The garden is now fully functional and starting to produce!  I have harvested some lettuce, spinach, cilantro, chives, raspberries, a miniscule amount of blueberries (like 4) and an abundance of sweet peas.  I am also starting to have to deal with the garden pests that come with organic (chemical free) gardening.  While I visit friends and neighbors who have these beautiful weed free, bug free gardens thanks to Sevin dust, commercial fertilizer sprays and the like I have to relish in the hodge podge jungle that sometimes invades my gardening space and relish in the fact that I am feeding my family with chemical free, as close to nature as God intended produce.  Oh, and bonus is we can eat straight from the garden without having to worry about washing the produce! 

This is currently one of my nemisis, the potato beetle larvae.  Someone forgot to tell these guys that these are tomatoes, not potatoes.  Seriously.  Last year they nearly decimated my potato crop and when I didn't plant the potatoes in the same location they have now gone after my tomatoes....arrrrgh!  So, here is the way I deal with them, are your ready?  This is pretty complex...I hand pick and squish them. one by one.  yup, it's tedious.

My other main pest right now is the cabbage worm, he makes short work of my cabbage heads turning them to swiss cheese looking masses.  I hand pick him too, however I kept reading about using a "floating row cover" to deter the white chaotic butterflies that lay the worm eggs in the cabbage.  I never did order the stuff so hubby rigged up a redneck floating row cover for me out of an old roll of window screen that was in the barn.  That guy can be pretty ingenious sometimes!  Here it is, I will keep you posted if it works as well as the organic gardening magazines tout.

The berries I have on the other hand seem to be doing very well and so far have not had any pests.  I have to say that I have never in my life tasted raspberries as sweet or good as the ones that are homegrown.  My aunt has some as well and hers are just the same as mine, so sweet and not at all like the ones from the grocery...simply delish!

Last but not least, a few of these green tomatoes that promise the abundance to come.  I think I ended up with almost 60 tomato plants this year...mmmmm.

I was making dinner the other night and was in need of just a little something else so I went searching for a recipe to fit the bill.  However, I couldn't find exactly what I was looking for so I created this recipe from a few sources and my own sweet tooth!

Recipe:
2 cups flour
1 cup milk
2 tsp baking powder 
1 tsp salt
4 eggs
1/3 cup sugar
2 peeled and finely chopped apples

powerdered sugar for dusting

I mixed up all the ingredients together and then threw in the diced apples.  Heat a pan of about 2-3 inches deep olive oil to high and drop by 1/3 cup "plops" into the oil.  Turn fritter with tongs when browned on one side.  Pull out to drain on a plate lined with a papertowel and then dust with powdered sugar...WOW!  I served them with a side of apple butter to dip in and we demonlished them!

I am still working on growing my own blueberries (I think my plant has just 3 startling berries after 2 years of growth) and my own apples (6 trees have yet to produce one apple) but in the mean time I am buying my fruits from the grocery.  

What I do not like about this arrangement is that I do not always get fruit that doesn't have a waxy type spray that has been added to it and sometimes leaves an undesireable taste on the fruit.  Short of running my fruit through the dishwasher (just kidding) I wanted a good way to cleanse the fruit naturally so I wasn't adding anything else processed to it.

Here is what I came up with.  I wash my fruit with lemon essential oil.  I just add 3 drops of oil over the fruit, fill a bowl with water to cover the fruit, swirl around a few mintues and then strain the water off.  Fruit is cleansed, tastes fantastic with just a hint of lemon and I feel better about serving it to the kids!  Oh, and bonus...when I do apple slices this way it also keeps them from browning!  (and uses a whole lot less then if I use lemon juice).

If you are interested in learning more about essential oils you can click here or just ask me!

    I am that mom.  I could be seen as old fashioned, true, but I have my reasons.  It is now summer in full swing, hot days, firefly nights, garden blooming, yard mowing summer.  I want my kids bored.  They cannot come to me and complain of boredom, that leads to work (ie if you are bored enough to tell mom about it you must need a chore to do).  So, when the boredom comes (and I welcome it), just don't complain to mom.  Now, let me clarify...

   I have never been a mom that feels it necessary to completely fill my children's schedules with activities.  Okay, maybe I did a little for the first child but I have since learned some valuable lessons.  

    We only allow our children to do one sport/activity at a time.  (ie if you learn karate you are not also playing soccer during the same season).  We want them to experience many activies, just not all at once.  I believe in "down time"  time to just be a kid.  I know what a full packed schedule is like and it doesn't leave any time for...well you know...nothing. 

     Many of us make the mistake of believing that we want our children to have all of the experiences we did not have as children (I never took ballet so my first daughter was introduced at 4 years old...she wasn't a fan) 

    We want them INVOLVED we want them HAPPY we want them to learn an infinate number of skills.  However, this often leads to a lack of quality time with family, siblings and again that nothing time I mentioned.  We run to this practice, that team function, the store for new cleats, across town for that class, and we loose sight of one very important thing...down time.  I also want clarification here...down time is not media time.  My children will tell you I am vicious about avoiding media in the summer.  I don't usually allow it before 7pm, hardly ever during the day, and no video games or computer if it is nice outside...Go.Outside!  I have been known to tell my children to go outside and not come back in until lunch saving for bathroom and refreshment breaks.  I told you...I am that mom.

