Pioneer Woman at Heart

I've boiled eggs a few times lately, and have more sitting in the fridge to boil after a few weeks.  As you can see, no green/blue eggs.  Hm.  One breed is slacking, but we are getting enough.

I made Hubby and I a muscle rub yesterday.  I adapted a recipe to use my calendula oil, mixed with coconut oil (but when my arnica is up and ready to pick, I'll be making it with that).   If this helps, I'll be posting my recipe.  Until then, say a prayer it works.  We have a garden to put in, and the remainder of a felled tree still needs cleaned up.  But...

I started the day rather slower yesterday.  My achy body didn't want to get going.  I did my yoga stretches as usual, and got busy.  First, with rain in the forecast, I went to the kitchen. My new oven mitts.  These were a gift at the big birthday bash from an old friend.  They are longer than they look in the photo, and withstand up to 500°F.  I love them. I baked us some blueberry banana bread.  I different recipe, but used up a few lingering over-ripe bananas.  My freezer is still full of blueberries (thankfully).

I woke up to checking the weather yesterday, and saw rain was 60% at 10am and 90% at 1pm.  So, I adjusted my day.  I started by making 3 "cans" of homemade condensed mushroom soup.  Smelled so good too.  I love the smell of shallots cooking in butter.  Mmm.  The "cans" went into the freezer.  By the way, this soup on top of turkey breast, in the crock pot, tastes amazing. At 11am the rain had not arrived. At noon, no rain.  At 1:30pm?  No rain.  I chopped up a head of cauliflower to prep for dinner early.  Put that in the fridge and checked the weather again. 

I've noticed, that now that we are down to just 4 people living here, my costs have reduced greatly.  I have reduced my purchases of organic milk, sugar, peanut butter, coffee, and more.  I'll admit, even toilet paper costs reduced.  Our electric bill should be much lower now too.   Handmade thank you notes went out to a few people.  Hubby said if I thanked everyone at my party, it was not necessary to send another thank you out.  Anyway, I made these by adhering scrap fabric to cardstock, then used a marker to make dashes around it, and on the back I have a stamp that says " Inspired by Life, Created by Hand, One-of-a-kind art created by......."  It's a circle stamp and I sign it. I'm having trouble with my lavender seedlings.  They came up, but are dying off.  I have tried different amounts of rain water, and put them in a sunny window.  Even so, they drooped over and only few remain.  So delicate to work with.  N...

As promised, here is a photo of the carpenter bee traps I use.  They work if your mount them in a place where they do not move (swing in the wind on a hook etc).  It's the only thing I can come up with to cut the bee infestation down.  They  There is a hole on 3 sides of the wooden box, and the clear container on the side screws to the 4th side.  The bees go into the holes, crawl through tunnels, and then end up into the container.  They can't get out once they get in.  No chemicals involved.

. . . finished the set of pot holders and o versized hot pad using the afghan hook.