Be joyful though you have considered all the facts
DH and I tried to save it, but the snow inside the “boat”/”float” is unapproachable. The bent pipes are still holding it up, about 1 foot off the ground, which is good on the one hand because the beds inside aren’t (totally) crushed, but which is also a problem because we can’t just jump in …
Continue reading “Hoop House Update, Bees, and Washing Indoor Plants”
We woke up to one more foot of snow and this: That’s not the shape it had yesterday. Something gave. I’m still smiling here. I don’t know why. A peek inside: one of the connectors snapped. Should I go in and try to push off the snow from the inside? It’s creaking ominously… Better not, …
I bottled the ginger beer. It is still sitting out, and I am waiting for bubbles to reappear before I stick it in the fridge. As I was forwarding the link to the recipe, I noticed that in my haste to share this with you, I made a mistake: I added 1 cup of sugar, …
The hive in the distance. Gotta go dig it out. Some wading and digging and it’s done. The new dead bees at the entrance means the bees in there are still alive, trying to clear out the die-off. They’re well insulated now in that blanket of snow, as long as the hive gets some ventilation. …
Bubbles! The Ginger Bug is bubbling so I’m moving on to the next stage of brewing a good beer: adding the culture to the base (water, more ginger and sugar/honey) and letting it ferment away some more. I’m making a little less than a gallon, about 6 wine bottles, I should say. DH made some …
Continue reading “Bug to Beer. And Growing Ginger and Turmeric”
Today I started an Echinacea tincture. Don’t know why I waited this long (and will have to wait for 6 more weeks) . This winter I’ve already spent a good $40 on store-bought tincture – gah! You can make it for about $2 a bottle at home, and control the ingredients too. It’s a 1:5 …
Just realized I need to start the sweet potato sprouts if we want to grow any this season. It begins…
Yesterday I had great fun at the NOFA Mass. Winter Conference. (I took my red scarf off, I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking.) One of the things I learned, from Sarah Shields of Birch Moon Farm & Herbals, was how to use fermentation from airborne yeasts to carbonate drinks. I just started my first ginger bug, …
This is what the view out of the window looks like at the moment. Glorious! DH and I spent three hours digging out our driveway on Wednesday (1 1/2 feet of heavy snow over about 2000 sq.f) and it had been a long time since I had been that exhausted. As I trudged back up …
Today’s harvest of pepper, from the pepper plants I brought indoors. The bell pepper is from a plant I started from seed in March 2009. We finished the last tomatoes that were still ripening after I pulled them green, in November. of all the tomatoes in that picture, 99% ripened and was eaten. The cherry …