Winter Gardening

Seed catalogs....the gardener's long awaited treatment for winter blues. However if your eyes are good you might be able to read the CD on top is "A Little Drummer Boy". This catalog arrived, that's right before Christmas. That's okay, I was still excited and a little giddy.

However with the holidays, I'm not sure where it currently is .... I could use it about now. Just the other day, I heard someone say they had tomato starts in their window. Mine may be a week or two or three yet, but soon.

We will see if I start that or my new Pasta Herb Seed kit, a gift from my neighbor, with instructions for me to have them over for supper once the herbs are ready for eating. I need to get them started, because there can be no epic fail with conditions like that and I have eye surgery planned for the end of March and the last time I had eye surgery, my ambition dropped dramatically.

Another exciting thing is this rain gauge, I found at a discount store. I have been wanting to get a rain gauge, and I'm partial to dragonflies, so I could hardly pass it by. I have yet to decide where to put it.

Looking forward to playing in the dirt....

Not quite gardening...but enjoyable...

Well after such delinquency, why not just post twice in one day. I wanted to share with you another new adventure, that I worked on this past week. I had checked a book out of the library on making cheese several weeks ago, it is probably due tomorrow...or yesterday.

Last week I finally got around to trying on of the recipes, so here are some pictures of that.

Paneer cheese

It is an Indian cheese, so I made some Saag Paneer.

Here is the cubed and fried paneer before I added it to the spinach.

My saag paneer, I liked it and my brother liked...thats two thumbs up.

On Thursday, I helped my mom at Deck the Halls and here is the project that I was in charge of - it is a Willow Spool Tree. I had fun and all of the lady's walked away with a finished project so I must have lead it okay.

Thanksgiving is this week and we had our thanksgiving program at church this evening. I was reflecting on things that I am thankful for this past year. I had been struck in my Sunday school class at the many different facets of God that we experience each day and throughout the year. I had my students bring in an object that represented their relationship with God and was struck by the things they brought, so I will share them here with you.

One brought a picture of friends......

because God is always there for you, just like friends.

One brought a knot .......

because it is tight and connected.

One brought a motion alarm......

because he is not perfect and when he makes

mistakes God reminds him to be the person

God desires him to be.

One brought a ball made of tape pieces......

because our relationship with God is made

up of different experiences and as we share

those experiences with God and spend more

time with God our relationship with God grows.

And then today I was reminded how God is the master healer - he heals us physically, emotionally, and spiritually. I was working on

a "pine tree" project and missed the pine branch and snipped my finger. Don't worry...I didn't cut off my finger...but it did bleed and hurt. However it reminded me that I might have to worry about it bleeding too much or hurting alot, but I didn't have to worry if it would heal. This past year with my eye has been interesting, it not have the vision that it had before, but it has healed and I can function pretty much as before and if I decide to have surgery to try to improve the vision - it may or may not, but I can trust God that He will heal.

Here is a picture of my "pine tree" that I was making this afternoon.

And now for just a fun picture....

My mom might not appreciate this, but here is my mom the bell player....probably the only time she will ever be in a bell choir. The kids from church played some songs for us and then had the adults give it a try to see how they would do. It was a fun evening.

The Delinquent Blogger

I must say I was not only a delinquent blogger, but also a delinquent gardner. However I will share with you a few other pictures that I took of my garden over the summer.

A red cabbage waiting to be harvested.

Long Beans

A long bean stir fry.....these were delicious.

Definitely plan to grow these again next year.

My poor basket...need a little help keeping its bottom attached.

I may have to retire it next year and buy a new one.

And here was a very fun new adventure, that I thought I had posted before, but couldn't find it in my old posts...so here is how I used up some of my squash blossoms to reduce my prolific harvest....

Squash blossoms stuffed with cubes of feta cheese.

Dipped in egg.

Then in Panko bread crumbs.

Fried in some oil.

A jar of last year's spaghetti sauce.

And walla .... a wonderful meal of squash blossoms and ravioli.

Delicious!!!

Who's Day Isn't Brightened By Flowers?

I have been enjoying flowers from my garden this week. I even entered one of my gerbera daises in the local county fair.

The yellow flower got a 2nd place ribbon at the county fair.

Here are some other shots at my flowers throughout the summer.

The Tomatoes are Turning Red...and yellow...and dusky purple...

It seems I have been delinquint once again, I will make a quick post here, but really there is much more I can say. I will focus a little on my tomatoes, I made one small batch of sauce 6 pts of very thick sauce...well actually I juiced the tomatoes, proceeded to get sick, and my mother finished the sauce...I was "watching" it cook down and fell asleep, making it a very thick sauce.

A collection of tomatoes ready to be juiced.

Purple russians ....

... making an interesting colored tomato juice ... but it tastes quite good.

Tonight I made Lok Lak, a dish I learned from Kimsin and Sina my Cambodian friends. It was very good.

Rattlesnake Beans...Awesome...

Harvested my first beans this week. The rattlesnake beans are ready, served them for supper tonight with zucchini ratatouille and applesauce from my freezer. That was a good meal.

The bean teepee a few months ago.

Starting out...

My crazy Pole Bean climbing up my potato plant...

Enjoying the blossoms.

First spotting...

First picking.

My zucchini ratatouille - eggplant, zucchini (from my garden), onion, green pepper, tomatoes, garlic, oregano, basil, and spaghetti sauce (from last years harvest) (the rest was from the local produce stand excluding the spices from my cupboard) MMMM...fresh harvest...

I Found a Cucumber in My Garden !!!

It may not seem noteworthy that I found a cucumber in my garden, since I planted two cucumber plants....but I really was concerned. I typically plant cucumbers, but I don't typically plant squash - mostly because they tend to spread out so much and also because they are so prolific. One of the squash I planted was a climbing squash, so I planted it along a fence near the back of the garden, then I proceeded to plant my cucumber nearby, and then my zucchini ...and then my patty pan squash. I did expect it to get crowded, but truth be told the climbing squash has decided to take more than its allotted share of the space and I was beginning to get the impression that my cucumber would not have enough sunlight to supply me with any cucumbers. Needless to sayI was quite surprised when I reached beneath the leaves of my climbing squash and pulled out a cucumber. Hey I won't complain, I will make myself a cucumber, tomato, and cheese sandwich to celebrate. Then I will probably have to put myself on a zucchini diet.....picked another two zucchini today.

The Space Hogging Climbing Squash (...no that is not the real name of the plant ...but it sure describes it from my cucumber view point)

The produce that will eventually be harvested ...it better be edible and taste good for the amount of space it is taking.

My beloved cucumber rebelling against the climbing squash by producing a harvest before the climbing squash could steal all its sunlight and choke it out. (and yes, I know only one of those is a cucumber.)

The prolific zucchini trying to change my diet and make me a vegetarian.

See all those blooms....I am in so much trouble...this is why I don't plant squash...

Being chased from the garden once again...