Garden update!

A little garden update for you all.  With a bit of rain and lots of sunshine, it's going bonkers!!  This little planter is a tub I found half buried under our deck from residents prior to us.  The bottom has some holes rusted through, so it just called "planter!" to me.  I like to incorporate herbs and flowers together when I can so here you see the pansies with basil growing in the center.  Pesto, here we come!

This is the new section of the garden.  I will admit, it's looking a little woolly, the aisles anyways.  Music Man was going to weed whack the edges of the beds and mow this past weekend...but mountain bike trails called to him and he took the boys off biking instead.  And I was glad for it even though the garden didn't get it's beauty treatment.  They had a great time and that's more important then a pristine garden path, I reckon.

Bush beans and cukes and pole beans all ready for their trellises.  I know, I should have done them earlier, but time has gotten away from us with an incredibly busy baseball season for the boys.  Next year, I'll be more prepared.

Tomatoes, amaranth and peppers are sharing a bed.  I planted them WAY too close together!

This is a funny story...I planted these amaranth plants thinking they were peppers.  I got them from Laura, she had extras and told me to please take them.  Well, the pots weren't labeled and I forgot that I had them.  The leaves looked vaguely pepper like in shape, so I planted them.  Then, they went NUTS and when she came over, I had to ask her what the heck kind of pepper had these flowers?  She laughed at me and said, "Not peppers, that's amaranth". Oh.  So, now they are totally taking over the pepper bed and I'm not sure how well the peppers will end up doing, but I've been enjoying their drappiness all over the place.  And the leaves, blossoms and eventual grains they will produce are all edible.  Ah, live and learn.

Zucchini is exceptionally happy.  I only got 4 last year because I lost the plants to powdery mildew.  This year, we've not had a recurrence of it (knocking very loudly on wood!), so they are doing well.  I have a couple more that are much larger then this one that will be slated for zucchini bread, I do believe.

The two varieties of onions I planted are coming along swimmingly.  This one is even so happy it became a twin!



The wild and crazy potato patch is also thriving.  I'm afraid to look under the straw as we lost a bit to slugs last year, but the plants are looking quite content.



And this pretty little goldfinch joined our garden a week or so ago.  He's sitting happily in the sage bush.   I think it's fetching, don't you?

How does your garden grow?  ~Peacemom



A Snow Day

As we've finally got some snow falling, we're having a snow day here at Casa de Peaceable Kingdom.  Above is the view from the front door of our humble abode...

Music Man and Maestro are currently deep in the assembly of the Mystery Machine driven by Shaggy and Scooby...

Little Red is the boy always in motion around here.  He's also got the body temp of a reptile as he can withstand cold that I can't understand.  You can see how Music Man and Maestro are dressed above...here's Little Red in his current clothes running about the house throwing the football to himself.  This is a constant activity around here for the two boys.  Ya know...whatever works, that's what I say. 

I have taken the bulk of this week off work with the boys home.  I desperately needed a vacation, and am having to do so without pay this week. That's additional stress for us financially, but I've not had a vacation or day off in 3 years, and I decided I wanted to take some time with my boys this week relaxed and unneeded by anyone else but these three precious men in my life.  So, on my afternoon off, I'm choosing from my current reads to dive into.  Music Man will be starting the fire soon and hot cocoa is brewing.

We spent the morning at the Museum of Science in Boston, but departed for home when the snow started to fall.  Hope you enjoy a snow day checked out yourself.   What's on your reading list?  Leave a comment if you'd like to let me know what I might need to read next!

Snowy peace to you today, ~Peacemom

Can You Smell IT?

I woke up this morning, and autumn struck me.  There's a special smell to the air when it's becoming autumn...clearer, crisper, chillier...I dug out wool socks yesterday and smiled as I pulled them on to sit in our wonderful sun porch and have hot tea, with toasty toes.  It was not iced tea that I reached for as I have all summer, but wanted to hold the mug in my hand to feel it's warmth, to inhale the vanilla goodness, see the steam rising.  Flannel, wool socks and hot tea, perfect comfort are these.

