I’ve got worms!

I knew I’d get you with that title!  Not parasites, but red wigglers! I decided that the best way for me to get rid of my produce/bread/pasta/grain/newspaper waste was to do vermiculture…. aka, having a worm farm!  I wanted something small enough for just me… so I invested in a Worm Factory, which can be inside (in the winter) or outside (from the spring to the fall). Until the worms get settled, it will be inside. The best thing about having a worm farm like this, is that you have a spigot to harvest the compost “tea” for healthy fertilizer for your houseplants etc.

The worm farm I chose was from Amazon.ca . . . Nature’s Footprint.  It is expandable incase I get it going really well, and get my neighbours involved!

 

My compost outside did not have a huge amount of worms in it (I have to admit that I have neglected my composter for the past 6 months).  So I opted to purchase some worms through Burnaby Red Wigglers.  I mailed off my cheque, and before you knew it, I had worms arrive at my door! He also has some information here. Very nice to deal with! Wish I lived in the Lower Mainland to get to one of his workshops.

Here’s a picture of the worms…. most were hiding, but I could tell that there were lots of “babies” in there.

I’m trying to convince Cody that we have new “pets” in the house LOL!

Once I get this worm farm producing, I will post more of my vermicompost adventures!

May 20th Gardening update

Well, I’ve procrastinated long enough. I’ve been meaning to take out the front lawn, and have started the process.  By hand. I don’t think I will make the deadline I set in last month’s post. I can’t believe that it has almost been 1 month since that post!!!
Cody enjoyed being out there with me.. some before, during and after pictures for you.  I ended up getting about 1/3 of the lawn dug out. I think in practicality, I will leave a strip around 8 ft deep in the front of the “lawn” that will just be covered with plastic and bark mulch this year. I’m thinking that it will take a good three years for the front lawn to be the way I envision it turning out.  Cross your fingers for me!

Above, the view of the yard from the neighbor's side, and Cody enjoying being outside with me.

Above, Cody was trying not to be in the way, but invariably was right where I wanted to dig. Then the view from my side of the work in progress. That big pile is sod that I’ve shaken the dirt out of (for the most part)…. not sure how I’m going to get rid of it!
So, the game plan is to get the majority of the sod dug out by Thursday night. Friday and Saturday I will be getting 50/50 mix to enrich the areas I plan to plant, as well as a healthy amount of shredding fir mulch to cover the planted beds.  Oh! I forgot to mention it, but I will be getting pea gravel to make a pathway between our places for the mailman and us to use.  Stay tuned!!!!

My White Bread Recipe

I find it amazing at how expensive a loaf of bread is to buy these days! It really makes sense to make your own, even with the higher cost of flour.  I’ve never really used a recipe for bread making, when making it by hand. I do use proportions. I know what size of loaf I want to make, and how much liquid it takes to make it. I started off with the liquid and yeast, and then added my dry ingredients until it felt right. Being single again, it doesn’t make sense to make 5 loaves at a time, so I’m using my bread maker again. You can’t fudge with a recipe with a bread maker, and expect it to turn out right… but once you have the proportions down pat, you can consistently make great bread!  Here is my recipe, in the order that I measure it. I use a scale, and put the baking insert on the scale and use the tare function as required to weigh out the ingredients in this order:

Shelley’s White Bread = 2 lb. loaf

• 315 gm. warm water
• 15 gm. lemon juice
• 5 gm. salt
• 15 gm. oil or combination (oil, butter)
• 15 gm. sugar (your choice, I usually use white)
• 500 gm. flour
• 15 gm. potato flour (or starch)
• 5 gm. gluten powder
• 7 gm. yeast (2 tsp.)

 

I use the medium color crust, and 2 lb loaf setting on my bread maker.  It turns out just the way I like it. The potato flour makes it soft, and the lemon juice, gluten powder work with the flour to increase the ability of the dough to rise.

Now…. drum roll please! Here’s what it looks like!

How do you make bread? Do you have a favorite recipe or method? I’d love to hear about it in the comments below!

F is for Father

Actually, F was my co-worker’s husband’s first initial… I had fun making this card for her family to give him (they were giving him money to buy his own IPad). I designed the card to look like it was a piece of technology (I hope!), with his initial and an APPLE logo attached to it. I also made a tab to simulate a closing tab of an IPad case. It is to scale in size with a regular IPad too! You could take the idea and run with it, by changing the wording around the border of the “screen”. As usual, lots of room for personal notes of love

On the inside I made a money holder by embossing a flap and gluing it onto the card. The white embossed piece of paper is just to guide the money out of the flap. I used Serif's Draw PlusX5 to make the inside signing insert... I find that program makes it just too easy to make a shape and then put wording around it. Silhouette Studio does an ok job at do that as well, although if the project is large, it bogs down the program significantly IMHO.

I hope you enjoyed the card! And thanks for visiting from the Card a Day Blog too!

I’m going to post a Father’s Day poem this coming week, so stay tuned!

Sweet Invitations

Thanks for visiting from the Card a Day Blog! This is the first of May (unbelievable eh?), and the first card of a new theme - Invitations.

