Category Archives: home

Fantasy, Food, Gatherings, home, Seasons, The Baboon Congress, Uncategorized

Dinner For Twelve

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Last weekend was a real scramble dealing with all the garden produce that chose to ripen at the same time. We made our tried and true Minestrone ala Milanese recipe from Anna Thomas’ Vegitarian Epicure. It makes twelve or more servings, and I thought what a good thing to have on hand if a Congress of Baboons showed up at the door!

That really got me imagining how I would go about feeding a mixed bunch of vegetarians and omnivores at the same time. I think it could be quite fun. I haven’t settled on a menu yet, but it is fun to think about.

What would you serve at a dinner party for twelve people of differing food preferences?

Automotive, Family, Food, home, Science, Technology, Uncategorized

New Toys

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Husband’s new smoker/grill arrived on Tuesday. You can see it in the header photo.  It is quite the machine, something my dad would have called a “delicate piece of equipment” given all the complexity involved in using it. It is iron, true. It took two trips to the hardware store just to unpack it. We needed a tin snips to cut the thick, wire strapping that secured its protective wrappings. Then we found it was firmly attached to a heavy wooden pallet by screws that had odd heads needing  a bit with a square head for the electric screwdriver.  I am thankful I managed to remove the screws without stripping them.  What would we have done then?!

Husband has waited years for this grill with the same anticipation as a child waiting for a long hoped-for special toy at Christmas. His first smoked sausage and country style pork ribs turned just as he wanted.  We are truly blessed with good cooking equipment.

What is the most complex piece of equipment you ever had to operate? What is your favorite cooking vessel or utensil. 

 

education, Family, Food, gardening, home, Nature, Uncategorized

84 Pounds of Pickles

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I have never been able to do math in my head. Husband is far better at it, but last week he failed at basic math hilariously while using a calculator.

Husband found some lovely vegetables at an Adventist farm  stand.  (Adventists are supposed to be vegetarian,  but I find it humorous that some of our most prominent local  Adventists are big time cattle ranchers.) We decided to make German  refrigerator pickles with them.  The recipe called for four quarts of brine and one cauliflower,  one carrot, twelve pearl onions, two cucumbers, and two bell peppers. It all had to sit in the brine in a steel pot in the refrigerator for a week.

We have a refrigerator in the basement just for this purpose,  but we are always concerned about the weight on the shelves. Husband calculated the weight of everything and worriedly told me that we couldn’t possibly put the brine pot in the fridge because it weighed 84 pounds.

Well, that just didn’t make sense to me, and after some sturm und drang, Husband recalculated and determined it all weighed 8 pounds. The veggies are brining  away in the pot in the fridge.  Now I can finally tease him about his math skills.

How are your Math skills?  What kinds of Math are easiest for you? When have you miscalculated?

animals, Family, Health, home, Seasons, Uncategorized

Keeping House

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Today’s post comes from Linda.

One of the projects I have been putting off way too long, and finally got to this summer, was to re-roof an old birdhouse I’d gotten from one of my gardening clients. It’s a very old weathered wood house that had been chewed on by a critter of some sort, and I had put it aside when the old roof fell apart.

I rounded up the wood scraps, saw, hammer, nails, ruler and pencil necessary to play Norm Abram for an hour, and hung the completed project on a panel of the old gazebo out back.

I felt rather pleased to be able to check it off my to-do list, but even more pleased when two days later I spotted some nesting material poking out of the opening.

After consulting a local wild bird store, I invested in some live mealworms to help provide a steady food supply for the parents and the offspring that were likely to follow soon. One of the parent birds became quite bold when s/he realized what I was delivering, and would come perch on the feeder while I sprinkled the mealworms from the container. The birds became a bit shy when I tried to film them, but I captured a few short videos of feeding time.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/l17jw3bbm3u7vjw/wren2.mov?dl=0

The activity intensified when the little ones hatched out. They were hungry, and talked about it a lot. The bold little wren actually brushed a wing against my hand one morning in its eagerness to get breakfast started. I was a little concerned that it was becoming too tame for its own good!

Do you cut corners on safety when you’re in a hurry? Do you worry about your family and friends who do?

animals, Art, Family, Food, home, Kids, pets, Uncategorized

Birthday Art

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Last week was my birthday.  I learned a long time ago that I don’t want to wait around to have friends/family bring celebration to me; if I want a particular celebration, then I just make it happen.  I came to this revelation after wasband #1 and I split up.  It was Valentine’s Day and I was feeling sorry for myself so I went out and bought myself a small bouquet of flowers, some heart-shaped balloons and a couple of pink frosted donuts with sprinkles (one for me, one for the dog).  I had also scored a big box from the new tv of the neighbors (Katy Scarlett loved to sit in big boxes and then eventually destroy them) which I decorated with red and pink markers for her.  Turned out to be a great day and a great lesson for myself.

This is not to say that I don’t love what friends/family do for me – I think when folks think of me it means MORE to me because I am self-sufficient in the “celebrate me” arena.  This year I had an especially nice surprise.  While I was out walking the dog that morning, the little girls next door (Margot and Matilda) came over and did chalk decorations all over my sidewalk.  I’m sure they had help from their parents, but the rainbows and butterflies were clearly Margot’s inspiration.  It was so touching – it’s still there a week later although getting a little faded from folks walking on it and the couple of rain sprinkles.  It was the best birthday wish I got this year!

