Christmas 2013

Wow, another year has gone by.  I had such an incrediable year, I traveled, I camped, I grew things and most importantly I ate what I grew.   I learned so much this year, about myself, my surroundings and the people in my life. I am so thankful for everything in my life I can't really bring words to how I feel.
2014 is going to be a fabulous year, I'm planning to stay a little closer to home and instead of a few little trips my family is planning one big trip in the fall. I found that I regretted leaving in the summer months when all my plants are starting to grow and bloom, and besides it's not fair to make my friends and family take care of everything while I'm gone  ;) 
I have a few new things coming for 2014 and am super excited about it, once my new toy arrives I will share it with all of you.
But for now have a very happy and healthy new year!

Update on my baby orchid

I have an update on my baby orchid.  So earlier this year (I think it was early March) my orchid grew a keiki off its old bloom spike.  I was so excited because everyone I asked about it had never been able to grow one before, and here I was hoping to just not kill the thing and it grew a whole new plant for me.
I have now expanded my orchid collection to 6, one of which is a gorgeous light purple dendrobium, the rest are phalanopsis orchids. All are doing really well.
So this is my keiki in the picture and you can see its stages of growth, now I'm really excited because with any luck it will come full circle.  In the bottom right picture you can see a tiny bloom spike starting ( I've marked it with a red arrow), I'm so excited!!  The blue arrow is where you can see the cut bloom spike from the mother plant.
It's doing very well and I can't wait to see it bloom, I'm not using any grow lights just the good old sun :) oh and momma is also producing another bloom spike!

Seeds, seeds and more seeds

I was going through my seeds today, not a good idea. Now I'm ready for spring, lol. Anyway in an earlier post I talked about storing my seeds using the dried flowers.  Well that didn't work, they rotted and looked horrible, a couple of them were ok but the majority of them just rotted and got moldy.  So instead I took pictures of all my flowers and got the printed (2 X 3) and pasted them on the outside of the little envelopes instead :) 
Worked much better.  I have so many seeds, I'm excited to start them all in the spring! 

Been awhile

Hey guys!  Sorry it's been so long, I had a very busy but amazing summer.  A little update on my garden. It was fantastic, the veggies were amazing and tasted fabulous.  I will change a few things though, I will still put peas in the back row, but will plant a lot more carrots, beets and radishes.  I will keep the squashes out of the beds and put them in their own containers :). 
I had a decent hall of apples this year, and they tasted very sweet and crisp. I ate them all! This was my third summer with this baby honey crisp apple tree and I had about 15 apples this year.
I'm hoping to be back here a little more frequent now that things have slowed down, have a good night! 

Breakfast for a week

I just made these for the first time today. So simple.  Spinach quiche cups, I added onions and fresh basil from my garden. I also used tomatoes from my garden.  It's a nice low carb high fat and gluten free breakfast :)

http://www.manilaspoon.com/2012/08/spinach-quiche-cups.html

It's good eaten

Well we are really enjoying the veggies from the garden.  Last night we ate our first cauliflower and I was going to cook it.  My husband usually doesn't like raw cauliflower but one bite of the fresh out of the garden one and he said "nope don't cook it", it was so sweet and tender, one of the best we've ever had.
A couple of days ago I had peas, carrots and garlic shrimp, it was delicious.  Seriously nothing beats fresh veggies out of the garden.  My speghetti squash is looking amazing, can't wait to eat that sucker.  My mom and dad were up visiting for a few days and I put them to work ;) my dad shelled a big bowl of peas for me and my mom helped me deadhead all my flowers.  Unfortunately the sugar daddy peas that I thought you could just eat off the vine are a bit stringy and need to be shelled.  My search for the suger snap pea continues.

Cucumbers

Look what I found.  That's right, one lonely little cucumber.  I had just about given up on getting any cucumbers this year, the cucumbers I planted in my garden boxes got overrun by other plants and didn't flower.  But one of my cucumber plants I planted on it own in just a plastic container flowered and I have one cucumber on it.
I think next year I won't start them early, I will plant them directly into their own boxes outside and there they will stay.  The squash wasn't quite as finicky as the cucumber so I might start them again. So far I'm very happy with how my first year of gardening has turned out, I will change a few things for next year but I'm loving being able to eat food that I've grown. 

