Virginia Real : September 2017

Friday, September 29, 2017

Going Nuts...

September 29, 2017

Earlier this year my sister (Sis) gave me a pound of black walnuts that she had gotten from one of our cousins who cracks walnuts and sells them. I had some shredded zucchini in the freezer, so I re-worked an old recipe that I had used years ago and turned it into a gluten-free recipe. I didn't have high expectations for the final product because gluten-free rarely tastes as good as gluten-full, but I tried it any way and...oh...My...GOODNESS! It turned out great! So I used the rest of the walnuts to bake about five or six more of the yummy loaves of bread and stored them in the freezer. They say all good things must come to an end and so it goes with my zucchini bread. We ate the last one several weeks ago and now I'm wanting more. Why don't I just go to the grocery store and buy more walnuts you ask, well almost every nut available in the average grocery store in America has a note on the package that reads something like, "These nuts were processed on the same equipment that processes wheat, soy, and peanuts." Since wheat is a real bummer for my tummer I try to steer clear of it as much as possible.

While at the farm this week, I was lamenting over the fact that we had no more zucchini bread with the wonderful walnuts in it. (Yes, I do go into a state of "lamenting" when I run out of certain foods...mainly just potato chips and some form of sweet bread, muffins, or donuts...gluten-free, of course.) So Charming says something like, "We've got acres of woods. Surely there's a walnut tree out there somewhere." So we drive around the property with Charming at the wheel and me hanging out the passenger window peering intently into the woods for the familiar leaves of the walnut tree. (We were driving, not because we're lazy, but because I've had a bum ankle for the past few months.) We did not go on the other side of the river because I have a fear of tramping through the woods in warm weather. I don't want to stumble upon a snake of any size or color...the only good snake is a...well, there are no good snakes. I don't like ticks either. Or spiders...they're worse than snakes in my book.

After about twenty minutes of driving at one mile per hour, we returned to the camper. Not finding a walnut tree during our drive only made me fixate on having my own walnut tree. (Yea, unfortunately for Charming, I'm kinda like that.) Driving up the gravel road that leads to our house, I counted at least five walnut trees that are dropping walnuts on the road. So about that time, I was feeling like a villain in a Batman movie, "I MUST HAVE MY OWN WALNUT TREE!" The next morning after the morning dew had evaporated, I gimped across the open field towards the woods while Charming was busy working on the siding job. I followed the exact path that we had taken in the truck, but I took the time to look on the ground for leaves that had fallen off the trees. I knew if I could find the leaves from a walnut tree, the tree had to be within sight. Sure enough, when I got back within sight of the house, I found the small pointed yellow leaves on the ground and instinctively looked up to scan the tree tops and saw the green and brown clusters of nearly baseball-sized walnuts hanging in the tree. Yippee!!! The tree was about ten feet inside the wood line. There was quite a bit of undergrowth in front of the tree that was hiding it from view. The undergrowth needs to be cut out and the tree is not huge, but it's definitely a walnut tree. I count my blessings as God does indeed provide!

The walnut tree hidden behind weeds & bushes.

The top of the tree looks to be about 30 feet tall.

I used loppers to remove some of the undergrowth.

Just like finding Easter eggs!

Need to let the walnuts dry out a bit then remove the hull & crack them.

Monday, September 18, 2017

Siding Into Fall...

With colder weather looming on the horizon, Charming has been feverishly working on getting as much work done on the outside of the house as possible. Because the house needed new vinyl siding and new windows, we figured it made sense to do them both at the same time. The old windows were the type that you find in a mobile home/trailer, which looked really awful and weren’t insulated. The new windows are insulated and tilt inward for easy cleaning. Although I’m not a fanatic about cleaning windows, it’s nice to know that I won’t have to climb a ladder to wash the outside of the windows. (This “Miss Grace” just ain’t what she used to be!)

So the process goes like this…Charming tears the siding off one side of the house at a time and replaces the windows and the siding, then moves on to the next side. So far he’s gotten the back side of the house completed as well as one end, except for the apex part which requires quite a bit of angle trimming. He’s now working on the front side of the house, where he’s removing the big bay window from the living room. We were not a fan of the bay window for several reasons. The window went from floor to ceiling, which is an awful lot of glass. (We have lots of small rocks that could get thrown by the mower, birds, and a fairly awkward farm gal, better known as…well….me.) The window was not insulated. I also wanted the extra “wall space” that a smaller window would provide. I like the idea of having a couple of feet of wall space (from the floor up) if a sofa and chairs are going to be next to the window. To accommodate our needs, Charming will install two smaller windows spaced 12” to 16” apart. By installing the two windows, we should still have plenty of light without all of the down sides of having one huge window.

The gardening season is winding down. We had a bumper crop of green beans this year so I was able to freeze about thirty-five quarts of these tasty veggies. That should be plenty to last us through the winter. In addition, we had a decent crop of potatoes, tomatoes, onions and squash. The potatoes, onions, and squash have all been harvested and stored away for use during the coming months. We’ve cleaned off the garden, all except the tomatoes and the pretty amaranth that I had growing just for the pop of red color. Charming will turn the ground again in late to mid-October. That should help to freeze out some of the bugs and bug eggs that might otherwise show up in next year’s garden. It will also undoubtedly unearth more of the gazillion small rocks that are sleeping below the surface, just waiting for me to scoop them up and put them into my farm wagon for transport to the “burn pit” that we are slowly filling back in. Come next spring, we’ll do it all again. I just love the natural cycle of gardening!

When cold weather sets in we’ll be spending most of the winter at our current house with plans to finish up the kitchen renovation in the spring. After that, we should be on schedule for moving in late spring or early summer…then the REAL work will begin!