Goings on around the home front

     Hello again and welcome to fall in Ga! I thought I would share with you some tips and some of the things I have going on around the little house on the driveway! The first thing I would like to share that I have been doing for years, which is my little stand of green onions. I love to throw green onions in many things I cook and since I mainly use the green part of this onion I learned a way to have them all season and only have to buy them once!

As you can see what I like to do is use the green parts of my onions and then I just dig a little hole in my onion pot, place the base of the onion in the dirt, firm around it and waa-la I have onion greens any time I need them. You can see where I cut them off and you can see the new growth. These have not been in the pot any longer than 2 weeks. They start growing again as soon as you place them in the dirt. Just another way to save a little cash


Now the next thing I have going is the garden, which is a moderate size this year, but some of the things grown in this garden can be grown in pots on you porch. Last year I had 2 window boxes going, one with spinach and one with leaf lettuce and I had salad right up until summer. I just hate paying a buck for a head of lettuce and the worst part is I don’t know what pesticides were used on my food. This way I know! (Unless my husband did something in not aware of.

In my garden I have at the moment baby acorn squash, leaf lettuce, spinach, arugala, mesclun, collards and broccoli. After a rain last week the lettuce started growing quite quickly. I’m hoping that the spinach and the rest of the salad greens start making this jump as well. Below is just part of the spinach I have growing. I chose 3 different types, Avon, baby leaf and Teton. After a few weeks of growing I realized that only 1 type was actually coming up. The Teton, so I took the rest of the teton and planted it where the other 2 SHOULD have been growing. Not sure what happened there as the seeds are not old just dont seem viable. Oh well! ......Hum it seems that the 2 that aren't growing are Burpee and the 1 that is growing is Ferry Morse. Note to self!

These baby acorn squash are just too cute! I've never grown acorn squash so these are a first for me. I have 4 plants, all in different stages of growth as I wish to keep them coming as long as possible. I just can't wait to bake up these little buggers! I just spread a little dried blood around all the greens. Dried blood is 100% nitrogen and just what the greens need to burst into happy table food!
One more thing I did was to go ahead and cut the seed pods off my moon flowers so they have plenty of time to dry out before it freezes. I had a real nice bunch of flowers this year so I have many seed pods. I will let these dry outside on newspaper. I dont want them inside cause ants love these vines and I dont need ants inside the house. (I dont need them outside either) Come to think of it im not really sure what ants are good for.......they are too damn small to eat! ;)

Last week I had a massive amout of female hummers. The males have already gone south leaving the females to fuel up and should be going soon. They have become very trusting of us and will almost let us touch them. I have only noticed a few today so im guessing that they are hearing the call to leave. I will take down 2 feeders and refill 2 feeders for the stragglers to have food. Some hummers dont get the call and will hang around, sometimes all year so I try to leave at least one feeder going year round.

Thats all for now off to water the garden!
Stay tuned as soon we will be making rock candles and shitake mushroom logs. I am very serious about growing as much of my food as I can and keeping our money in our own pockets!
Just remember. Do what you love and love what you do!

Planting fall crop in Ga

Its late summer and I started planing my fall crop today! Seeds in the garden today are acorn squash, cabbage, collards, broccoli, 3 kinds of spinich and iceberg lettuce. Last week I planted some boxes with leaf lettuce, mesclun and arugula. This is my favorite time! My favorite garden veggies all grow in cool wheather. Next month I will do another row of all of the above so that I can have a continuous crop. Henk and Hilda have been out ridding the lawn of bugs and doing a very good job I might add! They were both rescued from a chicken house after clean up and I say they are a couple of very lucky chickens. We have a friend that has some real small chickens, dont know what they are called but im going to try and get a couple. They are too cute and I love the way they sound as they run around in the yard peeping so daintily. Looking cloudy today so I dont need to water the garden in as we have had an abundance of rain as of late.

I have been collecting aluminum cans for years now and the bins are getting full. I can only get .65 cents a lb right now so I will wait till Jan when the rate should go up. I would really like to get .70 to .85 cents a lb if at all possible! I found a place in jefferson to take plastic so Ive started saving that also. Anything I can keep out of the landfill I will!

One important lesson I learned this growing season is not to plant veggie seeds that someone gives you and you dont know what it is. I had some squash and beans take over the garden and had to pull them out. That left me with a lot of space and too hot out to start anything else! The squash I will try again next year but in a place where there is plenty of room for it to grow.

