Britesea - Living the good life in rural Oregon

[Mini Horses]

Wish I had a green house. One day.

I happens that I was able to obtain a set of dog kennel panels about a week ago...CHEAP! So many uses and had been watching for the deal of deals. They are here & with storm prepping , doing nothing. Spending late night on net, I came across a greenhouse made from a set of panels!! How great an idea! Now I am thinking -- I have panels, actually have the clear tarps FOR covering greenhouses. With some thought I could put up a little greenhouse. NOT permanent but, a good temporary one that could be set up and dismantled with a little effort and little $$. Then re-use all when Spring arrives. Not saying I will get it done but, what a possibility for a useable growing area for winter and Spring starts. I'm looking around for a perfect area....what a "HELLO!!" this was

 

[frustratedearthmother]

What a great idea!

 

[Britesea]

you'll want to anchor the plastic real well against winter storms

 

[Britesea]

Well, we've had our first frost of the season; it's two weeks earlier than usual. the tomatoes and squash show a little frost damage, but the peppers look ok. Now I'm trying to decide whether to bring all the green tomatoes in and try to ripen them (but then they won't taste much better than supermarket tomatoes) or cave and make green tomato relish. I don't hold out much hope for that bumper crop of apples we have on the trees... they were only just beginning to turn color. We had a late, heavy rain in spring that knocked most of the blossoms off the plum trees, so we didn't get much of plum harvest. We didn't get much in the way of harvests from the vegetables that need pollinators either- I blame the heavy smoke from all the fires as well as the huge numbers of yellow jackets we saw this summer. Glad we aren't dependent on the garden and orchard for all our food...

On the other hand, the Auracanas have started laying, yay! So now I get at least 1 green egg a day along with the white and light brown ones. Henrietta, the RIR isn't laying right now; I think she's molting. And Gertrude the turkey gave us a few eggs, including a TRIPLE-yolker on two separate occasions, but has apparently stopped for the season now.

I didn't go to Tai Chi yesterday because my heel got some painful cracks. I slathered my healing salve over it and covered it with a gauze pad Thursday night and kept at it until this morning. It feels fine today.

I found a recipe for a Drawing Salve that looks pretty good, so I ordered the ingredients I didn't already have; I'll make some when they come. DH stepped on a broken rose cane a couple of weeks ago and it stabbed him right through his Croc. The wound still hasn't fully healed. It doesn't appear to be infected, but it was a deep wound and it looks like something may be encapsulated in there. I'm hoping the Drawing Salve will pull it out faster.

Enough Doom and Gloom. Next year will be better!

 

[Mini Horses]

Next year will be better!

The eternal hope for all of us. Sometimes it is because "it can't get a whole lot worse". Weather issues have plagued everyone this year …. except weeds! not the good ones

Hope DHs foot gets better soon. Kinda hard to walk much on soreness.

 

[Britesea]

Thanks, @Mini Horses but DH has Neuropathy in his feet (one of the 30% that have it without having diabetes) so it's not nearly as painful as it would be for me. Lol, go figure, I have diabetes but no neuropathy, he has neuropathy but no diabetes?.

My seeds for mache and claytonia came today, so I'm going to start some in pots for the greenhouse winter garden.

We got our first frosts of the season... 2 weeks early. The tomatoes got some frost damage because I missed covering them the first night. I guess I'll just pull them and make some green tomato relish. The peppers seem ok, and the squash only got a couple of leaves hit... I think the fruits are ok because they were shielded by the leaves.

It's cool today. Should be pleasant while adding more wood chips to the paths. I'm DETERMINED to smother most of the weeds this winter! I can't do much more turning of the compost pile until I finish the second bin. We need one more course of concrete blocks (and I need to buy a couple of half-blocks to finish the rows) and then drive some of the older T-posts down the hole to help keep them in place. I also need to trim and tie up the raspberries and top up their mulch, but I doubt I'll get to them today.

Looking over my stores, I'm almost out of freeze-dried bell peppers, although I have plenty of the dehydrated ones. I prefer the freeze-dried one for stir-fries and denver omelettes (a favorite around here). So I will be watching for sales on peppers so I can get some batches in. I also discovered that I'm all out of tuna! How did that happen? We should be seeing the case-lot sales that our favorite store holds in the fall pretty soon now, so that goes on the list too.

Went to LB's house to help her move her freeze-dryer into the spot she made for it, and we discovered it took some damage during shipping. They didn't notice the crease in the cardboard when they got it, and it's been sitting in the garage for a couple of months waiting for her to make room in the house. I hope that the company will do the right thing even though it's been a while.

I think we'll have Wasabi Salmon for dinner tonight (mix up equal parts of wasabi and mayonnaise, layer on the salmon, and bake just until the fish flakes) and mushroom salad (sliced raw mushrooms, lots of parsley, and vinaigrette). Cherry Jello for dessert.

 

[sumi]

Frost already? Sorry to hear about the damaged tomato plants. Mine are still as green as grass on the plants too and the pepper I got to grow and pumpkin is so slow going, I don't know if they are going to produce before it gets cold here. We'll see?

 

[Britesea]

Well, the Harvest Right people are doing the right thing for LB's freeze-dryer. She's got it repackaged and ready for the Freight Carrier to come pick it up. They were a little unhappy that she hadn't checked for damage right away, but decided to be understanding. I suspect that since they are still working on building the business they are much more concerned about having happy customers than an older, more established company with Name Brand would be...

We continue to have nights in the low 30's and days barely climbing up to 70. Still no rain; still have some smoke, although a lot less than earlier. Most of my greenhouse seedlings are popping up, but the kale came up and then wilted-- damping off? I need to remove them from proximity to the other seedlings in case. We aren't seeing much in the way of wasps now, but the flies are desperate to get into the house or somewhere warm enough to overwinter.

DH has almost finished the roof on his workshop; just the dripline is left. While he was up on the roof, he noticed that some screws on the roof of DS's studio were lifting, so they got up there and screwed them down again, so his roof should be ok this winter. Next we need to get into the greenhouse and tighten up the back supports of one of the shelves. It has slipped a little because of the weight of the plants, water and soil- so now it isn't level anymore. DH has figured out what needs to be done, we just need to do it now.

Ham and Onion Quiche tonight, I think. Probably with a green salad. I still don't know what to make for dessert yet- possibly a chocolate/chia seed pudding.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Good for ya'll getting your winter preps done. Better to take care of those roofs now rather than wait until they start having a problem. Dinner sounds delish! (as usual)

 

[framing fowl]

Mmm...ham and onion quiche! I haven't had quiche in forever.