Gardening News

It seems like a while since the last gardening post, but there is finally news to report. I purchased a compost bin from the Gardener's Supply Company and it finally came in a few days ago. Maw's parents are visiting this week, and his dad put the bin together. I'm pretty excited to have it, because I've been wanting to compost for a long time now. We go through lots of vegetables while we are cooking, and I hate to waste them by throwing them away. I looked around for ways to make your own, but they didn't look very good, so I decided to buy something that was made to do the job. We've broken it in with the leavings from the last few days of cooking.

In other news, Quickbeam is sick with her first cold. She has been congested and coughing, but she doesn't seem to be feeling really bad. She has still been smiley and interactive, she just gets frustrated at times when it's harder for her to breath. She's been getting lots of attention lately with visiting family. I had to learn how to share her, because after being just the two of us with her I am not used to having to give her up. I guess it's good that it happened when it did, because I'm starting back to work next week and have to get used to being seperated from her. Needless to say I'm not looking forward to it.

Work In Progress

So I have been working on my New Year's Challenge for the last week. I have done better in some ways than others. :) I have tried three recipes from my recipe pile, and they were successful. I finished reading one of my books, Acacia by David Anthony Durham. This book was a Christmas present from one of my best friends. I enjoyed it more than I have any fantasy book for a long time. It was pretty dark, but the story was interesting.

Now I'm working my way through Touching Earth by Janet Lembke. It is a series of essays on vegetable gardening, which is really appropriate this time of year. The seed catalogs are pouring in and I'm plotting out what I want to grow this year. I'm going to make a modest start at vegetable gardening this year, a small raised bed with tomatoes and a few other vegetables. I just have to resist the urge to try to start too big. :) I start making large, ambitious lists when I go through the seed catalogs, I'll have to use some self restraint. The flower catalogs are also pouring in, and I have to use even more restraint with them. I am going to get a rose this year and plant it for the baby, who shall henceforth be called Quickbeam, after another name for the tree she is named after. :) This is the rose that I'm favoring at the moment.

I went to the doctor today for my postpartum checkup, and was given a clean bill of health. So now I can start working to get myself back to normal. I need to start exercising and making sure that I eat healthy so that I can take advantage of the calorie burning increase from breastfeeding. I am actually below my pre-pregnancy weight, so I want to keep going with that momentum. I've also been getting tired really easy, so I need to exercise and get back into some stamina. I have to start mentally preparing myself to get back to work, because I'll be starting back in a couple of weeks.

We went by this afternoon and met the pastor at the church we are planning on going to. It was a pretty interesting discussion. He has been the pastor here for almost 40 years and had some interesting stories to tell. His first calling was to Mississippi in the 1960's, during the Civil Rights era, and he was the pastor of a black church. It must have definately been culture shock to say the least. We've been meaning to start going again, but with long work hours, kidney stones and finally being freaking huge and pregnant, we kept putting it off. So now we're going to get started again, and get Quickbeam baptized. Life is getting a little more normal. :)

It Was a Cold and Snowy Night...

After being holed up in the house for so long, I had planned on going shopping today. Just something to get out of the house for a while. Unfortunately I heard on the TV this morning that winter weather was expected tonight, so I wanted to make sure that we had something really warm and hearty to eat for supper. I broke out my Savoring the Seasons of the Northern Heartland cookbook by Beth Dooley and Lucia Watson and found a recipe for Wisconsin Cheddar Cheese and Vegetable Soup. I also had a recipe for Apple Pomegranate Cider from my recipe file to try out. Here is the recipe for the soup, which I made some changes to. So I bundled up the munchkin and we went out for a grocery shopping trip. I carried her around in the Baby Bjorn carrier and she got lots of attention from old ladies. :)

Wisconsin Cheddar Cheese and Vegetable Soup

2 Tbs. canola oil
3 leeks, white parts only, sliced and rinsed
1 stalk celery, chopped
1 c. cauliflower florets
2 large russet potatoes, peeled and chopped
1 carrot, peeled and chopped
1/2 lb. sliced low-fat kielbasa or other smoked sausage
2 c. stock
2 c. milk
Salt and Pepper to taste
8 oz. 1/3 less fat cream cheese
2 c. shredded cheddar cheese
1 Tbs. Dijon mustard
1 Tbs. Worcestershire sauce
Hot sauce to taste

Heat the oil in a soup pot over medium heat. Add all of the ingredients ending with the sausage, and saute over medium heat until vegetables begin to soften. Add the stock, milk and salt and pepper. Simmer until vegetables are soft. Remove pot from heat. Cut the cream cheese into smaller pieces, add to pot and stir until melted. Add cheese and stir until it is melted. Add remaining ingredients and stir to combine. Return the soup to low heat until warmed through.

