Today's Update - 23 Sep 2014

Just a short note to say thank you so much for all of the comments.  They are well and truly appreciated. 

Good gravy I'm tired.  I knew I would be but I didn't realize how bad being this tired would make me feel.  My sister in law isn't a problem at all, neither is her dog.  He is a huge part wolf dog that is reaching senior-hood so having two large dogs ... one older and one still pretty much a puppy has been an exercise in teaching them both some patience.  I guess it is just all of the disruption and how nothing that I had meant to get done while hubby was out of town is actually getting done.

My sister in law is actually doing a lot better than expected.  She'll be able to return to dialysis on Thursday and will probably go to her home on Saturday barring any nasty surprises.  There wasn't any cancer though the ovaries were so polycystic that she had to have larger than expected incisions.  She now has been given a  clean bill of health if you don't count her failing remaining kidney.  Unfortunately she is now required to start over with the whole transplant process.  She has a match willing to donate, just no doctor will touch her until she is able to complete the three month process from beginning to end without any disruptions.  She was almost finished when the full-body MRI showed several issues that had to be taken care of.  As you can imagine it has been a real roller-coaster since she got on the transplant list.

She's resting at the moment and I needed to unwind so I did a little updating ...

And the Geek Shall Inherit the Earth
http://geekinherittheearth.blogspot.com/

Zombies Aren't Real ... Are They?!
http://zombiesarentrealarethey.blogspot.com/ 

Up On Hartford Ridge
http://uponhartfordridge.blogspot.com/

Larkspur in Eden
http://larkspurineden.blogspot.com/

When All Doors Close
http://whenalldoorsclose.blogspot.com/

A Bunch of Wild Thyme
http://bunchofwildthyme.blogspot.com/

Enduring on the Lake
http://enduringonthelake.blogspot.com/

A couple of them have more than one addition which is good but there are some that I wanted to update that my head just hasn't been clear enough to address.  I will try and get more writing finished for this weekend but I'm going to have to take her for a doctor's appointment so it may not happen until after she goes back home.  Which is just in time for hubby to get back into town so I'm hoping by this coming Sunday or Monday to have my daily schedule back in order which should help with getting the updates back on schedule as well.

Thanks for your understanding and patience.

Below is something that has saved my life the last couple of weeks.  My kids love homemade pizza ... or pizza bread ... or pizza muffins, etc.  Well you get the picture.  But that commercially canned pizza sauce is expensive.  So I've been canning my own for several years.  Yeah, it is a little trouble up front but on the back end there is just nothing like the flavor and convenience of having your own homemade pizza sauce on hand.  And for those of you that don't or can't start from fresh tomatoes here's a tip ... use commercially canned tomato sauce.  I buy a couple of #10 cans of tomato sauce when I can find them on sale or at least for a better price than starting from scratch and then make pizza sauce, spaghetti sauce, etc. and process it that way.

Update ...... 9/15/14

Hi everyone.  Just a quick note ...

I've had a family emergency.  My brother has pneumonia and his wife - who is already very ill - is having emergency surgery on Friday and after that will be coming to my home to recuperate until she can be on her own.  We are the only family we each have in the immediate area so with God's grace I am being given the opportunity to be a caregiver.  I will try and post when I can but at the moment my energies have to be elsewhere.

Thanks for being so understanding.

Today's Update - 12 Sep 2014

Yesterday was our oldest son's birthday.  I have got to tell you it is very different being the mother of 20-somethings.  They are young 20-somethings but still, it is a whole different world of parenting compared to the two teens I still have and the ten year old.  Not bad, just different.  In addition to his birthday we spent some time remembering 911.  I was sitting there watching the live TV when the second plane struck.  Even today, thirteen years later, it is very difficult to talk about.  Hubby wasn't home (still worked downtown back then), couldn't reach him, couldn't reach my father who is retired military, the phone lines were packed, crazy things on both the tv and radio.  And MacDill USAF Base really wasn't that far away as the crow flew.  I didn't panic but having four young children at home (at the time) it was very nerve wracking and I was never so relieved to have my father call me and let me know that hubby has already called them and was on his way home.

