Another Day in the Life......

We are still in our cooler spell.  I was a little chilly during my walkabout this morning.

Our work crew just did 4 hours  yesterday and won't be back until Monday when they will paint the garage roof.  They got a lot accomplished in 4 hours.

This all that remains of the monster Elm tree downed by a tornado several years ago.  It was still alive when they began. 

I thinks he has gone as far as he can with it.  I hope it will  die now!

This is what I see from the garden now....used to be almost a solid wall of sapling trees 8 feet tall, brambles, poke weed, and various other weeds.



This is taken from another angle to show the huge amount of clean ground I now have.  I am standing on the west end looking northeast.



I think I will make this the new berry patch so I can keep a closer eye one it than way out back in the orchard proper.  Speaking of berries, I knew I would wait until cooler weather to plant my new 6 little potted Kiowa blackberries so I re-potted them in gallon size pots and have them in afternoon shade until I am ready.

I spent the morning cleaning the garden fence  row and picking my first small harvest besides the green beans from a few days ago.

A few Jalapeno, bell and cheese peppers, onion, volunteer cucumbars and one eggplant. I think there was a handful of green beans.  This new kind will never be planted again.  I am sticking  to Trail of Tears and Fortex.



I am pretty sure the eggplant was  Rosa Bianca and true to the description, no bitterness and was delicious.
Even  my non-veggie eating GD liked it! I just sliced it  tossed  it with salt and when the griddle was hot, rinsed it off, coated the griddle with oil and fried it until tender.  We tossed  parmesan cheese on top to eat.
Unfortunately the  big one came alone and the others are just blooms now. 

I want to try sauteing, yellow squash, onion and a variety of peppers for lunch.  Still no tomatoes but I hear a local neighbor has sweet corn and we may have  to buy some.  My corn is just now filling out.

Late in the afternoon, I made an angel food cake.  I had a surplus of eggs and still have two dozen ahead.

From cooking

The GD and friends went frog gigging last night and only got three.  I have warned  them I will not cook frog legs!!!

Rain and Fog

We ended the last rainy episode with 2.75 inches.  This morning is so humid but overcast...very, very foggy.




This is looking east where we  usually can see the neighbor's big red barn....not so this morning.

I hadn't been to the garden since the girls came down (last Tuesday) and knew I had better check things out yesterday morning.  I had left onions 'drying' on the mulch.  The tops were getting slimy so we pulled the rest, ready or not, and hauled them over  to the east sheds (in above picture). We spread them out over the flat bed trailer and hope they will dry before rotting!

I also harvested the tomatoes (our first nice haul), the squash and the pitiful eggplant that I will never plant again.  I pulled a pepper or two for cooking with the squash.



I also pulled a dead summer squash plant.  The butternuts are taking over the west end of the garden and look like I will have enough to last a lifetime......unless the squash bugs attack.

The sweet corn is almost ready.  Probably be just enough to us to eat fresh.

It began showering heavily before we finished; we both were soaked and had to change completely when we came in.

My next project in the garden is to mow down (using the string trimmer) the onion row weeds.  It will be too wet to till for some time.  They are also promising more rain beginning tomorrow.....We now have 33 inches for the year and the total for the year last year was just 31 inches.....we are well ahead.

Pictures of the Farm

The girls took picture when they did the ATV tour so I thought I would post some.  These are places I haven't been in ages.

This is a pond  on the old farm (the acres we kept when we bought the farm we now live on).
Sugar had a very good time!


The same pond,



I think this leads into the 7 acre part of the old farm, but not sure.



About 2 acres of the above 7 is wooded,



More to follow.

Also a new experience for me......the girls talked me into it....sort of....an IPod.  More on that later.

Heirloom Petunias - Onion and Garlic Harvest - Pumpkin Sheet Cake

It is a  very cold morning here; our first hard freeze (28° for three hours).  We will sink down to around 26 by daylight.  I meant to get some rose cuttings...may be too late for that.

So far the heirloom petunias I grow have been improved by the cold....I will see what this does to them when I go out to milk this morning.


This is a little patch that reseeds itself  right by the garage door.  I just leave them be and we walk  around them.
These are growing outside the back porch door among the late lettuce I planted.  I just tossed the seeds out during the summer.

They are such a carefree plant...no hybrid ruffly things for me!  I love the simpler blooms of all heirlooms the best.

The lettuce is still good too.

If I have shown this picture before, forgive me.....I didn't want to look it up...I did gather all the cured onions and garlic a couple of weeks ago and got it stored in a freeze-free zone (the milk parlor).



The onions will be gone long before winter is over...the garlic might last forever (it will go bad before then).

I made the Pumpkin Sheet Cake as promised and we kept out 4 pieces and the rest is in the freezer for the Holidays.and iced and cut into squares.

Pumpkin Sheet Cake

1 can (16 oz.) pumpkin

2 cups sugar

1 cup vegetable oil

4 eggs lightly beaten

2 cups flour

1 teaspoon cinnamon

2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

Beat pumpkin, sugar and oil together. Add eggs and mix well. Combine flour, b. soda, cinnamon and salt. Add to pumpkin mixture, mix well. Pour and spread over a greased 15x10x1 inch baking pan. Bake at 350 for 25-30 minutes or done.

Cool and then frost with cream cheese frosting.

Frosting

1 pkg cream cheese softened (3oz)

5 Table. butter softened

1 teas. vanilla

1-3/4 cups powdered sugar

3-4 teaspoons milk

Chopped nuts (optional)

Beat the cream cheese, butter and vanilla until smooth. Gradually add the sugar and mix well. Add enough milk to get the right spreading consistency. Frost cake and sprinkle with nuts.

Yield 20-24 servings.

Gardening - Harvest - Bread Day

We are still needing a good soaking rain which seems to pass us by.

Two days ago, worked seriously in the Kitchen Garden doing some weeding. I finally exposed the potato row where I can actually find the potatoes to dig them They are getting very close to that stage. This was an interesting potato year. They barely bloomed and they got very tall. I do find potatoes under the vines. The onions are looking quite good.

This is the row of Yukon Golds, the vines are laying over but now quite ready for digging yet.



When I finished the weeding, I pulled all of the Early Wonder beets that were sizable, I pulled several onions to thin and because I needed onions in the
kitchen, I cut the first head of cabbage. It was a very nice first harvest.

I dug a few more volunteer potatoes out of the onion rows and that is the last of the broccoli. I will be pulling and adding it to the compost or more probably tossing it to the chickens.

I think the garlic is going to be nice this year. It is not quite ready to pull. I use the term pull loosely; it will need to be dug. The bulbs seemed to have grown more down in the soil than I planted them.

The next day I processed 5 pints of beets. I need help canning!!! I lost some liquid out of the jars.....Ilene what did I do wrong? I am very new to pressure canning.


I also made two loaves of white and 2 of whole wheat bread. I made up one loaf of the whole wheat into burger buns.



Late in the day we drove over to pick up the cured meat from the hog we bought. We haven't tried any bacon or ham yet.