SO BUSY

 We have been SO BUSY this past few days!

Before Kyle left for another trip to Florida

he built us 3 more raised beds.

And filled them.

He's amazing.

Next the the one we already had 

(we did a Florida Weave on the tomatoes to stand 

them up and get them out of the dirt...)

And then we planted the middle where the

onions failed, in radishes.

The next bed over is loaded with carrots.

The two outside rows closest to the tomato bed

is a mixed rainbow.

The center is all Imperator orange carrots.

And then final 2 rows are purple carrots!

The next bed over is Sugar Snap Peas

with more orange carrots in-between the rows.

We will need to get some trellis up for the peas.

Then the lone bed out front is Slenderette

green beans since we have gotten a

grand total of THREE beans from the farm garden.

The plants out there are COVERED in flowers,

but the grasshoppers have eaten too many of

the leaves and the plant can't generate enough

energy to make a bean.

So sad.

Next year we will have drip irrigation and

row covers to protect them from those 

munchers.

All the little orange pots around the edges are baby broccoli starts.

We planted 60 pots of broccoli and then another

20 pots of swiss chard. I have no idea what to do 

with swiss chard. Soni said we should freeze dry it

and sell it as chips like kale chips... only chard.

LOL.

Anyhow.

I've also been freeze drying up a storm.

These are zucchini slices with parm cheese.

And now that our cold snap is over and it's getting back

up into the high 80s and low 90s again,

Kyle built me an insulated "box" to house my

freeze dryer. It's up against the garage window and

we put a window AC unit in there.

The little dents are Beau footprints. Silly dog.

The wheeled cart just rolls right on in.

I just pulled out a batch of zucchini and cucumber chips.

The little remote control registered a steady 76

the whole time.

That's PERFECT.

This morning while on my Thursday phone call with Soni

I bagged them all up.

(These are the cucumber chips with a drop of ranch dressing

dried on top - they are delicious!)

After two runs, I have 22 bags of zucchini,

5 bags of cucumbers,

and 2 bags of "sample" zucchini with 

everything but the bagel seasoning

and a bag of "sample" with dried ranch.

(I don't like the one with dried ranch...

it has too much dill...)

I just finished defrosting the machine and its

cooling down now and I have 3 trays of

bananas and 2 trays of apples with pumpkin

pie spice sprinkled on them.

Those should be done sometime tomorrow.

And then I'm ready for this week's market.

And now...

I need to eat my breakfast and get out to the farm.

Oh, first I have to run by City Hall and pay my

water bill, find out about the pipe thing 

(they sent an email saying they need to know if

we have lead or pvc or whatever pipes... I have

NO idea and I'm not going into the crawl space.

I'll never get back out!)

And then I need to run to Gibson's Gifts

and get a box of envelopes so I can send

another check for a bill that can't be paid online.

(Welcome to the 21st century people!)

And THEN I can run to the farm.

There are zucchini and yellow squash that

probably need to be harvested.

And depending on how the ground looks

I might try to run a load or two of water.

But it's very overcast today,

so I won't be able to run the tank pump.

So ... we'll see. We have gotten over 

2 inches of rain in the past week so the ground

is dry on the top but probably we have some

good moisture down below.

Anyhow.

That's what my Thursday looks like.

Hope yours is AMAZING.

Happy Birthday My Darling!

 Today is my darling Rod's birthday!

It's been nearly 3 months since we've been together!

I'm so blessed to have him in my life.

He takes such good care of each of us.

He is such a hard worker.

There is always a project that needs his attention.

He is always up for an adventure.

Whether it's learning to love riding his horse.

To teaching a Primary class.

To taking care of EVERYTHING while we sell the house.

To moving across the country.

He is my love.

He is my joy.

And I love him to BITS.

I love you Rod.

Counting the days until I get to hug you!!!!

Great Farmers Market

 Ok, maybe GREAT might be overstating a little...

But it WAS pretty good!

I only brought 8 zucchini and sold out.

But I also brought freeze dried salt water taffy.

