Garden produce

We just finished our 4th week of school, our 2nd week of piano lessons for Tuki and 2nd week of skating lessons for Tuki and Ve. Mim is working extremely HARD at her classes. She is taking 2 science classes, 1 math class, 1 social studies class, 1 english class, and 1 french class...all  requiring nightly work.

We have begun to clean out our garden, but we haven't had a freeze yet, even though many around us did a week or so ago. We get blessed with a micro-climate action being surrounded by trees and in a lowland..I say once again I will put up with the mosquitoes because the benefits of living in an area with a high water table is great. Our pumpkin patch, butternut patch, peppers, beans and leeks are still growing and matter of fact thriving. I keep watching the weather prediction for 10 days out so that I am ready to pick right before it freezes, but not too soon since these veggies need the lengthened growing season.

So far we have harvested and made from the garden:
41 quarts of beans
6 quarts of beets
countless cups of shredded and sliced summer squash made into chocolate summer squash bread, pickled summer squash and fried summer squash
23 quarts of carrots
12 bags of freezer coleslaw made with our garden cabbage, carrots, and peppers
14 quarts of salsa
10 quarts of spaghetti sauce
cups and cups of fresh tomatoes
countless summer lettuce salads
dried seasoning in dill and coriander
and we still need to pick the items mentioned above that are still growing.....

the only thing our garden didn't produce that we planted was cucumbers..maybe we picked 5 or 6  cucumbers total and I have heard that others had the same problem this summer..never did figure out why. This happened 2 years ago with the cucumbers?????

Summer is over

and haven't posted in a while. Students return this Tuesday. All last week I was preparing for the students and the week before I was in technology training. This school year will be busy because I will be training and working with 2 other new 7th grade teachers and I will be spending about 9 hours weekly on my Principal Practicum...

Today I am canning 3 batches of salsa which will probably equal to about 18 quarts. So far we have canned 40 quarts of beans, 6 quarts of beets, no pickles since our garden didn't produce any cucumbers this year. We have also froze too many to count shredded squash and broccoli. It looks like it will be a bumper year for tomatoes (just now ripening), butternut squash and pumpkins. One of our pumpkins is well over 50lbs already and there is about 6 weeks left of the growing season and it is getting bigger every day.

Mim is going into 11th grade with a very full academic load so she won't be running cross country this fall, and will continue to see her therapist Gretchen.

Ve is going into 5th grade, hopes to start violin and will be skating and basketball again this year, and will continue to see Gretchen as well.

Tuki is going into 3rd grade, hopes to start piano and will be skating and basketball again this year as well.

Even though I have my practicum and hopefully will be taking my Master's Exam on October 25th, I don't feel like we have a ton to do this fall and I am happy about that.

Week 9 of summer

found our first nest of wrens

green/purple and yellow beans from the garden

the biggest moon this year

Jeff and Darla are visiting again for Farm-Tek days

gathering at Jill's house for my birthday

the garden

the pumpkin from 2 weeks ago, big difference in size

we have canned 27 1 /2 quarts this summer

a small pie pumpkin starting to grow, actually we have many new pumpkins growing now, but still no cucumbers....

the girls have finished VBS this week and I had my second to last admin class this week....

Week 8 of summer

I spent this week in Colorado at a STEM conference, here is an example of mining a side of a mountain near Idaho Springs, CO

It was very rainy, foggy and my ziplining experience was canceled because of the poor weather

a photo of Georgetown, CO, 1 hour away from Vail, CO

Grandma stayed with the girls and hung some of the girl's art work that I left for her

the river of pumpkins...good thing they aren't in the garden this year. I also canned 12 1/2 quarts of yellow beans and 3 1/2 quarts of pickled summer squash.

Seventh week down

The girls last week of summer school. I finished my 24 page curriculum school improvement plan and I am now getting ready to head out to Colorado next week. The girls will be staying home with Grandma. I will be zip-lining, rafting and learning new ideas about implementing STEM . This week was pretty much staying the course.

I have been thinking about how nice this summer has been and I think it is due to Mim and Ve, but especially Mim's visits with the therapist...what a difference it has made.

my rose bush that I received last year for my 50th birthday and now it is blooming again on my birthday.

pickled summer squash from out garden

the house wren nesting in one of the boxes attached to the garden fence

a few more photos

tomatoes are beginning

red cabbage

beets

pole beans

a baby pumpkin that will hopefully grow to massive size

a few more rose photos

Summer squash bananza

This summer we are getting a lot of summer squash and besides making more pickled summer squash and Gluten free Sundried tomato summer squash, blueberry/summer squash bread I also made this yesterday and boy do the girls love this bread recipe...for the obvious reasons..I add walnuts to the recipe:

CHOCOLATE ZUCCHINI BREAD RECIPE

(12)           1 1/2 cups (360 ml) shredded raw zucchini (courgette) (about 1/2 pound or 225 grams)

(8)            1 cup (130 grams) all-purpose flour

(4)            1/2 cup (45 grams) unsweetened natural cocoa powder, sifted

(6)             3/4 teaspoon baking soda

(2)            1/4 teaspoon baking powder

(2)            1/4 teaspoon salt

(2)            1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon (optional)

(6)            3/4 cup (180 ml) semi sweet or bittersweet chocolate chips

(16)           2 large eggs

(4)            1/2 cup (120 ml) vegetable, safflower, corn, or canola oil

(4)            1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated white sugar

(4)            1/2 cup (105 grams) firmly packed light brown sugar

(8)            1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (180 degrees C) and place rack in the center of the oven. Grease (or spray with a nonstick vegetable spray) a 9 x 5 x 3 inch (23 x 13 x 8 cm) loaf pan. 45 minutes

I altered a few ingredients summer squash in stead of zucchini, used no GMO whole wheat flour, fresh eggs and added walnuts...YUM YUM!!! Made 10 loaves but will probably make more.

Summer is half over - week 6

 Mim helped Tuki and Ve bake a cake and cookies

 bluebird not wanting to move from her incubation when we checked her box

our chickens
Our week wasn't too exciting;
Tuki & Ve went to BB camp every morning and swimming every late afternoon
Mim continued with her classes and finishing up painting the basement
I continued on my homework and reapplied for the elementary school job that reopened when the candidate declined the position
We all went o Noah's Ark again on Saturday, too busy so no more Saturdays
I had a lot of meetings at school and we received the blueberries so we canned jam and made 18 loaves of bread.