Dairy Daze...and Now Beyond

 It is a new year here for the House of Howard; as it is all over the world.  We, any of us here, rarely make resolutions.  It is just another year to live and love.  I usually set a few goals; center my life around my faith more, write more, both on here and for my writing group, declutter some more, buy less.  That is pretty much it. We do have a few plans for the new year.  Ellen will go back to uni here in a few days; I think her first day back is the 12th. I am going to concentrate, as I said, on writing, managing my alpha gal and histamine intolerance issues, and on gardening.  Last summer I pretty much failed at gardening for several different reasons, I just felt so awful from this syndrome. This year I am on a med for it, plus I am learning how to manage it.  I am also going to garden a bit differently...  But I digress.  Ellen and I are planning on going to California to visit family over Memorial Day weekend. We are hoping to ...

 Happenings from the House of Howard  Ellen has resumed pursuing her interest in playing drums.  Since she has been working this summer she saved up enough money and bought herself an electronic (I think that's what they call them) drum set.  She is faithful to practice every day.  I'm glad she has this outlet because I think it helps with her anxiety and general stress to get in there and whack away at the drums.  She has always loved music, it helps her deal with stress. Since I posted about it on Facebook there have been several people who have mentioned that they had always fancied playing drums, but had never followed through with it. I'm glad Ellen has followed through. It will give her something to occupy her, and something to strive for.   Gary has been super busy working on well repairs the past couple of weeks; seems like almost every day last week he went out to one job or another. I'm thankful he has Doug to help him. They enjoy going ...

 Life is not all gloom and doom in the House of Howard.  About a year and a half ago in the fall my sister-in-law planted 4 little thornless blackberry starts she'd ordered from a plant/seed company.  She wasn't sure if they were going to survive, but she plunked them into the ground and prayed for the best.  She had to make sure they were covered with netting to protect them from the deer and the ground hogs that wander through.   Last year she got quite a bit off of them, enough to take up some room in her freezer and provide her with a few berry pies over the course of the year.   Those 4 little canes went crazy, put off all sorts of shoots and they are bearing like they are on fire. Her freezer is as full as it can get and I have over a gallon of them in my fridge that I am going to work up into jelly or jam or preserves of some kind this week. Ha! Two weeks ago I'd put up a couple pints of freezer jam with them. They are starting to slow down...

 So my blogging got side-railed this week, and probably last week too, I didn't check to see the date of my last post.  I've not been getting much sleep lately for one reason or another, my back is trying to go out for one thing, so I've been in a bit of a haze during the day.   I also am trying to get things ready for a couple of vendor events coming up in the next few months.  A friend and I are scheduled to set up at the Celtic Festival on Sept 7th.  I always love going there.  The calling of the clans on Friday night is always moving.   I found some Pioneer Woman brand velvet yarn a few weeks ago, so I have made a handful of octopi: Ellen wanted googledy eyes on them, but I prefer the more traditional stuffed animal eyes.  Haha...  Ellen saw the googledy-eyed one and laughed and laughed.   The velvet yarn is a pain to work with.  It's workability, as it were, varies with the color.  The green on the left is m...

 Every year for the past few years I have had volunteer vegetables and/or plants come up.  Usually I know what they are; sunflowers, tomatoes, cantaloupe...etc.   Last year I had a couple of mystery gourds come up; one proved to be a cross between a pumpkin and a spaghetti squash.  One was in the actual garden bed, another couple of mystery vines were in the spot where I toss the kitchen scraps.  One actually was a pumpkin, but I think there might have been a gourd out there as well.  I am not sure, I didn't go plundering in the weeds very far.  This year I have this little fellow: It initially looked like a strange cross between a birdhouse gourd and a watermelon, and when I posted the above picture on Facebook a week or more ago it garnered much amused speculation. However, just a couple of days ago I noticed on the far side of it this lovely yellow patch.  From that I presume it is some sort of ornamental gourd. It is also out in the kitch...

 The above are my pumpkin vines in the foreground; barely visible behind them are the cantaloupe vines. They grow more and more every day, so my search for squash bugs is becoming a challenge.  I manually pick them off the vines and toss them into a jar of soapy water.  They die within minutes.  Nasty outfits.  Then I have to check every leaf for the eggs.  I have eliminated most of them, but they keep coming in from somewhere.     The vines are finally getting teeny pumpkins on them, but the weather is worrying me.  Today, Tues, July 9, 2024, we are getting the fallout of Hurricane Beryl.  It looks like it will rain pretty much all day.  Pollinators are not very active on super rainy days.   ******** The peppers are really coming along.   These all came off of just a few of the pepper plants I have out there.  I hope the other plants start producing soon.  I need to fertilize them I guess.  T...

