Garden

I have not updated much on the garden and I think now is a good time to do so. The children and I have had so much fun going and discovering what little treats our garden has left us each and every day.

The cucumbers have been plentiful and we have shared several from our crop with friends & family. I have loved making cucumber salad with these little delicacies, or simply slicing them up and adding them to sandwiches.

creative organic learners funny face

 

Harvested cucumbers

Here are some of our squash that we harvested recently.

And then we decided that our watermelon was taking over the whole garden area, It had exploded over the box, across the yard and into the other boxes. 

moon & stars watermelon

Heart of Gold Cantaloupe

For some reason one of the watermelon's (the bigger of the two) was not ripe yet even though it felt ripe. The cantaloupe was so soft, sweet and juicy. 

Having a garden has been more fun then I could have imagined it being. I believe we will be starting some winter crops soon, we LOVE broccoli, and cauliflower, and some of the other veggies that are grown in the late fall/early winter. It is nearly time to clear out the boxes once the fruit that is still growing is finished ripening. I am disappointed that my tomatoes never really ripened, we do have some green ones on the vine and maybe I will still get some but we are quickly coming to a point where we wont have the chance for them to get ripe. 

Dream Big

As the mother and teacher to my 4 growing kids I am always telling them to dream big. Nothing is to big for you to accomplish. This is not something they always believe when I tell them, its hard to believe when your a child that you really can accomplish anything if you put your mind, and passion to it.

That is what I am doing with my dreams, dreaming big! I want one day to own & run a B&B. Maybe it that does not seem like a grand thing to many people but for me it sounds like so much fun. I love the quaintness of a B&B for relaxing in, I have visited many over the years. Some are rather close to home, because as the mother of 4 children we don't like to go to far when they are to young. The first B&B we ever stayed in was in the town I live in, when my oldest two were 4 & 2, my husband and I needed some time alone and this provided a great place to just relax! The Harkey House has great local history and was so much fun to hear stories about the first sheriff of this town we live in. Since then we have stayed at several other B&B's usually for our anniversary. We make it a point to go away together at least once a year, it is so important to keeping a relationship healthy, getting time alone. Our latest trip was a fantastic voyage to Fort Bragg California. We went for 3 nights and enjoyed so much of our time together! We stayed in a lovely victorian home that was modified to a wonderful B&B blocks from the ocean, called Glass Beach Inn. Over the years we have stayed at The Grateful bed, The Riverside B&B in oroville, that seems to be closed now, as well as a wonderful one tucked into a wonderful little town known as Placerville called The Glen Morey house. Each of these visits has only taken my dreams to new heights.

 I want to put my personal touches on things and use my creative talents to allow others a peaceful place to relax in. I love to cook, bake and create. When I am doing those things I find that is when I am my most authentic self. I am Happy in the kitchen, I am happy having a place to create wonderful dishes that please other people. I love seeing people smile when my food hits their pallet and they are enticed by my creative spice choices. I love decorating the home, if I had the finances I would have different fabrics and patterns for each season in my home personally. So taking all these things I love and combining them into one big thing seems like the most logical thing in the world to me.

I dream at night that my B&B is just on the outskirts of some town, where I have a flower garden, and a food garden. I dream that my home will be a relaxing environment to come to and that I can add my homemade touches of crocheted afghans, baked breads, cookies, and cakes, and where there is a wonderful reading library for those who want to to sit and enjoy a good book snuggled under one of those crocheted afghans.

Here are a few of the pictures that I have taken over the years that have inspired me in my love of a B&B...

a flower bed 

 scrabble tiles that included our names

If you have never enjoyed the accommodations of a B&B I would like to encourage you to give it a shot. If you figure in the cost of a hotel room + your breakfast you really are not spending anymore for a cozy more home like feel. In fact I have found you are likely spending less. A good B&B offers week day rates that are less then weekend rates and if you can take advantage of that by getting a Thursday- Saturday stay or a Sunday-Tuesday stay you will spend less and get great service. You also will have a pleasant personal experience then a cold impersonal hotel room. One other thing to remember about B&B's is that they are all locally owned, when you support a local business over a large chain you help out your local economy, or the local economy of the location the B&B is located in. Supporting small businesses is so very important in this economy, but that is a blog for another day...

So remember to Dream BIG!

