More Winter Canning & A Little Harvest

Hello, friends.  The increasing amount of daylight has our hens laying more, and J is enjoying plenty of their eggs.   I'm still soaking their scratch grains overnight, and giving them a mash of various things every day, including grated squash, chopped banana peels, chopped sweet potato, and whatever else I rustle up.  I steamed eggs, and made egg salad for J.  If you haven't tried steaming them yet, that has been the easiest way I've found to peel them.  So quick and easy.  I was skeptical when I first tried it, but it works.  I chose a slower shipping time on amazon to receive $2.25 in digital credit.  I harvested sweet potato leaves for a smoothie, from the indoor plant.  It was looking rather puny, so I fed it with some of the worm castings I was gifted last summer.  

I finished watching Tales From the Green Valley on youtube, a series about life in the 1600's, and am sorry to see it end.  I used our onion, and sweet pepper pulled from the freezer, for fried potatoes.  When I canned apples last week, I'd thought there was another bag in the freezer, but couldn't find them.  Well, I've found them since, and canned another three quarts of apple slices for pie.  This time, I didn't use a thickener or Tattler lids, and am thankful all sealed.  It will be easy enough to add some spices, and some flour if needed, before baking.  Batches of suet for the birds and golden paste for the pups were made.  I dropped off two books, and picked up three more at the library.  Chickweed was gathered for smoothies.  The first one used straight chickweed, which tasted stronger than I'd like, so after that, I mixed it with spinach. 

I've started working on a piece of cross stitch, which will be a gift.  I took my car in for an inspection, and it passed without problem.  It's 13 years old, and has been a wonderful car.  I'm hoping it has a few more good years in it.  When I picked up sunflower seed for the birds, I noticed the bag had 10% off written on it.  I questioned the cashier, and she gave me the discount, though she hadn't at first.  I'm glad I asked.  It's expensive these days!  There was a piece of tape over a small cut on the bag, and it didn't look as though any was missing.  I'm thinking I will not use the feed through the warm months this year, for a number of reasons, including the spread of disease from feeders in house finches.  Birder extraordinaire Julie Zickefoose  has stopped summer feeding for this and other reasons, so I'm comfortable making the same decision.

One morning, I woke at 3:30, and couldn't go back to sleep.  By the time dinner rolled around, I was ready for something comforting, so used our potatoes and broth in mashed potatoes with mushroom gravy, along with peas and a salad.  I forgot to mention last week that Joseph received a free 5# bag of dogfood in the mail, and has no idea why.  We've not ordered from them before.  It's a cheaper brand that I would normally buy, but it won't go to waste.  At the grocery store, I picked up spinach, cara cara oranges and lettuce, on sale for $1 off each.  The wild blueberries I use in my morning smoothies dropped $2, to their previous price, so I picked up a couple.  They didn't say they were on sale, so I'm hoping this will be the every day price again.  Laundry was dried on the clothesline.  A tuft of usnea was found on a walk, and added to the glycerite jar, and a new batch of cat's claw glycerite was started.  I finally remembered to watch the Call The Midwife holiday special on PBS, which was lovely.

Saturday's low was to be 24, so we covered up all the winter garden again.  Before I covered the lettuce, I noticed the lettuce had grown enough to harvest some.  It's not growing fast these cold days, but there's enough for a few salads.  I try and eat a good amount of leafy greens every day, so these are most welcome.  On Sunday, I canned another round of vegetable broth.  While keeping an eye on the canner, I prepped the last of our apples.  It was still pretty early in the day, so I went ahead and made applesauce, and canned 3 1/2 pints.  That's the last of the perishable things that need canning.  I'll keep working  my way through the vegetable scraps in the freezer, and also plan to can up some beans during these cold months.  Now that the pressing canning is done, I need to concentrate on some deep cleaning.  The cobwebs are calling me.  Take care, friends.