Do you have a favorite neighbor?  Or a not-favorite one?

education, Food, home, Travel, Uncategorized

Frozen Treats

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I have always loved popsicles.  I ate so many as a small child that I got lots of cavities in my teeth. My early favorites were the blue raspberry ones. Ice cream bars were never a favorite,  not until I spent a month in the summer after Grade 11 in Saltillo, Mexico studying Spanish. It was hot there in July, and I discovered a world of wonderful frozen confections. My favorite were strawberry ice cream bars with a ripe strawberry at the base. I looked for them in vain in the grocery store back home, but never found them again. I stopped eating popsickles and ice cream bars over the years.   My frozen treat consumption had dwindled to mainly bowls of vanilla  ice cream.

Just the other day I was wheeling my cart past the frozen treat section at Walmart when I spied some interesting looking frozen treats with a lot of Spanish words on the boxes. I bought some ice cream ones and some fruity ones that had the slightest hint of hot chili. They were all wonderful, and the strawberry  ones were very much like the Saltillo strawberry bars. I am in Heaven!

What were your favorite summer treats as a child? What do you like now?

 

100 Words, education, Gatherings, Health, home, Media, Uncategorized

Staying Home

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Perhaps I’m odd. Perhaps my early years as an only child enhanced my ability to entertain myself. Perhaps I have forgotten what it was like to be young.  I just can’t understand why people are having such a hard time staying at home.

I see in my Facebook feed challenges to live for  a couple of months off the grid in a remote cabin, and winning a bunch of money. Heck, we have all sorts of entertainment in our living spaces, yet people continue to crowd into bars and large parties.

My  question for the Baboons today is:

Why is it so hard to stay home?  What would you include in a tutorial that would help people stay put?  How would you manage in a remote cabin off the grid for a couple of months?

Family, gardening, home, Kids, Uncategorized, work

Digging a Hole

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I can get really dirty when I’m working in the yard and putting in a new fence post this week made for TWO seriously dirty days.

The fence was initially installed in the end of April 1991, right after I moved in, so I didn’t have to take the dogs out on leashes six or seven times a day so they could do their business.  One of the fence posts was replaced years ago and the others have slowly deteriorated over time.  I have a huge black steel fence post “holder” keeping one up and my handy man did a serious MacGyver on another one last November when the ground was already frozen.  YA and I decided to replace the saggiest one and see what lessons we learned before attempting the MacGyvered one.

All the online advice talks about how hard it is to get the previous concrete out and they weren’t kidding.  The hole was humungous because we couldn’t get any leverage in a smaller hole.  We finally got down to where we needed to be and we measured the post and I sawed it off to the right height.  Then on Day 2 we got an ugly surprise; the very corner where there post needed to go had an old remnant of the initial fence post.  Believe me when I tell you it doesn’t take thousands of years for old wood to calcify.  It took an hour, a saw, a drill with 2 different bits, one dandelion digger that didn’t survive the ordeal and a hammer to finally clear that corner.

So the post is in, I’ve taken another super serious shower and some ibuprofen for my sore shoulders.  YA and I had lunch after we had finished and we both agreed that we learned a lesson that we could apply to the gate post – that we were hiring someone else to do it!

Any projects that you’ve gotten dirty doing?

 

animals, Family, gardening, Health, home, Uncategorized

Tales of Woe

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Last week I got bitten by a bee, on my bottom lip.  I felt the bee start to fly in my mouth (I’m sure that’s not where he/she meant to go) and I spit it out pretty quickly, but not before I got a mild sting.  No big swelling, no allergic reaction but it did hurt for a few days.  On Day 3, if I looked REALLY hard, I could see a teeny whitish blister.  Kinda.  Certainly no one else could see it, including YA.

Then on Monday, while hammering a nail in the bathroom, I missed the nail and whacked by left index finger something good.  I swore so loudly that I had to go apologize to the neighbors.  It really hurt.  No bruise, no blood under the fingernail.  Nothing except for the lingering soreness.

Now I don’t know about you but I think if you get hurt enough that it still hurts after a day or so, you should get a little bruise or a blister or something.  It doesn’t have to be some egregious wound, just a little badge of honor for your pain.

Have you ever received a trophy (or badge or prize)?

Family, Food, home, Kids, Uncategorized

Who’s Choosing the Menu?

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After the great naan breakfast recipe last week, we had ricotta cheese left.  I hate throwing out food so I bought some lasagna noodles and told YA what I was going to make.

The morning I started to make the dish, YA wandered into the kitchen.  “Make lasagna rolls instead of regular lasagna” she said.  I whined and said this was a lot more work than just quickly layering stuff into one pan.  She whined a bit more and I told her (as I was putting the noodles into the boiling water) that I would think about it.  This is straight-up parent-speak for “No, but I want you to quit bugging me about it.”

She left me in the kitchen and a few minutes later, I heard the vacuum running upstairs.  I made the lasagna rolls.

Is there anybody who can push your buttons this well?