Now, anyone that knows me, or if you've been following my blog for a time know I am totally obsessed with the Fall Equinox season.  There is something very interesting that happens to me during this time of the year.  I don't know how or why, because certainly in this day and age we've got all modern conveniences that basically totally negate this visceral reaction that I have to the cooler temps, the color of leaves changing, the need for another blanket on the bed.  The ingrained sense is this...it's time to get the hunkering down started.  I have a drive to make sure there's wood split, the shelves in the pantry are full of canned goods, the sweaters and wool socks should be in good working order or mended if need be, the fall comforter needs to be hung on the line and freshened up.  All these things harken back to a more basic time, don't they?  But, they honestly do exist in my nature, the drive is there and starting up with full force. 

As I woke this morning to work in total darkness, I noticed that first light didn't arrive in the sky until about 5:50.  At the height of summer, it began getting light about 4:10 in the morning, so oh yes,  the days are definitely shorter.  That's sometimes a bit tough for me being the morning person that I am, I'm ready to go with first light usually.  But when first light doesn't come until almost 6:00am, and I've got to be up at 4:45 to start work...that's a tough one some mornings.  My internal clock pushes out too, and suddenly I should have been up earlier and now it's 5:30, messes up the whole flow of my day.  I don't use an alarm clock, I've got one in my brain.  It takes a little time to adjust to the fact that  I need to get up in the dark rather then the light.  And I've been doing this for over 40 years, you think I would have the hang of it by now!

 I do so love waking to a chilly house in the morning.  It's not yet the cold of winter, it's the feeling of cozy-the feeling of wanting to pull the blanket up close to my ears and rest for just a few more minutes.  That chill when it's not yet time to turn on the furnace, but time to just put on a layer or two.  Cozy is just the right word for that feeling.  And I know I'm in full autumn swing when I reach for the hot tea mug and make that the first beverage break of the morning.  In summer, I have iced tea going all the time, in fact I drink about 2 quarts a day (unsweetened, I don't muss it up with sugar or anything else), but fall/winter/spring it's hot tea all the way.  I'm not a hot weather worshipper, in fact, as you probably know, I really, really dislike being hot.  I much prefer the need to add layers of cozy clothes and blankets then get to the summer heat where there's just so much I can take off an not freak out my neighbors.

This week's autumn preparation will include harvesting the copious apples on the trees in our current yard.  They are spotty, funky in shape and multicolored, but taste great.  So, I'll be saucing and for the first time trying my hand at canning my own apple juice.  My boys prefer it and I figure if I can stop buying the organic kind in the plastic bottles for a while and have a few gallons preserved for them for winter, that's a win-win all the way. 

Wood smoke on the air this morning...can you smell it too?

Wishing you apples and wool socks of your own, ~Peacemom

Heirloom Salsa

Oh yah Baby!  This is the stuff!  Salsa from the garden, most delicious...just in case you wanted to try your own, here's my recipe:

3 large tomatoes (I used Gold Brandywine, Beefsteak, and a few Juliettes)
1/2 med onion
1 Jalapeno pepper, seeds and rib removed (if you prefer HOT salsa, leave them in, I'm a mild kind of girl myself)
Fresh Parsley (to taste, everyone's different, and it you like cilantro, well by all means throw that in too)
small amount of salt (to taste again, perhaps you don't need salt, but I like a little bit)
squeeze of lime juice from 1/2 lime

Chop, mix, enjoy!  We ate it with multigrain tortilla chips, then had the inspiration for chicken, cheddar, bean & salsa quesadillas.  I'm telling you, nothing oh nothing you can buy in a store tastes as good as this fresh from the vine salsa. 

Happy taste buds to you, ~Peacemom

We have EGG!

