Seed Balls

Last year I decided to add flowers to our garden that I could cut for the table. I grew zinnias, cosmos and had one humongo (yea that's a word in my extensive vocabulary)marigold that I grew from seed. I grew them all from seed which makes a gardener all the more proud. They ended up on the table, in beautiful pictures and the remnants of them in seed form found themselves in jars on the top shelf of my goodie cabinet in the kitchen. Over the winter I pondered on what to do with all the seeds. I can just picture them lining the fields of our farm with red, pink and orange blooms. But what are you supposed to do, just throw them out there? Without tilling up the ground where they'll go they would either get eaten by birds or wash away. The areas that I have to put them aren't the best in flat ground. I needed a different approach. I remembered reading about making seed balls out of red clay, potting soil or compost, water and seeds. Combining these ingredients, besides making a mess, creates little balls of seeds with their own ecosystem. You can throw them where ever and they'll stay put. The spring rains will dissolve them in their soil and the seeds will come up without having to break the ground. The clay holds them together.

I found a place in Nashville where you could buy powdered clay pretty cheap and also bought a bag of Black Gold compost potting soil. No I do not compost... I know.. I should and one day I feel that I will take this step in gardening. I am afraid of attracting unwanted critters to eat the scraps it takes to make compost. It's just one of those things.

Back to the balls. There is a really good tutorial here. I realize that I should have made my own tutorial and please forgive me for not doing so but this stuff makes the kind of mess that you don't want to get on your camera. Never-the-less it was fun and I hope that it brings rewards that line our farm with beautiful blooms this summer. In the spots my weed killing husband misses that is!

Pretty Little Things

I love a good Saturday early morning phone call with my sister that begins with "yard sale" or "estate sale" and ends in "see you in a few." It means there are deals to be hunted for and found. Deals that we are durn near professionals at finding. We aren't the coo coos that show up as the homeowners are rolling out of bed or still unpacking boxes. We figure they get all the junk out of the way so the good stuff can be seen. And good stuff we found this past Saturday! We hit two estate sales but could have actually called it quits after the first one. The prices were oh so right to begin with but as we walked in the door, this being the last day of the sale, we heard the words "Half Off." Music to our ears. The pickin' began and here's what I found.

I ADORE stitch work, needlepoint. These were made by a lady named Betty Smith and range in dates from 1975 to 1979. There were a lot more there than the five that I bought but these were my faves.
These little geese were my first pick ups. No makers mark or dates that I could find. Aren't they just a pair of cuties though. For fifty cents I couldn't say no to them.

This pair of cookbooks turned out to be a real find once I got them home. My guess is that they are part of a book-a-month club. They are full of separate cookbooks on subjects from The French Cookbook to The Lunchbox Cookbook. They are from the mid fifties and are so colorful and jam packed with recipes.


These two prints are actually framed ceramic tiles that could be taken apart and installed. The sayings are from Poor Richard's Almanac (whatever that is)and have great vintage kitchen appeal. Not sure what I'll do with them yet but the more I look at them the more I like them and for a dollar... couldn't leave them behind.
The trunk actually came from a yard sale that I didn't want to stop at. When you can see tons of kid clothes and toys from the road I am liable to opt out. Not my sister... she's a true picker. There were two trunks, this one being a little smaller than the other (and locked!) They had three dollars marked on them and when we showed interest the homeowner dropped the price to two for five dollars... sold. We wound up flipping a dime to see which one got which one. The enamel teapot (enamelware being my other love besides my husband and pets) in it's orange glory was a great find by my sister. We speak an unspoken language when it comes to enamel... I get it. She gets the roosters :) She held it up and I held out my hands and wound up buying it for one dollar. Word to the wise and curious... Trophies are "in" in home decorating. Coming to a mantle near you.
I have to begin summing this up but it is hard to do. I came home with a trunk, and chair and two sacks full of goodies from two estate sales and two yard sales and all was picked, bought and home within a three hour time span. I told you.. we are professionals here. Don't mess with us and don't get in our way... we'll see you at the next sale down the road.

