If you give a Mom a dip to make.....

You know that poem about "if you give a Mom a muffin" and how she gets side tracked?  Well, after I did my morning routine exercise, I headed out to see what needed harvested.  The zucchini looks pretty bad, and I have ants chewing away on them now.  Cucumbers look oh-so, not good either (sad about that), and only one yellow squash to bring in.  

One daughter reminded me upon entering the kitchen, that I bought organic cream cheese to make a cracker dip we like.  So, I returned to the herb garden, where I could not even see the green onion I needed. 

I'm not sure if passing cars saw me throw my hands in the air and started talking to myself...."where do I start?"

Everything was a muddy mess from the rain, and it was hot and humid.  Very humid.

 

I ended up pulling all the "tall" stuff out.  Then I couldn't stand it, and went around and got more weeds pulled, but had to fight off an onslaught of sweat bees.  Even my homemade bug spray did not help.  I went inside about noon, and had mud all up and down my arms from swatting bees, and never even cut the green onions.  It will take a few more days to tidy up the herb garden.

I have weed piles to clean up today.  I left them sit, as I was drenched in sweat and wanted to clean up by then.  Today, I have thistle rash all over one hand and arm, and I even wore gloves. 

What else did I accomplish?

I put our first 5 pounds of home grown tomatoes into the freezer.  So thankful for that.  I just left the others on the plants until I have enough to can something.  I'm afraid to have so much on my tables right now, as King has been "table surfing" and has stolen raw potatoes, cucumbers, bell peppers, hot peppers and more.  Sigh....you'd think the hot peppers alone would have taught him a lesson.  

Hot peppers are slowly rolling in since the last rain, but small.  I have been slicing, flash freezing and putting them into the freezer for now.  I planted jalapeno, dragon cayenne, serrano, and hot banana peppers this year.  I also put a tray of green bell peppers (diced) into the freezer.  

I had greens to put up too, but those went into the fridge, so I could make my first visit to a new farmer's market last night.  Hubby had to work over, so I took a few girls.  I was thrilled to find so many organic farmers.  I brought home giant head garlic, beets, a large amount of hot banana peppers (we didn't plant enough), and a pint of red raspberries.  The raspberry lady almost convinced me to buy 2 quarts to make jam, but I said "no thanks."  She was asking $7/quart.  Too expensive for me.  

I didn't have enough calendula heads to make a completely full quart of infused oil, but enough to get a head start.  I took advantage of the sun too.  We are completely out of lip balm and on the last jar of healing salve.  My calendula did much better planted directly into the herb garden.
 
I've been freezing the last of the blueberries and will finally have that done today.  I have a bit of broccoli to freeze, but ran out of ice.  Looks like a trip to town is in order as well.  Oh, and today, I get the glorious job of taking the girls to the school to pay their $307.50 in school fees.  That is the highest I have ever paid for simply two girls in high school.  That doesn't include supplies, or clothing either.  It's ridiculous really. Once school starts, they will be asking for money for something else required.  

Just maybe, I'll get the green onion cut and the dip made.  Ha!  I sometimes forget what I'm doing from the kitchen to the door.  I have sticky notes everywhere, and just about killed my houseplants from forgetting to water them.  I had one daughter remind me to go extract a praying mantis from the herb garden (that I was pretty sure was about to have babies).  I finally go her moved out to the pasture.  Oh, that would be a mess if she had babies in the herb garden.