Happy Homemaker Monday

The weekend went too fast, but we had a fantastic time with family.  I took an orzo pasta salad, and a cold mostly sugar free carmel apple dessert.  It was very nice to visit with everyone, and with help we figured out what the strange plant is growing in my asparagus patch (more on that later).

Two lap afghans were delivered to my husband's cousin and her husband, who live in an assisted living home.  

I have been successful at purging books I have read. Over the last two weekends I placed books, reader glasses I can't use, and two sets of nautical crocheted cup coaster sets in a little library on the island we visit.  A bag of books went home with my sister.  I also found homes for three more sets of crochet cup coasters leftover from craft shows.

Trust me, I have more craft supplies to purge, but I am very behind on reading books.  If I am not using something, or haven't used it in years, it is making it's way to another home.

We had to cancel our plans to go to a festival over the weekend, because it rained.  We are thankful for the rain, as the gardens needed it.

Today I am joining once again with Sandra at Diary of a Stay at Home Mom.  The link up is back, so it's easy for me to link up today.

Update:  I could not link up.  Again.  Sorry folks.

The weather . . .

86°F/67°F today.  We are finally getting a break in weather, but that could change. 

Right now I am . . .

Writing out my to-do's for the day, and waking up with coffee.

Thinking and pondering . . .

To purge all of my writing books or not.  I used to freelance write when the kids were younger, and all lived at home, but I have not had the time, nor the desire lately.  Getting the house in order (trust me the fractured foot set me back 2 months) has been on top of the list.

It's been on my brain, but I'm considering putting and end to this blog.  Various reasons.

How I am feeling . . .

Depends on the weather, ha ha!  If it's hot out, and I've been working out there, I'm too tired to do much when I come back inside.

I am however, back to a pretty good exercise plan, other than the treadmil.  I'm still waiting on the final x-ray of my foot.

On the breakfast plate . . .

Have no idea yet.

On the lunch plate . . .

Chicken salad on cucumber slices, leftover orzo salad.

On the dinner plate . . .

If my husband doesn't call or text with a change in my plan, it's a sheet pan chicken sausage/sweet potato and green been dinner.

On the menu . . .

Anyone else have a husband that has a knack for meddling in the menu plan for the week?  I'll have it all planned out, and he'll come home with burgers to grill or some other option.  

I'm going to try my best to use up some food this week, that was intended for another day, including the green beans in our freezer from last year's garden.

On my reading pile . . .

Still reading this.  I haven't had the energy or time to read over the last month.  I really need to read at least a few pages a day.

A quick once a day read, and sometimes very appropriate for the day's work/events.

Dug out a box of letters to get finished reading. I need to pass this on to another family member (part of my purge).  I've had it since my Dad passed away.

On my TV this week . . .

Fried Green Tomatoes

Looking around the house . . .

I have a habit of starting the to-do list for the next day, and not finishing the current day list.  In the end, I am still looking at piles of yarn, and other things like tablecloths I no longer use, that need to either be put in storage or passed on.  I use them for tables when we have people over, so I may be saving them.  Anyway, I am working on more areas of the house, so come fall, we can get back to bigger indoor repairs/painting, and what not.

To-do list . . .

(for the next two weeks, and in no particular order)

-harvest yarrow
-harvest thyme
-dust
-wash master bath rugs, sweep and mop

-make homemade insect repellant

-work on all the craft supplies I wish to purge

-work on list for getting the house back in order

-water pots and greens

-work on sorting yarn, and re-organizing them to reduce storage totes

-weed flower beds

-continue cleaning porch

-get back to working on master bath, removing items we no longer use and remove everything from the walls to start washing down walls.

From the camera . . .

I have nothing today.  I had a pretty busy weekend, and the same last weekend, filled in with other projects and work around here.

Devotional, prayers, Bible Verses . . .

No current prayer requests.

Happy Homemaker Monday © June 2024 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart

Microgreens and Lettuce / Greens Update

The microgreens I planted in soil are ready to eat today.  I planted broccoli and radish microgreens, but we plan to expand on our options.

I filled a tray I had in storage, but I feel this only provided enough for one meal, so I will be using my sprout jars next, to have more than one meal available.

Other than adding to your sandwiches, you can toss them into salads, smoothies, top your hummus, add to omelets or eggs, or even add to anything that you add lettuce too.  Do you have a favorite way to eat microgreens?

The two types of lettuce are up now.  I will have to thin them out later, as the seeds are small, and as you can see, there is more than one in that container.  I'm not even using the grow lamps right now, as they are getting a good amount of daylight/sunshine.  

We finally got rain last night.  I hope it was enough to keep things alive and well outside.  It's been so hot and crazy dry.  Not to mention the well needs water too.