The apple cider was really good, and hit the spot. This is from the Cooking Light November 2007 issue.

Apple and Pomegranate Cider
6 whole cloves
2 (3-inch) cinnamon sticks
1 (3-inch) strip lemon rind
1 (3-inch) strip orange rind
8 c. unfiltered apple cider
1 c. pomegranate juice
3/4 c. fresh orange juice
1/4 c. sugar
1/4 c. fresh lemon juice

I threw all of the ingredients into a crock pot and turned it on high heat for a while. That way it stayed warm through the night without having to keep the stove on.

The Challenge

To document the extent of my recipe pile, I made a list of recipes from my file. This shows the extent of my problem. http://goblingastronomy.blogspot.com/2008/01/pipeline-list.html I also made a list to show progress as I work my way through it. http://goblingastronomy.blogspot.com/2008/01/tested-list.html Maybe I'll actually make it through. :)

Resolution

Last year was pretty eventful, with the most important being our new baby. She's amazing and I can't get enough of looking at her and being fascinated by her. Over the last year we've gotten settled into our new home and my new job. Life has been very good, and for that we're grateful. Over the next year, my main goal is to get even more at home, explore more of our new hometown, and to be the best mama that I can be to my little girl. In order to gain more appreciation for the things that we have, I'm going on a buying moratorium.

Over the past few years I’ve gotten very bad about buying books and not reading them. I have a shelf full of cookbooks in my kitchen that I have never really even looked through, much less cooked out of. I have books on my shelf that I bought but never read. I have countless recipes from magazines that I have torn out and set aside, but never done anything with. It’s like I’m obsessive/compulsive about wanting to buy these things, but when I get them the itch is scratched and I never do anything with them. So I decided that this year, I’m going to reform my ways. My resolution this year is that I won’t buy any new books or cookbooks until I have actually read those that I have now. I’m going to caveat this, in that the one subject that I will buy books on is childcare/rearing. I even plan on restraining from getting books from the library until I have gone through those that I have already. We’ll see how far I can get with this.

The other part to my resolution is to try to buy only essential items, and only buy things to replace those that get worn out. Again, we'll see how far I can get with this. The main thing that I foresee buying is clothes and other necessities for our baby. We'll see how creative I can get. :)

Apple Cranberry Hermits

There's something about the holiday season that makes me feel in the mood, nay, compelled to bake cookies. In this case I've had a couple of accidents while baking lately that made me feel like maybe I was cursed (or too absent-minded from being 9 months pregnant) to bake. They had a baby shower for me at work, and I had decided that I would bake some cookies and take them in to the people who contributed gifts. So my first effort was making Maple Oatmeal Cookies, during which I broke my bottle of vanilla and was unable to bake enough for all. So a week or so later I decided that I would make some Cranberry Orange Sugar Cookies, and things were going along swimmingly until I noticed that the clean spoon I had taken out of the dishwasher had some food residue on the concave part of it. So I'd just about decided that the rest of the people just weren't going to get their cookies.

Tonight I got bitten by the bug again, and had an apple that was getting in a bad way. So I went online and looked up apple cookie recipes. I found a recipe for Apple Hermits on allrecipes.com and decided I'd give them a try. I made a couple of changes to the recipe, notably substituting craisins for raisins, reducing the amount of cloves, omitting the nuts and shredding the apple instead of chopping it. I also added a teaspoon of vanilla, because really, who likes cookies with no vanilla in them? These turned out really tasty, and had an almost butterscotch flavor to them. The recipe called for them to be glazed but I'm happy with them without it.