Almost

I am a part time college student, in my spare time ya know. I am taking 2 classes this semester and am working towards a degree in culinary arts. I love to cook! It truly is my passion. One day very soon I will post a blog that is ladened with pictures of all the culinary goodies I like to make, it will surely make your mouth water. In the mean time I have been a stay at home mom, and homeschool Organic Learning teacher for 16+ years. I have not held a job outside the home in that amount of time. Since my husband was laid off and we live in such a poor area it has been difficult to find work for him. We are waiting for active duty orders to come through so he can just finish out his active duty time and collect his retirement. So when I went looking for work that I had plenty of "home" experience in I was denied time and time again because there are just to many people out there who have "work" experience that can do the job. So I decided that it would be a good idea to get my degree in Culinary Arts so that in a few years I can then either get a part time job working in the field I love, or open my own business like I really want to do... The dream is to own a B&B (Bed & Breakfast), If you have never had the pleasure of staying in a B&B you should check it out sometime.

At any rate when Daughter M got sick 4 weeks ago my schooling was a bit derailed. The first week she was home and I stayed on top of things okay. It was when she went into the hospital and stayed in the ICU for 9 days that I slowly started slipping behind. My professors have been very understanding and even allowed me extra time to make up some of my work. You would not believe how much time it takes to make up work once your behind! As of Friday I had 6 history lectures to review and take notes on, 2 health lectures to review and take notes on, a test in health AND a 2 week food journal to type out and save. This food journal had to be started while I was taking shifts staying with my daughter in the ICU so it is not really a good example of my daily eating habits. It is frustrating to have to take notes on what your eating daily.

As of today I only have about 5 days of food journaling to finish typing up and then I am completely caught up with both my classes! I am sick of typing up food entries. It is rather tedious to type out all the different things you ate and drank in a day, but at least I can get it done quickly and be ALL caught up!

As for Daughter M, She got her staples out today and is recovering nicely after having her appendix rupture from the tip. The dr said that it rotted instead of truly rupturing. I am so amazed by the body! her body attempted to heal itself by wrapping the Omentum around the ruptured appendix to stop the leakage of bacteria. Simply amazing! Of course we are grateful that the dr was able to remove the offending appendage and clean out the infection, saving Daughter M's life. She was seriously ill for many weeks, but now she is almost healthy.

Going Green

As a homeschooling teacher we have spent a lot of our energy learning about current affairs in the world. The decline of the ice caps is a big concern for us as family and should be a global concern. This adventure started about 3 years ago for us. My son A who is a very hands on learner (don't know your learning style? find out for yourself here) also known as a tactile or kinesthetic learner, likes to build or do things in order to fully understand them.  


Our knowledge slowly grew from one thing to the next. We started by learning all about planned obsolescence when we watched The story of Stuff by Annie Leonard. We love all of Annie's videos, they tackle complex problems with a very clear understanding that even my youngest can understand. We as a family feel it is very important to cut back on the "stuff" in our life. Do we really have to have that latest gadget? We feel that if we don't step up and cut back on those things we don't need to have we are simply compounding a problem that was started decades ago and has just boomed to a point where we are all drowning in "stuff". 


So as I was saying we started this project because my son A wanted to get his hands on some projects. We started learning about solar power, & solar energy. Since we live in a rental we can not build solar panels and live with solar energy producing most of our electric needs, yet! We actually are discussing ways to build a portable solar panel system that can at least do part of the energy work for us. That is still in the works for now. A great book on solar is Power from the sun: a practical guide to solar energy.  We started simple though and built a small solar oven, kinda like this. The biggest problem we had with this was location. Our backyard is covered with a pergola and does not offer a lot of good sunlight locations. 


In the grand scheme of things we are working towards becoming more green, not because its cool or the 'in thing' to do but because it is the right thing to do. We carry our own water bottles when we can, we do not buy non essential items, we shop in thrift stores when we can, we do not shop in box stores if we can shop anywhere else first, we do try to fix what we can on our own first. Living green does not mean you can't have nice things, or that you have to give up modern convenience. It does mean that you have to be aware of the cost of those things. We are a small car, one car family right now. We do not do a lot of travel right now because we feel strongly that our dependency on oil is not healthy. If we could get a car that was diesel and then convert it to bio-diesel or veggie oil we would like to travel all over the united states on grand adventures, but for now we are doing our part. 


We all need to remember that this is our planet and if we keep polluting it with toxins all over the place then we eventually will have no where else to live. I personally want the beauty of this world to survive so I can take more pictures like these:

plum tree in bloom this spring

The Sutter Buttes California

sunset from my backyard

Canadian geese flying in front of moon

natures bird bath

ocean after a storm in Fort Bragg California