Deviations from my "new normal"
The new normal for Saturday mornings has to been get up, have breakfast with the kids (at the dining room table!), clean the kitchen, mop and vaccum the floors, etc.
I have wicked cold right now though, well technically I'm on the mend from a wicked cold. I couldn't afford to take time off from work to recuperate, so it's been a rough few days while dragging myself through the days (still doing dishes every day! Still picking crap up and putting crap away evey day!) with a cough, sneezes, and the exasperated exhaustion and pain that comes with having normal sickness on top of chronic sickness.
So, I'm being kind to myself this morning. I let the kids grab semi-junk food for breakfast, sat and found cute bunny pictures on the internet for a dear friend who got some horrifying news last night (if that's all I can do to help dammit, then I'm gonna do it and do it NOW!), and just now finally dragged myself out of my cozy chair cocoon to make some tea and toast. The toast is from last weekend's home made bread, with homemade (sadly not by me, but someday...) raspberry jam. The tea is an herbal tea with lemongrass, chamomille, peppermint, and cinnamon. It's sweet and spicy with a hint of lemon. Very delicious.
I'm enjoying the "new normal" I've established in the past couple of weeks. No soda (well, not none, but very little and no diet soda). More water, more tea. More homemade cooking from fresh ingredients (yay- farmer's market!).
I learned to make roasted chicken the RIGHT way, and OMG, so good. So. Good. The skin came out so crispy! Just like in a restaraunt, or when we buy a hot roasted chicken already made to eat at home. The kids loved it so much that even Pixie (who normally won't have anything to do with any soup) were very excited at the idea of me making soup from the carcass and leftovers. And the soup was FANTASTIC.
It makes me slightly sad that I am forming these habits so late in the year, because if I had done so earlier I could have gotten more vegetables to do some canning and pickling with. But, we're already running short in this area of such things. Damn the short growing season. Oh well- next year! And even better, this year I got my yard in order (go me!) and can really have a garden next year!
Oh- speaking of which, I found through on-line investigation that I have several edible plants already growing in my yard.
Day lilies are edible! the leaves, petals and bulbs are all edible. :D The vast majority of the ones in my yard are too old for the bulbs to be very good, from what I've read, but there was a nice crop of new sprouts this year that should have delicious bulbs next year. And the petals will be good no matter how old the plant is. I'm gonna try those next year. At least for the novelty of it. I found this out because, hey did you know that garlic is a kind of lily? And there's LOTS of edible lilies. But you have to be careful and check first before you go noshing on them, some varieties have alkaloids and should not be eaten.
Of course, I knew that the leaves and petals of dandelions were edible, but I'm not terribly interested in that right now. Although, I might look into making dandelion wine. My great grandfather used to make dandelion wine and my Mom has lots of fond memories of spending her childhood gathering the flowers. I'm not sure I'll be abl to get enough dandelions for that, though. My understanding is that it takes quite a lot of them, and most of my neighbors wage serious war against dandelions, digging them out as soon as they see them.
There's some other green leafy things that I think might be in the edible "field greens" category, but I want to confirm before I go tossing them into salads, lol. I love the dark green leafy greens I buy at the store, and they look pretty much exactly the same, but that doesn't mean that they ARE exactly the same.
Clover is edible, too, although I don't currently have any in my yard. I did earlier this year, though, so maybe it'll be back. There wasn't a lot.
I'm fortunate that none of my neighbors use pesticides or herbicides in their lawn maintenance. My one set of neighbors doesn't really have a lawn, per se. They just have garden. Lots and lots of garden. I'm envious and plan on emulating them a great deal. My other neighbors just have tiny patches of yards around their paved areas and prefer to dig weeds out by hand, and handle bugs and other pests with traps rather than sprays and poisons. Quite possibly due to the influence of the gardening neighbors.
Well, the farmers market opens in about 10 minutes, and I want to get to that right away, then I want to get the rest of my grocery shopping done. Monkey is having an overnight guest tonight, so I do need to do the vacuming and mopping before he gets here.
