It's all about the "before" photos.

So here's my problem; I get half way through a project and then think, "I should be taking pictures of this".  The "after" photos aren't nearly as effective if there's no "before".

 Here it is.  The only before I have for this year.  You can't see the other 170 filled buckets and carts.  Or the scrapes and cuts.  Or the permanent bend in my back.  Really, I think this might be just an ad for John Deere.

 It's been a relatively lovely, dry (and by dry I mean not raining buckets constantly) spring around here.  So my poppies look beautiful.  Usually they look like wet tissue paper on a stem.

And look!  I found the vegetable beds!  And more importantly, planted things in them!  Kind of impressed with myself.  Does it show?

Of course now we have more lettuce than anyone can be expected to eat.  

Who wants salad for breakfast?

Halloween is the season of love

Wednesday: Me, "We have that party, what are you going to be?"
     He, "I don't know, should we do a couples thing?"
Thursday: Me, "How about a dead couple? Zombies?"
     He, "Meh."
     Me, "We could put you in a coffin."

and an idea was born....


Saturday:

 And he's not wearing pants, 'cause, you know, they don't dress corpses below the waist....

And that, my friends, is how you stay married for twenty years.

"snakes. I hate snakes"

This is what I kept thinking while doing this little project.  Remember Indian Jones?  Actually, I was thinking the same thing about hot glue gun glue that does that stringy, webby, thing all over.  Am I the only one this happens to?  Anyhowsers, I pinned this neat, but kinda creepy snake wreath thing a few months ago.  Thought if I was going to do it myself, I'd better get on it, since Halloween is coming up hard and fast.

Here's my version:

First, get a wire wreath.

Then, get yourself some snakes.  Lots of them.  I ordered mine from Amazon, but misread the description and ended up with snakes littler than I anticipated.  But I'm cheap and wouldn't have sprung for bigger snakes anyway.

The requisite hot glue gun...

Start glueing.  The first row is the hardest, but I just worked my way clockwise and stacked and twined my way around (and around and around)

Probably took me 30 minutes and a couple of glue burns.

 

The pinterest one is sprayed black, but I'm grooving on the multicolors.

Whatcha think?

how to skin and gut a tomato (a tutorial!)

So my mom said she stopped reading my last post at "peel and seed tomatoes".  Lots of you felt the same way.

Here you go, another tomato tutorial right on the heels of the last one.  Hope it helps!

You are going to need: a saucepan of boiling water, a bowl in the sink of ice water, a trash can, and a knife.

First, core a few tomatoes (I do five at a time; it's a manageable number for me, but gets the job done without taking all day).  

Drop them in the boiling water for about half a minute.  

   Take them out of the water and plunge them in the ice water. 

As you take each tomato out of the ice water, you'll notice the skins are coming off.  Help that process along a little as needed, but it kind of does itself (yeah!).

Last step; stand over the trash/compost bin, aim the cut end down and give 'er a squeeze.  The seeds and gunk squish right out and you can toss the rest in the food processor. 

Bam, done.

Go forth, and beat up a tomato..

salsa canning: a tutorial for the masses

I have managed to grow exactly four tomatoes this year and the dog ate three of them off the vine when I wasn't looking.  BUT a quick trip over the pass to eastern Washington and I became the proud owner of a box of tomatoes!  

Therefore, and because I'm out of last years supply, it's salsa making time and the Alati house.  All other things must come to a halt, 'cause these buggers are going to rot if I don't get on it.
Ever made salsa? Not rocket science, but you do need tools (neat!).  When you're done, they can all live together in the canner.


Here's what you need:
a tall canner
jar lifter
jars and lids the size you want
lid lifter
canning funnel
I picked up all this stuff years ago at Ace Hardware.






Salsa recipes are all over the place, but my go-to is from Allrecipes.com, called rockin' salsa

Ready for instructions?  Here ya go
boil your jars in the canner, put the water on now, it takes forever.
blanch, peel and seed the tomatoes.  toss in food processor and chop up using the pulse setting (that will chop your product, not beat it into mush).  Pour into a BIG stock pot.  Do the same with all the other ingredients.  bring to a simmer and let it go for a couple of hours.  Shuttle a kid to a friend's house and back, notice the front of your oven is disgusting and go at it with a bamboo skewer and microfiber towel, read a book, whatever.
The salsa will go from this:

To this:

Put the lids to the jars on the stove in a enough water to submerge them and bring to a boil.  let them simmer for 10 minutes or so.  Your jars should be nice and hot (man, I hope you haven't been boiling them all this time, your house is going to be HOT! just keep everything hot).

Take the hot jars out of the hot water bath.  Use a ladle and the canning funnel, fill the jars with your hot salsa, to within about 1/2 inch of the top. 

 use your lid lifter (it's a little magnet on the end of a plastic stick that lifts those hot lids from the hot water), and place a lid on each full jar.  screw on the bands, to just finger tight.  This is important: DO NOT tighten the bands down!  you're just putting them on, but giving the air a way to escape when you process the salsa!

Now, put all those now filled jars of salsa back in the canner, crank up the heat so it's simmering, not boiling like crazy, make sure everybody is covered with water, put on the lid and let it "process"/simmer for about 15 minutes.

Carefully take out the salsa and let the jars cool to room temp.  You'll know you're good to go when none of the jar lids bounce back when you push on the tops.  If the top pushes down, that's the stuff you put in the fridge and eat sooner rather than later.  Bring it to work, people will think think you're the bomb!

Did you get all the times I said HOT there?  It's important to note 'cause you don't want to do this with your toddler helping you.  Filling the jars doesn't take that long (like, maybe 5 minutes), but it IS a hot, potentially messy, process, and you want to do this with your full attention and only risking burning yourself!

This salsa tastes great, and is even better after sitting on the shelf for a while.  You can make it hotter, smokier, whatever, but the process is the same.  People have been canning for years and you should too.  You'll be so proud you did!

Next up, dilled green beans!

just when you think you have a slacker chicken

So Azul, the weird looking chicken had been laying pretty nicely.

Then suddenly nothing.  I gave up trying to be a chicken psychotherapist after the first year of having them in our midst.  They're weird.  And have little tiny brains; who knows what goes on in there.

So no eggs from Azul.  Whatever.

Then yesterday, Izzy found this.

Hmmmm, who's been laying eggs NOT in the coop?  in the barn. behind a plastic lid. in the gravel.

18 of them?!

The rest of the family is refusing to eat them.  But really, our version of summer hasn't been hot.  And a few days out?  I'm willing to take the chance.  So two were had for breakfast this morning.  We'll see if I'm regretting my decision by noon.

And maybe I should redecorate the boxes or something to make it more pleasant to lay eggs where they are supposed to be laid.  

Holy Toledo I finished it!

 I started this in January when the power went out.


Here it is, spring in the great Northwest, also known as Junuary, and I've finally finished!

The kit has enough yarn to make two of these...anyone want some yarn and instructions cause I'm never doing this again!

We now return to our regularly scheduled life..

Only one more week of school and I can stop getting up at the crack of dawn to make lunches!  Can't wait!