I guess for some of us we'll always remember where we were at on 911 like some of the older generation can remember exactly what they were doing when Kennedy was shot or when they heard about Pearl Harbor.  It is in the American psyche and is never leaving.

Today has been a different kind of day of catching up and moving forward.  Got a bunch of bananas (bad pun) on sale for 39 cents per pound.  I'll be spending some time on Saturday and Sunday processing them.  Soccer season starts tomorrow which means there goes a good chunk of my Saturday for the next three months.  We finished moving the dirt around the concrete slab and laid sod today - two pallets - and the carport is supposed to go up Monday afternoon.  Generally I've been running around like a chicken with my head cut off and still have some running around to do tonight so I'll just post which stories were updated, the videos, and then get back to work.  Still hoping to finish a story this weekend so I better go get the chores done so I have a hope getting it done.

Enjoy!

And the Geek Shall Inherit the Earth
http://geekinherittheearth.blogspot.com/

Zombies Aren't Real ... Are They?!
http://zombiesarentrealarethey.blogspot.com/ 

Up On Hartford Ridge
http://uponhartfordridge.blogspot.com/

Larkspur in Eden
http://larkspurineden.blogspot.com/

There Is No Such Thing As A Thornless Garden
http://thornlessgarden.blogspot.com/

When All Doors Close
http://whenalldoorsclose.blogspot.com/

A Bunch of Wild Thyme
http://bunchofwildthyme.blogspot.com/

Enduring on the Lake
http://enduringonthelake.blogspot.com/

Mother Hen's Recipes
http://motherhensrecipes.blogspot.com/


Saw the first of the pumpkins hit the grocery store the last couple of days which means that I need to be on the look out for a cheap source for "pie pumpkins."  This is what my grandmother always called the smaller, flavorful pumpkins that she would bake and make pumpkin butter, puree, etc. with.  The larger, tougher pumpkins she generally left for jack o lanterns and things like that.

Below are some videos on canning pumpkin, making pumpkin puree, making pumpkin butter, etc.  Now the idea is generally held that you cannot can pumpkin puree because it is too thick and the temperature cannot be raised in the center of the jar to properly process it safely.  I've heard a lot of conflicting real life anecdotes for this.  Personally I do can pumpkin butter, pumpkin chutney, and I've also made a pumpkin-apple type sauce and canned it.  But I make them in jelly jar sizes, not pint or quart.  I will cube pumpkin and squash and can it that way in pints and quarts and then when I need pumpkin puree I pop open a jar and mash that up.  You'll need to research it yourself and pick what you think is right for you.

Today's Update - 10 Sep 2014

Today's update is going to be short.  I did get about the same amount of writing done but I made a big boo-boo and let myself get dehydrated while I was working outside.  Wound up with the headache from Hades so I'm going to publish this and then take a long soak and try and stop feeling like an overdone piece of toast.  I'm not burnt, just dried out.  I also tripped on some saw briars I was trying to get rid of that were/still are clogging the overflow culvert between our manmade pond and the natural pond next door.  Our neighbors are working on their side and we are working on ours.  The culvert hasn't really been needed - frankly we didn't even know it was there - but our ponds and the swamp are now so high it is just a good idea to get the maintenance out of the way just in case that way nothing backs up and goes into the swamp from our pond instead of backing up into the other ponds and canals in the area.  That happened back in '98 and it was a huge mess with washed out road beds, collapsed septic fields, fish frolicking in backyards, etc.

Stories for your enjoyment:

And the Geek Shall Inherit the Earth
http://geekinherittheearth.blogspot.com/

Zombies Aren't Real ... Are They?!
http://zombiesarentrealarethey.blogspot.com/ 

Up On Hartford Ridge
http://uponhartfordridge.blogspot.com/

Larkspur in Eden
http://larkspurineden.blogspot.com/

There Is No Such Thing As A Thornless Garden
http://thornlessgarden.blogspot.com/

When All Doors Close
http://whenalldoorsclose.blogspot.com/

A Bunch of Wild Thyme
http://bunchofwildthyme.blogspot.com/

Enduring on the Lake
http://enduringonthelake.blogspot.com/

Mother Hen's Recipes
http://motherhensrecipes.blogspot.com/


Now I'm making no absolute promises but it is my plan to finish one of the stories over the weekend.  Which one will depend on which one catches my fancy and what mood I'm in.  I'm hoping that Linderhall or Larkspur reaches out and grabs me but we'll see.

