I wasn't really expecting to feel sad or really feel anything when the time came. But I did. I was a little overwhelmed. Stunned and sad and angry. Angry that I never got a chance to tell him what I thought of him. Angry that I never got that dramatic phone call at the end saying "sorry I was such a shitty dad and will you accept my apology?" Sad that somebody that shared my first 18 years of life had decided that I wasn't worth knowing anymore and never bothered to see how I turned out.

So dad, sorry it turned out this way.

And in case you were ever interested, I turned out okay.

Actually, despite you and my crazy mother's best efforts to make it otherwise, I turned out awesome. I am smart and I'm funny and I'm interesting and I am strong. I provide for myself because I learned early on (thanks again) that most people could not be depended on for much and you are better off never expecting help. Valuable lessons those.

So, not getting to know me was very much your loss.

Thanks for the dimples though. They've always made my smile stand out.

(I don't look 38, do I?)

Almost May?

2008-04-29T16:11:00.007-04:00

How is that possible?

My chickens still aren't on their own yet. Still in their comfy giant box in the garage. I tried. I really did. One whole day in the chicken house. And then at night they simply didn't know what to do and peeped sad and loud and long and I took them all back to the garage. I would be a terrible mother. I can't help but spoil.

The foofies know this and exploit my weakness shamelessly.

My flowers are speeding right along. The tulips are now over, daffodils are long gone. I had iris blooming yesterday. Yikes. Bleeding heart is probably my favorite plant. I wish it lasted all year. But then maybe I wouldn't like it so much.

How am I behind already?

2008-04-24T13:11:00.004-04:00

Spring so quickly becomes overwhelming. Or is it just me? You wait and wait to be able to go out and get dirty and then it just seems like you can't keep up. There are so many things I have to plant yet!

And as usual, I panicked and bought my tomatoes too early, so afraid that the ones I wanted wouldn't be available if I waited. So I dutifully haul those in and out of the garage every day. I'll wait until the beginning of May, but even that is two weeks early based on out last frost date of May 15th. But at least I am set for San Marzanos again for 2008.

But I suppose it is good to be busy. I spent entirely too much time the last few months thinking about things and it is good for me to have a distraction. Even politics has failed to draw much of my attention. Can you believe it? I did work the polls on primary day this last Tuesday. And while Obama lost Pennsylvania, he did win in my precinct (the only Obama precinct in my district) and I like to think it was because of my smiling face and my "Lancaster for Obama" pin wishing everyone a good day.

My trout lily (Erythronium americanum) bloomed for the first time. Actually, they aren't my trout lillies, I didn't plant them. I've noted the foliage every year that we've had the house, but never seen a bloom. There were three this spring, although I was unable to get a shot of any of them fully open. The leaves really do look like a speckled trout's back.

Spring so far

2008-04-09T12:54:00.009-04:00

I suck. I know. I've been busy. Really, really busy for like three and a half months. Ok, not really. But it seemed like it. To me anyway. Okay, that isn't so true either. I just haven't felt like it. There. So here is what I've been up to:

I got four new chickens! One of my Plymouth Barred Rocks died in March. She molted late and just never really seemed to get her strength back. After a few days in chicken intensive care she gave up the ghost. I watched the other chickens for a few weeks for signs of disease and they were fine and healthy, so I got four more Barred Rocks. These little girls are about 4 weeks old now, they were two weeks old when I bought them. Hopefully no roosters in the bunch.

I lost thirty five pounds! I got sick in January and was on antibiotics for awhile. This particular antibiotic killed my appetite entirely and I literally had to remind myself to eat every day. So that resulted in about 15 pounds lost which is as good of a jump start as you get, and I've kept on going. Yay me!

I've developed rats. Sometime in February I noticed the chicken feed going faster than usual. And then one fateful night in late March I came face to face with a surprisingly large rat in the chicken house one night. It was reddish brown and not at all shy. So I bought some poison and shoved it down some holes that were chewed into the chicken house floor behind some flowerpots and waited. On Sunday, I strolled across the yard towards the chicken house and there sitting in the sun was that very large rat. Sort of struggling to breathe. I felt kind of bad. I know, its a rat. But still. So I went to get a stick to poke around at it a little, never having been that close to a rat. And when I returned my husband was standing there with a shovel poised over his head which then came down hard on the rat's head and rat was no more. I felt really bad. The next day I read on Wikipedia that rats are self-aware like humans and primates and that their favorite food is scrambled eggs. And I felt worse. I hope there aren't any more rats.

My tree is starting to bud out! A bit slower than the silver and red maples that we have, but that's okay! As long as it does.

My garlic has all sprouted!

mah new tree

2008-01-07T12:48:00.000-05:00

During the summer of 2007 you may remember that we had to have a tree cut down. This huge silver maple, over 100-years old, was exhibiting signs of decay. And since it was such a large tree, we were really concerned about the damage it could do should it come down in a storm. It sat at the corner of our driveway and the street, blocking the driveway and the garage part of the house from the morning sun. When it was gone, the void that was created was immense. We really felt exposed and it just looked awful to have nothing there anymore.

So in September we went and picked out a new tree to be planted in that space. We purchased an Autumn Blaze Maple, a red maple-silver maple hybrid that is a moderately fast grower but without the weakness of a full silver maple. And we wanted a good-sized tree, something that will have immediate presence. It will have awesome fall color and it has good salt and drought tolerance.

And then we waited. They said they plant big trees in December, so all through the holidays I was hoping we would have a tree planting. But nothing. And then this morning, as I was getting ready to leave for work, I saw a tree pull up outside. Yay!

I cannot wait to watch this tree blossom and leaf out in spring and shade our driveway in the summer and give color to our home in the fall. The Autumn Blaze gets approximately 50 feet tall with a 40 foot spread. I'm so excited about a tree!

Moving on

2007-12-26T11:24:00.000-05:00

I hope everyone had a great Christmas! Mine was nice but I'm sort of glad it's all over. Every year just seems a little more rushed and hectic than the last. Or maybe that is just me. I almost want to just celebrate Solstice instead because that makes the biggest difference in my life. The mood elevation from just knowing that daylight will increase gradually each and every day for the next six months is amazing. I still like New Years though. No gifts, not much craziness (we don't even stay up for it anymore). Just a sense of a clean slate and a new beginning. What will 2008 be like? What do I want it to be? Things to ponder in the waning days of '07.

cold

2007-12-17T10:42:00.000-05:00

A few years ago I spent a lot of money on a pair of neoprene waders. And even though I only have cause to wear them a few times a year, there are times when they are worth their weight in gold. Seriously. Especially last week. A few days in Pike County Pennsylvania doing stream work in water that was 1.4 degrees C. That is 34 degrees F. Really, reallllllly cold. But I stayed warm for the most part. Except for when we have to measure cobbles and boulders submerged in the stream to determine how fast that stream gets going during peak flows (the size of the material moved tells us that). I don't have elbow length neoprene gloves. Plunging your bare arm in water that is barely above freezing is like one million little knives stabbing your flesh and then you stop feeling anything. I feel cold just looking at these pictures again. But it was a pleasant experience overall. A stream in wintertime, especially with waterfalls and ice coating the bedrock walls is a calming thing. And a cleansing thing in a way. Cyndy, this is Saw Creek in Lehman Township, near Winona Falls. Is that near you?

Speaking of ice, we've had two ice storms in the last few days. No snow, but tons of ice and wind. There are lots of limbs and sticks to pick up and I think I lost about half of a very large butterfly bush. I really don't like ice and I have a feeling that we will be seeing a lot of it this winter season.

One week and counting and I still have a few gifts to buy but nothing terrible. This month went crazy fast, not helped I guess by being out of town for awhile. I'm looking forward to having off for a few days. Hopefully there won't be any ice.

first snow

2007-12-06T15:54:00.000-05:00

We had our first snow yesterday. Only a few inches but enough to cause a normally 30 minute commute into nearly an hour and a half. But I guess that always happens the first few snows of the season. People have to get a little refresher before things run smoothly.

It was pretty, but I'll be glad when it is gone. I am really not a snow person. The chickens are really not that happy about it either. All the girls have moulted and regrown their feathers except for one. Violet started moulting over the weekend and this will be a cold few weeks for her. Poor chook.

Next week I get to go away for a few days to far northeastern PA and do stream characterization. Stream work in December is fun. Getting your hands wet when it is in the 30's isn't something I look forward to.

I haven't started Christmas shopping. I bought Christmas cards but they are still sitting where I put them in the middle of November. I have this awful feeling that the next few weeks are going to go really, really fast.

Sorry

2007-11-26T12:23:00.000-05:00

so, so, sorry to have turned my back and let this place go for almost two months. I am terrible. Everything just got so busy all of a sudden....all of the things to do outside before cold weather set in, things for work, just so much stuff. So now everything is put to bed outside. Things that needed to get in the ground before freezing temps set have been comfy now for awhile. Seeds were saved (although some San Marzano seeds still have to be mailed), pots and birdbaths and patio furniture were put away, plants brought inside....everything on the list has been crossed off.

And then Thanksgiving. Oy. I hope everyone had a nice one. Mine was nice. A lot of work for people I'm not quite convinced appreciate it, but nice. And the neices helped me put up the tree and all the decorations last Friday. So I"m all ready to go for the holidays and it isn't even December yet!

Indian Summer

2007-10-05T14:57:00.001-04:00

I guess it's Indian Summer anyway. 80 plus degrees today and high 80s over the weekend and into at least the middle of next week. Overnight lows in the high 50s to low 60s. I always though Indian Summer came later though, cause this is just still....well....summer. Whatever, I'm not complaining. I wish it could be like this until Thanksgiving.

Not in my garden

2007-10-01T11:07:00.000-04:00

Awhile ago, Kim at Blackswamp Girl did a post on things in other people's gardens that you can appreciate, but that you would never want to have in your own garden. Well, I've been thinking about it for a few weeks, and on Saturday I went shopping with a friend to Waterloo Gardens in Exton (super plant selection and a clearance section to.die.for) and was able to further flesh out my list. I bought a bunch of stuff too and will post about that later this week. And be forewarned that I sometimes cross the line into things that, if I were Queen, would never be in anybody's garden. Here is my list.

1. Boxwood. They are pretty. I can appreciate them. I know that they are finicky and to have a substantial boxwood hedge takes patience and a substantial green thumb. They are an investment and I've even heard that they smell like money. Ummmmm.....no. They smell like cat pee. Actually reek of cat pee. And for that reason, will never plant one in my yard.

2. Hibiscus. The fact that they are so tropical looking bothers me for some reason. This isn't Bali Hai, this is South Central Pennsylvania. They look fake somehow. Just wrong in this area. Florida? Texas? Southern California? Okay. But really not for mid-Atlantic gardens.

3. A television, mini-fridge, dishwasher, or other appliance that should be inside. I look at a lot of gardening magazines, shows, blogs, etc. This trend of making 'outdoor kitchen rooms' is ridiculous. A grill is fine. A little wine refrigerator and a flat screen television that rises out of a cleverly concealed chest is insane and basically indicates that the individual is not worth knowing.

4. Sweet Woodruff. Something that is in my garden that I desperately want not to be. Oh how I wish that I had never met this plant. And I fear I will never get rid of it. I had this lovely area of Hostas at the front of my house. All different shapes and sizes and colors. A great study in green. Some were then when we moved in 5 years ago and I added some as well. IN the beginning there was a tiny little area of Sweet Woodruff under these hostas. How pretty in the spring, with the bright green of the Woodruff and the new, shiny hosta leaves unfolding. And it has that lovely scent when stepped on. So I transplanted it, spreading it out more evenly among the Hostas. And it looked pretty for two or three more years. This year it went haywire. Forming a dense mat that some of the hostas couldn't even get through. And the hostas that could get through were apparently robbed of any and all moisture. This lovely blue-leaved specimen is no more. This plant should be on the invasive list!

5. David Austin Roses. I love them. They are beautiful and they smell lovely. But you know how when you are dating, and you realize that certain people are simply out of your league? Well these roses are out of my league. I feel like I wouldn't treat them right, and to have something that beautiful die by my hands is just not something I could stand. So I admire them from afar and know that those roses are simply too good for me.

6. Topiary. Again, something I absolutely admire. When you see a formal home and there are these beautifully maintained, clean, sharp shrubs trimmed in a myriad of shapes, it is truly something to behold. But I am not disciplined enough to keep up with something that high maintenance and I don't live in a formal looking house. So no topiaries for me.

7. Barberry. Pretty. Great color. I had a guinea pig named Bear as a child and sometimes I would bring him outside to get some air. And he would escape whatever enclosure I had him in and go straight for the barberry hedge in between our house and the house next door. And I would spend the next hour reaching around the barberry searching for Bear, getting cut up from the thorns. No Barberry for me.

8. Trumpet Vine. Another thing I have that I sincerely wish I didn't. Our front porch is partially covered with lattice. When we moved in, it was entirely covered with Trumpet Vine. It was splitting the wooden lattice everywhere and growing up the roof and covering the satellite and was just a mess. And it never bloomed. In three years, never a bloom. A former homeowner even admitted that the vine had never bloomed. So we replaced the lattice and cut that vine down. I posioned the stump hoping to never see that vine again. It won't die. It comes up all over the flower bed, in the lawn, even at the base of a tree 30 feet away. Evil nasty plant. Yet when I see it happily climbing a fence, abloom with fiery red tubular flowers, I appreciate it.

9. Stella D'oro Daylilies. One of the things that I would ban from anyone's yard were I queen. Totally overused and abused by landscaper, both residential and commercial, in our area.

10. Vinca and myrtle. At some point, someone must have had pots with these plants in the or planted myrtle as a groundcover now long gone. Both of these have escaped and now every year am constantly pulling them out of random spots. I can't kill them. They won't die. Yet a bed of myrtle carpeting the base of a tree is pretty. I'm not sure that I can ever appreciate vinca though. And the same goes with Pachysandra. Sometimes it looks pretty. But it is waaaayyyy overdone and hard to extirpate once established.

serendipitous

2007-09-28T13:59:00.000-04:00

Show me some color!

This is a volunteer Grandpa Ott morning glory and some sweet potato vine. I have a planter between the garage doors in which I planted the sweet potato vine and some orange french marigolds. Well, the marigolds didn't do too well and were puny and stick like by mid-July (not enough sun apparently) but the vine was doing very well. So it looked like a wire work trough with giant chartreuse ears.

Enter the morning glories from seed in the gravel of the driveway. The vined themselves up and over that planter and we came home from vacation we were treated to this lovely mound of foliage:

I don't think I'll ever have to buy seed for GrandPa Otts' again. I like morning glories, but they are frustrating plants to grow. They never grow well where you plant them, only seeming to do well from escaped seed. And they never get started until at least the middle of August here in the mid-Atlantic.

And here is a shot of orange just because. I went to Cabela's this week (it was on the way home from a jobsite) and bought a whole bunch of orange things seeing as how it is almost orange season here in PA. Ha. I got a fuzzy fleece hat and a pair of those mitten where the ends fold back and there are fingerless gloves underneath, and a long sleeve t-shirt, and a fleece jacket. There was a really cool hooded fleece winter coat that was this nubby fleece that sort of reminded you of an orange Cookie Monster and I loved it. But it was really expensive for a fleece coat and I just couldn't justify it. And it was very very orange. Almost as orange as this Tithonia here.

And something else I am realllyyyyyy excited about: In 1992 or 1993, my ex-boyfriend and I had a subscription to Outside Magazine and in it, we read an article by John Krakauer about a hiker named Chris McCandless who, after forsaking all matieral things and turning his back on society, crossed the country, headed into Alaska and atempted to live on his own. He ended up starving to death, but his story was still really inspiring. Krakauer turned the article into a book called Into the Wild in 1995, which I have read many times, and gave to my husband when we first started dating. Now it is a movie, directed by Sean Penn and it opens Oct. 5. Here is sort of a trailer. I cannot wait to see this movie. And the soundtrack is awesome as well. Entirely done by Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam. I love the entire thing. So go read the book! Listen to the music! You'll love it.

Autumnal Equinox

2007-09-21T11:00:00.000-04:00

So summer ends this weekend. The frost warning earlier in the week has thankfully given way to overnight temps in the low 50s and every morning is thick with fog. The grain elevator at the farm behind us is going 24-7 and some mornings with the fog, it makes it sound as if it is in the backyard. Fog does funny things with sound. The farmer started taking the corn down last night, so our days of having a wind block are numbered. But I do like how the landscape opens up again.

This morning there were dew-covered spider webs everywhere and Emmett was barking at all the big ones for some reason. I wonder what he thought they were. I'm sort of getting into the fall spirit, but am also very sad to see another summer end. The next one always seems so far away.

I will probably break down and buy pumpkins over the weekend and lots of apples. The chickens will appreciate the banged up ones. I should also probably make chicken corn soup before the last of the sweet corn is gone, which will be any day now. And order garlic to plant. My garlic harvest wasn't that great and I hesitate to plant mediocre bulbs for next year. I don't think I'm going to plant any flower bulbs. I suspect many of mine were the victims of underground marauders earlier this summer so I need to see what I have left before I add more. I still have a few plants and shrubs to get into the ground. Isn't that awful? I was stressing about potatoes and lima beans but was happy to receive advice that both can be left until later and will be fine.

career change

2007-09-19T13:32:00.001-04:00

I've become a fireman. Firewoman? Well, no not really. I was doing haz-waste work at a fire station in Philadelphia yesterday and they were kind enough to let me play dress up in their duds. I didn't don the pants or the boots though. I was paranoid that the alarm would go off and I wouldn't be able to get them off in time. Really interesting to be around a fire station with paid firemen instead of the volunteer fire companies I grew up with. I also went home with a load of Wissahickon Schist, a stone native to the Philadelphia area and used in the foundation of the original firehouse (built in the 1800s) which we unearthed in the course of our hazwaste investigation. Fun day.

Garden Neglect

2007-09-17T11:31:00.000-04:00

I've been avoiding my garden. Ever since we got back from vacation I barely even walk in there. I just kind of cast sideways glances at it as I walk by, afraid to see the waste amidst the weeds. It was a little weedy when I left but when I got back....well, it was a jungle. A jungle littered with overripe, half eaten tomatoes. And some really huge grasshoppers.

