Precious Moments

Reflections

Tuesday was granddaughter Addies 5th birthday. Since we’ve been having surprisingly warm fall weather, we decided to have a small birthday celebration for her at the farm last Saturday.

Tina and Ken arrived with Jackson and Addie just as I arrived with the pizza. We started our picnic outdoors with pizza before a few sprinkles of rain moved us into the barn.

It was actually good timing since it would have been difficult to light the candles on the birthday doughnuts outside in the wind.

The doughnuts were a huge hit as Addie proclaimed, “this is the best birthday ever!”

This picture leaves no doubt about how much they loved the doughnuts.

Presents were next. We got Jackson and Addie each a coloring book and a book of nursery rhymes. A bit later they each spent some time reading and coloring.

Addie modeled, as she put it, “my beautiful new dress” and matching hair scrunchie that I made for her. She also showed me how she could make the skirt twirl by “spinning around on one foot.”

The rain had stopped, so grandpa and dad got out Jackson and Addie’s EV (electric vehicle) that we keep at the farm. Dad put the battery in it and Jackson and Addie took turns driving it around.

At one point, when Jackson was driving, he stopped near where his mom was standing. He asked her for a coke and when she replied that we didn’t have any coke he told her “No, just pretend.” It was then that she realized that she was (pretend) working at a fast-food drive-through and she dutifully filled his (pretend) order. After placing his order in the back, he drove on to the (pretend) grocery store. 🙂

Addy was thrilled when she and I found an egg in the chicken coop. “I can use that to make my egg salad,” she told me. (Egg salad sandwiches are her favorite lunch.) Of course, I gave it to her to take home. Other activities including playing ball with Ruby, giving lovin’ to Ranger and Peanut and feeding carrots to Colby Jack and Bernard (the neighbors horses).

What blessed day it was!

I don’t know who enjoyed the day more – Jackson and Addie or Grandma and Grandpa, but as they were leaving, and Addie asserted “I want to come back,” she was assured by everyone that we would do this again.

Halloween Costume

Halloween, homemade, Reflections, Sewing

In early October my daughter sent me this message “Hey mom, I’m trying to be a bat for Halloween, but I also like the idea of having something I can wear for more than one day and I came across this shawl. What are the odds you (or I) could make something like this by late October? Just curious. Thanks!” This was what she wanted me to create.

I chuckled thinking “No way!” (First of all I don’t knit. Second it would take me way longer than a month to make something like that.) Then I smiled thinking that she must think I am some kind of ‘super woman’. LOL!

I then went online to see what I could find that might work for her. My reply to her was “That’s not much time for a crocheted shawl. The sewing pattern shirt (linked) below could be done easily. The crocheted pattern (linked) below I could do but probably not in time. Check out the links below. ” I had found this sewing pattern and this crochet pattern.

When we talked, we decided I would sew the batwing shirt for her. It was a very simple pattern and reading the tutorial that I linked above made it even easier. Here’s how it turned out.

Thanks for reading and Happy Haunting!

Easy Pickled Garlic

garlic, Garlic Recipe, Pickled Garlic, Reflections

As we finished one of the jars of refrigerator dill pickles that I made earlier this year my husband and I each ate one of the garlic cloves that were in the bottom of the jar. That pickled garlic was so good that I decided to make some more.

I used the brine and dill that were already in the jar and just peeled a bunch of garlic cloves to add to it. These cloves will now bath in that brine in the frig for and in a couple of weeks we will have more delicious, pickled garlic. YUMM!

Have you ever reused pickle brine/juice?

Planting Garlic 2022

Planting Garlic, Reflections

Hello and welcome!

If you are thinking about planting garlic and live in northern parts of the US or Canada, it’s time to plant. We planted ours this week.

The sky was blue and temperatures warm as we arrived at the farm Tuesday (October 11) afternoon to plant garlic. With rain in the forecast for Wednesday and temperatures cooling after that, Tuesday was our best opportunity to complete this task and it was a great day to “play in the dirt”.

We had about 330 cloves to plant. A bit more than last year but nowhere near the up to 8000 we have planted in previous years. I had split the bulbs into cloves the day before.

My husband had prepared the ground earlier in the day and laid out the line for our first row. The soil was like dust. I don’t ever remember it being so dry when we planted garlic. According to the US drought monitor map we are in a moderate drought.

Long time followers will likely remember how we use the lattice as a grid for planting our rows. We plant the spaces that have four across and leave empty the ones that have three across. Our lattice panels are 2 ft. by 8 ft. We can plant 64 cloves spaced 6 inches apart in each panel.

Ranger and Ruby ran around and played in the area as we worked. They are such good dogs.

It only took about an hour to get the planting done. I was surprised at how quickly we were finished. We decided to wait to mulch it hoping it would get a little rain first.

As we finished this task there was still time to enjoy some of this beautiful day. 🙂

Thanks for visiting.