Today's videos are on the "Day of the Triffid" theme.  The saw briars had me laid up and so did the heat so it was a natural choice for me to have playing in the background while I recovered.  OK, kinda silly but I saw the original movie on Creature Feature when I was a kid and I've loved it ever since.  Here are the two versions that I could find on Youtube.  There is a 1962, 1981, and a 2009 version.  The 2009 version wasn't bad but I'll always love the original.

Today's Update - 9 Sep 2014

Well didn't get the dirt moving finished.  Guy whose Bobcat was being used is waiting on a new starter.  Such is life.  But it has to be done before Tuesday - may wind up having to do it by hand which will not be fun - because that is when the carport is being delivered.  We are having that built on-site because they can do it cheaper and faster than we can and we get it certified to hurricane codes.  Nothing to sneeze at around here with the way insurance and code enforcement is.  Oh, my pardon, inside the Tampa city limits they are now calling it "Neighborhood Enhancement."  Ugh.  That should tell you what direction the bureaucrats are going.

I did get a good surprise ... saw a sign that said persimmons for sale.  Well, I wasn't going to pass up investigating something that interesting and wound up getting quite a load of them because apparently people just don't know what they are missing.  I processed them into pulp today and I've included some videos on how to do just that on the bottom of this post.

Don't mean to be short but I still have a lot to finish before I can hit the hay - including switching out the trays on the Excalibur - so here is a list of the writing that got posted.  And my apologies about the ones that didn't post yesterday for some reason.  Looks like BlogSpot hung up and I didn't take the time to check before I exited.  I'll know better from here on out.

And the Geek Shall Inherit the Earth
http://geekinherittheearth.blogspot.com/

Zombies Aren't Real ... Are They?!
http://zombiesarentrealarethey.blogspot.com/ 

Up On Hartford Ridge
http://uponhartfordridge.blogspot.com/

Larkspur in Eden
http://larkspurineden.blogspot.com/

There Is No Such Thing As A Thornless Garden
http://thornlessgarden.blogspot.com/

When All Doors Close
http://whenalldoorsclose.blogspot.com/

A Bunch of Wild Thyme
http://bunchofwildthyme.blogspot.com/

Enduring on the Lake
http://enduringonthelake.blogspot.com/

Mother Hen's Recipes
http://motherhensrecipes.blogspot.com/


Persimmons and making persimmon pulp:

 

Today's Update - 8 Sep 2014

Well we didn't finish with the dirt moving, hopefully will get that finished tomorrow assuming the weather cooperates.  It is looking good and I think we'll even be able to avoid having to put in a French drain to direct run off into the pond.  I'll have pics tomorrow if we get it finished.

Also, I've changed the posting settings on this blog.  You should be able to post "anonymous" now if for whatever reason your google ID isn't working or BlogSpot is having a migraine moment.  Hope this helps those that are having trouble posting comments here.

Someone said they were trying to imagine my yard.  ROFL.  We've lived in this house going on five years now and we've done more "taking out" than "putting in" as far as the yard goes.  We hadn't been in the house that long before we had to completely excavate and replace the septic field.  That required a lot of changes.  After that I had built raised beds and then dismantled them when I didn't have time to take care of a garden.  For us it was been more cost efficient and time effective for me to go to farmers' markets and u-picks than it has been to grow our own veggies.  We also had to dig out and get rid of some citrus trees that were almost a hundred years old that didn't survive the bad drought we had in this area for a couple of years ... clean the fences, clean out the pond and then change plans when we realized there was a huge difference between the pond during the drought and the pond during a normal year, trim trees, etc.  I do grow barrels of lettuce but that is because a couple of my daughters seem to be part rabbit and that stuff can get flaming expensive at the store not to mention inconvenient.  I go in for lettuce and wound up coming out with several additional items ... bad for the pocket book.