Oh the tomato carnage......so many, many tomatoes wasted. I started picking some last evening just before dark, but there were just too many. Cherry tomatoes and Sungolds as far as the eye could see. Honestly, I'm kind of sick of tomatoes. We were supposed to get a frost last night, and even though I am horrified at the thought of frost in the middle of September, I was almost hopeful that I would wake up to brown, limp tomato plants. See, out of my hands. An act of God. I didn't have time to save them. That isn't what happened. There were all still there, shining happily in the sunshine this morning as I let the chickens out. Undoubtedly ripening more tomatoes.

The most guilt inducing are the San Marzanos. For most of August I was processing a flat every few days. My freezer is full of sauce made with just San Marzanos and basil. Absolutely the best paste tomato I've ever grown. And I'll grow it every year from now on. Just prolific as heck and super vigorous plants. And it is still producing and I feel horribly guilty for each and every fruit that drops off into the mulch below. The tomato Gods will punish me next year with a terrible tomato crop I'm sure.

Something of a rant

2007-09-13T09:47:00.000-04:00

I am 37 years old. I don't think that is that old, yet I feel old. Why do I feel old? It has nothing to do with joint pain or gray hair (although those are appearing with greater frequency). I feel old because I am just not understanding people anymore. Not like hearing wise, but why people do what they do.

What do I mean?

Okay, I've been going to the 'beach' for vacation all of my life pretty much. When I was a little kid, my aunt and uncle lived in Stone Harbor, NJ. My parents and I went frequently to visit. I don't remember much about those days, but I do remember lots of beach going, taking walks, cooking seafood, and just hanging out. As an older child, we went to beaches at the southern end of North Carolina. There were three kids, my parents, and usually my grandfather. We swam, we fished, we rode rafts (there were no boogie boards then), built sand castles, etc. In the evening, we played cards or other games or walked on the beach with a flashlight to find ghost crabs, scaring the crap out of my brother by finding really big ones and then turning off the light. We didn't watch television, although there always was one in the living room. These were fun times. The houses we stayed in had modest bedrooms, a big living area, a functional kitchen. The things we most cared about were the view, decks, and screened porches. We wanted to be outside as much as possible.

So, fast forward to about ten or twelve years ago when I started going to the Outer Banks of North Carolina. My husband and I pretty much do the same. Swim, kayak, sit on the beach, read, cook lots of seafood, maybe fish or crab or dig for clams. We don't need much. The first year we went together we stayed in a little two-bedroom beach cottage on Pamlico Sound in Ocracoke. It was perfect. There was a screened porch you could ballroom dance in. But someone bought it and made it private so we had to find a new house. Since then, there are no more two bedroom cottages. People buy them and tear them down and build monstrosities. We rattle around in a four bedroom place simply because that is the smallest there is with a great location that accepts dogs. But four bedrooms is fine, because that is what most people need. Location is, to us, the most important thing. And privacy. The house we've been renting was perfect for both location and privacy.

Until this year. The photo is of a house under construction next to where we stay. It will have 8 master suites and 10 bathrooms (all on septic I might add) and sleep 16-20 people (also a bunk room for the children). The little building next to it is an auxillary cooking and eating area. That's right. A separate kitchen and eating BUILDING!

This isn't an anomaly though. There are several under construction up and down the Buxton area. And this is just the next step in what has been going on for the last several years. The constant construction of these giant vacation homes. Realty ads down there now picture 4 or 5 bedroom homes for sale and mention that you could buy it and tear down cause the lot is permitted for up to 9 bedrooms.

So we won't rent the house we love anymore because I really don't want to be next door to this. I just imagine a lot of noise, and lights, and cars and not a very relaxing vacation. And I am confused. Maybe it is just me, but I really don't consider going on vacation with up to 19 other people relaxing. I just don't understand these huge homes. And then I pick up a little informational package for homeowners that rent their homes, prepared by out realty agency. It provided a list of what today's vacation home renter wants and needs. It mentioned a pool (almost every oceanfront and soundfront home now has a pool), foosball table or pool table, Xbox or Wii system, flatscreen and DVD IN EVERY ROOM, wireless internet and some kind of computer, multiple kitchen appliances (like two refrigerators, two dishwashers, etc.), a hot tub, DVD library, etc. There are even multiple beachfront homes with private, stadium style movie theaters in the house. Am I alone in thinking this is crazy?

The house we stayed in was situated at the end of a dead end road with two other rentals. One of these rentals is an outrageously equipped home like I just described. It is on the sound and comes with canoes and kayaks and has a great dock. We rarely saw the people staying there the first week of out vacation. They simply never came outside. On the day they left, there were children getting into cars that I had never seen before. Because they had never come outside. What the hell has happened in the last 10 or 15 years? I feel like an 80 year-old railing against push-button phones. I seriously don't get it.

I'm back!

2007-09-12T12:45:00.000-04:00

Well, bless your hearts. I am so sorry to have worried anyone. You are all such dears for worrying about me. I am fine and all is well. I was vacationing on Hatteras for two weeks and before that, a fellow coworker was leaving after 15 years and bestowing me with mucho work and instruction, and then I just got back from a few days in Connecticut for work. So, whew! Two thirds of the east coast in a short amount of time.

But I am back and fully recharged and ready to accept that it is pretty nearly fall and summer is over and I'm okay with that, honest I am. Okay, not really. When I saw what appeared to be trees with leaves that WERE CHANGING!!!!.........along I-95 in Connecticut, I really wanted to believe that they were diseased or something instead, because, heh, it is entirely too early for that stuff yet. I'm still getting used to the absence of haze and the odd crystal clear quality of the light and the fact that I can no longer pull weeds at 9 p.m., or 8p.m., or really even 7p.m. anymore for that matter. And people, it is so NOT TIME FOR PUMPKINS YET!!!!!!

So now I have to go back and read several weeks of y'alls blogs (see, two weeks down south does that to a person) and catch up. And I do have much to say and lots of pictures to share and I swear I will be better about posting.

One Local Summer: Week 7

2007-08-10T10:52:00.001-04:00

We had thunderstorms all day yesterday and most of the evening, dropping the temperature roughly 20 degrees, making this meal possible. No way I'm boiling pasta when it's so hot I'm sweating in the house.

So I only make this a few times a year, because it isn't exactly healthy. But oh my is it good. My sheepnose pimientoes (those little red pepper looking things) are coming in pretty fast now, along with another kind of pimiento (the short, oblong to the left), and I think some Relleno chiles which are very sweet and mild. I combine these with a Pennsylvania Simply Sweet Onion (grown in PA but I don't know where), my garlic, my basil, and cook down until soft. Then it gets pureed and added to......cream (from Shady Acres in Etown). Served over pasta (not local ingred., but made and distributed by New World Pasta in Harrisburg, PA). And the freshly grated, aged Parmesan wasn't local either, but there just isn't a decent source. The Naughty Marietta red wine was local though, with the vineyard less than 5 miles from me.

Very, very, very good.

Special thanks to a former co-worker of mine whose wife is Italian and supplied me with some splendid recipes for ripe, red peppers several years ago. This is easily one of my favorite summer meals, and it just doesn't taste right the rest of the year.

Killer tomato

2007-08-08T14:41:00.000-04:00

Dudes, check this out! Monster tomato, with a quarter for scale. And it was a suprise. I hadn't seen it growing. It was way, way inside a Constoluto Genovese plant. And I was reaching around in there and grabbing ahold of whatever looked ripe and pulled this thing out! Ha. It will be dinner tonight. I am picking serious tomatoes. In the last three days, 34 quarts and 4 pints. I have some serious canning to do with my deluge of San Marzanos. And I am making nice money with the tomato stand.

In other news, our Silver Maple was finally cut down on Monday. They didn't even give us any notice. So when I pulled out of the driveway Monday morning I had no idea it would be the last time I would see it. Our yard looks like it was bombed where that tree stood. And I feel very exposed. The sun really beats down in the morning and it just feels very open to the street. Husband is also freaked out about it and agreed to spend a good bit of money towards fall to have a substantial tree installed. It was for the best as almost all of the large limbs were hollow inside, but I seriously miss its leafy treeness.

Kitt tagged me for the seven random garden things meme and I am slowly compiling some items. Key word is slowly. It is 96 degrees here....feeling like 104. I break out in perspiration 5 minutes out of the shower. I don't like being sweaty. Still won't break down and get a.c. though husband is seriously tempted. It will be fall soon enough I'm afraid. I saw a garden center advertise mums on the way home. Good lord.

I'm still here

2007-07-31T14:12:00.000-04:00

I haven't disappeared. I just have been very busy with work and garden stuff and when I stop for a minute to catch my breath, I find I don't really have much to say.

I put the tomato stand up over the weekend. This is a photo from last year, but same stand....just different tomatoes. I've almost made enough that the tomatoes have paid for themselves, so that is nice.

I'm embarassed that I missed OLS again, but I keep waiting to make these wonderful meals, and it just isn't happening. I'm pretty much existing on the following: either cantelope (from Nissley farms, 5 miles) or blackberries (my yard) for breakfast, my own cucumbers in that Basic Su dressing I blogged about a while back and tomatoes and a peach (Masonic Homes) for lunch, and tomatoes with basil and fresh mozzarella and olive oily croutons with balsamic for dinner. We're talking almost every day. It doesn't make for good reading.

I seriously could eat a bucket of those cukes in that Su dressing. Really refreshing in the heat and humidity if they are really chilled. But at the rate I'm going I won't have any pickles to put up. Not that I have the time right now to do any canning anyway.

I can't believe it is august already. Summer is rapidly winding down and I think I'm also getting a little sad about that. Maybe that is why I don't have that much to say right now. Anyway, I'm still here and will read and comment on your blogs as I find time.

Catching up

2007-07-23T11:17:00.000-04:00

Oh, I missed OLS 4. I ate mostly local last week, but I kept thinking that later in the week I would make this really great meal of roasted veggies (from the garden) and friend polenta (with corn meal from Manheim, PA) and some fabulous fruit dessert......and well, that never happened. And I should have taken some pictures of our more plebian fare earlier in the week . Oh well.

Back to the mushrooms..through a business relationship, a coworker came in on Monday afternoon with some fresh baby portabella mushrooms for me from Kennett Square. I had discussed the whole chinese mushroom thing with him and he happened that day to be around an owner of a mushroom house, so he asked him about it. Turns out most canned mushrooms come from China. And China is allowed to use formaldehyde in its mushroom growing process. We aren't allowed to use it in the United States. China also uses human waste in the compost that they grown their mushrooms on....another thing that is a no-no in the United States. So check those labels and use fresh when possible, most of which are grown in the United States. I didn't use those canned mushrooms in a local meal, but now I'm tempted to throw them out and not use them ever. Formaldehyde? Human Waste? ewwww.

Those fresh mushrooms were grilled that evening in an aluminum foil packet with local butter and I ate them on one of those grass-fed burgers from Masonic Homes with a side of sweet corn and the best white peaches I have ever had in my entire life. Plebian maybe, and the pretty much the same as I meal I already used in OLS, but darn good all the same.

And on Saturday I hit a milestone. I have never been a tomato person. I hated them for years, only tolerating them cooked, or really diced up small in a salsa. Then after college, I started to get the gardening bug a little and planted a cherry tomato or two every summer. I ate them on salads and enjoyed them. But I still could not tolerate a giant slice of tomato on a sandwhich. Yuck. Since we've moved to our house, I've planted a lot of tomatoes every year. Too many. And I gradually started to enjoy bigger tomatoes, especailly in a caprese salad. Of course anything with mozarella cheese and basil will taste good I suppose. I'd look at a big old heirloom tomato and really, really want to enjoy just biting into it. But I just wasn't there yet. I mostly sold them or gave them away.

But Saturday I decided to make a BLT. I had goregeous garlic clove studded bread from Central Market and pepper bacon and lettuce left over from Masonic Homes the week before and my Brandywines had ripened (pictured unripe here cause I am lazy and didn't take a picture before I sliced into them). So I whipped up some homemade mayo, toasted that bread and stared into that sandwich with those big huge slices of tomato. And I took a bite. And I loved it. And all my tomatoes issues just disappeared.

I heart orange

2007-07-20T13:20:00.001-04:00

Maybe it is age. I'm not sure. As I get older I am drawn to more vibrant colors. My current favorite is orange. I love it. I love orange flowers, orange clothes, orange food, everything orange. Everyday when I get home I changed clothes and put on a pair of orange Crocs. Yesterday I had a matching orange shirt on. And I wore an orange hat during field work. On Tuesday I ordered a flaming orange halter swim top from Lands End which I will wear on vacation while kayaking in my orange Crocs. I hope they have an orange kayak.

After years of wearing a lot of black and brown, it feels strange to me to be drawn to these vibrant colors. I even have started liking bright spring green. How cool will my orange halter swimsuit look with a pair of lime green swim shorts? Or a poppy red swim bottom? I keep thinking of that Sandra Martz book about being an old woman and wearing purple. I can totally see it happening.

Peaches!

2007-07-16T12:46:00.001-04:00

The trip to Masonic Homes farm market this week was extra special. They had their first peaches in!!!! And plums! And still some cherries! And while I contemplate some fabulous desert combining all of them, I'm really just very happy eating a peach just as it is. Although last night I sliced one and ate it with my Black Raspberry sorbet on top. Very good. And look at all my veggies! See my adorable little lemon cucumber? Anyone have any cool recipes for lemon cucumbers? They will probably be made into pickles anyway.

This time of year is awesome. I buy hardly anything at the grocery store. Basically kitty food and husband food like soda and frozen pizza. Can you imagine having all these fresh things and prefering to eat frozen pizza? Neither can I.

Recipe Request

2007-07-13T10:55:00.000-04:00

Pennie asked for the pimiento cheese recipe previously. Note that you can spell it pimento and pimiento. I've written about Pimento Cheese before but I never tire of it. My recipe is an amalgamation of two of the finalists in the Southern Foodways Alliance 2003 Pimento Cheese Invitational. That is right. There was a Pimento Cheese Invitational. SFA is an awesome website if you like reading about southern food and the relationship people in the south have with their food. I wish I had been born in the south sometimes. I dream about taking long drives to visit eccentric relatives with a picnic lunch of cold fried chicken, deviled eggs, and thick slices of devil's food cake. All of you who actually live in the south are probably like "uh, yeah, that never happens" but I can dream. The best pimiento cheese sandwich I have ever had was from the Fig Tree Bakery in Ocracoke, North Carolina. When we used to vacation there, we'd stop at this bakery on the way to the beach to get sandwiches for lunch. I'd tuck my wax paper wrapped treasure into the basket of my big old beachbike next to a few old-timey Cokes in glass bottles and off we'd go. Munching on pimento cheese with your feet dug into the sand on Ocracoke Island is pretty close to pure bliss. I know, I'm weird.

Many of the recipes I have seen recommend homemade mayonnaise. I second this recommendation. It makes a big difference. In lieu of homemade, Dukes (you lucky southerners you!) is probably the best and then Hellman's. And bonus points if you eat it on toasted slices of homemade bread with the crusts cut off. I also like to eat it with those really thin sesame crackers you can get at the grocery store.

These were the three finalists in the SFA competition and this is basically Nana's recipe with amounts tailored to my taste:

One pound extra sharp cheddar (preferably yellow. I just think Pimiento cheese should be yellow)

1 4 oz. jar pimientos, undrained

onion powder

cayenne pepper

worcestershire sauce

pinch sugar

2/3 cup mayo

Hand grate the cheddar with a box grater. Dice up pimientos a little but not so much that they completely disappear. Combine all rest of ingredients together, adding spices to taste. I think I add a little salt and pepper too. Yummy.

I have yet to try it grilled though. The photo is from the website Road Food and was taken at the Henpeck Market in Frankline Tennessee. All reviewers agreed that the grilled pimiento cheese sandwich was the standout at the eatery. How good does that look?

OLS 3

2007-07-10T15:27:00.001-04:00

I'm not sure what I did this year to the garden. I think it may have been dumping chicken manure on it all winter long. Or maybe the stars just lined up this year for produce at my particular parallel. People, I have a scary amount of produce. I planted a ton of squash and zucchini. Because I usually am besieged by squash bugs and am lucky to harvest two or three before the plants are chewed to oblivion or wilt. This year I planted all the squash seeds I had. Two different yellow squash and two different zucchini. Something like 20 plants. Not a squash bug in sight. I have full size bell peppers already. I planted a ton of tomatoes. The scariest of all are the San Marzanos. Tough tomatoes to grow many people said. No disease resistance. So I planted five. Each of these plants must have 50 green tomatoes on it. And they will all ripen at once. I eye them with fear in my heart as I pass them by. One day soon, with little warning, they will be ready and I will be rushing to can them on some hot sticky day in August.

For now, I enjoy the Sungolds and the Juliets, which do not overwhelm, but deal out a steady trickle of sun ripened fruit. They figure into my 3rd OLS meal which was brunch on Sunday. Eggs are mine, tomatoes are mine, strawberry jam is mine (made with strawberries from Masonic Homes). Butter is from Shady Acres, bacon was from Hummer's Meats in Mount Joy (made from Lancaster County pigs) and toast was made from Martin's Potato Bread, made in Chambersburg, PA.

An interesting note. I was going to make a mushroom omelet, since we live approx. 60 miles or so from Kennet Square, Pennsylvania, otherwise known as the mushroom capital of the world, growers of 50% of the mushrooms consumed in this country. There are mushroom houses everywhere and many, many different growers. So I got my can of mushrooms out. The one called Pennsylvania Dutchman, with the little outline of the United States on it. And just as I was about to open the can, I saw the most peculiar thing on the back of the label. Product of China.

So then I grabbed the Giorgio Mushrooms. I have done work for the Giorgio company at a previous job. I have delivered wetland reports to their offices and have been given boxes of pure white button mushrooms as a thank you. I know that they grow tons of mushrooms in Chester County. I've seen them. Same thing on that can. Product of China. Very, very strange.

Hot

2007-07-10T14:42:00.000-04:00

Pretty view, isn't it? It is the Susquehanna up around Wilkes Barre/Scranton area. It was what I got to look at while I stood in various parking lots and examined subsurface soil borings for petroleum contamination for 12 hours yesterday. In jeans and workboots and a safety vest. Did I mention it was 97 degrees yesterday? Have you ever sweated so much that when you finally dry off, your skin feels like sandpaper from all the salt accumulated on it? I have. Yesterday.

I have said before that I do not care for air conditioning. Let me clarify that. I do not care for air conditioning when it is under....let's say....93 degrees.....and I can be in shorts and a tank-top. When it is 97 degrees and I have to peel my jeans off my body to use the bathroom and I keep getting that weird tingling sensation at the back of head (signalling that I am minutes away from heat stroke) I looooooooovvvvvve air conditioning and wish the whole world was icy and cool.