Apple Hermits

2 c. all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 c. softened butter
1 1/2 c. packed brown sugar
1 egg, beaten
1 c. shredded apple
1 c. dried cranberries

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees (175 C). Line cookie sheets with parchment paper. In a medium bowl,, sift together flour, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and salt. In a large mixing bowl, cream butter until light and fluffy. Mix in sugar and egg. Stir in flour mixture, and mix thoroughly. Fold in apples and cranberries.

Drop by rounded teaspoons onto prepared cookie sheets about 1 1/2 inches apart. Bake for 12-14 minutes. Cool on a wire rack.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Apple-Hermits/Detail.aspx

Janet Lembke

I personally think that one of the most important innovations on the internet was when online bookstores started acting as marketplaces for used book stores, i.e. Amazon Marketplace. It seems that almost no book is too obscure to be able to find online now. It used to be so frustrating to find an author whose work you just loved, and then be unable to read their previous works because they are out of print.

Janet Lembke is one of my very favorite authors. I first came across her work in the book "Shake Them 'Simmons Down" about ten years ago. She is from the same area of Eastern North Carolina where we used to live, so I identify with her work. The book was a collection of her essays about trees, and I loved it. So the other day when I was on Amazon, I happened to look her up, and saw many of her works available through the marketplace. So now I have some new reading material. The first is "Touching Earth", which is a collection of essays on kitchen/vegetable gardening. The second is "Despicable Species: On Cowbirds, Kudzu, Hornworms, and Other Scourges", which (as you can tell from the title) is a collection of essays on undesirable species.

Over the years I have gotten much fonder of reading essay collections. I don't seem to have the attention span necessary to read a whole book at a time, unless it's something that really catches my attention. Essays are usually the perfect length to fill in the time that I have available to read now, and I don't have to worry about trying to figure out what I read last time.

Bookstore Lovin'

We stopped and ate after work today, and then headed over to one of our favorite bookstores to hang out for a while. He read some manga and I read some gardening books and we just enjoyed sitting for a while. We're not going to have a whole lot of quiet downtime soon, so I figured it was a good thing to enjoy it while it lasted. It was quiet until the two teenage boys showed up hanging around the Dungeons & Dragons books and going on and on about their gaming. It kind of ruined the mood. ;) So we left and got some coffee and headed home. I think it's about time to snuggle up in front of the fire with a book and relax. :)

Cooking with Mojo

I haven't been up for cooking the last couple of months, so we've been eating out quite a bit. Every now and then I will get an inspiration to make something. For the last week or so, I've been getting really tired, most likely since I have a space alien in my stomach that is sucking the energy out of me. I also get out of breath easy, and have almost no room in my stomach for food because there is a space alien growing in my stomach that is taking up a whole lot of room now. So I tend to lay on the couch and nap a lot. I was doing just that this morning, and watching the Food Network in between snoozes. One of the times I briefly surfaced Guy's Big Bite was on, and he was making Cuban Pork Chops with Mojo and Sofrito Mashed Potatoes. Now I'm a girl that loves the Latin flavors and I also think mashed potatoes go just super with anything tomato-ey. So when we went to the grocery today I got what I needed to make them. You can see the results above, and it was REALLY good. Very flavorful and didn't take a long time to make. The sauce for the pork chops was a bit acidic when I tried it so I cut in a tablespoon or two of brown sugar to round it out. Definately something I'd make again. :)

The recipes can be found here:
http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/show_gi/episode/0,2857,FOOD_26717_49895,00.html

Update

Fall finally hit the Tennessee Valley, and it's been beautiful. We've finally gotten quite a bit of rain lately, and the trees have changed color. The weather has been chilly a few times, but mostly still gets to the 50's and 60's during the day. We spent our Thanksgiving at home, and I made dinner. We got our Christmas tree up, and a wreath on the door, so we're ahead of where we usually are. :) I've also started packing up the hospital bag and trying to get everything ready. They had a baby shower for me at work where I got a ton of stuff. I am still trying to get it all processed, because we don't really have a dresser or clothes storage area for her yet.