Collecting seeds

So I was trying to figure out how to store my seeds nicely and to see exactly what colour flower is in the packet. This is what I came up with.  I went to the dollar store and bought small plastic re sealable bags, they didn't have the small brown envelopes so I went to staples and bought those there. They were a little more expensive then I would have liked them to be but I did get 250 of them so they will last me awhile ;)
Last year I just put my collected seeds in plastic ziplock bags, but I wanted to do something a little prettier this year.  I haven't collected to many seeds yet this year but I did collect a few pansies. So the flowers in the picture are from the seeds I collected last year and so are the seeds. I'm hoping to collect more seeds this year and maybe some veggies too, we will see.
Ok back to the envelopes, I cut some of my blooming flowers and layed them flat in the plastic bags and sealed them. Then I took what I had left of my seeds from last year and put them into the brown envelopes. I taped the plastic bags onto the envelope and wrote on the back what it was. So along with the text there is a visual as well.
I just hope they dry nicely, the bags are not airtight.

Veggies on steroids

Wow!!! So I went on vacation for almost two weeks (which I'm never doing in the summer again btw) and I came home to giant veggies. Thanks to one of my best friends who took really good care of all my plants, they look amazing.  I had my first kohlrabi out of my garden today and it was delicious.
All my vegetables are doing amazing in the soil mixture I put them in, even my squash are now starting to produce fruit. Here again is what I put into my soil.
In a 6' X 2' X 2' garden box
12 bags 50 L organic all purpose potting soil
1 bag 50 L sea soil
1 bag 50 L sheep manure 
1/2 bag 25 L worm castings
1/2 bag 25 L vermiculite 
1 C Epsom salts
1 C egg shell powder

It's been about 5 or 6 weeks since everything has been put in the garden and we are now starting to eat veggies from it. My peas are blooming and carrots and beets are doing great too. It's a little crowded in there and I will be doing things a little different next year, but I'm quite pleased with how things are turning out.

My first harvest!!!

Omg!! My first harvest, ok so it's one radish but I'm totally excited!  I planted everything about 3 weeks ago in my awesome dirt mixture, well at least I think it's awesome.  The recipe is in an earlier post.  Everything is doing really well, and when I saw that radish a couple of days ago I thought, wow that's big.  I pulled it out today and it was a decent size radish. I say was cause my husband and I gobbled it up immediately.  It was really good. I replanted two more in its place.  Yeah I love this!

I'm a gardener now ;)

Lol, well sort of.  So here is a little update of everything that's been going on in the garden front.  My petunias are blooming, my snapdragons are about too and everything else is doing great.  
Now for the veggie garden, I didn't have any luck with my own kohlrabi or lettuce (starting them indoors) however once I just planted the lettuce seeds outside they came right up. I ended up buying a couple of packs of kohlrabi from my local nursery, and they just exploded once I put them in the garden boxes. I did make a boo boo in one of my boxes, actually I'm sure I've made several ;) but live and learn.  I planted my peppers with my kohlrabi thinking they would grow with them and since they were bigger I figured it would be alright. Not.. Like I said the kohlrabi exploded and my poor little peppers are now not getting any light.  So I may be moving them very shortly, I just don't know where too.   I think I'm alright the the other box. I tried to make sure I planted taller things in the back and smaller things in the front.  We will see.  We have been getting a lot of rain showers daily so I haven't had to water much, which is awesome. But we do need a few good days of sun.
I have to say I love my garden boxes, my father in-law made them for me and they rock.  No bending over of any sort.
Well I will keep you posted on my progress.  Oh I have been finding ladybugs and putting them in my boxes, I have aphids on my peppers.  So far they have been sticking around, but if they can't get a handle on them I may try a couple of the natural remedies I have found on Pinterest :)
Happy gardening!! 

Bird house

Wow time flies when your having fun, I planted my garden (in raised beds) I will take some pictures when everything is up.  Everything is now outside, my cucumbers and 2 of my squash are a little sad, I'm hoping that they will recover. Hopefully next year I will have a green house and they will stay inside. My tomatoes that I started from seed are very happy to be outside and I planted them with basil, I read it helps deterr pests and makes the tomatoes taste better. 
I also put all my petunias and snapdragons outside (the seeds that I started and collect from my plants last year).  They are doing great.  I will continue to collect seeds, the germination rate for my own seeds was 95% vs the store bought seeds at about 65%. However that was flowers only, my store bought veggie seeds were fine.
On another note my brother in-law made me a bird house and I painted it today.  Now just have to put it outside and it will be ready from some occupants :)
I've been very busy and loving every minute of it.  Hopefully I will have some time to write again soon.