Our old house had a lot more edible landscaping and I am improving what we have at this house as time, finances, and weather allow.  We still own our old house but the people that have lived there haven't taken proper care of the landscaping and nothing is as healthy and producing as it used to be, not to mention the drought dealt a death blow to quite a bit of it (as did their kids and pets).  But that's life and I'm happy to have more scope for my plans here.  Life is a series of lessons ... just like I had to change my plans for our BOL because some of them were unrealistic I've also adjusted and changed plans for our primary location.  In addition to volume I've now added in the issue of nutritional impact.  What I mean by that is if I only have the capacity to take care of so many tress/shrubs/bushes what should those be that give the biggest bang for the buck ... enter the Barbados Cherry with its super high Vitamin C content, the papaya, the pineapples, the plaintains and bananas, the limes and lemons, prickly pears, etc.  Also enter in forage ... the apple snails from the swamp, the bamboo shoots, the dollar weed from the lawn, the swamp bunnies and squirrels when they get too numerous for my patience, etc.

Eventually I will finish rebuilding my garden and I will have my edible and defensive landscaping to the point that I'm content with it.  All of that takes time and money ... and energy and focus to do it the right way the first time around so you don't waste time and money.  I keep a 4" D-ring binder full of ideas and plans ... and that D-ring binder is just one of several on various subjects that I keep handy.  Filing cabinets are great but binders are more portable.  LOL.

I have managed to get some writing accomplished today ... Enjoy!

And the Geek Shall Inherit the Earth
http://geekinherittheearth.blogspot.com/

Zombies Aren't Real ... Are They?!
http://zombiesarentrealarethey.blogspot.com/ 

Up On Hartford Ridge
http://uponhartfordridge.blogspot.com/

Larkspur in Eden
http://larkspurineden.blogspot.com/

There Is No Such Thing As A Thornless Garden
http://thornlessgarden.blogspot.com/

When All Doors Close
http://whenalldoorsclose.blogspot.com/

A Bunch of Wild Thyme
http://bunchofwildthyme.blogspot.com/

Enduring on the Lake
http://enduringonthelake.blogspot.com/

Mother Hen's Recipes
http://motherhensrecipes.blogspot.com/

The other thing that I've been doing but haven't mentioned is that after I did all of the pantry cleaning and reorganization I had some "orphan cans" of things that were like singles of an item; or, I had really super large cans of items that I'd purchased for another project that I never got around to ... like a #10 can of peaches that I was going to use to make peach butter or peach salsa.  Instead what I have been doing is dehydrating those items.  Below are some videos of drying commercially canned food.

Today's Update - 6 Sep 2014

Well the rain only did damage to a couple of inch square of the concrete pad.  It isn't even worth mentioning except to prove we got lucky.  Doggone it was like several squall lines moved through while the pad was being finished.  Two trucks of concrete.  Whew.  But it cured overnight and the cuts were made early this morning.

 

 

 You can see from a couple of the pictures there is still quite a bit of dirt moving that we need to do and we'll hopefully be getting to that on Monday if the weather cooperates.  The final part of this project is to build a steel carport structure on it.  At 25' x 30' at a minimum we will be able to fit three cars under it.  However it isn't just going to be an open carport. 

This whole project started because of some drainage and elevation problems we have between the barn and what we call "the pond" which is just a deep extension of the swamp that is behind our property.  I thought about modified terracing but that was more work with less reward than I like.  I thought about a garden and the ground just stays too damp back there for most of the year to be worth anything except as a place to grow bananas and plaintains.  Not to mention the varmints that come out of the swamp wouldn't cut me a break.  I have to fight them enough over the bananas.  Not to mention I didn't want any soil amendments washing into the pond and swamp and creating a different kind of problem.  So the carport idea was born and it will also be used for parties during the winter when the mosquito population isn't so bad that some citronella torches or smudge pots can't keep them under control. 