I've been getting pretty tired lately, and most of the time all I want to do is sleep when I get home from work. Somebody's feet reach my ribcage now, and I spend a lot of time trying to explain to her what personal space and sharing is all about. She lets me know pretty quick when she is feeling crowded. Other than that things are going well, 4 weeks until the due date and I'm ready. Now she just needs to cooperate and be out by her due date!

Four Point Oh No!

So I've been doing good and keeping a 4.0 grade average in my college classes. I used to be super competetive and was intent on keeping it. And then life happens. :) Working a full time job, going to class and having a baby coming kind of took the wind out of my sails. Right now I'm at the point where I just want to finish my degree, and a C is great in the class because then I don't have to pay back any money. ;) I mean, a 4.0 is great and all, but it won't really make a difference. The thing that put the nail in my 4.0 coffin was my Algebra II class that I'm taking this semester. I wandered through Algebra I and still somehow managed to get an A. This time it isn't working so smooth, and I'm hoping that I will achieve my C goal. :) It's a bit of a letdown seeing the lower average, but I can deal with it. I guess I had to descend down and be with the mere mortals at some point in time.

Tucked In

Yesterday I finally accomplished something that's been lingering around for about 2 months. Back in August, we went to the nursery and got some plants for me for my birthday. That weekend I ended up passing kidney stones, so they didn't get planted. Then D's grandmother in the Philippines died and he went home for the funeral. While I was unsupervised a few more plants ended up at the house. Then my sister came and visited shortly thereafter, and would you believe that even more plants made it home. Then there was a clearance sale at Lowe's and I ended up with yet more plants. I make it sound like I had 50 plants, but it was really more like 10. Regardless, I had to go out and water them and move them around every few days, which got really old.

Yesterday was a beautiful fall day, and I resolved that if I got nothing else done I would get those plants in the ground. So late yesterday afternoon I set forth and got almost all of them put out. There are still one or two left, but they are more manageable than 10. I also evicted several other plants that had grown unruly and the whole place looks a little neater. Definately was happy to get that done.

Tonight when I got home from work I decided to make some soup. D is sick with a sinus infection again, and I felt like having some comfort food. So I decided to make the Irish Colcannon soup from this month's cooking light. I saw right away that the recipe needed to be modified some. For me the ideal potato soup has a light, creamy broth and is not congealed or floury. So since I had some reduced fat sour cream and some half-and-half in the refrigerator I used that. And since I had some ham that needed to be used, I put in some of that too. I was very pleased with the results, and I think I'm going to go have another bowl. ;)

Irish Colcannon Soup
Adapted from Cooking Light

1 Tbs. butter
2 ½ c. small potatoes, cut into quarters
1 medium onion, diced
1 c. ham, diced
Salt & pepper to taste
4 c. broth
8 c. thinly sliced savoy cabbage
1 c. reduced fat sour cream
¼-1/2 c. half-and-half

In a stock pot, heat the butter over medium heat. Add the onion, ham and potatoes and stir to combine. Cover and saute for about 5 minutes. Add the broth and cabbage, season to taste with the salt and pepper. Reduce heat to a simmer and cook for 10-15 minutes, or until potatoes and cabbage are tender. Remove from heat and add sour cream and half-and-half. Correct seasoning if necessary.

The Mum that Ate Alabama

Okay, so that's a bit of an exaggeration. Just slightly though. ;) I seem to have odd luck with mums. Last fall I picked up a couple of plants, all shaped like perfect little domes, and planted them out. This spring, one didn't show up at all, one stuck up a few leaves, and one started growing pretty fast. By July-August, it had eaten half of the flower bed. Now it's a huge behemoth mutant that I think has eaten some smaller neighborhood pets and possibly slow moving elderly people. Too bad you can't ever predict what they're going to do. :)

The weather has been beautiful, clear blue skies, bright sun and a chill in the air. Fall is always my favorite time of year, and this one has been beautiful. The trees haven't started changing color yet, but I can't wait to see it. We need to get a firepit for the back yard, so that we can have a fire out on chilly nights. I think it'll be a great weekend for making a pot of chili and snuggling up on the couch to read.