Almost time

One more week and I think everything can go outside, a good thing too because my squash, cucumber and zucchini are huge. I wanted so badly to put them out this weekend but my mom told me to wait until after the full moon, she said " it doesn't matter what the forecast says you will get one more cold snap" I know she's right, I've lived here long enough to know. I have been putting them outside during the day to harden them off so that when I do put them out it won't be a shock. Thanks to all my gardening friends for all your advice:)
All the things my mom did but I never payed attention, I just loved eating all her hard work ;) but now I realize how much work it really is and I love every minute of it.
I got almost all my yard work done, I found a zone 3 blackberry bush I'm very excited for and also bought a lilac for my husband (he loves lilacs).  It's been a very busy weekend. I also got my raised garden beds planted. My sqaure foot garden plot kinda went out the window, turned more into a spiratic planting of seeds. We will see what happens, lol.  

Transplanting

I transplanted some of my veggies today.  I have done a lot of reading on what type of fertilizer to use, how much to use, all kinds of different recipes.  I still don't know, so like I always do I take snippets of info and make it my own. 
In my mix I used organic all purpose potting soil, sea soil, vermiculite, bone meal, worm castings and Epsom salt I left out the coffee grounds this time :) As for ratios, I didn't measure.  But I'm thinking it went a little like this,
8 C organic potting soil
3 C organic sea soil
1 C vermiculite
3 Tbs of worm castings
2 Tbs bone meal
1 Tbs Epsom salt
So far all plants seem very happy, I put cucumber, squash, tomato and ornamental corn in this mixture.  I will let you know what happens in the next few days.  Also be very careful when transplanting cucumber or anything for that matter. I accidentally ripped part of the root system of a cucumber plant and it was not happy, I think it will live but it looked very sad and it's leaves it curl a bit.  Try not to disturb the roots to much.

Started my veggies

I started my veggies last Saturday and I have to say I'm really excited about them.  Many of them have already popped up.  The japanese ornemental corn, zucchini, squash, tomatoes, red onion, cucumber and a daisy are all up within 3-6 days.  Unlike flowers the vegies are quick, makes you feel like you've accomplished something, lol.  I didn't do the vegetables in the egg cartons only because I have to figure out a better way to do that.  The cartons are decintagrating  to fast and are tough to move, because I'm using a  south facing window for light I rotate the cartons everyday so the plants grow straight.  I'm thinking a tray might help that. So for my veggies I did use a normal seed starting tray, but the good news is that I can reuse the trays next year.  

All the snow has melted from the front yard and looks like all my trees made it and so did my Alexander Mackenzie rose :) I can't wait to see all things green.

Tomato oops

Ever heard the expression you can have to much of a good thing? Well, I over fertilized my little tomato plants and they are on their last leg :( I believe it was the coffee grounds.  My large plant loved the coffee ground and Epsom salt bath, but I think it was just to much for the little ones.  So I think when I propagate my adult again I won't fertilize until they are older. Well live and learn right? So moving on and trying something new.

PrimalCon2013

Wow!! What a blast.  Hi again everyone, my husband and I went to PrimalCon2013 this weekend. We had an amazing time.  For those of you unfamiliar with the primal lifestyle it's basically getting back to our roots as human beings.  Eating animal protein, vegetables, fruits, nuts and seeds and of course playing outside, a lot.  This weekend was all about that! We got to meet the author of The Primal Blueprint Mark Sisson and so many other wonderful and amazing people, all experts in their fields.  We learned so much useful information about nutrition, posture and exercise. I'm so excited to get back home and implement all the things I've learned, I will post a link to Marks website for those of you who would like more info.

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/#axzz2QTiO8SRj

An alternative to stuffing

I know it's not really the season for stuffing but we did just have a long weekend with yummy food, and yes I made stuffing.  Well an alternative to stuffing anyway. I really like this recipe, I hope you will enjoy it too.
This was a big batch to feed 15 or more, although there was nothing left so maybe 10 or more. Lol.

