Doggy Social with Kira & Murphy

If you are visiting from the Saturday Blog Hop, welcome!

Last Sunday, we took Lucy to her first doggy social. It was hosted by Carmen, our Puppy Kindergarten trainer, who also runs a separate doggy training program from her home. She has a great off-leash nature walk and a fun fenced in area with agility equipment for the pups to play on.  We convinced Kira and Murphy to go with us, which made the 45 minute drive and the 2 hours of hanging out with the dogs way more enjoyable. I totally stole all of Kira's photos from their blog, thanks for sharing guys! We will have to go again soon!

Me riding in the back with beautiful Murphy and pesky Lucy.  They really weren't too bad together!

Murphy with some awesomely photogenic drool.

Lucy checking out the agility tunnels.  She wasn't too impressed at first.

Andrew and I would call her and try and get her to go through, at first she just kept going around.  Murphy tried to help her some.  By the end of the day, she had it down.  She was running through them looking for treats like it was no big deal.  She even went through some longer cloth tunnels that rolled around.  I hope we can go back again before too long so she doesn't forget.  They also had a lot of climbing agility gear, she loved to climb all over it.  We had to watch her pretty close, we worried she would just jump off the top she was so comfortable!

Lucy sucking up to Kira.  She's good at that.

Somehow Lucy got this idea that if she sits and looks pretty she gets treats.  Sometimes it works.

Game of bitey face with a black lab puppy.

Murphy wasn't phased in the slightest.

They also had a fun pool party going.  We threw treats in the pool, some floaty ones and some hot dog tid bits that sunk to the bottom.  Lucy was a little confused why she couldn't smell where it was once the hot dog went under water, but she started to figure it out.  She was getting her head all the way under there digging for them.  I love the intent look on both Lucy's and Murphy's faces in this picture.

We had a great day hanging out with Kira & Murphy and it was a fun way to wear the dogs out. We will have to do it again soon!

If you want to read more about Lucy, click here.

Half Acre Farm

Just last week, we discovered a u-pick vegetable farm about a mile away from our house. We tried it last weekend, went again this weekend, and I have a feeling we will be stopping by regularly through the end of the season. Half Acre Farm is located within Boxx Berry Farm, so it's very convienent to get an ice cream, a few berries, and then stock up on veggies for the week. We have some veggies growing, but definitely not enough to sustain us. Until we can grow that much, it is way more fun to go to Half Acre Farm and dig up our own veggies!  Seriously, have you ever gotten to go dig up your own potatoes and carrots?  Chop off your own cauliflower? Way more fun than getting them from the grocery store!

Here is what we got this week: cauliflower, fingerling potatoes, and carrots. As an added bonus, the carrots were even free if you promised to spread the word. So go check it out, you won't be disappointed! When we get back from our trip next week, I have great plans for stocking up on all of our veggies!

Carrots

We planted carrots way back in the beginning of our planting frenzy. Like end of April beginning of May.  They took forever to sprout and when they finally did, they weren't very thick, just sparse little patches. We pulled a few before we left on vacation and they were just tiny little roots with huge bushy green tops. Andrew wanted to tear them all out. He thought they were just a flop.  I convinced him that maybe if they got good watering while we were gone they would grow more. And they did! I will be honest, I agreed with him but I just hate to admit defeat.  They still aren't amazing, but they are definitely carrots. I think they needed more consistent watering from the beginning, and I think we should have planted them thicker and then thinned. But the rainbow colors we are getting are fun. We have a bunch more that we are pulling and eating. And we just planted some more for a fall crop so we can see if we have learned anything.  Yeah for more food from the garden!

Like my no make-up, dirty garden face?

Ignore the messy kitchen in the background, we are in a constant state of food prep and cleanup around here.

Mint Jelly

Last summer, when we moved out here to our eclectic rental property, I moved one of my mint plants from a container to patch of dirt under an apple tree. I know, I know. Mint is invasive and it will take over. I thought it might be able to complete with the blackberries and weeds that take over too. And it holds its own. Not spreading too far, but branching out nicely. Even with the cat traffic in that area. We use it in the few recipes I have that call for it, but it grows faster than we use it. Seemed like a waste if we didn't find a way to use it.  And then we saw a mint jelly recipe on the sure-jell box. So we decided to try it, just for fun.  And to practice our canning skills. I guess it turned out, jars sealed, jelly set.

