"Lettuce" tell you About Growing a Garden!

Lettuce in April

Wow, Wow, Wow the lettuce is growing.


I trimmed the lower leaves and ate them same with the Bibb lettuce in the back.
I can't remember WHAT the tall lettuce plant is.

Drink Garden in April - mint and chamomile

Drink Garden in May - Mojitos and Tea

Onions in April

Onions June 1st

Salsa Garden in April

Salsa Garden in May - Peppers on far left not doing well but tomatoes and onions are.

Addy took this photo of our Rosemary. It is doing well.

Eating our own lettuce !!!

Addy took this photo we call it "waiting for strawberries..."

Addy took this photo of one of our lettuce plants.

Do you have TOMS on your Tootsies?

My choice Vegan with inspiring words.

What do you wear on your feet?  Is it hide from an animal? Glue from an animal? Rubber that will never decompose? I have all of those but I have found some earth/animal friendly vegan shoes from Toms.  Toms is starting to gain interest because they give a pair of shoes for every pair of shoes purchased.  They are a bit more pricey but you have to think of it like a donation as well.  In fact, who needs 10, 20, 200 pairs of shoes? Really.  Luckily for me I cannot walk in high heels and I refuse to have back pain for fashion purposes.  Therefore, I have two pairs of running shoes, a pair of hiking shoes, a pair of hiking boots, rubber rain boots (also great for feeding chickens), flip flops etc.  I am trying to pare down like the gal from Zero Waste Home.  She has six pairs. Period.  My new theory is that with all the money I save from not buying various shoes I can put more money into the few that I do purchase. They aren't the pretties pair of shoes I have ever seen and I am not sure how comfy they are but I think I will give them a try.  I saw a kid with a pair of Toms shoes on yesterday and they looked nice and I liked the fact that some other kids who needed a pair of shoes finally had a pair!

Edamame & Veggie Pasta

Yesterday I wanted lunch.  I couldn't figure out what to make.  If we had chips I would have just eaten those and called it a meal. Fortunately we don't have chips that I like in the house.  Yes, that is planned.

I knew I needed to eat veggies so I started there.  I took a bowl and dumped in some grape tomatoes, kalamata olives, artichoke hearts, sauteed onions, edamame, lots of olive oil, salt, pepper, oregano, thyme, and rosemary tossed with some whole grain pasta. It turned out pretty good and Addyson loves edamame so that worked out great. Edamame is great because it is packed with protein and has all of the essential amino acids.  It is also high in fiber!

Shredded Veggie and Goat Cheese Quesadillas

Trying to fit more veggies into my daily diet. Everyone in my family loves quesadilla's so I made one with goat cheese and shredded radishes, tomatoes (seeded first so they weren't too mushy), broccoli, cilantro, cucumber and onion. I would have LOVED some avocado in there but I didn't have one.  The veggies were organic from the food co-op but I couldn't find any information on the goat cheese company.  Unfortunately, I couldn't get it past the 3 year old or the 38 year old ;)

Garden update

Today I realized that my plants are actually growing!!! I took a photo of my lettuce plant.  The onions and lettuce and strawberries are doing the best.  Tomatoes seem very slow to grow.

Recycled Garden Box Update

Carrots - the seeds haven't sprouted at all.

Chamomile and Basil - new plants that's why they are still green! Ha ha.

We've managed to keep the strawberries, lettuce and basil alive.

Had a lot of little onions to plant so I added some around the yard to see where/if they grow.

Extra onions that are probably too close together.

Salsa garden in the HEAVY iron tub.  No sprouts from seeds but plants doing ok.

Sunflower seeds doing great.

A Kale Chip is Oh So Hip!

How did I get so behind the times?  Apparently people have been eating Kale chips forever.  Well this week Daron's mom and I made not only Kale chips but Swiss Chard chips too.  We liked both.  Daron even ate them.  Eating them and truly liking them are two different things but he will eat them and get some veggie nutrition so that is a score for me!  I LOVE the texture - the kale ruffles really make them crunchy and cool tasting.  There are many recipe variations so I would suggest trial and error.  We like ours just a tad bit brown. See how I do it below.

Wash kale and rip leaf off the stems.

Place on tinfoil covered cookie sheet and sprinkle with olive oil and salt.

Bake at 425 for 10ish minutes.