What happened to July?

Boy have we been busy. The last post was "the garden waits for no one". This post could be  part  2 of that. July started off with rain, it ended in rain and August is continuing as much the same.  Roads have sink holes in Morganton, rivers have jumped their banks and people feel moldy.  As for us.........we are quite thankful to Uncle Tim for the land contouring he did on our property.  The rock drain needs to be widened a bit but that should be an easy job as Mother Nature has carved it out and shown us where we need to expand.  We have not encountered any flooding but the rain has had an impact on our daily lives.  The grass gets mowed 2 times per week and the garden has done fairly well through it all.

We are frequently asked how we accomplish what we do.  Everyone says what we do is so much work.  My first answer is that we rarely watch TV.  My second answer is that we don't really see it as work.  A fellow blog writer  benhewitt.net sums it all up for us pretty well..........

What is work?  Our culture seems to equate work with labor, and likewise seems to revere labor avoidance technologies and conveniences.  Our perceptions of work-and in particular, labor- are just that: perceptions.  In other words, how we think of those tasks, whether we consider them burdensome, bothersome or whether we view them merely as something that needs to be done, and furthermore, that we are blessed to have the opportunity to do them, informs the attitude and spirit with which we approach them.  

So with that being said, we have been quite busy this past few weeks and have not had the time to keep you updated. But we have been having FUN.  Yes we fall into bed each night exhausted but we get to go to work the next morning and get refreshed so we can come home and as we jokingly say "start second shift".

So here is a brief recap of what has been taking our time:

Blueberries- last year we had none due to the freeze.  This year has made up for it.  We have been picking most days of the week and have hardly been able to keep up.  The birds have been grateful for our lack of time.  We have 12 gallons thus far in the freezer.  Several friends have come to pick, we have taken some to neighbors and coworkers and always have a mixing bowl full in the fridge.  2013 will be remembered as the year of the berries.  Just as amazing have been the blackberries.  Though not as many in gallons, we still have bags and bellies full.

Tomatoes-

 the rain has caused tomato blight for almost everyone in the area.  We have been able to salvage some but we are not as tomato rich as we were last year.  I can't complain though as we have been able to can salsa, spaghetti sauce and eat fresh tomatoes at will.  I will still have enough for another run of salsa but won't be able to put up any tomato soup this year.  Oh well, we will eat blueberries instead.

Potatoes- The rain caused a lot of trouble for potatoes.  We dug them a bit early as we could smell them rotting in the ground.  We planted blue fingerlings, russet, Yukon gold and Kenebecks.  We got a smattering of them all but nothing like we had hoped. I am in the process of freezing some rounds for scalloped potatoes, strips for fries and we already canned some of the baby sized ones with a run of corn.  All in all we can't complain. Just for fun I made some blue potato salad yesterday (sorta purple)which looks cool and tastes great.

Green beans-

nothing like eating fresh green beans for which we have eaten our weight in.  We also canned a couple runs so we have some for winter.  I froze some for soups and we gave some away.   Some from last year were a bit tough so we decided to pick them earlier this year but had to do it between rain showers.We planted some october beans yesterday so that we can harvest them in the fall.  They are grown for the beans inside which we like as bean soup.

Sewing-while it was raining I got to spend a little time in my other workroom, the sewing room. I made a top which I am really pleased with.

and  a skirt which was totally free.

 One of my quilting buddies gave me some fabric that she did not plan to use since it has lycra in it and another quilting buddy had picked up a bag of zippers from a yard sale.  She is not a garment seamstress so she had no use for them but knew I would put them to good use.  So other than thread and time this new skirt cost me nothing.  I like these kind of projects.  Plus it fits great and is super comfy due to the lycra.

I also got another quilt made for the guild.  Most of this fabric was given to me from the Linus project group so I designed, cut, assembled and will return it to them this next week.The 5 squares that look black are really purple.  There is an indescribable satisfaction that comes from doing something for someone in such need.

Woodshop-while it was raining Patrick spent a bit of time in his workshop.  He has been working on some fun stuff but that will be revealed in a post later this week.

So we are still alive....just really busy. I already have some posts in mind for this week so stay tuned.........