It was yummy.

I brought 8 bags, sold 5 and traded one

for a giant bag of cucumbers.

But I also brought some freeze dried zucchini

with a little parmesan cheese on top.

I hadn't planned to sell it. It was just in a 

gallon ziplock bag.

I gave a bag to my new friend Sonia who makes

delicious breads (she gave me a lemon poppy seed

loaf a few weeks ago and I bought a pistachio loaf Saturday...)

and also a bag to my new friend Mary whose husband traded

the cucumbers for the candy.

They are kind of the leaders of the market,

although its very casual.

(Hill City charges $5 to be a vendor... WaKeeney welcomes

EVERYBODY who has anything they want to sell.)

Anyhow.

They both LOVED it!

Wanda Mae (the lady we bought the house from)

came by and loved the candy, but when I let her

taste the zucchini, begged me to sell her some!

So I bagged some up in a sandwich bag and charged

her $3. (I sell TWO zucchini for $3 and this was

maybe one whole one...)

Then Mary Jo H., our home owners insurance agent

came by and she also talked me into a bag of

zucchini and asked if I would do more "just for ME!"

She said whenever I had some done to bring it

by the agency and she would surely buy it!

Another family (all adults) came by and the

brother made me promise to bring more next

week so he could buy it.

(I was down to crumbs in the bottom of the

bag by that time...)

All told, I sold $41.00 worth of stuff

(a friend's husband from church was there just

as we closed up and bought a bag of candy and

my last 2 zucchini...)

We went out to the farm and I picked 4 more

nice looking zucchini and a couple yellow squash.

Brought them home and made up 6.5 trays for

the freeze dryer (5 in the machine and 1.5 in the

deep freeze). I double stack - a layer and then

parchment paper and another layer.

They are just now ready to pull out of the machine.

Which is good because it is going to be in

the 80's today.  

When we went out to the garden I found

OKRA FLOWERS!!!

We've had a good bit of rain every day lately.

No sun though.... 

The wagon had LOTS of water in it!

Kyle dumped the rain gauge on Friday.

And it showed another half inch Saturday.

We brought the wagon and a load of dirt home

and Kyle has been busy building and filling

3 more raised beds for the backyard garden.

We are going to do a fall garden of green beans,

carrots, radishes, and peas. (The radishes are going

in the existing bed where the onions failed...)

Our little cherry tomatoes are COVERED in little

green cherry toms.

The farm garden has a good bit more zucchini and

maybe we will finally start getting okra.

(It's AMAZING freeze dried - people eat it right

out of the bag like a crunchy snack or put it on

salads as a crouton.)

Anyhow.

I'm having fun.

And Kyle is leaving again.

Probably Tuesday, or Wed if we don't get the 

backyard gardens done today.

But this time when he comes back he

will have ROD with him!!!!!!!

I'm so excited to finally see my husband again!

It's been a LONG time.

Not "gone to England on a mission" long, but

still.... long enough!

And Wed is his birthday.

So we will miss that, but we will celebrate

a late birthday when he arrives.

Kyle just got up, so now I can make noise.

Hahahahahaha.

I'm going to peel the cucumbers,

slice them (I have a good mandolin) and

put a dot of ranch dressing on the top

and stick those in the deep freeze as well

so I'll have another load ready to go.

I think we are going to put the window AC 

unit back in the window in the garage

and turn the freeze dryer so it is 

blowing directly on the fan intake side of 

the machine and see if I can run it even

when it's warmer out there.

(It made it to 77 yesterday...)

Saturday I nearly froze at the market...

it was 57!

Have a wonderful MONDAY!

BRRRRRRR

 Kansas is trying to prepare us for winter.

The whole upper United States is colder 

than normal for August.

(But only for another day...)

That was about as good as it got.

It dropped to 58 for most of the day.

And it rained.

But it also rained at the farm, so

we are HAPPY.

(We got about an inch and a half over

night the other night as well...)

