Brandywines & Bonfires Part II

I had planned I had planned on having my first Brandywines of the season last night for dinner, but I had my plate full before I remembered them. Hubby had them sitting on the deck railing. Out of sight, out of mind! So I had them for lunch today. Summer is about the only time I eat tomatoes. I don't like the ones you get in the grocery store or in a restaurant. If they're not vine-ripened, they don't taste the same. Have you ever bought a tomato from the grocery that looked like this?

We went to the bonfire last night. I saddled up Maggie to ride over. I didn't think she'd cross the creek (on the driveway) because she's so barn sour. I left her lead attached to her halter in case Hubby had to make her walk across. I wasn't going to spend time going in circles. He walked beside me and headed for the front field. I couldn't believe it... Maggie walked right across behind him! I didn't have a single problem getting her to leave the barn area. As long as Hubby walks with me, I can get her out in the fields.



The neighbor that had the bonfire doesn't live there yet. He's renovating. This farm house was built in the early 1800s and has quite a history. It has over 6000 square feet! He has pretty much gutted the place as far as walls & ceilings. He basically has a shell to work with. He wants to get a few rooms on the first level done by December. They are expecting their first child in January and want to move in before the baby comes. He's got a lot of work to do! This is what it looked like when we first built our home here six years ago...He has removed most of the white paint and brought it back to the red brick. The upstairs porch had collapsed on one end by the time he bought it. He has repaired that also. It's really looking awesome on the outside.


There is one property between us. The man that used to own all this farmland owns the field next to us. He built a barn on the front part. It also has a greenhouse that the former farmhouse owner put up for his wife. (He was buying that property as well, but lost it.)

This picture shows where the farmhouse looking from our house. We can only see it in the winter when the leaves are gone. If you look closely, the farmhouse is circled in red and there is a red X behind it where the bonfire was held. It doesn't look that far away, but walking uphill through the long grass and weeds in the field is quite a trek! It will be nice to have neighbors again.

Ali came back this afternoon. I'm going to go bake some of those orange danish rolls she loves.

computer woes

For the longest while I've been pulling my hair out on Blogger. When I first came here, things went smoothly. That soon changed... These messages kept popping up on my screen saying it couldn't show what it already showed... go figure. Then it would take me away to that e-land of the unknown. Often it would do this while I was leaving a comment. So the comment would go away, never to be seen again.

Thank God for friends like Judy a.k.a. Squirrel Queen at Through Squirrel Eyes and The Road to Here. I mentioned that I suspected a compatibility issue with my browser and she told me that switching to Mozilla's Firefox ended her issues. I downloaded Firefox just a little while ago. My troublesome days are over! Thank you, Judy!

It seems that Internet Explorer does not like Blogger. Even though that is the only site I was having trouble with, it was so time consuming that switching was well worth it! I read the pros and cons for using Firefox. One con was that it starts up slow. Not true. It starts up as fast as my IE ever did. One pro was that it is faster loading. I believe it. It may just be my positive outlook, but I think it's faster than IE.

I thought I'd share this with you. Many of you have talked about problems you're having with your PCs. Try Firefox and see if that clears them up for you. I've only been using it for about an hour or so, but I'm ready to recommend it. And best of all? It's FREE! Don't we love free?

Awards, Blogs, Brandywines and Bonfires...

DJan at D-Jan-ity has honored me with the Top 10 Fav's Award. Because I recently received this award and posted my list, I will not repeat it now. I did want to acknowledge her for honoring me and hope you check out her blog. She is an amazing person with a gusto for life. At this moment she could very well be free-falling or mountain hiking! Reading her blog is the only way I could possibly keep up with her.

Today shall be my Sabbath. The Lord wants us to rest one day each week. It was a commandment. We quite often skip over that one. I do have to take care of Mom's medicine later, but that is all the work I'm doing today. Well, OK, feed the dog and the horses.

I've been trying to catch up on all the posts I've fallen behind on reading. I just can't keep up anymore. For those of you that post wonderful pictures and entertaining stories, I'm still reading. I haven't left you; I just haven't posted as many comments. I'm still having laptop issues (only on Blogger) and it sometimes eats my comments. I gave up spending time rewriting them. Sorry. I also have to refresh a lot before it will let me view your pages. I think it's a compatibility issue with my browser. Duh... That says a lot. Anyway, it's gotten to the point that I must limit my time in Blogville or never get anything else accomplished.

For dinner this evening, I'll be having my first Brandywines of the season. It seems late for that, but our tomatoes are just now ripening. I've had cucumbers out the ying-yang (whatever that is) and loads of zucchini and green beans. But the tomatoes have kept me waiting. I'm most eager for the Black Sea tomatoes. They're like Brandywines only better! Yum. Don't serve me a sliced up yellow... I want a tomato that's acidy and tomatoey! You know, that old-fashioned tomato taste you only get with heirloom seeds.

It's supposed to rain today, but so far - nothing but dark clouds. This evening is supposed to be dry. I hope so. Our new neighbor (new as in hasn't moved in yet - been refurbishing for two years) just invited us over for tonight's bonfire. He doesn't mess around when it comes to fires. We could toast marshmallows from here! Anyway, he wants me to bring over one of the horses.

