Yet more Beans & Art Classes.

It has been a strange week, John has had a cataract  removed, formed due to the operation he had last year, so no need for the other eye to be done which usually happens. He has had to be very careful this past week, with drops, and dark glasses and a plastic dome patch for night. He has used all this free time applying for another grant which has taken up most of this week. 

 

 The Commuity Garden though, have had a major bi-annual plant sale, for this weekend, and have had to work it out on their own for once. The garden though is looking lovely.

https://www.facebook.com/SouthCoffsCommunityGarden/ 

 

  My garden, on the other hand, is  ploughing on, despite all the nut grass, trying to work it every day for an hour.

 

Unbelievably I have had to pick another basket of  beans, both butter and blue lake, even after Miss P picked every one she could  8 days ago.

 More Kale for my smoothies which saves me $6 every time I do it, and which I freeze,plus another zucchini I missed. It is still fairly hot outside after 9 so I am not going out for  too long the humidity is exhausting.

 

I did process them and they weighed 800grms, ready for blanching.

I also froze them individually on a tray, then vacuum packed them in the freezer bags. The tomatoes from the garden are in my new vacuum fridge bags.

I noticed today that I should pick some more beans, despite giving 2 big handfuls to the neighbours, I am getting sick of them.  I also noticed, especially yesterday, when I defrosted the freezer and realised how many bags of carrots and beans there were from the garden, as we are mainly eating salads. Winter should sort that out hopefully.  

 

 

One of many oil paintings I did in the early days that sold.

 The past year I have been planning to go back to my art, and yesterday visited the local art centre for their casual day, meaning no classes. 8 painters were there and I liked the set up so will be joining them at two weeks, after I actually join officially. I have also decided to check out the journal, bookbinding  group Thursday as I shall be experimenting in small art books so can easily join in there as well for extra time to work. 

I have also organized  a few online classes, which I have looked at first and now collecting new paints and water colour brushes, so I can actually start the lessons. I usually paint in oils.

 

Abstract class in acrylics,  I will be doing which is very different.

This is a Watercolour class.

 

 It is all very exciting, and I am still getting things together to start.

 

 In the midst of all this I am also continuing to  photograph miniatures for my Etsy shop, yet to open.

 

I think I have finished all the furniture and now starting on the fiddly bits, which  at the moment isrocking horses.

I don't want to be photographing while stuff is hopefully selling at the same time, well not until I have most of it uploaded. Then it will be a case of packing and posting.......maybe.

I feel I have not done a lot this week, except  lots of research on the computer, that is quite tiring. 

Easter Daisy amongst the nut grass.

Till Next Time.

 

New Vacuum Sealer & Autumn Weeding

Well it rained this past week and what a relief to all the hot weather, it gave us a couple of days respite from the heat. In between times we have managed to clear and fill 3 1/2 beds, so there is no more soil in the trailer. The flower beds on the edge need weeding, but they will get a layer of  hard mulch rather than soil. Still 3 more small vegetable beds to go though.

 Planted seeds of beans, carrots and beetroot, and seedlings of kale, lettuce,rocket and bok choy but the heat after rain, was a bit much although I covered them, some have died. Will try direct seeds instead.

A tangle of green beans and cucumbers.

Miss P came over Saturday, and we partially weeded the back rose garden, while the shade was there, with a reminder on how to prune them, and the hydrangea bed and path at the back steps, filling the wheely bin for Monday.

 

 Before she went home picked beans and more carrots to take back. There is just so much we can handle. Also 2 large cucumbers John bought home from the gardens. As the family have chickens and I get quite a few of the eggs, if nothing else it can all go to them.

 

Yellow Butter  and Green beans from two different Trellis's

I think there is probably one more go of the carrot bed. They are small and lots of fine roots growing from the carrot itself is  proof  I showed Miss P,  that they had stopped growing, most likely due to the heat as some plants won't grow if the weather is a certain temperature, and been in too long. Still ok to cook for meals. 

Semi cleaned carrots

John cooked up half of the chillis, also from the Community Garden, and made a hot  Sweet Chilli Sauce. It is a bit hot for me though, unless it was a tiny bit, but the purchased sweet chilli is more my style.

 After sadly  reading the last post on Down to Earth with Rhonda Hetzel, as she is retiring from writing, I found on her cooking for one series that she had purchased a hand held food vacuum that uses bags. 

