Early Saturday Morning

There is nothing like getting to the farmer's market when it opens. I never get tired of seeing tomatoes in September. They are always a reminder that the Summer may have left us, but the Sun still has gifts to give. 

Saturday morning passenger seat in my car.

Beginnings of chicken stock. I just love this time of year.

Thanks for visiting our digs,

C

Red and Green

I love it when we are all wrapping up with Summer and the tomatoes and peppers are like, 

"Wait, wait! We're not done yet! The best is yet to come."

Art For the Digs

I don't know the first thing about art, let me say that. So when it comes to choosing decor for the digs I go with my gut (perhaps at the peril of our friends, family, and other visitors.) In any case, I choose what feels good and has a story behind it (always.) We have a very dear friend that painted a piece of artwork for our living room when we moved into the digs. She, like most of our close friends, know what a journey we have been on to get to this place and so the painting has a great deal of significance to us. Let me tell you, we are blessed with the best of friends. 

I adore Etsy for handmade items and cool prints and one day I'll be organized enough to start browsing Etsy in September for Christmas items. Until then I just peruse in my free time. Recently a friend on Facebook shared a post about an artist that collaborated with her four year old. I absolutely loved her her drawings and the way they came together with the help of her daughter. Some of her prints are available on the website Society 6 and I hopped right on over there to get these two prints: The Pink Mermaid and Mr. Beaver. Here they are:

I can't get enough of Mr. Beaver's expression.

I'd love to know what cool things make up the story of your life and your home. Please share below!

Thanks for visiting our digs, 

C

September: Planting and Preserving

Sorry for being absent for so long. As I alluded to in previous posts, we have some personal family stuff going on right now. But with all four of our children in school we have a bit more time to devote to things like blogging, so thanks for tuning back in to our humble home. As the title of this post suggests, this time at the end of the Summer is all about the crops that are giving one final push, the clearing of dead plants, amending of the soil, and planting for the Fall. We are still harvesting plenty of eggplant, okra, tomatoes, basil, and a few cantaloupe. Even though it's really very warm (hot) here the Fall plants needs this initial burst of heat to get started. Then the cool air will give them time to grow slowly as the seasons change. It is also a time to harvest plentiful herbs for drying, save seeds, and dry flowers, so there is a lot of that going on as well. I mentioned in the previous post what I'd been drying but here are some pictures:

Here is some anise hyssop and lemon verbena. Both are dried for tea.

Figs and blackberries. The blackberries are cleaned and frozen, the figs are dehydrated.

 Dried seeds and herbs from top to bottom: lettuce seeds, cilantro seeds (coriander), dried chives, dill seeds.

Since the last massive chive harvest they have all grown back so I harvested, cleaned, chopped, and dried chives again today. I love this time of year. As much as I resist mainstream anything, I look forward to the busyness and routine of September. I love that first morning when the air smells differently than it has in months. It will be a pleasure to work in the garden when the air is cool and crisp. We will not truly have a grasp of our garden, our property, until we have lived here through all four seasons and taken note of what happens in each. Right now it's hard to walk barefoot on the back path and driveway because the squirrels are eating the seeds of the berries in the dogwood tree and tossing the rest on the ground. The okra has reached a particularly itchy stage and you HAVE to wear long sleeves and gloves to harvest it (or go insane like I did last week.) The gorgeous purple flowers on the Italian dandelion plant lose their color about thirty minutes after being cut and the color only returns half as bright once they are put in water. Volunteer cilantro, dill, and lettuce plants are popping up in several places, a pleasant surprise. Roses are blooming again. You can't help but be overwhelmed y all the beauty.

Thanks for visiting our digs, 

C