We were out riding in the fields one night when he had some people over. They got excited when they saw the horses. (city folks) He always asks us to bring them over again for the kids. I secretly think it's not just for the kids. So I might just take Maggie over for a bit.

For you people that love learning about country life from my blogs, this is what we do in our spare time... We gather and burn things. We either burn things, or watch other people burn things. First we burn paper and wood, then we burn hotdogs and marshmallows over the paper and wood. It's a rite of passage for field-dwellers. It's a social event. We call people up and ask them if they want to come over and burn things.

There are a few country folk that do not very often take part in the burning ceremonies. They practice a different ritual. They gather in a barn and drink large quantities of beer. I'm really surprised that Hallmark doesn't have boxed invitations for barn parties and bonfires. Don't they realize the market they're missing?

Well, that's my day. Catching up in Blogville (being honored is always nice), filling Mom's medicine box, eating veggies from the garden, and going over to watch Steve burn things. Sounds like a winner!

This Farmer's Market... Part II

First my green speech... We try to live green. I like to re-purpose as much as I can. You'd be amazed at what I've used skids for... People are happy to have you haul them off! Free wood! A nearby bath-makeover place has skids that have five 2x4x10s each. You'll find some of those in the walls of the chicken house. We found a place that had stacks with really nice wood, not weathered and splintered. It's going on a wall in my basement bath. Whole skids make great fire-starters. OK, they're a little big for the fireplace, but outside they're wonderful. Stuff them with the important papers you usually shred, pile some limbs and logs on top, and light!

What does that have to do with a farmer's market? Glad you asked...

We have sold vegetables from our farm in the past. Selling at our local markets is not an option for hobby farmers that don't have much. By the time you pay for the permit and insurance (required) you'd have to sell an awfully lot of beans to break even! So we decided to sell our surplus right from home. We live back a long lane, so we wanted a sign at the road to advertise what we had available. I don't buy materials for projects like that. I use what I have. And what did I have? Skids!

So, here I am painting the skids that will make my sign. (Left-over paint of course.)

This is a terrible picture of me, but I had to include it as a tribute to Bob Dylan.I engineer, Hubby labors. Here he is using skid boards to fasten the sides of the sign together...

TADA! Doesn't it look nice?


Now, let's measure out some beans...

Here is our farm stand, complete with my recycled Frappucino boxes, 5 gallon paint buckets, and a $10 WalMart canopy. We couldn't survive without at least 20 paint buckets. Notice the table? Yep, recycled wiring spool. If you ask people at construction sites, they sometimes give them to you.

We also sold corn, tomatoes, and whatever else we might have ripe that day. It helped pay for the seeds for next year's crop. That's really all we want... free food!
Well, there you have it... our own farmer's market.


To see more farmer's markets, check out Squirrel Queen's challenge.

This Farmer's Market... Part I

This is my first herb. I planted this beside the new steps to the pool. Ali and I love to much the onion chives in the evening while sitting on the steps looking into the woods. Yum. I plan on adding garlic chives to the other side of the steps. This is where we 'buy' our fresh eggs. It will take eating the eggs for 200 years to really break even on the deal.

Here's a sample of the eggs. Notice the twins in the background?



This is our vegetable garden. Well, I should say, this is Hubby's and his dad's garden. You remember the old saying, two's company, three's a crowd?
These first rows are FIL's white half-runners. Yuck! Strings!

Aw, aren't the baby zucchini cute!

From left to right: FIL's beans, whole row of tomatoes (I don't know how many varieties this year), Hubby's beans (Kentucky bush beans - no strings!), sweet potatoes, and corn. Across the back, climbing the fence, are cucumbers.

The zucchini would be in the bottom of the picture if I hadn't cut them off! I see a stray plant next to the corn. The gardener's bench marks the spot where Hubby left off picking beans.

This raised bed is away from the garden so the melons don't mix. These are Tennessee Muskmelon. My FIL told Hubby about them a few years ago. I went online and found some heirloom seeds. They get long like a watermelon. The best I've ever eaten!

I tried to find some babies, but they hide... So here are some blossoms, and if you look closely... Do you see it? I'm soooo excited! It's a honey bee! While I was holding the blossoms, it came and visited them. (Stupid camera won't let me capture 'the' moment.) I saw another one this morning on the clover! These are the first honey bees I've spotted this year. Our area is one of those you hear about where the bees are disappearing. Seeing them made my day!

Back in the garden... Here are some of the bush beans yet to be picked. I like them young and tender. FIL likes them to get big beans inside. So we pick some early, some late.

Well, I must have reached the maximum for photo uploads on this post.

Check out Part II for the actual market...






To see more farmer's markets, check out Squirrel Queen's challenge.

Hitchcock's Birds

I was looking through some old photo folders and stumbled on these videos I shot last November. For serveral days, these migrating birds entertained us. If you are my age, you might remember the old Hitchcock film 'Birds'. For the young folk out there, it was a horror film where birds invaded in masses and attacked people. It scared the bejeebies out of me! Thank God the birds in these videos aren't as aggressive.