Three months ago we purchased the Bushnell 8MP Trophy Cam Standard Edition
More Fall Color
Oh, I love this time of the year. The air is cool, but not cold here in NC. The colors this week were just fabulous! I believe we hit our peak. I just Ooooo and Ahhhh on my drives to and from work each day. I am so blessed to have such beautiful scenery along the way. I have tried to take many a photo to capture the brilliance, but only a few really show up.
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| View at My Parking Space at Work |
Witch Fingers for Halloween Party
Recently, I was trying to find a neat spooky treat to make for a soccer Halloween party. I found a couple of ideas on pinterest to try. As sometimes happens some of the ideas did not turn out as easy and cute as it looked on pinterest. However, I did have much success making witch fingers. So, when Sarah and I decided to make them again yesterday for our family Monster Mash Halloween party I thought I would take some pictures of the process.
We started with vanilla white chocolate squares. I used the store brand for Candy Quick. I have tried melting chocolate and white chocolate in a double boiler, but it can be tricky. I do find that working with the microwave to melt the white chocolate is so much easier. It comes in a tray that you can just melt the squares in.
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Fall Around Our Place
You would think that now it is fall things may be slowing down around here and I would have a little bit of time for blogging. But it seems my paying job, church, and Sarah’s ever busy calendar has kept me on the go. I must admit I am looking forward to slowing down a bit and trying to get back to a little crocheting. But I cannot seem to be still long enough for that or when I do have a moment, I’m just so darn tired and brain dead.
Sunday afternoon I had a couple of hours to myself. I walked around and took inventory of how everything was looking around our place. I honestly have not done much of that lately. Jon has been doing most of the lingering garden tasks as things were still growing and coming in. I decided to take a few photos as I did my walk about.
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| The Crabapple Tree is Loaded Down |
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Lavender Oatmeal Facial Scrub
Over the last 6 months or so I have been experiencing some changes to how products I have used for years work on my face like (soap, facial scrub, and make-up). I’m sure it is due to being 38 years old and my body and skin’s chemical make up or something is changing. I have always used a particular store bought facial scrub brand for many years that all of a sudden makes my skin burn like fire and turn bright red! At first I tried different products, but they still caused irritation. Then I decided to go with no product on my face at all but water and to only wear make up on my eyes. Finally, I wasn’t having the fiery burning any more. After some time I thought I would start trying more natural products on my face. I decided to try making up a batch of homemade lavender oatmeal facial scrub.
Bare Root Raspberries 8 Month Progress
Back in February we planted 2 Latham and 2 Heritage Everbearing bare root raspberry canes. We were pleasantly surprised when they began growing and did not die like our attempt last year. But what was even more amazing to us is that the 2 Heritage Everbearing canes were putting out fruit! A few weeks ago we were doing our evening walk in the garden and out of the corner of my eye I saw bright red over at the raspberries.
Natural Remedies for ADHD
Treating ADHD with medication has become as standard as handing out ibuprofen. Unfortunately, the use of these types of medication also creates a long list of potential side effects ranging from mild symptoms – such as irritability, stomach ache, and insomnia – to more serious symptoms like high blood pressure, psychiatric episodes, substance abuse and irregular heart rate.
Harvesting and Curing Onions
Knowing the proper time to harvest veggies from the garden can be difficult. Luckily, with onions there is no guess work. You can harvest onions throughout the season to use as you need them, or you can leave them in the ground to get bigger bulbs. Once the tops of the onions fall over and dry out, the onion bulb will stop growing.
Harvesting the onions can be as simple as grasping the stalk and pulling. The bulb should pop right out of the ground. If you have a stubborn onion, you can simply stab a small hand spade under the onion and pop it out, just be careful to not hit the onion.
Once the onions are harvested, they need cured prior to storage. It is best to harvest the onions on a warm sunny day, so you can let your onions begin to cure in the sun for a day or two. After that, or if the weather is not cooperating, they need to be placed in a shady location with good airflow. Good airflow is very important so make sure they are spread out and not stack on top of each other. We used a short, wide crate with lots of air holes. You can lay them out on a table, or even braid the stalks of several onions together and hang them to cure.
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| Onions curing in our crate. |
After curing for two to three weeks, the roots and any stalk remaining should be dry and brown. Also the skin of the onion should be very dry like paper. After this onions can be stored in a cool dry place. Onions properly cured can be stored for up to six months.
More from the Winter Onions Series:
Our First Winter Onions
4 Month Update
5 Month Update (Comparison to Annual Onion Sets)
6 Month Update
Harvesting and Curing Onions
One Year Update
It’s NOT the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!
No, it’s NOT the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown! However, we did officially have a “pumpkin harvest”….barely.
Last year we only planted mini pumpkins. They started out great, but the stink bugs destroyed them literally over night. This year we had higher hopes. Cornfield Pumpkin and Connecticut Field Pumpkin seeds is what we planted this year. As par for the course, we do not remember which we planted where. So, as they grew we did not know what we had. Does anyone else do these kinds of things?!?
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Chicken Cam: 6 and 7 Months Old
It seems time has just flown by recently. There has been so much to get done. It occurred to me that I haven’t taken any pictures of the chickens in quite a while and my have they grown! We had such a gorgeous day today. We were just enjoying the beautiful day that God had blessed us with (for the little bit we had at home this afternoon) and so were the chickens.
6 Months Old: Our Barred Rock Roo, The Hoff, and One of the Barred Rock Pullets
(They are Technically Pullets Until 1 Year Old)