A Gardener's Delight

Just like any other true gardener, I started to plan out this years garden as soon as last years was done. In December, I started dreaming of seed catalogs, and in January thumbed through them over and over until I got my 'final list' I had to make myself not order too early, as to not have to baby tomatoes and peppers along in February, so I waited. My seed order came last Friday, minus my onion sets from Burpee Seed. Co. I think those are being shipped seperately, at least I hope so, since I ordered 3 different kinds of sweet onions. Something about sweet onions can make an onion lover out of most anyone. I also got these White Wonder cukes, they were free! Yay, free!! I've never grown them before, so they'll be sort of a novelty. Either way, cucumbers are good. The marigolds, I love marigolds, are a small variety, so I'll put them at the edges of the gardens, maybe they'll border my pumpkin patch, and I'll mix a few with my carrots and herbs.

Beans ~ I've grown to love the pole beans. My Mom always liked the bush beans because they were so tender, but she did grow these Romano beans one year, they are so delicious! Flat like a ruler, tender and sweet. I don't know why she prefered the bush beans over the pole beans, maybe because it's a pain to build the tepees for them to climb on, or if you don't pick them early enough, some of the older varieties can be 'stringy', again more work when it comes time to freeze them, and a farmers work is never done, but I prefer the pole beans. Even the Kentucky Wonder beans, one of the oldest heirlooms around, are nice and tender if they are picked young enough. My girls hang out inside the tepees, and I also plant them to climb up on old cow stantions, believe it or not, from the old barn that has since fallen, but the floor and a few walls and beams remain, along with the stantions and old feed troughs for the cows. The troughs have become the 'raised beds' for my beans. They look absolutely beautiful climbing on those old stantions, the same ones that held our Jersey milk cows for milking when I was a kid, (my Daisy Mae, the sweetest cow ever). They transform a fallen old barn into a living, thriving place once again. It feels good.

The squash and gourds shall be stars once again this year. The Ball Mix zucchini I grew last year, were long keepers after they were harvested. The ones picked in September lasted until December, and were still sweet and delicious, a definate winner. The Camoflauge Hybrid is a striped squash, similar to the Tiger's Eye I grew last year. I thought this would be fun to try; another sweetie. The Lakota squash, I'm particularly excited about. It's an old heirloom traced back to the Lakota Souix tribe. I feel drawn to it for some reason. My plan is to use it with my Three Sisters Gardens (corn, beans, squash grown together, as the Indians did for centuries They were the 'original' companion and organic gardeners). It looks like a Turk's Turbon gourd, minus the turbon, of bright orange and deep green. Can't wait for this one! My Mom also planted Luffa gourds one year. They were fun. After we would pick them, we would peel and then hang them to dry. The inside is very fiberous, and dries to the look and consistency of a bath sponge. They look just like the luffa type sponges in the stores everywhere now, but these are the real thing ~ they can be used in the bath or kitchen, or for cleaning the grill, but can still be composted once their worn out. When I was a kid, I thought they were cool, very cool. I hope my girls feel the same way!

I'll be planting lots of lettuce. I have many varieties, but this one is another old heirloom which is more like a mini romaine type of lettuce. It's dark red and green speckled, so it should add some great color to the garden. I'm all for a pretty garden, and I love lettuce. It's one of those veggies anyone can plant, along with basil, that could save a good bit on the grocery bill over the summer, and tastes so good! Think of how much 'salad greens' cost in the store ~ kaching! As far as I'm concerned, I'd rather spend that money at the Mingo Twist (an incredible summer ice cream place around here, it borders a horse farm, what could be better?). Now, the New Zealand spinach is another find of my Mom's. It's so delicious, but much more tolerant of regular spinach, so I figure, why wouldn't I plant it? It can be pinched back all summer long, and the plants will keep producing ~ one spinach patch is all that's needed!