The other thing I did while hubby supervised some of the last of the concrete work was took my 18 year old to an estate sale over in South Tampa.  Lovely old homes owned by people that have and had money at some point.  Wasn't too crazy about some of the prices as the majority of what they had were inherited antiques ... I guess they didn't have any children/descendants still living that wanted or would take the stuff the idea of which turned my stomach as there were stories attached to almost every piece.  I'm kicking myself now that I didn't get some of the laces and linens but that's the way it goes.  At the time I didn't think some of them were salvageable.

Here's the thing.  I have three daughters and two sons.  When I got married I had almost everything we needed to start our home in my "hope chest" which was actually a chest, several boxes, and most of my clothes closet.  <grin>  My oldest daughter never was interested in that sort of stuff and is now married and got some really nice things during her year engagement and as wedding gifts.  My mom made her a quilt and hubby and I paid for a very nice wedding and since they didn't spend the whole budget we told them to take the rest and finish outfitting their home ... apartment I mean.  My next kid down is a boy more interested in completing college than "frou frou mom stuff."  I've got box of things put back for him and being he is a pretty big minimalist I'll wait until he finds the right girl and ... well, you know what I mean.  Our middle child is a girl and she is like a Martha Stewart wannabe without being mean or neurotic.  She is the Downton Abbey, linens & lace, blue willow kind of girl.

With the way the economy is helping your kid develop a "hope chest" just makes sense in my opinion.  But, with the economy is that isn't the easiest thing in the world to do.  So hubs and I have taken to going to auctions and estate sales.  We go, have some fun, knock some things off of our personal wants/needs list and also try and get stuff for the kids' hope chests.  Today I and the 18 year old got a couple of deals.

 

 

 

The cast iron muffin pan is for her and the supersized non-electric beater is for me.  The frou-frou tongs in the picture with the beaters is also hers.  Spent less than $10 and the cast iron doesn't even have any rust on it.  I also got suckered into a crystal, two-tiered canapé or candy tray sort of thing but I only paid $5 for it.  Like I said, what I wish I had done was buy some more of the linens and laces.  I didn't because most of them were badly stained.  I got a set of 12 lace coasters and though they cost me $10 I'm not going to bleat about it because I'm going to use them as an experiment in washing old lace.  Turning used and abused items into something useful and visually appealing has always attracted me.  If my experiment works then next time I won't be so shy of haggling on something that looks pretty rough.  And hopefully my daughters will wind up with something really nice for their hope chests. 

 

From the estate sale I had to take the youngest ... aka "Monkey Boy" or "Dragon" depending on his behavior and my mood ... to his Cub Scout kick off.  Yep, it is that time of year again ... my calendar looks like a gross of highlighters and sharpies upchucked all over it.  Oy.  I was saved by a weather change so we came home before the bugs came out and I've been able to get some writing accomplished.

 

 

And the Geek Shall Inherit the Earth
http://geekinherittheearth.blogspot.com/

Zombies Aren't Real ... Are They?!
http://zombiesarentrealarethey.blogspot.com/ 

Up On Hartford Ridge
http://uponhartfordridge.blogspot.com/

Larkspur in Eden
http://larkspurineden.blogspot.com/

There Is No Such Thing As A Thornless Garden
http://thornlessgarden.blogspot.com/

When All Doors Close
http://whenalldoorsclose.blogspot.com/

A Bunch of Wild Thyme
http://bunchofwildthyme.blogspot.com/

Enduring on the Lake
http://enduringonthelake.blogspot.com/

Mother Hen's Recipes
http://motherhensrecipes.blogspot.com/

MJOTZY
http://mjoyzy.blogspot.com/
BlogSpot apparently objects to the story.  Trying to publish the next post.  Grrr.  Almost done.  Hopefully will go up before midnight.

Martha Stewart has the best "how to" vid out there for washing old lace and linen but I can't get it to embed.  The link is at http://www.marthastewart.com/913359/how-cleaning-fine-antique-linens and it is worth a watch.

And if you are looking for a good tutorial on restoring cast iron I've included a couple below as today's videos.  Enjoy!