My husband likes to joke that I was born about a hundred years too late. He is probably right (please don't let word get out I said that). I do to enjoy things that most women my age (and people in general) tend to scoff at. Not to mention that I use words like "scoff"---seriously, who in the past one hundred years has used that word?
I really enjoy baking and making things from scratch. I just found these from scratch websites here and here and am just downright chomping at the bits to make my own Vanilla Wafers. I have a bread machine, I know that is technically "cheating"---but, I use it all the time and do make yeast breads by hand (and kitchen aid stand mixer) on occasion.
We use so much flour that my flour canister has graduated from a little white container that sat on top of the kitchen counter to a 5 gallon bucket from Rural King. We buy a 25 lb bag of flour from Sam's Club at least once a month. The last time my little cousin was over we were making cookies and she spied my flour container and laughed at me. She is seven. This was timely because my self-esteem had been hovering around normal, and I'd been meaning to knock it down to negative 1000 (to quote comedian Mike Birbiglia).
I just used the fact I was bigger, older, and wiser to turn the tables, "Hey kid, do you want to make cookies or not?!" Who is laughing now?
Problem solved.
In addition to baking and intimidating young children, I also love to garden. I don't mean getting a pot, filling it with potting soil, and putting some petunias in it. I think I might be the only person alive who doesn't like petunias. I mean taking a shovel and digging about a billion holes in the ground putting in little seeds and treating them like they are your children for the next two to three months.
My Papaw has always put out a h-u-g-e garden. We are talking like 25 squash plants and around about 50 tomato plants. This doesn't even include the rest of the garden. By the end of the growing season, he is practically begging people to take something---anything home. Last year we *helped*---not very much because A. James was still very young and impatient. However, this year we mean business.
We started about two weeks ago getting everything ready and on Sunday we put the last of the tomatoes in the ground. Everything is in the ground; green beans, onions, garlic, squash, zucchini, cabbage, peas, okra, popcorn, sweet corn, green beans, watermelons (three varieties), melons (two varieties), peppers (bell and hot), cucumbers (straight 8 and pickling), gourds---and tomatoes. Cherry. Roma. Jet Star (52 of them). Right now it doesn't look like much. Just a few big spots of muddy earth with some sticks haphazardly stuck here and there. With the exception of the tomatoes and the peppers (which we bought as plants) you can't even tell that anything is living.
Just give it a few weeks.
Today I checked out the book "Too Many Tomatoes, Squash, Beans, and Other Good Things: A Cookbook for When Your Garden Explodes" from the library in anticipation. If everything goes as planned, I'm going to need it.
These are all planted at your house? Or is this at your grandpa's house? We're just doing a few things here. This is our first year and I don't want to overwhelm myself. Also, we can't plant in our yard....but between you, me and the bees, I cleared out this HUGE weed patch and planted a couple of pumpkins in the backyard. :D We'll see how it goes. :D
ReplyDeleteThese are all planted at my Papaw's house. Haha, I wouldn't have the room here. I have some plants here, though. I will take pictures of "my" garden and post them soon.
ReplyDeleteGood luck on those non-existant pumpkins. You can't be responsible for what grows when you throw out your scraps. :)
I think I should have been born a hundred years ago too. LOL I feel you on that. Just last night, I was talking about how I can't wait to have our own house so I can plant a garden and have our own veggies to eat off of for the whole year. My husband laughed at me. He said he doubted we could plant, produce, and can enough for an entire year, but I have lofty aspirations. I am jealous of your bread machine! I need one so bad, I've been wanting to try making home made sourdough bread for a while, and even bought the stuff to make it. Good luck with your garden and your huge bag of flour! haha
ReplyDeleteAmy---
ReplyDeleteCheck out a book called The Self Sufficient Life and How to Live it by John Seymore. Our library has it and I am going to have to buy myself a copy.
It has everything you would ever need (and lots of things you probably won't ever need) including a chart that tells you how much food you should plant to feed your family size.
http://www.amazon.com/Self-sufficient-Life-How-Live/dp/0789493322