4 butternut squash.  Peeled, gutted and cubed
2-3 Tbsp of apple and sage stuffing spice (epicure) or your favorite stuffing spice.
1/2 c butter cubed
1 Tsp onion powder
1 Tsp sea salt ( to taste )
I'm not a stickler for exacts :)

Place all ingredients in an oven safe pan, cover and cook at 350F for 30min.  Stir then put back into oven for another 30min or until tender :)

Recycling kitchen scraps

Have I mentioned that I love Pinterest?  I may have :) So I found that you can plant some of your discarded veggies in the ground and they grow again, specifically green onions.  So I had a batch of organic green onions left and thought why not?  So in the dirt they went and 4 days later I already had some major growth.  I may never buy green onions again :)

Worm composting

I've been doing a lot of reading on worm composting, what are the best worms, how to do it, the benefits of composting in general, and I decided I want to give it a whirl.  Especially since I spent $9.99 on a tiny bag of worm castings yesterday.  I was in my front flower bed today pruning my unfortunately dead roses when I came across a lot of earth worms snuggled against the house.  Well I figured why not start with those, they are not red wrigglers (I guess those are the best) but at least this will give me and idea of what worm composting is like, and it's free. Red wrigglers run around $30 - $55 a pound.  So I used an old honey bucket, grabbed as many worms as I could find along with some of the dirt they were in, and went inside.  I added some newspaper, water and egg cartons then crushed up some eggshells to put into it as well. Drilled some holes in the lid and tada, mini worm composter, I think ;) I added a bit of tomatoe clippings and cucumber bits to start, we will see what happens in the next week or so.

Stringy Dianthus

So I'm doing something wrong :( Looks like my dianthus are growing really stringy and weak.  My straw flowers are doing the same thing.  They were on the top shelf of my greenhouse, and upon googling why this is happening, temperature and sunlight seem to be the culprits.  I don't think they were getting enough direct light and possibly getting to hot. I've moved them to a lower shelf and I think I might have to open more of the greenhouse during the day.  Hopefully this will solve the problem, I will keep you posted.

My orchid's having a baby!!

So my orchid has been growing something off of last years bloom spike.  I was so excited because I thought it was going to re bloom, I've never had an orchid re bloom before.  Actually I've never been able to keep one alive this long.  But I love orchids and have been doing a lot of reading about them and I'm pretty sure I have them figured out.  Anyway back to the bloom spike, I was in my local nursery and saw their orchids going into re bloom.  They did not look like mine, I was a little bummed because I wanted it to re bloom so bad.  So I went home, got out my iPad and googled what the heck was growing on my orchid.  Turns out its growing a keiki! I'm going to have a little baby orchid, well now I'm really excited because I never thought that would happen, I must be doing something right :)

Update on my Dahlias

I'm so excited!!!  3 out of the 4 tubers that I separated from dahlias that I wintered from last year are growing.  The original tubers are also doing very well and I took cuttings to see if I could propagate them that way, the ladies at my local nursery seem to think it might not work but I'm going to give it a whirl anyway ;) I will give the baby tubers another couple of weeks before I transplant them into their own pots until they are ready to go outside.  Either way I have three extra dahlias and only paid for one.  Love it! On another note I'm not having great luck with my store bought petunias, the ones I harvested last year are doing great but my store bought aren't coming up nearly as fast or as plentiful. All other plant are doing great :)

Propagating Tomatoes part 2

So it's been a week since I planted and soaked my tomatoes.  The two that I put in water for a week grew lovely roots and the one I put directly into soil is also doing ok.  We will see how the next week goes but I do think that starting them in water to root might be the better way to go, the one that I planted directly into the soil is a little sad.  I think it will be fine but the others are defiantly looking better, but we will see how all three are doing next week.  They are all in dirt now.

Propagating tomatoes

I did a little reading on propagating tomatoes, I didn't think about it to much until I started planting my seeds last week.  I have that amazing little tomato plant from last year that is still producing fruit so I thought I would propagate it.  I pinched off some suckers and planted one in soil using cinnamon as a routing agent and two I just placed in water.  From YouTube I found a video that said to try both ways and this guy didn't have much luck putting the cutting directly into soil, he said to let it route in water first.  So I'm trying both ways and I'll see which way works best, so far both ways seem to be working.  I will let you know in a week.

