More Jam!

 Dearest Vince! Please do not pick any more strawberries! 

Seriously, I have never had strawberries this good and I wouldn't mind if he picked some every day but maybe just enough to eat. I can't think of anything else I could can with strawberries!

The first thing I made was strawberry syrup and I think I made about 24 pints of that. Then Vince picked more strawberries and I made Strawberry Rhubarb Jam. I think I made about 18 half pints. Can't remember and am too tired to go upstairs and look. This morning, he picked more strawberries! We had to take Cooper to Nevada for his "school". We left here about 2 and got home about 5. I had hulled and sliced the strawberries before we left so I immediately started making jam when we got home. I made two batches . . well three really. I made 4 pints and 8 half pints of more strawberry rhubarb jam and I made two pots of strawberry jalapeno jam. That's my favorite! I made 8 pints and 1 half pint of that one. So . . for today's jam making, I made the equivalent of 33 half pints of jam. I can't wait to have toast with the strawberry jalapeno jam!!

Tomorrow I sit and stitch all day with Debbie. I always look so forward to spending time with her and being able to sit and stitch without any interruptions! 

Oh, and the whole l reason for making this post:  A reader had left a comment asking for my strawberry rhubarb jam recipe. This is the recipe I use. I like it because it doesn't call for added pectin. When using pectin, I've always heard you shouldn't double the recipe. I wanted to double or triple this recipe so I chopped my strawberries, measured them out, then decided how much rhubarb I needed. If you're buying rhubarb and it's expensive, I'm sure you could cut back on it and maybe add more strawberries. The first batch of jam I made, I used 15 cups of chopped rhubarb. It helps that I have it growing in the back yard.

When I made the strawberry jalapeno jam, I wanted to double it so I made two separate batches instead of actually doubling it since it uses pectin.

Who knows . . maybe you can double the recipe even if there's pectin. I've always heard you shouldn't so I don't.

Tweaking the Stitching Plan

 The stitching plan I came up with a few months ago was this: Put all the WIPS I want to work on until they're finished in a big tub. The project bag with the floss and working copy of the chart in the tub with the project so I don't have to search for anything. I would grab a project, work on it for five days, put it away, grab another one and work on it for five days but then I had to wait for two months before I could work on any project again. That worked out fine but, because when I'm with Debbie once a week, we have specific projects to work on so my five days working on a given project could be Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Or it could be Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. That got a bit confusing - not terribly because I look at my calendar every day but every day, before I looked at my calendar, I would think . . is this the day I start another project??

So, the new plan is this:

Start a different project every Monday. Work on it Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Same rule applies - can't work on a project til it's been set aside for at least two months.

It's kinda the same plan as the original but I think this one will work better for me.

2026 Garden!

 The garden is finally planted. Here, I usually plant by mid to late April. 

This year, it was May 9 and 10 when I was finally able to get the plants in the ground. I still have three mineral tubs I can plant something in. I'm probably going to leave at least two of them not planted and use those for planting zucchini at various intervals to try to outsmart the vine borers.

Here are a few photos of what the garden looks like today.

This is the little compost bin I had in Texas. I used it when we first moved here but then Vince built a nice, wooden compost bin but I think it attracted mice and I don't want mice in my compost! We couldn't find the base to this plastic bin but this weekend Vince trimmed a big pine-ish tree that had grown out of control and found the base to the compost bin so I can begin using this again.     

You may remember that we had a volunteer tomato that came up last year. It has tiny (a bit bigger then spoon tomatoes), super sweet tomatoes and Cooper LOVED those. Every time he went outside, he went straight to that tomato plant and I would give him a tomato or two. I saved seeds but so many of them came up volunteer again this year, I didn't need to any that I had started. That's three of them in that tub that I moved but any bed that was near "Cooper's tomato" now has more tomato plants in it.

There are other tomatoes. I think I planted about about 24 tomatoes - some slicing, some canning.

The rabbits love sleeping in the raised beds. You can see where at least one of them made his bed in the potatoes. Those rabbits are such a pain and about the time we think they're all gone, we see more baby bunnies. Vince had already put chicken wire around some of the beds but this weekend, he added it to those that didn't have it. 

 

You can get an idea of the garden layout here. To the left where there's an open area, we had a couple of raised beds but Vince moved those this year. We're putting up a chain link fence, about 20' x 20' in that area so the dogs can play. We have a wood fence but there are places where they might go under it plus on both sides of the house is a retaining wall and I'm afraid the dogs will get to running and go over those walls and land 4 - 5' below on the concrete patio so . . they're getting a fenced play yard within the wood fenced area.

These little peppers are already producing. There are four purple peppers on two of those plants! I hope this means I will get a good crop of peppers. I think I planted about 25 peppers - giant Marconi, bell - green and purple, jalapeno, cayenne, poblano and I can't remember what else.

Above are the candy roaster sprouts. I love these and am so hoping I can keep them safe from the vine borers.

