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The Garden at the Turn of the Month
It seems like nature has switched ‘on’ and the plants are ready for spring. Overnight, blooms are coming out of seemingly nowhere. Sugar daddy snap pea bud Sugar daddy snap pea blossom The Brussels sprouts have not done that great. Unfortunately we have a row of beds that gets a lot of shade in the winter. The shade comes from a rodeo shelter that blocks a lot of sunlight from mid-morning to mid-afternoon, thus some of the plants in this section are stunted. I think the sprouts would have matured more had they had access to more light. I’ve been eyeing their leaves to add into my morning green smoothies,…
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Florida Trail ‘Summit’ | One Year Ago
Sunrise at Gulf Islands National Seashore, March 3, 2011….18 miles left until we finished. Finished! We walked through Florida! On top of Fort Pickens How was this a year ago? It seems like closer than that. While the Appalachian Trail seems light years away now, I think the Florida Trail seems closer because of our closer relationship with Florida itself. While I am glad to be in Texas again, I sometimes wish I had done more exploring and had gotten to know Florida more intimately, exploring its other locales. Despite the road walks, I do recommend hiking this trail. It’s a ‘quick’ trail, it’s flat and it offers up habitats…
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Rainy Weekend at Huntsville State Park
Early in the year Chris had scheduled out several camping trips throughout the spring. I had warned that he could potentially be in the field all spring—things hadn’t started up yet and he not received word about work. Even so, he made reservations to many state parks in anticipation of spring wildflower season. So far we’ve had to cancel most of them, but we rescheduled this trip to Huntsville State Park to a weekend sooner then planned since he was going to be off that weekend. Unfortunately a cool front with rain came through causing us to postpone leaving to the campground until early afternoon, when the rains had passed.…
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Prolific | February Wrap-Up
So. February. Was a bit better than January but still proved to be hectic. Writing went well, mostly because I also busted out about 4,000 words over the weekend. Honestly, if I just devoted an hour to it at least a few times a week with a larger spurt in the weekend things would be done faster. But I often find so many other things to do, which shouldn’t be the case. Alas, I’m happy with getting that much written. Running. Well, 9 isn’t good either. I have made myself a schedule for the next month though and hopefully that number goes up as does the yoga. I ran 3…
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Sunday with a Red Admiral
Taken *last* Sunday at our community garden, perched on the flowers of a cabbage, Vanessa atalanta the red admiral butterfly +This week…this week….whew, I am glad it is done. I ended up in the field for a few days, honestly thinking it was going to be two days max, but then it looked like it was going to bleed into the weekend. Chris is in the field full-time right now but the project I was on was nearby so luckily I was able to stay in his hotel with him. When I realized I needed to run home to check on the cats, mostly because I wasn’t sure if I’d…
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The Turnip Harvest
We pulled all of the Golden Ball Turnips last weekend in an effort to make room for a spring crop of cucumbers. Some of the turnips were gigantic, including some that I had thinned and transplanted in a spot that we’d just harvested radishes several months ago. We took the turnips home and made two batches of mashed turnips and froze them for future eating. I love having all of this food, but I can’t wait to get a deep freezer and more storage space for keeping food for throughout the year.
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Texas Wildflowers | Erythronium albidum, Trout Lily
Trout lilies are wonderful and beautiful native wildflowers, blooming early in the spring, really late winter. The last two years we’ve ventured out to Tandy Hills to check them out. The first year we found many blooms, but last year not so much. This year I ventured out with with my brother to show him where a small population of them were; he’d never seen them. When we arrived I didn’t think there were any blooms yet. I’d thought there would be with the warmer winter we’ve had this year. But it took looking a little closer to find the flowers. Most were just budding but one was fully open.…
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The Creative Process
The other day I was lamenting that it is incredibly frustrating that I have my best creative moments in the middle of the work day. Those moments where I think, ‘Man, I wish I was at home because I could really get some writing/art/whatever done right now.’ So, in those moments, in the middle of the day I get excited for my creative energy and inspiration and then, what happens? I go home. And what happens when I go home? I’m hit with being tired, lack of motivation and an overall brain drain from working on projects for clients instead of my own works. I thought about this as I…
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The Final Product| Sauerkraut
Last week, about a month into the fermentation of the sauerkraut, I skimmed off the last bits of mold that had formed on the surface water and jarred up the sauerkraut. I gave it a taste beforehand and it tasted pretty good. Still crunchy and there was no mold growing on the actual cabbage itself. Will I make sauerkraut again? Maybe. I know we will have more cabbage in the garden in the future and it is hard to eat it all so I may end up doing this again. I might try the jar method next time. I only put the sauerkraut in the jars and stuck them in…
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The Great Sprout Experiment
A few weeks ago I was at a local garden center, The Arbor Gate, and they had some seeds on clearance. I found a package of broccoli sprouts and jumped at the chance to try them out. I thought it would be fun to see how it worked but also to have sprouts on hand, and a specific amount of sprouts at that. Of course it takes a few days to have sprouts ready, but if you were planning a meal for a few days out that involved sprouts, it would be easy to start. I always feel bad when I waste sprouts bought at the store because it is…