Our first CSA delivery

Today was our first CSA delivery. I am so excited. We have radishes, pints of strawberries, lettuce, chives, parsley and some other things. We even got something new - garlic scapes. They gave me a recipe for garlic scape pesto. Let's try something new. Yippee. This will compliment our garden which is only producing spinach right now. I can't wait to go plan our menu for the week around our fresh local organic vegetables!

Delights of summer

One of my favorite things about summer is the berries. The strawberries are finally ripe and ready to be picked. Since we have had a few days without rain, I thought it would be the perfect time to buy berries. After our bike ride, we stopped at Spooners to pick up a flat of strawberries. They were beautiful. We stopped at the store for lemons so I could make lemon cloud with strawberry mint compote for dessert. Yummy... I thought that I had pectin at home for my freezer jam, so I didn't buy any. After lunch my dear husband was kind enough to slice all of the berries, but I realized I only had a small container of pectin. So after 3 trips to the store and one wrong pectin purchase, we were finally able to make about 12 jars of freezer jam. It was a whole family affair. My son loved smashing the berries and even my one year old had a turn at stirring! We didn't use the entire flat of strawberries because we wanted some for enjoying and for our dessert. So for about $12 ($ 9 half a flat and $3 in pectin) it comes out to about $1 a jar. Not bad when I know what is in it (except for pectin) and that we had fun making it. We can't wait to eat it and make more, as last year's supply ran out in May.

Secret Dream Jobs

I have to confess that as of this moment I have two secret dream jobs. The first is to be a farmer. What?! I know, you'd think growing up on a farm where I helped hay in the summer this would not be a secret dream of mine, but I love growing my own food and picking it just before dinner and we do quite well. The spinach crop is wonderful this year. The lettuce is not doing so well, but should improve with the weather and maybe some compost. (Yes, one of our Christmas presents this year was a composter.) The zucchini should yield a nice crop again and hopefully we'll get a pumpkin this year. The onions, shallots, broccoli, and carrots are growing slowly, but the peas and beans need help.The strawberries have pretty much taken over the second bed and three of the four pots of blueberries look fantastic. (Now if I can just keep a little boy from eating all of the fruit, we'd be golden.) We've acquired a new huckleberry bush and the 4 combo fruit tree has fruit! All of these wonderful things have just caused me to dream of owning acres of my own fields with lots of vegetables, but the truth of the matter is that I never will. I will always stick to my little backyard garden, even if we buy lots of land. Why because I am kind of lazy. Lazy as in, I would much rather sit and read a book all day (which I have been known to do). I also don't like to get dirty. I don't like the feel of being dirty, um, gloves please. Even then I feel dusty and dirty, so I guess being a farmer will have to be a dream. My second dream job is to be a fancy baker and own my own shop. Now I have taken cake classes, but they are not anything amazing. I just wish they were. I wish I had tons of time to practice baking desserts and making fancy cakes. I also wish that I had the money and storage space to buy all the fancy things for baking (like the cupcake cake pan I am drooling over at Williams Sonoma - I just may have to use my Christmas gift card to buy it). My problem is that I can't cook or bake without tasting and heaven knows I don't need anymore sweets, nor do my kids who seem to move in fast forward. So again I leave this as a secret dream and hobby for when there is a need or time. It feels nice to have dreams.

I've been swallowed by a whale! Twice!

All day today, my son has wanted to play pirate. His ship sank and he had to come aboard my ship (my rocking chair - I was tired). We tried to be quiet, but that seems impossible in my house. I guess since we weren't quiet, we woke up the whale and we were swallowed. After getting out, we were swallowed again. Yikes - twice in one day. We even had to go on a treasure hunt. I guess I need to make him another treasure map (Thanks to Nana.) This fascination with pirates and whales I'm sure has nothing to do with the books we have been reading over and over and over and over: Pinocchio and Pirates Don't Change Diapers.

Sand in my dryer

I can't believe that it is summer vacation already. I'm not ready to be home all day with both kids. We'll see how many activities I can dream up. The never ending question of "What are we going to do tomorrow?" has already started. Even though it is vacation, I still have chores and today is no exception. On my list today was washing all of the linens, but as I was taking out the jeans from the day before to fold, I discovered a dryer full of sand. Hmmm.... a certain little boy's pants must have been full of sand after playing in the sandbox. Despite my vacuuming and general clean up, I still hear sand when I start up the dryer. Aaargghhh... (This after I just picked Kleenex remnants off of another load. I feel like a broken record about emptying pants pockets. Like father, like son though, as his dad left the garage door opener in his pocket one time and we washed it.) How can I be mad at my lovey though when the same little boy asked me to pick him up and when I did he looked at me and said, "Momma, I like loving you." Ah, melt my heart.