Sweet Briar Cottage Journal: In The Valley Of Love and Delight

                                       

Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free

'Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,

And when we find ourselves in the place just right,

'Twill be in the valley of love and delight.

~Simple Gifts - Traditional Shaker Hymn~

 Hello dear friends!   Happy first day of summer!  Guess what I'm doing right now?  Waiting for my  granddaughter Violet to be born.  Our daughter-in-law is at the hospital tonight.  One of the greatest joys of my life is seeing what amazing fathers my sons have become.  I was very young when I had my first, just twenty, and I know I made a lot of mistakes along the way in rearing them, but I must have done something right to make them such caring and loving fathers

Another thing I am inordinately proud of is my beautiful foxglove growing in the herb garden!   Usually my foxgloves are puny and anemic looking but  this one I started from seeds I gathered on a walk is so robust, almost as tall as I am! 

Gardening

We made a discovery this year.  In our attempts to keep the groundhogs from eating our Cheddar cauliflower, Ran made a little enclosure for them out of old storm windows and chicken wire for the top.  Well!  That made a nice little hothouse for them and we harvested a nice big head today.

Look at that beauty!    The other cauliflowers that we planted in the garden haven't even formed a head yet. Now my mind is turning.  Maybe next year we can get a jump start on tomatoes.  What if I found enough old windows in the trash to line the entire inside of my garden fence?  Could I plant and harvest earlier?  Maybe I could use the idea to protect my finicky roses?  Who knows where this will end up. 

We also harvested some strawberries.  Tomorrow we will have some buttermilk pancakes with diced strawberries instead of our usual  blueberries. Yum! Store bought strawberries can not compete with  homegrown ones picked and eaten in the garden still warm from the sun.  If I have enough, I will probably can some in a light syrup.  I've sliced and dried them before.  The reconstitute nicely.  

Stealth Health

Speaking of drying food, we dried a bunch of spinach and kale this week. Once they are dry we grind them in an old coffee grinder and it makes a nice powder.  You can use the powder in soups, smoothies and stews,  but another way to use it, is to add it to meatloaf and meatballs.  This is what we call "stealth health"  because you may not like the taste of these veggies, but you never notice it in meatloaf and such.  Anything to add more nutrition!

A Fun Day

On Saturday we held a garage sale.   The weather was perfect and we had so much fun!  It seems that people just want to talk and talk.  I  think we all are becoming more isolated as a society.  People don't go outside and talk to their neighbors anymore, they sit inside and watch TV.  I really feel that TV has been one of the reasons for the downfall of society.  So, when people have a chance to have a conversation and a willing ear, well, they talk!  Everyone was so pleasant, except for one man who grumbled about the skimpy offerings (it was late and we had sold everything) and called our dog fat!   To go about with such a sour disposition all the time.  Well all you can do is laugh!  Every day you have the option of "taking joy"  or being unhappy.  Being unhappy and miserable won't change your circumstances but being joyful can!

We all are down here in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars

~Oscar Wilde, Lady Windermere's Fan~

Most things were sold for a quarter, but we still managed to make a nice profit and at the end of the day all we had left were two small boxes of books and a bag of clothes for the Salvation Army drop box.   And people went away happy with getting a deal.  One lady said she looks forward to coming to our sale every year!  Oh dear!  I may have started a tradition.

A Thrifty Experiment

Well, I've prattled on and haven't really given you any thrifty tips. This one is way out there, and I don't think many of you will do it, but here it goes, anyway.  When we had our boiler problems, we noticed that our water stayed hot for three days, so we started thinking, what if we turned off the electrical switch to the boiler every other day? So that's what we did.  It's causing us to rethink how we use water.  I've retrained myself to turn the cold tap rather than the hot, when running water  to fill pots and for baking.  Also by being deliberately conscious of the amount of hot water we are using,  we broke the bad habits of letting the water run on full throttle when brushing our teeth and washing up.  Time will tell if we save on the electric and water bill.  But it proves that you can teach an old dog a new trick!

Natural Health

I just received an e-mail from our congresswoman that she is working on a bill to ban microbeads in facial scrubs.  The small "beads"  are just that, plastic beads, and they are too small to be filter out of our water system.  But they sure cause a lot of trouble with our eco-system. Who would have thunk it?!  So I'm experimenting with some natural scrubs that are biodegradeable.  Once I get one I like, I'll let you know.

Thrifty Things We Did This Week

We didn't do much this week because the garage sale  took up most of our time, but we did manage to harvest lettuce, beet greens, spinach, kale, strawberries and cauliflower from the garden.

Dry some herbs and kale.

Foraged purslane.

Baked bread
.

Watch some free movies on Xfinity's free weekend.

And as usual, hang the laundry and eat from the garden and pantry.

Sorry if there wasn't much information this week, garage sales are exhausting!  Hope everyone has a lovely week  and hope to see you the next!

Jane