Lamb's Quarter, Nettle and Wild Strawberries too

This year I am learning to rely more than ever on "wild" plants. I did plant a little spinach but since we didn't move here to mid-June it isn't near ready yet so we have been making good use of the lamb's quarter here. There is loads of it and I think I will even pop some in the freezer for winter use.The other day I made a simple pasta sauce with a jar of last year's tomatoes simmered with garlic, herbs and lots of chopped lambs quarter. A drizzle of olive oil and a little Romano on top finished it off nicely. The next night we had new potatoes fried up as hash browns, some fried mushrooms and scrambled eggs with lots of chopped, steamed lamb's quarter in them. Delicious. The boys thought we should have that for dinner Every Night. And since we are enjoying all that green goodness it seems only right that my tomatoes should get some too.

This year is going to be quite a lesson for me on gardening in "difficult" conditions. I really want to do all I can to encourage my tomatoes to get growing since I am anticipating an early frost up here. I also have some sad, pathetic, shrimpy sweet little tomatoes planted in town which are in serious need of encouragement as they were started from seed late and planted out late. I don't want to try transporting my buckets of aged nettle or manure tea into town so I needed to come up with something else. I picked some nettle and blended it with some water and am pouring it right around the tomato stems in the hope that each time it rains they will soak up some of the nettle goodness. We'll see if it helps at all. I am a huge fan of nettle and its amazing properties and so I expect good things.

We're still enjoying the wild strawberries. E had noted the difference between wild strawberry and wood strawberry plants and has had fun taste testing to see which he prefers. ;-) I've been collecting the leaves to use as a sore throat gargle in the winter.E also came across a new-to-us plant called Self-heal. With a name like that, it seems like an herb worth getting to know.

Starting to Feel at "Home"

Little by little it is starting to feel like home around here.

Flowers on the table

Nettle drying

Fruit in season for dessert dogs being silly

Bird, bug and plant books on the table alongside tea and binoculars...

and most importantly...

clothes on the line.

It just doesn't feel like home to me until I can put clothes on the line. (Thanks so much for the proper clothes line, Mary-Sue)

So many things have been going on in my life lately that have had me really considering what "home" means to me and to my family. It has really sunk in for us (even though we thought we already knew!) that home is really key in our lives. I knew it for the boys and I...knew how vitally important a part home plays in our lives but everything that has been going on lately has caused my husband to also consider the role of "home" in his life. He really gets more than ever that home is his anchor - the place where he gets his strength and comfort and peace from.

I used to not really like the term "homemaker", mostly because I felt it was applied in a rather limiting way (as I think most labels tend to do) and it wasn't a label I would have thought to apply to myself (I don't like any labels, really). But, now when I look at the word homemaker...Home Maker - the maker of a home -I wonder if that term needs to be thought of in a whole new light. Could there be a more important job -to us, our families, our communities, our world - than to be the maker of a home? The home we make for our families - for ourselves - will be what fills our days, as well as our memories and our children's memories, for years to come. It is, for me, where I feel my most settled, my most comfortable, my most at peace and I know this to be true for my family as well. I wonder if we all realize the importance of being the makers of a home?

Lemonade Syrup Recipe

The boys love to have lemonade as a cool treat on a hot day in the summertime. E likes the sourness of lemon so much he will eat them as is. The other day they wanted to make some so we bought some lemons and they set to it.I really like this recipe because you make the lemonade syrup and store it in the fridge, that way whenever you want a glass of lemonade you have the makings on hand.

Lemonade Syrup

6-8 lemons, juiced (you need 1 3/4 cups - 2 cups lemon juice)

lemon zest

1 1/2 cup sugar

water

Put sugar and 1 1/2 cup water into saucepan and add 3 tbsp lemon zest. Bring to boil. Stir constantly while boiling for 3 minutes. Let cool. Add the lemon juice and then pour into mason jar and store in fridge.

To serve, fill drinking glass with water and ice and then add 1/4 cup of lemonade syrup.

Enjoy! (preferably while sitting on the deck enjoying the sunshine)

Homemade Pizza

We like to have pizza night once a week. We've tried several dough recipes over the years and then a friend told us about Jamie Oliver's pizza dough and that became our favourite. We've always made all whole wheat dough but with this recipe we use mostly all purpose flour ( we still use at least 1 cup of whole wheat). I finally remembered to buy some semolina flour last time I was at the Mediterranean market and used 1 1/2 cup of that in the recipe as well. I quite liked the crust with this flour and will be sure to have it on hand from now on.The same gardening friend we received the rhubarb from also gave me some garlic scapes (these are so yummy) to use. I was going to put them in pasta salad but then thought they might be tasty on pizza. They were! The pizza above is mine - we each top our own. We all like to make half with tomato sauce and the other half with pesto as a base. I'm looking forward to when my own basil is ready so I can make fresh pesto again, I've used up all of last year's frozen supply now.

