Jules and the Giant Cornstalk

This year Jules planted heirloom organic corn in one of the gardens. The corn is beautiful with rainbow kernels and a special flavour planted from original seeds from last year and passed on through time to today.

Some of the cornstalks grew to over 16ft tall. I’ve never seen anything like it so its simply a-maze-ing. We will plant corn again next year from the seeds.

Hand crafted Hardwood Maple Tables

With the help of our neighbour Dan Wall, this year Sacha and I made a pair of hand crafted maple tables. The tables were made from a couple of maple trees that we needed to cut down because they were leaning over one of the buildings.

Dan has a great wood working shop and so we brought over some slabs of the maple tree and started making some furniture.

The trees were milled into 2inch slabs and then we planed them into boards. The design we made was based roughly off another old wooden table I had and I think its a classic modern heirloom organic hardwood maple table that will hopefully stay with our family for many years.

I look forward to sitting by the fire and reading, or writing. Having coffee or tea, playing chess or a glass of wine and many more fun things to share with family and friends over these tables.

Spring Planting Seeds in the Gardens

I have lots of heirloom second or third generation seeds from last year.
This weekend we planted peas, beans, pumpkins, carrots, kale and acorn squash all from these seeds. I also have cucumber and tomato starts from a local business in town who have heirloom organic plants.

Thanks so much also to all my friends and family who came out and helped with the gardening and taking care of the chickens. Jules, Lorna, Sacha and Karen all helped me and now we have 8 raised garden beds full of plants ready for the Spring and Summer growing season

The Kale does really well almost all year round and the carrots are in many different colours which is a lot of fun because its always a surprise when we pick them. The peas beans and cucumbers all like to climb on frames I have made from fencing against the backs of the beds.

Pumpkin Puree Process

We have had the honour of a lot of fresh large ripe pumpkins growing in the field and so while some may go to Halloween, the rest must be processed for puree and frozen for future awesome meals and snacks.

This year has been a lot of fun with acorn squash, pumpkins, zucchini all growing really well in this Summer and Fall seasons of 2023.

Nice Ripe Pumpkin ready for processing
Cut the pumpkin into large chunks, remove the skin and put in a large pot with some water in the bottom 1-2 cups for steaming, not boiling the pumpkin pieces
Drain the pumpkin pieces and the blend with a hand blender in the pan or mixing bowl. Ready for use in your recipes for pumpkin pancakes or pumpkin banana bread.

Have a look at these Kitchen Recipes for Pumpkin Pancakes and Pumpkin Banana Bread

Full Fall Flavour

What a great time right now. All the vegetables and greens are ready and its nice to celebrate lots of hard work and enjoy some delicious food.

This year we’ve got lots of kale, carrots and beans. Eggs of course, and several different types of squashes and pumpkins.

This post is a different style of vegetables instead of a Thanksgiving roast we are making Fall Fried Rice.

Pumpkin and the Bean Stalks

Its a beautiful summer and the garden beds are really growing for it.
The beans are reaching for the sky, bringing tomatoes and pumpkins up the vines. Its really neat to see them intertwined and together reaching higher than the posts.

The tomatoes, beans and pumpkins are reaching for the sky

The Kale is growing great in all the beds and wild in the fields.

Second generation beans that grow and multiply reaching toward the sky!

Perhaps these beans are well trained.

Summer Solstice Garden Party

Celebrate the longest days of the year and share these moments with your friends and those you hold dear.

Remember the light in times of darkness, and be filled by the love and energy of life. Life and love from our sun, our friends and the sunlight saved in everyone.

The sun grows our food, charges cars, feeds dinosaurs and provides the essential energy for this planet all the time non-stop thermonuclear power station which also includes heat, light and air-conditioning.

Thank you everyone for your support this year. The gardens are growing and we have a fun safe spot here for everyone.

Potluck dinner with many awesome neighbours, friends and family. This is a great chance to celebrate the summer and the good that is going on in our community.

Raised garden beds

We have new raised garden beds, fantastic thriving filled with wood, soil, chicken mulch built from easily available materials. The metal on the outside walls of the box helps keep the slugs away. The peas and beans and tomatoes love climbing further up on a simple fence trellis.

Full of beets, peas and greens. We built 12 boxes this year with the help of Brian and some volunteers. Perfect for permaculture.

Fire on the Water

So its a birthday party for Micah and the kids are all hanging out – which is great !Micah_12BdayIMG_4521

Such a good day for everyone to be outside. And we have a fire on the beach.

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Some people extended the beach into the water what fun!

 

 

Got Chickens and lots of Eggs

Its spring time not the Easter bunny its our awesome happy chickens taking charge.

Forget about composting the kitchen scraps and leftover lunches these are gourmet chickens. Leftover food from the night before is a dozen eggs the next day.chickensIMG_4426

These ladies know what they like and its freedom.

 

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Lucky chickens all the way thanks everyone for your support. Your paying for our ticket to love. Love fresh eggs, love fresh greens love sunshine and wishing we could fly. And stay safe of course. wishing everyone the best of health.