Pages

Monday, May 16, 2011

Two and a Half Days of Sunshine


What a glorious week we've had in the great Pacific Northwest! Even though it rained for a few of the days, we were able to enjoy 2-1/2 days of dry weather...in a row!

It could be a new record. ☺

Since my fingers have been itchin' to play in the dirt, I headed into one of our local nurseries.


Then I went to another.

An herb garden for the patio

And then I went to another....I'll have you know that cabin fever is a real illness and I've been suffering for awhile!


With the sunshine came our first breakout of dandelions. Some might call them weeds. I see potential.  In about 6 months, our weeds will have turned into wine.

At least, that's the plan. 

 With bucket in hand and 7 kids by my side, we spent an afternoon picking dandelion heads. The wine recipe called for a gallon, so that's what we picked. 

We may have started with a gallon, but after removing the green part of the flower head and all of the stems that had hitched a ride, we were left with only 2 quarts of petals.


You might be wondering how long it takes to pull every single petal off of a gallon of dandelions.

Let me tell you. It's a loooonnnnng time.

And we had run out of dandelions to pick.

Thankfully, we have our own Wizard of Oz in the Internet. We were able to find a recipe that only called for 2 quarts of petals. We were back in business!

Dandelion wine is good for digestion.
Currently, the petals are steeping in a bucket on my counter.

Sometime this week, I'll be adding the rest of the ingredients, using equipment that I'm sure is supposed to be used when making wine.

I may need to consult The Wizard again.

Maybe "he" can tell me how to get the jaundiced look off of my fingers.


During our previous stretch of dry weather, which was a total of 1, we had put up field fencing in our little field. The idea was to have a place for the goats to play.

They didn't seem too keen on our idea though.


After some coaxing, bribing, and finally some threats, they came with us to their new play yard.

Gertie dove right into the lush green grass.


Blynken chewed on every stick she could find.


They ended the day by bullying Molly.

Molly's still hiding under the coffee table.


While cleaning out the flowerbeds, in anticipation of another stretch of dry weather (probably sometime in July), I found last year's old hydrangea blooms.

Now they've been re-purposed into a nice little bouquet by our back door.


The days of sunshine made me so giddy that I almost forgot all about the days of record-setting rain we've had.

Almost.

This post is linked to The Homestead Barn Hop.

2 comments:

  1. I know those herbs are feeling the love! An umbrealla! Normally I'd say you're off your rocker but with the weather we've been having, it's totally justified. :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. I can understand the umbrella! Everytime we have a hard rain in the spring I am anxious about my 80 plus pots of flowers on my deck. All it takes is being too close to the house and getting the roof runoff to totally wash them out. Even in the southeast we have had weird rainy cold weather. It should be hot by now and we are rainy and in the 60's this week. My yard calls to me and I long for the sunshine :)

    ReplyDelete

I love reading your comments!