Harvesting the Greens

This week the dehydrator has been busy with greens.  I planted Kale, Swiss and Ruby Red chard, Romaine lettuce, and Leaf lettuce.  I have cut all rows once and my kale and chard are ready to be cut again!  I am dehydrating these and crumbling them up then placing them in a half gallon canning jar. Its almost full already.  It looks like I"ll get two of them full this year. That will be plenty.  I usually take a handful of them and put them in soup or in whatever skillet dish I'm making.  This gives you the greens without really realizing it.  I dried them on a very low temperature for two days to help keep the nutrients in.  Its a great way to plant greens you can eat throughout the season and then save some for winter.  Right now I've gotten everything in my garden except my broccoli.  I dont plan on planting that till end of July or beginning of August.  Right now its harvesting the greens, sugar snap peas, and turnips.  Carrots are coming soon too.  Oh and Blackberries soon too.  Gonna be busy busy busy.  Pardon if I dont blog.  I didnt realize how hard it is to be a mom, harvest/plant/can the garden, go to school, and blog lol.

Saddened by a loss

Everytime I get a favorite chicken and become attached, they end up dead somehow.  It happened again.  My beloved peachy cream.  She was a mostly white golden comet.  I loved her dearly.  She was such a human.  She would always be the last one in, making sure all were in bed.  She would come up to me and "talk" to me, love on me, and she just generally cared that I loved her.  Its sad to say but instead of being angry at a neighbors dog or at a coon, hawk, or skunk...I have to be mad at one of my cats.  Its the only explanation of the time of day she disappeared and the location I found all the feathers.  I"m so upset, I want to cry but its my third favorite that died.  She had gotten out of her pen like she always does and goes picking around the yard, mostly in my garden.  Apparently that was her downfall this time.  The cats have never even hinted at the chickens.  They walk by them when the free range and dont even look at them.  Its just sad to say but I miss her terribly.  Its almost better not knowing sometimes.  I guess I will be finding homes for my cats and reinforce the chicken run so none can get out.  I went out this morning and all the others of the same kind and size were all "talking" to me telling me what happened.   Goodbye my beloved peachy cream, I'll miss you.

Holy Hotness!!

Well I've been inside mostly trying to get cool.  Its been in the middle to high 90's here the past few days.  I have tried really hard not to cook.  I have to make bread but have been trying to hold off until tomorrow with the hope of the "cold front" that is suppose to come and lower us back down into the high 70's. 

My poor garden is looking horrible during the day.  I bought a new sprinkler.  I had two last year, one leaked REALLY bad and was more of a waste then help.  The other I put high on a landscape timber in the middle of the back garden.  My corn got so high last year that I couldnt water it.  I am hoping this year the landscape timber will help.  With the new sprinkler plus my old one I can water my entire garden at once and not miss anything.  Of course it means sprinkling my chickens too but the last two days they have been fine with it! I did manage to harvest two of those plastic walmart containers full of strawberries out of my garden.  I took those along with the 4 I bought at Aldi's and the last of my mature rhubarb stalks and made jelly with my boy.  I call it jelly but its probably preserves, or jam, or something else.  I dont get all technical its all jelly to me.  You spread it on toast and eat it with peanut butter lol.  I also have gotten two pickings of sugar snap peas.  I swear if I go into the garden and work a bit, all my plants seem to grow overnight!  I picked those peas totally gone.  Skipped a day and then had to pick another couple handfuls today of huge normal size peas.  I also bought some straw and put that over my watermelon and muskmelon section.  Had some left over and put it around my zucchini plants.  I went out today and they doubled in size!  I guess some plants like it HOT and some just wish it was winter again like my lettuce.  I still have some plants to place in the garden and some to restart.  I hope its better tomorrow.  My plan is to mow and place the grass in some newly planted pepper plants.  They are still mega small but I think they will grow better in the garden then in my start container.  Plus some of my tomatoes died when I planted so I'm gonna throw a few roma or cherry tomato plants in with my normal ones.  I am also going to start my pumpkins this weekend.  Still trying to decide on the whole winter squash thing.  Might plant my second planting of lettuce and carrots too. Cant decide.  Guess it will depend on weather and time.

Lovin Life

Sorry its been so long since I blogged.  I've just been enjoying the rain free week or so we've been having.  Memorial Day was great. I went to my best friends parents house for a cook-out like we do every year.  It was great seeing all of them again.  You dont realize how much you miss your friends parents till you dont see them hardly at all.  They have a wealth of knowledge that I enjoy obtaining from them.  She's the one who got me planting at St. Patricks day.  Something that came in extremely valuable this year.  Most of my root crops went in just a little after St. Pat's day and then we got tons of rain.  They are doing really well this year.  Had I waited I wouldnt have been able to get into my garden to plant them.  

Things are going really well here. I bought 2 seedless concord grape vines and planted them in my back garden along the fence.  They say it will be about 3 years if you prune correctly.  I have looked things up online but I'm going to see if youtube has any videos.  I bought seedless because I want to make juice mostly and dont want to have to deal with seeds.  I have wild grapes out here but they are getting overrun with blackberries, and this weird fake grape looking plant.  I looked it up once.  All I know is it produces grape looking berries but they are poisonous.  I am not getting the crop of grapes I did a few years ago but cant really get back in this field corner to fix the problem so I just decided to go buy some.

Today I went grocery shopping.  I decided to stop at Aldi's which is one of those stores like save a lot where you bring your own bags. They try to keep the cost down but most of it is prepackaged food that we dont eat.  I really wanted perogies ( I know I spelled that wrong) and dont really feel like making them. While I was there I did do some shopping and got some green peppers, strawberries, and bananas.  Walmart has bananas for 54 cents and Aldi had them for 44..but when I looked at the sign it said 1/2 off bananas!  What? excuse me?  I looked at the bananas and grabbed half a banana box full.  These were going bad but guess what because of a smart purchase last summer I have a dehydrator.  I can use these older bananas that others cant, so I get the deal most dont.  I have a dehydrator full of banana chips plus I made a double batch of banana bread. ( it smells so freakin good in here right now!) You can freeze that once its made and enjoy it whenever you want.  All my bananas cost me like $3!  Since the strawberries were only 99 for a container I got 4 of them.  My garden strawberries are going this year but I planted plants this spring so they arent giving the fruit they will next year.  I have gotten about 2 handfuls, one each day.  I am trying to decide if I want to make strawberry jelly or dehydrate them.  I have 24 hours to decide lol. Dehydrator is full.

Right now life is good.  My bills are paid, my garden is rocking produce, my dehydrator is full,  my pantry is filling slowly with "backup" food, and life is good.  I have to give all the credit to God.  Without his blessings on my life, on my lifestyle, giving me crop sharing friends, and blessing our finances...I would be nothing.  I am so greatful that I can do what God is calling me to do and to enjoy working for the Lord.