The rhubarb is doing great. I made a triple batch of strawberry rhubarb jam last week - 13 half pints. I hope to get that much made again this week. I'm trying to get the strawberry rhubarb jam made while the amazing strawberries are available. Thank goodness I don't have to replant rhubarb every year.

Yesterday I repotted the bay leaves. I had two bay leaf trees (way smaller than these) when we lived in Kentucky. I would bring them into the garage when nights were going to be colder than about 30 degrees. They say they will survive down to 20 degrees but I bring the in if it's going to be 30 or colder. But, one night in Kentucky I forgot to bring them in and they both died. I looked for years for more bay leaf trees. In Texas, either the Fed Ex or UPS guy told me he had seen some at a nursery in Abilene. Since we went to Abilene, about 70 miles from us, for most of our medical issues and for the vet who treated Rita's eyes, we ran by the nursery on one trip and got two bay leaf trees.

They both were fine for several years, then one of them started looking sickly. Both were in pots and they had ants in the pots. They were just full of ants. I would pour Neem oil/water through the pots often and one of the plants did fine and one seemed to be dead. I kept treating it and babying it but it appeared to be dead. The greenhouse was near the woods so one day I threw the dead bay leaf out in the woods. 

A couple of years later, we were out in that area and something bright green caught my eye. That "dead" bay leaf had started growing. I grabbed it, put it in a pot of dirt and it grew. 

Now you can't even tell which tree was the "dead" one. I keep them in pots because we have to bring them in and out of the garage all winter. The two big pots are the bay leaf trees. The 5 gallon bucket has a basil plant in it.

Last but not least, the fence guys are here. They will set the posts today and be back "later this week" to get the fence up. I think Cooper and Oscar are going to love being able to go out there and play.

Patriotic Finishes

Back in February, Debbie and I decided to work on patriotic pieces on the one day per week that we get together to stitch.

This week I finished the last piece I had on this one piece of linen. I do have other patriotic WIPS. Some of them will be finished in time to add to my Independence Day decorations; some will hopefully be finished by next year.

Here's the piece I finished a couple of days ago. There are 6 projects on here. The flag (third on the left) was my Finish #3 for 2026 so, with the other 5 projects, I've finished 8 pieces now.

I'll try to give a bit of information on each piece.

I'm kinda confused because I thought I stitched that flag (third one down on the left). I know I stitched that and finished it on February 13 so I'm not sure how it ended up in the middle of that piece of linen. But . . it's there so we'll just go with it.

The linen is 36 count Vintage Country Mocha.

Top left:  All American Cross Stitch by Primrose Cottage Stitches.

Second from Top left: Sarah Jane's 1776 Saltbox (freebie at Pinker N Punkin.

Third from Top left: One of the Grand Olde Flags  by Brenda Gervais (three different flags).

Bottom Left - Old Glory by SubRosa. She has several other pieces that coordinate.

Top Right - Fourth of July Rules by Primrose Cottage Stitches.

Bottom Right - 4th of July Hoopla by Brenda Gervais.

There are a few blank spots but I was afraid by the time I left room for finishing, I might not have enough room so I'll save what I can and use if when/if I need a really small piece.

I don't know if any of these will be framed but I hope to get them all fully finished by the first of June.

Tomorrow's Storms

 For once, I'm not complaining about bad weather predicted for tomorrow. I pray no one has tornadoes or hail or any serious bad weather and I certainly wasn't hoping for storms,  though I may have hoped for rain.

As I mentioned, we picked about 22 pounds of strawberries Saturday. Then we came home, Vince helped stem them and I chopped them ALL and made strawberry syrup, then canned 24 pints and 1 half pint of the syrup.

Then Sunday, also as I already mentioned, I spent hours getting the kitchen clean from that big canning session. 

I was looking so forward to spending all day today stitching (Monday) but Taco Salad was on the menu for today and I somehow overlooked buying lettuce when we were at the store last week so I told Vince I needed to run to Walmart to get lettuce. He needed some things. I needed a couple of other things so it wasn't as quick of a trip as I had hoped. Vince wanted to stop at one of the dollar stores and I said "Can we please just go home?" Yes. A one stop trip . . rarely happens but it did.

After lunch, I was happy to go down and start stitching. I sat down and . . fell asleep. I slept in the chair with the dogs for at least two hours.

The strawberry patch isn't open every day. Some days they're closed because they're all "picked out". Some days they're closed for ripening. They were closed today and were going to open 9 - 12 in the morning. Vince wanted to go back and get more and I do want to make strawberry rhubarb jam. Because we have to go to Nevada tomorrow for Cooper's class, I figured today I would pick rhubarb, get it washed and chopped. Then tomorrow after we pick the berries, I would come home, wash those, chop them and be ready to make the jam and get it canned when we get home about 6 p.m. I would also wash the jars, get the water in the canner so I don't have to do any of that tomorrow.

