November 15, 2013 - Same Old, Same Old

Just a quick note to let everyone know I'm still alive and kicking.  Nothing worth writing about is going on in my life lately, just the same old, same old.  Boredom.  Blah.  It's not even winter yet, and I'm yearning for spring.

Yesterday I was so bored I decided to bake bread.  I've been making all of our bread lately.  Mr. Granny will only eat bread made with white flour, so I was making his and buying whole grain bread for myself, but after I happened upon this simple bread recipe from Hickory Holler Farm, I bought myself that perforated French bread pan and began making the 2 loaves of French and one loaf of pan bread from her recipe each week.  The bread tastes soooo good!  I love using the regular loaf for toast and, of course, the French loaves are great for garlic bread or just for dunking into big bowls of homemade soup.  Anyway, boredom made me decide to bake and fill the freezer.  I used my regular bread recipe, doubled, for one loaf of bread and a pan each of hamburger and hot dog buns.  Then I made two loaves of french bread and one loaf of...well, it's still French bread but in a bread pan, a must-have for my morning toast.

Of course, I cannot resist eating this good bread.  DUH!  I've taken to weighing myself every morning, thanks to the bread.  I've set a "danger" point where I'm still a couple of pounds below my desired top weight, and when I hit it I only have to watch what I eat for a day or two to get back to my lower desired weight.  Since I've begun baking and consuming all that bread, I've hit that "danger" point about once a week!  No gardening to keep me in shape, comfort food weather, white bread.....

I was going to go out and rake the front yard today.  We had a little wind and a bit of rain last week, so the pine tree mess is back.  Not even close to as bad as it was after that last big wind storm, but just rather tatty looking.  Then I see this "Severe Weather" warning on my sidebar.  I clicked on it, and sure enough...........

THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN PENDLETON HAS ISSUED A WIND ADVISORY... WHICH IS IN EFFECT FROM 10 PM THIS EVENING TO 4 PM PST SATURDAY.
* TIMING: WINDS WILL INCREASE THIS EVENING AND CONTINUE THROUGH MOST OF SATURDAY. THE WINDS WILL DIMINISH BY SATURDAY EVENING.
* WINDS: SOUTHWEST WINDS OF 25 TO 35 MPH WITH GUSTS TO 50 MPH CAN BE EXPECTED.

Sigh.  I might as well wait to clean up the mess, because it will be another big one.

November 5, 2013 - Harvest Monday on Tuesday

I haven't been very good about blogging about my harvests the past couple of weeks, but I have had a few pounds to add to the totals for the year.

 Tomatoes that have ripened inside, have been weighed and added to the total.  Last week there were just enough to make some seasoned tomato sauce for the freezer, and these will soon be ripe enough to go into the pot for another batch of sauce.

I'm almost at the end of the tomato season.  This is all that's left to ripen.

Yesterday I did dig a few small parsnips as I was cleaning the leaves from along the fenceline.  They weren't in very good shape, evidently the root knot nematodes have now moved into that area of the garden.  I got just over 12 ounces from the four parsnips.

I picked a lone sugar snap pea yesterday, and ate it right there on the spot.  It was so good!  I still see quite a few blossoms, but they just aren't forming pods.  We're getting very close to having a hard freeze, so I hope they will at least give me a meal before it hits.  I'm not holding my breath, though.

Other than those peas, two small cabbage plants and the baby spinach, there's nothing left in the garden.  It's almost rocking chair time!

Total for the year (to date) is 1007 pounds.  I'll probably end the year at around 1010 pounds once the remaining tomatoes ripen.

Visit Daphne's Dandelions to see what others have harvested!

November 4, 2013 - Wind Mess Cleanup

 Luckily the weather was sunny, rather warm and relatively calm yesterday, so I could begin cleaning up all the mess from the previous day's windstorm.

I raked it all up and bagged it, then used the leaf blower for the final cleanup.  Unfortunately this will all go to the landfill, as it was too full of large twigs and branches to chop up for the compost pile.  I do so need a chipper-shredder!

 All cleaned up again.....for now.  

 I also got a new piece of 4 mil plastic for the spinach bed, cut and stapled on the end pieces, then used one large piece to cover the back, top and front.  I put in four more hooks for extra bungee straps to hold it down during windstorms, and it's all weighted down on the front edge to allow for easy removal by just rolling it up on that 1x2 board that's stapled to the front.  The spinach got a good sprinkling from the watering can, then was covered up for the night.

The patio and the side yard mess will have to wait for another day.  I was too tired to tackle it.  At least this is mostly leaves, except for a few large limbs from the neighbor's sycamore, so I can pick them up with the mower and dump them in the compost.  

November 3, 2013 - Goal Met and Wind Woes

My 1000 pound harvest goal has been met, before weighing another tray of tomatoes that are still ripening, and a few parsnip yet to be dug.  There's no way I can top last year's 1040 pounds, but 2013 was definitely a success nonetheless.  If my onions and tomatoes had performed a bit better, it could have been my best year ever.

Wind woes, oh my!  I spent a day last week cleaning up the pine mess after one of our all too frequent wind storms.  I raked out the flower beds and the entire front yard, swept the driveway and front porch, and chopped all of the leaves with the leaf sucker vacuum.  Everything looked so nice and tidy.  Then yesterday this happened......

 Leaves, pine boughs, pine needles and pine cones......