My sister-in-law arrived about 10:15 with my niece and her cousin.  They were here for a visit and to see the chickens, which they've not met yet.  As we approached the coop, Pete Rose and Betty were no where to be found.  This is unusual, as Pete is usually crowing the second he sees me.  I am his mother after all.  But today they were not there.  I was mildly alarmed and wondered aloud , "Where's my rooster?".  I opened the coop door and there he was and Betty was inside the nesting box panting an in obvious distress.  Expecting that perhaps she might be ready to lay an egg, she is 20 weeks old after all, I shut the door to give her her privacy.  I checked her a couple of times quickly, no change and she wasn't moving.  We stood around the pen chatting over chickens and suddenly, my sister-in-law and Maestro both said, "I heard a knock sound in the coop!".  I opened the door and sure enough, there was Betty proudly standing over her very first egg.  To say I was excited was an understatement.  And Betty let out a very proud cackle of her own.

The picture above is a normal large egg, on the right is Betty's first pullet egg.  Small, but perfectly formed.  We cracked it open last night to see if it was the way it should be on the inside.  It was miniature, but perfectly formed, all parts there, color right. 

Our little farmstead is making food.  That's the most awesome thing I can think of.

Wishing you miniature eggs in your nest, ~Peacemom

A Most Definite Spiritual Directive To Me

I find there are times in my life when I feel so exasperated by my lifestyle.  Let me clarify...when I explain to a family member or friend or even acquaintance when they ask why I have wanted chickens for 30 years, or why I put all the work into the vegetable garden or why it matters so deeply to my soul to be able to grow the food that sustains my family only to have that person look at me like I have six heads and have fallen off the 21st century wagon. 

I feel frustrated by this lack of understanding or even attempt to understand because it's not what they would do, or that it is not fathomable why I don't just go to the grocery store for all these things like everyone else does.  Or how can I help them understand that this is for a more genuine life?  That creating things with your hands matters. That picking that egg out of that nest from the chicken that you've given a good life matters. Or plucking that sun warmed tomato from the vine offering your family the freshest, most healthy food for their bodies matters. For me, all of this is most definitely a spiritual directive.  When you feel something is right and true so deeply in your soul, then it's met with the glazed over look from the person your talking to or worse the dismissive, "what's the point of all that work, that's silly- just buy it" attitude.

Well, to be honest, it's kept me inside my passions for a long time now.  I used to share these things with people, but after so many rejections of your core beliefs, it becomes a very personal dismissing.  And a lifestyle that I can't understand why more people don't want.  I know so many people that rush from one thing to the next, shepherding kids to this activity and the next, needing to work late at that business meeting or project.  Folks who spend hours on activities I think are inane, but yet, I allow that there is value to it for them.  If they did not get some sense of satisfaction, then they would not be doing it.  I don't think they are crazy for their lifestyle choice, but I do think that perhaps some of them are missing the boat.  Why is there so much craziness and anger and disconnect in our world? 

My feeling is because so many people have lost their connection to the very things that keep us grounded.  You're not feeding yourself staring at your cell phone or computer screen or ipad.  Or feeling the sun warm your skin as you sit among the blueberry bushes harvesting if you're indoors for hours playing wii or watching tv.  Life is meant to lived, dirty, physical, satisfying, challenging and most of all connected to nature.  What is more essential to our nature then living that genuine life?  Then harvesting food, sewing the curtains you need, building the chicken coop to house the very source of your life-giving food?  Having the skills to do all this builds the genuine life. 

My husband and I could just as easily buy all of this, hire someone else to do the work for us, yes, all that is true.  That is the age we live in, but I don't feel it's all for the better.  We live this life by necessity to some extent as we don't have the income to hire everyone for everything we need fixed or repaired or built.  But even if we did, we would not.  We would lose the soul level satisfaction of working with our hands and nourishing our bodies with love and care and attention. To see the sense of pride in my husband's eyes at the coop he built for the chickens, or installing the new light fixture or fixing his car.  Or for myself to smell the strawberry jam simmering on the stove, or shelves of canned food to get us through the winter, or chickens happily clucking while they go about their business.  The knowledge that we have the skills we need to survive in a different way then most.  No amount of money could buy that. Ever.