I planted greens (Collards, Swiss chard, Russian Red Kale) in a waist high raised bed this year, and there are pros and cons so far.  

Cons:

Not all the seeds sprouted due to the soil not staying wet in this heat.

I have to water every single day, and sometimes two times a day (heat wave).

They may not grow as big as if they were planted directly in the ground.

Pros:

No rodents can eat them.  

It's easy to water, and no bending down to weed etc.

Microgreens and Lettuce / Greens Update© June 2024 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart

What was I thinking?

It was 100°F yesterday, and yes I did garden work.  Watering everything has come first due to the lack of rain (we didn't get enough).  

It's going to be up in the 100's again today.  Yesterday, I put my chargeable fan on the chickens.  They love the frozen water in tins to cool off better than anything right now.

 I thought I would get so much more done by June, and I have not.  What was I thinking??

I thought I would get the baby blanket done.  Ha!   It was only something to use up yarn and store for gifting.  It's still not done.

I thought I would get a few lapghans done for extended family, and have them delivered by now.  They have yet to be delivered to the assisted living home they are in. Sigh.

I can't even get to the library to return a book, and pick up a book.  Eye roller.

I forget to check my email on a daily basis.

I contemplated starting a crochet group once a week in our home town.  Big eye roller.  I had big ideas, but have so little free time.  I honestly thought it would bring people together, and get to know each other, and help small businesses in the process.  

Heck, I had plans to purge more craft supplies this week, and that never happened at all, ha ha!

From the book "A Year of Positive Thinking" by Cyndie Spiegel.

What was I thinking?© June 2024 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart

It's Already Friday???

 My husband and I were comiserating about the heat, and he could not believe I did garden work (the weeds are out of control). 

He said something about Friday, and I said, "huh?"

I could not believe Friday as snuck up on me this quick this week.  It cracks me up, when there are folks who assume, since I do not work a regular "job" that I have all the free time in the world.  Ha!  

Yesterday I froze water in tins, so the chickens could walk in them and cool off.  They loved it!  The heat and humidity has been grueling for all.

Regardless, laundry went out on my solar powered dryer (clothesline).  

It's too hot to cook, and too hot to do dishes - chicken salad on cucumber slices.  I used blended cottage cheese in place of the mayo this time, as I had heard it was just as good, less fat, and more protein.  I have to say, it's pretty good.  We can't tell a difference.  So, when organic/non-gmo mayo gets too expensive, and you can make homemade cottage cheese (or buy it on sale), it does work in this recipe.  

We simply add home canned sweet pickle relish/hot pickle relish.  I mean, each are made with vegetables, and it's delicous.  Once we get garden produce, we can use fresh too.

The heat and humidity continue, and it won't end next week for us.  The fog is due to more thunderstorms and rain, but we got more thunder than rain.  It barely got the ground wet, but caused so much more humidity.  Every little bit of rain helps the garden.  By the way, when I took this photo, there was no wind, and all the flowers we planted made the air smell like perfume.  

I got some garden work done, but the cultivotor needs gas (tiller needs a new belt), so I hand hoed some areas for now.  The heat and humidity suck the energy out of you by the end of the day, so errands are not happening.  I did manage to tie up more tomatoes.  

On a rodent note, we know a family that stocks their freezer with wild hunted rabbits for food.  They have volunteered to come help reduce our plethora amount of them.  However, I have not seen one of them the last two days. 

Each year we make more progress, but fencing the other garden will cost us more than we can spend this summer, so any rodent help is help, and if it puts food on someone's table, then it's a double win. So many people are struggling right now.

Speaking of struggling, more stores are closing, more people are baking at home and trying to sell stuff like that, just to make ends meet.  All Rite-Aids are closing here.  

I do plan to watch the prices on fencing, for what we want.  We are hoping they will put them on sale in the fall.

On a good note, my microgreens I planted are already sprouting.  The lettuce has not yet.

It's Already Friday???© June 2024 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart

Hot and Humid

 

I debated just freezing the last of the peaches, but canned a smalled batch early in the morning.  We'll get more peaches later this summer.

I made a new recipe for pomegrante vinaigrette.  One recipe uses the seeds (using a blender) and the other uses juice form concentrate (the one I tried).  I used a bit more dijon in ours to thicken it just a bit more, and we love it.  We are enjoying more salads this week with the heat index so high.

I was out checking berries and taking the chickens fresh cold water, when I discoveredd this growing between the raspberries and asparagus patch.  Does anyone know what it is?  The plant itself is growing just like a red raspberry bush, but it obviously is not a raspberry bush.

I have never see this before.  In finding this, I do see some poison sumac in another area, so we need to remove it.  Always something to take care of around here.