OLS 2

2007-07-05T09:59:00.001-04:00

We had a very wet fourth, how 'bout you? I don't mind the rain though. It's been really dry. Not that you can tell by the corn across the street. I think we're well past "knee high by the fourth of July", don't you?

This was Monday's meal. The husband was home and eating so I have be totally honest and admit the use of......gulp.....Shake n' Bake. Don't hate me. The pork is from our local Darrenkamp's Market which the butcher assured me came from one of several pig farmers in Lancaster County that they buy from. Corn and squash are from Masonic Homes in Elizabethtown. Squash is local and the corn is from Delaware, most of which is within my 100-mile range. The tomato

and basil salad came from the garden.

For dessert, there was the black raspberry sorbet that I made with my new ice cream maker, which I love, love, love. Black raspberries came from my garden. I made more sorbet yesterday which I will savor and ration out, as the black raspberries are over for the year. Part of the joy of eating seasonally is the anticipation of beloved fruits and vegetables coming into season, and eating as much of something as possible before the season fades away into another. Would this sorbet taste as good if I could get black raspberries all year round? I'm pretty sure it wouldn't.

2007-06-29T10:44:00.001-04:00

My nieces were down over the weekend. We went to the Marietta carnival and watched the fireworks on Saturday evening from the front porch. The corn is so darn high, some of the low ones were cut off, but still nice to have a show from your own porch. Since I have so many black raspberries still, I picked up one of those automatic Cuisinart ice cream makers (the kind you don't need ice and salt) and we made a very good black raspberry sorbet. It was so easy!

Shady Acres, the farm that I buy dairy products from recently started selling ice cream. I got peanut butter last week. Very, very good. They have Jersey (I think) cows which make really superior dairy items. The butter is out of this world. I'm excited about using their heavy cream to make black raspberry ice cream.

We had ladies luncheon last Friday at work and I made deviled eggs and pimiento cheese to bring in. I made homemade mayonnaise for the first time. That was exciting. If you haven't tried it, you must. And it is kind of magical how the emulsion just suddenly happens and what was an eggy oily slop suddenly becomes fluffy yummy mayonnaise. Much different than bottled mayo.

The inundation has begun. I put in waaaayyyy too many tomato plants this year. This week's local meal(and probably many weeks after) will figure heavily with tomatoes. And I have two eggplants!

I took the girls to see Ratatouille on Sunday so maybe I'll make something like that! It was a good movie with stunning animation, but not a movie for little, little kids. There were several in the audience that lost interest about half-way through. More of an older child and adult movie

For some reason, I'm having trouble getting YouTube videos to post to my blog. But since we were talking about art in the last post, I thought I would link to This. Very cool.

Getting to know me

2007-06-28T10:40:00.000-04:00

Ali at henbogle tagged me for

the seven things meme. So after much thought and deliberation, here are seven positively fascinating things about me. I'm kidding.

1. I watched the Library of Congress tribute to Paul Simon last night. I like Paul Simon a lot and have for a long time. When I was in 5th grade, our art teacher let my best friend and I listen to our Simon and Garfunkel records in her supply closet instead of going out to recess. I also had a pair of parakeets as a kid named Simon and Garfunkel. Suffice to say, there weren't many kids in my school that were in to Simon and Garfunkel, making me pretty much a dork.

2. I was artsy in high school and was convinced that I would live in the big city and work in advertising. After high school, I went to F.I.T. in New York City and majored in advertising design. I hated it. And I didn't realize how much I missed nature when living in the city. I left to eventually major in Biology at a state school outside of Philadelphia. Now I admire toads and stick my hands in the nether regions of chickens. Funny. I don't draw or paint much anymore and I should. The coneflower above and the chickadee are little doodles I have lying around my desk at work. Another funny thing was that there were a suprising number of women in by biology classes that had started out their schooling as art majors.

3. I have an extremely dysfunctional family and haven't spoken to any of them in over three years (mother, stepfather, sister, and brother). I haven't heard from my real father since I was 18. I had to make a deicision to remove myself from their dynamic to save my sanity. I am a much calmer person because of it. Now I just read about them in the paper.

4. Some people have a need to be around people all the time. That is not me. Lately, my favorite day of the week is Sunday. My husband works every Sunday and I get to spend the entire day reading and gardening and cooking and just general housework without ever having to open my mouth once to talk to anybody. Well, except for the dogs, cat, and chickens. I don't go anywhere except to take the dogs for a ride to get the paper in the morning and the day stretches out before me and seems to last a really long time.

5. I don't have air conditioning in my home. The older I get, the weirder this is to people apparently. I don't like air conditioning and can't see spending the money to have central air put into our house. We have a good breeze most of the time and there are only a few days a summer where it gets a little unbearable. Good thing I don't mind sweating. I don't have it in my car either. And on hot days when I am going into and out of air conditioned spaces over and over I get really tired.

6. I worry that I will regret not having children.

7. I am seriously addicted to this recipe for New York Takeout Style Cold Sesame Noodles. Yummy. Oh, and I can't stand Rachel Ray.

you ungrateful toad

2007-06-27T11:16:00.001-04:00

Really. Some amphibians!

I was weeding on Sunday with my five feathered 'helpers' and they were jumping on anything that moved. I came across this toad. He didn't even attempt to flee. And five pairs of chicken eyes spied him and moved in. Just seconds away from being pecked to messy, toady pulp, I whisked him away and carried him to an area that would be a little more secure. And how does he thank me? By letting loose a torrential toad-sized bucket of pee on my hand. Twice.

He is Bufo americanus, the American Toad. Here is what he sounds like. It makes me really happy to find things like toads in my yard, as we are pretty far from any water or wetlands and it just isn't a common occurrence.

Be careful Toad. There are five hungry ladies scratching around looking for good eats. Hell, they even eat their own kind. They'd certainly eat a toad.

OLS Meal 1

2007-06-27T11:01:00.000-04:00

Nothing terribly exciting. It has been hot and I've been busy both with work and the yard.

Local burgers from Masonic Homes, buns from Terranetti's (a local bakery in Mechanicsburg), little squash from Chicque's Roc Organic Farm (named after local Chicque's creek) in Mount Joy which were marinated in Gazebo Room Greek Dressing, also made in Mechanicsburg. And radish 'pickles' along with a seedless cucumber from Shady Acres in Elizabethtown.

The buns and dressing come from about 25 miles away and are probably not made with local ingredients, but are made by small, locally owned companies. Everything else came from within 5 miles, and the radishes came from me!

And since I've been averaging about four quarts a day of black raspberries (you should see the freezer), dessert for the evening was handfuls of berries consumed standing up as I rush to get them picked by the time the sun goes down.

I'll stop talking about chickens soon, I promise

2007-06-22T10:11:00.000-04:00

Violet. My special needs hen. When they clipped her beak when she was a mere day-old ball of fluff, they messed up. Her lower beak sticks out a good bit, making her a little slower on the take. And when competing with four other hens for a juicy bug or ripe berry, Violet usually loses out. So I always save her an extra portion and make sure she gets her share. I think the lower beak gives her sort of a pouty look. She is a friendly little gal and for some reason prefers to pal around with the two barred rocks instead of the other two Buff orps.

I've been picking a few black raspberries here and there, but it will really ramp up in the next few days. The far end of the garden, where I intended to have orderly rows of fruit bushes, has morphed into a tangled mass of black raspberries with a few blueberries and red raspberries mixed in. I remove the blackberries when they volunteer in there because I just can't abide those thorns. Raspberry thorns aren't too awful and the reward is worth the small scratches. I think my first OLS meal will have a yummy black raspberry ending.

I am not a huge radish fan. Yet I plant them every year. Probably because they are easy, pest free, and almost instantly gratifying. Yet I never knew what to do with them other than put them on salads. I've read about slicing them thin and putting them on buttered bread with salt, but that didn't seem that appetizing either. So I made Suzuke. Basically a pickle, it is sliced radishes or carrots or onions dressed with Basic Su and refrigerated. Basic Su is a Japanese sweet/sour dressing and is just one cup of sugar mixed with one cup of white vinegar and salt to taste. Really easy and really good. I can eat lots of radishes now. And I look forward to using it with cucumbers when there are ripe ones, but not quite enough to can a batch of pickles. Thanks to the Kitazawa Seed Co. Catalog for the idea. While I didn't order any seeds from them, I did hang on to the catalog because the back is filled with really interesting recipes.

Catching up

2007-06-20T11:34:00.000-04:00

So there will be no baby chicks. Saturday I walked up to the pen to let the girls out to roam and Claire was part of the pack. Something that hasn't happened in many many weeks. And she wasn't acting her broody bitchy self, biting the other chickens and strutting around with her feathers all fluffed out. She was normal.

Uh-oh, I thought. I unlocked the door to the shed, walked in and saw that there were no more eggs in the nest and that there was a pile of shells on the floor. But no yolky messes. Ewwww. So somehow the eggs were removed from the nest and broken and then apparently eaten. I saw that one egg had rolled off in the corner. It was cracked but still holding together. I took it outside where my curiosity got the best of me. I opened it up to see just how big the chick embryo was. Inside was a baby chick about a third the size of the egg. I think it was still alive. It totally freaked me out and I buried it in the compost pile. I looked at the chickens scratching the mulch from my flower beds and realized that they had consumed 11 chicken embryos and their yolk sacs. Yuck. Chickens are evil.

I thought about getting more fertile eggs, but I think Claire is happier not being broody so I don't want to cause her to be that way again. If she goes broody next year, maybe I'll get her some eggs then, but for now I'm glad she isn't spending every hot summer day in her nest box.

I've been very busy with work and haven't had much time to do much of anything. I'm excited about next week when a stream restoration project begins. I actually get to oversee the sectioning off and dewatering of several sections of stream. They pump the water from the upstream section to the next live downstream section, giving a stretch of a few hundred feet of dry streambed in which to work installing erosion protection and such. The critters get moved on Monday, so I get to help move fish and whatever else we find when the water level starts dropping. Fun!

I'm particpating in One Local Summer again this year. I hope to have an entry every week (even though most of what I've been eating is local). This year there are 100 participants, so I want to have something great every week, really reflecting my area of Lancaster County. I think I'll stick to the 100-mile radius limits, which for me goes about to Trenton, NJ to the east, a little below D.C. to the south, Altoona to the west and Scranton to the north, but mostly concentrating on my home county. This should be easy, and pretty much most of our food comes from within 10 miles of our home this time of year. So I'm starting off with good intentions. We'll see how well I follow through with the postings.

Tweet tweet. Tweetely Deetlety Deet.

2007-06-13T11:12:00.000-04:00

Baby Robin, just hanging out. I should form a committee and lobby for changing the Latin binomial for this little guy. Turdus migratorius is really kind of unfortunate. And not very fitting to this feathery little harbinger of spring.

Yesterday was a good day. Spent mostly driving all around southeastern Pennsylvania. I got an hour long tour of a quarry in Birdsboro, when all I really needed were some pictures of rocks for a stream restoration project. Still interesting though.

And I got to see MORE GOATS!!!!

A farm near where I was taking more pictures of a stream project had all these little guys. How cute!

It was all I could do to not just jump in their pen and start grabbing baby goats and just absorb all their smushy baby goaty goodness.

But then I could hear the unpleasant ruminant noises coming from the barn which housed the adult goats. Did you know that goats make this rather piggy snorting noise which is actually them burping because they eat a ton of grain and sit around and digest it? It momentarily cured my goat fever.

And since it was Tuesday, on the way home I stopped at Roots Farmers Market in Manheim. I didn't buy much. Some Swiss Chard and two quarts of homegrown berries. I'm getting a little berried out. Kind of ready for cherries and blueberries and something different.

Last week was a whirlwind of local food. Wonderful spring mix, snap peas, baby potatoes, and strawberries from Masonic Homes Orchards. Which is now also offering grass-fed, dry-aged beef. We bought some hamburger patties to try, as the cuts of steak were rather expensive and if it wasn't that great, I'd be annoyed that I spent a lot of money. We made the burgers over the weekend. Just beef, nothing added. My husband took one bite and said "Is it just me, or are these really, really good?" I thought they were fantastic as well. He thought they tasted like burgers we had when we were kids. He said he had forgotten what beef was supposed to taste like. We loved them. And probably will never buy anything else. Seriously, that good. And then there was local chicken from Shady Acres, which also had homegrown tomatoes from their hothouses. Yumm!

More chickens!

2007-06-11T10:22:00.000-04:00

I had a few days off at the end of last week. And in addition to getting caught up (ha!) with the garden and cleaning the house, and all the other things that pile up, I went to visit my rooster. He is doing well at Meadowview Apiary and is king of his own little harem. When the owner asked about my own hens, I said they were doing fine except that one was broody off and on. He asked me if I wanted to hatch some of Roo's fertilized eggs! He gave me a dozen and I am free to keep all the hatched chicks or give them back. I will probably give them back. Well, maybe I'll just keep one. Or two.

Anyway, when I got home with the dozen eggs and put them in a pile, Claire was beside herself and hopped on and hasn't willingly budged since. I pull her off every afternoon to make sure she eats something and runs around a little. It will be interesting to have newly hatched chicks with a mother hen.

The owner of Meadowview Apiary (in addition to bees) has so many chickens and turkeys and ducks, I can't imagine keeping track of them all.

Thank goodness he didn't offer me any of these to take home. Cause I totally would have.

I am such a dork

2007-06-04T16:39:00.001-04:00

Apologies to Harry McClintock, the first known person to record this song. Click here if you aren't familiar with Big Rock Candy Mountain.

I give to you "Big Mulch Chicken Mountain".

Ha.

One evenin’ as the sun went down and the garden I was waterin’
O’er the yard came a fat Barred Rock who said woman I’m not roostin’
I’m headin for a land that’s far away beside the rooster fountain
So come with me and we’ll go and see the Big Mulch Chicken Mountain

At the Big Mulch Chicken Mountain there’s a yard that’s fair and bright
Where the hornworms grow on bushes and you roost out every night
Where the nest boxes are all roomy and the sun shines every day
On the tender lettuce leaves and the earthworm trees
Where the cool water springs and the Orpingtons sing
At the Big Mulch Chicken Mountain

At the Big Mulch Chicken Mountain all the hawks have broken wings
All the raccoons’ teeth are missing and the snakes are tiny things
The farmers trees are full of fruit hanging just off of the ground
Oh, I’m bound to go where there ain’t no snow
Where the rain don’t fall and the wind don’t blow
At the Big Mulch Chicken Mountain

At the Big Mulch Chicken Mountain the hens can all soar high
Your feathers never all fall out and there’s no such thing as pot pie
There’s plenty of gravel for your gizzard with cracked corn mixed right in
I’m goin’ to stay where you scratch all day
The bugs never end, a fine place for a hen
At the Big Mulch Chicken Mountain

I make my own self laugh.

Scuttlebutt

2007-06-04T10:24:00.000-04:00

So I got a fun new toy for my birthday recently. A Canon A630! I still have to tinker with it and learn to use it more effectively. And figure out how to lower the resolution cause the photos are HUGE.

Sorry if that bogged everybody down.

We have had two wonderful days of rain so far and the weeds are quickly gaining ground in the garden. Tonight I have to get out there and put down newspaper and straw in the tomato/pepper/eggplant area. Everything is coming up nicely, but the entire snap pea crop was lost to the groundhog(s) that live under the chicken shed. Seems we had an agreement these last few years, but this year somebody apparently feels entitled. They haven't touched anything else though. Yet. I have a few days off coming up and it might be the perfect time to discuss relocating with this varmint family.

My grandfather's peonies. Every year they get bigger and happier looking. After not blooming for so many years due to shade, they bloom their hearts out for me now. And they have a nice fragrance.

Spring is almost past us and it seemed to speed by very fast this year. The farmer planted the field behind us in corn this spring and every day I look out from the second floor to see that it has grown a little more. Sneakily covering a little more dirt. It is like a giant hour glass ticking down the days of warm weather and freaks me out a little bit, a big huge reminder of the passing of time. Barley does not have this effect on me. Nor do soybeans.

Mockingbirds

2007-05-31T13:29:00.000-04:00

We are currently overrun with mockingbirds. They were dropping from the sky on Sunday while I was spreading mulch (actually dropping from their nest in the crabapple tree), watching me weed while perched on a tomato cage in the garden, treating us to serenades at all hours of the day. The picture is of the one of the three babies that fledged on Sunday. It didn’t survive. Don’t think I’m morbid for photographing a recently deceased bird. I just like to get a really close look at them. I noticed they have attractive black whiskers and wonder what they are for. I was surprised by the size of the fledglings.

We have the Northern Mockingbird (Mimus polyglottos) living among us and it is one of my favorite birds. For the past three years it was a single male. Never any babies. Well apparently this spring a lady mocker showed up and I’ve also seen other adult mockingbirds flitting about flashing their white wing bars. I wonder how many mockingbirds we can support here? Mockingbirds establish a breeding territory in the spring, different from a territory used in the fall and winter that is centered around a food source. My mockingbird’s food territory for the last three years has been our crabapple trees which usually retain their fruit well through the winter. Many mornings in late winter I could lay in bed and watch out the window as this single mockingbird valiantly defended his food source from small bands of Blue jays to crows. Mockingbirds also depend on Pokeweed, poison ivy, Virginia Creeper, and Hollies.

Some mockingbirds mate for life and remain together at all times, others separate in winter to establish their separate feeding territories.
Mockingbirds can incorporate from 50 to 200 sounds or calls in their repertoire, gaining more experience with age. While usually I appreciate and look forward to this serenade, out mockingbird has decided that night time is the right time for his particular repertoire and sings from 2 to 4 a.m. approximately 8 feet from our bedroom window. This has happened for the last several nights. This is not uncommon behavior for male mockingbirds, particularly unattached males in and around the full moon. Which doesn’t happen until tonight. Because I could not sleep I decided to see how many bits and pieces of bird call I could identify of his lineup. I could make out a robin, a chickadee, a cardinal, a blue jay, a flicker, a red tail hawk, and sadly, what sounded for all the world like a car alarm. I say hello to him every time he is around with the hopes that one day, my hello will make it into his song list.

Did you know that there was such a large market for caged mockingbirds in the late 18th and early 19th centuries that they were completely extirpated around large cities such as Philadelphia and St. Louis? I guess that is the era which the lullaby comes from, about buying a mockingbird and what would happen if it didn't sing.

Click here to listen to a sound recording of a mockingbird call.

Speaking of birds, I watched the documentary The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill last night. I loved it. Check it out if you can.

Somebody thinks I'm special!

2007-05-24T10:51:00.000-04:00

Sandy, at garden path, has tagged me with a Thinking Blogger award. I'm so tickled. Seriously. I read your blogs every day and gain inspiration and motivation from what so many of you are doing, but I never consider that I may be inspiring somebody else. That makes me feel good. Sandy is a prolific poster and each and every post has an amazing photo and frequently a wonderful haiku. Her blog always makes me feel peaceful and calm. And when she posts recipes, they are awesome! I still make her pozole recipe a few times a month.

So I am charged with the impossible task of passing it forward to five blogs that I think are awesome and inspirational and just all around cool. Just so you know, I think all the blogs I link to and read are great and I've learned so much from so many people that it is difficult to narrow it down to five. And I think several of the blogs I'm mentioning have already been given Thinking Blogger awards, but whatever. I don't think its a bad thing to have more than one and to know that you inspire many.

So, here are the people that motivate and inspire me:

Liz at Pocket Farm. Liz was one of the first blogs I read and has inspired me to do many things. She definitely has motivated me to think about the food I eat and where it comes from. And has inspired me to try making things that I find intimidating (for whatever silly reason) like yogurt and most recently cheese (totally making mozarella this weekend).

Kim at Black Swamp Girl. Kim is a gardener extraordinaire and has inspired me to take a more critical look at garden design. I have a tendency to buy things I like and then find a place for them. Lately, thanks to inspiration from her blog, I have been walking past impluse purchases and really thinking more about what would work best in a spot.

Shannon at Not So Virtual Homestead. My gosh, just reading this blog makes me feel tired. Two people, two full time jobs, a baby, a market stand, many, many chickens, goats, crafts, a huge garden, baking, canning.....just crazy. But always motivating. After reading Shannon's posts, my thought is always "I need to get my butt in gear". And she is a wealth of knowledge and answers questions whenever asked.

Rurality is another one of the blogs that I have read since the beginning. I love the mix of wildflowers and wildlife and chickens and gardening and just about every facet of the piece of ground on which she lives. I always learn something and I think much more about what is creeping about my yard at night after the introduction of her Gamecam.

Judith at Weeds between the cracks. Sadly, Judith has decided to stop blogging at least for the time being and has been on hiatus since early December. I've been inspired by Judith in gardening, attracting and respecting wildlife, having a sense of humor in the garden (see Judith's gnome doors), crocheting (even though I've never progressed beyond a simple hat and scarf) even possibly to keep bees one day. I will miss Judith's writing and humor and hope to see her back this fall.

So, if you've been tagged, and haven't been tagged before, and feel like it, and are still blogging, make of list of five people that inspire and motivate you!

Here is the link to the origin of the meme:the thinking blogger

Thanks again Sandy!

Goodbye, Tree

2007-05-22T11:03:00.001-04:00

Hard to tell from the photo, but this is a big tree. A silver maple that was probably planted when our house was built in 1900. Two other silver maples along our road have been taken down recently(one by our asshole neighbor for no good reason) and another by an even further neighbor because theirs was rotting as well. One of the local families said that the trees had been planted on birthdays and special occasions, and the two recently taken down were planted for two elderly sisters in the Heisey Family when they were born in the early 1900s. They lived together in a little house up until about 10 years ago when they had to go into a home. I think both are passed away now. I don't know if there was a special occasion behind the planting of my tree.

It has done a superb job in it's life of shading the house from the hot summer sun and has (during our brief time here) been home to many birds and squirrels.

But the tree is dying. Although it fully leafed out this spring, a large portion of it's insides are rotting, including the roots on the street side. If it was anywhere else on the property, I would let it go. But since it is near the street and sort of close to the house, I'm worried that it could come down and hurt someone. Our road is dark and a car would never see it if it came down in a storm and was across the road. A tree man came yesterday to give us the final diagnosis (and cost of taking it down).

I'm a little shocked at how angry I am about losing this tree. At first I was determined to get a second opinion. There must be something we can do to save this tree. But I know there isn't. I try to visualize what our yard will look like now without this tree. It won't be the same. Yes it will be easier to pull out of the driveway without this tree in the way and no I will not miss the torrent of silver maple helicopters that come raining down just about the time I have mulch put down, making everything look messy. I will miss this tree terribly though. And the worst part is that even if I plant another tree in it's place I know that I will not live long enough to ever see a tree that big there again. I don't like being forced to confront my own mortality by a tree.

Animal Wednesday

2007-05-16T09:47:00.001-04:00

No sex in this one, I swear.

This is my front door. Every year a purple finch builds her nest in this wreath. Earlier this year another bird also decided that this would be a good location for a nest. A short but very bitter turf war ensued and somebody's eggs were splattered all over the front porch. Mrs. Purple Finch prevailed. And she was very good about staying in the nest when I opened the door to take the dogs out at night. Only once did she leave the nest and fly into the living room. After being batted down a few times by a thankfully clawless Roy and being gently placed back into her nest atop her eggs, she went on to brood six (I think) little baby purple finches.

And in June when I replace this wreath with the geranium one and have to scrape bird dirt off of it and my door..... I won't mind. I love watching a nest full of baby birds.

And this is a picture I've been meaning to take for awhile. This is Humphrey the camel. I drive past her every day to and from work. Seeing a camel on the way to work in South Central PA puts me in a good mood. Particularly when Humphrey is taking a dust bath. How often do you get to see a camel rolling joyously around on her back in a big dust cloud? Humphrey and her companions are participants in a live nativity scene every Christmas. The rest of the year they just hang out in their pasture. I love the donkey. Some days they chase each other. Quite a site to see a donkey, a goat, two cows (the other one is a red and white spotted cow not pictured) and a camel running after each other.

2007-05-14T13:18:00.000-04:00

Chooks in the garden.

I was going to write about worm-sex, but I don't want to get myself wedged into a blogging niche that might seem unsavory. It was really cool though. Saturday night we had a long sustained rain....not too heavy, but just right. I went out with a flashlight to lock the chickens in for the night and there were worms everywhere! In the garden, there were worms extending over a foot from their holes and then meeting up with other worms similarly stretched. And they were touching and where they were touching was all gooey and gross and it was happening ALL OVER MY GARDEN! I totally watched for like 20 minutes.

Click here to read more about the howzits and whatzits of earthworm reproduction.

Saturday I went to the Landis Valley Museum for the Herb and Garden Faire. A lot of my favorite vendors weren't there, but I still came home with some very cool plants. I bought Borage, several tomatoes (Olivette, Roughwood {a stable cross of Yellow Brandywine and San Marzano}, and Black Ruffles {a cross of Black Krim and Zapotec Pink Pleated}), a few peppers (Hinkelhatz {or chicken heart} pepper, a Relleno, and Amish pimiento) to go with my already burgeoning collection of tomatoes and peppers. I always buy way too many cause there are so many interesting varieties. I can't help myself.

But the thing I was most excited about buying at the Herb and Garden Faire was........RAMPS! I've never seen them being sold before! I've never even tried one but I snatched one up. It is apparently an Appalachian thing, as last year when I went to West Virginia, I saw many signs for Ramp Festivals. At first I thought it had something to do with the Interstate, but a ramp is actually a sort of onion, sort of garlic type thing that is wildly popular in the southern mountain states and mostly harvested from the wild. Allium tricoccum is really a wild leek that grows in wooded areas of higher elevations (supposedly 3,000 ft). I'm not at a high elevation, but I have a wooded area with a low pH (something else they like) and am willing to give it a try. How fun!

And in other news, I should have listened to Liz in the comments about the asparagus catastrophe. Asparagus does have deep roots. And I should have waited to see how much of what my husband tilled would come back before running and planting more asparagus. Because about 75% of what was tilled came back. But only after I planted 25 new crowns. So now I have 60 asparagus plants. And I am the only one in this house that eats it. That is a lot of asparagus.

adult content

2007-05-11T09:19:00.000-04:00

Warning! Adult Content! Of the geeky bio kind.

The past week has been extremely busy with lots of long days of field work. But occasionally you are rewarded by sights you have never seen.

Like snake sex. I've never seen snakes having sex. I've seen turtles 'occupied' twice which was pretty exciting, because you don't see turtles that often anymore, let alone two turtle in the act of making more turtles. But I've never seen snakes engage in the act of procreation. These are the Common Northern Watersnake (Nerodia sipedon sipedon). The larger snake is the female and the smaller one is the male. These were in shrubs in between a pond and a stream. The property owner proudly exclaimed that on a good day you can count 25 at one time. Huh.

See the three entwined tails in the middle of the picture? You might have to click on the photo to enlarge. These three were in a shrub overhanging the water all day. Seriously. All day....from at least 9 in the morning to 3 in the afternoon. This is serious business apparently. We were doing aquatic insect surveys in the stream right next to this bush in the morning. While I was writing down some data, I noticed the bush shaking. When I looked closer, I saw the snakes and laughed. How funny. What is that saying? When the tartarian honeysuckles a' rockin........ We tried not to bother them too much.

Here they are again all wrapped up together.

This was the pool area of the stream right where the three snakes were. As you can see, they have plenty to eat. The interesting thing was that all of this was going on less than 100 feet from a major road that sees 90,000 cars a day. And finally a shot of Moby Dick, the last remaining carp in the big pond. He must be a lonely guy. Just him and a bunch of snakes.

On dead and dying things

2007-05-08T13:02:00.000-04:00

Last week there was a smell upstairs. It started out lightly. You'd be walking through the bedroom and catch a faint whiff of something fairly unpleasant. But upon sniffing in earnest to discern from whence it came, the scent would elude you. Towards the end of the week the smell was stronger. You could smell it all the time but couldn't pinpoint it. I had just spring cleaned upstairs two weeks before, so I knew everything was fairly clean, but still inspected corners, emptied wastecans, checked the guest room to look for food left behind by the neices. Nothing. Upon getting out of the shower on Sunday and being met with a particularly vibrant new strain of the stench, I decided that it must be something dead, either in the walls or in the ceiling. There is nothing you can do about something dead in the ceiling or walls. I hoped that later this week it would get very hot so whatever it was would mummify quickly and stop eminating stink. So there I am staring into the mirror brushing, flossing, contemplating the tragedy of some animal dying alone within the walls of my house. Did it suffer? Was it a long drawn out death? Did it's family miss it? Did it live a full life? So very sad. And I look up and see four FOUR! gray hairs sticking out of the top of my head. I will be 37 this year and I have probably been lucky thus far to have not had a single gray hair. But there they were. All shiny and a different texture and OLD LOOKING! And it is totally not a good time to be confronted by your own mortality and irreversible aging when you are thinking about the solitary and probably lingering death of some unknown creature in your walls. I was depressed for the rest of the day.

Later that night I was getting ready for bed. The smell was terrible but it was too cold to open the windows. I saw the cat laying on my pillow and I wondered. I got down on the floor and flipped up the bed skirt. There under my husbands side of the bed was a partially decomposed vole, splayed neatly out on his back. I wondered what his placement meant. At least I knew that it wasn't the awful ending I had imagined. I scooped him up (the cat lazily looking up to see that I discovered his prize, wondering what took so long) and put him in the garage trashcan. He was just fur and bones. The stink went with him.

On a totally unrelated note, check out my Redbud in all it's spring glory.

Some tasty reading

2007-05-03T10:26:00.000-04:00

I 've linked to a great article by Barbara Kingsolver on eating local. She has a new book out called Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life in which she chronicles a year (A YEAR!) of eating local. I can't wait to read it. They interviewed her on NPR on Sunday about the book and she talked about how they couldn't decide when to start the actual year. So they picked asparagus as the starting point. They had asparagus already and it's emergence seemed a good point to begin. I teared up a little, hearing this the day after the untimely demise of my own asparagus. I spent two hours last evening preparing a new asparagus bed, neatly aligned with the ten remaining plants. And then made sure my husband saw where it was and swore not to till it under. Dinner for me last night was 8 spears of asparagus (from the remaining plants) and some fresh eggs.

So read! And be inspired! And plant things!

I was so close

2007-04-30T15:46:00.000-04:00

So, those of you that grow asparagus know that it takes three years from planting to harvesting. Three long years to wait before you can eat your very own homegrown asparagus. When we moved here, there were 10 plants from a previous owner. I enjoyed asaparagus out first spring. But it didn't seem to be enough. So the next year I planted 25 more plants. Woo Hoo! Tons of asparagus! I just had to wait three whole years. So on Saturday, I was walking through the garden in the morning with my neice. We picked a few spears, leaving many in plance that were less than 6 inches tall. Then we rounded up the other niece and we spent the day at the King of Prussia Mall for the younger one's birthday. Shopping (thank god only twice a year!) and lunch and just a fun girl's day. Then we came home. And the tiller was in the driveway. And the husband proudly announced that he had tilled the garden. My face fell. Everything moved in slow motion. I dropped my bags and ran towards the garden. Only the 10 original plants were left. The 25 other plants that I put in were completely tilled under. Along with 25 Sparkle strawberries that had miraculously survived the winter. But that one was my fault. i jinxed myself the other day saying that this was the first year that he hadn't tilled up/burned/or otherwise destroyed the garden. I didn't cry. I just got very quiet and sad and I know he felt terrible. But seriously. How do you not see 25 asparagus plants in rows where at least half of them had asparagus stalks poking up through the soil? What weed does that look like? None. So I will go and buy more plants and three more years and probably be thwarted again.

Dog Food

2007-04-27T10:20:00.000-04:00

These are my kids. They are messy and dig holes and occasionally smell a little funky, but I love them terribly and want to protect them from harm always and forever. They are my beloved Chessie and Emmett. Foofie and L'il Brown Dog.

So when it became known that some assholes in China were purposely adding Melamine to ingredients used to produce pet food (in order to artificially boost the protein percentage) I became worried. They have eaten Iams their entire lives, and Iams dry dog food wasn't on the list. But Iams wet cat food was. So it wasn't a great leap to think that it could be in the dry food as well, they just haven't reported it yet. Well, I don't think Iams dry food was ever recalled, but the torrent of other foods and treats being recalled was too much for me. They started getting homemade dog food. I could not imagine taking such a huge chance with their health. And I could not imagine the guilt I would feel if something happened to them because of what I was feeding them.

Jamie was asking on her blog if anyone was making their own pet food because of this awful recall situation. For the last several weeks, I have been feeding my dogs a mixture of ground turkey, rice, carrots, a little red bell pepper (Chessie's favorite thing in the world), garlic and spinach, topped off with a dollop of cottage cheese. They get about 2 cups total: one cup of turkey and one cup of the other ingredients mixed in.

They absolutely love it. They have never been so excited about dinner time. And Chessie's allergies have improved a good bit.

I make a big batch every 5 days or so and it takes about a 1/2 hour to chop and cook everything. It is worth it to make sure that what they are eating isn't going to kill them.

Roy (the cat) has been eating Whiskas wet food. I tried a combination of hearts/gizzards etc. cooked up for him but he wanted no part of it. And plain tuna is good but for him to get everything he needs it has to be mixed with other things and then he wants no part of it. So for now he is still eating his wet cat food (not made by Menu Foods). Any ideas on homemade cat food for a picky kitty?

A moment

2007-04-25T16:13:00.000-04:00

On Sunday afternoon, I stood in my kitchen making tuna salad for lunch. It was almost 80 degrees and all of the windows were open, the curtains fluttering in the breeze. The kitty was asleep in the sun coming through the laundry room door and the house was filled with the song of the white-throated sparrow sitting in the holly tree just out from the kitchen window. The tulips were just starting to open and everything is just so very green. I was overcome by spring at that moment. I love love love this time of year.

Fordhook Farm

2007-04-25T09:45:00.000-04:00

Last Saturday my friend and I took a trip to Fordhook Farm in Doylestown, the home of W. Atlas Burpee. Saturday was the Heronswood Hellebore Open. As many gardeners know, Burpee Inc. bought Heronswood Nursery from Seattle, WA and closed it, choosing to take the fabulous Heronswood plant varieties back east and make them amenable to east coast conditions. Many people thought this a sacrilege. And I'm not exactly a fan of Burpee Inc. as I think George Ball (the current owner) is somewhat arrogant, but the farm was lovely and the plants were lovely and the history was interesting.

W. Atlas Burpee belonged to an established Philadelphia Family and was destined to become a physician, as his father and grandfather had done. Except his boyhood hobby was poultry breeding. In 1876, Burpee dropped out of the University of Pennsylvania and started a mail-order livestock and poultry catalog. In the next few years, the focus of the Burpee Seed Company would change as Atlas talked to farmers and realized that European Settlers were having problems with seed brought from their own countries...they just did not grow well here in the United States. By the 1880s, W. Atlas Burpee was the main supplier of feed and seed to the Northeast and the Midwest.

In 1888, Atlas bought Fordhook Farm in Doylestown and set about making it into a premiere plant development facility, developing varieties that are household names today. Did you know the Fordhook Bush Lima Bean was developed here, supplied by a farmer in Chester , Pennsylvania? Burpee also developed the first yellow sweet corn "Golden Bantam". Prior to its development, the public associated yellow corn with livestock and thought that only white corn was fit for human consumption. By the 1890s, Burpee was the largest seed company in the world.

To read more about the W. Atlas Burpee legacy you can go here. He was an interesting man, as was his son, and is responsible for many of the flowers and vegetables that we see today. I think he is also the father of the seed catalog, giving all of us something colorful and dream inducing to while away the dreary days of late winter.

I didn't end up buying much. The Hellebores were beautiful but the ones I wanted were $40 and I just couldn't justify that for a single plant. A tree or shrub maybe. But not an herbaceous plant. I did buy a little plant called a Fire Pink (Silene virginica) for $4. Pretty little thing. I am a sucker for red flowers.

We stopped at Waterloo Gardens in Exton on the way home (after a fabulous lunch at Classic Diner. Everything is good there!) and I was able to find a reasonable facsimile of the Hellebore I wanted for far less than $40. And two Endless Summer Hydrangeas. And a Euonymous "Manhattan". I so love plants.

At Fordhook, I discovered a new must have plant. Hakuro Nishiki or Variegated Willow (Salix integra). Absolutely lovely. Great shape and it appears to be a somewhat fast growing shrub. Alas, they did not have this yet at Waterloo and since it was a poor seller last year, were not sure that they would be selling it again. *sigh*

National Hangout Day

2007-04-16T15:16:00.000-04:00

Hullo fellow members of the laundry underground! What's that you say? What is the laundry underground and who is a member? Well, I'm a member. I didn't realize I was. In fact, I didn't realize there was such a thing as the laundry underground until I read this article in the New York Times. The laundry underground is made up of frugal people, people without dryers, and people from other countries where hanging laundry outside is a cultural tradition.

