I am still alive

Gosh it is so hard to believe that it has been almost 2 months since I last made a post. Good grief how time flys by. We are all well here, doing OK, staying busy with the usual garden stuff and things around the farm, Can not believe I have went all summer and not taken one single picture of our garden. But we did have one. First off the strawberries out did themselves and us. I have tons of berries in the freezer and made jam. The raspberries are still producing and we pick those every couple days. Already made some jam and a couple batches of jelly with them. Our sweet corn did great this year. We went for about 7 weeks in the peak of the garden growing season with no rain at all. NONE! Then just when we needed it most we got rain. Just as the corn started to tassel out and that sure made a big difference in how well it pollinated too. Our stock feed corn crop is beautiful this year. This is the first year that we have raised that much corn since my dad passed away in 2004. And daddy would be proud. He taught me well and Rodger learned from both of us. That field of corn has 2 ears to almost every stalk and it is open pollinated as well so we can save our own seed for next years crop and not pay $100 a bag for seed corn. The corn we use for corn meal is pretty too. But back to the garden, we have already got the carrots harvested, and frozen and dried. We made lots of pickles this year too. So they are done and gone. Cabbage has been sauerkraut for a long while now. It sure do smell good in the crock too. I have dried and froze a lot of bell peppers this summer. I did get lots of jalapeno peppers to make jalapeno poppers for the freezer too. Yummy! Did them a lil different this year tho.

Jalapeno popper recipe:

Jalapeno peppers as many as you would like to freeze
Equal parts cream cheese, mozzarella cheese and mild cheddar cheese shredded and mixed well. Add a dash or 3 of garlic powder. Half the jalapeno peppers and take out the seeds, and do wear gloves. Let the peppers dry off and use a spoon to fill the hollow centers with the cheese mixture and smooth it off. Place in layers on a cookie sheet and freeze. Once frozen put in to zip top bags and store in the freezer. To serve they can be dipped while still frozen into an egg wash and then crumbs of your choice and placed on cookie sheet and baked till the cheese is hot and bubbly. 350 degrees for about 20 to 30 minutes. Or you can wrap a slice of bacon around each one and bake the same way. Or just top them with crumbled crisp fried bacon. Good any way ya eat em.

I still have some jalapenos in the garden to fix up when I get some free time and am able.Also still have lots of bells to freeze and dry more. The cayenne peppers are starting to get red and they will be threaded on stings to hand in the house to dry and look pretty.  We are still picking and canning green beans here. Our tomatoes were a complete bust this year. We didn't get rain to make them grow heavy foliage and the maters just sun scald and rot in place. I think Rodger has already mowed them down. Good thing I canned a ton of those last year. Some friends gave us a bushel of tomatoes last week and I made 3 batches of salsa as that is the one thing I did not make last year. So I think we set with mater products, Those are the same friends  that we gave the remainder of our sweet corn that we did not need to. We put about 90 quarts of corn in the freezer and I still have lots of corn canned in the cellar. I really don't know why the hell I planted eggplant but I did. Now I have bunches of egg plant that I don't need. Oh well, live and learn. I am still picking okra and slicing it and freezing it for gumbo later. The plan for tomorrow is to dig our taters and get them in the out building to dry and cure before they get moved to the cellar. The weather is supposed to be nice tomorrow and not too hot so should be a good time to work in the field. After we get those dug we need to pick raspberries, beans and more okra. Not much time for down time here this time of year. But I do love it. But my body hates me for it. Sure makes the fibro and arthritis flare up pretty bad. We are letting some of our purple hull peas dry on the vine to be picked and shelled later for dried beans. I canned a lot of them earlier this summer. So sad you cant give them away. I have offered them to any one who wants to come pick them and can em or freeze em and everybody says they don't like em. But those same people eat pinto beans. Not really much difference in taste. On Thursday Jason's girlfriend Mary Kay and I canned up a bunch of pinto beans for us and them and canned up some mixed bean soup for all of us. It is all still sittin in the summer kitchen waitin for some strong body to tote em to the cellar. About the only thing left in our garden right now is the green beans, sweet taters, okra, and peppers.
I did manage to take some pics of things in the herb bed for you all to see tho. Gosh it has gotten over grown. Or maybe I should not plant so many things in one space.

 The Mexican cucumbers took over my big parsley plant and pulled it over to the ground. I scattered the seed from the parsley in the bare area and it has started to come back up. So I will harvest and dry  some later.

Aren't the lil Mexican cukes cute. They make really cute and tasty dill pickles too. They do need to be picked really soon. This is only about 3 plants.

 

My friend Deb from Mississippi gave me some cotton seeds and I planted some just so I could see what cotton looks like growing in real life. Beautiful plants I must say.

The herb bed is rather over grown with stuff this year and a good deal of weeds too. I cut the sage last week and gave it to a friend to use when they make sausage at hog killing time this fall. I have more than enough to last us already dried.

My Luna girl guarding her food bowl. I have combed her this summer and got all the loose hair off her and she looks skinny now. Sure hope she grows hair back before winter or she will freeze.

This is the lil orphan kitten that Rodger named possum. From the back end when it walks away from you it reminds you of a possum. They have grown into really pretty cats. Possum has a lil solid black sibling.

This is my sweet Buff Orphington rooster. He is the daddy of all the lil chicks I have hatched this summer. I have 3 hens sitting now. Of the 3 brown hens I have all of them have set clutches of eggs all summer and raised 4 different batches of babies.

This is in the summer kitchen, the pintos, mixed bean soup and veggie soup we canned last week. All so good this winter. My empty jar supply is getting kinda low right now. If things keep going I may be buyin more canning jars this year. I do want to can some deer meat this year. And its not long till muzzle loader season too.
As for my health, I am doing OK I guess with the arthritis and fibro. Still take meds and plug along. Have a lot of pain in my joints tho. A friend in Virginia sent me some herbal tincture and I have been using that for over  a week now. I think it does helps some. I think the only sure fire way to fix it is to just retire and not do any thing. But dang may as well just shoot me then. If I only knew when to quit and rest I would be in fine shape. Usually don't happen tho.
Not much else happening here, so till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.


Stella