The Petunias ~ love petunias. They have such a simple heir about them, they feel comfortable, and make the holder of this flower feel pretty. I know I've sort of developed a theme for this post; that being plants my Mom grew years ago, but she was a smart gardener, I learned so much from her. One of her favorites was petunias, we had them growing everywhere, and she particularly liked the Razzle Dazzle petunia. It's simple by today's standards, bright purples, pinks, and blue tones with white stripes. That's it, a single pretty flower. I'm adding the Magic Carpet petunias to add to my pots and bales of hay/straw that I plan on using this year for the garden. I envision them trailing down the sides while gaurding my cantaloupe and watermelon that grow inside. Bugs for some reason hate the scent they give off (same is true for marigolds), so I'll get double duty out of them~ beauty plus bug chaser. I think they'll earn their keep.

The peppers will be, excuse the pun, the 'belle' of the garden. My hubby loves hot peppers and salsa, so I've planted Ristra Cayenne, Serrano Chili, Jalepeno Gigante for him, and Tangerine Dream, Red Delicious, and Pinot Nior for the rest of us! Well, he likes the sweet ones too! The Ristra Cayenne, I'm excited about because they are a green to red hot pepper that dries well and fast (I'm all for that), pack some heat, but not enough to have to drink a gallon of milk afterwards, and curl up at the ends to give them a 'cartoon' look. I think we'll like them. The Tangerine Dream pepper is for me. Again, I have this thing with connecting with a name, I don't know why, but this one stuck with me while I thumbed through my catalog. They are cute, small and bright orange. I also love the color orange for some reason, it's a happy color, I could probably make a post on why I like the color orange. Sorry, strange thought. The Red Delicious are for my girls. I'm hoping to keep trying peppers until I find one they actually like ~ without me having to sell it too hard. They are supposed to have a sweet, apple taste, once they turn red. I tried this with tomatoes, planting all kinds of cherry types, hoping to instill the love of veggies without having to force them to eat them. They didn't go for the cherry types, amazingly, it was last year that they found a tomato they could enjoy eating, even straight from the garden. It's a huge 2 lb. tomato, Homer Fike's Yellow Oxheart ~ the most amazing tomato I've grown ( http://www.tomatofest.com/). Orange, like a canteloupe, mild and sweet. It barely has any seeds and is very meaty, a great sandwich tomato, or anything tomato. My favorite, and it carries the orange theme too! And it's an heirloom too, which equates to seed saving which equates to saving more money!! Yay!!

Until next time, you know what I'll be doing, playing in the dirt every time I get a chance!! (Smiles!!)

"Lovin' from the Oven"

It starts with this: an easy box mix with about 1/2 cup of added unsweetened cocoa. Mmmmmmm...looks (and smells) good!

These mini cake molds are so cute. Some are from my Mom's collection, some are what I've found looking around estate sales and thrift shops.

Add a bit of icing and some Hershey's syrup, and you have this. Beautiful desserts that shout "I love you!"

Mmmmmmmm...looks good.
And finally, "lovin' from the oven", sealed with a kiss.

Happy Valentine's day. And remember, if you don't have a honey, or honey bunch kids to snuggle with, the most important person to love is staring at you in the mirror! Have a happy day!

(For the Love of)... Chicken Soup

I love chicken soup. It's always there at times of need, or need of comfort. My hubby was sick yesterday. Often, he complains about how sick he feels, buy yesterday, he was sick. So, he deserved some extra attention, and some feeling of comfort, so I made him soup. Funny how soup is always the answer when someone needs a quick pick me up. Happy soup. Here's how I make mine:

I grab some veggies. I always have celery, onion, and carrots on hand about a cup of each. They are the base for all of my soup broths, but I add these after I boil the chicken to start the broth. The celery leaves in the bowl, I'll add towards the end to give a nice 'parsley' effect. Now, I buy a couple of fryer or roaster chickens and cut them myself to save some extra cash ($0.88/lb, compared to $2 or $3/lb). I save the backs and sometimes the top of the breast portion and cook them first in a large pot of water, and I simmer them for about an hour.

This might look kind of gross, but the end result is quite the payoff. Boiling the chicken and bones gives great flavor to the broth, and the chicken is so tender! Remove it to a bowl, to let cool, and remove the meat from the bones. Strain the broth and you are ready to make soup!