Looks like Ghostbuster slime doesn't it? The jars are really a clear bright green when you hold them up to the light.  I'll take a picture of that someday.  When we licked the pot, it tasted like peppermint candies. Not quite sure how we will use it all (got a good recipe?) but hey, it looks pretty!

P.S. A few of the jars don't look quite clear all the way through, like it set slightly different in the middle. Anyone know what that is about?

Check out the Thursday blog hop at http://www.sustainableeats.com

Building the Basics

This happened somewhat gradually, so I don't know if I have actually stated this, but Andrew and I have become slightly obsessed with being self-sufficient.  Not in an all at once, hide from the world sort of way.  More of a let's learn how to grow what we eat, preserve food for the whole year, and raise animals for our meat, dairy, eggs, and honey.  With some let's wait to build a house until we figure out ways to make it as efficient as possible.  And a little bit of if we really get the hang of this, maybe we could sell and trade some of our extra goods.  We know we have a long ways to go, but we are totally nerding out learning how to preserve food, garden, and take care of animals.  At night when we are bored, we slip into perusing Natural Living,  Homesteading, Homing Instinct, or the Ball canning guide for the year.  And we have daydreaming conversations about all of the ways that we could exist without a grocery store.  It's not easy, we know that. We have spent many whole days gardening, cleaning, canning, building, freezing, and cleaning.  But we don't mind hard work.  Especially when it is work that we can do together and will directly benefit our existence.  I think that is our biggest motivation.  We like the idea of working for what we need to survive, instead of working for someone else and being disconnected from our needs.  I'm not making any promises for what we will actually end up achieving, but we are definitely obsessed with learning how to build the basics that we need to survive in life.

Onions

Not all of our gardening is successful. Just about every day we remind each other that we are learning. These onions are an example of our gardening ignorance. I bought a set of starts completely on a whim, near the end of May.  I was on a big planting spree and I set them out without reading a single thing about them. I just knew that I liked sweet onions.  The tops grew for a little bit, and then started slowly disappearing. I kind of wrote it off to cat and duck traffic through the garden. Whoever, or whatever, the culprit was, by the time we came back from our 2 week vacation, there was only 2 or 3 little green tops poking out of the ground.  Didn't look like we had planted anything in that box.  When we dug around we could find a few baby onions, but nothing big. So we decided to save what we could. We dug up the whole box and hunted out all the little baby onions. I just didn't know if they would keep growing without any greens above ground. And I thought that the baby onions where better than no onions. This was our total onion crop for this year; 1lb of baby onions and we already ate them all.

Project for this week=learn about planting onions and garlic for next year. I think you plant in the fall for a next year harvest? When in the fall? What kind of soil?

The Story of the Raspberries

There once was a young couple who loved raspberries and everything made from raspberries. They were silly enough to plan a two week vacation right in the middle of raspberry season. This caused some concern for them.  Knowing there would only be a few days left of berries, they went to pick the day after they got home. Sad day for them, the raspberries were closed for u-pick. Too many people had been too heavily picking over the weekend. Two days later, they tried again. Success! There were a few rows of berries open.  This ambitious and crazy young couple picked 15 lbs of raspberries! In the hot sun while tending a 5 month old great dane pup. This pup was not happy to be there but had to come as she was not feeling well and couldn't be trusted not to have an accident while left in her crate. (She's fine now).  Oh, and there were a few school buses full of middle school kids there picking too, fun right?

