Harvest season is well underway!

Harvest season is well underway on the Funny Farm. We still have lots of zucchini, patty pan squash, cukes, green beans, and tomatoes. The greens herbs, peppers, and edible flowers are also still producing. Below, are pumpkin # 3 and 4. We're also harvesting loves of raspberry leaf for tea and the dominant garden berry are black berries. After verbally insulting my two eggplants for only turning out 1 eggplant all season, they promptly spit out the lovely one above, and now 7 more are growing! I shall have to remember to speak sternly to them from now on. (Although, I did remember to thank them for the one they made)

As summer winds down, we are taking advantage of the last of the sunshine. Last weekend, we went across the mountains for a musicfest in Leavenworth. We heard some great Northwest talent. One of the musicians was Anni's physical therapist. Great music Hunter! On Sunday, I went hiking with my pal Lisa on Tiger Mountain and then to Snoqualmie Falls. I also learned how to do track lighting installation. Today, we hit our local farmers' market for tree fruits and spicy peppers (which we don't grow) I also found some lovely handmade soaps and beautiful handcrafted cards by our friend and local artist , Danielle, The Crazy Card Lady. Tomorrow, we are off to our favorite apple farm, Jones Creek Farm, to pick apples for apple butter. Anni has been learning about apple in her home school programs and has her basket all ready to go!

And speaking of school, Alex is once again a mighty viking of Inglemoor. He and David went to the football games last night. Unfortunately, the mighty vikings were trounced by the more mighty and less brainy rebels. Ari is gearing up for the University of Washington to start, but she still has a couple of weeks of vacation time which she is using to check out all the student life activities. So far, she's thinking activity clubs and yoga. Anni has been very busy with her home school program and therapy activities. She's doing awesome!

David is busy tacking the honey-do-it list. This week's task: fix the washing machine, which starting groaning, then whining, and finally spun to its death. A family of five can not be long separated from a working washer. I'm busy as ever with the teaching, writing, chauffeuring of future farmers, yoga, dance, and figuring out what to do with all this wonderful funny farm produce. At this very moment, I'm baking a low-fat chocolate zucchini cake, another entrant in the Zucchini 100. It smells divine. Hmm, I think I need to go see if it's done. Laters!

Preservation Day!

What do you do when you have this:

going on on a daily basis, or even more?

And then you decide to go pick blueberries at the Mercer Slough?

 Ari looking for a choice blueberry bush.

 Julie Ann picking berries.

Well, the fridge and freezer are rapidly filling up with berries, zucchini, cucumbers, green beans, peppers, herbs, and did I mention zucchini? All the kitchen counters are sporting baskets of tomatoes.

It's time for Preservation Day! No, not Presidents' Day or Native American Reservation Day, but preservation day! First, we made 10 jars of mixed berry jam and 2 apple blackberry pies. Then it was time for 2 big jars of bread and butter pickles, and 5 jars of tomato salsa. We also roasted 3 lbs of green beans and froze another 3 lbs after blanching. The kitchen was steamy!

 And because of the aforementioned zucchini abundance, it's also time for the Zucchini Challenge!

 Today's contenders are savory zucchini basil parmesan corn mini muffins and spicy sweet zucchini muffin cakes with orange and almond. Both were delish!

And in other news, Anni has finished up her summer cooking camps. She loved all of them! Last week's was the Science of Cooking.  She learned all about yeast, eggs, dairy, flour, and made lots of very calorie dense goodies! The gym is calling! Alex is halfway through his summer tennis lessons, and getting ready to restart the IB program at high school. When not fighting evil doers on his gaming rig, he takes care of the family computers maintenance. Go geek boy!

Adventures and Vegetables

It's that time again when the family has a multitude of both adventures and vegetables.

We started our August adventures with a trip to Snoqualmie Falls. The lodge at the fall was the one of the sites of the Twin Peaks tv show. The falls themselves are part of a historic hydroelectric plant.

 Here was our first view of the falls.

 Here's a close up. The roar of the water was amazing!

 Ari happily sipping her coffee and admiring the view.

 The view!

 Alex being uber cool with his sunspecs and i-pod.

 The falls with the electric plant in the background.

A beautiful blooming thistle.

A fabulous twisted root tree on the grounds of the fall.

Our next adventure, featured Anni and myself. We were off to gourmet cooking camp again. This one was at the PCC Market Cooking School. Anni made cuisine from Brazil, Italy, the Southern USA, India, and Thailand. It was all delicious and lots of fun!

Alex and me went on our next adventure with family friend, Lisa, and her nephew, Stu, visiting from Indiana. We spend a beautiful warm day exploring the Washington beaches near Ocean Shores where we saw sand dollars, foraging deer along the side of the roadway, a Japanese fishing god statue that washed up after the big earthquake and now resides the Ocean Shores Interpretive Center. We explored tide pools, spying hermit crabs, tiny fish, and lots of sea stars. At night, we got a look at a single shooter from the meteor showers before the evening clouds moved in. Fun, saltwater, and sand were experienced by all.

The next day of our adventure took us to Mount Rainier. It's been so long since I last visited that I'd forgot how truly majestic the 14K+ peak really is. We stood on a log bridge over the rushing Nisqually River and visited the 176 ft drop Narada Falls before checking out the new visitors center at Paradise. It was evening when we began our hike up the mountain. My goal was to see a marmot. Lisa spotted the first. I found two more, and Stu found a pair whistling away to the twilight. We all took a turn standing at the base of a glacier before it was time to head back down before we got lost in the dark. Our only mountain casualty was a mosquito bite on Alex's forearm that turned narly giving him a Popeye arm for the next few days.

Marmot

Our final adventure (thus far) was a visit to the Ballard Locks to see the salmon running, the boats passing, and the flowers in full view. 

After all that fun, it was time to take care of the garden:

 The garden is in full swing turning out gobs of zucchini, patty pan squash, beans, cukes, berries, chives, herbs, and tomatoes.

It's time for tri tomato balsamic salad with feta cheese and basil, my absolute favorite summer salad! Here's the recipe:

1 large heirloom tomato, sliced

5 golden pear tomatoes, halved

5-7 cherry tomatoes, halved

Arrange on plate in spirals.

Dressing:

1 Tbsp olive oil

1 teasp balsamic vinegar

Salt and pepper

Mix and pour over tomatoes.

Top with 1 teasp. minced basil and 1 Tbsp. feta cheese

Excellent with crusty bread and a glass of wine. Enjoy!

Violet Beauregard's Favorite

Why is Anni smiling?

Because this morning, she, David and I all headed over to the Mercer Slough for two hours of blueberry picking bliss. We picked lots and lots of berries!

 What did we do with all these berries? Well 12 cups worth immediately into pies! 2 cups worth went into lemon blueberry muffins. 2 cups went to a friend. 1 cups is destined for a salad tomorrow and another cup into the dressing. That leaves 12 cups for freezing! We had so much picking them that we can't wait to go back to the slough.

The pies prior to the tasting of the pies!

Can you spot all the gypsy peppers on this plant?

What are these strange orbs? Why, there the beginnings of this year's pumpkin crop! Yea!

And just to end with something pretty, the Asiatic lilies are blooming. The hummingbirds love them! 

Baking up a storm!

After a very busy weekend, full of sun and music, today was definitely a get to work day down on The Funny Farm. The back yard garden patch needed weeding and watering, and most importantly of all, harvesting! The tomatoes are turning, and the summer squashes are spewing forth. So much so, it was time to bake up a storm this evening.

Luckily  for heat wimp me, it was cooler today. First, I baked up a batch of curried eggplant slices for tomorrow's dinner (thanks greenhouse). Next, it was time for a double batch of cheesy zucchini mini breads with parsley and chives (all from our garden patch). Then, it was on to two trays of chocolate chip cookies, just because the oven was already on and the bread was still rising. Finally, we needed some breakfast breads, so, into the bread machines went orange currant bread and buttermilk apricot bread with almonds. I like to use the dough setting for these sweet breads and then form them into small loaves to be baked in the oven. After all the baking, the house is warm and smells incredible!

It felt good to escape the sun today. Ari and I got a little too toasted by it while attending the Blue Grass Music Festival on Bainbridge Island on Saturday. We'd never been to Bainbridge before. It was a lovely ferry ride over, and the island is pretty, lots of green and trees. We'll be back.

On Sunday, the whole clan went to the Highland Games in Enumclaw. There were pipe and drums and lots of marching about. We saw many mad Scottish athletic events and loved the modern bands playing at the main stage. Our favorite for the past few years is a band called Brother. These three guys combine the didgeridoo with page pipes and a bit of punk - awesome fun! While haggis was an option, we opted to dine on mini shepherd's pies instead. Mixed in with the tartan clad crowd were assorted fairies, pirates, and recent escapee from the ren faire. We had a terrific time!

Music, Flowers, and Gourmet Goodness!

We've been having a very busy week down on the Funny Farm. Summer here in the Pacific Northwest brings out all the artists, visual and musical. On Saturday evening, David, good friend Lisa, and I went to see a circle of songwriters at the Black Dog Cafe in Snoqualmie. The music and the edibles were both terrific.

Alexander finished up his series of drawing classes at the Bellevue Botanical Gardens on Sunday. The girls and I wandered the grounds snapping photos. Yes, we finally located the camera battery recharger! Yea!

This week, Anni has been attending gourmet teen cooking camp at Sur La Table in Kirkland. Everyone has been very inclusive, and she is having a blast! On Monday, she made homemade spaghetti noodles (lots of cranking), marinara sauce, mini meatballs, creamy dressing and Italian salad, and for dessert tiramisu. Yesterday, she cooked up a fiesta with tortilla chips and pico de gallo, chicken fajitas, veggie quesadillas, and  both strawberry cream and mango popsicles. Today, she journeyed to a Japanese menu, rolling sushi, folding gyozas, tossing yakisoba noodles, and mixing up some green tea ice cream. Tomorrow, Anni does a frog leap to France for a classic french menu. I love helping at cooking camp. The kids feed me well!

A word from Barkley: "Woof, arf, arf, bark, woof!"
Translation: I'm a happy dog: dog park! dog park! dog park!
                  Other dogs yippee! wag, wag, sniff, sniff, run, run.
                  Water? Water. Water! I need water!
                  Nap, Time for a naaaaaaaaaap.

Yes, we took the woofer to the dog park. He was deliriously happy and then slept the rest of the day!

In garden news, we're harvesting tomatoes, zukes, cukes, and lots of herbs and flowers. The lettuce and radishes have begun to bolt in the warm weather, and all the berries except for the blues and blacks are about done. It looks like we should soon be seeing more eggplants, pattypans, peppers, and green beans.

Even though, everyone knows I'm a winter queen, I'm really enjoying summer this year. Hope your's is great too!

Summer Celebrations

Hmmm Honey, where did I stash the camera battery recharger??? Apparently this item is currently in electronic witness protection for overused devices. So sorry, no pics today.

Last Thursday, I went to hear a great local singer/song writer, Jean Mann, in one of my favorite venues, the Kirkland Backyard Concert Series. It was a very cozy evening with lots of great food, and Jean played "The Dance" one of my all time favs to listen and dance to. Many congrats to Jean for being commissioned to write a song for a movie!

And speaking of reasons for a celebration, it was Ari's birthday over the weekend. The mighty petite turned twenty three! She had a day out with her pal, Tony,and the next day we had a garden party with friends; Lisa, Shanie, and Jean. There were grilled garden veggies, a big salad, basil lemonade, raspberry ice tea, and truly decadent French chocolate cake. Lisa added Hoppin' John, Shanie some delish curry croutons for the salad, and Jean's wonderful salty sweet and sour homemade chocolates completed the feast. The weather was gorgeous. We ate, laughed, did a craft, and planted some herbs. Now, when's our next excuse to celebrate?

A few folks have been asking some gardening questions. I'll attempt to answer a few:

1) How do you supply nutrients to your organic garden?

We use a variety of methods, the biggest being compost. We compost all our plant based food scraps in a 3 tier composting system. By the time, it hits the 3rd box, it's ready to go directly onto the garden plants. We also use worm casings (poo) from the worm bin. Tomatoes love this, and finally for our acid loving berries, I use an organic fertilizer with a low pH.

2) How do you control pests in the garden?

Again this is a multiple step process. First, we don't plant in rows. We lasagna plant. A typical raised bed has a squash of some kind, a tomato or two, leeks, lettuce, marigolds, chard, nasturtiums, an herb plant or two, and more marigolds. By not planting in rows, if bugs attack that can't take out all of any one type of plant. Nasturtiums act a bug traps for a couple of pest drawing them away from your zucchini, squash, and pumpkins. Marigolds help keep cut worms away from root veggie such as carrots, radishes, onions, and potatoes. Lettuces grow quite happily in the shade of tomatoes which seems to help keep the dreaded NW slugs away. Lots of bugs don't like the strong odor of herbs such as basil, lavender, rosemary, and oregano. If rodents are pesky in your garden, plant lots of mint! We have two chickens, Henrietta and Claudette, they do a great job taking care of ants and earwigs.

When bugs do attach, I spray the plant with this mix: 1 cup warm water, 3 cloves of minced garlic, 1 tsp castile soap (like Dr. Bonner's), and 1 Tbsp olive oil. Put everything in a blender and whirl. Let sit 1 hour and shake. Put in sprayer bottle and spray plants after they've been watered for the day. Keep extra in the fridge for up to a week. Lots of bugs don't like the garlic and the oil helps gum up their larval stage, protecting your plants. A word of caution: don't use on foods non compatible with garlic, such as berries, unless you enjoy the subtle tinge of garlic with these.

3) Exactly, what are you growing this year?

Oh, the toughest question of all, because I keep starting seeds and adding new plants! So far, we have 21 tomato plants, mostly heirloom, 4 gypsy peppers and 2 jalepenos, 4 garden cukes and 2 lemon cukes, 7 pumpkins, 4 zucchini, 3 pattypan squash, 3 butternut squash (thanks Lisa), lots of leeks, 5 kinds of lettuce, marigolds, nasturtiums, runner beans, peas, pineapple, purple and common sage, Greek and Mexican oregano, lemon balm, lemon verbena, purple, white, and red potatoes, rhubarb, camomile, borage, dinosaur kale, rainbow chard, mustard greens, zinnias, Gerber daisies, Icelandic poppies, Asiatic lilies, rose geranium, red geranium, black eyed susan, sun flowers, corn, garlic chives, common chives, chocolate mint, citrus mint, French and English thyme, begonias, snapdragons, calendula, sweet and Thai basil, eggplant, curly and Italian parsley, rosemary, pasque flower, bleeding heart, tea rose bush, black currants, jostaberries, marionberries, strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, boysenberries, blackberries, grape, coleus, radishes, fuchsias, maple flower plant, aloe plants, cyclamen, an orange tree, canterbury bells, pansies, and lots and lots of dandelions (I count these as a garden crop since I eat them!).

Harvesting summer veggies!

It's been a busy day down on the funny farm. All the warm weather has finally engaged the fruiting parts of our garden veggies. Today, we harvested our first zucchini of the season, and we have one big tomato just about red (I can hardly wait!). Yesterday, we harvested our first gypsy pepper from the garden and eggplant from the greenhouse. We've also had a few runner beans and pear tomatoes. And the lettuces, berries, and herbs are out of control! We have to have big salads and berry smoothies for lunch everyday just to keep up with the flow!