This is what I got after removing the bones~ a full plate of very tender chicken. I cook the veggies first in the broth until they 'sink' into the pot, and add 2 boullion cubes, the chicken pieces and some more coarsely chopped carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, corn~whatever I have on hand. I add some herbs: basil, parsley, oregeno, thyme, and garlic. Add enough to suit your taste. That's the beauty of soup~ using what you already have.
I also add rice, about one cup to the mix, or noodles. For this soup, it was the rice, a wild and brown rice mix. It's beautiful to look at, and healthier than the white version. It gives a slighty more 'nutty' taste. And it's so pretty! Simmer the soup until the rice is cooked, and it's ready to go.
Now, whether it's coincidence or not, the hubby felt better today...ahhhh the love of soup!

The Story of the Terrible Towel...

Once upon a time, there was a tiny little man with a squeaky voice who somehow landed a job in radio. His name was Myron Cope. He had the looks for radio, but certainly not the voice, but he loved sports, he loved the Pittsburgh Steelers, and he knew the game, which earned him respect in a town that demanded a good work ethic. Somehow, even with his radio looks, he landed the TV broadcast post for the WTAE broadcast games too. In this town, he is a legend. Everyone knows who Myron was. He did alot outside of the broadcast booth too. He loved this town, and did alot of charity work, especially with Autism research. Now, a little about the Terrible Towel, as I remember it.

It started out in the mid 1970's during a playoff year for the Steelers, when Myron was asked to try to involve the fans a bit more with the broadcast. He came up with a crazy idea to wave a yellow or black towel to encourage the team, and fire up the fans. He asked people to bring a towel to the game. It worked. Eventually the towels were marketed as Myron Cope's Original Terrible Towels. Now back in the day when they first came about, they were just towels. I remember my Mom buying some yellow and white kitchen towels, and we drew our own Steeler emblems and wrote "Terrible Towel" on them with marker...long live the simple days! We'd run around the house waving our own version of the towel. My homemade version, I'm sure soon became dusting cloths for my Mom, but my hubby has managed to save two towels: one black, one gold, which are tucked away safely in his sports box. Now once playoff season starts, the towels can't be touched until the season is over. No exceptions! (My kitty, Emma, came dangerously close to touching the towels in this post, lucky for the cute kitty, she kept her paws off! We can't have a cat jinxing the team now, can we?) We didn't get them out by playoff season this year, so they can't be touched until next year. Steeler fans are pretty superstitious, and we can't afford to be the ones to jinx the team, that would be bad.



Now, all superstitions aside, it's only good sportsmanship to wish for a good competitive game on Sunday against the Packers. It should be a good game. Two old school, tough nosed teams duking it out for all the marbles. Now only if I could watch the entire game. My husband thinks I'm a jinx! Wishing a good, tough, safe game on Sunday. I'm happy for Green Bay to be at the Superbowl, but I'll be chanting "GO STEELERS!!!"

Backyard birds outside today

The winter in the backyard woods. This pine tree in our back yard is huge, about 50 ft. high, and might be the main reason we're lucky enough to have such a variety of birds visit. It's like a bird hotel.

I was trying to get a nice perching shot of this male cardinal and snapped just as he started to fly to the ground to feed. This isn't the best shot, but I'm keeping it because now I'm determined to catch one in flight! It's going to take me bundling up and sit outside for a couple of hours and to be patient, but I'm determined now! (This shot was taken from my bathroom window of all places!)

The male northern cardinal is always so easy to find because of their bright red plumage. That would be the reason you see so many shots here, plus the fact that we're lucky enough to have about 8 pairs of cardinals this year as regular visitors!

This sweet little Carolina wren hangs out mainly in the fall and winter. It might be around in the summer, but I don't notice it as much. We have two visit the yard, and one or both has flown into the house twice! Thank goodness they are friendly little birds that don't panic easily, the happy go lucky bird of the backyard. It was easy to direct them outside. So cute, and this one looks great against the brick pile we planned to use for our firepit. It's turned out to be a great winter feeding station so it's a good thing my hubby decided to go with stone for the firepit!

Ok, this gorgeous summer green may be out of place, but look below and it will make sense...