Rhubarb syrup and rhubarb pie

A generous gardening friend gifted us with great armloads of rhubarb so I set about making rhubarb syrup on Saturday morning. I made this years ago with frozen rhubarb to use as a base for a Christmas party punch (out of a Company's Coming Christmas cookbook which is still packed so I just made it up as I went along here). It is simple to make and delicious. This year I wanted to freeze some in ice cube trays so that we could have some to pop into a glass of sparkling water whenever we wanted.I love the colour.

And the boys love the drink - the tartness of it is so refreshing. I used about 8 cups of chopped rhubarb simmered for 20 minutes in 6 or 7 cups of water with 1 1/4 cups sugar added. Then strain and there you have it. Delicious! (But don't throw out the cooked rhubarb mush left after straining off the juice. I popped it in the fridge and am using it for topping my scotch oats each morning.) By making it not too sweet you can serve it with sparkling water for a rather tart drink or you could serve it with a sweetened lemon/lime type soda and it still wouldn't be overly sweet.

Pink seems to be the theme around here just now as our home has wild rose buds everywhere.

I chopped up some to save in the freezer and decided to make a strawberry rhubarb pie as well (since we had been strawberry picking the day before).

The pie filling is based on this recipe and then I just made a crumb topping for it.

Now I'm thinking I'd like to make some more of these rhubarb apple muffins for tea time today except I didn't copy down the recipe or if I did it is still packed somewhere which hasn't occurred to me yet. I've found another recipe for Apple Oat muffins from Vegetarian Times scribbled down in one of my books so I'll try that one out with some rhubarb added. ;-)

If you give a girl some ground...

My boys loved the If You Give a Mouse a Cookie books and this past week as I've been planting things here and there around this property I couldn't help thinking that I was in a sort of If You Give a Girl Some Ground...She's Going to Plant a Garden situation. I was given some squash plants and then some herbs and tomatoes and that got me started. Then I was looking at our squash hills and thinking that I might as well plant some pole beans in those hills...

E wanted us to plant some corn too - "you know mom, like 3 sisters" - but we're a bit late for that up here. Since I had an herb bed going I might as well get some basil in and since I was at The Greenery for basil and they had a sale on I might as well get some more tomatoes...and zucchini...and some flowers. I have a bank of tomatoes now and a couple hills of zucchini.

Of course it only made sense to plant some salad greens and spinach too. I dug some horse muck into this and then broadcast some seeds in it. It is in shade for a good portion of the day but should be fine for lettuce and spinach.Then the boys wanted a few flowers as well and so now E has a little garden that he worked so carefully on and W will put his in when he gets back from his mountain biking race. Since I normally scorn won't buy annuals but my husband loves petunias I bought some of those for him and E and I planted them in the front flower garden I've been making. I guess it goes to show that you can take the family out of their garden but you can't take the garden out of the family. ;-0We also found a patch of nettle not too far down the property so yesterday I cut some for making nettle "tea" for my plants. I think with the rocky, poor soil and the colder temps up here that the plants might need all the help they can get.

Oh my, but life is good...

Sunday morning we left our home of ten years and I spent some time during those last days taking more photos of things I thought I would miss.

Some favourite flowers.

E wandering through the garden looking for something to snack on. My rose garden just beginning to bloom.

The boys playing in their "dirt pit" which they have always preferred over a sand box. (and making sure they had all their hotwheels before we left)

And my veggie garden...oh, my lovely veggie garden. :-(

But actually...we're having such a good time in this new place that we aren't missing anything at all. E had a good cry as we left the only home he's ever known and then hasn't stopped smiling since we arrived here. We've walked down to the creek; sat on the deck and watched hawks; the boys have made trails in the woods and we've picked wild roses to make garlands.

We've found lots of wild plants like raspberries, strawberries, lupin as well as loads of daisies just about to burst into bloom.

And...I know I said I would be taking a year off of gardening up here but when I went to plant the tomatoes that E and I had grown from saved seed at someone's house in town they gave me some extra squash plants...and I couldn't say "No", could I? So we wheeled up a barrow of horse muck, put some caging around to help prevent deer from getting in (am I being really naive?) and made some squash hills. And there you have it...the beginnings of a garden. ;-)

And then yesterday another friend brought me some more plants so the second she left I began to turn this sandy soiled, weed-filled area

into this,

an herbal salad bar for the deer. ;-) (really, I was already hauling the horse muck, why not put it to good use?)

I know, I know...Hello, my name is Heather and I'm a gardening addict. (but an intensely happy one nonetheless)

Life truly is good!! I feel very blessed...Very!