It was so humid and hot, I was getting seriously worried about my chickens, and I was about to go look for a box fan and extension cord, when I heard thunder.  The heat index was 103°F and extremely humid.

Soon enough we had not only a few hours of pouring down rain, but thunderstorms.  I'm not sure what took out our power, as it could have been due to everyone's AC on, or the storms.

Thank goodness I keep extra watering units for this purpose, and had them filled for the chickens.  I had to take them fresh cold water almost every 2 hours, due the heat index.

We also have several battery powered lights in each room, candles, a portable phone charger (however even 5G was not working to get weather updates), and I am very thankful I purchased our power source that runs on the same battery our power tools run on.  It has one outlet, a light, and a few charge ports, so we can charge our chargeable fans (we have two) to stay cool, and charge anything else.

In light of this, and for the fact the power has gone out more often, we plan to add some new items to our list.  A generator has always been on the list, but they are expensive.  We do have a plan to keep the lights on (more than the one the power source can run).

 By the way, we took the power source off of the lamp, used some candles for light, and plugged a laptap into the power source to watch a DVD.  Save your DVD's and don't get rid of them.  Our interent was out until this morning, so no netflix or amazon.  We were thankful we kept the DVD's and the old laptop for this purpose.  Otherwise, we could run one lamp and read books or play cards.

My husband is in agreement on keeping the lights on, so I'll update you if/when we locate what we are looking for.  We have considered a well hand pump in the future as well.  When the power goes out, we cannot get water from the well otherwise.

Once our power was back on, we could only watch a DVD using a DVD player.  Our interent was out the entire night and we had trouble getting connection this morning, but it's back on.  It makes you wonder about everything digital these days, and what to do with the power/internet out.

(source:  Amazon)

Our smaller one is similar to this one.

As for the fans, I had a small chargeable fan with a clip, that we use on the treadmill.  It worked like a charm to cool us. 

(Source: Amazon)  Our foldable chargeable fan is similar to this one.

The other fan we have is adjustable in height, and folds up, and we take it camping, so we had that one too.  Both have been used a lot, and my husband was impressed how well the smaller fan worked.

Of course we purchased them many years ago, so I can't say for sure if it's still on the market, but there are some very similar to them.  I'm just glad we had them, along with everything else.

We are thankful for the rain, as the gardens got a good dose of goodness, and the temperature dropped just a bit.  It is still very humid here however.

It's been too hot to do any garden weeding or tilling/cultivating at all.  The weeds are growing, so I hope we get a break soon.  I was literally dripping with sweat just being out there for the watering of everything.

At the end of the day, it's too exhausting to crochet, read or do anything really.  We are thankful for the AC (when the power is on) or the fans.

Hot and Humid© June 2024 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart

In a World of Expensive Free is Good!

 

The laundry has dried so much faster with the heat wave.  I love our solar dryer.  Free!  Smells great!  I get exercise.

Wild black raspberries are on now.  I'm picking daily, and will use them for simply eating or making fruit smoothies for a cold lunch.  The best part?  It's free!  I forage for them, and some plants have been planted closer to the house by birds.  If there is an abundance, I will freeze some, but the lack of rain and heat wave may say otherwise.

I received some free merlot heirloom lettuce seeds, so we are trying something new with this heat index skyrocketing - planting lettuce indoors.  I'll let you know how it turns out, or if it does well.   I decided to plant two kinds of lettuce, and a tray of microgreens.  If it all does well for our meals, I'll start more later this week.

The mulberries are also on the trees, but they are not all ripe yet.  I did get a mix of berries a few days ago though.  I see there are white mulberries almost ready to pick too.

In a World of Expensive Free is Good!© June 2024 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart

It's Hot!

We've entered a heat wave, and yesterday we had a heat index of 102°F.  No one is enjoying the outdoors right now.  The chickens are being treated with frozen treats, ice water, and I have even frozen water in a tin.  I am also freezing water in bottles that I put inside their watering unit to keep their water nice and cold.   I have more treats in the freezer for today, but the forecast is saying the heat wave will last the entire week.  It is unusual for us to have such hot weather this early in the summer.

Our red raspberries are slim pickings.  I have to water the plants this week, as the rain we were to get, never arrived.  Watering the entire garden and flower beds is a full time job this week.

That's a bell pepper dipped in a new hummus recipe I made.  It's a red lentil hummus, and my gosh is it creamy and good.  I used 1/2 cup tahini (recipe said 1/4th), and used 3 cloves of garlic (recipe said 2).  It is higher in protein and less fat, and does not contain olive oil.

I have made red lentil hummus before, but used a different recipe.  There are many online, but if you want to try this one, it's called "Easy Lentil Hummus" by "It doesn't taste like chicken" online.

It''s Hot! © June 2024 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart