Hot Hot Heat

Today I dragged Michael out to Lawrence, KS to go look at fabric. And I didn't really have to drag him. He willingly drove over an hour on the hottest day of the year to spend $20.00 on burgers and fries at local burger and then go to Sarah's fabrics so we could scout out fabric for the little bird's room.
I'm shocked that I get him.
I'm also shocked that we found some fabric that we like - for now. We decided to hold off getting anything until September when we find out if we will be bringing home Eleanor or Henry/Finnegan/Oliver/Jonah/Zorro/Beauregard. It was also nice to see what kind of things Michael envisions for the room.
Upon returning home - covered in sweat and utterly exhausted we crawled into bed and took a nap. Aside from a quick trip to the grocery store, I have been unable to do much else. The heat and the growing a person has taken it out of me.
I think I'll wait for it to cool off before asking to be taken on any more excursions.

First Harvest

This week I finally harvested some veggies from the garden. I haven't fertilized at all so things are a little on the small and slow side, but I rally don't mind. The thrill really comes from walking outside and finding that I have yet to kill every plant in my garden.
Today's harvest consists of:

• 1 small zucchini (I could have left it for another day or two, but I wanted to eat it with my lunch)
• 2 roma tomatoes (the whole roma plant is about 1/3 the size of the others. I think it is because I planted it late)
• 1 green zebra tomato (it too is small, but I like it that way)
• 1 medium sized yellow, crookneck squash (that plant is over-running the garden)

Aren't they cute!

I immediately cut up and sautéed the zucchini and served it over pasta. It was delish! The pasta is Hodgson Mill's Organic Whole Wheat with Milled Flax Seed and it is very, very good. Slightly nutty but not gritty like some whole wheat pastas - plus it is the only omega 3 rich pasta I can find that doesn't use legume flour (aka - allergic reaction in a box).

This is all that remains of a cherry pie I made nearly two weeks ago. When I removed the plastic wrap it actually stank. Here is a note for all of you - if there is pie in your fridge EAT IT! Don't try to be nice and leave the last piece for someone else. It will just go bad in your fridge and make a sticky, stinky mess. Although the photo still looks fairly appetizing.

Right now I am savoring my first peach of the season. Just the smell is delightful. I love the way it melts in my mouth and tastes like sunshine and rainy, cool evenings at the same time.

Dinner - As promised

Dear Alexa-
Tonight I roasted half of a local raised chicken from the CSA. I coated it with olive oil and lemon pepper from Penzeys Spices. The mashed potatoes were baby reds, also from the CSA, spiced up with a healthy dash of French Onion Dip and some garlic powder. Finally we had some flash cooked green beans. Strangely enough the green beans are frozen and from Aldi, but they really are the best green beans I've found. They are the super thin type that I love.

A leg and thigh for me and the breast for Michael.
I could make a joke about him being a breast man,
but really he just doesn't like to eat meat off of the bone.
Something that seems crazy to me.

Yum!

Also this week I've been eating tons of watermelon.
Check out the giant hunk I ate for breakfast on Sunday.

Well that is "what the Perry's are eating tonight". Not really exciting, but yummy. I have no real plans for tomorrow. Maybe a quiche. I have some bacon and spinach that I need to use up and once again we have more eggs than I know what to do with.

Hope you are having a great day!
m

Today's CSA Haul

I have to admit I was a bit underwhelmed with the CSA last week, but this week it was great.

• 1 whole free-range chicken (which I've already roasted)
• The chicken turned out beautifully. I was slicing it when I realized that I should have taken a photo, but trust me it was perfect. And it tasted pretty good too. I chopped the rest of it up for soup or chicken salad later in the week.
  
• 1 dozen farm fresh eggs (I'll be making a frittata later)
• I made a potato and chicken frittata for breakfast, it was good but needed onions!
  