Last week, we noticed a garden mystery; our zucchini and other summer squash were starting to grow and then withering and dying. Hmm, what was up? I checked for insect - none. I recharged the soil with compost. Still, they languished. So, I dug into my stack of gardening resources, and found the answer in Ma book: Willi Galloway's: Grow, Cook, Eat. The lady flowers were not being (eh-hem) pollinated by the male flowers. This might have been due to lack of bumbly bees, but I suspect it was due to our love of stuffed squash blossoms. I put a halt to their harvest and hand pollinated several lady flowers. A week later, the squash plants are all happily making zucchini, yellow summer, or pattypan squashes.

In family news, Ari is gearing up to start the UW in the fall. Translation: she filling out lots and lots of forms.
Alex got his pre-senior picture haircut yesterday. David had been trying the yin yoga classes with me. Now, I just have to get him to try a flow class. (I'll have him  in pretzel poses in no time!) Anni enjoyed her yoga session this morning, and she's been loving her afternoons in the back garden.

Remaking and hip hop!

We've been busy down on the funny farm this weekend. All the garden fruits and veggies needed to be recharged with some fresh compost. So, there was the turning of the compost, the shoveling of the compost, the spreading of the compost, the watering of the postcomposted plants, the splitting and repotting of the aloe vera plants and then an afternoon nap for all the farmers! Phew!

We also hit the farmers' market yesterday morning for tomatoes, broccoli, sweet pea flowers, and a very cool pendant for Alex, made by one of my favorite market artisan, Stephanie of Ponder Press. It's shaped like a shield, inset with his school colors, gold and black. Go mighty Vikings!

We've been doing lots of arts and crafts this summer, part of our new goal: Be remakers instead of new consumers or destroyers. The idea is to repurpose stuff you already have, might be tired of, or is wearing out, into new items that you really like. We'll be posting pics of some of our remade items over the summer.

Alex was continuing in the artsy mode today with his drawing class at the Bellevue Botanical Gardens.

Anni and I dug into the craft bin and decided to make a very cute purse:

Side 1

We took a rounded wooden clasp box, painted the outside black (with leftover acrylic paint), added dotty scrap paper and leftover black velvet ribbon. Then, we decided to have some fun. We added scrap velcro to the front, back and inside, and attached felt flowers, a wooden flamingo, and a felt bird cage. The additions can be mixed and matched to a unique look. The ones not in use can be conveniently stored inside.

Anni loves her new purse!

 Side 2

Inside

Tomorrow, we'll paint the inside of the purse, after the outside glue is completely dry. Anni already has her eye on some more items in the craft bin as possible future additions.

As many of you already know, I love to dance! Usually, I Celtic modern, ballet, or belly dance, but lately, I've been kicking my heels out. I've been enjoying Zumba with its latin rhythms, and tonight, I took my first hip hop class. It was a blast!Tomorrow, I'm trying a Tease class, va-va-voom!

Happy Beginning of July

The sun has finally reached the Pacific Northwest, and it decided to stick around for awhile. We're loving it; even when we grumble that the house is too warm in the evening! So what have we been up to?

Gardening of course! Berry season is in full swing. Almost all of our different berry bushes are producing. We have an abundance of raspberries, boysenberries, marionberries, blueberries, strawberries, and even a few jostaberries and black currants. The blackberries will be along in a few weeks. We're also seeing our first green beans of the season, and yesterday, I harvested 3 yellow teardrop tomatoes!

What is this patient girl waiting for? Dinner of course! We've been favoring simple dinners in the heat. This one is a ginormous garden salad with coastal shrimp added and a rounds of garlic bread from our favorite local bakery.

What's going on here? The raspberry bush in engulfing farmer Julie Ann. Help!

Where did she go? Oh, no! The raspberries have exacted their revenge! Even the dog looks worried.

This week Ari had to go to Shelton, WA for a training. I went along too, and while she was training, I found a cool bookstore and an enormous bead warehouse to explore. Now, I have the yearning to remake some of my old jewelry. Crafting is cool! (Even on a very hot day like it was) After the train, we continued west all the way to the Pacific Ocean! It was gorgeous on the beach, even the water was warm (very rare here!) We had a lovely lunch and walk amongst the surf before heading the Prius back home.