I’m planning a BBQ this summer for my co-workers to come and enjoy an evening of fun in my backyard (if I ever get my yard work done!).   My yard is small, and I’ve been trying to think of what activities I can have with a varied group of adults.  Hmmm lawn darts… ring toss… crocket… I think the type of party I want is an old fashioned, be a kid-type party, not the bring your own beer and drink too much type party. I hope you like it! The card size is 6 inches square.

The one thing about invitations is that if you don't have a whole lot of time, and want to mass produce them, for me, its just a printed/digital card.  I find myself using Sihouette's Studio to do a lot of these cards, as there is a lot of choices in their store for things to put on the cards.  I chose two regular cutting files, and colored them in the program, set them not to cut, and then printed them out.  If I would have had time, I would have cut out the "You're Invited" part of the card, printed the rest, and used a clear dimensional highlighter for the rose in the vase.
The table and chairs were the "Bistro Table and Chairs" file by Sarah Baily. The "You're Invited Title" was by Jamie.

I hope this gives you an idea of what you can do on short notice to make a sweet card :-)

Join our May Challenge!

April 27th Gardening updates

Today I am so excited to go to the mushroom workshop at Tsolum River Truffula Tree Farm!  I realize though that I’ve not done a gardening update.  I’ve been so busy trying to get the yard in order, and renovating what I have.
My goals this year:

1. Raised garden beds in the back yard.
2. Re-do the lawn edging along the path in the back yard, from the house to the workshop. I want to use landscape ties instead of the plastic edging. When doing this I want to incorporate a future fire pit/ bbq area  (On my bucket list is to make a Cobb Fireplace/Rocket Stove/Oven). I’m still pondering how I’m going to do this.
3. Weed and mulch the soil under the Prune Plum tree to plant “Garden Giant” mushroom spawn.
4. Completely redo the planter bed between the deck and the workshop. Its overgrown with weeds and lawn seed that I missed vacuuming up (long story from last year I did not share online). Mulch it well so it will be lower maintenance than it is now.
5. Take out the lawn from the front yard. Plant with shrubs, perennials and annuals, and mulch heavily to make it low maintenance.

I’ve got #1 done on the list, although I still have to tweak the positioning of the landscape ties that separate the garden from the lawn.  The wood I used was 2”x12”, and it provides a good height that the dog thinks is separate, and so far hasn’t gone into (crossing fingers!)
Here’s a picture of the back yard garden, the first picture is when I was making them, and the second picture is filled and partially planted. 



In the first bed I have 1/4 planted with Garlic, 1/4 planted with one Cardoon, 1/6th planted with Sugar Snap Peas, 1/6th planted with Red Russian Kale, and 1/6th to be planted (I’m thinking with Perpetual Spinach).
In the second bed the planting is more free-form. I planted a one foot by five foot strip of sugar snap peas along side the fence. The central part of the bed has five sprouting purple broccoli plants, surrounded by three different types of lettuce (12 plants total). The remaining part of the bed is filled with “walking onions” (Egyptian walking onions… you treat them like green onions, snipping what you need, and then let them go to seed… they form bulbuls that make at least five more plants!)
I’m debating on what to plant in the last bed, closest to the greenhouse.  I’m thinking squash, although I may try the Three Sister’s Planting method one more time. I know that I want a good planting of Purple Peacock Pole Beans - I really enjoyed them last year!
I should note that between the last bed and the greenhouse is a Lovage plant that barely survived me digging it out and leaving it “bare” over the winter.
Below, Lilac and Asian Pear Tree in bloom.

Below, the info. for the Purple Sprouting Broccoli, and Blueberries in bloom.

My Dad used to say “no rest for the wicked”…. Now, I really didn’t think I was that bad!!!!
Stay tuned for more gardening updates in the next month or so… did I tell you I wanted to accomplish this all by the end of next month?????? YIKES!

Card a Day Blog ….. Oh Wishing Well …..

This week one of the RN’s I work with is retiring after over 35 years of service… Our department wanted to make a card and include something special for her (shhhhh! It’s a secret!).
I thought a wishing well would be the perfect thing to put on her card, as we were making a wish for her success in retirement!
I had a lot of fun making this card… I started out with the idea of a wishing well… thought about doing it with a print and cut with my Silhouette, but opted to make it from scratch.
The card base is approx. 5 inches by 7 inches. 
I made a cream colored background out of some cardboard I had, and ran it through my crimper both ways several times… it made a subtle texture, and softened the tone.  I layered that on some velum, and cut it out to be a border. 
The real fun came with making the well. I had some nice rich brown cardstock, as well as some leather textured art paper.  For the top of the well, I basically cut out these pieces, and ran them through the crimper (except for the left side of the roof and the posts).

After crimping, I cut a piece of black cardstock to be the shadow of the inside of the roof. I also taped on the leather textured paper onto the well part… it was a fussy cut, as I wanted it to simulate stone, so I really chose what area I used on the paper.
Then it was simply to use glue, tape and double sided foam adhesive to put it all together.  I felt it needed greenery, and instead of fussy cutting grass, I used some silk leaves from an arrangement I had in my house.
On the outside I wrote: We made a wish.
On the inside is : we hope your every success!
Sorry I don’t have more pictures to share with you… just wanted to give you an idea of an easy card to do

Thanks for visiting from the Card a Day Blog! Make sure to visit again soon for more card making inspiration!