• 1 jar of local honey (we use a surprising amount of honey in this house)
• 1 jar of fresh made salsa (chips and dip are always welcome here)
• 2 baguettes (I traded in the tofu - which I can't eat- for the second loaf)
• 3 huge tomatoes (I'm sure they were grown in a hot house - but at least it was a local one)
• a bunch of fresh rosemary (which I used to season the roasted chicken)
  

Dinner Is Served

And the salad was grown in my garden.
I have 6 lettuce plants and they are all doing well. I even tossed some baby chard and cilantro leaves for kicks. Paired with some grilled asparagus and chicken it was a delightful meal and the first of many that involves home grown veggies.
Visit Grow Your Own for more people eating what they have grown themselves.

Rainy day

Yesterday I put in the paperwork to take today off. It had been a long week and we have a very full weekend planned so I knew that nothing was going to get done around the house so I took the day off to get things done. I was hoping that is in addition to gettign things done I could work in the garden or sit out on the patio and knit. But the weather is against me. It is cold and rainy and all plans for sitting outside have been shot. I guess this means I really will have to get some work done. Here is the list:

• Hang Photos that have been sitting in frames with the hammer, nails and level next to them for the better part of 6 months. Seriously - 6 months. Though it was only in the last month that they moved from the guest room to the room where we plan to hang them.
• Photos hung! The one on the left is one of my favorite wedding pictures, the top right is me and my brother and bottom right is Michael and his brother and sister. We are all very cute. David is surprisingly blond in the picture which throws me every time.
  
  
• Clean Hall Bathroom. I cleaned the Master Bath last week, but the hall bath could use a scrubbing.
• Bathroom Scrubbed! I love my bathroom floors. The grey and yellow tile just makes me smile. And after a good scrub they look even better. I have decided that we need a shower curtain liner - no amount of scrubbing will save this one. I've been using seventh generation free and clear all-purpose cleaner - some say clean smells like lemons or pine, but to me you shouldn't be able to smell clean, so I love this product.
  
  
• Sweep Floors. I love having wood floors, but you can tell when they are dirty and they are dirty all the time. I sweep at least once a week and it still always looks like a fur ball exploded and with all the ins and outs from the yard there are little peices of grass that just have to go.
• Floors Swept. And once again I am shocked and appalled by the amount of dust and dirt that is tracked into our home over the course of a week.
  
• Vacuum. Only two rooms have carpet but there is Tallulah hair everywhere. I'm telling you Goldendoodles shed. They may be sweet and wonderful, but they shed - don't let anyone tell you they don't - they are lying.
• Carpet Vacuumed. So much dog hair over so little floor.
  
• Put Clothes Away. We have 2 baskets of clean laundry just sitting in our bedroom. But to put these clothes away I need to pack-up my winter clothes. Something I'm having trouble finding the motivation to do.
  
• Finish Baby Wrap Dress. All the knitting is done, yippee! All that is left to do is sew on the ribbons, block it and add some optional embroidery. I might skip the embroidery.
• Dress Finished! It looks so cute. I can't wait to see it on a baby instead of just a ruler. Now I just have to decide which baby shall wear it. There are so many out there right now.

• Sew Up The Test Bag. I fear I have lost all steam for this project. I really hate making muslins and this was definitely that. But I need to finish it up before I move on to making the real one so I can make sure that I like the size and strap width and length.

• Pay Bills. Technically this is already finished. I just need to track down a few stamps.

• Run My Outside of the House Errands: I'm going to map this out to take the most energy efficient route. Something I never do - I'm a backtracker.
  