   Why in the world would I tout downtime and boredom as a desired experience for my precious gems?  Because...it leads to greater things.  It leads to dragon slaying from the tops of the 30ft pine tree, it leads to prairie living out of the back of a wagon parked in the bushes, it leads to building miniature landscapes from pebbles and peering into the world that may exist beneath the leaves at the base of a tree.  Boredom leads to seeking mom out in the garden and asking about how she can tell the difference between weeds and plants, it leads to expirimenting in the kitchen and coming up with a new recipe, writing stories in a previously abandoned notebook, creating games that never exisited, forcing one to work with a sibling to figure out how to create something big. 

     Bottom line...nothing to do, and nowhere to go leads to... IMAGINATION.  I was a child of the last times when you didn't have the immediate access of computers and gadgets.  I survived, my whole generation did.  We reminisce about long hot summer days with popsicles, sprinklers, tag wars, firefly lanterns, secret forts, rock collections, dandelion crowns, and BOREDOM.  In that boredom imagination takes flight.  You learn to create ideas from...well nothing.  To engage your creative processes and figure something out...kick a can if you have to.  Ask some old timer about that game. 

   When I was a child summer also seemed to go on forever.  So long that when it was time for school, it was kind of welcomed as a structured setting once again.  You looked back on the summer and it was a vast expanse of experiences and adventures and it seemed that it lasted forever.  But, since our children today are growing up exponentially faster than most previous generations did, it doesn't last forever...but I want them to feel like it did.  I want them to remember sticky hot summer lying around looking at cloud shapes, imagining new games (my kids made one up with a sprinkler  under the trampoline and sports balls inside the trampoline) and dreaming new ideas.

    I believe that this imagination that comes from boredom and nothingness will serve my children well later in life.  They have created ideas that not been given them. When it is time to make a living, maybe they will be the quiet one behind the scenes coming up with a new innovation for how to make this or that work better.  Maybe they will be leading at the forefront with groundbreaking plans for something big, maybe they will just be the mediators who help different sides see one and other's point of view.  

​But, I believe that what is created out of boredom will serve a purpose.  At a bare minimum, maybe I will have created a space that my grandchildren will one day relish in, a space where you have to rely on creativity to save you because your mom made you go outside and play.
    

This post was featured in Mary Jane's Farm Magazine 2016.

Some might say I am teaching my children foraging skills as maybe their palettes are not accustomed to "country fresh" foods, but here we like to eat fresh.  How much fresher can you get then mulberries straight from the tree?  Wild strawberries fresh from the ground? We have at least 2 mulberry trees on our property that bountifully supply these fun little delectables when the kids are out playing.  And, if you look closely enough you may find wild strawberries galore too! 

It is so neat to me that my children can be outside having fun and go on a spontaneous berry hunt.  I had to snap some photos as I overheard the conversation between 3 of my children.  

My 11 y/o was pretending that they were living "in the olden days" and that they (she and her brothers) could only eat what they could grow on thier own land...hence the mulberry snacks!  I love the imaginations and my 3 y/o kept asking if he could eat "all the berries"  too funny!  Makes a person think back though, there was a day not too long ago that there were not Walmarts and chain grocery stores to run to for your food.  You had to make, grow and pick what you wanted to eat.  If you think back too I believe there were a lot fewer people with health problems back then too.  So, this is the kind of fun I will continue to encourage!

I was teaching an essential oils 101 class not too long ago when I  met a sweet and wonderful mama.  She was expecting her 5th baby and that always leads to laughs and disucssions between two mamas of large families.  I have begun to ask, when I hear of a mama having a new baby, if she has ever used a ring sling as this has been a saving grace for me.  Through fussy babies, grocery trips with toddlers, and just general "trying to get things done" my ring sling has been my best friend when I have babies.

After we made a connection and chatted on a few different occasions I decided that I wanted to give her a ring sling as her baby gift.  If you look on etsy or any number of stores you can find the price range for ring slings to be astronomical...however, with a sewing machiene and the right instructions this is a simple undertaking that will mean the world to a mama.

First and foremost is getting the right quality rings.  These are seamless and weight tested rings that I only purchase at www.slingrings.com (I have no affiliation with this company, I just love their products).  The sets are $5.95 each but I always order at least 3 because there is always a baby shower to go to and I can save on shipping that way.

Secondly, I just followed the instructions I found on the slingrings site...this is the shoulder type I use with photo tutorial here...  As for the material, since this baby will be worn all summer I wanted something light, but sturdy so linen was my go to choice. (Don't use a stretchy or jersey fabric).  It is so simple then just hemmng the 4 sides and pleating and sewing the shoulder!

The mama loved it!  If you need to see one in action, this is me with my now active toddler when he was in his fussy teething stage.