Homemaking

I sliced a bunch of zucchini for the freezer one day, and decided to try dehydrating some. I sprinkled them with salt, and they are quite good! I did learn that it’s best to oil the trays before putting the zucchini on, or they stick tight. A couple of the children had fun putting the slices of zucchini on the first time.

I had never seen a head of cabbage like this one! It had many small heads growing out around the stem, between the leaves.

One of the little boys was quite impressed with the bumblebees on the sunflowers.

One day’s harvest of cucumbers and squash.

Little Miss helped me fill jars of green beans one day. She did a good job of it.

We did an experiment this year with the tomatoes. After reading on the blog of one of Gayle’s cousins how she fertilized her tomatoes with sour milk and had very good results, I decided to try diluting the whey from cheesemaking and the buttermilk we couldn’t use up from making butter, and water the tomatoes with it. To make it a good experiment, we only did that with half the patch. The tomatoes on the right came from the milk-fed tomatoes, and the ones on the left came from the others. I would say the experiment was a success!

We’ve been trying to get the garden planted over the last couple of weeks, and spending a lot of time weeding what we planted in August.  The day we planted peas, Little Miss wanted to help! She only got one packet open, and thankfully, peas are large enough we were able to pick them all up out of the grass.

My boys planted all the peas. It’s a little amusing, now that they are coming up, to see exactly how they were planted! Some rows have long empty spots, and other spots are pretty thick. Oh, well, peas are pretty forgiving. This is Mr. Sweetie and Mr. Intellectual, who was in charge of the planting. I dug the rows this time.

Soon, Mr. Diligent and Mr. Imagination showed up to help. I think it was about here that the planting started looking funny!

After I had all the rows dug for the peas, I started planting onions. The onion seedlings were a lot larger this year than most years. They’re looking pretty good.

We’re eating stuff that we planted last year, still, as well as some Bok Choy that I set out in September. Here is Silverbeet (Swiss Chard), celery, spring onions, broccoli, and some cabbage that was going to seed (I cut off the leaves and used them), from last year’s garden. The carrots were from the shop; we ran out of our own awhile ago.

Potato planting! Esther came out and helped Gayle and Mr. Inventor. She wanted to discuss the plot for a movie the children were making with the boys, and that was the only way she could talk to them that day.

I’ve been cooking weeds more this spring than ever before. I harvested stinging nettle from the area in the bottom photo, as well as other areas that grew up in weeds. I also use mallow. I cook them together in chicken broth, blend them thoroughly, and freeze them in muffin tins to put in soups later. Mr. Imagination named the concoction for me—prickle mallow soup!

Yes, it’s a little early, but we have the garden started. I wanted to make sure the pepper plants got big enough to produce some fruit before it gets cold in the fall, so I started them early. This is what they looked like in early September; now they are outside in our “greenhouse”, so I don’t see them every day.

I set out Bok Choi, kohlrabi, broccoli and cauliflower that I started, the other day when we had a warm spell. It’s turned cold and rainy now, but the little plants look great, at least what I can see of them from the kitchen window (the middle window you can see in this picture; the window on the left is a bedroom, and the one on the right is the laundry). Mr. Sweetie had fun with my camera while I was transplanting.

Little Miss had fun crawling around on the grass while I worked in the garden.

Mr. Imagination had fun running in the dirt, and Mr. Intellectual was working on a project.

Mr. Inventor’s ducks have been eating the lettuce and Swiss Chard that I had growing, so we informed him last week that his ducks would be locked out of the yard/garden, or eaten. He got busy putting up a duck-proof fence, and then herded them out.

Here is the beautiful tom turkey again. I know I’ve posted a lot of pictures of him—I love watching him display!

Mr. Imagination on the trampoline.

Mr. Imagination picked me a bouquet of daffodils!

These ducks wanted back in the yard!