Harvest Monday 10.31.11

Linking in with Daphne for Harvest Monday. Don't forget to check out her blog and see what people are harvesting this HALLOWEEN!!!!

HOT PEPPERS

They are still ruling the garden. There are also a few green (purple and yellow) beans coming in but not too many. The french beans have blossomed out and are beginning to set nicely as well so those will be int he tally shortly. Not much in the way of pictures this week. This momma was super tied up with pink poodles and newly FIVE year old twins. (YIKES! When did that happen)

The best part is the second berry patch was completed. The blueberries that have been long suffering in their nursery pots after being rescued in the 50% off bin are finally getting what they deserve. A good peat mossing and their roots are stretching as we speak. They instantly looked happier. In with them are the Sweet Charlie strawberry plants that were sent to me via trade for some onion sets from Darcy. The other blueberry bed has the Festival strawberry plants and they are only about 2 weeks ahead so this will be an interesting spring! I have easily tripled the number of berry plants. :-) I can't wait!

The rest of the garden expansion isn't going quite as planned. This weekend was the deadline for having the grass turned under and next weekend there is a delivery of compost and topsoil scheduled. Guess we might have to rethink that.

'Till next time!

Barbie~

Pink

One pink poodle party successfully completed. Oh so sweet!

Pink party

As pink parties go this one is... well.... PINK!

Last night I spent some time fiddling in the kitchen.
I made these:

Pink chocolate covered Oreos - with pink and lavender sparkle sugar.

WOW do they pop. This picture just doesn't do them justice. It was late and I snapped it with my cell phone. Even so they are so sweet and cute and...PINK. I cannot wait to see my girls faces as I start putting together this party. It's not all that much of any one thing - a dozen of these cookies a dozen chocolate cupcakes that I baked and are now frozen waiting for their *PINK* frosting on the night before. The pink decorations, the little touches.

Oh my I feel bad for the one little boy that is coming. :-D Poor kid. I'll have to think of something special for him.

I'll also have to get out my camera before anyone get there so I can take pictures of all the pinkness. More updates soon to come- My home is going to the dogs on Saturday morning so it should be interesting. I'm excited to see it all together.

'Till next time!

Barbie~

HARVEST MONDAY 10.24.11 !!!

It's Harvest Monday and I am FINALLY BACK! Linking in to Daphne's our most gracious hostessat Daphne's Dandelions. Don't forget to check her site out and see what everyone is harvesting and maybe even what they are doing with their harvest!  

 Scarlet fever is a real bear at 30 something (OK more towards forty but still thirty something darn it!) It's something that doctors don't normally see any more and when they do they see it in kids - not adults. HA! Well leave it to me to throw a wrench in that. I've been gone a couple week so I do have quite a bit to share. LOADS of Limas, a few bells, tomatillos are back on the menu, too! Hot peppers of course, and also back on the menu are green beans. Unfortunately there aren't very many of them just a handful - but enough to appreciate. A couple little deformed but yummy cucumbers and some Okinawan spinach while I am waiting for the real deal to germinate.

 

Basil made a come back and PESTO has been eaten - a LOT of it I might add. :-)

The rice peas are done for the year. In an experiment I cut back the bushes (REALLY LONG VINES) to see if they would start again but hope is dwindling and I'll be pulling them next week if no growth has been spotted by then. The night time temps have been dipping into the 50's each night and they don't like that at all.

Since I've been laid up the last few weeks there has been lots of soup- and I declared one day GUMBO DAY! Okra, bells, hot peppers and onions from the garden safron rice and meat from the grocers - and yummo!

Lots of seeds have been sown. Carrots and radish, spinach, cabbage and onions are all beginning to sprout. S~L~O~W~L~Y.... but hopefully surely. Oh, and I have tomatoes on the vine again. YIPPEE!  It's almost time to finish clearing out the beans and put in the rest of the winter veggies. I'll have to update with pics soon.

'Till next time!

Barbie~

Absent.

I may have been absent but I've been thinking about blogging.

I wanted to post Monday for Harvest Monday.
I wanted to post about a family trip to Seaworld and such - but I got whapped upside the head with some nasty little bacteria. It got in my ears and down in my throat. It made me all feverish and funky feeling. I'll be back soon to share pictures and posts of harvest.
I've done a bit to the garden and new seeds have been sown, too.
I'll be back soon.

B~

Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day

October 15th is National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day.

It's a day to remember babies that have been lost either during pregnancy, or in the first year of life. If you, or someone you know has been touched by this, PLEASE join  in lighting a single candle at 7pm on Oct 15th. Let this candle shine for one hour (or longer) in remembrance for all children who have been lost. Join me in this 'Wave of Light' movement.

If you are reading this - then you DO know someone who's been touched by this tragedy.

My blog has been and will remain silent (other than this post) in memorandum for my own losses and for the losses of other 'Mothers of Angels' around the world for the remainder of this week.

In Memory of my Angels.

Bento Tuesday!

It's the first Tuesday of the month, and that means it's time for sharing  Bentos!