This is the same tree as above, a huge silver maple, but this is it's winter look. A squirrel was able to get this apple my hubby put out for the deer up to the nook in the tree shown above, about 15 ft. up. I'm sure it was a tasty little snack.

And here is the gorgeous female northern cardinal. They aren't as easy to find to photograph since they blend in so well to the trees. She is quite pretty. Towards the end of February, she'll be amost entirely olive, just in time to lay eggs for springtime. I can't wait to get a shot of her in her glory.



After a bit, I heard a woodpecker in the woods, and I spied where they had been feeding on the trunk of a huge tree. I didn't expect to actually be able to spot them, but this was my lucky day.

This red headed woodpecker appeared pretty quickly and it moves so fast, it's hard to get a good clear shot, but I thought it was worth trying (and keeping) since I don't often catch them with the camera away from the feeders. It's extra special catching them doing their thing, eating bugs under the tree bark.

This little white breasted nuthatch was doing the same thing. So cute, and so quick.

How NOT to Grill a Christmas Turkey!

This year was the closest to "The Christmas Story" dinner we've ever been! This is how not to grill a turkey. It shouldn't look like this. It should be a pretty dark brown and juicy! What we ended up with was charred and dry. It was a 'series of unfortunate events'. First, my hubby filled the entire grill with charcoal, instead of the usual placing of the pan to catch drippings, and building coals around that. It was a rather large turkey, so maybe he thought he needed the extra coals. I then, had the bright idea to place the bird in a roasting pan to try to make a buffer between the coals and the heat. That proved to be a bad idea. It caught on fire. After about an hour of grilling, our turkey looked something like this, although not quite as bad. (This is the look after trying to save an unsavable bird!)
I made the frantic call to my mother in law to ask if she just happened to have a spare bird. Luckily she did. I left in a flash to pick up the back up bird to roast in the oven~ by now, we figured we had to play it safe. The third of our series of unfortunate events came to light as I realized that I now couldn't make the cookies and desserts I planned since I now had a 15 lb. turkey in the oven! Again, I jumped in the car to desperately attempt to find an open convienence store~ hurray for Get-Go! Get-Go was opened for business and packed with holiday shoppers. Did they all burn a bird, or was it just me? Probably just me. I was able to pick up some chips, pop, and goodies for fill my dessert trays, and I was relieved to know that they also sold subs, just in case my back up bird didn't cook in time. I devised a plan then, that if by 4 pm., I didn't have a cooked bird, I would head out again to Get-Go, to buy holiday sub sandwiches! Good eating! Meanwhile, the hubby tried to save the burned bird.

He tried, but there wasn't much left to save. What he did 'save' was DRY! At this point, I thought the only thing worse that could happen would be the pack of hungry dogs running through the house, and devouring what was left of our bird. They didn't come and we're making turkey rueben's tonight with the grilled, dry bird! We were able somehow, to find humor in this day of near disasters. Everything somehow came together. We didn't have to eat at Get-Go. I've never prepared side dishes so fast as I did this Christmas. I was a chopping, slicing, shredding, mixing and baking maniac! I felt kind of like a ninja.

This is how the day ended. Nice. Cozy. Happy. The way every day should be! And, we have a story to tell for years to come. And I was tired...very tired.

Cold day for the birds...

It's COLD here in PA today! The 24 degree F temps outside with lots of strong wind gusts have kept some of the birds hiding in cover this morning, but some are hungry enough to brave the wind to scoop up some food from the backyard. Enjoy!The cardinals~ especially the males look so majestic perched in the trees.This little tufted titmouse came around for some sunflower seeds. I was waiting for a bluejay to swoop down for some of the nuts, but this little guy happened along first. It kind of surprised me. I took the picture as soon as it landed because the jay's are so quick to eat and run!

Even this bluejay looks cold today, darn those northwestern winds!

So, this female cardinal will continue to get lighter throughout the winter to look almost entirely olive color with that stunning black face mask in February. She's a gorgeous bird.

This one might be Christmas card worthy.


I need to make a point of getting a good pair of gloves, a warm scarf, boots, and coat ready for my next birding date...it's way to cold to sit out (or hang out the window) without them!