Take care, my friends, and have a good weekend. :D
I have wicked cold right now though, well technically I'm on the mend from a wicked cold. I couldn't afford to take time off from work to recuperate, so it's been a rough few days while dragging myself through the days (still doing dishes every day! Still picking crap up and putting crap away evey day!) with a cough, sneezes, and the exasperated exhaustion and pain that comes with having normal sickness on top of chronic sickness.
So, I'm being kind to myself this morning. I let the kids grab semi-junk food for breakfast, sat and found cute bunny pictures on the internet for a dear friend who got some horrifying news last night (if that's all I can do to help dammit, then I'm gonna do it and do it NOW!), and just now finally dragged myself out of my cozy chair cocoon to make some tea and toast. The toast is from last weekend's home made bread, with homemade (sadly not by me, but someday...) raspberry jam. The tea is an herbal tea with lemongrass, chamomille, peppermint, and cinnamon. It's sweet and spicy with a hint of lemon. Very delicious.
I'm enjoying the "new normal" I've established in the past couple of weeks. No soda (well, not none, but very little and no diet soda). More water, more tea. More homemade cooking from fresh ingredients (yay- farmer's market!).
I learned to make roasted chicken the RIGHT way, and OMG, so good. So. Good. The skin came out so crispy! Just like in a restaraunt, or when we buy a hot roasted chicken already made to eat at home. The kids loved it so much that even Pixie (who normally won't have anything to do with any soup) were very excited at the idea of me making soup from the carcass and leftovers. And the soup was FANTASTIC.
It makes me slightly sad that I am forming these habits so late in the year, because if I had done so earlier I could have gotten more vegetables to do some canning and pickling with. But, we're already running short in this area of such things. Damn the short growing season. Oh well- next year! And even better, this year I got my yard in order (go me!) and can really have a garden next year!
Oh- speaking of which, I found through on-line investigation that I have several edible plants already growing in my yard.
Day lilies are edible! the leaves, petals and bulbs are all edible. :D The vast majority of the ones in my yard are too old for the bulbs to be very good, from what I've read, but there was a nice crop of new sprouts this year that should have delicious bulbs next year. And the petals will be good no matter how old the plant is. I'm gonna try those next year. At least for the novelty of it. I found this out because, hey did you know that garlic is a kind of lily? And there's LOTS of edible lilies. But you have to be careful and check first before you go noshing on them, some varieties have alkaloids and should not be eaten.
Of course, I knew that the leaves and petals of dandelions were edible, but I'm not terribly interested in that right now. Although, I might look into making dandelion wine. My great grandfather used to make dandelion wine and my Mom has lots of fond memories of spending her childhood gathering the flowers. I'm not sure I'll be abl to get enough dandelions for that, though. My understanding is that it takes quite a lot of them, and most of my neighbors wage serious war against dandelions, digging them out as soon as they see them.
There's some other green leafy things that I think might be in the edible "field greens" category, but I want to confirm before I go tossing them into salads, lol. I love the dark green leafy greens I buy at the store, and they look pretty much exactly the same, but that doesn't mean that they ARE exactly the same.
Clover is edible, too, although I don't currently have any in my yard. I did earlier this year, though, so maybe it'll be back. There wasn't a lot.
I'm fortunate that none of my neighbors use pesticides or herbicides in their lawn maintenance. My one set of neighbors doesn't really have a lawn, per se. They just have garden. Lots and lots of garden. I'm envious and plan on emulating them a great deal. My other neighbors just have tiny patches of yards around their paved areas and prefer to dig weeds out by hand, and handle bugs and other pests with traps rather than sprays and poisons. Quite possibly due to the influence of the gardening neighbors.
Well, the farmers market opens in about 10 minutes, and I want to get to that right away, then I want to get the rest of my grocery shopping done. Monkey is having an overnight guest tonight, so I do need to do the vacuming and mopping before he gets here.
Take care, my friends, and have a good weekend. :D