new year resolutions

I usually make several resolutions involving saving money, eating healthy, taking care of myself spiritually/emotionally/mentally and working out. Unfortunately I don't usually go beyond thinking of setting them, let alone starting. However, last year I decided to stop drinking soda (I grew up calling it pop or coke but I've switched to calling it soda cause its fun to say if you draw out the ooo. Try it: Sooooda, see wasn't that fun?) and with only a couple of relapses I've done well. I've only recently stopped craving it even though I never really drank that much of it before. I can't imagine how hard it must be for people who get hooked on much more addicting things.

Anyways this year I decided to limit myself to eating out once a week. This has actually contributed to not spending as much money and eating healthier as byproduct goals. It hasn't helped tons though because when I do go out now, I tend to splurge :) But I've done really well, in fact a couple of weeks ago I didn't even eat out once! Last weekend I didn't quite do it (see post about Tom and Alec), and this week I got a couple of "snacks" to go with my lunch so not doing as well but overall its a vast improvement. (this picture doesn't really go, but I was proud of the 18 cups of pureed squish!)

This week, I printed out my monthly goal sheet and put it up on the fridge to mark up daily. Just that small step has put me back on track for some things that I really do want to do everyday. Shiny Sink is back and with it all the benefits of having a cleaner house. Just by breaking things into small doable chunks I feel better about myself, my home, etc.

So how are you doing on yours?

Alec and Tom

I only touched on the subject of going to lunch Saturday with Tom and Alec in the previous post. Well thats cause I wanted to do a whole post just on them. Thats cause they're special :)

ps this picture is from my birthday





Its been fun having Alec up here at college. Its crazy to see my nephews and neices growing up so fast, but its fun to get to know Alec as an almost grownup. I always mean to invite him to dinner, but never think to do so until to late. He should just invite himself ;)

Sometimes we go shopping together as I have transportation. One time we found something that I've only seen in Taiwan. Alec actually bought some so he could shock some people.










On Friday we went to a BYU men's volleyball game. Those are very fun. I went to one several years ago and the place was packed and its just amazing to watch how high those guys can jump and how hard they can hit! This game wasn't quite as packed but still fun to watch. It was over pretty quick as they won 3 straight in a row.




We went to In and Out before the game and then to the Malt shop for shakes afterwards. Pretty good shakes but scary place! Saturday between sessions we went a little lighter with Zupas. It was fun to get to spend time with Tom too. I've got great brothers and sisters in law. Tom's been around for quite awhile now and has always been like another brother.

Conference Weekend

Conference equals spring! It was funny to see it all snowy today. I meant to get a couple of pictures of my first daffodils blooming in the back window garden, but forgot so I just went out there. My new phone has a flash! Poor daffs.



I do enjoy conference. its nice to get things in perspective and remember the things I can do to make my life better. I'll also admit its nice to not put together a lesson for sunday. Last year I was glad to not have to teach too, but this year our little guys are much easier :)



I was pretty tired today so I decided to cook up the remaining squash from downstairs for squash mac and cheese, and preserve the rest in the freezer. Besides 3 small squash (2 baby blue hubards, and a mystery volunteer) all that was left was bubba. It cooked up pretty good, and had more flesh then i thought it would. Very mild and fairly sweet. Not great for pumpkin pie but perfect for my needs. I found it worked better to squeeze out some of the extra juice to keep it from being so soupy.


Have you ever squeezed cooked pumpkin. Its kind of a fun experience :)



Friday I got home from work early enough to do plenty in the garden. I dug up potatoes and since I had already worked on it a week or so ago, it was much faster going. Cathy was nice enough to stop by and keep me company.... I also got some of the back wall garden cleaned off before going to play.

Saturday was also a beautiful day. I organized my primary stuff during the first session of conference so now the spare room will not get as messy, hopefully!. In between conference sessions I got some of the house work done as well as ate lunch with Alec and Tom. Then it was out in the garden after the afternoon session where i finished digging for potatoes, shoveled all the dirt back, planted broccoli and cabbage, put down cow poops on the bed where the peas are going, and finished cleaning the bed around the fire pit. This lasted till it was too dark to see anything. I also planned out the garden on the computer so I know what goes where. I really hope to do more vertical plantings this year to try and fit more things in. We'll see how it goes. Then the rest of the evening was finishing house work. I'd let it go a bit long but the house was looking much better when I started so thats good.




Digging out the potatoes took a lot of work. Some of them were over 2.5' down. I think this year will be better since I planted to shallow the first year and too deep the second. 3rd year is a charm, right? I also need to find a way that saves me from skewering so many when I dig them up. I got some great big ones so I must be doing some things right. Now I need to figure out how to use them all up in a hurry. Any suggestions?








I had hoped to get the peas planted yesterday, so hopefully that will happen this week. I can plant the onions now that the old potato bed is all dug up and turned over. Just need more poops :)


i love these nasturtiums. They just popped up and are already taller then the older seedlings. For some reason they look like hands lifted up in prayer to me (hard to see in this picture)

Whats commin up?

I love wandering around the garden when its not actually snowing to look at what is popping up.

Lots of baby parsley where its gone to seed.







Tons of red orach is coming up so I don't think I'll ever have to reseed it. Now I just have to figure out what to do with it.

Fennel is greening up, and unfortunately has proved rather invasive without producing many bulbs.





My garlic experiments seemed to work. Last spring I took some that was growing on the counter and put it here and there in the garden. It grew and I took the biggest cloves from each new bulb and replanted it. Now each of those are growing and looking well.




Seeing buds on most of the fruit bushes, little pussy willow looking things on a couple of saskatoon bushes, swelling pink buds on the bush cherries, and the leaves are popping out on the elderberry bushes.