On the first day, they used these berries to make 3.5 lbs of sure-jell freezer jam and 2.5 lbs of ball freezer jam.  Freezer jam is the best kind of jam!  They tried two different kinds of pectin, sure-jell and ball, as a little comparison experiment.  Here is what they found:

Sure-jell freezer jam:
Uses 3 cups of berries and 5 1/2 cups of sugar
Tastes like heaven (meaning like dessert)
Sets up great everytime

Ball freezer jam:
Uses 4 cups of berries and 1 1/2 cups of sugar
Tastes like freshly sweetened berries
Doesn't set up quite as firm

They decided to use the Ball freezer jam in the future as it seems to be quite a bit better for their waistlines.  This crazy couple also froze 6 lbs of mashed berries to make 2 different batches of wine during the winter months.  More on that story later.  They chose the prettiest, firmest berries to freeze whole, almost 3 lbs worth!  They set aside enough berries to try a cooked jam and used the remainder as snacks and to flavor some delicious raspberry lemonade.

On the second day, this ambitious young couple decided to make a batch of cooked and canned raspberry jam.  Everyone told them they wouldn't like it near as well as freezer jam.  Everyone is probably right.  But they wanted to try it anyway, canning is a good skill to have right?  And canned jam still makes a pretty little gift!  But this couple isn't very good at canning.  They make a big mess.  And have to consult 4 or so books in the process.  And check things on the internet.  And call both moms at least once.  People tell them it will get easier, they hope so.  A few hours later, they called it 100% successful.  They had 4.5 lbs of cooked jam in cute little 8 oz jars.  And a messy kitchen, which is normal.

Andrew in the messy kitchen

The adorable cooked canned jam

And so the story of the raspberry is complete.  15 lbs of fresh berries turned into 3.5 lbs of sure-jell freezer jam, 2.5 lbs of Ball freezer jam, 3 lbs of frozen whole raspberries, 4.5 lbs cooked canned jam, and 6 lbs of frozen berries ready for wine making.  That's almost like a novel.

The end

John

You get to see a lot about Lucy, and little bit about our ducklings, but you might have forgotten that we have three intriguing black cats.  This post is dedicated to John.

John is large. He looks like a big ball. We know he is overweight, but he is really happier that way. He is miserable and obnoxious when we try to limit his food at all. Meaning that he meows incessantly until there is food out. He gets obsessed about it. Like he is worried we will forget to ever feed him again. And he has a wide assortment of meows that he can use to get your attention. It's very impressive.

Despite his weight, and ball-like resemblance, he can still manage to look slightly regal occasionally.  Really though, he is a huge lap cat.  He would like nothing better to sit on your lap, or even better, on your back while you lay on the floor.  It really bothers him that we are moving around all day long.

John gets curious about new things. And he occasionally gets stressed out when we mix things up too much. But really, give him a little bit of time, love, and food and he finds his confidence again pretty quick. One of my favorite things about John is that if you shake a bag of his favorite treats, he always comes running and yelling. He will even stand on his hind legs and grab it with his paws. That's his only trick though.


My second favorite thing about John is how comfortable he is with his own body shape. We frequently find him sprawling about on his back, showing his belly, and rolling himself all over. It's quite adorable to have your cat beg for a belly rub.

Saturday Blog Hop & Counter Surfing

If you are coming from the Saturday Blog Hop, welcome!

Lucy, seeing if the kitchen chairs are furniture that she is allowed to sit on.  She's not allowed on couches or beds, but she still likes to try!

In the week that we have been home, we have discovered we have a counter surfing dog.  The extra few inches she grew means that she can reach everything on the counter.  She won't steal it while we are right there, but if we turn out backs it is gone.  We are dumb though. The following instance has repeated itself many times this week, us humans obviously haven't learned as fast as she has. 

Scenario:  Lucy sound asleep on floor (not in the kitchen).  Human cooking.  Human leave room.  Human come back to room, food gone, Lucy still sound asleep on the floor. 

This week's haul:

• Pineapple
• Peanut Sauce
• Hummus
• Package of graham crackers
• two hamburger buns
• a loaf of bread that was rising (that didn't go down so well, she was choking on it and we had to pull 3/4 of it out)
• Multiple shredded recipes

All food is now delegated to the top of the fridge and we are off to Walmart to buy baby gates to barricade off the kitchen!

Tomatoes

Here's a little update on a piece of the garden. And we need a little help. So if you know anything about tomatoes, keep reading please.