Here's the overview pic. It includes everything but the chair... I think. It may not look like much to you. You may have chosen totally different items. Or you may have sat your happy tail on the couch. But these are my Saturday morning treasures carefully chosen and picked. Keep in mind that the opportunity was there to bring home much, much more but I am married and I want to keep it that way. And the season has just begun.

Oh and here's the chair... and my FooFee. Thanks for your interest in my worldly goods. Not worldly really... just Springfield.

A Helpful Potato Trick

A wise old dude up at the feed mill (as my husband described him)told Shaun's Dad about this little trick.

Two years ago, as we did not grow potatoes last year, we grew potatoes on our farm and Shaun's Dad grew potatoes on the farm next to ours. While the potatoes did turn out fantastic, both stored and canned, we had a time fighting potato bugs. I have a book, Rodale's, Successful Organic Gardening, Controlling Pests and Diseases, which is handy to have as it has pictures and describes just about any problematic insect one might find in their garden. This book calls our potato bug Colorado Potato Beetle. These little reddish orange bugs with black spots (in their larvae stage) nearly devastated our crop eating leaves and stems which wound up killing several of our plants.

On the next farm over, no bugs were found. Potatoes were put out at the same time only about a quarter of a mile in distance from each other yet Gary's potato plants had no bugs. We found out what he had done and are well on our way to giving it a try for ourselves this year and I am going to share the tip with you. How it works I'm not sure. If it will work... I intend on finding out. The canned potatoes were like gold to me, all the way to the last jar. I aim on canning more this year.

Buy a regular pack of potatoes which you can find at the hardware store or feed mill this time of year in whatever variety you wish. Take each starter potato and cut the ends off. Not a huge chunk just chop off a sliver. Next, in order to make more plants, cut each potato in to fours. If it is a large starter you can make six. Slice across and the across each piece again. Lay the wedges on a tray and store in a safe place, away from bugs or mice, or dogs, or cats. In about a week the potato starters will heal, as Shaun calls it, and will be ready for planting. Once in the ground each one will sprout, a plant will form on top of the ground and little to big potatoes underneath amongst the roots and hopefully this little trick has worked and the bugs for the most part will stay away from the leaves and stalks. Happy Gardening!

A Quick Marinade

So, Sunday when we got home from church we laid out some venison steaks from the deep freeze to allow them to thaw in the sink in time for supper. Long about four o'clock I got the steaks apart, which were still a tad frozen in the middle, and put them in a cold water salt bath to get any excess blood out. This also takes the "strong" taste out if there is any. While they were soaking I realized that I was out of our normal "go-to" marinade that we like to use. It's a store bought bottle brand that I can usually mix a little water with and get two, maybe three soakings out of.

Now, I've been highly addicted to a couple of sets of The French Chef with Julia Child over the last month that I rented from the library. J.C. drops mention of wine in every show that she does. From using it in dishes to what wines for with the dish that she made. Well.. maybe not the baking, Queen of Sheba cake episode... I'll have to watch it again and see.

Needless to say.. she got me thinking. I drained and rinsed the steaks and put them back in the bowl. I added a generous helping of red wine to the bowl and sprinkled the tops of the steaks with fresh cracked black pepper. YUM. After allowing the steaks to rest for a good half hour, I flipped them over and peppered that side of the steaks. At this point I felt like they were missing something. I wanted a bit of bold taste outside of the red wine and pepper. I looked in the refrigerator and pulled out the Worcestershire sauce, poured in a tablespoon or two and swished it a tad to blend. After about another half hour the grill was hot and the steaks went on. Shaun took it from there. I did tell him it was OK to add a touch of seasoning, McCormick's Garlic and Onion medley, to each side. He likes to chef it up when he's at one with the gas grill.

When the first bite of these steaks went into my mouth I knew I had done something right that day. I absolutely love the smell in my house when I have included wine in a recipe. This marinade didn't exactly fragrance the entire house but it was fantastic. Juicy, elegant, magnificent.