Five ~

Off and running, that describes Rosemary best.  She loves the out doors, to be free, run, and swing.  She turned 5 on Sunday and had a wonderful birthday.  Five amazing, transforming years.  Happy Birthday love!~

easy ~

Can you feel the quietness in this picture?

Yesterday was the most perfect day.  If I had to describe it, these would be the words I would use:  breezes, quiet, swings, blanket, knitting, calm.  What sometimes can seem like a day full of stress, can turn out to be a day of much needed respite - a day of ease.





Hanging outside with my two littlest ones turned out to be just that.

My Herb Garden

Earlier in the Spring, Daniel encouraged me to clean as much out of the side of the house which had been a make-shift herb garden the past couple of years and redo my herbs.  I had a few herbal plants that were well established so I decided to keep them, prune them back, and work around them.  Those were my lavender, sage, mint, and lemon balm plants.  I decided to make the sage plant a focal point of the garden, and used some various sizes of quartz rock to line the bed.

I made a list of herbs I wanted in the garden and over the course of a few weeks, the seedlings were ready to be transplanted.





A month later, the herb garden is flourishing.  The lemon balm was growing so well, I decided to prune it back the middle of May and make my first herbal tincture.  My intent with this herb garden is to learn to use the herbs medicinally as well as for cullinary uses.  The lavendar blooms were harvested last week for our annual lavendar cookies we all love.













My list of herbs in this garden:

Lavendar
Tarragon
Valerian
Stinging Nettles
Chives
Oregano
Thyme
Comfrey
Sage
Basil
Plantain
Fennel
Cilantro
Chamomile
Mint
Lemon Balm
Dill
Rosemary
Calendula

Growing any kind of garden is an experiment.  I'm very excited about this one, hoping to learn more and more how to use these herbs.  I have hopes of making salves (Calendula, Comfrey), tinctures,  and teas later this season!

Happy growing season everyone!!

This year's garden

Our garden is coming along nicely this year.  I have to give all the credit for this garden to where it's due - my husband.  Each year we rotate our crops to a different location in the garden, there are more sunnier spots than others, but this year is looking very promising for everything we've put in so far.

This is what is currently growing:

Sunflowers
cucumbers
beets
parsnips
carrots
corn
beans
potatoes
onions
garlic
limas
peppers (red, banana, Jalepeno, Cayenne)
tomatoes
brocolli
cauliflower
cabbage
kale
zucchini
yellow squash

I think I'm most excited about the beans this year.  The bamboo tee-pee's are already getting covered with growth.  Last year we didn't have any luck with them, they just wouldn't grow.  New to our garden this year are the onions and garlic, and so far the broccoli, cauliflower and  cabbage are doing well and look healthy.  The squash plants have been blooming for a few weeks and we have our first squash growing this week.  We're looking forward to a bountiful harvest this summer.  I'll keep updating here as our garden evolves this season . . .  a record of this year's garden.

outside

From the very beginning of Spring, we have enjoyed being outside.  We eat outside, play, and garden as much as we possibly can.  Our garden is growing leaps and bounds, but I couldn't go forward with sharing about it without retracing the beginnings of it all - how our Spring began.

Refreshing

With all the snow and closed school days behind us, we are focusing on one thing this week, Spring, Summer, and gardening.  Our first step into that glorious manifestation was buying seeds, making plans and dreaming for warm sunshine.   Each year we make changes to the garden layout, decide what we're going to cut out of the plans or add.  This year we're adding more potatoes and have 6 rows already in the ground as of last week when the temps were in the 70's which is unlike this week where we're getting more snow and freezing participation even as I write this.  Such bi-polar weather we're getting this season, which has proven to really reveal and stretch my patience more than I'm willing to admit.  It's times such as these, that with this winter card we have all seemed to have drawn this year, that we grow, mature a little more and reflect that which nature has always been reflecting back to us, that we can be peaceful during a lot of chaos, we can grow during a lot of chaos, and we can have faith in the unknown and trust that all is well, even when it feels the times we're in are so tremultuous.   