First, here is a picture of the tomatoes from June 30th. I took this picture meaning to write about the tomatoes before we left. One of those posts that never happened. As you can see, the tomatoes are growing quite nicely in their pots and with their dripline. The pepper plants that were in the pots between the tomatoes are not. We are pretty sure that the ducks keep eating all of the leaves off of the plants. Too late to do anything about it for this year, but it's learning experience for next year right?

These are our plants as of today. They grow fast. We have been trimming the suckers off and tying the plants up regularly and they still look huge. We are just starting to get tomatoes, but we are eating them faster than they can ripen.

Here is the problem. There are several bunches like this one below. Where there are some tomatoes on it, some flowers, and then some twigs where it looks like the flower fell off before it became a tomato. Do you know what is happening? No the ducks can't reach them. We've watched. Ideas?

Rachelle and Taylor

These pictures are stolen from Rachelle and Taylor's Blog, thanks guys!

While in Utah, we got to stay with my little sister Rachelle and her husband Taylor. We don't get to see them nearly enough. And terrible sister I am, we haven't been there once in the 5 years she has lived there. Our time was way too short, but we were very grateful for a comfortable and relaxing place to stay. There place was very cute, much more put together than ours will ever be.  I also got to go to the doctor with Rachelle and hear my nephew's heartbeat! Just before we left town, Taylor and Rachelle showed us this amazing ice cream place. Which also happened to be the only time we were energetic enough to get out our cameras. Silly us!

Taylor and Andrew

 

Lauriel and Rachelle (and Levi)

Lucy, licking her lips after cleaning gum and ice cream off the pavement.

Miss you guys! And thank you again for being so accommodating with all of our stuff and our large puppy!

Go Local-Pan-fried Beans & Kale, Salad, Green Beans

Sorry about the blurriness of the picture, I didn't notice until after the food had been consumed.

This week my personal goal for the Go Local challenge on Living Senses was to find a delicious new recipe to use the kale that is exploding in our garden.

Goal accomplished.

Pan-fried White Beans & Kale
6 oz kale (from the garden)
2 TB olive oil
3 big handfuls cooked white beans
1/3 cup lightly toasted walnuts
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 teaspoons kosher salt
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
splash of lemon juice

Wash and chop the kale and set aside.  Heat the olive oil and add the beans in a single layer.  Stir to coat the beans and then let them sit long enough to brown, about 4 minutes.  Flip them to the other side to brown.  Beans should be golden and crunchy on the outside.  Add the kale to the pan and cook for less than a minute, just long enough to lose a bit of its structure.  Stir in walnuts and garlic, wait 10 seconds and then stir in the nutmeg.  Wait 10 seconds and stir in the lemon juice.  Can dust with Parmesan cheese if you wish.

Verdict:  Very tasty and easy.  Not a main dish though.  We think it would be great with fish.


Note: The green beans are our first batch from the garden, and the lettuce and peas in the salad are also from the garden.

4th of July

I know this is a little bit late...the 4th was a just a little bit too close to our trip for me to get this up in time. But we had a great evening, so it's worth including.

I know I shouldn't be surprised, living in the Northwest and all, but it was cold and rainy here on the 4th! We didn't let that stop us though! We loaded up our hiking backpacks with blankets, coats, and food, and walked on down to the waterfront park with some friends. Lucy joined us of course! We had a delightful picnic with cherries from the trees in our yard, homemade bread, fresh sugar snap peas, chocolate, cheese, and chips.

Lucy got to meet lots of new people, play with a couple of puppies, and see some fireworks. We were a little worried about how she would do with fireworks. We shouldn't have been. When the sun started to go down, she got cold. And, true to form, she hid under the blankets sound asleep and warm. This is her gracing us with her acknowlegement.

I guess I shouldn't have been too suprised, I was pretty cold myself. Very glad for the tank top, t-shirt, fleece, ski-coat with hood, hat, gloves, and blankets.

But it was good food, good company, and we saw a good sunset before the fireworks started. 


Happy late 4th of July!

Clematis

This clematis sits in a pot, to the left of the stairs to our front door. It changes everyday with more blooms and new vines. Just recently, the second clematis in the same pot started blooming. I can tell because it's a darker purple. Fun to see how the plants intertwine and get all mixed up together.