Childbirf Classes

From the time that I found out I was pregnant I have dreaded the childbirth class. I know that you can pick up some good information from them, but I'm not a touchy-feely-huggy sort, and don't usually bond that well with women. After being in the military for 10 years and working almost exclusively with males, I just don't have that much in common with women and don't like their moodiness. However, I know that you're much better off during childbirth if you actually have a clue what's going on, plus you can find out about the facility you're going to deliver at and get some info. Knowing already that I want whatever pain relief that they can give me, up to and including knocking me out, I didn't want anyone lecturing me on natural childbirth and judging me. So I signed us up for one, much to the dismay of D. Last night was the first class and I have to say that it wasn't too painful.

The instructor is an Australian lady which is cool because she could read the back of a cereal box and I'd think it sounded neat. She's pretty laid back and funny, which is the way to get me to listen to things. The other couples in the class are a similar age as D and I are, and they all have due dates within a day or two of mine. Three of the other four husbands are from Illinois, which made D fit right in since that's where he's from. We watched some videos on the stages of childbirth, ate snacks, watched some videos on diet and nutrition, ate snacks, and then did some relaxation techniques where my massage slave had to rub my lower back while I lay there and focused on relaxing. We went to eat out before we went to class, so it was a pretty nice evening out.

I also had my doctor’s appointment this morning where I had my blood glucose test done. I don’t have gestational diabetes and I am not anemic, so that’s two less things to worry about. I go in two weeks for my next visit, and I’m going to have a 4D ultrasound done. I can’t wait to see the baby and what she looks like. :)

It's a Sickness

I took an unsupervised visit to the nursery today, which is always a dangerous thing. Actually it got more dangerous because Bennett's didn't open until 11:30 or noon so I stopped by Lowe's to pass some time. I always like going by myself better, because then I can putter around and look at everything and don't get hurried. While it may be more enjoyable, it definately does more damage to the pocketbook.

Lowe's had several racks of plants on 75% clearance, so I had to go nose around there. I ended up with a Winged Euonymous bush with a couple of leaves left on it, a Penstemon 'Silverton' that wasn't too badly off, two Bronze Ajuga plants that looked very healthy and a mystery bush that had pretty purple flowers just right for attracting bees. I always have the desire to try to rehabilitate these walking wounded plants and see if I can bring them back. Let's not mention all of the otherwise healthy plants that I've killed off this year. In addition to the sick plants I also brought home a May Night salvia, an Arizona Sun Gallardia and a verbena plant. And then I went to the next nursery. :)

My main goal in going out this afternoon was to get some tulip bulbs. Or at least that was what I said I was going out for. My real objective was to get a mountain laurel bush for the back yard. When we lived in Virginia the mountain laurels were so beautiful and I've always wanted one. By the time I was finished at Lowe's I was already hot and sweaty and ready to go home, but I went ahead and pressed on. Instead of my usual rambling around and looking at everything, I homed in on my objective which took a few minutes to find because they'd moved since the last time I was there. I spent a few minutes agonizing over whether to get the light pink ones, pink ones with some white on the flower, or the one I ultimately got, Minuet, which had red rims with white centers. Carrying my prize, I went on to the front office to pick out my tulip bulbs and to pay. I got several different kinds of tulips, in red and yellow which are the colors that Maw asked for.

So now the plants are at home and in my garage, waiting patiently for me to get them put out. I'm giving it an hour or two more to cool off and then I'm going out to plant my new babies. I think this is the last purchase of the year, because I'm about planted out. So now it'll be time to get everything prepped for winter and start making big plans for next year.

Whodathunkit

I've had elephant ears at various points in my life, with varying degrees of success. They have neat foliage, but that was the extent of interesting features in the plant for me. This spring I found some elephant ears with black stems, which add further architectural interest. As the summer progressed, I noticed that there were yellowish leaves on the plant, and was thinking that it might not be doing so good. So I went over to take a look at them, and imagine my surprise when I figured out that they were flowers. Not pretty fragrant flowers, but flowers nontheless. In fact they reminded me somewhat of birds of paradise. So this has been the first surprise of the growing season for me.

Everything else is doing pretty good. I'm going to have to relocate some of the other plants that have gotten too big for their neighbors, but that's to the good since I still have some bare spots on the front of the house. I think we're going to do one last trip to the nursery tomorrow and get some tulip bulbs, get everything set out and transplanted and then call it a growing season.