  This is the hibiscus Gary got me for Mother's Day.  I love the deep pink color, which doesn't show up properly in the picture, of course.  I hope I can keep these new hibiscus going over winter.  I am going to cover with straw or hay or something to try and insulate the roots. My Betty Hibiscus has yet to bloom!  It is about 4 feet tall by now.  I have to keep metal stakes by it to keep it propped up, otherwise it would fall over and break, or be sprawled all over the walkway, like it was last year. ********   Most of all spring and summer, up until about 3 days ago, I have been fighting squash bugs on all of my vining plants; the cukes, squash and gourds.  I take a glass of soapy water and just hand pick the bugs and dunk in the water.  They die within a minute.  I'd get at least a dozen of the little horrors a day sometimes.  But the past 3 days or so I haven't seen a one.  I can only pray their season is over with and they...

 At the moment; 5:45 AM on this date, we are under a system that is dumping yet more rain on us.  I expect my draggled garden is out there attempting to learn to swim.   However, if it survives I will have green beans in a couple of weeks.  This seems to be an earlier crop than the Top Crop variety; I believe this is the variety called "Contender."   The tomato and pepper plants are doing pretty well, as is the row of okra.  Out in the big garden I planted the cucumber, cantaloupe and pumpkin plants on either hills or a long raised ridge, maybe they won't be drowned too badly.  I call that a small victory as well.    At least I I haven't had to water any of the garden for the past couple of weeks; maybe a month.  That is surely saving on the water bill. 

Permit me to talk about the muddy garden again. Yesterday I decided I just couldn't let the mud win, and aside from letting it all "go to thunder" as Gary would say, or changing the garden into a rice paddy, I knew I had to salvage what I could. So I headed out into the mud to attempt a rescue operation.   This wasn't even the deepest part... I took the shovel with me and attacked the weeds between the rows. As I went I would pluck the weeds from between the vegetable plants.  I used the shovel to "skin off" the top inch or two and then flip it over.   The bigger weeds will regrow from the roots, but I think it will at least keep them from blooming and going to seed; not to mention prevent them from shading out the vegetables.  I forgot to take a pic of the row when I was finished. We are hoping for a few days grace from rain so the ground can dry enough to till. Here is the expression of the gardener herself, that would be me, not complaining about the rain...

 Yesterday afternoon we had another gully washer blow through.  It dropped about 3/4 inch of rain in just half hour or so.  It was the same system that had pretty much washed out my friend's garden in Kansas that morning.  They got over 3 inches out of it; there was an actual stream flowing through her garden area; all of her mulch and top coating was collected against the back fence.   This morning there is a system south of us in Oklahoma and Arkansas that may or may not head our way; depending on which way the wind blows.  We can hear the thunder from a system that is going north of us. Right now, at 6:30 in the morning, it is overcast and not looking inclined to do any drying up out in the garden, whether or not we get another rain storm. Last week, this being Tues, we got 2 inches and I went out to check on the garden. This is how it was: I had literally sunk down to my ankle.  As you can see; the weeds are taking over.  I keep grubbing ...

  Usually I never bother with planning or keeping a written record of what I have planted where, or what should go here or there.  I have tried it once or twice, but have never followed through with keeping track of it.  It would probably be handy, but what with so many variables going on, I just don't bother.  This year will be no exception. It's not that I just throw things out willy-nilly, I usually have a plan in mind, or at least a reason for planting things where I plant them.  But often my plans go awry for one reason or another, usually a crop failure, or a cat digs up the area, or my child has other ideas, or a certain spot gets drowned out by a record rainfall.  Last year the volunteer tomato plants I took pity on pretty much overwhelmed and squelched my okra and beets.  This year no volunteers of any kind will be tolerated; unless the volunteer is a sunflower.  Then it will be relocated.  I am not going to deny the birds their sust...

 According to what everyone else around us has been doing we are a bit late in getting anything out into the garden.  Many, if not most, local gardeners have had lettuce, onions and other cool weather things planted for a few weeks.  Gary's Aunt Kathy has had lettuce growing in a little planter in her front yard for a month or more.  We usually wait 'til the end of March to get going.  So all day yesterday was dedicated to gardening. I got the weed eater out and sheered off the garden beds here by the house.  Then I got out Little Brother, my rototiller, and tilled them up.  Later in the evening I planted every onion slip and bulb I'd bought in the second garden bed.  I am going to head to Greasy Creek this morning and get more. Gary was feeling much better yesterday; he's on the recovery end of this bout with COVID, so he did quite a bit of stuff, too.  He got the mower going, and mowed the lawn where it's been getting shaggy.  He spr...

 Yep,  Gary got COVID again.  For this reason I haven't been on here blogging.  The only time I blog is when I am on the laptop here, and when he is sick this tends to become his domain.  I am quite, quite sure I am going to come down with the beast here in a few days.  This time he had like over a week of mild congestion leading up to it, and that is what I have had the past couple of days.  I am doing everything I can think of to keep Ellen from catching it here at the end of the school year.  I follow Gary around sanitizing everything he has touched or sneezed on; same for myself.  Every door knob, drawer handle, faucet handle, counter food container, door jams...whatever.  I have stayed "quarantined" more or less, in the bedroom.  Last time I caught COVID that seemed to work; no one else caught it.   In any case, in the past few days Gary has sold off all but two of the calves.  One has a sore foot and the other o...