I have babies!!

I am happy and very excited to report that my petunia's and snapdragons that I collected last year germinated and are coming up out of the ground.  I will no longer buy them if I can help it (unless of course I find one that I just have to have).  I also planted some seeds I collected from my mom's garden, until yesterday I had no idea what they were, I found a great website that shows you the seeds and tells you what they are.  I will post the link. Oh they were hollyhocks btw. My dianthus and double petunias that I bought are also coming up, I have to wait another month or so start my veggies but I am super excited.  This is the first time I've grown plants from scratch on my own :)

And the link for the seeds

http://theseedsite.co.uk/

Dahlia's

I decided to check on my dahlia's and calla lily that I dug up last fall, I had put them in a plastic veggie bag (the ones that have tiny air holes in them).  I dried them and put the in the bags with peat moss then stuck them in the bottom of my broom closet. I had forgotten about them until last weekend when I started my seedlings so I went and got them out of the closet. Unfortunately I lost the lily,  I think there was too much moisture in the bag. But my dahlia's had little feelers coming out of the bag and looked quite happy.  I decided to pot them because I want to try propagating them from cuttings.  I separated the tubers a bit from one plant and just put the other in dirt, the whole one started to grow right away, the others not so sure.  We will see as time goes on. I'm very excited if I can get them to propagate because I love these dahlia's, they are the smaller ones that only grow to about 8-12" and are covered with blooms all summer.  These ones are purple and orange, fingers crossed :)

Pruned my apple tree

OMG!!!  I was so scared to prune my apple tree today... My local nursery said  that I could and should do it now, while the tree was in a dormant state.  So I got out my sheers and grit my teeth and off I went.  Now I didn't just hack away at it, I googled it and watched multiple videos on the subject and have been staring at it for months deciding which branches to cut. I also added a branch to bend one of the main branches down a bit, it's supposed to be at a 45 degree angle, so I've read.  I am very happy with the end result, it looks a little bare but I was assured that once it starts growing again it will be far happier.  Once I started it wasn't so bad, I actually had fun and could see more and more as to where it needed to be pruned.  I can't wait to see it this summer :) I had 5 apples off this tree last year, hopefully I will get a few more.

Getting started

So I couldn't wait any longer... Luckily for me petunias and snap dragons are ready to plant ;) I asked a lot of questions today at my local nursery and they gave me the go ahead.  I wanted to try more things from seed this year and I collected seeds from my petunias and snap dragons last year so I planted those.  I will keep you posted.  As you can see from the picture I have a lot of snow outside so I have a while to wait.  But I figure why not, that way I can watch all the baby plants grow in my house.  I bought a mini greenhouse, used organic all purpose soil and my old egg cartons to grow them in, from what I have read when the plants are ready to go outside you should be able to rip the cartons apart and plant them directly into the ground.  They will decompose :) I'm so excited, and now we wait!

Storing your seeds

So I saw this on Pinterest and thought, what an awesome idea.  I have in the past been known to throw out the extra seeds that I don't use, or I put them somewhere and forget where they are and re-buy them.  But if you have an old cd storage book (you know, the ones with the plastic pages where u insert 4 cd's per page in that little sleeve), well works great for seed packets :).  I didn't have one kicking around so I went to my local dollar store and picked one up for $2.00, it's nothing fancy but will do the trick.  Since I already started buying seeds for this spring I needed somewhere to put them, and I love this idea.  
I also went to my local nursery to check on the babies,  they're doing great ;) and of course I did not come home empty handed.

New orchid!!!  Yeah!!

Tomatoes

So a little while ago I wrote about my poor little tomato plant.  Well, seems its still kicking and after a haircut and an Epsom salt bath it started blooming again and today I noticed a little tomato.  The whole plant is full of buds again, I really didn't think it would continue to produce fruit over and over again.  So if you would like to grow some fruit year round keep a tomato plant indoors.  I have left mine in a south facing window all winter and it only had about 1-2 months where it didn't produce fruit. That may also have been my fault because I wasn't very nice to it for awhile ;)

Valentines day breakfast

Good evening everyone :). I know this is a little late but i found these cute heart shaped cucumbers at the grocery store and just had to eat them.  They were actually very tasty.  I'm so excited to grow some cucumbers this year, I've even bought my first pack of seeds.  Hoping to go to my local nursery again this weekend and see all the baby plants.

