Q-tip Love

It's nearing the end of July and things don't seem to be slowing any time soon around the house. I've been picking up hours to afford all our outings while the boy has been bashing his brain to bits in order to finish his undergraduate dissertation. Needless to say, it's a bit chaotic.

The garden with me in the background, hi!

Speaking of chaotic...the garden has exploded. I meticulously planned the 4x8 raised bed with square foot gardening in mind. I don't think the plants got that memo. The tomatoes tower over me and try to crowd out the poor bell pepper plant - even with pruning. The butternut squash and pumpkins have run amuck, sprawling across the lawn as if it knows it has better places to be. Let me tell you...nothing says fun like Q-tip pollinating pumpkin blooms because the bees are slacking...(too many blooms to choose from)

By the way, if you're going to play with cucurbitaceae family plants (i.e. cucumber, squash, pumpkin) be careful if you have sensitive skin. I'm out there in shorts and flip-flops with my Q-tips, next thing I know it's hive city on my arms and legs.

Slowly emerging

The, sometimes itchy, fruits of our labors are starting to pay off as we harvested a nice sized cucumber today and over the last week collected 6oz of snap peas (there would've been more but I kept eating them). There are more cucumber on the vines and the super chilies are hanging out until they redden. We've got a few okra and tomatoes that are ripening as well. It's nothing significant with some of the veggies - like the snap peas and okra. But it's something to put on our plates outside the normal farmer's market fare.

As for the rest of the gardens the daylilies and hosta have finally started to bloom with the Black-eyed Susan not too far behind. The sunflowers are already producing wonderful yellow flowers. But the chocolate ones are just starting to open. The golden finches love the sunflowers and I often times see them hanging around our front porch.  Meanwhile, the regular house finches are using the bare patches of our yard as their personal sand bath. There are whole colonies crowded in the 'dead zones.' It's a mad house out there....

Birds of Paradise

Jake, enjoying the weather and the dirt

The 4th of July has come and gone. The weather is picking up that it's summer and July, meaning the days are warm and humid. At night you can feel the moisture on the linoleum floors of the kitchen, collecting as the night tries to cool the evening air. The kids are just puddles on the floor during the worst of times. Otherwise, they're packed against the windows watching the wild birds that claim our neighborhood frolic in the yard.

I've seen and heard a plethora of the winged entertainment. The other day cardinals foraged in the yard with a female singing out our bathroom window for a good fifteen minutes. Little chickadees crowded the boxwood tree, an ironic backdrop of chirps to the book I was reading (Suzanne Collins 'Mockingjay') or house sparrows played around the old aluminum ladder we've yet to get rid of. Sputnik loves watching them all from his perch in the enclosed back porch. Funny thing, he sits atop an old kitty litter pail, that we've filled with wild bird seed. There's more - mourning doves, gold finches, house finches, red-winged black birds, robins, once we saw a blue jay. But the one bird we really want in the yard still eludes us: hummingbirds.

We try to plant with them and butterflies in mind. There are plenty of those - butterflies - in the yard too. A friend mentioned seeing a hummingbird last week. Makes me jealous and that much more resolved to attract them to my yard. It makes me wonder if there's some type of habitat (nesting area, water source) aside from our normal plant cultivation we can erect in our yard to meet their needs. Something, anything. Just another thing to add to the list of things to do to the yard, I guess.

Hell, a trip to the local you-pick strawberry field prompted plans to erect our own vertical strawberry planter. With my ingenious idea it would involve strawberries on one side and hanging potters with lettuce on the other. When I tried to describe this plan to my partner all I got was the blank stare. That is until I drew the damned thing. My verbal description of it's an inverted V actually turned out more like a swing set, but whatever. I owned up to the mistake of probably drawing it out first then trying to describe it.

The raised veg. garden exploding!

One thing at a time though. The raised bed we erected earlier this spring is overflowing with vegetables. The butternut squash probably wasn't the greatest thing to put in there but lesson learned. It needs it's own home next year. The okra is doing fabulous as well as the tomato plants which are taller than their cages. I'm excited for the harvest this year. The strawberries we picked became strawberry-margarita jam, pie and frozen nuggets for later use. So I'm sure you can only imagine what I'll turn my vegetables into when they're ready - pickled, canned, devoured!

Culinary Delights

Speaking of pie...I made a strawberry-rhubarb pie the other night. We picked the rhubarb up earlier in the season from our local farmer's market, which was bursting at the seams yesterday with over 7,000 people in the five hours it was open! I froze the rhubarb for later use because, honestly, I had no idea what I was going to do with it, but at $2 a bunch I couldn't pass it up.

The pie turned out wonderful (there's only 2 slices left), so good in fact the boy and I ate two pieces in one night. Not only was the filling good but the crust which was a coconut oil based experiment vs margarine, my typical choice. The crust still turned out flaky and wonderful. You can probably find any variation of this crust online and for the life of me can't remember where I pulled this one from but here it is:

mmm...pie....*drool*

Coconut Oil Pie Crust (makes a double crust)

1ts salt

2c flour

3tb coconut oil

6tb veg. oil

6tb cold, iced water

Directions 

1) mix the salt and flour together

2) add in the liquids and mix until well incorporated but not over mixed

3) wrap in saran wrap and chill for 1hr

4) divide into equal pieces and on lightly floured surface roll until desired thickness/diameter

What summertime treat/dessert do you look forward to the most? Is it berry based? Or do you prefer citrus?