Nothing incredibly exciting but still nice to post to continue to encourage myself and others to pack healthy and cute lunches for our kids. I actually got stopped when I was out with the kids this week. An assistant at the school recognized the kids and commented on how wonderful the bento boxes are and how much healthier they eat because of it. That made me feel GREAT about choosing this style of eating for them. It also reinforced what I don't see and that is because of the choices I make when I put their lunches together they are eating better. I know that I would like more variety and even better things for them to eat but even what they are getting is good. :-)

 This lunch is a PB/banana roll up with goldfish and 2 raspberry swirl cookies.  I couldn't help the treat. I found myself addicted to these cookies and I was eating more of them than the kids. So I sent them for their lunches. :-) That very quickly kept me from having to eat them!

Here we have turkey on a hamburger bun (the bun is a recurring theme as we always have left over buns after cookouts) with goldfish and grapes. This box came back completely empty so it got sent back the next day but it didn't go over so well the next time. OOps! I guess you live and learn. What works one day doesn't necessarily work the next.

 Here is an almond butter and honey sandwich with pretzels and a yogurt box with a candy corn on top. After all it's getting close to Halloween and that dreaded candy has found it's way into my home. I did find out after doing this that you can't let it sit overnight or the candy will melt... and THAT is not a pretty sight. Plopping the candy on that morning works out but not the night before. Yet another lesson learned. :-)

This is the kids favorite bento box, and mine as well. It's harder to pack the right sizes but the way that the box stacks and the size that it makes is a whole lot easier to fit into just about any lunch bag or box. Of course my son won't be caught dead with this box because it's bunny themed but when no one is looking he'll eat out of it and stack it up, too.  This is a veggie sandwich with cream cheese, chives, cucumber and lettuce. Yogurt covered raisins accompany it and the snack for the day is well - scooby doo! fruit snacks and goldfish of course. After all that healthy sandwich must be counteracted in some way. At least they think so. They don't know the goldfish are whole grain and that Betty Crocker is one of the few mass marketers that use real fruit juice as one of the main ingredients.

The next bento is the perfect size for my littlest one. This is chicken strips and grapes. Simple, yet perfect. I added some applesauce and a fruitable and she was in hog heaven. 

The next day was rice ball and PB/Jelly

 

Here is my favorite lunch from the last few weeks. The heart sammie. Inside is ham, a side of carrots, half an apple and a round of cheese finishes off that meal. The other box is pate with lettuce (go figure) and grapes, carrots and a cheese wheel.

 

One of the lunches got sent with a side of fresh mulberries from our tree. The girls love to eat them straight off the tree but that makes me cringe. I much prefer washing them and sending them this way.

I'm always looking for new (very) inexpensive containers for bento boxes and so far the biggest trouble seems to be fitting into the lunch boxes! I have found that the sandwich containers are perfect for one type of lunch box but have to go sideways into another. So I am still on the hunt. The best fit overall seems to be the tri stack skinny bunny. The kids enjoy the design, I enjoy the size and the ease of fitting into any size lunch bag/box. 

I love the lock box littles for things like yogurt and applesauce but I would prefer to keep as many of the parts of the meal together as possible.... but then again that may not be possible. I mean how feasible is it for the partially liquid ingredients to stay in their 'section' of the box? Probably not all that likely.

Thanks for catching up with bento Tuesday - or tolerating it as the case may be. :-D

'Till next time!

Barbie~

Harvest Monday 10.3.11

Oh My! It's OCTOBER! Happy Harvest Monday Y'all! Don't forget to stop by our host over at Daphne's Dandelions to check out everyone's harvest! It's crispity out this morning and the kids had to wear jackets to school. Very odd for us. Typically this chillness isn't here until late November at the earliest but never the less it was in the 50's for the last 2 nights. It has made for some amazing days though. A high of 80 is as near to perfect as I can imagine. Windows open and yard work getting accomplished. Who could ask for more?

Apparently the stinking aphids! UGH and the leaf footed bugs. They have learned to stay out of my reach. When they see me coming they fly to the top of the citrus trees. I think I'm going to have to break my own organic rules. I think there is MALATHION in my future! I can't stand it any more and I've recently seen a large clutch of young teenager leaf footed bugs being taught first hand how to avoid me. :-( Me not happy! I hate to spray away the good bugs, but some of the bad ones need controlled. The beans are suffering now and my hot peppers have finally gotten some sort of bacterial spot. I wanna cry. I have got to start thinking seriously about my no spray methods. There must be a balance out there somewhere.

This week the garden has blessed us with a pound and a half of limas, 9.5 oz shelled rice peas, 2lb5oz hot peppers, 2 lonely tiny figs, and a single gherkin.

I only took one picture, but I got one of these pretty much each day this week. and two of the lima beans below.

A nice bowl of hot peppers. Serrano, Jalapeno, and uh - well I thought they were cubanelle but they won't go yellow. If I leave them on the plant they just get limp and then start turning brown, not yellow. Go figure. I'm happy with my take. I've cleaned off the plant and I'm taking the peppers young now instead of letting some of them go red because of the bacterial spot. I don't want the fruit damaged and so far only one single fruit has had any signs of it at all. Now I have to decide if I want to fight the disease or rip out and start something else. I've got about 2 more months frost free. Not enough to do too much, but enough for something, just maybe not from seed.

'Till next time!

Barbie~