Note: This clematis died while are gone, so this picture makes me somewhat sad now.

We are home!

We've actually been back since Saturday night. But I feel bogged down in all of the things that I want to get done, so blogging isn't the highest priority right now. Our trip was great. We saw tons of people, relaxed a ton, and didn't take near enough pictures. I am going to be busy stealing some from friends and family. Until then, here are some highlights.  There will be many posts from this trip.  Someday that is not now.

Lucy with a goopy eye and her gentle leader on.  Not her most photogenic, but adorable nonetheless.

Lauriel & Andrew's highlights:
BBQ with Bybee cousins in Salt Lake City
Staying with Rachelle and Taylor
BBQ with Ward Family in Utah
Seeing Tommy, Meg, and Jaevin in Logan
Staying with Gma Anthony and the Burtons in Pocatello
BBQ with Bybee's in Pocatello
Seeing the Berkeley Pit in Montana
Lauriel getting food poisoning or something like it from Taco Bell.  Didn't last long, don't worry.
Priest Lake for 6 short days (lots of books, cribbage, and relaxing)
Scenic route home

Lucy's highlights:
Sleeping for 25 hours straight on the way to Utah (Seriously.  15 minutes breaks only)
Trying to get Frankie to play at the Bybee BBQ in SLC
Meeting a turtle at Rachelle and Taylor's
Playing with Ollie at the Ward BBQ in Utah
Meeting a horse at Tommy and Meg's
Attacking a plastic bunny at the Anthony/Burton's
Eating cherry pits and wrestling with kids at the Bybee's in Pocatello
Sleeping for another 20 hours or so on the way to Priest Lake.
Trying to get Orion to play at Priest Lake, not swimming in the lake, laying on the sand, and scavenging for any dropped food possible.
Very excited to be home.  Gained 10 lbs and grew about 3 inches while we were gone :)

Humoresque for Brass Quintet

Danny Hansen's Humoresque for Brass Quintet
Andrew Bybee-Trumpet
Andrew Scheurich-Trumpet
Eileen Osterhaus-French Horn
Jacob Nielson-Trombone
Danny Hansen-Tuba

This is the fifth of five pieces from Andrew's senior trumpet recital this Spring.

Fifteen Dialogues for Trombone and Trumpet in Bb

David Borden's Fifteen Dialogues for Trombone and Trumpet in Bb
Andrew Bybee-Trumpet
Jacob-Nielson-Trombone

This is the fourth of five pieces performed at Andrew's senior recital this Spring.

Saturday Pet Blog Hop and Lucy's First Day

In honor of the Saturday Pet Blog Hop, here is some video footage of Lucy's first day with us.

We got Lucy from a breeders a little over four hours south of us.  We weren't planning on getting a puppy that day, but we knew there was a slim possibility.  We were actually going to look at a litter that was a little bit younger than Lucy's and wouldn't be ready for a few weeks.  But we fell in love with Lucy, her markings where just too darn cute.  And we decided to take her home with us that day instead of driving back again a week later.  One of our planned spontaneous decisions.  Wade, Lynne, and Tyler drove from their house to the breeders, which was very nice.  Both to have them with us and for Andrew not to drive as much.

We had a four hour plus drive back from the breeders.  Lynne took this video when we stopped at their house to drop them off and let Lucy run around.  She looks so funny in this, it makes us laugh!

Scherzo for Bb Trumpet and Piano

Ilia Emmanuilovich Shakhov's Scherzo for Bb Trumpet and Piano
Andrew Bybee-Trumpet
Katie O'Rourke-Piano

This is the third of five pieces from Andrew's senior trumpet recital this Spring.

Horseradish #59

A bitter truth for the day:
When people ask if you play a certain sport, it is likely that they are very good at that sport and are hoping you are only mediocre so that you can waste an afternoon losing a game. In such instances the safest action is to run away very quickly as soon as the question is asked.

From Lemony Snicket's Horseradish

Asiatic Lilies

I think. I got them last year at Walmart for almost nothing because they were going in the garbage. The looked sad then. And that made me sad.  Now they look very happy and they make me very happy as I walk past them everyday. And they remind me of my little sister.  Miss you Rachelle!  Wish you and Taylor and Levi were with us on our vacation!