Pine mess and neighbor's leaves everywhere!

 The patio is covered with dirt and littered with leaves.

The back yard is quite clean, as the leaves all blew up against the side fence where they will be easily vacuumed up.  The plastic covering the spinach bed took a bit of a beating though.  I had removed it earlier in the day, during a short rain, then bungeed it down to keep the wind from drying it out.  I guess I should have used a few more bungee cords.  I need to buy a new sheet of plastic and do a proper one piece cover this week.

The mess I have to clean up today doesn't compare to what happened elsewhere around the Tri-Cities area, where there were downed trees and power lines, and our newest elementary school, under construction since June, collapsed. 

We have always suffered from high winds in this area, but I really think they have been more frequent this past year than ever before.  I know I've had to do much more cleanup than in the past.  I'm surprised our pine trees aren't naked by now, they've lost so many branches!

October 31, 2013 - Trick or Treat!

BOO!

From Alicyn and Amaya

October 28, 2013 - Basking in the Cuteness

A couple of people have expressed their concern because of my lack of blogging recently.  I'm still alive, people!  It's just that the gardening has slowed drastically, and I'm bored to the point of playing a lot of solitaire and Scrabble with my computer.

We're expecting our first hard freeze tonight, so I've picked the green tomatoes and they are ripening in the house.  Weight totals are added to my sidebar as they are moved from trays to kitchen window.   Just six pounds to go before I hit 1000 pounds of garden produce for the year! 

I still had one pepper plant, so I pulled off all the peppers and got them into the freezer yesterday.  

There weren't many carrots surviving after Annie and the squirrels tried digging up the bed, so I pulled them all and had delicious baby carrots for dinner last night.  

 

Some of the flowers are blooming prettier than they did all summer, but I fear today is the last time I'll be enjoying them.

We're in the middle of another big windstorm, so the pine branches have been joined by the neighbor's leaves to litter our yard.  The leaves were so deep on the front porch this morning, I had to dig around in them to find the newspaper!  I had moved the lettuce cage over to cover the spinach seedlings, and stapled on plastic to keep the little plants warm. This morning the entire cage had blown off the bed and was up against the back fence.  I had to go out and staple on some heavy boards to (hopefully) hold it in place.  I may have to find some tie downs!

Spinach seedlings (last week).  They aren't much bigger yet, so I hope they survive the winter.  Yesterday I found two huge slugs sliming themselves all over the plants.  Today I noticed the squirrels had again dug holes throughout the bed once the cage blew off.

I had Mr. Granny light the pilot on our propane fireplace insert last night.  I'm preparing for the oncoming frigid temperatures, and ready to plop my body into the recliner in front of a roaring (or maybe a simmering) fire.  In the meantime, I've been basking in some real cuteness.......

Great-granddaughter Yaya (Amaya) is three weeks old today.

October 10, 2013 - The Garden in October

 It's still touch and go with the sugar snap peas.  The vines blew off of the trellis during our last windstorm, but there are some blossoms showing on the few upright vines.  I see just one pod developing so far.  

 The raspberry canes have been transplanted.  Eventually this should be a more productive bed than the old bed, as it is nearly twice as long as the old 8' bed.  Right now the canes share their spot with carrots, onions and the snap peas, but they'll have all that space to themselves before spring arrives.

 There are still a lot of green tomatoes on the three remaining plants, but I'm only finding a bit of color on four or five a week now.  Night temperatures have been dropping into the high 30s this week, so a frost is probably not far off.

 The two new beds have been built, but the far bed still needs some soil and compost to bring the level even with the top.  I put a few spinach transplants into the near raised bed, but next spring both beds will hold the tomato plants.  There are still two broccoli plants giving me a few side shoots, the recently transplanted strawberries are looking strong and healthy.  

 The north garden is looking quite empty, but many of next year's planting beds have been cleaned up and prepared.  

 The east garden is empty, except for a few parsnips and nasturtiums along the fence at the left, and two or three lettuce plants, along with a few bunching onions in the net covered bed.  The ground is littered with walnuts from the neighbor's tree.  Too bad they're wormy and unusable.

 A view of the north garden from the patio.

The garden shed has been cleaned up, and most of the tools have been cleaned and stored for next year.  I've been busy washing buckets and containers for winter storage.

Yaya update:

 Great grandbaby Amaya Christine (Yaya) with proud daddy Aaron.

All dressed up for her trip home from the hospital.  Mama says she's doing fine, a very good baby, just eats, sleeps and poops!

October 7, 2013 - Harvest Monday (Updated)

The weather has been too cold for them to ripen, so I harvested most of the peppers and pulled the plants.  There were about 27-1/2 pounds of them here, and my daughter took 5 pounds of them home with her.  The remaining peppers were all donated to the food bank.

I'm still getting a few tomatoes.  I manage to get about two quarts of tomato juice a week now, just enough for drinking, but not enough to bother with canning.

My year to date total is now at 981 pounds.  I might get another 20 pounds of tomatoes, but it's doubtful.  

Maybe I could add this 6 pounds 12 ounces to my harvest total......

  I just got back from the hospital, where my new great-granddaughter was born just 2 hours ago.  Welcome to the big world, little (Amaya) Yaya !  

Daphne's Dandelions is the host for Harvest Monday.

Update....about 4 hours after the birth

Yaya with her mother, Alicia. They look alike, don't they?