2. Harvested: radishes, chard, onions, chives, elephant garlic shoots, parsley, rosemary, marjoram, rhubarb, spinach, broccoli, lettuce, trout, compost fish (Northern Pikeminnow), eggs-as-usual.

3. Preserved: rhubarb, trout, goose eggs (blown, frozen)

4. Stored: rye flour, buckwheat flour

5. Prepped: trout, make-ahead soup, fall garden bed. Rebuilt deer fence. Potted up lilac shoots to trade for quince shoots.

6. Managed: reconnected the homemade solar hot water heater. Began using scythe for first time.

7. Local: Seeds are from Territorial; they are local. http://www.territorialseed.com

Now, the problem is that I’m not quite sure what to do with it. It could be eaten as a snack, but it is quite … leathery. Any suggestions?

Harvested: nothing

Tended: 1 cucumber seedling transplanted into 12″ dia. pot. 1 Stupice tomato seedling into similarly sized pot. 2 other tomato seedlings still to be transplanted into large half-barrel pot, once I’ve got a way to insulate them against the cool nights. Transplanted 27 cucumber seedlings into larger containers. Will have cucumbers coming out the ears if they all produce anything. Will be over at the FIL’s weeding and tending some of the previously planted goodies, today.

Preserved Something: Nope.

Make Preps: bought a 12-pk case of qt-sized wide-mouthed mason jars in case all those cucumber plants produce. Also bought 4 boxes (12 each) lids, 2 of wide-mouth size, 2 regular size. The hubby also built me a 3×8 ft planter bed that we situated, dug out the gravel-filled dirt from underneath, and refilled with top-soil last night. As well as rototilling out 2 flower beds and filled one with the 12 strawberry crowns. The other may get flowers again, or veggies. Not sure yet. ALSO prepped 2 half-barrel planters for tomatos and zucchini, and 2 chicken-wire “bins” for potatoes yet to be planted.

Cooked Something: Not from locally grown, but I DID make my own Creme Brulee yesterday from scratch!!! And beef-stuffed Sopaipillas for supper last night, and various meals through the rest of the past week.

Managed Reserves: usual rotating of supplies as used.

Worked On/Toward Local Food Systems: Nope.

Composted Something/Reduced Waste: well, weeded a clothes-basket of tops out of my closet. I never wear them, so I might as well pass them on to somebody who can. Will take up to the transfer station tonight or tomorrow, and leave on the platform with the other reusable goods.

Learn a New Skill: Nope.

****

More details and lots of pics at my blog.

Continuing construction on the chicken coop. We’ll have the frame for the run pretty much done by the end of the day I hope.

I transplanted about 300 tomato plants and around 150 pepper plants. For those who don’t know, we have a small CSA, which accounts for the crazy numbers. Though I admit to being nearly incapable of killing anything green. Deliberately anyway, though I sure did my best with these guys. We have a hodge-podge of plants in the market garden that only time will tell what they are. I tried to plant them based on similarity, so we may have some semblance of organization down there.

Harvest:

Harvested variety of lettuces, kale, chard, radishes, strawberries, green onions, snap peas, thyme, cilantro, sorrel, chives, milk and eggs.

Preserve:

Picked 6 quarts of strawberries and made jam out of 4 quarts to yield 16 half pints. Froze 2 quarts for use in smoothies and ice cream.

Skimmed 9 quarts of cream! This will go towards making butter and ice cream. Yummmmmm!

Store:

Put up 3 bottles of “cheap ass” vodka, according to Jim, for use in making tinctures; 3 bottles lamp oil; matches; organic lemon juice; 50# hard red winter wheat berries; 25# arborio rice; 25# brown basmati rice; 50# organic sugar; vanilla; Em’s favorite graham sticks.

Prep:

Picked up 25 buckeye chicks to round out our breeding program. Purchased a book called Spinning in the Old Way, which talks about spinning obviously, but also about wool prep. Jim picked up 10 cattle panels.

Manage:

Weeded in the market garden, laid tarp to keep down weeds in the staging area, covered spinach with shade cloth, continued to slug-hunt, pulled out soaker hoses.

Cook:

I made ricotta cheese for the first time this week, and it was pretty tasty, though the curds were quite firm—almost mozzerella like. The first batch didn’t come out at all, but the piggies and the chickens didn’t mind one little bit; they thought it was just marvelous.