So here's to the most sought after change in seasons I've ever experienced.  I honestly can't wait to feel the warmth and sunshine on my face that will stay with us for more than a day or two, and look forward to what's ahead, yet at the same time, trying desperately to enjoy the days we're in.





 

Portraits of my children

Whenever I can capture the essence of my children with my camera, I am delighted!  There are times when I view my world as through a camera lens, I can see the pictures before I ever see them on screen or paper.  It can be frustrating to me when the camera isn't seeing what I see for whatever reason, the lighting might not be strong enough for the camera, or it might be too strong, or the pictures come out blurry from the movement of the child.  These days, it’s rare for me to be able to capture that special millisecond of time because of all of the demands, but it certainly is special when I do.  Sometimes it comes from a child calling my attention, other times I happen to be a part of the action and can see the photo unfold right before my eyes. 

I love portrait photography.  It tells a story without words, it has emotion, it has meaning.  It’s like carrying that one moment into eternity; that one moment that gets frozen forever.  It’s that special. 

Last night I had one of those moments.  The story goes like this.  Elise comes up to me telling me about this bee costume she made, I look up from the computer and know instantly to go grab the camera.  She had cut and pasted bee antenaes and wings, found the perfect yellow shirt from her drawer, attached a stinger, she had thought of everything.  Out the door we went to get the right amount of lighting and click click click.  The photo I was most proud of was captured towards the end as we were wrapping up our little session.  She happened to look up at the sky and there is was, that was amazing.  Intuitively, I had an a-ha moment and snap, I got it.  Now I have a wonderful little memory of these 5 minutes spent reveling her little homemade costume, and grateful I took the time to make a big deal of her creativity.   

Outside

This weekend, lots of time was spent out of doors.  Stroller riding/pushing, biking, planting, measuring, watering, it was a full weekend.  We're getting our garden ready for the planting season.  All the root vegetables were planted several weeks ago when the moon was in the dark phase.  I refer to this often.  We're excited another planting season is upon us!  I love this change of pace in our family day to tending to the small crops planted, excited to see what grows best this year (hoping for more squash this year and earlier tomatoes!) Its always an experiment isn't it?  So much depends on the weather and how many deer pass by, but each year we gain more experience and knowledge to apply to the next growing season.

Days / Nights

Many days and nights have passed since I was last at this space.  Reason being . . . my external harddrive that contained all of my pictures since Christmas of 2009 was dropped and unless I fork up $1500, nothing can be retrieved.  So it sits up on a shelf waiting for technology to catch up to my pocketbook!  So what few pictures I have scattered among the various computers in the house, what I've uploaded to a few internet photo sites, what's on my blog via Flickr and what's on my camera currently is all I've got for now.  I just haven't allowed myself to think about it really.  I vowed to be at peace about it and that's where I stand.  That being said, many more pictures will be taken and many more pictures will be safely archived in the future!

Here's a look at our recent days and nights:



















Days: A look into our days around the home.
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Nights:  A joyful ending to our busy days.

Hope your days and nights are too filled with joy!

the mad dash

I subtitled this year's halloween, "the mad dash."  It certainly was a mad dash to get all six pumpkins carved in two hours, waiting for expected guests, phone calls to be made, and get out the door in time to make it this year to our neighborhood pot luck before gandering off to fill up the candy baskets as high as they could be filled.  Oh and in the mix of it all, celebrate Daniel's 39th birthday.  Whew.
















All expectations were met.  This was probably the most fun we have had on Halloween in many years and more importantly, we were all together.

