Taters & Maters & Berries

Hello, friends.  One morning, after a good rain during the night, I looked out and saw this tree steaming in the sun.  It lasted for several minutes.  Last week, I made pesto with basil and purslane from the garden.  I painted the baseboard in the workshop, which was good to check off my to do list.  J trimmed the roots and stems off the garlic, and they were stored in the basement.  Groceries were bought at Food Lion and the natural food co-op after a soap delivery, but there are no exceptional sales to report.  I perused the little free book library at the B&B, and found one by an author J likes.  The B&B was recently sold.  I'd been worried that I may lose my gig of supplying them with soaps, but instead, gained a second B&B they also own.  That was a nice surprise.  A free trial of Sirius was enjoyed while driving.  I was offered three months free, without providing any payment information, so took them up on it.  

a portion of our potatoes

J dug our potatoes.  When we've had a large amount, as we do this year, we keep them in an unusual way, which we read about and which works well for us.  At the edge of the woods, under tree cover, we spread pine straw on the ground, lay the potatoes on top, sprinkle with agricultural lime, which keeps insects away and inhibits mold growth, then cover with more pine straw, and lastly roofing tin.  They've lasted well this way until March, much better than in our basement.  We just wash them well when we're going to use them.  In the meantime, we've been eating potatoes most days... steamed, grilled, in a saute, and potato salad, trying to use up the damaged ones.  On our morning walks, I saw wild turkeys a couple of mornings at the back field.  One morning, they left this calling card. 

I harvested blackberries, blueberries, lambs quarters, tomatoes, cucumbers, basil, the first tromboncino, lavender, parsley and oregano. There are 5 small chard seedlings at the moment, which don't seem to be growing.  For some reason, I've had a challenge with chard this year, and planted four more seeds, which have started sprouting.  I'll give them all a dose of garden tea.  I finally changed summer and winter clothes in the closet, and decluttered 9 items.  It's a small closet, and half is rather hard to get to, so putting the current season to the front makes it easier.  My Lowe's cc balance was paid in full.  This way, I can take advantage of 5% off the purchase, but accrue no interest.  

One of our freezers failed.  Much of it went into the compost.  Some items that were still icy were salvaged, and crammed into our other freezers.  I salvaged a couple of small bags of chanterelles I had foraged last year, which had been sauteed in ghee.  I made a saute with them, added some leftover potatoes and fresh lambs quarter for lunch, which was very good.  The ghee isn't in my current diet (no dairy), but one has to make exceptions sometimes.  I was pretty sad about the homemade pizza, which hadn't been in there long, I guess just before I started the protocol.  I'd been making a double batch of pizza dough, and freezing one, but this time, I also added the sauce, so all I needed to do was add veggies.  Oh well.  I'm counting down the last two and a half weeks of the eczema protocol, and hope I can begin introducing a few things back into my diet.  

On the 4th, I canned the first round of tomatoes.  Since there weren't many, pints were canned for this round.  I ran out of those during the winter, and want to have more going into the coming winter.  One jar didn't seal, so was put in the fridge to be used this week.  I spent a good amount of time crawling around on the workshop floor last week, between taping it off three times to paint the baseboard and the final coat on the walls, then to seal the floor.  First, J & I got up all the paint splatters and caulk, and sanded black marks and such off.  Then I vacuumed and steam mopped it, before J put two coats of sealer on it.  We'll soon be able to move the powder coat oven in, and create the shipping and storage areas.  I'm looking forward to getting in there.  A watermelon was cut to enjoy, and a "clean" version of caprese salad was made, subbing avocado for the cheese, and lemon juice for the balsamic vinegar.  I'm thankful for the rain we received last week, and hope those in hot and dry areas are getting some relief.  Be well, friends.