We also made our first ice cream, and boy was it just amazing! We made vanilla for everyone to fix up the way they like. Jules and Em had chocolate syrup, Jim and I had sugared strawberry topping I quickly whipped up from our garden, Sam had both! Em kept saying, “It’s like heaven in cream form!”

Add:

CSA delivery to three local families. Natural foods co-op, volunteered for unloading and check in.

Reduce:

Used my chico bags again while shopping. I love having them right in my purse for those times I forget to grab my canvas market bags.

Learn:

Learning all about cheese making.

1. Planted: Pole beans, bush beans, pickling cucumbers, purple sage, rosemary and thyme. Have bought more currant bushes and two saskatoon berry bushes, but haven’t got around to planting them yet.

2. Harvested: It’s growing poorly in the heat and drought. Harvested some salad greens, rhubarb and herbs. Soon the spinach will be ready.

3. Preserved: nothing

4. Stored: Nothing

5. Prepped: Well, no…

6: Managed: Weeded, prepared beds for planting. Dh trying to fix broken water pump (he’s good at fixing things .-)). Used gray water to water the garden.

7: Local: Discussed mulching and potato growing with neighbour (does that count?)

8: Cooked: Only the usual stuff. Too hot to cook much anyway.

9. Waste: Composting as usual

10. Learn a new skill: Learned how a water pump looks on the inside…

Now I’m off to the lake with the kids and a bunch of freshly made cinnamon rolls, mmm We will swim and cool off a bit!

Here is another meager list:

Planted: More tomatoes (Roma, Green Zebra, and Black Krim) & peppers (Tabasco, Jalapeno, California Wonder, and Cayenne), West India gherkin cucumbers, Butternut squash, sweet & Indian corn.

Harvested: More eggs; mint;radish, beet and turnip seedlings, lamb’s quarter & field mustard (I also forgot last week to mention the wild field garlic I found in the nick of time before it disappeared for the year), black swamp soil, raspberry leaves

Preserved: Dried the raspberry leaves

Stored: I didn’t store anything this week, but I did bring a shelf from the old house to the new property that will house stuff in the basement pantry. Oh, I guess I did pick up a couple of bottles of Witch Hazel on clearance from the drug store.

Prepped: Found four dozen canning jars at local thrift ($14/all), bought canning lids. Mentioned the shelf above. Will be picking up five dairy goats this afternoon\ which meant we had to create area for them. Still in the process. Made a list of “wants” (and was surprised how small it is, although it doesn’t include miracle wants like solar panels or books).

Managed: Used yard sale money to buy fencing and material for new goat area. I also found a firesafe on clearance at TSC and bought it to store “important” documents like birth cert., ss cards, marriage cert., etc. I also picked up a couple of peg board shelves in order to do some organizing in the barn (yard sale find $1/three). Reread dairy goat books. Worked on inventory list of useful (medicinal/edible) plants on property (found a plum tree!!!)

Cooked Something New: I barely cooked at all this week (we had folks over on holiday and I have been using extra burgers and such to cook with-nothing particularly new).

Work on Local Food System: Bought extra tomato plants to fill in losses from local greenhouse. I also gave this man in my area a business idea and have been corresponding with him with advice. He found a local source for food grade barrels he was willing to share with me. I found a few more people that need one or two and emailed him back to find out if he would be interested in making a few dollars. He will charge $10 for straight barrel (he gets them for $5 and drives about 20 minutes) or for $30 he will prepare it with overflow valves, screening and a spigot. I think it’s a bargain if you do a quick search online. I gave him emails of people interested and told him I would spread the word around. I am buying five (two prepared/three back-ups). I love the one I have already. I also shared some extra plants with my co-worker who is putting in his very first veggie garden.

Reduced Waste: I ‘ll mention the rain barrels again because they are used barrels from the food industry (used to hold vanilla extracts and such). Composted as usual.

Learned a New Skill: I can’t think of anything at the moment…

Also, a couple of questions: Chile, can you give us your pumpkin leather recipe/ I actually still have two rather large heirloom pumpkins from last Fall’s harvest and already have canned and froze pumpkin puree, butter and made muffins and bread until it was coming out of our ears. The leather sonds intriging. And,the second thing is actually just an opinion for Gail, I think it definitely counts despite any heartbreak involve. It is a long term decision that will prevent stress. hugs.