Who knew!

According to Alexander Lee, a CLOTHESLINE ACTIVIST from New Hampshire, this April 19th we can make a statement on National Hanging Out Day and encourage others to join in our laundry underground ways and dry our duds outside. I must confess that I am not a die hard clothesline activist. I don't do it in the cold. I prefer to be warm. And I need to polish off my sheets with a tumble in the dryer because otherwise they would be coated with dog hair. But otherwise I pretty much use the clothesline for curtains, other bedding, rugs, and all my clothes in the warmer months. Thankfully we purchased a very energy efficient dryer, so it lessens the guilt when I push the on button during the dead of winter or on rainy days.

A good concept, good thoughts, but seriously....clothesline activist? laundry underground? It really makes you wonder if these reporters for the NYT ever go anywhere other than New York or LA. I hang out laundry, all my neighbors hang out laundry (except for the assholes nextdoor that think they live in a development), most towns around me are filled with little houses with clotheslines out back....ummmm....most people never stopped hanging out their laundry as far as I know. It makes me laugh to think that some hipster standing with a clothesline at the statehouse in N.H. has totally been whupped by my dutchie neighbor lady down the road who been 'hanging out' for the last 50 years.

But I guess it will be nice next time I'm standing at the clothesline to feel edgy and anti-establishment as I pin up my panties.

The first tomato of the year

2007-04-16T10:44:00.000-04:00

Yes! The first tomato from the bathroom greenhouse window. Mmmmm. The result of using compost that wasn't hot enough. A little seedling that appeared out of nowhere in a plant I had repotted.

And I had my first big harvest of greenhouse window lettuce. I can't believe I only ever had houseplants in there.

So for the next few days, homegrown salads!

I bought a salad spinner on Saturday. I know. Its a gadget that I've always considered silly. Totally uneccesary. And then I had a salad at the The Classic Diner in Malvern on Friday. The salad was just greens. But the balsamic vinegarette on the salad was perfectly applied. Each little leaf had the perfect amount of dressing sticking to it, like it was sprayed on with a fine mist. Not too much, not too little. It was amazing. You probably think it wierd that I'm getting this excited about some leaves and some dressing, but I just can't explain it. So I tried to recreate it at home. Now I have the salad spinner and I need some spray mechanism for dressing. I know I've seen spray bottles for oil products, but I looked at Target on Saturday and they didn't have one. Anyone use something like this that they can recommend? And what if I just use a regular sprayer like you mist plants with? Would that work with a vinegarette?

Now I can't wait to get greens out of the garden. Some mustards and several kinds of lettuce, some beet greens. Yum. If spring ever gets here and I can plant anything outside. Although I'm glad nothing was in the ground yet, because all the rain we've had, it would have rotted. Hopefully this weekend.

The chicken story

2007-04-10T16:20:00.000-04:00

So last Thursday evening, I went into the chicken coop around dusk to collect eggs and shut them in for the night and Claire was still on the nest. Not normal for a chicken to still be on the nest in the evening. I made a mental note to check her out the next morning, already becoming paranoid as to what this might mean. The next morning she was on the nest as well. She looked uncomfortable and seemed to be flexing her nether regions....y'know, where the eggs come out. Oh God. She is egg bound. Freak out a little bit. I felt her abdomen and it sort of felt like an egg was hanging out there but I couldn't tell and that doesn't necessarily mean something is wrong. I will check on her when I get home from work and take action then. Hopefully she won't die by then as a result of my neglectful chicken husbanding ways.

I got home in the mid-afternoon (Good Friday and all) and found her still on the nest. Still felt like an egg in there. Time to take action. I consulted my trusty Storey's Guide to Chickens to see what I had to do to fix an egg-bound chicken. It involved a latex glove and ummm....personal lubricant. Which I did not have. But okay, CVS is only a short drive. I'll just go get some and come back and save Claire's life.

So I go to CVS to buy the personal lubricant, for the chicken, and I wasn't sure where to find it, since I've never bought that particular product (not that there is anything wrong with that particular product, I just haven't had the need for it. Okay, TMI.). Anyway. So I find the aisle in the store where it is stocked and wow. I was not aware that there were so many choices of personal lubricant available. I figured K-Y, Astroglide, and maybe some generics. I was stunned. There are tons and tons of these products! Scented, spray-on, warming, flavored, different colors. When did this happen? I stood there looking at the the five shelves of personal lubrication that stood before me.

And I must have looked bewildered. Because a CVS employee, a man, came over to ask me if I needed help. In my head I was telling myself "Just say no, just say no, he'll go away, just tell him no". But I didn't do that. I said that I was looking for a personal lubricant that was plain, that didn't have any fragrance or smell or warming stuff, just a plain simple one. And he asked if there was an allergy issue or something.

And I said...... "No, its for a chicken".

I know. The words started slowing down before they were even out of my mouth because only then did I realize how ridiculous the words were and how they most likely would totally be taken wrong and would suggest something unspeakable.

And that is exactly what happened.

The CVS employee looked at me with such disgust and horror. And I had to explain about the egg-bound thing and how it really wasn't what he thought. And he still was unnerved and shoved a box containing a CVS brand plain lubricant at me and mumbled "this should work". And I paid and left.

Long story short, after the donning of the glove, the applying of the shame inducing product, and a suprising compliant chicken....she was not egg-bound. She was broody. And she came bounding out this morning all fresh and happy, not sitting on her nest. And I have learned valuable lessons about when to keep your mouth shut.

We interrupt this spring.......

2007-04-09T09:56:00.000-04:00

to bring you more of winter.

Sorry I haven't posted in awhile. It has been ridiculously cold here with snow flurries just about every day. It has put me in a gloomy mood. And the riotous change from upper 70s to below freezing apparently jostled my immune system so I have been battling an annoying cold for the last week. Or I have developed allergies for the first time due to the obscene amount of tree pollen floating about. Hard to tell. I just know I'm miserable. THe photo is actually from winter, not recent. But I thought the gloom factor was appropriate to illustrate my current demeanor.

It has been painful to be outside with the biting wind and frigid temperatures, so nothing is getting done in the yard. Daffodils are still blooming but I feel like I missed a big chunk of spring already. It just isn't the same when viewed from inside through a window. The chickens are cranky, the dogs are listless and confused, and I just want to hole up with a fire in the woodstove, some movies, and emerge when it is 70 degrees again. This isn't fun.

Can you take the heat?

2007-03-27T10:30:00.000-04:00

I’ve been in a daring mood lately. So daring in fact that over the weekend I bought a horseradish root to plant. A member of the mustard family, horseradish (Armoracia lapathifolia) gets approximately two feet tall and 18 inches wide with small white flowers. This pungent herb was once used to treat a variety of ailments including tuberculosis, scurvy, food poisoning, and colic. It is also included in the 5 bitter herbs used during Passover.

Horseradish is planted approximately 4-6 inches deep. It prefers full sun but will grow in partial shade. A soil pH of 5.5-7 is best. Planted in the spring, it can be harvested in the fall. For the most pungent flavor, it is advised to wait until after the leaves have seen frost. One plant will produce about 1 pound of root, needing no fertilizer (if planted in compost) and occasional water. You can harvest either the tap (main) root or the lateral roots, but one-year old plants supposedly have the best flavor, so replant a portion after your harvest.

The notion to plant horseradish has been bumping around in my brain for the last several seasons. When husband and I were first together, his dad gave me a mammoth horseradish root from his yard, with the stern warning never, ever to plant horseradish because you will never get rid of it. Hmm. Sounds like a challenge. I looked up several methods of processing the root to make prepared horseradish and set about grating it. The root pulled from the ground is fairly neutral, no odor, no tang. It is only when the root is ground and the cells pulverized that it releases it’s isothiocyanates and you are really in trouble. Every recipe I found warned against inhaling the vapors of freshly ground horseradish. Did I listen? No, of course not. I stuck my head right over the blender full of freshly ground root and was instantaneously very very sorry. I think I went blind for a little bit, and what felt like very strong acid made it’s way slowly up my sinus cavity and into my brain. Wow. Strong stuff. Adding vinegar stops the release of the offending volatile oil, so you add it right away if you won’t be using the horseradish to strip paint, or you wait awhile to add it if you want your future cocktail sauce to make people faint. I waited awhile cause I luv me some horseradish. When it makes you double over and clutch your head, its perfect. That batch got eaten pretty quickly and I’ve never had homemade again, just the stuff from stores which is quite tame by comparison. So I’ll try my luck at growing it.

I’m still debating whether to plant this legendarily aggressive plant in a contained space or perhaps to throw caution to the wind and plant it unfettered directly in the garden. I see myself battling horseradish in the lawn in years to come. I will keep you posted.

Said the Delphi Oracle to Apollo, "Radishes are worth their weight in lead, beets their weight in silver, but horseradish is worth it’s weight in gold" (possibly because they used it as an aphrodisiac). So any stories of triumphant horseradish cultivation out there?

Happy Chickens

2007-03-26T10:12:00.000-04:00

There are five chickens in this picture. Can you find them? Or is all you see a great feathered mass of mulch kicking feathers? They so enjoyed Sunday, as did I. It was a lovely warm day and we were outside the whole day, getting beds cleaned up and pansies planted and distributing mulch onto the lawn (well I wasn't, but they were).

Remember when I said that once it starts, it just steamrolls and moves so fast? The snowdrops are over and even some of the crocus are starting to fade. How did this happen so fast? Where have I been? These crocus are still vibrant though, growing in the lawn. Not something I'd recommend, as they have to be mowed around for a little while until the foliage browns, but they do look so pretty against the very green growing grass at their feet.

In an area at the front of the house, there apparently was an old gravel driveway. Some grass grows there but mostly it is weeds. When mown, you can't really tell as it just appears green, but in the spring, the entire area is covered with Persian Speedwell (Veronica persica) shown below, Northern White Violets (Viola pallens) and Common Chickweed (Stellaria media). When the sun shines on it, everything just opens up and blooms profusely and for a weedy area, it is just lovely.

Things that are scary

2007-03-20T15:36:00.000-04:00

Okay, first, go read this post at The Underpaid Kept Woman. GO ahead. I'll wait.

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Scary right? Reallllllllyyyyyyy Realllllllyyyyyyy scary. And in a later post she actually says that she bought the thing AND IS BRINGING IT INTO HER HOUSE. And the scariest thing is one of the comments about that picture and having it in your house and hearing skittering feet in the night and turning the light on and the little boy isn't in the picture anymore and holy crap that makes my throat tighten up. Freaky little children scare me. There is nothing scarier than a movie about a possessed child unless it is a movie about killer ventriloquist dummies. I can't even watch the tv promos for that movie Dead Silence. I have to turn my head and look at the wall.

Other things that are scary:

very very short people. I don't know why. Maybe because I'm 5' 9", but I am freaked out by very short people. Not necessarily scared, but definitely disturbed.

peacocks. When I was little I stayed at my grandparents a lot and my grandmother would put me outside in one of those round collapsible play yards, you know, the kind you pinch your fingers in? And one of the houses in the neighborhood had peacocks. And you could hear them calling in the distance. And she told me that peacocks peck out bad little children's eyes. Especially blue ones. So I better behave. Guess what color my eyes are? And then she would go inside. And I would sit there motionless listening to the peacocks and being good. Thanks Nanny.

monkeys, but you knew that already.

my grandparents basement. Terrifying. Long and never ending basement with big sections of those bamboo screens hanging (that people hung on their porches) where totally anybody could hide and wait. even peacocks. And there were five bare light bulbs with pull chains that you had to turn off as you made your way to the steps, so the dark was always encroaching on you and by the time you were almost to the steps you couldn't see the area with the bamboo screens anymore. Or the dresser that belonged to the previous owner whose son hung himself down there that eveybody said was haunted and it was scary. Scary as a child and scary as a 30-something. I lived there for awhile after my grandfather died and I had to get the house ready to sell and even as an adult, I hustled for the steps and never ever looked back at the bamboo screens.

A Legend of Sleepy Hollow read along record narrated by Bing Crosby. I can't even bring myself to put it on, it is that scary. It just sits there in the extra bedroom collecting dust.

spiders that jump

Alberto Gonzales

Dancing with the Stars

This house. During a wetland job I came across this house. This abandoned house in the middle of nowhere. See that arty looking thing over the doorway? It is a female face with vampire teeth. I almost peed myself when I walked up to it and saw what it was. But why was it on an abandoned house out in the middle of nowhere? Ther person I was working with was not scared and insisted that there was a good explanation. Couldn't think of one, but insisted there was one. And then a little man came from around the back of the house and asked us what we were doing. And we told him and he said that we should stay away from there and then he went back behind the house. And there was no car, no driveway, no where for him to go but into this abandoned house. And I was totally freaked out and the idiot that I worked with kept insisting that there was a good explanation. Yeah, if weirdos that think they are vampires is a good explanation.

The guy that owns the shop where I buy my pet food. He thinks that he is Hunter S. Thompson I believe. Same glasses worn propped on his head, same kind of clothes, same gonzo approach to life, only here it isn't jornalism, it is kibble, but still. I don't know why he scares me. I can't even bring myself to speak to him, so when he talks to me I just kind of stare at the ground and nod my head appropriately.
The Count on Sesame Street. I think it is the pointy nose. I used to hide behind the chair when I was a kid and he came on the TV. I don't do that now, but if I flip past and see him, I definitely get a chill. Funny.
Old fashioned wheelchairs
Abandoned mental health facilities. Google Byberry. SCARY.

So what weird things are you scared of?

Mother nature is a cruel, cruel mistress

2007-03-19T11:11:00.000-04:00

Here in south central Pennsylvania last week, the mercury climbed to a summery 77 degrees on Wednesday. On Friday we got twelve inches of snow. It snowed and snowed and snowed some more. And then it blew and blew and blew some more so that anywhere that was shoveled quickly got unshoveled. But it is okay. There is something pleasing about a mid-March storm. It was lovely to look at and didn't put me in a blah mood because I knew that this would be the last. The forecast for this week showed temperatures in the 50s and 60s so I knew I wouldn't be looking at snow for weeks and weeks.

One exciting thing was the amazing variety of birds that it brought to the feeders. We are in transition here. Not quite all of the winter birds have left but quite a few of the summer birds have arrived. And everybody was hungy. On Friday and over the weekend I had to fill feeders twice a day in addition to scattering cracked corn and leftover cereal on the front porch. We had brown thrashers (which we almost never see), and lots of red-winged balckbirds which are very infrequent visitors to our feeders. A pair of bluebirds, white-throated sparrows, and elusive bluejays (rare feeder visitors for us). Many grackles and cowbirds, and tons of robins. The robins didn't some to the feeders however and wouldn't eat the cracked corn. I cut up some oranges for them, thinking they would eat those but they didn't. Maybe I was thinking of Orioles. They did however cluster on the cleared road in front of the house, drinking meltwater all weekend. Easily 100 Robins would be on the road, causing all traffic to slow and quite a few to blow their horns to scatter the birds. The dogs really loved this. Insane barking every 20 minutes or so.

Thanks to the foot of snow delivered, I didn't get peas planted, or anything else planted outside. I did however start some alpine strawberry seeds indoors and managed to squish them in to the already packed greenhouse window. I have lettuce ready to eat in there and tomatoes growing like there is no tomorrow. So I will enjoy this last of the snow and will almost be sorry to see it go. Almost. I am really ready for spring.

busy, busy, busy

2007-03-10T14:15:00.000-05:00

Out in the field for the next several days. Have to watch PENNDOT put up a habitat fence around some wetlands that may contain bog turtles (endangered species), so won't be around. Hopefully I'll get so see a turtle or two, but it would have to get really warm for that I'm afraid.

Tomorrow I'm starting tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants and hopefully it will be nice enough to be outside most of the day, clean things up a bit. And next weekend I'll get peas, onions, and potatoes in the ground. St. Patricks Day is the day around here! So much to do. Once it starts, it steamrolls you and it seems there isn't a break until next fall.

My orange pansies from last year are shown. Nobody has them here yet, but its only a matter of time. Can.not.wait!

Staunch character

2007-03-07T15:11:00.000-05:00

Okay, so remember when I said that I joined Netflix? Well one of the features that I recently watched was Grey Gardens, something I don't think I could find at a Blockbuster. Have you seen this? It is a documentary filmed in 1976 by the Maysle Brothers (of Gimme Shelter fame) about the Beales. Big Edie and Little Edie Beale. Mother and Daughter. Aunt and Cousin of Jackie Onassis. Living in squalor with 30 cats and raccoons in a mansion in Long Island. There is currently a very successful Broadway play with Christine Ebersole based on the story?

Oh.My.God.

I've watched it three times now (and every extra on the DVD) and am probably going to buy it because I can easily see myself watching it many, many, many more times. I think I have a problem. There is probably no 12-step program for this.

And that woman's voice (Little Edie, pictured above) is in my head. I hear her odd quotes all day long. "This is the best costume for the day." "Its very hard to keep the line between the past and the present, know what I mean?" "Its just a sea of leaves." "Whose been dropping books around here is what I want to know." All done in the most grating Boston aristocracy accent you can imagine. Tennessee Williams could not have made these people up.

I feel like a crazy person because I honestly wish I could just step into the documentary and sit and talk to these people (even though both are now deceased). Thankfully, Amazon.com reviews and Netflix reviews reveal many more people that are mesmerized by this movie and also have seen it many, many times. So if you can get your hands on it, watch it. At your own peril. You'll either love it or think I'm crazy for spending more than 10 minutes watching it. Sadly, there is a movie coming out based on the story starring Drew Barrymore and Meryl Streep which will probably ruin everything.

Things I didn't know I needed

2007-03-05T10:16:00.000-05:00

1. Giant reclaimed sheet metal roosters. I need at least three. Actually I wouldn't mind several reclaimed sheet metal animals in my yard. I think a donkey would be particularly keen. Note to self: learn to weld.

2. A hanging bed in my garden. Really, all of us need this, don't you think? How cool would this be? A little mosquito netting hanging around the sides and it becomes my summer bedroom. Although a futon type thing would be nicer, something you could sort of fold up and it would become a giant swinging couch? I happen to have a futon that I'm not using in the garage attic. Note to self: increase carpentry skills or befriend Amish men.