So Kyle has been home for Thursday and

Friday because a) we don't need to water

and b) when it's this overcast the solar

pump on the water tank won't work anyway.

It's been nice to kind of relax a little.

I just finished teaching and now I'm 

heading out to the living room to eat the

yummy beef stroganoff I can smell Kyle cooking.

(We are eating "winter food"... lol.)

Have a wonderful weekend!

And if you are sweltering,

I'm sorry.

You should come visit!

Treats, Tuesday and... other stuff

 Our FedEx guy came by to deliver the

check for the sale of the AZ property.

He's been here before.

Usually he just leaves stuff on the porch,

but if it's an envelope he knocks.

Last time, Beau freaked out.

(As dogs do when someone comes to the door...)

This time he knocked.

I came to the door while holding

Beau's collar.

He reached down to Beau with a big

ol' dog treat!!!

Smart man!

Beau has never had a milk bone type treat.

He wasn't sure how he felt about it,

but was busy thinking about IT instead

of biting the guy at the door.

He got it figured out though.

And was SOLD.

Yesterday it was 103 degrees.

And about that in the house.

I filled a tub with cold water for him to sit in.

(And another one for MY feet!)

Once he was all nice and wet and cooled off,

he climbed into his bed for a snooze.

Rinse and repeat over and over and over all day.

(And then his bed was wet, so it was also

kind of cool to the touch....)

That worked until I had to teach.

And then I turned on the window unit in my office.

It's LOUD and sitting in my office chair all day

isn't a ton of fun, so I wait until I HAVE to go

in there to turn it on.

Meanwhile, Kyle stopped by Home Depot after

spending the day at the farm and picked up

a portable swamp cooler.

(Because all the portable AC units were sold out...)

He could have ordered one and had it delivered

later this week, but he was hot NOW.

And today the high is only 88.

And then in the 70s for the rest of the week.

And he will be able to use the cooler in

HIS house in the future.

(And, probably most important, it was $99 and

 the AC unit was over $400...)

Anyhow.

We decided to hold off on getting the AC fixed

until Rod gets here so we don't have the

"take advantage of the old lady" thing going on.

We'll be fine.

We've got this figured out!

Under Contract!

 Our realtor is back from vacation.

And brought with her a new sign!

I'm so excited!

Rod has been busily packing stuff from the garage

and the shed and putting it in the tack room

ready for when Kyle gets there and they can load

it into a truck and head up here for the FINAL time.

He will probably retire on August 23.

And then they will head out.

Oh.........

And yesterday I very nearly got in my truck

and drove to Tucson as a surprise.

It's only a 15 hour drive.

I could have been there by today.

But my truck needs an oil change.

And it's HOT in Az right now.

So I'm looking at flying out in October

for Mom's birthday instead.

Don't put it on your calendar yet though.

Still in the "thinking about it" stage.

SOLD

 Just got off an online virtual closing

for the Arizona property.

One down!

I'm sure they will be very happy with it.

We hadn't even been out to see it in years.

But our legacy is still out there,

since we got to name the road.

Meanwhile.

Kyle and I did a farmer's market this morning.

We sold 8 zucchini.

Most people already have it growing in their garden,

or their neighbor has been giving them some.

There were a few people though that wanted a couple.

And we met some nice folks.

A family whose son just moved to Gainesville FL to

go to school and was worried about the Tropical Storm

heading their way.

(We helped them to understand it's nothing more than

a good afternoon rainstorm. It's not until you get a 

Category 2 or 3 that you need to pay attention...)

(I think the weathermen just get bored.)

Anyhow.

We also met the deed registrar for the county.

She said "Oh, I know you! I did your deed!"

And then we met Wanda Mai, the lady we 

bought our house from.

We had a nice chat.

She said "We weren't sure you were real people..."

We did everything online as well.

So...

Then it started to sprinkle.

And then it started to rain.

And then the breeze increased a little so it

was pretty chilly.

And we were wet.

So we all packed up and headed home.

And now..... I'm going to make us some lunch.

Have a WONDERFUL Saturday!