Sonata for Trumpet and Piano

Halsey Stephens' Sonata for Trumpet and Piano
Andrew Bybee-Trumpet
Katie O'Rourke-Piano

This is the second of five pieces from Andrew's senior trumpet recital this Spring.  The piece was too long for youtube, so we split the video into two parts.  It was performed as one piece.

Horseradish #30

A Bitter Truth for the day:
Temper tantrums, however fun they may be to throw, rarely solve whatever problem is causing them.

From Lemony Snicket's Horseradish

Ducklings

We lost one of the ducklings a while back. I have no idea what happened to him. He just didn't come back one night. No harm to other guys, no body, just a missing duckling. We like to say he flew away to somewhere nice and warm. Honestly though, he was the one who kept getting stuck in the chicken coop with the chickens, so I doubt he is that smart. The three ducklings that we have left are great. They make me laugh every day. Andrew calls them the party train and it fits them perfectly. I will have to get some video of their antics soon. For now, here are a few photos of these friendly guys.

Don't you love the bright blue feathers?

Disclaimer: I have no ideas if we have males or females or some of both. They just remind me of a pack of boys running around so they are all "hims" to me.

Lucy Swimming and Saturday Blog Hop

Lucy loves playing with Sasha, Dirk and Lisa's dog. A few weeks ago, when it actually felt like summer here, we went to Birch Bay state park with them, Wade, Lynne, and Tyler. It was quite nice to enjoy the sun, good company, and some food. Lucy also had her first swimming experience! She has always been willing to put her feet in the water, but this is the first time she actually went out where she wasn't able to touch. Thanks Sasha for showing her what to do!

Gardening for Everyone

You Grow Girl is the subject of my weekly internet inspiration post this week.  You Grow Girl was one of the first blogs that I started reading consistently, and I still love it.  The author, Gayla Trail, also wrote a book by the same title.  You Grow Girl is one of the first garden books that I ever read and I love it.  The book focuses on starting small and simple and how to garden with whatever space you currently have.  I very much recommend reading it if you love the idea of gardening but don't know how to start.  You Grow Girl, the blog, focuses on what Gayla is growing or reading about or seeing in other gardens.  I love having her posts pop up in my blog reader.  They are always full of beautiful pictures and inspire me to get outside and make something beautiful.  I love all the creative ideas that she comes up with to make gardening even more beautiful.  Her approach to gardening is definitely not traditional.  She describes it as a "contemporary, laid-back approach to gardening places equal importance on environmentalism, style, affordability, art, and humour."  I like it, you should check it out.

Isn't this colander turned hanging lettuce container great? Read more about it here.

Sonata in D

Guiseppe Torelli's Sonata in D
Andrew Bybee-Trumpet
Phillip Pintor, Mary Mahoney-Violin
Kyle Purnell-Viola
Tobin Schindler-Cello
Katie O'Rourke-Harpsichor

This is the first of five pieces performed at Andrew's senior recital this Spring.

Compost

We started our compost pile last year right after we moved out here. We had previously talked about starting a worm bin compost in our apartment, but Andrew couldn't convince me that it wouldn't stink. Our composting right now isn't perfect, but it works. We would love suggestions about how you are rotating and adding to your compost! Here's the scoop on our system.

We have two piles. They each have a back and three sides that is made out of chicken wire and wood. All of the materials were discarded and left for dead on our property.

We put everything in one pile for a long time. We did this until it got really hard to turn and was starting to get a lot of dirt in. Then we start adding all of our new material to the other pile, while we rotated the old pile. When the old pile was completely broken down, we used it. And then we started a new pile there and let the now old pile break down. Make sense?

Our compost piles in their current state.  The pile on the right is what we are adding to right now and the one on the left is that one that is busy decomposing.

We put tons of stuff in our compost. Lots of weeds (not blackberries), raked leaves, old duck and chicken bedding, grass clippings, and best of all, most of our food waste. I was really surprised by how much this cut back on our bi-monthly garbage. I'm tempted to have it only picked up once a month now.

