Fall Colors

Hello, friends.  Groceries seemed especially high this week, even with my 5% senior discount.  There was very little on sale, among the things I needed, much of it fresh produce.  I did find organic crushed tomatoes on the markdown shelf, for $2, and got four of those.  I do hope prices will not continue going up, as they have been lately.  As the green tomatoes ripen, I'm freezing them, until I have enough to can.  I caught up on some YouTube channels I follow, while wrapping soap for the B&B.  J and I went to town for early voting.  There was a steady stream of people, but we were able to get in and out quickly.  I've really been enjoying the Fall colors this week.  

Joseph readied the ground, and planted our garlic.  He also tilled up a plot for me.  It's late, but I planted carrots, beets, a small kale patch, and a blend of bird and butterfly wildflowers my stepson gave me.  In other spots, I planted a blend of shade garden seeds.  The carrot varieties included Tendersweet, Danvers, Danvers Half Long, and Scarlet Nantes.  Some of the carrot seeds were saved from our garden.  Beets were Detroit Dark Red and Golden.  There's no frost in the 15 day forecast, so maybe they'll at least have time to germinate.  Peas, lima beans, green beans and kale were harvested from the garden.  

With a forecast of 80 on Saturday, I decided to give the pups baths, as I'm sure it won't be long before we shut the outdoor shower down for the season.  As I hadn't seen any in several weeks, the hummingbird feeders were taken down and scrubbed.  We ended up getting 3/8" of rain Saturday night.  It wasn't enough to begin using it in the house again, but we're thankful it helped water in the seeds and garlic we planted.  Greens of dock and kale were gathered for the chickens most days.  A pot of small sweet potatoes was placed on the woodstove, to simmer for the pups.  It's beginning to feel like the cozy season.  Stay well, friends.

Bodywork

Hello, friends.  Last week, Joseph finished hooking up the electrical for the generator, and did quite a bit of bodywork.  He welded metal on larger holes, and filled in smaller holes with body filler.

He bought a regulator and fittings to connect the propane tank to the piping, and installed it.  Onward.

Little Seasonal Chores

Hello, friends.  Well, we ran out of rainwater in the big tanks on Tuesday, while I was doing laundry, so we're on well water for the foreseeable future.  I made a nice batch of curry powder blend. This way, I can be sure there's no turmeric, which J is allergic to.  All the sweet potatoes were brought in to storage.  We had three nights with a frost advisory, so I picked the garden first... tomatoes, eggplant, beans, chard, roselle, and basil.  I also harvested a little parsley for a dish, and lettuce.  It turned out we had only the slightest frost.  I only noticed one affected basil plant, but everything else is doing OK.  I mentioned last year about gathering sweet potato leaves, to replace spinach in my smoothies.  As the sweet potatoes were in the pond garden this year, so less convenient, that didn't happen.  Many sweet potato vines will continue to grow, even after harvesting the potatoes, so last week, I harvested a bag of the leaves to use.  It saved me from buying spinach for the week.  

Early morning, with a full moon through the window

The last cabbage in storage was used, half in two different dinners.  A bouquet was gathered as well, the day I harvested the garden.  I had an errand in a town I don't go to often.  There's a branch of our library there.  I requested books before going, so they'd be ready to pick up.  I changed out the summer sheet sets to flannel ones.  The woodstove was lit for the season.  Batches of pesto were made with the basil.  The pup's coats were brought out for the cold mornings.  Seedlings of lettuce, chard and cilantro were planted in the ground.  Little seasonal chores.  Early in the week, I had small amounts of several things, all of which had the same processing time, so I canned a quart of tiny potatoes, a pint of fresh limas, and a pint and a half of peas in the same canner load.  Vegetable soup was made, using almost entirely homegrown veggies, including tomatoes, summer squash, limas, carrots, onion, garlic, peas, and potato.  I save small bits of leftovers in a "soup" container in the freezer, and this was added, which included jasmine rice and lentils.  It was an especially flavorful soup this time.  Tomatoes were canned over the weekend.  The season ended a bit better than I thought it might in mid-summer, and I'm thankful for that.  Take good care of yourselves, and have a lovely week. 

A Door & An Ozone Generator

 

Hello, friends.  Last week, Joseph finished installing the generator, and fabricated a door for the space.  He'd saved the hinge from the original door, so was able to cut it down, and use it in this project.  It looks so much nicer than the previous gaping hole there, and gets us closer to being able to paint the bus.  He's already purchased our primary color, Seaside Teal. 

 

Buses in general have a tendency to overheat on long upgrades, so he's bought a transmission cooler, and fabricated mounting brackets to place it in front of the radiator.  After he posted on a skoolie site about purchasing our mattress, someone suggested that an ozone generator works to repel mice and other critters, so there's now one of those on board.  We'll just need to air it out before boarding, whenever it's been less than 48 hours since running.  Next up... propane piping.

A Little Sewing & Another Garden Experiment

Hello, friends.  For the first time ever, we ran out of our drinking (rain)water.  With the skoolie project, a lot of maintenance-type things on the homestead have been neglected, including cleaning out the gutters to that tank.  I swept the shed roof while I was up there, and cleaned the muck off the gutter screens, which were covered with soil-like material.  It's no wonder there was no rain getting through, to fill our tank.  The forecast is showing little to no rain in the 15 day forecast, but in the meantime, we're able to use the main tanks to fill our Berkey.  As long as they last, that is.