Oil Gush and eco friendly autos

58 days the oil has been gushing, this is not a spill people it is much worse. Oil is gushing millions of gallon a day! Millions!
It wasnt long ago I remember talking to my brother and him with the idea that the first trains we had ran on steam and it burned coal to heat the water. He said why hasnt someone come up with a car the runs on steam? We have microwaves now days that could heat the water to propel the auto. Not long after that Moby from Moby in the morning a country radio station here in Ga, said someone had the plans to build an engine that ran on water. It worked well, so well that the patton was bought by some big wig and stuck away in a safe somewhere so that the plans could never go into effect, keeping us dependent on oil and gasoline.
All I can think is that all the problems of the world when it really comes down to it hinge on greed. If only we could irradicate greed people could work together to REALLY solve the problems that plague this earth.

Work shift disorder?

Their joking right? That's what many of us should be thinking. Yes I hear the commercial everyday on my way home for work. Do you work all night and have problems sleeping during the day? You may have work shift disorder. What I really hear is hurry up call your doctor and we can find a drug to match what ever stupid little problems you may have. Too fat? don't exercise, take a pill. Too skinny? take a pill. Your kids cant concentrate in school? To hell with bed time we have a pill for that too. Kids too hyper? Oh go ahead and let them have the mountain dew, then give them a pill to bring them down. Do you worry that you didn't blow out that candle before you left the house? You might be OCD we have a pill for that too! Seriously people! Where have the brains of America gone?
We are trying so hard to keep our kids from doing drugs but it seems that every other commercial is advertising a new pill, like pills arent a drug! From what I understand withdrawel from pills is not any easier that withdrawel for other types of drugs.
Every single day I hear some of the stupidest things come out of the mouths of people that are suppose to be looking out for us. Governor Sonny Perdue takes forever to sign a bill about texting while driving, he hems and haws and then finally passes that it against the law to text and drive..........Why in the hell would it take so long? What is there to think about? This is a no brainier people.

When I learned to drive there were not as many people on the road as there are now. Ive been driving for 35 years and I get on the highway and it scares the shit out of me all the time. You cant look away for a minute cause there are just too many people that got their drivers license from a cracker jack box, they are on the phone, eating, putting on their makeup! If that's not bad enough do we really want to add kids (and adults) taking their attention away from the road going 70 miles an hour in a 2 ton auto mobile?
This is what I think!
You work the night shift then get use to it or get another job!

Too fat? Then get up off the sofa, turn the damn TV off and put on some music and dance, dance it a universal language, most people complain about exercise but no one complains about dancing.....it's fun! Next go in a make yourself a salad or two. You cant keep weight off unless you back it up with the lost art of actually moving your body.
Your kids cant concentrate in school? Stop letting them stay up all hours of the night, be a friggin parent, stop feeding them hot dogs bologna and soda pops and get them on some good food. You will only get out of your body what you put into it. Hey here's an idea dance with your kids, that way they don't end up couch potatoes too!
Are you worried that you didn't blow out that candle or turn off the iron then by all means go home and check it doesn't mean you have OCD it means you might be forgetful but if you go home to be sure then that could mean that your responsible!
Make marijuana legal and out law alcohol! There are more people getting in auto accidents and killing people from drinking too much than from smoking pot. For that matter the pot smokers are still on the sofa stuffing their face with potato chips and if they are on the road then they are probably sitting at a stop sign waiting for it to turn green!
There are just some things that chap my ass! I just cant for the life of me figure out how the people in America got so stupid!
We have to learn to stop treating the symptoms and start treating the cause of our problems! You can cover up pain with pain pills but for how long are you willing to do so! Pain is a sign that something is wrong but you go to a pain clinic and I will guarantee you will walk out with some pills and I am also willing to bet that they wont even mention exercise or streches.
OK I'm done! I'm sorry, sometimes I just get overwhelmed with the stupidity I listen to everyday.............Hummmm wonder if there is a pill for that?

Oil spill needs help

We all know that we have a huge problem with the oil spill but there is a way you can help!
Please let every hair dresser and dog groomer that you know that the hair they collect is badly needed. Please click on the title and visit matters of trust and see what you can do to clean up the spill!
A sea creature somewhere will thank you!