We celebrated the holiday with a backyard bar-be-que and lots of fun decorations. We also went to see the new Lone Ranger movie. We liked its humor.

 The Independence Day BBQ: Ribs rubbed with dry rub, slow grilled, and slathered in BBQ sauce,

 Corn on the cob with butter and garden oregano, homemade potato salad, organic watermelon, and

Anni's favorite - red, white, & blue cupcakes, full of garden berries. We hope you all had a great 4th of July!

Clafoutis mania!

A few weeks ago, I read a book about an American who goes to France, learns to cook, becomes a cookbook author, and lives in a converted medieval convent. Along the way, Ms. Loomis dots the narrative with  lots of delicious sounding recipes, and now I'm absolutely hooked on clafoutis. What's a clafoutis? It's a  fabulous dessert concoction, part firm custard crossed with sweet omelet dashed with fruit tart, minus a crust, and since you all know, I HATE MAKING PIE CRUSTS!

So far, I've made:

raspberry clafoutis,

dark cherry clafoutis,

and apricot almond clafoutis.

These desserts are fabulous ways to use an abundance of summer fruit, and they only take 20-30 minutes to cook in a 350 degree (F) oven. They also make a terrific summer breakfast with a cup of tea or coffee. Here's my simplified recipe:

Clafoutis
2 cups fresh fruit (berries, apricots, cherries, apples, whatever!)
3 eggs
1 cup milk (I've tried these with both 2% and almond milk, both worked)
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla (or other flavoring to fit the fruit. For example, I used almond extract with the apricot)
1/4 tsp nutmeg (or cinnamon, or other baking spice to fit the fruit)
1/8 tsp salt
powdered sugar (optional)
nuts (optional)

1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Butter a pie dish. Scatter sliced fruit at bottom of dish.
2) Beat eggs until frothy. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix well. Pour over fruit. If using nuts, sprinkle on top.
3) Bake 20-30 minutes, until a knife inserted in center comes out clean.
4) Finish with a sprinkling of powdered sugar, if desired.
5) Enjoy warm or chilled. (Some folks like to top them with fresh whipped cream or ice cream. I like them without. You decide.)

Next on my clafoutis list; banana walnut!

Besides baking desserts, we also make some very awesome pizzas to use up some of our garden herbs for dinner on Saturday.

This one is Kalamata olive, shaved ham,  feta cheese, and freshly picked  oregano. The other pizza got eaten too fast to even snap a photo, It was a Margarite with sun-dried tomatoes, fresh parmesan, and just picked basil. There were no leftovers for the new fridge this night.

Sunday was a super low tide (-3) due to the Super Full Moon phenom, so we put on our grubby sneaks and rubber boots and headed to one of our local Puget Sound Beaches.

 Alex and Ari discussing the finer points of beach ecology.

 Julie Ann getting sandy and salty in a tide pool. Here I was pointing out nudibranchs (really cute and colorful sea slugs) to another beach explorer.

 Anni wondering if there's any possibility of lunch or ice cream or ice cream for lunch.

 Ari being super animated after finding a lions mane jellyfish alive in a shallow pool, way cool!

 Alex and Julie Ann  checking out the Dungeness crab while Ari continues to gaze at the jellyfish.

A scallop shell amongst the seaweed. All told, we saw lots of cool beach life as we explored. We saw gulls and an osprey, a wriggling gunnel fish, clinging sea stars, lots of anemones, multiple species of nudibranchs, a red velvety sea sponge, mussels, dock shrimp, five kinds of crab including a very well appointed decorator crab, a squid egg pod, an armoured chiton shell, a moon snail shell, live clams, and baby sea urchins.

Then Anni finally got her wish. We had a car picnic along side the beach. The rain had moved in by then. It was cheesy chive (from the garden) scones, ham sandwiches on market rolls, pasta salad, baby radishes (garden), strawberries (garden), and blueberry ice tea. Yum.