I really want to get the strawberry jam made because once rhubarb and strawberries are gone . . that's it for this year. But, I also have a "meet and greet" at a neighbor's home tomorrow at 1, then I have to leave for Nevada about 2:15 so that doesn't give me much time to get anything done.

When I woke up from my nap, a message popped up on my Facebook that they've cancelled the strawberry picking for tomorrow because of weather!! They will pick Wednesday during the day but I'll be with Debbie so Vince will go pick. How nice! I don't have to do the picking but I'll have lots of fresh berries to make the jam.

Cleaning & Cooking

 Cleaning is definitely not my strong point. After finishing up the strawberry jam close to midnight,  I put the pots in the sink, ran water  in them, got all the food type things in the fridge and that was about it. I knew that when I got up the next morning (yesterday), I had a big job in the kitchen. I got all the pots and pans, measuring gizmos, etc. washed and put away. Then I was going to wipe down the stove and realized . . the stove needed a deep cleaning and scrubbing so I did that.

It actually looks brand new! I took all the grates off, took them outside and scrubbed them; came in and dried them well, oiled them, scrub everything! Then I took those cast iron pots that are on the stove, gave them a good scrubbing, oiled them and heated them to "cook" the oil on. 

Next was Vince's Ezekiel Bread. I make three loaves at a time. I do not like making the bread. It isn't a fun bread for me to make. It's sticky, it's more like a banana nut bread consistency - gooey, sticky - I love making yeast breads but not this kind of bread. 

I always make the three loaves before Vince uses all of the last batch but this time, I didn't. I need to have almost a whole day at home to be able to make it and there hasn't been a single day in the past 7 days that I was home all day, or even long enough to get enough done to stick it in the fridge til the next day.

Today I finally got the bread made.

Our meal today was a sheet pan dinner. It was Sheet Pan Curry Chicken Dinner. Vince has always said he doesn't like curry but not long ago I made a recipe that was somewhat curry-ish and he liked it so I thought I would push my luck and see what he thought about this one.

These were the listed ingredients. I added a fennel bulb (also in the photo), asparagus because we're still getting it from the garden, and broccoli.

It was delicious! And . . Vince liked it . . a lot!

I think the recipe said to line the pan with foil and I did that but I also doubled parchment paper and put that on top of the foil. It was super easy clean-up - probably a bit of a waste of money to line with foil and double parchment paper but . . it may be worth it for the easy clean-up. I didn't even have to wipe out the pan!

There are a few other sheet pan meals I want to try. Have you tried them? Do you have any recipes you want to try?

Strawberry Season

 Yesterday (Saturday) Vince had gone to a neighborhood garage sale in one of the subdivisions near us. He came home and yelled "Come upstairs. We're going somewhere!" OK. I went upstairs and he said "We're going to pick strawberries!" OK. Over in Carthage there's a new strawberry patch and it was so nice. No mud holes. The wind was blowing a bit so there were no mosquitoes. It was fairly cool.

When you get there, you are given a bucket (which you pay for and bring back with you each time you go). Of course, we got the BIG buckets, picked our berries and went to check out. 

We got up to the checkout area. The lady weighed Vince's bucket - 10.94 pounds. Then she weighed my bucket and had a really funny look on her face. My bucket was also 10.94 pounds - exactly! Because we managed to do that, she gave us a free pound of strawberries.

These were, without a doubt, the best strawberries I've ever had. They were sweet and juicy and big and clean!

There are blueberry farms around here too and when I can get good berries, I always make blueberry and strawberry (separately) syrups. They're so good on ice cream, pancakes, biscuits. I like to put some in our smoothies. I like to make a drink with Matcha tea, a bit of strawberry syrup and milk or cream.

We kept out some strawberries for eating and used the rest to make strawberry syrup. I ended up with 24 pints of syrup.

I'm so happy to have that. We haven't had strawberry syrup on the shelf for about 4 months. We still have a few jars of blueberry syrup left but I will need to make more of that this year too.

I think the strawberry patch is open again Tuesday morning so we're going to go back and get more strawberries to make a double batch of strawberry rhubarb jam. 

Tuesday afternoon we will go back to Nevada, MO with Cooper so I will be rushed to get jam made that day. Wednesday I will be gone all day. Thursday a friend is out of town and I'll be caring for her pets and Cooper goes back to Nevada so I need to get some streamlining done to get the jam made.

My plan is:

• Monday, cut, clean and chop the rhubarb.

• Measure out the sugar for two batches of jam.

• Wash the jars, lids and rings, then just heat them up before filling.

• Add water to the canner. I should be able to can a double batch in the big canner.

• Then, on Monday, get the strawberries picked early (they open at 9 a.m.). Come home, get them stemmed and chopped.

• Depending on how long it takes for the jam to thicken, I may be able to get it all canned.

• If not, we should be home by 6 p.m. and I can get it canned then.

It will get done and I'll be glad when it's finished!

I did take a casserole out of the freezer so I can heat that up and serve it for dinner . . don't have to think about that.