I'm determined that this is the year of the patio. A nice simple flagstone deal in the "L" of the house. But that might now include a pergola with a hanging futon off to the side. An outdoor shower would be nice too. I'd better buy some lottery tickets.

3. And a greenhouse. Although I did know that I needed this. Really an entire separate glass house would be nice. That way I could use part of it for a chicken house, attach the outside shower and outside bedroom to one side, connecting to the flagstone patio. Perhaps a fixed grilling station. Theoretically, I could live entirely in my yard for the entire summer And then I'd only ever have to go into the real house to retrieve refrigerated items.....unless......

I can't wait to be hot again

2007-02-28T13:11:00.001-05:00

Just a few shots from last year, in warmer times. The flower bed picture is from the end of March though, so it won't be long.

Chickens will be glad to loll in the sun and to have bugs to eat again.

And I seriously can't wait for homegrown fruits and vegetables. *sigh* I transplanted the lettuce and stock seed growing in the greenhouse window on Sunday. And noticed two tiny little tomatoes on the plant. They looked oblong, so perhaps a roma tomato. Yum. I think I need a real greenhouse.

The other day I made this sweet and sour red cabbage recipe. I could eat it for days and days and not get tired of it. But maybe that is just me. It uses balsamic vinegar, and given a good quality balsamic, I could do shots of it. That is how much I like balsamic vinegar. This recipe was really really easy and really really good. Actually, most everything I find on Simply Recipes is good. I also made this tuna noodle casserole recently. I was craving something 'comfort foody' and hadn't had it in years. I added another can of Cream of Mushroom as it wasnt' quite as creamy as I wanted. Very good. But not something you might want to make very often as it involves a crushed potato chip crust. Whisks you right back to those casserole days of your youth.

Rohrer's Seeds

2007-02-23T11:04:00.000-05:00

So yesterday I had a really early day. I had to be in Dover, Delaware early in the morning for a meeting, meaning I would be coming home in the early afternoon. Right past Rohrer's Seeds. During Business hours. Yay.

I purchased a bunch of seeds from my hardware store earlier but I still had a lot to buy. I've only been in Rohrer's once before, briefly. I knew that had tons of tons of seeds packets, but I didn't look closely at them because at the time I was in the market for heirloom tomato plants (having scorched all the ones I started from seed last winter).

So there I am yesterday, cash in hand, wanting to buy seeds. Not only do they have their own brand of seed, but they also carry varieties of Seeds of Change, Seed Saver's Exchange, Johnny's, Botanical Interest, Landis Valley Heirloom Seed Project, and a few other ones that I was not familiar with. I was like a kid in a candy store! So many many seeds. But I have a new favorite. Franchi Seeds from Italy. Oh.My.God. First of all, the seed packets are roughly 4 by 6 inches in size with lovely pictures on them. Instructions are printed in like 6 different languages with a zonal map of southern Europe on it. And they had some really cool varieties. But they were $2.99 a pack, so I held back. I only got four things.

Rapini (Broccoli Raab). I was going to buy the Rohrer's variety, but I figured Rapini from Italy would probably be a little tastier. Yum. Their website has about 10 different kinds.

Ugly but Good melons. That is the translation. Ugly but Good. How cute are these?

Genovese Zucchini. The Basil is great, so the zucchini must be as well, correct? Well, maybe not. But aren't they pretty?

Christmas Peppers or Pimiento. So cute. I'm such a sucker for little peppers. I'll have to start these soon. I was hoping for some really cool eggplant varieties from this company, but they didn't have any. They had two really wild radish varieties that I was not brave enough to try but looked really interesting.

A giant black winter radish.

Christmas Candle Radish.

I won't tell you how much I spent in total. But I will tell you that I got a 5 pound bag of Yukon Gold Seed Potatoes for.........$2.75!!!!!!!

Perhaps next week I'll list everything that I bought.

Auntie x 4

2007-02-19T13:12:00.000-05:00

The newest niece. Less than 12 hours old. Oh my. All these little girls. And it is very dangerous for me to cuddle a warm little bundle in the grey days of February. It makes me revisit the decision and nobody can think straight when under the influence of new baby smell. The husband gets particularly intoxicated. Ironic since the day before he was listing the positives (for us) about deciding not to have children. Twenty minutes of a newborn snuggle-bunny batting her clear blue unfocused eyes and its all out the door. What a pushover.

Well that sucked

2007-02-16T12:14:00.000-05:00

"I'm kind of excited" I said....about the snow. Stupid, stupid me. Well, I guess snow would have been okay. The four inches of sleet on top of the snow wasn't. Nor was the freezing rain and then more snow on top of that. And then sub zero wind chills with 40 mph winds. Ha. The driveway was one giant sheet of foot thick ice and my car was in the garage. I couldn't shovel it. Plows wouldn't work. So at 7pm last night a farmer with a skidloader on a flatbed truck opened up our driveway for us. I was trapped in my house for two days. Husband was hardly home because of work and had to park on the front lawn in the one protected area we could chip away at. Getting stuck coming in and going out, resulting in an hour of shoveling, chipping, throwing down craked corn and cat litter on both ends. Fun. I took lots of pictures of birds.

One lone bird (see the tracks coming up to the door?) checking to see if the coast is clear.

It was. At some points in the day there were upwards of 30 Mourning Doves on the front porch trying to get out of the wind.

Birds eating the cracked corn out of my husband's tire tracks after we got him out.

Weird sheet icicle hanging at an angle on the front porch. I guess that is what happens when ice melts in a 40 mph wind.

I guess it could have been worse. I could have been trapped in my car on Interstate 78 for two days....like some people.

On the bright side, I'll have lettuce in a few weeks.

Winter Storm Warning

2007-02-12T16:38:00.000-05:00

It reached almost 40 degrees here today. So much better than what it has been. But we are under a winter storm warning. Probably 6 inches of snow (doesn't sound like much of a storm) mixed with freezing rain. I am kind of excited. If I can't have an early spring, then we might as well have snow. Plus it seems that it doesn't get as bitter cold when there is a layer of snow on the ground. I hope we get walloped!

The Old Sled Works

2007-02-07T12:51:00.000-05:00

So, as I was saying, I went antiquing on Saturday with my friend. Not really antiquing, more like browsing old stuff. I always picture antiques as really old and really expensive. We went to the Old Sled Works in Duncannon, PA. It is now an antique dealer mall with over 125 vendors but it used to be the Standard Novelty Company which made Lightning Glider sleds from 1904 to 1990. In addition to a little museum thing that shows all the different sleds that made and lots of historic pictures, they have great old stuff....especially great old kitchen stuff! Which makes my heart go pitter pat.

After Christmas I was looking at Martha Stewart refrigerator containers, the precursor to tupperware and gladware etc. She had some nice refrigerator-ware but it was pretty expensive. And boring looking. So I started looking around. I got this set of Pyrex refrigerator ware for far less than new Martha Stewart stuff and it is so much much cuter. Plus I got another blue one and this

cute little glass one (that someone stenciled tomatoes and radishes on) for a dollar a piece. I will have adorable leftover vessels for the rest of my life!! Go me!!

I also got (for $2) this super cute vintage tea towel which will learn me my cuts of meat and where they come from on the respective animal. In case I ever get as committed as Jamie and want to purchase a half hog. Or a half sheep (do they come in halves?) Or a cow.

And for $1 I got this cute little floral apron that was in really good condition. It is so soft and you can tell that is was well used. I wore it last night to make sausage and peppers. Hee. It fits in well with the rest of my aprons. I probably have enough now, but really, how can you pass up a $1 apron?

My aprons live here, in my laundry room with my grandfathers clothespins and my old bars of Fels Naptha soap (in the jar between the plants). Click here to visit someone else whose laundry room is spruced up with aprons.

The weekend

2007-02-05T11:30:00.000-05:00

Little bit of snow on Friday afternoon. Not enough to write home about. It was downright balmy compared to today. We're in the single digits with a treacherous windchill. It was down to ZERO overnight, so yesterday the chickens got a heat lamp installed in addition to their water heater and are faring well. I seriously do not want to deal with frostbitten combs and toes nor do I want to have to contemplate amputation. I'm probably being overcautious, but oh well.

Things were pretty much melted and the roads were clear by Saturday morning, so I could make my way out in search of good junk. More on that in a later post. I got some fun stuff!

We had fires in the woodstove on Friday and Saturday nights, but Sunday we started early. Nothing like reading the morning paper by the fire. And then reading gardening books the rest of the day battling to keep animals off your lap.

Chessie and Roy stayed by the fire all day. They both love to be very warm. Emmett (not a lover of heat) stayed in the doorway to the room and kept an eye on the unholy alliances forming in front of the woodstove.

Happy Whistle Pig Day!

2007-02-02T09:55:00.000-05:00

Did you hear? Spring is coming! Woohoo! We were supposed to get snow last night and today (only a few inches) but the morning dawned bright and sunny and almost above freezing! Anyway, a few odds and ends today.

First: I just joined Netflix. We don't go to the movies and we only rent movies maybe once or twice a month. But for two movies at Blockbuster, its almost $10. So when I saw that Netfliz had a $9.99 plan, one movie at a time, unlimited for a month, I thought well, cheaper than Blockbuster and probably lots more movies and documentaries that I'd like to watch than are available at Blockbuster. Two weeks later and I'm a Netflix addict and eagerly awaiting the little red envelope in my mailbox. At home right now, the first disc of the multipart documentary "The Farmer's Wife" originally shown on PBS. But you know how you can never think of what you want when forced to choose? Well I just can't think of all those indie films or foreign films or missed PBS series when I'm scrolling through the choices. So what are some of your favorite films? Things that you think I would like. I want to keep the red enevelopes coming.

Second: I promised a few recipes to some people and have thrown in a few that I've made recently and have really, really liked.

I made French Lentil Soup on Saturday. Yummy and suprisingly easy. And I served it with Farmgirl's Beyond Easy Beer Bread. Whenever I've made beer bread in the past, it has always turned out semi-brick like. But this recipe resulted in a really nice loaf that was a close approximation of real bread. I added shredded sharp cheese, garlic, and cayenne pepper and it went really well with the soup.

I promised Jamie this recipe for Fig Cake. This cake is the reason we lug back several jars of fig preserves from North Carolina every September. Yummy. And different.

Frances’ Fig Cake

Preheat oven to 350°
Grease bundt pan and dust with flour

3 eggs
1 ½ cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
½ tsp. Nutmeg
½ tsp. Cloves
1 tsp. Cinnamon
1 tsp. Salt
2 cups plain white flour
½ cup buttermilk
1 tsp. Baking soda, dissolved in 1 Tbs. Water
1 tsp. Vanilla extract
1 cup preserved figs, chopped
1 cup walnuts or pecans, chopped

In a medium bowl, beat eggs until light and foamy. Add sugar and beat until pale and thick. Add oil and beat another minute.

Sift together spices, salt and flour. Add to eggs alternately with buttermilk beating well after each addition.

Stir in soda, dissolved in water, vanilla, figs and nuts.

Pour into pan and place in preheated oven. Bake for 45 minutes. Cool in pan for 20 minutes and then invert onto a rack and cool completely. Dust with confectioners sugar if you want.

Serves 10-12

Recipe from The Backporch Restaurant Cookbook by Debbie Wells

And since I have this cookbook in my hands at the moment, I think I promised this black bean casserole recipe to Liz about a year ago.

Cuban Black Bean and Monterey Jack Cheese Casserole

2 cups dried black beans, picked over for rocks, covered completely with water, and soaked overnight
½ gallon water
1 tsp. Salt
1 bay leaf
2 tsp. Dried oregano
2 tsp. Dried thyme
2 tsp. Fresh minced garlic
1 ¼ cup water
½ cup white rice
dash salt
2 Tbs. Olive oil
1 ½ cups onion, diced
1 cup green bell pepper, diced
1 cup red bell pepper, diced
2 tsp. Fresh minced garlic
1 cup dry white wine
1 cup chicken or veggie broth
¼ tsp. Salt or more to taste
2 dashes coarse black pepper
¼ tsp. Crushed red pepper flakes
4 tsp. Ground cumin
1 cup golden raisins
1 cup blanched almonds
4 cups (about 1 pound) grated Monterey Jack Cheese
¼ cup dry bread crumbs

Drain soaking water from beans, rinse thoroughly and put in a heavy bottomed soup pot with ½ gallon water. Bring to a boil, skim off the foam that forms on top, then add salt, bay leaf, oregano, thyme and garlic. Cover and cook for about 2 hours until beans are soft and the liquid is thick. Stir often.

Bring 1 ¼ cup water to a boil in a small saucepan. Add rice and dash of salt, cover and lower heat. Cook until rice is soft and all water is absorbed. Set aside.

Heat 2 Tbs. Oil in large sauté pan. Add onions, peppers, and garlic. Saute until soft.

When beans are done, add the cooked rice, peppers and onions, wine, broth, salt, black pepper, red pepper flakes, cumin, raisins, and almonds. Stir well to blend and cook over low heat for 8-10 minutes until mixture begins to thicken. Correct salt if necessary.

Butter a deep 10 x 13 casserole dish and cover bottom and sides with the grated cheese, reserving ¾ cup for the top. Fill with the bean mixture. Sprinkle with bread crumbs and reserved cheese.

Bake in a 375 degree oven for 30-35 minutes or until top is crusty and beans are bubbling.

Approx. 6-8 servings.

Also from the Backporch Cookbook.

If you ever find yourself on Ocracoke Island, North Carolina, you can't beat this restaurant. And do order the Blue Crab Beignets. To.Die.For.

More bathroom gardening

2007-01-29T11:42:00.000-05:00

I was bored yesterday. It was cold (although not as cold as its been) and windy and I think I was fighting off some unknown ailment cause I just didn't feel right. Plus, on Saturday, I drove to Smoketown, excited to purchase the remainder of my seeds at Rohrer's. They were closed. Apparently not open on Saturdays until March! Arghhhhhhh! I can't wait until March! And only open normal business hours (8-5) monday thru friday! That totally sucked. I need to do something gardeny! I really want it to be spring sooner rather than later so I decided to start some seeds in the bathroom greenhouse window. I know it is too early, but I just wanted to play around with some dirt and seeds. So I started three little containers of stock seeds from my plants last year and in keeping with the tomato....three kinds of lettuce: Black seeded simpson, red sails, and Amish deer tongue. So we'll see. I just have this overwhelming urge to plant something, y'know? By the by, the tomato has one little bud on it! And I realized that although I think tomato foliage is stinky when you're crawling around in it weeding and it is humid and 85 degrees.....it smells heavenly in January.

Bulb patrol has begun in earnest as I walk around the yard bundled so only my eyes are showing to see what is up and about. Snow drops will be blooming in a week or so. A few daffodils are poking their little heads aboveground and I have two lenten rose blossoms. I love the first flowers of the year. They aren't the showiest but they aren't needy and boy are they a sight for sore eyes at the tail end of January.

Perhaps tomorrow I'll do the 6 weird things meme. I have to whittle the list down. There are a lot of weird things about me.

So. Very. Cold.

2007-01-26T13:10:00.000-05:00

Come back unaturally warm temperatures! Wind chills were in the single digits last night and I think the overnight low was 10 degrees. It won't get above freezing today. I hate this so very much. You just have no idea how I detest being cold. Husband built a roaring fire last night and it was so very comfy, but I thought I would die taking the dogs out several times last night. The wind was just tearing across the area. And the chickens. I was convinced that I would open the door to dead chickens this morning when I gave them their yogurt. Yes, I feed them yogurt every morning. They get really excited about yogurt. I started feeding yogurt to correct a gastointestinal malady about a month ago in one chicken. Yogurt supposedly helps get them back to normal. It worked (or the illness improved on it's own) but the chickens get very cranky now when I open up their coop to let them out and I don't have a bowl in my hand. Talk about getting the cold shoulder. Anyway, I was convinced the cold would have killed them. Tossed and turned for much of the night listening to the wind and imagining chickens slowly freezing to death. If husband would have been away last night, those chickens would have been in the garage with a blanket over them. But they were fine this morning. Jumping up to get at the yogurt bowl I held in my hands, excited to run outside. None the worse for wear. I worry too much.

I want winter to be over in the worse way. And its only been here a very little while.

2007 seed order

2007-01-22T14:32:00.000-05:00

So I stopped by my favorite hardware/garden center store on Saturday to grab a Rohrer's seed catalog. I wanted to compare what I was seeing in all my catalogs with what they were offering this year. The store had a large selection and Rohrer's is about a 30 minute drive from me in Smoketown, PA and has everything in the catalog. Rohrer's has been in business in the same location since 1919 and while not everything is organic, much of it is. Some of the things that other seed catalogs offer as rare heirlooms are offered by Rohrer's but aren't noted as such. Probably because they have been offering them nonstop since 1919. So there might not be a seed order this year, just a Saturday trip to finish things up. I think this happened last year too. I thought I was embarassingly early, but some seeds were already sold out at the hardware store.

I purchased the following:
Cosmos "Dazzler"
Morning Glory "Grandpa Ott's"
Tithonia "Torch" ( I so love this flower)
Zinnia "Orange King", "Miss Willmot", and "Canary Bird"
Nasturtium "Whirly Bird"
Sunflower "Velvet Queen"

Beets "Detroit Dark Red"
Beans "Henderson's Bush" Baby Lima variety
" Romano" pole variety
Carrots "Tendersweet"
Egg Plant "Black Beauty"
Lettuce "Black Seeded Simpson", "Red Sails", and "Amish Deer Tongue"
Mustard "Giant Red"
Radish "Sparkler"
Spinach "Bloomsdale Long Standing"
Squash "Black Beauty" zucchini and "Summer Crookneck" yellow

Peas
Shell Peas "Wando"
Snap Peas "Sugar Snap"

Still to buy when I make the trip to the actual Rohrer's Seeds next Saturday:

Zinnia "Raggedy Anne"

Bean "La Victoire" french type green bush bean
"Great Northern No. 1140"
"Hutterite Soup Bean"
"Vermont Cranberry"
Broccoli "Calabria"
Broccoli Raab "Rapinni Spring"
Cucmbers "Northern Pickiling" "Marketmore", and 'Lemon"
Eggplant "Rosa Bianca" and "Red Egg"
Lettuce "Rouge d'Hiver" and "Lolla Rossa" and "Salad Bowl"
Swiss Chard "Ruby Red" and "Bright Lights"
Kale "Lacinato" and "Red Russian"
Melons "Charentais" and "Pineapple Melon"
Onions "Borettana Yellow" cippolini type
Potatos "Yukon Gold"
Watermelon "Allsweet"

I still have tons of tomato, pepper, and pumpkin/squash seeds from last year. I'll probably buy a few more varieties of squash seeds, but I haven't decided yet. Not that it matters. Cucumber Beetles get them all anyway and the ones that survive......well they ususally rot.