2 weeks ago I vacuumed 2 jars of grapes, to keep fresh from the kilo bag of them in our grocery order. They go off so quickly and this was opened yesterday as fresh as we bought them. The trouble is I have to drag out my big machine to do this, so once opened I don't bother to vacuum it again. 

I also have vacuum bags that can be put in the freezer such as the carrots and beans I did recently, or meat in a sauce like John's kangaroo meat he loves, and vacuuming bulk flour, sugar, tea etc to keep it long term.  

I decided to buy a not very expensive one on Amazon, and below is the  tiny hand held vacuum, about as big as my hand, with 2 cucumbers sealed in the bag system. It goes over the blue dot after closing the bag with a double  zip lock. 

The good part about this system is that I can keep it on the bench or shelf, ready to re seal the bag quickly, as when I take out one of the cucumbers for example.

 

 I have had pumpkin, cucumbers, tomatoes, and lettuce go off before we can finish them. Testing these cucumbers out, but I keep them in the fridge still. This system won't take any liquids and  bags aren't to go in the freezer. The unit is easily charged same as a phone.

As long as the product doesn't go past the blue dot, I see no problem with this so far and look forward to testing my home made bread next time, rather than freezing it. As from using my big vacuum machine I know it will keep biscuits, cake, muffins, fresh long term also. Nowadays I always freeze half the cake or slice, so when I cook next will test that out also. 

The Frangipani is so full of flowers this year.

Thank you to the two subscribers who joined recently, it was a such a lovely surprise.

Till next time.

 

New Aircon, CWA Market, Russian Garlic.

Another challenging week, as the air conditioning units for both guest bedrooms, went in over a 3 day period, finishing yesterday. In order for this to happen a mattress, cupboards etc all had to be moved, also my scaffolding in the hallway and the painting has stopped of which I was part way.

 This has not been too much trouble as I had my last quilting class and also helped CWA with their first market last Friday plus a bit of Christmas shopping while I was in town.

Market Tables around the edge

Tea and Scones Time

Craft Store room, mostly donated fabric, patterns,books and a few items. A work in  progress.

The rain has stopped more or less, with a couple of thunder storms, and more hot sticky weather, although not as bad as last year. It is just taking a while to get used to it having such a cool rainy November and early December this year.

The air con in the main bedroom will be great for me to start with as I use this room for sewing, as it has a lovely view out of the garden. By the 23rd though two of the children will be home for a week, so if it does get really hot they will be ok. }

Clearing the book shelf of some of mum's photo albums has put me to thinking of what to do with them. By memory nearly 30 books in all. When I think of the 8 year old twins and the photos it will not make much sense even when they are adults.  Most have been put on computer so my thinking is to keep original photos of importance and throw the rest. A big decision, which I might get  our eldest daughters help at Christmas time. 

Russian Garlic.

 In the meantime I did do a little bit of gardening. Picked the Russian Garlic which are enormous this year but haven't split into cloves. I think I will chop finely and dehydrate. The other lot of garlic I picked, 2 weeks ago went soft half way, as got to wet with all the rain, and we are slowly using them up by peeling the outer layers.

Gives you a better size idea.

I also picked some beetroot to bottle. One lot I sent to the Market at community garden today, along with 400grms beans, 4 cucumbers and 3  yellow zucchinis. I kept the rest of the beetroot for bottling in salt water, so I can use it in salads.

Cucumbers are flourishing there were 8 on the vine, which  I hadn't noticed this week, when I was roughly checking between rain. They love to hide. 

 So far we are keeping up with the beans, between a neighbour, SCCG and ourselves but a 2nd. vine is about to start so more processing for them to do, I am sure.

Front Garden Beans

Back Garden Beans Northeaster.

Usually by this time in the year I stop planting the garden beds as by Nov. to Jan it is way to hot to garden, but this year is so different and I am in two minds which way to go. There are quite a few gardens bare and what to plant another thing, do I want more beetroot or beans, plenty of tomatoes growing, Corn I am not that crazy about, lettuce is growing but it will get hotter and they go to seed quickly. I have never had this problem before.

In the mean time I am busy painting the hallway, and can start again  now the aircon is in. Always more decluttering as well, craft projects to finish, and Christmas to Prep for. 

Pierre de Ronsard looking such a picture with all the rain.

Till Next Time.