...seed catalogs time, that is!  This one, my first one of the year, came in 2 days ago.  I love that it is illustrated in the old fashioned way.  The first few pages and the last few pages are of their most popular selections are always in color...   The last few pages are always of flowers and those are always in color as well:       But the middle pages are in black and white: The old timey-ness of it is fun.  I think this year I am going to order a few things from here.  I have ordered from them in the past and have always been pleased.   Last year we weren't able to get any Top Crop green bean seed locally.  I notice that they have them in this catalog, so I might go ahead and order them.  Also last summer I had volunteer pumpkins and spaghetti squash thrive and grow, so I thought I would try growing pie pumpkins.  Of course, last summer was a drought and the bugs were pretty scarce.  I didn't even see ...

 Today I processed a couple of pumpkins that grew from a volunteer vine in my garden.   Last fall I bought a pumpkin and a couple spaghetti squash.  I tossed the innards, as it were, out into the garden area.  The seed sprouted.  Except from the way the "pumpkin" looked inside after they were cooked, I think they were crossed with a spaghetti squash.  Wherever they'd been raised there had been a crop of both and they crossed.  But whichever the case, it cooked up pretty good.  I made some keto pumpkin quick bread with it.  I got about 8 cups altogether.  What I didn't use I froze.    I just whack in half and bake.  I saw one recipe where they just tossed the WHOLE pumpkin in the oven and baked it.  Gary wondered if they had to pierce it somehow, or take off the top, to prevent it from exploding.  Once it's baked, I take out of the rind, put in a bowl and use my immersion blender on it.  You have to...

Every spring when I set out those little sweet potato slips I always marvel that they will eventually take over the area and become a writhing mass of lovely vines. They are very popular with the deer and groundhogs. Hubby's aunt's sweet taters were decimated by the deer. The tater part didn't get a chance to develop. The deer would eat the leaves as soon as they grew. My mother in law's sweet taters were decimated by a groundhog; they could see it running for cover sometimes when they went out there. Originally they'd thought it was a deer getting them, so they set a hotwire, but the leaves still kept disappearing. ARGH! I think just now they have finally started growing out, but we aren't too sure that the roots will have time enough to develop. You are supposed to wait until just before frost before you harvest; but I always jump the gun. I pulled maybe 3/4 to 2/3 of ours already last week. I couldn't wait to see what was under there. This was my take so ...

A little over 3 years ago our second closest neighbor's house burned down. He and his wife subsequently settled with the insurance and got out of Dodge; bought a place in Wisconsin. He had has the place here next to us up for sale for over a couple of years now. Well, glory hallelujah! It finally sold on Friday; they went and signed the papers and such. The former owner spent all last week hauling junk off of the place. We are so happy that the new owners are a nice couple from up near Lake of the Ozarks. They are going to use the place as a weekend retreat. At first they are going to just put up their RV here and come down and work on the place as they can. For those in the know, the former owners, MN and his wife, are actually wanting to come back to this area and are looking for property here. Apparently Missouri is a better place than Wisconsin. From what I hear the taxes are killer up there. ******* Dairy news We have two new little bottle calves as of Thursday I be...

Ellen and I planted over 50 tomato seeds today. They came in those packs of 20 little white pelleted seeds in each, but really there are closer to 20 pelleted seeds in each pack. I like using the pelleted seeds; Ellen can pick them up and plant the in the little holes I've pushed in the soil. She had a fine old time poking seeds into the holes, covering them up and, later on, watering them. Several hours later she came back in the house, inspected our containers and wondered why there weren't any tomatoes growing yet. Time means little when you are 4 years old. Last year I bought several different kinds of peat pots. This year I am not going to waste my money. I just used empy containers, like sour cream tubs, yogurt cups etc. I am also going to try making my own little pots from newspaper. Seems easy enough.

This past March when the stores started putting their seeds on display I loaded up on them lest they not have them by the time the weather was agreeable enough for planting. I believe in March we were still having temps down into the 20s at night, and not much warmer during the day. Ellen does not know the finer points of gardening, all she knows is that on TV Rabbit from Pooh is forever planting his radish seeds. Therefore she was all on fire to plant some of the seeds when we got home. I didn't see the harm in letting her plant some of the cabbage seeds, they are my least favorite vegetable. (ugh...but this post isn't about my vegetable dislikes...I have griped enough on Facebook about that.) So I cleared a tiny spot in my little flower garden and let her plant away. Days, weeks passed. Much to my everlasting astonishment I noticed that her planting efforts had not been in vain; lo and behold, the cabbages had sprouted. So here is Ellen holding one of the fruits of her g...

Actually it's a vegetable. You can see that this pic was taken back in June when it first started coming on, by now there are so many shoots you can't see the ground. This is what asparagus does when you don't pick it. I just got them this last spring and you aren't supposed to pick them until the 3rd year after the seed was sown. So I will be able to pick them this coming spring, as I got them as 1 yr root stock. I can't wait to have another vegetable FREE from the garden.