Keurig Planting

Not having any peat pots, I decided to use what I have....lots and lots of Keurig cups!! (I love my Caribou Coffee in the morning!)  Woo woo!  Let the planting commence!

I gathered all of my Keurig cups, potting soil, and clippers.

 

 

The first thing to do is to remove the little liner on the top of the cup.  Make sure you don't spill the coffee.  Yet.  You want to put it on your compost pile.

 

 

After getting the lids off, dump the coffee in the compost pile and you'll have a filter underneath....

 

 

 

 

Just rip these off and put them in the compost pile too.  (It's not quite as easy as that, but it's fairly easy once you know what you're looking for.)

 

After cleaning those up, you'll want to head back over to your Keurig.  That little hole on the bottom of the cup that your coffee drips out of?  Yea, you want a couple more of them.  I had my youngest daughter drop the cups into the Keurig and punch a couple more holes in each cup.  You end up with something like this:

 

I then dropped a little potting soil in there and a few tomato seeds and I was good to go.  The seeds came up fairly quickly and since I didn't have grow lights, they got kinda leggy.  Which is okay, I have Blue Bell ice cream pints ready for them to go into.  :)   (Those pictures will come a little later, I just got them transferred over. It looks like we eat a TON of ice cream, but I rounded a few outsiders up!)

And that's how you can completely justify your Keurig!  :)  LOL

 

Workforce

I have applied for tons of jobs and my interviews are starting.  It's a weird thing, doing interviews.  I'm not a good interviewee, I feel too nervous most of the time.  But, these last couple have gone pretty good.    I won't hear from anyone until after Monday so I have the weekend free.

While waiting for that phone call, I got another call to fill out another online questionnaire...one of those 'what would you do in this situation' type of things.  I hate those even more than interviews...they never have exactly what I would have done!  I got as close as I could (which they tell you to do), but nothing ever sounds like me. *sigh*  I'm hoping for the best.

So, I've got those out of the way, and this weekend, I'm heading to a seed saving clinic and a farmer's market in Austin.  I might start some seeds - picked up some squash and since I have developed this parmesan cheese on zucchini fetish, I need to get some starts!
 

Compost Bin

I forgot to post the completed compost bin photo! 

 

 

I only got three good pallets, so I did what I could.  No worries, however, it seems to be working like a charm.  I will keep my eye out for another pallet to make it better enclosed, but I'm more than happy with it.

Photo From Yesterday

The Hunny and I went for a drive yesterday.  We found the local swimming hole and I snapped some photos on the drive home...

And:

 

Compost Baking

After getting my recycled compost bin up and together (holypostdrivers, Batman! and photos will be posted later, when I can lift my arms), I decided that it was time to bake some bread. I've always loved making bread and needed that comfort,  I guess.  I had read earlier on Facebook that a friend of mine had brain cancer.

Actually, she wasn't a "friend", really.  She works in my old local running store.  We shared a name and she was always, always, always kind to me.  It upset me that someone that wonderful was going through something so dreadful.  I needed to be creative and bake.  I needed to make something.  So, I was off to the kitchen!

I realized instantly, that I needed to be really be creative - no bread pan.  I had to do some Internet hopping to find recipes.

Happily, I found this: Easy No-Knead Skillet Bread.  Having lugged my grandfather's skillets down from Montana, I was ready. (I had been wanting to try another no-knead bread for a while, after pretty decent success with this recipe, but my mother was not parting with her dutch oven.  I really
recommend it if you're fortunate enough to have a 5 quart dutch oven.) 
I got flour on my bare feet and my fingers are still a little greasy from the dutch oven seasoning.  It was wonderful and exactly what I needed. 

 

It was kind of an ugly thing - I should have used the 8 skillet, not the 10.

 

 

But, it tasted great.  The kids ate it up and it'll be a great base for herbed bread this fall.

 

 

The Canvas

The backyard, roughly where the garden will be placed.  The scaffolding will be out of here in a couple of weeks.  This fall, I'm going with a 10'x10' plot, maybe to extend out to a 20'x20' in the spring.  It depends on how much soil I can get my hands on.

The frontyard.  (The bags of trash have been taken to the trash/recycling)  I'm thinking of a climbing rose to the right of the window on the right.  Hanging baskets on the porch and maybe some other nice homey things.  The kids are already planning their pumpkins on the porch for Halloween.

Empty Canvas, Except for the Chickens

I have two rooms more or less completely unpacked.  Of course, the first one was the kitchen.  Dishes were unearthed and holding spots chosen.  I am unfamiliar with having such a large kitchen and the walk from one side to the other bothers me. 
Sometimes.
Other times, I'm thrilled with the cabinet space and all but dance from dishwasher to cupboard. 

The dining room is done and we have more books than the Thrall, Texas library.  (There is no Thrall, Texas library.  It's too small for that even)  Why a gardening fanatic married a science/history teacher is beyond me, bookwise, anyhow.  We have more shelves of books than we have furniture.
Godshonesttruth.

I am slowly beginning to get my driving bearings and can at least get over to my in-laws' place.  As long as the Walgreens, HEB or gas station is along the way, I'm good.  If I have to find anything, I'm sunk like a U-boat.

New friends have made their way to our feeders, dive bombing each other the whole time.  I've begun to recognize their chirps and beeps at one another.  This little beauty made her way to food while the others were arguing.  Good girl.

The neighbor has the friendliest, egg-laying-est chickens I'd ever met.  They're sweet and I save bread crusts for them.  It cracks me up to watch them race to the fence when they see me heading their way.  I'm hoping that we can get the property that separates our yards so that  I can have them over to our yard once in a while.  The grasshoppers here are fierce and the hens race like rugby players trying to get them. 
The Youngest has made a friend across the street, making parents and siblings all around dance in delight. 
Seriously. 
She was driving me insane, always underfoot and "bored".

I took some photos down at a (sorta) local park.  They get a lot of my beloved wading birds so I try to stop by whenever I can to get some shots.  The blasted furnace of the sun was setting and the tree made a decent shot.  What you can't see is the large amount of cattle and great egrets on the branches.  Still, a nice shot.