It isn't until I get the chance to talk to someone that is interested in this sort of thing that I see the glimmer of hope.  I have made such a new friend and we spent the whole of our children's baseball practices talking about CSA's, canning, the benefits of raw milk, why organic is so important to our children's health, chick rearing and our shared disgust over the school lunch program.  It is then that my spirit relaxes, when I see the glimmer of passion building in that person's eyes and someone who is interested in the knowledge I have built over the 4+ decades of my life, it is then that I feel a little song build and a sigh in my heart.  Kindred spirits for your passions are not to be taken for granted.  Ever.

Wishing you the enlightenment that shared passions bring, ~Peacemom

Chick Update

Okay, the first order of business as the update to the chicks is this...Rose, pictured above started making some pretty funny noises about a week ago.  Around 10pm, some strange sounds were emanating from the brooder box.  I went to check on them, and well, she stopped the noises.  Everything seemed okay, so I went back to bed.

I have started to put them out during the day in the baby gate we saved (I knew it would come in handy again someday!  This used to keep the boys away from the woodstove when they were babies).  They are very much enjoying the fresh air, new space and perches I set up in there.  Well, Rose has been sparring with one of the other hens quite often, so I'm watching with caution to make sure they're not hurting each other. So far, they are just posturing.  Chickens figure out a pecking order (hence the term) and so it's normal for some of that to go on.  Well...then yesterday...I witnessed her hopping on the back of one of the other chicks...uh oh.  That's not girl behavior, that's randy teenage boy behavior. Now, I'm on full alert.

This morning while the boys were eating breakfast, we heard what is unequivocally a beginning practice crow.  And yes, it was emanating from Rose...Rose, the Rooster.  As this is Little Red's chicken, and he loves it and named it himself, it looks like we're gonna have to be the proud owners of a rooster.  No, I didn't want any roosters, but there's not a lot we can do about it.  As long as he doesn't become aggressive to anyone, he can stay.  Hopefully he'll be good protection for the girls. I'm just praying the one he spars with, Betty, is not also a rooster because I definitely don't want two roosters for 4 girls!

And by the way, Little Red has decided to rename Rose,  Pete Rose.  We've got to leave the boy with his dignity.

Wishing you hilarious practice crowing of your own, ~Peacemom

Rare...

This morning was rare for me.  Not the morning itself mind you, because luckily, that comes every day.  What was rare was the chance to just be and do the things I wanted to do because I had time to do them.  I should tell you, I'm a morning person.  Normally, my day begins at about 4:50 when I get up and hop into some sort of clothes and head to the kitchen for a tea and glass of water.  Then I fire up the ol' computer and sit down for what is then the next 5 hours of my work life.  In between there, yes, I do take two breaks to get the kids breakfast and when needed drive them to school.  We are fortunate enough to live very close to the school, so I'm able to do that quite quickly in my 10 minute break in my 5 hour shift.  In the afternoon, I go back to working for a couple of hours after the boys are home from school. 

I will usually grab the kids something quick for breakfast.  Perhaps it's cereal, or a bagel or fried eggs and and english muffin.  Yes, Eggo waffles would be easier, or just nuking some sort of frozen breakfast product or toasting a pop tart (all of which they'd eat, but I can't bring myself to do it!), but of course the slow food is paramount here.   Then, it's back to the computer and my work life.  My mornings are definitely not my own.  I should preface this by saying I am VERY thankful to have a job I can do from home so that I'm able to do this for the boys and be here when they come home from school.  However, for the folks that think that's all sunny and great, I will say there are sacrifices that are made so that I can do that for them.  Any kind of social life is one, another being there's no separation of work life and home life.  It's all taking place in these four walls every day and some days, it's cabin fever city around here.  It's also incredibly hard to work with two very active, loud boys in the house.  Imagine trying to concentrate in a cacophony of noise constantly.  I have taught myself to tune most of it out, but it's a challenge sometimes, really, a very big challenge.