Anyway this was breakfast shortly after valentines day,
1 egg
2 strips of bacon
1/4 C blueberries 
1 heart shaped cucumber
And a Tbsp of salsa mixed into my egg

Gone for a week

Sorry guys,  but I was in Vegas all week.  What a blast, I really love Vegas and we went with a great group of friends so that's always awesome.  Just wanted to say hi and that I'm still here ;)  but I am recovering today in my PJ's so I will write more tomorrow.  Have a wonderful Sunday!!

The nursery

I did go to my local nursery yesterday, and like always had a wonderful time.  Like I said they start some of the seedlings in February so I went and spent some time with the babies :)

I have to admit, being there is my happy place.  It completely calms me after a hard day at work or just a lovely Saturday morning, it's just such a peaceful place to be.

I looked through the veggies to see what I wanted to plant this year, I think I would like to try square foot gardening.  I find it an interesting concept and since I don't have a huge amount of space garden boxes are the right choice for my back yard. 

I do like the idea of pest confusion by planting different plants together, since I would like to keep my garden as organic as possible I will not be using conventional pest control methods.

I will try all organic solutions and I will be ordering ladybugs again.  They were fantastic last year, I had them in my house for my herbs.  They just hung around my herbs and windows and never moved to interior of my house, and they are just fun to watch.

So I leave you with a nursery shot :). Happy Sunday!

It's Friday

Yeah!! It's Friday.  Not much going on tonight, but I think it's time to start heading to the local nursery tomorrow.  I know, I know, it's way to early but they start the seedlings in February and it's fun to watch them grow up :)
And besides it makes me feel like spring is just around the corner.
Well I will write tomorrow about how wonderful it was ;) night!

Test results

I received my results from my blood and urine tests today.  I guess I should explain, there is a wonderful non-profit organization in my town that specializes in prevention medicine.  Made up of naturopaths, nurses and doctors, they do extensive blood and urine analyses to pinpoint any deficiencies in your body.
They do the same tests that your family doctor does when he/she thinks there might be something wrong but go into way more detail, testing every little thing.
Pretty much any test you can think of they do.  Upon receiving your results they make recommendations on how to go about correcting any concerns that have come up. 
Living in the north we are all vitamin D deficient, so it was no surprise when that came back low.
Otherwise my vitamins and minerals were all pretty good.
In the heavy metal department I have high amounts of lead in my system, so I have a follow up appointment with a naturopath to help reduce it. Otherwise no heavy metals were detected.
I do have elevated cholesterol so I have to work on that, upping my omega 3's and my vitamin D intake will help with that.  Since my diet has already changed and I'm no longer eating fast or processed foods I'm half way there, but my overall risk for heart disease is minimal and I want to keep it that way.
It would have been interesting to test before my diet change and then now, but I guess I will just have to wait a year :)
I had a low glutathione level, which is the body's major detoxifying protein.  So I will be working on raising those levels as well.  Apparently eating animal proteins helps with that... SWEET!!
But overall my health status is very good, and all other body functions are in great shape. I test again in a year so it will be interesting to compare the results.
This is an amazing organization and I'm very lucky to be apart of it!

This weather

This winter has been something else, of course we did have an amazing summer and last winter was pretty mild, so we can't really complain.
It's warming up again and should be back in the +'s by this weekend, what a roller coaster. 
I find it a bit difficult to eat primal in the winter, I don't like to eat salads and cold veggies when it's freezing outside.  I really need to find some good warm soothing winter food.  I love chillies and soups, but I also loved them with dumplings, beans, rice, homemade bread and potatoes.  And because my goal is still weight loss, I'm trying to stay away from those things.  For the most part I have given up wheat completely, although I do occasionally indulge in birthday cake or a donut from Krispy Kreme  ;). YES I said Krispy Kreme,  I'm sorry but Timmies donuts just don't compare.  The coffee, well that's  another story.
With that however comes consequences, since giving up wheat I get pretty bad headaches and bloat when I do indulge so that's becoming less frequent.
So tonight I leave you with an image from my very first raspberry off of my raspberry bush from last year  :) can't wait to see them again!