Tomatoes in the bathroom

2007-01-17T09:45:00.000-05:00

What? You don't grow vegetables in your bathroom?

I didn't intend to. Here's the story:

I have a greenhouse window in my bathroom. I don't know why. It was there when we moved in. A little odd, being on the second floor, and being in a bathroom, but whatever. A little gardening first thing in the morning was kind of nice. And it was a cat magnet. When Beanie was alive, both her and Roy would pass out in there, one on each shelf, absorbing the heat. So when we had the windows replaced we left that one alone, even though you can feel a bit of a breeze on very cold and windy nights.

So, this past fall I just couldn't throw out the geraniums and that little frilly white flower that I had planted with them. I've tried overwintering things in the garage and they always die. So, what the heck. I repotted them in smaller pots with compost and brought them inside to the bathroom. Nothing cheerier than a geranium in winter in the bathroom. Well, apparently my compost is not hot enough. Several weeks ago I noticed a tomato seedling growing up out of the white frilly plant's pot. Hmmmm. I let it go. Now it is pretty big and I should see flowers on it in a soon. I'm curious to see what kind of tomato it is. I hope it is a Resientraube or the little Blonde Haired Girl one. I don't think I have room for a Brandywine or Oxheart in there.

Now I'm thinking about starting some lettuce maybe. Or some basil. Mmmmmm. Bathroom basil anyone? I promise I won't wash it in the shower with me, like that episode of Seinfeld.

Foggy Monday

2007-01-15T13:01:00.000-05:00

So I took the day off on Friday and went to the farm show. Not quite as I remembered, but still fun. I spent quite a bit of time checking out the poultry. I wish I had pictures to show, but some people were taking pictures and it was really freaking out already stressed birds, so I didn't. There were hundreds of varieties of chickens. For future chickens there are definitely some varieties I'd like to try. Of course I was also interested in the two varieties that I have (Barred Rocks and Buff Orpingtons) and was a little disturbed by what I saw. Is there such a thing as steroids for chickens? The grand champion and reserve champion Buff Orpingtons were easily three times the size of my girls. They were scary big. And they had big pointy beaks and they must have been old because their combs and wattles and feet were completely washed out, devoid of any color. Or they were taking performance enhancing drugs. Seriously, these chickens were so big that I would be afraid of them. And the roosters! Wow. Very big. Scary big. Look like they could weigh 20 pounds big.

I also spent a good bit of time with the goats. I think I'm not ready this year. Maybe next year. They are very cute but I need to do a lot more research about which kind I want and more about goat husbandry. And this may be a stupid question and I was afraid to ask the goat owners at the farm show. Why would you remove a goat's ears? Lambs too. There were lots and lots of sheep and goats with no ears. This seems cruel and unnecessary to me and also makes them look very strange. Big floppy ears are part of a goats charm. Anybody that knows goats, weigh in and tell me why anybody would do this.

Also of interest at the PA Farm Show was a fair amount of information regarding local food and resources to help you find local food, choose restaurants that feature local food, and the importance of making these choices.

I picked up a brochure for the 16th annual Farming for the Future Conference at Penn State University February 1-3. While I don't intend on becoming a farmer, I would absolutely love to go to this conference. Key Note speakers include Joel Salatin of Polyface Farm in Virginia and Michael Ableman, author of On Good Land - Autobiography of an Urban Farm. Thursday night you get to attend a local food picnic with Mr. Salatin. And all the meals served throughout the conference are local.

And the classes available sound really awesome:

The Art of Cheese

Seedsaving

Brambles and Ribes: Establishment and Disease Monitoring

Gardening in Small Spaces

Basic Beekeeping

Making the Soil, Pasture, and Animal Health Connection

Creating Demand for Local Food

Winter Cropping with and without Hoophouses

Melons, Heirloom Melons, and more melons!

Living Lightly in a Heavy World

Living within your local means: Eating year round in your foodshed

Food for your soul: Dinner at the farm

And tons and tons more. It would be so interesting. Here is a pdf of the conference brochure. I probably won't go because I would have to take off work. But I'm putting it out there just in case anyone else in the northeast might like to attend.

Coming Soon: My seed list for 2007. I think I've gotten it narrowed down and am ready to make the order.

Chilly

2007-01-09T16:06:00.000-05:00

I'm cold today. It is actually seasonal out. But it may get to the mid-60s again on the weekend. Last weekend was phenomenal. I weeded, I cleared brush, I spread compost. Chickweed and speedwells were blooming in the lawn. Absolutely lovely. Until you notice the buds on the fruit trees and all the flowering shrubs about to burst open on this second week of January. Me thinks I'm not gonna get a whole lot of fruit this year.

Its Pennsylvana Farm Show week here in the midstate. I hope I get the chance to go. A lot of the focus this year is on alternative energy development in Pennsylvania. And I want to look at chickens. And then of course there is the food. One of the very best things available are the baked potatoes. Hard to believe that there could be much variation in the baked potato department. But there is. These are the best baked potatoes in the world. They practically ooze out of their jackets, they've been cooking for so long. Absolutely perfect!

And another entry in the "Attack the notion of responsible food" category. This time from Katha Pollitt of The Nation of all places. One of her New Years Resolutions:

4. Don't think your lifestyle can save the world. I love slow food! I cook slow food! I shop at farmers' markets, I pay extra for organic, I am always buying cloth bags and forgetting to bring them to the supermarket. But the world will never be saved by highly educated, privileged people making different upscale consumer choices. If you have enough money to buy grass-fed beef or tofu prepared by Tibetan virgins, you have enough money to give more of it away to people who really need it and groups that can make real social change.

Because really, what makes more of a tangible change? Handing cash directly to the farmer down the road that grows tomatoes or sending a check to a huge bureaucratic organization where it will probably be used for administration? The check of course, you snotty food elitists! Why help a person succeed in what they are doing while they are doing it? Better to let them fail and then give them a handout.

Take heart all my highly-educated, privileged friends making upscale consumer choices. We might not be able to save the world, but we can save some nearby farms.

I wonder if I could track down some Amish virgins to make that Tofu, thereby making it a 'local food'.

how cute are these?

2007-01-05T13:51:00.000-05:00

I love vintage seed packets. Love them. I would so rather have a lovely drawing than a photograph. On the seed packets that is. Not in the catalog. You do need a photo at some point along the way. I collect them when I come across them, with the intention of someday framing a decent quantity. They are small, and would look awkward if not presented in a large grouping, so it might take awhile. Until....... in my travels to seek out new and exciting seed catalogs, I came across D. Landreth Seeds , touting itself as the oldest seed house in America. If you scroll down to the bottom of the first page, you will see that these vintage seed packets are available as blank notecards. A set of twelve notecards that are 4 1/2 by 6 1/2 inches in size (perfect for framing) is $8.00. There is a entirely flower set, a vegetable set, and a combo set.

Or, if you want to order the actual seed packets, they have those as well. A little more expesive and only available in limitied quantities. I love these. They should make poster sized replicas. Or fabric. I would love a barn jacket made of fabric with tons of little vintage seed packets all over it.

Request for information

2007-01-04T14:05:00.000-05:00

It's getting down to the line for planning the 2007 garden. I have the catalogs assembled and have made sticky notes of what I want from where. But, the grass is always greener, and I am paranoid that as soon as I send away the money, some faulous seed catalog that I've forgotten about will arrive in my mailbox. I have the following catalogs:

Baker Creek
Seed Savers Exchange
Fedco
High Mowing
Nichols Nursery
Jungs
Gurneys
Pinetree
Territorial
Select Seeds (flowers)
a few berry catalogs that I can't remember right at the moment

and for fruit trees:
Raintree
Sonoma Antique Apple Nursery
St. Lawrence (order it just for the pen/ink drawings)
Adams County Nursery

Are there any great ones that I am missing? Leave me a comment.

Airing of grievances

2007-01-03T14:54:00.000-05:00

I missed Festivus again this year. And with it, the traditional airing of grievances. There are quite a few grievances that I could air at this point, but one that has been particularly getting under my skin is the constant painting of 'local food' people as elitist. Two times (Buzzwords and Greenwash) over the holidays, New York Times lackey Kim Severson wrote articles with a distinct bias against people that eat local and/or organic. The Buzzwords piece was particularly nasty, unfortunately protected behind the Times' pay wall. Basically calling local foodies snobbish and trendy and only a kneejerk reaction to Walmart offering organic food. "Oh no, we're so elitist! What will we do now that Walmart is selling organic food? We can't eat organic anymore, obviously! Well, invent 'local food' as a way to further elevate ourselves above the riff-raff I suppose". My favorite line is at the end where she says that it might be a good idea in California, but not in North Dakota. I wonder what all the local foodies in Canada have to say about that. Greenwash isn't as bad, but snark against organic food companies is definitely evident. Yes, the "all natural Cheetos" are ridiculous. But who buys them anyway? But making fun of the Stonyfield Farm cow? bitch.

Breaking news for Ms. Severson: Not everyone's idea of eating local is exiting their Hummer House, starting up the SUV and tooling on down to the uber-expensive boutique farmers market to pay $10 a pound for mesclun mix from a nerby farm with a cutesy rural name. Some of us actually grow that food ourselves. Scraping frozen chicken shit off a plywood floor isn't exactly what I call elitist. Or we buy directly from the farmer at 'real' farmers markets where those that offer overpriced trendy items don't last long. And we don't do it to elevate ourselves over others. We actually do it to keep the money in our community, to preserve family farms and open space, and to prevent the further consolidation of the food industry. And we do it because its healthy. Here is what I call elitist: flouncing through your life without ever giving thought to the consequences of your choices. Get out of the city every now and then.

And another thing!

Here is a Grist article with a link to an article from the Economist. Also trashing the local food movement. You know something must be worthwhile if it starts generating this much backlash.

Loving global warming

2007-01-02T14:36:00.000-05:00

I am. I'm sorry. I can't help it. I know its wrong. But I love this crazy weather. We have had only a handful of nights that temperatures have gotten below freezing. Every day that I was off over the holidays, I took the dogs for a long walk.....in a sweatshirt. I weeded over the holidays! At the end of December people!!!!! I always thought I wanted to move to North Carolina or even further south to take advantage of the mild temperatures. I hate snow and ice. Now I don't have to! They are coming to me!!!! The weather forecast for the rest of this week is highs to almost 60 degrees and not getting below freezing at all. This is awesome!

I know. Not awesome. Polar bears are starving. The ice caps are melting. All coastal areas will be flooded. But I'm doing as much as I can to not contribute to it. Can I help that I'm not as morose as I should be? I'm downright giddy. Okay, just a short post. Hope everybody's New Year started out well. I gotta go though. My truckload of Zone 8 nursery plants just arrived. Gotta get planting! Zone 6b my behind!

Okay, only kidding. That would be jumping the gun. But I may push the envelope to Zone 7 plants this year. Just to see what happens.

Merry Christmas!

2006-12-22T14:01:00.000-05:00

I hope everyone has a great holiday! Here is a picture of my main tree. There are a lot of ornaments. Maybe a few too many. We buy ornaments for each other each Christmas and we also buy one every year on vacation.

Here are a few of my favorites:

An oyster shell Santa and a crab shell Santa from Ocracoke, NC. We bought these the first year we went on vacation together in 1997. We always make sure to search out something locally made. Ocracoke isn't a really wealthy place and when the tourists go home, there isn't much of a livelihood.

This is one of my first ornaments when I was an adult. The boyfriend I had from age 20 to 26 (and lived with for 4 years) was a firephobe and we could never have a Christmas tree or a jack-o-lantern, or a candle of any kind. So after we parted ways, I went out and got the biggest and best Christmas tree I could find and put it in my bedroom, so I could fall asleep looking at it everynight (and allow it to remain lit while unattended all night long. Take that Jim!). I didn't have much money for ornaments and the 4 little snowmen were pretty much it. To me, they represent strength and independence and feeling comfortable in your own skin for the first time.

This is a vintage Santa that my husband put in my Christmas stocking two years ago. He isn't the greatest gift giver, but I loved this and it meant a lot that he "thought' about it and searched for it.

My husband is an engineer for the railroad and every year I get him a train ornament. I think he is kind of sick of them but I like them. This year he gets a vintage pick-up truck instead. The ornaments shown are a Pennsylvania Railroad boxcar and a Chesapeake and Ohio coal car. Yes, our dog is named after a rail line whose mascot is a sleeping kitten.

These are ornaments for kitties that have passed on. Blackie and Quina (Beanie). I have them for all the pets and makes me tear up when I put them on the tree because I know that someday, all of the ornaments will be for pets that I no longer have.

This is one of those styrofoam ball kits that people used to make. My mom made it for her parents before I was born and my grandmother always hung it on the swing lamp over the breakfast table at Christmas time. When she died in 1979, my grandfather left it there and it hung there until his death in 2001. It reminds me of him and his pnk formica kitchen and his fabulous spaghetti sauce and the very cheap beer we would drink when I visited him, laughing and talking at that little kitchen table under that glittery green ball.

Almost better than Christmas

2006-12-21T09:20:00.000-05:00

Yay! I made it! The shortest day of the year! From here on out, we gain daylight! Woohoo! Seriously, the last two weeks or so, when I wake up in the morning, I feel like I'm underwater. I just feel so sleepy and slow. Its strange the effect that light has on some people. Before I started paying attention to it, every November I thought I was sick. Really sick. Surely I had cancer or lupus or some horrible disease because I would get so tired and sleepy and my body just felt bad. So I would go to the doctor and they wouldn't find anything. After a few years of this, I realized that it happened every year, just about the same time, around the middle of November. And every year in the first week or so of February, I would feel great again. Just like one day, all of a sudden, it would feel like a light switch got turned back on and I would have lots of energy again. So now I expect it, and don't go running to the doctor. But it sure is nice to get to the end and know that every day from now until June 21st, there will be more and more light. Definitely something to celebrate!

hard to believe its December

2006-12-18T10:13:00.000-05:00

Hard to believe it is almost Christmas. It was in the mid 60s here yesterday and will be again today. Working outside at the end of December and being warm in a sweatshirt is strange. But I'm not complaining. Doggies and I went for a long walk and it was just lovely to be outside and feeling like its spring.

The chickens had two long days of free ranging and enjoyed every minute of it. I think I can almost see them smile when they emerge in the morning and it is balmy instead of biting cold. Poor little chooks. It'll arrive eventually.

Little Roy is doing so well. And I think he already feels normal again. I learned how to give shots on Friday and was really exepcting a disaster. I don't like needles. Cats are slippery. And I have to give him a shot every 12 hours. But he absolutely doesn't care. I give him the shot while he is eating and he doesn't even flinch. And I'm a pro already. It is part of our routine now. I'm only worried about having to be away for work or vacation now. No more leaving a bowl of food and water for the cat for an overnight. He'll have to go to the kennel with the dogs.

The bird feeders aren't very busy. There are always birds, but it isn't like the bitter cold winter days of past year. You can see clouds of insects (not sure what they are) as you walk through the yard, and the chickens easily pluck big grubs from the lawn that must be coming near the surface because of the warmth. Nobody really needs birdseed.

No such thing as a free kitten

2006-12-15T09:45:00.000-05:00

My little guy Roy was found on a street about 6 years ago as a stray. A tiny kitten, wandering about with his 6 brothers and sisters. Malnourished and dirty with no momma cat in sight, I watched them for awhile and when it became clear that they were strays, I picked up each and every one and put them into the big front pocket of my sweatshirt. I found good homes for everybody but Roy. He was the runt of the litter and someone had spattered paint on him so he looked perpetually dirty. Roy ended up staying. He also had some behavioral issues. He liked to nurse. On anything. Your ear, your neck, fingers, whatever was available. That personality quirk took awhile to go away. The two other cats that I had (Beenie and Blackie) accepted Roy eventually and became good friends. Now Beenie and Blackie are gone and only Roy is left. He acts a little like the dogs, wanting to be included in doggie things. After Beenie died in the spring, Roy lost a lot of weight. I attributed it to stress. In July, he was getting really thin and also was constantly thirsty. I thought diabetes but the vet took his temperature and looked him over (didn't take blood) and pronounced him healthy. Two weeks ago, I took him back. There was definitely something wrong with him and I wanted to know what it was. He was even thinner, drinking all the time and eating voraciously. This time they did take blood. Several hundred dollars later, lo and behold, Roy is diabetic. So this evening I have to go and learn how to give my cat shots of insulin. Grand. But at least little buddy will be fine after some fine tuning.

winding down the year

2006-12-13T13:27:00.000-05:00

With Thanksgiving and my Christmas party out of the way, I feel really relaxed now. I still have some Christmas shopping to do, but not too much and I feel like these next two weeks will be rather calm. For the forseeable future at least, the weather is projected to be in the mid to high 50s, barely getting to freezing at night, so I'm looking forward to being able to putter around the yard a little on weekends. Recent putterings have revealed that a very tall rabbit or sorta short deer has been munching on my Viburnum dentatum 'Blue Muffin' that I planted, in addition to several Ilex verticillata 'Berry Nice' that were little more than twigs to begin with. The Pink Diamonds Hydrangea are almost no longer visible but I can't figure if it was a critter or the victim of the last mow before the Cub Cadet was put to bed. They are suspiciously short.

I am taking the week off between Christmas and New Years and I'm expecting that is when the Arctic air mass will appear. But, whatever. I've got books and seed catalogs and plenty of stuff to keep me busy inside if need be. I picked up these three books recently at Chester County Bookstore, as I happened to be in the neighborhood. A little early Christmas shopping for me.

Paths of Desire by Dominique Browning

Continuous Harmony Essays Cultural and Agrarian by Wendell Berry

it's a long road for a tomato by Keith Stewart and Flavia Bacarella

I've only barely started the Dominique Browning book, but I'm not loving it so far. She of course was/is the editor of House and Garden and is a little too designy for me. I should have realized this, but I am always a sucker for books about people buying old houses and redoing the grounds. I don't hate it, but I'm not devouring it as I usually do.