• Turn in my CSA Application at the Hen House. $25.00 a week = 2 bags of farm fresh fruits, veggies, milk and meat. You never know what you'll get - but it will always be what is in season and what is locally grown. The trade off for this is that I have promised to stay away from the Farmer's Market this summer. I think it will be a fun experiment in "cooking with what you've got". I'll also get a cook book when I sign up so that will help.
• Swing by Prydes of Old Westport. They seem to be the only place that carries non-plastic food storage containers. I'm on the run from BPA. Before we even think about bringing a baby into this house (and we are not even going to think about doing that for at least another 4 months) it will be as BPA free as I can make it. Luckily we don't have too much plastic to begin with - but what we do have we will be saying "farvel" (that's good-bye in Danish).
• Visit Michaels or JoAnns for another skein of yarn. I'm making a caplet for myself and I'm short about a 1/2 skein. Sigh.
• Pick up Milk. I can alway tell when Matt's been swinging by the house - we go though milk much faster than normal. That and the big bowls are in the sink - the bowls that Michael and I never use because they are too big.
• Errands Run. Mattie joined me. At Prydes I picked up gifts for the three weddings I'll be attending at the end of the month and one small BPA free container. Then we went to the Hen House to sign up for the CSA. I like the CSA program but a HATE the Hen House. It is dark, the people are mean (seriously everyone who works there is unpleasant. At the Hy-Vee everyone is nice. They've even run to the back of the store to get cream cheese for me and did it willingly and with a smile.) and it is expensive. I'll just be running to the market section on Saturdays and getting the heck out. Plus the cookbook that came with the membership is the "Cattlemen's Guide to Healthy Beef". Seriously. Beef? I need to know how to cook the million veggies that will be coming our way this summer - not beef. Also - I didn't find the yarn..boo.
  

Tallulah About Town

I took Tallulah with me to the Farmers Market this morning. We walked around, picked up some tomatoes (one yellow and one green zebra), a tiny melon, a patty-pan squash, some purple potatoes, a head of garlic and some organic, grass fed beef. Quite the haul. Lula was great. Walking around with me, sitting when I asked her to (for the most part), and being sweet and letting people pet her. She was barked at once by a big dog and she barked at a puppy once. Then all was well. We walked around a lot and by the end of our walk she was walking on the leash like a pro. I think we will continue this for the rest of the summer.

food

I'm an eater. I love to eat, I love the taste of spices, I love different textures and temperatures. Eating is great. We all know there are things I can't eat and that often gets in the way of my general eating, which is just a bother.
Yesterday I spent 5 hours cleaning our kitchen. Taking everything off the shelves, scrubbing them down and then only returning food that I know we will eat to the cabinets. Nearly everything I tossed (really I put in a bag for our churches food drive) is non-perishable, pre-packaged food. Many of these had soy warnings and yet I still bought them because doesn't every house need a box of bisquick? Really it doesn't - all it really needs is flour and baking powder and poof - bisquick!
This past year I have begun to cook more often and with increasingly better results. I'm trying to cook with only whole, natural ingredients for two reasons:
1) I'm allergic to too many things found in pre-packaged foods - so much soy!
2) It just seems healthier and better for the earth.
Now I'm trying to take things up a notch!

EATING LOCAL!

We've always purchased local eggs from Camp Lindo Farms and now I've added local milk and butter from Shatto Dairy. There are great farmers markets in the area and it is really not that much more expensive. So here are the rules for the M. Perry's attempt to eat local and just plain better:

1. Eat what we have or give it away- We will not waste our previously purchased food but just make smarter choices going forward.
2. Ask questions - Discuss with the local grocery store where their meat and produces comes from.
3. Local doesn't have to mean next door - Local is open to Kansas and Missouri, Iowa and Nebraska - but the closer the better. To start off we are just trying to stay away from Apples from New Zealand and anything coming out of China.
4. If not Local, then Local Business - The big chains don't need our money, the little guys do. Also I doubt we will find local olive oil or frozen pizza (something I know we can't give up yet) and that it is okay to buy these things - from a local store.
5. If nothing else, cut out the fast food in our diet. That last one is important as I've eaten at Taco Bell twice and McDonald's twice in the past 4 days. Talk about a waste of money!

My goal for the summer - eating better.

Update: I've just come back from my local, independent, family-run grocery store. Our meat is "local" the produce is not. But will be in a few months. I still stocked up on some good veggies. Everything is trimmed and packed up for easy storage and eating.
I've got a pot of Asparagus Soup on the stove so I can freeze it for later and everything cut up and ready for dinner tonight. Meals are also planned for the rest of the week and now I'm thinking about baking some cookies.
Clearly I could be a stay-at-home wife with no problem at all. :) Got to love a day off!