But this morning was different.  As I worked more hours earlier in the week due to an intense workload, I only had 2.5 hours to work today.  I got to sleep until 5:15.  Then I got up, checked my email, surfed a blog or two and then went to the kitchen.  On the counter sits the score from our winter CSA that arrives every Thursday.  In this batch is collard greens (even though I'm originally from the south and that's a key food source there, I never know what to do with these!) and parsnips.  I have a bag in the bottom of the crisper drawer that contains 4 other parsnips.  The last time I made them, no one ate them but me, so I've kept them stored in there from the last three deliveries and planned to look up a recipe for them.  When I found the time.  Which never seems to happen.  But this morning, I had time to check out my favorite recipe site food.com and found a wonderful sounding recipe that I'm going to try that entails maple syrup and balsamic vinegar and slow roasting.  Sounds good, right?  I also had time to give the chicks waterer a good scrubbing, make breakfast for the boys, made their lunches and get the dishes done and the kitchen cleaned up.  And sit down here to write my blog.  I watched the sunrise and really listened to the rooster crowing and enjoyed the quiet of my sleeping household.  Just took some time to do things at my own pace instead of my employer's pace.  It was really a very nice morning to just take the time to do things that I found important to me this morning. A rare occasion, this.

Now, I sit down to begin my work day.  The rest of the day will entail spending some of it outside.  There's much to be done around here with the girls outgrowing their brooder at a very rapid pace and the garden beds to get the sod removed and the soil turned.  Yes, so much to do in not nearly enough hours to do it in.  It's all on the list, right there waiting for me to have the time to give it all the attention it needs. Until then, you'll find me working at my computer, thinking wistfully of things I'd rather be doing.

Wishing you your own rare moment of calm, ~Peacemom

What A Difference A Week Makes!

Remember this little peep a mere week ago?  This is Tulip, the Red Star one week ago.

She looked just like her sister Betty, this is Betty now!!  Only one week and look at how they've changed.  She's getting her big girl feathers in, her comb is beginning to show and she's got a tail now.  So adorable!  Pretty soon, she'll be at the gangly teenager look.  I'll miss my little peeps, but it's exciting to see them growing so much, too.

Making My Way

We're beginning to see the first glimpses of that wonderful promise of approaching autumn.  The days are warm, the nights are cool and when I wake up in the morning, I've needed a blanket or two the night before.  This is probably my second favorite time of year, when the days are still warm enough to enjoy swimming at the beach, but the nights are cool enough for a sweater...lovely!

I got to thinking this morning as I pulled out one of my many autumn inspired cookbooks, that I needed to add to my homesteading skills.  To be a homesteader...someday.  But, what I came to realize is that to some extent, I'm already there.  I'm getting ahead of myself a bit though, let me back this up so I can explain.

See, I guess my homesteading skills really began when I was a child.  I was the last of three and that being the case, I think my parents were more confident in their parenting skills enough to let me sorta figure a lot of things out for myself.  Or, perhaps they were just tired of explaining everything by the time it came to my turn, either way, it worked out pretty well for me on some levels.  I've always been a very independent person, even as a child, I don't think I was clingy or needy.  Quite young, I learned to make things happen for myself and not wait around for someone else to do it for me.  That's a skill that is completely invaluable for any person.  One we're trying so hard to teach our youngest who will just whine and complain until someone gets sick of it enough to do whatever it is for him.  But, that's a whole 'nother blog topic for another day. 

I was able to figure out how to ride horses when there was no money to buy or board one.  I swapped labor for meager riding time until I was graced by a friend to ride her pony she had outgrown.  Then, it moved on from there and when I outgrew that pony, another horse presented itself for my care, then when that one left, another, until I was able to free lease a horse of my "own".  I had Dixie for 2  years and it was the best two years of my childhood.  And, honestly, with the grace of God and a whole lot of sweat and tears on my part, I learned an amazing amount about how hard work and perseverance really pays off.  I was a very hard working child, I don't think anyone can dispute that.