As the garden catalogs trickle in I'm mentally making a list of what I want to do next spring. And what worked and what didn't this past year. El at fast grow the weeds is doing a year end wrap up of her garden and it has gotten me thinking. And Liz at Pocket Farm has me considering beans, something I've never grown before. I know I'm gonna give up peppers, save for a handful of pimentos. They just never do well and don't show up until September. I'm thinking about little hoop houses and maybe a cold frame to start things earlier, and goats are always on my mind. Oh the grand plans we think up during the long winter months.

how it went

2006-12-11T12:16:00.000-05:00

I think really well. I wish I wouldn't get so stressed out because half of the things I stress about, don't even matter, which I can only clearly see after the first guest arrives. So 24 people and 7 children came and went over 61/2 hours and I think everyone had a good time (at least they said they did). I cooked most of the day Saturday, since I didn't do the tree until Friday night and it took a lot longer than I expected. For food, I made pesto deviled eggs, roast beef/horseradish wraps, roasted red pepper wraps, meatballs in my homemade tomato preserves, hot artichoke spinach dip with a roasted garlic bread loaf, a cold spinach dip, a roasted red pepper dip with crackers and cut up veggies, these neat little blt pizzas, and a fig cake. And there were also chips and pretzels, chocolate, cookies, etc. from the store. The pesto deviled eggs were very popular and went very fast. I didn't even get one. Thankfully I had eaten a spoonful of the filling before washing the bowl that afternoon. People really like the house which made both my husband and I feel good. It shouldn't be important to get approval from other people, but it feels nice. I like seeing my home through other people eyes and knowing that they like it. Nothing was broken, nobody hurt (which with 7 children, only one of which was school aged, was a blessing), and there was nothing spilled on the new carpet. I did buy apple juice juice boxes for the kids just in case, knowing it wouldn't stain if spilled. The only thing I don't like about having parties is that it goes very, very fast and I never feel like I get to spend enough time with all my friends. I'm too busy running around trying to be the perfect hostess.

In other news, I think I have a sick chicken. Claire is losing her feathers. I thought I understood that chickens don't moult until their second fall. My chickens were born at the end of March and supposedly shouldn't molt until next fall. Is this right? I looked all over her yesterday for mites or some kind of insect on her skin, but there isn't anything. I'm really worried and will probably separate her from the rest and put her in the garage in the next day or so if it appears to be getting worse. Her appetite is good, she is running around same as ever, just losing feathers. Although the scales on her legs appear a little redder than ususal. Also, is my egg production supposed to be dwindling? Everything I read is different. Some say they should lay the same all the time unless they are sick. I thought I read that laying slows down as the days get shorter and will pick back up in February or so. Sometimes I get one egg, sometimes I get three. But I never get 5 a day anymore. I only have two chicken books but they contradict one another.

T-minus 53 hours and counting

2006-12-07T13:04:00.000-05:00

Okay. Party is on Saturday at 5. Carpet, new dishwasher, and plumber were at the house yesterday. We paid for probably an hour to have a plumber tvisit us for ten short minutes to tighten bolts my husband forgot to tighten to keep water from pouring out of the bottom of the toilet tank. I do believe we have made yet another "idiotic homeowner' list in the greater Elizabethtown area. The dishwasher is super cool but a little intimidating. Why can't you buy a good quality basic dishwasher anymore? I want the stainless steel tub but I don't need all the fancy pants electronic stuff. I have never pushed a button other than "normal wash" in my entire life. A pre-rinse cycle? It's called rinsing it off really quick in the sink! Plus I want a real honest to God button. Not a touch pad thingy that I know damn well will break in a few years a cost a fortune to fix. Oh, and the carpet guys! Installed the carpet. Looks great, only it really reminds me of Triscuits and makes me hungry. Not good. Anyway, apparently after they installed the threshold into the bathroom, they tried the door to see if it would close. It is a pocket door. It did not close. They must have kept trying, because they broke said pocket door and quietly pushed it back into the slot and didn't say anything. And then they left. And now my husband is trying to fix it, which will involve many trips to Home Depot and removing the moulding and probably pulling up the threshold all of which will probably not be fixed and pretty by 5pm on Saturday. Stupid carpet installers!!!!

Also....

I am probably the last person in the world to realize this....but those Mr. Clean Magic Erasers? PFM! That stands for pure f*cking magic. I love those things. How have I lived lo these many years without using this miracle product? It took stains off that I had just assumed were permanent and had quit trying to remove. One word of warning: Do not wipe the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser on vinyl wall paper that has been in the kitchen for probably 20 or 30 years. It will make it several shades lighter, removing a micro-thin layer of time filth that you didn't realize was there because regular Windex does not touch time filth. And you will then be forced to Magic Erase EVERY WALLPAPERED SURFACE IN THE ROOM, lest your party guests see the one clean area and realize everything else if dirty! And then you will run low on Magic Erasers and be forced to triage stains so as not to completely be out of Magic Eraser and still have major stainage. And in your quest for super clean vinyl wall paper, you will miss the two carpet installers ripping your pocket door off the track and quietly sneaking away.

So tonight......the tree. And some more cleaning. And the fig cake. My husband is home today out picking a tree by himself. Alone. Pray for me.

It's starting already

2006-12-05T10:37:00.000-05:00

Last night I dreamed about bulbs. The orange tulips that I planted in October, specifically. Only when they came up they weren't tulips. They were pretty, but they weren't tulips. I think its the seed catalogs that are coming in that have gotten me thinking about spring. I've gotten a whole bunch, but Territorial has really captured my attention and I anticipate Seed Savers any day now. There are still things growing in some of the beds, but my mind is already on next years garden. Isn't that awful. As I peruse what to plant next year, I'm thinking about what worked and didn't work this past year. I'll have to make some lists of what to repeat and what not to. I'm already looking forward to those days in January when the ground is covered with snow, and somethings cooking in the crockpot, and I'm all curled up in front of the woodstove with my piles of seed catalogs and mini-post it notes.

Last night it got into the low 20s. The chickens had seriously frozen water this morning. I have to take fresh water out in a plastic container each morning. They get that dirty I'm sure by noon, but so far by that time their other waterer is thawed out. Not sure what I'll do when it just stops getting above freezing at all for days and days. How do other chicken owners tackle this? There is no electric in their hen house. I could run an extension cord out to it and get one of those warmers for their waterer I suppose. And at what temperature will they get frostbitten combs? I'm a little worried about this cold issue. I'm still getting eggs though. From 1 to 3 a day. Poor cold little chookies.

Field trip

2006-12-01T15:12:00.000-05:00

Delineating wetlands just west of the Delaware Water Gap in the Poconos. Walking around on the last day of November in a single long-sleeve shirt and being sweaty is a very strange feeling. Waking up the next day to 70 deegree temps is even stranger. But I'm not complaining. As freaky as it is, I love it.

My co-worker Cathy for scale.

Its beginning to look a lot like.......

2006-11-29T09:32:00.000-05:00

I know its a little more than 24 days away, but thats as far as the Santa counter goes. I have a little decorating done. But have lots more to do. I still have to do outdoor swags for the windows, but that will have to wait until Saturday. Tough to do that stuff in the dark.

Here is my cute little retro tree in my living room. Looking at those fat colored lights takes me right back to childhood. As do the burned fingertips. Tiny cool-brights are for weaklings.

The big Christmas tree will have to go somewhere else this year. I haven't heard from the carpet people yet about the installation date, so I'm thinking its not going to happen by the 9th. Which is OKAY. (Note my new, relaxed tone.) There is nothing wrong with having the main tree in a different place for one year. NOT A BIG DEAL, I say. We do however, have to put all the stereo equipment back in the armoire in order for me to play my adorable 40s-50s-60s Christmas CDs. And that really shouldn't happen until the carpet is put in because it is a major pain in the butt to put it all together and take it all apart again. So hurry please carpet people! I can't have a party without my super soudtrack! It just won't be the same.

I know this isn't very simple. Its kinda materialistic. Christmas is about Jesus, and sharing, and getting together with family and friends (I have a manger scene, I just haven't unpacked it yet). Which we do. But I can't help it. I just love decorating for Christmas. LOVE IT. If I see Christmas stuff in an antique store, better get out of the way. I could sit for hours going through boxs of old ornaments and decorations. I don't pay a lot for things. But I pay for a lot of things. Its fun to completely turn the house over and put a little holiday cheer in each and every room. And the yard. And the mailbox. And my office at work.

I may be a little aggressive though. I have found myself driving slowly past a house nearby where an elderly couple live. They have the best collection of outdoor plastic santas from 50s and 60s I have ever seen. There are about 20 of them. I'm not sure what I'd do with them, but I want them. I actually am contemplating stopping by and giving them my phone number. Just in case they are about to move into a retirement home that doesnt' allow plastic santas and they'd like to sell. To someone that really GETS plastic santas.

Anyway, how far are you in your holiday decorating? Show me your plastic santas people!

Holiday wrap up

2006-11-27T10:15:00.000-05:00

Foggy day here today. Actually yesterday was quite foggy as well. It's eerie in the early morning. Everything feels so heavy and damp and it's so quiet. It was beautiful the last three days and will be again today, making it up into the 60s. I was stringing lights on outside trees yesterday and it felt very strange to be decorating for Christmas without a coat on.

I hope everyone had a good holiday. Mine was nice. A lot of work, but worth it. I think everyone enjoyed themselves.

Here are some shots of the meal itself. Try not to see the cans of soda on the table. Not local and soda with Thanksgiving dinner is kind of yucky, but whatever. There is no picture of the turkey as it was being carved as I took pictures and wasn't very attractive at that point. The table setting leaves a little to be desired, but I was hurrying at that point and was just concerned about getting the food onto the table with some semblance of warmth still attached to it.

This is what's left of the caramel swirl pumpkin cheesecake. I highly recommend this recipe. It is easy and always gets good reviews.

This was the only thing I managed to get a shot of before it was sliced. My apple-cranberry pie. Yummy.

One good thing about these past few weeks. That party is in less than two weeks. I am not going to get stressed out. Well, try not to at least. What gets done, gets done. I get myself all worked up and end up not enjoying myself because I am tired or anxious or what have you. Everyone had a good time at Thanksgiving regardless of the less than perfect table setting or lukewarm brussel sprouts. I have to learn to step back and be more relaxed. No one's expectations of me are nearly as high as what I expect of myself and I end up not having fun. And that isn't what holiday get togethers with friends and family are about. Lesson learned. Until next year.

100 mile Thanksgiving

2006-11-22T11:02:00.000-05:00

So here is the run down. Not everything is local. I just couldn't do it with the amount of time I have to track things down. But I did pretty well. Will post a picture after the big day.

Turkey - A beautiful 22-pounder from Shady Acres in Elizabethtown

Stuffing - Potato Bread cubes from Martins in York County, with Shady Acres Butter, local celery, and tons of my onions that are really small because they didn't grow real well. Not sure where the celery is from. I stopped at three farm stands in search of celery with no luck. My grocery store had celery marked 'local', so not sure of what their definition is. Flat leaf parsley grown by me.

Potatoes and Sweet Potatoes - Farm stand in Lebanon County. My roasted garlic will go in the mashed potatoes. And my eggs will go into the sweet potato souffle. Sour cream for mashed potatoes from Shady Acres.

Brussel Sprouts - Again, grocery store had 'local' Brussel Sprouts.

Baked Corn - From a box, but very, very local. John Cope's Corn is made in Rheems, which is a little over a mile from our house. All through august and september the trucks loaded with sweet corn rumble past our house headed for John Cope's. The baked corn made with dried sweet corn, eggs, and butter is just awesome. The canned dehydrated sweet corn I could just eat cold with a spoon. Not sure how widely available it is, but if you can find it, try it. John Cope's corn has been on my Thanksgiving table since I was born.

Pumpkin Pie and Pumpkin Cheesecake - pumpkins purchased in Lancaster County, my eggs. Crust made with Sweetzels spice cookies made in Skippack, outside of Philadephia. Not organic, but a small, family owned company. I could claim that the Philadelphia Cream Cheese for the pies is local too, but that would be dishonest.

Apple Cranberry Pie - Apples from Masonic Homes Orchards in Etown, that Daisy Flour from Annville, Lebanon County, and butter from Shady Acres.

Mulled Cider - Apple Cider from Adams County.

What wasn't local: try as I might, all cranberries I find are from California. Grrrr. Pecans and coconut into the souffle. I cheated and bought those brown and serve rolls. So not local. I don't know about other people, but I always like to have a relish tray with different types of olives and pickles. I have dill pickles that I made this summer, but I purchased olives and sweet pickles from the Mt. Olive Pickle Company from North Carolina. Mt. Olive is the second largest pickle manufacturer in the United States and recently worked with the Farm Labor Organizing Committee to unionize laborers and improve working conditions for migrant workers. So, not local, but bearing the union label.

Got pumpkin?

2006-11-20T14:24:00.000-05:00

I do. Lots of it. I roasted two pumpkins yesterday in preparation for Thanksgiving and ended with a lotta lotta pumpkin. I make a pumpkin cheesecake and pumpkin pie for dinner, a pumpkin pie for each family unit to take home, and I usually give some away to co-workers. And I still have three pumpkins on the porch to roast.

My lists are made and I'm only a little stressed out. I won't be getting much sleep these next few days, but by Thursday morning the whole house should be clean, a guest room will have been competely redone, and most everything will have been cooked but the potatoes and the bird.

Hope everyone has a great holiday!

pretty

2006-11-17T09:45:00.000-05:00

Some wily weather yesterday. Torrential rain and crazy wind and a tornado watch all day long. But round about 4 p.m., we stepped outside to see this. I couldn't get the entire thing, but we could clearly see the beginning and the end. Pretty neat.

more anxiety

2006-11-16T10:54:00.000-05:00

So we go to pick out carpet last night for my husbands living room. Actually its a family room, but we each have a room that we call our living rooms. I have mine and I decorate it my way, he has his and decorates it his way. Weird, I know, but it keeps us married. Anyway, his living room has just been painted a brick red color and he needed carpet. I have been bugging for weeks to go pick carpet. But no. He waits. And waits. And actually thinks carpet will be installed by Thanksgiving. Hahahahaha! So after several hours of walking around different carpet stores and being shocked at the price of carpet (I never knew carpet was so expensive), we bite the bullet and purchase a really good (although pricey carpet {thank God the rest of the house is hardwood}) and sit down to talk about having it installed. I knew there was no way it would be in by the end of next week. I did not think it would take almost three weeks. So guess what it is three weeks? That's right. That party. So now on top of the anxiety of having this party I have to worry about whether I will have carpet. And on top of that, no tree can be purchased or decorated until there is carpet in that room. That is the room where the real tree goes. The main tree. I have smaller fake trees for other rooms. But that is the main tree room. Haha! So I envision having carpet installed the day before, rushing out to get a tree and staying up all night decorating it. SUPER! DUPER! LEFT ARM TINGLING!!

Check out these cute ideas I found on a Colonial Williamsburg site. Don't you just love the egg one! Although there is no way I would undertake something that tedious. I'd have to buy fake eggs. The apples on the other hand.....$1.50 at the orchard for 20 pounds of deer apples.....just might be doable.

Any Ideas?

2006-11-14T13:12:00.000-05:00

Okay, so after Thanksgiving, approximately 2 weeks later, I will be hosting my department Christmas Party. I'm guessing about 30 people, made up of current and old employees and a few non-work friends. I'm already starting to freak out about this but would like to get past turkey day before I advance to the full freak out. Most of these people have never seen my house before and I really, really want everything to look perfect. And I know, it isn't about things, or the house, or whatever, its about being with friends and acquaintances and blah, blah ,blah. People, I want my house to be over the top. Homey and smelling good and not a speck of filth anywhere, filled with meaningful touches and a jaunty 50s Christmas song soundtrack, and just the best Christmas decorations anywhere. I want people to contemplate what they have to do to live there. I know that this is unreasonable and materialistic and self-absorbed but this is what happens when you read Martha Stewart Living every month for 10 years. To make things worse, the week before I will be attending the Marietta Christmas House Tour and will witness amazing feats of craftiness and brilliance that people spent a year thinking up and executing and I will try unsuccessfully to duplicate in less than a week. An 8-foot tree form made entirely of fresh fruit and greenery? I think I can do that!

So, what brilliant decorating/entertaining tips can you contribute? I'm having trouble with the outside. I want outdoor decorations that are natural looking (no inflatable thingies or motorized deer), with white lights, and that aren't too hard to assemble. I have plenty of pine/cedar trees on my property from which to borrow. I have ivy. Give me ideas! And what about food? Can you recall just the best appetizer that you've ever had?

Not politics

2006-11-13T14:27:00.000-05:00

So I ordered the turkey last week. This was apparently a good turkey year. Last year the biggest they had was 17 pounds. Sounds like a lot, but after 10 people eat and everybody gets a leftovers, I still have two growing girls to feed for three more days (my neices stay with me over the holiday weekend) and 17 pounds doesn't do it. So I asked for a big turkey. 'How big' she said. Well, 22 or 23 pounds sounds good. Lots of leftovers. "We have a bigger one. We think probably pushing 30 pounds". I was tempted. Wow. 30 pounds. Turkey for days. But I don't think it would even come close to fitting in the oven. So 22 or 23 will do.

The turkey is local then. Less than 5 miles away at Shady Acres. I believe I am competing in the 100-mile Thanksgiving. I think everything should be available from nearby except the cranberries. Hopefully I can get a hold of Jersey cranberries. While a little more than 100 miles, it's the best I can do and people expect cranberries on Thanksgiving. I went out to lunch with my sister-in-law and the kids on Saturday and we all went to a local diner and had a sort of Thanksgiving type meal. Turkey, stuffing, and sweet potato souffle. The kids went on and on about being excited to help this year and was I going to make exactly what I made last year and it has to be the same. It's funny when the most mundane thing you do in your mind is something cherished as a tradition in someone else's. It really put me in the mood for the Holidays. I almost wanted to start decorating. But there is so much more to do beforehand.

The chickens are starting to slack off in the egg laying. I thought for awhile that there was another sneaky chicken, but after pulling aside everything in the shed and checking for eggs, it must be that the days are too short. They are very spoiled now and seem to think that if they surround me and cluck very loudly, then I will let them out. They don't get out to run free too much these days. They have their little chicken yard, but there just isn't enough light by the time I get home to let them roam around. They, like me, will be glad to see warm weather return in the spring.

Praise Jesus and pass the wine

2006-11-10T12:45:00.000-05:00

If you haven't been to visit the anonymous woman yet, please do. I finer collection of politically related articles and musings is hard to come by. Today she linked to Eleven new and happy things, a Mark Morford piece that pretty much describes the way I'm feeling.