One of our game roosters had a bad habit of flying out of the chicken yard, to explore other areas.  Last week, something killed him.  So, now our flock is down to 11, including three roosters, which truly is enough.  All but two of last year's sweet potatoes were used in a curry.  It's time to bring in this year's potatoes, as they should be done curing now.  All the houseplants were brought in.  Last year, we dug up one of the pomegranates, and brought it indoors in a pot, to see if if would bloom earlier once taken back outside, thinking it would have a head start..  It didn't.  In fact, this year it didn't bloom at all, so we're no closer to getting ripe fruit.  A few years ago, J placed a large rock in the backyard, to use as thermal mass, and planted one of our olives in front of it.  It didn't make it, so we're now trying the pomegranate in that spot, and hope it thrives.  Gardening is always an experiment.

Two of the roses started in the spring, from cuttings I'd pruned, were still looking happy, and were planted in the rose bed.  One even has a rosebud, which looks like it will soon open.  A volunteer borage was transplanted.  Three tomatoes were picked to use for the Amish tomato starting tip Stacy shares, and are ready to winter in the basement.  Last week's harvest included peas, lettuce, eggplant, tomatoes, lemon verbena, green and noodle beans.  I gathered zinnia seeds for saving.  Making new covers for the decorative pillows on our bed has been on my to-do list for some time.  I finally got around to sewing them, using the remaining quilt square, which matches the bed quilt.  As there was only one, I cut it in half, and used thrifted linen fabric for the remainder.  I've gotten to attend a couple of performances with a neighbor recently.  The first was Sense & Sensibilities, and was a very humorous take on it.  This week's was Constellations, which was a somewhat dark, more serious play, but also good.  My niece and I are making plans to volunteer together in Western NC in a few weeks, which I'm looking forward to.  I hope you have a lovely week!

Work Continues & A New Mattress

Progress has been made on the skoolie, especially the past week.  Joseph has been running pipes for plumbing, and wiring the pumps.  He bought our mattress, crafted from organic wool and cotton.  I've been sleeping on clean mattresses since the 80's.  We spend so much of our lives with them, it makes sense not to expose ourselves to toxins, while we sleep.  PSA: if you're not aware, flame retardants and formaldehyde are common in conventional mattresses, which outgas toxins.  Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen.  The first mattress I bought, I had to provide a prescription saying I required a formaldehyde-free mattress for my health.  Thankfully, I was working in a Cardiology group, and one of the Dr's provided it.  It seems that's no longer a requirement.  Here's a link, if you'd like more info on the health risks of conventional mattresses.  

Joseph has begun working on the generator.  Once it's running and placed, he'll fabricate a door for that space.  We've been discussing how once we're up and running, we could be of assistance in natural disasters and such.  Being we can be self-sufficient for a time, we could just park and have what we need, to easily be of service.  Something to ponder.   Onward.

Resilience

Hello, friends.  I hope you are doing well.  J recently visited family members in Eastern NC.  His Mom sent him home with several things, including canning jars, which I was delighted to get.  I put some of them to use right away, in canning vegetable broth and eggplant.  Before canning, I set aside a little over a pound of eggplant to try a new recipe, and it's a keeper.  I harvested a large amount of basil, and made batches of pesto, then froze it.  This week's harvest included green peas, eggplant, tomatoes, green beans, and the last pawpaw, which was used in a fruit salad.  While canning tomatoes one day, I shelled peas while keeping an eye on the canner.

The next day, I canned peas and recanned broth.  I've been having lots of seal failures the past couple of weeks.  When I've redone them with different jars and lids (but same brand), I get the same results, which makes me think it's the lids.  I had started using some no-name canning jar lids we got, and am not having a great success rate with them, so J placed an order for a brand with high ratings.  A pan of GF bread ends was turned into bread crumbs.  The chickens get the two banana peels from my breakfast smoothie in their mash, but if I also have a lunch smoothie or freeze bananas, and have additional peels, I've been putting them in a jar with water, to turn into fertilizer.  Every few days, I water different plants with the liquid, and usually put the peels around rose plants.  On Sunday, I got the windows washed, all but the one with diamond panes in the bathroom, which doesn't lend itself to using the squeegee.  I am still loving that system, which only requires a couple drops of soap and water.  No spray bottles or rolls of paper towels, and it's so much quicker.  It will soon be time to bring in all the house plants, with a forecast of temps in the 40's, so now the windows are ready for them.  

  

With this second round of green beans planted from our seed, we've gotten some noodle beans mixed in.  I've just been cooking them together in the wok, which I think makes a pretty dish.  I am so very proud of my niece.  She returned to her Asheville home this weekend, to begin helping hike food and water into inaccessible areas.  She's an avid hiker, used to carrying a pack, so this seems the perfect fit for her.  I've not mentioned this before, but a few years ago, she had signed up with the Peace Corps.  She was talked out of going, due to family dynamics I won't get into here, just hours before she was to board the flight taking her to her assignment in Africa.  It broke my heart for her, and hers too, but she's resilient.  I hope this is helping heal her heart, in her desire to be of service.

Forget-me-not

I'm not sure how much of the Helene aftermath is still in the news.  I've been keeping up with what's happening on Facebook and various Youtube channels.  It's hard to comprehend how bad things actually are.  Some of the more heartbreaking news I've seen is a family that hiked 22 miles... 11 miles out and 11 back, for supplies, as there is no access.  They were able to have a family member provide an ATV, so they will no longer have to hike that distance.  Another was of an elderly woman, crying as rescuers reached her home, having seen no one for eight days.  A story that had me bawling was about a church in Fairview, the little community we just returned from.  Two hundred people were found in the church, none of whom had had anything to eat for 6 days.  Can you imagine?  Update: it looks like the story about the church may be a story passed along that is not true, but you don't have to look far to find other stories of suffering.  Hold your loved ones close, and stay well, friends.