My parents also believed that we were to work around the house.  No free rides in our home, for sure.  My parents both worked full time and that being the case, we girls were left with a hearty set of chores that needed doing.  I learned to cook and clean and wash clothes and dishes at a young age. Of course, at the time, I hated every minute of it (well, except for the cooking part), but those were skills that were invaluable to me as an adult and mother to my own two miscreants. As an early teenager, my father taught me to chop wood, and stack it, effectively, so it wouldn't fall over under a snow load.   Pretty funny now that I don't know how he learned that skill.  He grew up in the south and didn't need to know how to chop wood...I'm gonna have to ask him that.  But in any case, when it came time for Music Man and I to buy our first house (which heated primarily with wood from our own land), it was another invaluable skill.  Since Music Man had never needed to chop wood outside of a few camping trips with his buddies, he didn't know how to do that.  Guess who had the skills to teach him?  You guessed it, moi.  And he wasn't too proud to ask all the right questions and then run with the newly learned skill.  And now, he can wield a chainsaw like nobody's business, and I only taught him how to chop!  There is deep intrinsic value in being able to heat your home when you need to, having the skills beyond how to turn up the thermostat. 

I also believe that I got the homesteading bug early.  My parents went through a "back to the land" thing in the 70's.  I remember books in our home that included building a house into the side of a hill (I found that interesting even then and would look at those books a lot), as well as Mother Earth News subscriptions.  Yep, I guess they had some hippie gene in them somehow since they sold our house, renovated a bus into a camper of sorts and took us on the trip of a lifetime up the east coast for 3 months to decide where they wanted to settle next.  As an adult, I realize how daring that was, but then it just seemed exciting.  We visited people they "met" through placing an ad in Mother Earth News and we met some interesting and great people along our travel.  Once we flipped a coin (and I do mean literally, it was between Kentucky and NH and the nickel came up NH), we settled into a life that I don't think became as self sufficient as they wanted, but was interesting just the same. 

Now, I've taken those skills and residual inclinations and formed a life uncommon, I do believe.  Though we have many modern conveniences, and I don't shun them when I need them, cause I love my laptop and my washing machine, I also have skills that are from generations before me.  I can split and stack cords of wood (with an axe mind you, not a splitter), I am able to can tomatoes and a host of other fruits, I can pickle peppers (hehehe, but really, I'm able) and cukes and make jams and jellies.  Preserving food is a huge part of homesteading, in my opinion.  In my childhood of making money to support my horse, I learned how to muck a stall, collect the eggs and get goats and sheep back into the pen that are wandering in the neighbor's garden.  I can cook just about anything I want to, including complicated dishes and simple fare.  I don't believe in chicken nuggets from a box or a Mcwhatever...I make my own from fresh chicken and breadcrumbs and eggs laid fresh that morning, and my kids gobble them up.  I know how to start a fire, even when the wood isn't always perfectly dry, I can sew quilts, clothes, curtains, whatever I need for my home.  I have figured out how to grow a respectibly successful garden.  I can bake bread.  I know to save up water in left over juice bottles because when the power goes out (and it will my friends, it's winter in New England), we have no pump.  Still need water even without a well pump, so better start saving up beforehand.  Running to the grocery store to empty water shelves after everyone beat you to it just doesn't do.  I know to keep candles and lanterns handy, as well as the hand crank weather radio and flashlights for those times as well.  I can read the position of the sun to know what time of day and year it is.  And the list goes on.  But, you get my drift.

I decided today that even though I don't have the chickens yet (we hope they are coming in the spring) or the big garden (ditto on the garden), I do have many of the skills I need to call myself a homesteader.  We don't have the barn, or the acreage, or the animals, but I have the skills to know what to do with them once we do have them, and for that I am thankful and perhaps a little proud.  Most of these skills I taught myself and have been able to pass on to others (I'm teaching my dear friend how to can tomato sauce next weekend and have taught a couple of my nieces to sew...and well, my kids are getting the benefit of it all.  They are already pretty good cooks in their own rights). 