 

Garden Roundup Plus Tomatoes & Beans

 After all the weather drama of the past two weeks, it has now settled down to some pleasant days with the odd thunderstorm as expected today and tomorrow. I have been doing a fair bit of weeding and planting new crops. I also fell over, going up our wobbly steps, which threw me out a bit, scratched my face and glasses, and sore muscles, so have been very pleased with the ability to sit on the edge of my beds, so highly recommend anyone making raised beds to have them at seating height. 

The tomatoes are on their last legs so will pull them down this week. I have collected so many of them which has surprised me as all were volunteer and I just transplanted them to the frame. Rouge De Marmande and a couple of large cherry ones. I think the weather was on my side as the Rouge De Marmande ones prefer a cooler weather, and they were started late winter. 

Anyway, we have had a plethora of them over the weeks, and these are a few of the basket loads over the month, on top of what I picked fresh for lunches.

Our son was impressed with them he sent a photo to the family Whatsapp, from ones he took home as well.

 Of course we couldn't eat them all, so I made some spicy Salsa, and Spaghetti Sauce Base, just a few bottles at a time.

All together 8 pint jars of  what I call Salsa, which can be cooked with meatballs of sausages or eaten as a dip, and  3 small ones, 3 pint jars of Spaghetti Sauce, is what I have preserved plus the multitudes we are still eating. Now I am growing the larger cherry ones as they don't encourage the fruit fly as the skins are firmer.

  I recently, still covered the ones we planted earlier that I was experimenting with as bush tomatos I mentioned in September. 

I don't know if I would plant these again, maybe in a hanging basket as they were a bit wild, but I have had to trim back due to the hail and then put the net over as it happen to be covering the cleaned brocolli bed behind. The broccoli bed will become my new carrot bed, eventually, at the moment it is holding a bin full of cow manure. 

Last of the carrots 

 Current carrot beds

Front Garden

Back Garden just started and fightening birds plus growing Northeaster beans.

 Speaking of beans I cleaned up the two bean beds with the unusual dried bean colours, I planted 2 months ago, and replanted a new lot in each and will also let them go to seed. Very pleased with them though. 

Too Pretty to Eat.

 Garden is doing well and I am working in it every day. Cucumbers have started to grow, along with eggplant, lettuces are self seeding everywhere, tomatoes all over the place, picking blueberries and rhubarb. Mizuna,rocket,silverbeet,basil and beetroot all growing so all in all we will be ok for another few months. 

Butternut pumpkin vines

Letting the Red Lettuce go to seed as I love the colour.

Coreopsis

That's all for this week, stay safe,

 

 

Till Next Time.

 

 

 

Preserving Potato & Leek Soup, & Beetroot

 I managed this week to finish off planting the leek seedlings. This meant digging up all the leeks from the old bed and some beautiful beetroot to make room in a new bed. The new bed had some lovely soil so not too hard planting but the weather was hot and draining, yet today it is cool again. 

Last year I froze all the big leeks that ended up in the kitchen, by chopping them all up, and then using handfuls of frozen leek pieces when cooking. This year I decided to preserve them in a soup, in my pint bottles with the pressure cooker. I also used my vacola bottles which work just as well as the Balls brand.

The beetroot I did in plain water so it can be used in anything from a dip to hot for a meal. The soup is in chicken stock with potato and carrots as well as leeks, and can be heated up as is or added to with other vegetables, or meat.

All set to fill bottles, carrots from the garden also.

Now to find a space of where to store them.

Miss P came yesterday and I am feeling really tired today, as usual, the price of getting old, and  we weeded the back rose garden, which was way overdue, lots of digging, but it looks very nice. I am going to put more free mulch on as well, and sweep the false grass. The aborists have been very busy in this area and the pile of mulch getting bigger. So lucky they have a spot to dump it at the beginning of a forest walk, in the corner of a small car park. It always disappears as well.

 Interestingly as this path has been an experiment, the part where the weed mat was hasn't any nut grass under it except on the edges but the part without has long nut grass under it. So another project to finish properly.

 The hippeastrums are all flowering as well, I wish they weren't so expensive at anywhere between $15 - $50 just for one bulb or I would get more.

Miss P was complaining how her year 7 cooking class was not very exciting or challenging, they made hamburgers from scratch, so I decided to teach her how to make an upside down cake, this time apricot , as I had a tin of them. 

 

Turned out lovely and I love apricots so been very nice with a cup of tea, and heated for dessert with ice cream.

 

 Till Next Time, stay safe.