SUN DRIED TOMATOES

I love sun dried tomatoes. I love to throw them on a pizza or in some soup or in my stir fry or just eat them. They make a sweet/tangy addition to anything.

Usually it takes several days for them to dry in the sun and you have to make screens and cover them and bring them in at night and ya-da-ya-da-ya-da. Well, here is how I do it.

I slice them up and lay them on my dehydrator trays. I sprinkle a little sea salt on them. Then I plug my dehydrator into an outside outlet and place it is in the sun.


There you have it. Tomatoes dried out in the sun! hee hee ;) And it only takes about 10 hours.

I WILL NEVER DUST AGAIN

Why should I when I get left such nice notes.



Just a note on my behalf though. I did some wood work out in the garage and forgot to shut the door to the house, plus we have a big dust field behind our house so if the wind blows and I leave a window or door open I get lots of dust, and I have lovely, lovely grandchildren running in and out all the time, and okay, I'm a lousy housekeeper. I'm a creator not a cleaner upper!

LET'S EAT CAKE

I absolutely love this idea. You take a salad plate, glue an upside down tea cup on the bottom. Add the glass bell from an old cheese plate, do a little baking and behold...... CAKE!








I used this recipe that I found on my friend Maryjane's blog. I used chocolate chips instead of the raisins
http://thebeehivecottage.blogspot.com/2008/09/more-pumpkin-bread-please.html















Then I found this cake plate at Savers for a dollar. I glued a candle holder to the bottom, threaded some ribbon through the holes and there you have it....
MORE CAKE!!!

SOMETIMES A GUY JUST NEEDS HIS MOM

Franklin never worries very much if his Mom leaves him for a little bit, but this time was a little different. Liz ran to McDonald's to get us all some food and it is exactly three blocks so you know she wasn't gone long.






Mugga ( that's Franklin for Grams)
where is my Mom?















I'm going to wait for her right here!

Don't look at me in my misery.

Please go away!

I guess I'll go sell vegetables while I wait then.

The older kids decided to set up a vegetable and lemonade stand in front of the house on Saturday. I could kick myself for not taking any pictures, but they had signs and jumped up and down at the passing cars. Finally they decided that if they went door to door they might drum up better business. I think that in the end they made almost $8.00 If you look real close at the picture you can see their bag of money. I'm not too sure what the sign says but we have a few that are just learning to read and write so we take what we can get. I think everyone got the message though. (Hummm, I wonder if Alyssa can see Missy good enough.)

BEKAH'S BEEN DECORATING

Bit by bit it is coming together. It is such a beautiful house and she is such a wonderful little homemaker. We went over there last night for a party and she really has done a good job of making it a home..

This is one of the cutest decorations of all!!


It was an all girl party so Tyson chose to sit out on the deck all by himself to eat his goodies.

MOVING DAY AND FRESH BREAD

Yesterday was the big Day. Liz and Frank finally got to move into their new townhouse. Of course what is a good move without lots of food so I made Chile and bread and gathered up lots of my freezer jam and headed out to help.
Poor Liz is due in two weeks and was pretty much done for by the end of the day.

Live and learn. Having never used a moving truck before they were not aware how dirty they were and just placed the mattresses on the floor. Now their lovely beds are all dirty and will take much scrubbing to get all the nasty, oily dirt off of them.















I brought Brooklyn with me and Gabe came with Bryan and Alyssa and I tell you, those kids worked like crazy. They had a ball unloading the truck and taking things into the house.




Even Franklin helped with his little wagon. Poor kid, his clothes got lost in the move so he had to stay in his jammies for the day but I really don't think he cared.


The Men in our family might be little but I tell you they are STRONG!!!! They wore me out just watching them

FREE WOOD, WAHOO!

I salvaged a big piece of wood left over from Bekah's new house. Troy was just going to burn it. Of course I forgot to take a before picture but here are the leftovers.





I made a table top with it and put it on an old drafting table base we had. It can be raised up or down and tilt as well. I still need to wax it up really well but I'm pretty proud of myself.

I thought the toys added a nice touch on the floor. Brooklyn and Fischer were playing with them while I was working on it. Brooklyn helped me measure and make sure it was level. Fischer just kept taking my tools and hiding them.

HOLY CABBAGE BATMAN!

Well, my garden is winding down and I've been living off it for weeks but alas some things did well and others didn't. I have learned a valuable lesson and that is that things do not grow well in just mulch. They need real dirt so next year I will till like crazy and perhaps get some top soil. My husband has always done the gardening and unfortunately I didn't pay a lot of attention to the planting end, just the harvesting and preserving end. Oh well live and learn.
































My zucchini did well (who's doesn't) as did the cabbage and brussel sprouts.







Then let's talk about my mutant sunflower. It grew up out of a crack in the cement and produced these weird pod like things on top. I did have one regular sunflower but our big storm ruined it and it is just hanging there like some sad memory.




















I have a few little anemic cantaloupes, two acorn squash and one, yes just one pumpkin!












The pears are just getting ready as are the apples.


The corn was great and I'm still getting lots of tomatoes. I keep eating them green though so I don't know if I will ever get enough to make spaghetti sauce.

DOING SOME PAINTING

I got this old hutch early this year when we came home from California with all my Mother-In-Laws china. I really like the heaviness of it and love all the room it has. But you know me, I can never leave well enough alone. So I painted it black and now I really, really love it.

I also painted this old sideboard and my mirror frame black. I also painted my mantel black but don't have any good pictures of it yet. Be careful if you come to visit me or You just might end up painted black. It's amazing what you can do with a free gallon of paint. Thanks GABE!!!

MILLIONS OF PEACHES, PEACHES FOR ME

My poor little Charlie Brown peach tree has done it again!. Every year I think it is it's last but it still presses forward and gives me sweet juicy fruit.




I got 14 pints from it plus we ate and ate fresh ones for days.

I love to can and don't know exactly why. I guess it's seeing all that beautiful fruit and all those healthy vegetables sitting in the pantry that gives me a real sense of accomplishment.

My Mom used to love ironing and I hate it but I guess it was the same thing.

Yesterday we had a canning party. Bekah brought her peaches over and Liz came up and Emma dropped her boys off for a while and joined us later. It was really fun seeing the 4 boys finally at that age where they are starting to play together. They are all going to turn 3 in the next few months.

We got 21 quarts done. I'd say a very fun and successful day!