I decided to stop thinking about the homestead in the future and just allow that I'm already a homesteader...with skills yet to learn.

Wishing you some self-sufficiency of your own, ~Peacemom

It's a start

Well, friends, family and good folk alike...you've encouraged me to start writing and so I thought I'd start here. A little background about me would assist you in deciding that perhaps I've got something to say, and perhaps I don't. I never know for sure if anyone else will even care about my escapades. My life is a little amusing, a little frustrating, a lot of struggle but mostly fulfilling. I never know if I'm supposed to give out very much info in these things, or even how much is enough so I'll just give a little info for those who may be wondering what I'm all about.

I'm the mostly stay at home mom of two wonderfu, crazy, loud and at times completely frustrating little boys. One is 5 (we'll just call him Maestro) the other is 4 (Little Red is his moniker, the hair and the temper match the name so well). I'm married to a loving, smart, hard working, honest packrat, we'll call him Music Man. We live in a smallish town in Southern New Hampshire that's known mostly for it's apple orchards. I love living here, but wish it was closer to the ocean which is right up there on the top of the list of loves for me. I'm a bit of an environmentalist (I'm sure you'll see me go off on those topics from time to time), I love nature (it's my church, really). I consider myself a Quaker, but we don't have a meeting house in our area, so I worship in solitude to some extent. I love my boys with all my heart, but do find that being a stay at home mom can be very isolating at times. Sometimes I have to work to actually get dressed each day in clothes that match so that it doesn't look like I let the boys pick out my wardrobe for me. This will become even more important as both boys are starting school in just a few weeks for the first time and I will need to be sure to get out of the jammies before I embarrass them to death someday by picking them up in my tattered (most favoritist!) flannel pants.





I also am an amateur gardener and have had my little plot to feed my family for the last 3 years. My mom was my inspiration for that. She has the most beautiful little garden and even though she has some disabilities, she has adapted those raised beds (with the help of my father, of course) so that she can grow her own little bits of vegetable heaven each season. So, I call her from time to time with questions like "what is that fuzz all over the zucchini leaves (powdery mildew, don't even get me started on this topic)" or "are tomatoes supposed to be mealy when you pick them". Things like that which I could probably google and find just the same, but it's a very nice connection for me and my mom. My parents live about 3 hours away from me and I miss their company and wisdom.





One of my other loves in life is photography (which is another passion my mother shares with me). I'm told I have an eye for it, but just don't have the time right now to learn all I'd like to learn about it all and my camera, hoping that will come in time. I'll try to figure out how to post some photos here from time to time to see if I can make that work. I truly enjoy the art of photography and hope to get a digital camera (a Nikon D80 is my hopes, I'm watching that price just waiting for the below $500 to happen). Right now I do all my serious stuff on a Nikon N65, which I love, but hate the processing costs and would be a better photographer if I didn't have to budget to get the developing done.





I aspire to be a homesteader and have recently joined the locavore movement of eating locally. I get a little giddy high when I can make a meal that is completely local, one I did not have to drive very far to obtain. I have my little garden of eden here and I am very fortunate to have many farmstands within a short distance from my home. I love reading about the local food movement and have recommendations for you...if you've not read Barbara Kingsolver's book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life run, don't walk to the library or bookstore and obtain a copy. She's funny, serious, informative and entertaining all at the same time. It's time well spent and will help you get on the path to understanding and embracing locavorism yourself. I also really enjoyed the book Plenty: One Man, One Woman and a Raucous Year of Eating Locally by Alisa Smith and JB Mackinnon. And any book by Michael Pollan would make my list as well. As you may be able to tell, I'm an avid reader, though also dabble a lot in mystery fiction. On a cold winter's night, you just never know what you'll find me snuggled down deep in the comforter, drinking a steaming cup of cocoa or tea and reading up on.

So, here ends my first blog entry. Man, I'm so totally inept with computers that I can't believe I'm even doing this. Good thing Music Man is a computer geek, otherwise I'd be lost. Adios until next time! ~Peacemom