Together-ness

As I sat and scanned through the several hundred photos that I downloaded recently onto my external hard drive I realized that were was this pattern of together-ness throughout all the photos.  The first emotion that came to me was a sense of gratitude for how our family loves one another and also a great appreciation for the way everyone gets along and values their time with each of their siblings.  Despite all the challenges we have faced with Rosemary having so many medical needs and all the nurses that have been in and out of our family home, we are now in a place where everyone who comes and goes does feel like family.  So together, we can all relax and enjoy one another, look after one another, and love one another in peace.  In this moment, peace and gratitude fills my heart in a big kind of way.  What a lucky girl I am.

this sweater ~

This pattern has been neatly tucked away in my knitting notebook since I first came across it in this book in 2008.  So naturally when we found out last fall that we were pregnant with Nathaniel, out it came.  Not so sure why, if it was the yarn or the pattern, but I had a really hard time getting into a smooth knitting rhythm with this sweater.  I must have frogged it three times before I got it right.  For me, it was one of those patterns that was hard to imagine coming together until all the pieces were knit and laid out before me.  In the end it came out beautiful and was worth making.  I love seeing him in it!





 

Apples to apple jelly ~ a quick course

Autumn is here isn't it?!  Where has the time gone.  Wasn't it just last week when we were in birthday mode around here?  We have three September birthdays which makes the month of going back to school, that much more fun and hectic.  As I opened our last jar of apple jelly from my pantry recently, made two years ago, I knew what we were going to do with our apples this year.  Make more jelly!



I looked back through my blog and realized I have never explained how I make apple jelly.  There is a quick post about it here, but no mention of how I made it.  So today we are.  I've done it two different ways.  The old way was to peel and cut the apples and boil them, drain the juice (you need 6 cups of juice), then add 1/4 cup of sugar with a pack of Sure-jell pectin, bring to a boil, then add the remainder of the sugar (about 6.75 cups).





This year I came up with a new way.  I first juiced the raw apples with my Breville Juicer (lots of instagram photos floating around of that brilliant machine!).  All the apples in that pic rendered 6 cups of juice.  What I love about juicing the apples, is that it is pure apple juice, not watered down from cooking the applies, and its quick, no peeling involved!  The juice then goes into a pot, brought to a boil, then the same process of 1/4 cup of sugar and box of Sure-Jell pectin is added.  Once that comes to a boil, I added the 6 3/4 cups of sugar (7 in all).  After checking the gel consistency, I ended up adding almost the whole second box of pectin to get it the way I like my jelly, not too firm, and not runny.  Then I scooped it into sterilized jars, and sealed them.  This batch tasted a tad too sweet for me, so I'm making another batch using 5 cups of sugar to see if I like it better.  Either way, they will both be delicious, fresh from the farm to my kitchen to be stored and opened and enjoyed for many seasons to come.



{The two jars with white tops went straight into the fridge to be eaten this week with my family, they are not properly sealed for storage.}

eating local ::

Eating local has become more important to us over the years.  There is nothing like eating local when it means "backyard" local; "backyard - garden wish we had our own farm"- local, or "this is the best we can do and are making the most of it"- local.  You get my drift I'm sure, my heart is fondly desiring more acreage in our future.  But for now in making the most of what we have, we expanded our garden this year.



Daniel has done an amazing job this year tending to our garden.  The most I could do this year is help organize seeds and make row markers.  New this year to our garden has been potatoes, turnips, radishes, beets, carrots.  We expanded our corn, have less tomatoes, but our squash are doing well for once.  It has taken us a few years to learn where there is more sun and where spots are less fertile,  which crops do better on which row and on and on.  I even played around a little this year with planting by the moon.  I wanted to do a post on it earlier this Spring, but it just got too complicated.  So far it has served us well.  I like to think of gardening as a school of nature.

This is the time of the gardening season, where I get to go out and freshly pick our dinner each afternoon.  I prefer to pick and eat as we need the food each day, while my husband on the other hand loves to "surprise" me by harvesting a whole row at one time to preserve.  A few weeks ago, a lot got wasted because we weren't prepared for the amount of work it takes to preserve that much food (it was turnip greens).  As I said, successful gardening is a learned process.  Next year, I will be ready and prepared for that type of cooking and preserving, but for now, I'm learning as much as I can and am enjoying what is and what is left to come.  It only gets better each year.