When we first started adding kitchen scraps, we were filling a bowl full and then taking it out everyday. Two problems with that system: fruit flies and we got tired of emptying it daily. So we got a rubbermaid bin, smallish size, with a lid and put in in a cupboard in our kitchen. Every time we have scraps, we add them to the bin and then reclose the lid. When the bin gets full, we spread it around in the current compost pile and bury it. Then we hose out the bin and start over again. It helps that a lot of stuff breaks down while in our kitchen. And no, it really doesn't stink up our house even though we have gone 3-4 weeks without emptying it. It sometimes amazes us.

Here is a brief list of common foods that we add to our kitchen scrap bin: ends of veggies, cores from fruit, whole meals that have gone bad, coffee grounds, and eggshells.

Things we never add to our kitchen scrap bin: meat scraps, large amounts of bread, dairy products, cat litter, or dog poop.

We would love to hear how you manage your compost, I'm sure there are so many ways that we could improve on our system!

We are leaving...

...today.  The car is packed, filled to the brim with camping gear. And we won't be back until the 18th.  And I doubt I will blog anything until the 19th or 20th because I will be buried in laundry. Totally worth it as we get to spend an evening with Bybee cousins, an evening with Ward family, a day with Rachelle, a day with my cousin Nicole, a evening with Tommy, Meg, & Jaevin, and a weekend with Anthonys and Burtons and more Bybees.  All by Sunday.  Whew right?  Then a week of camping with my family.  Sounds perfect!

She's coming with us...and will be totally exhausted with all of the excitement.  Perfect!

But don't worry, while we are gone there will be posts about

• composting
• flowers
• garden
• ducks
• horseradish
• blog hops
• Andrew's senior recital

You won't even miss me at all.  Promise!

Happy Birthday Wade!

Happy Birthday Wade!

We love you!

Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread

Happy 4th of July! This recipe is one of my favorites. It's easy, it always turns out, and it's delicious. A loaf or two will be joining us tonight as we watch fireworks in the park. I usually substitute applesauce for either the eggs or the oil, depending on if we are sharing with vegan or weight-loss minded friends. Last year, when we had more zucchini then I knew what to do with, we grated it and froze it in 2 cup portions so it would be ready to use in this recipe. We have a few batches worth left, just enough until zucchini season this year!  Enjoy!

Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread

3 cups flour
1/2 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
3 eggs
2 cups grated zucchini
3/4 cup oil
3 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional)
6 oz mini chocolate chips

Mix all of the dry ingredients together, then add the wet ingredients.  Mix in the nuts and chocolate chips last.  Grease pans.  This batter can be poured into 2 loaf pans or 4 mini loaf pans or muffin pans.  Bake at 350 degrees.  Large loaves take 50-60 minutes, mini-loaves 30, and muffins 15-20 minutes.

Random Baby Lucy for the Saturday Blog Hop

In honor of the Saturday Pet Blogger Hop, here is some random video footage of baby Lucy.  I know she is still technically a baby at 16 weeks, but she already looks so different than this random video footage.  I can't imagine her in a year.  The footage is really nothing exciting, just random outtakes from the first few weeks we had her.

Farmfresh Food

Farmgirl Fare is the subject of my weekly post about what I'm reading on the internet these days.  I am suspicious that my love this blog is because I am jealous of the author. Susan, the author, sold her business in California when she was 26 and moved with her husband to a farm in the midwest.  There they raise sheep, donkeys, chickens, cats, and dogs, grow food for their animals and themselves, hang out with their Amish neighbors, and go antiquing.  Although I would never want a farm as big as they have, I love reading about their adventures, their animals, their food, their problems, and how they solve them.  Susan has tons of recipes and food ideas, that's how and why she started her blog.  One suggestion I am loving is this simple strawberry peanut butter wrap.  A nice filling way to enjoy all those fresh strawberries on hand, and something I wouldn't have though of myself.

As seen on Farmgirl Fare

In addition to all of the great food ideas, and farming stories, Susan has regular doses of cuteness where she shares pictures and stories of lambings and donkeys and kittens and every other adorable thing that happens with animals. Perfect for people like me who want to live vicariously!