The rhubarb bush that I semi-divided is doing well. The hacked off sectioned is also growing:








The grass is starting to green up and perennials are putting new leaves or greening up too. Tons of work to do!

First loads of cow poop were purchased Saturday to get the beds ready that will have peas planted in the next couple of weeks.

In bad news, cats got in the hoop house. I let it go a little long between waterings and the cats thought it was a nice, warm, dry place to hang out apparently. They wallowed out nice soft beds. grrrr Can see some radishes were coming up but most of the lettuce was literally wiped out.

Friends

I have been really blessed with great friends. Allison gave me this amazing water bottle after I was admireing it. Mama had one like it that I was playing with the night before. I wanted a new one, but didn't want to pay $8 for something I can get for couple of bucks- yes I know its ironic that I will put down hundreds for dirt! What I love: 1. Easy drinkability. Never fails that I end up with water on me from typical reusable water bottles. 2. No straw - those get nasty cause you can't clean 'em good. 3. Counter thingy that helps you keep track of how much you drink. 4. Fun pop lid to play with! 5. It reminds me of Allison every time I use it :) I did have to bling it out a bit since Mama's is the same color...

You may notice in the background of the picture, our wall of brackets. It was so fun filling them out that we also did the women's bracket. I really liked the first round when I got to use the highlighter a lot since games were going on so often. Now its not quite as fun, especially since a lot of mine is kaput. So far someone who shall remain nameless is the clear leader...

Hummus

My first spring flowers! I've also got some wild violets blooming :)

Today I made hummus and it turned out pretty good. I want to experiment some more with the recipe, ie less tahini maybe substitute some pine nut or almond butter, add some roasted stuff?

Of course with humas its best to have fresh pita bread so I found an easy recipe and made it. I could eat it all day, it was pretty easy and very tasty. Didn't really go with the stackups for dinner but no one was complaining!

What have I been up to? Not too much. I have stopped at the plant nursery, but only once. I stopped to get some cabbage and brocoli. When I first looked down at my hands I had pansies, new seed trays, and celery. hmmm not off to a great start. I did end up with some broccoli but they didn't have any cabages so I bought some seeds. I'll see how those turn out. Its actually not too bad since it all fit into one small box.

Even though I have been scrupulous in staying away from the nursery, I have still have managed to buy more seeds in addition to my massive Baker Creek's order.... oh well. I think I have 16 or so tomato varieties. That doesn't count the two or three varieties I always buy!

What did I get from Baker's Creek? Dragon Tongue Bush Bean (dutch origin), Henderson's bush Lima Bean (don't usually like lima's but thought maybe fresh would be alright), two chinese long beans, Atomic Red carrot, Jaune Obtuse du Doubs Carrot, Snow White Carrot, Dishcloth gourd, Canton Bok Pak Choy, Mizuna Green, Corn Salad Dutch, Red's Red Sweet Sorghum, New Zealand Spinach, Anise Hyssop, Siam Queen Thai Basil, Slo-bolt cilantro, Elephant Dill, German Chamomile, Rainblow coleus, Zebrina Hollyhock, Yellow Torch Mexican Sunflower. They threw in a packet of free Love-In-A-Mist so I'll try those too.

Here is the setup so far. Yes my seed setup has grown to a shelving unit with 3 shop lights with seeds in various stages of development. Can't believe how fast some of the cukes and tomatoes have taken off. I don't worry too much about the tomatoes as if they are leggy you just bury them deeper to help with root development. But cukes won't be happy if they're pot bound... I'll have to wait and see how it turns out.

My birthday phone is up and working. Its taken me awhile to get used to the idea of having a big 'ol phone but as my other phone was pretty beat up I decided to try it out. I already lost the instruction manuel. Fortunately those are available on line!

Man it takes a lot longer to load pictures from an actual camera vs a cell phone. I think I'll still use cell phone pictures for the less important ones!

Spring!

I was going to post earlier but couldn't find the cord for my camera. Kate said she would loan me her card reader and then I realized that I can put the card directly into my laptop. Yay! course I do still want to find that cord....

Anyways here is some little tulips and daffodils coming up in my front flower beds!

Here is the same group of tulips only a week later!

Saturday I was pretty productive so today I'm tired and have a headache.... Anyways I did some laundry, cleaned the kitchen blinds (I like blinds but cleaning them is so icky that I'm not sure they are worth it!), planted my hoop house, got 3/4ths of the stump garden cleaned off, covered the roof and another side of the chicken run with wire (ran out of staples and patience to finish the last side), cleaned the bathroom, did some dishes, straightened here and there, prepared primary lesson, and played on the computer and watched some tv.

Forgot to say what I planted cause I'm sure you're dying to know... I tried various lettuce mixes, couple kinds of spinach, some radishes, beets, and parsnips. Might also try some brocoli and cabbage in there. Sarah asked last time what the water bottles were for. Its to help regulate the temperature fluxuations, ie the water will warm up during the day and keep it from getting too warm and then give off that heat at night to keep from getting too cold. Seems to be working so far although our temps have been pretty mild.

I got a new shelving unit so I can start more seeds this year and hopefully save some money that way.... I now will buy another light fixture and some more starting boxes! I'll post a picture when they are all fixed up, but I can tell you it already looks better then the chair set up I've used in the past :)

As I mentioned, I got some tv watching in yesterday. Kate bought the complete set of "As time goes by" which is a cute british sitcom. We have watched lots of it this past week! Last night wasn't feeling too well (maybe dehydrated?) so made some tea and then decided to serve it in style. Yes its still sitting here today while I type this. Do you like cream and sugar or lemon with your herbal tea?

And of course we had biscuits with our tea.

Happy spring to you!