Bamalama Red Beans

Since D. is out of the country I'm flying solo right now. I haven't been eating that well lately, for various reasons and am trying to get back on track with healthier eating. So tonight when I got home from work I was thinking about having some black beans and rice. Since I got kidney stones most likely from a calcium supplement, I am trying to get more calcium naturally. I was out of black beans so I made it with kidney beans (how appropriate)! It was time to clean out the refrigerator crisper and so I threw most of what I had into the pot. Since I made salsa a few days ago, I decided a more Caribbean themed dish would be good. Here's what I came up with:

Bamalama Red Beans

1 Tbs. olive oil
1 small onion, minced
1 stalk celery, minced
1 (14.5 oz) can kidney beans, drained and rinsed
1 (14.5 oz) can tomatoes with jalapenos (or you could use Rotel)
1 c. water
1/4 tsp. allspice
1/2 tsp. dried oregano
1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1/8 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 tsp. smoked spanish paprika
Salt & pepper to taste
1/2 c. thinly sliced green onions
About 1 Tbs. or so of minced fresh cilantro
Juice of 1 lemon
Brown Sugar to taste (depends on the acidity level)

Heat the oil over medium heat. Add the onions and celery, saute until onion begins to brown. Add beans through salt and pepper and stir well to combine. Bring to a boil and reduce heat. Simmer around 10-15 minutes. Add remaining ingredients and stir to combine.

This turned out pretty spicy, but really flavorful. Instead of mixing it with the usual rice I made some quinoa to go with it.

Ave Maria

We had some guests in visiting this weekend and had a really great time. It was the first weekend I've felt like doing much in a while. We went to see the Ave Maria Grotto at the St. Bernard's Abbey which is something I've been wanting to do for a long time. It was an absolutely amazing place, I could have spent a lot more time there than what we did, but it was starting to get pretty hot outside. The grotto is a collection of miniature buildings that were made by one of the brothers at the monastery. There are 155 of them total and he made them from found objects. The buildings are located in a scenic wooded park that is very relaxing to walk through. It'll definately be a new stop for visitors who come to see us.

We went to see the Space & Rocket center and enjoyed that also. I'm not that into crowded places, but they did have some very interesting things to see. They had the OCC's Liberty Bike on tour there and set up which was something to see. They have a pretty good assortment of different spacecraft there, and also artifacts from the space program. We rushed the outside tour part, because it was starting to storm and we didn't really want to be standing out beside a giant rocket when it got struck by lightening. Our guests went home on Sunday and we spent the rest of the day relaxing. D.'s grandmother died last Wednesday and he is going home for the funeral so we went out shopping on Monday for clothes for him to wear. It was a pretty eventful weekend so it's nice to be back to work so that I can rest. :)

New Toy

Over the weekend I looked out in the backyard and noticed that there was a hummingbird flying around the regular bird feeder. So today I stopped and picked up a hummingbird feeder on the way home from work. I've been meaning to get one for a while and hadn't gotten around to it. I took the shephard's hook out into the back and tried to put it into the ground and couldn't because it is hard as a rock. I even tried soaking it with a hose and wasn't able to get it to go all the way in. It's standing, but not too firm right now, I'll have to push it in more when we get a good rain in. So now we'll see if I get any takers. :)

It's hotter than a....

I've been running through a list of colorful Southern sayings to try and describe how hot it is, but nothing pays justice. It was 105 F here today and I can say I'm really glad that I work indoors. I could only be persuaded to go outside to get lunch and to go home. It's been a rough week, I came down with either a kidney stone or a bladder infection that felt like one. After they figured out that the antibiotic they had prescribed to me was one that the bacteria had resistance to it went much better. So today is the first day that I have felt normal in a long time. We did find out that the baby is a girl last Wednesday which is fun news.

Since it's been so hot and dry none of the flowers are showing off at their best right now. I was surprised when I went outside this evening to check things over that there were some lovely flowers on my latest clematis vine. This is the Betty Corning variety, and I love them because they are so understated. In fact I barely noticed that it was there. :) I gave almost everything a good watering down to help them along. There's a tropical depression moving towards Texas and I'm hoping it blows some rain our way. A girl can dream. :)