Something to keep my mind off the cold

One of my creations from last year :)
I needed something pretty to look at today since it was another day of -40C.  I'm telling you spring can't come fast enough for me.  
I loved building this little fairy house and garden, I'm hoping it will make it through the winter ok so I can add to it this year.  That tree trunk beside the fairy house is my very own apple tree, even though it only produced 5 apples last year, they were some of the best tasting apples I've had.  
I'm going to have to prune it this year, should be interesting.  Never pruned a tree before but I've been watching you tube video's and reading online tips so should be interesting ;). I will let you all know how it turns out, pics and maybe a video.

Just a quick hey!

So it was -27C with a windchill of -42C today.. 
The moment you stepped outside it took your breath away, it's a wonder anything survives through our winters.  But it does.
Hopefully this won't last long, according to the weather forecast its supposed to warm up by Wednesday. So I figure we have about a 50% chance of that being true ;) 
Nothing overly exciting happening tonight, just a nice steak dinner with brussel sprouts (yes I love them) we did however just come home from walleyball which is always a great time.
Well time to go warm up with a nice hot shower before dinner, night!

Brownies

So brownies done!  
I did use almond flour but I used 1 C instead of 1/2, I find that the almond flour makes it more brownie like whereas the coconut flower is more cake like. 
I just tasted it and I do like it, I might try to use both coconut flour and almond next time because I do like the cake consistency better.  But I do find using just coconut flour gives it a little bit of a chalky texture, not sure if chalky is the right word but it's all I can think of.
Anyway I might experiment with a frosting, maybe cocoa powder, honey and butter.
Sounds promising ;)
But first, the orchids..

Here's that link again

http://www.unrefinedkitchen.com/2011/08/22/paleo-coconut-flour-brownies-with-secret-ingredient-zucchini/

What to do on a cold winter day

Like I said, I'm in the gardening mood :) Of course today the temperature dropped back to -20C so I'm feeling a little sorry for myself.  With a windchill of -30C there's really nothing to do but hang out inside, so I think I'm going to give my Orchids a bath and possibly make some zucchini brownies.
What does bathing my orchids have to do with primal gardening you ask.  Honestly, nothing really but the primal lifestyle has everything to do with doing something that makes you happy, so I bathe my orchids :)
As for the brownies, they are primal and one of the most moist and delicious brownies I've ever had.
Here's the link

http://www.unrefinedkitchen.com/2011/08/22/paleo-coconut-flour-brownies-with-secret-ingredient-zucchini/

I might try it with almond flour this time, I will let you know how it turns out.

Sweet Omelette

Occasionally I will post recipes that I find interesting or just plain yummy to look at or eat ;)

So here's an old favorite of mine, my dad used to make this for us when we were kids as a treat.  It's pretty primal and called

The Sweet Omelette!!

3 eggs (2 might suffice) 
1/2 Tbsp Agave Nectar - to taste
Cinnamon (a sprinkle or a pinch)
1 Tbsp butter

I'm not a stickler for exacts ;)

Separate egg whites and yolks, beat egg whites until fluffy and so they peak when you lift the beaters out.  Put saucepan on medium heat and add butter. Add agave nectar to the yolks and beat with a fork, then beat into the egg whites. Don't over beat.. Pour into saucepan and cook for 3-5 min, until bottom browns. Sprinkle cinnamon on the eggs in the pan.  Your omelette should slide out nicely onto your plate, and ta da.. Enjoy!

My first post

So my very first post. I have no idea what I'm doing so this is just for fun. I'm getting in the gardening mood again, unfortunately I have another 3-4 months to wait :(
I'm very excited to be starting my veggie garden this year, along with all my flowers of course. But I will be adding raised garden boxes to my back yard for the vegetables. Being in northern BC our growing season is short but the right veggies grow very well here.
It's going to be an experiment, I will be trying all kinds of things. Some will work and I'm sure some won't, but either way I will have fun doing it.
Anyway I will be posting my results and what works for me and what doesn't, please feel free to give me suggestions and ideas :)

Will write soon,
Iris