If you end up with more cabbage than you can eat before it goes bad, freezing may be the way to go for you. Sometimes I make sour krout but I did not have enough to be worth doing that this time. We use cabbage in several dishes, such as Vegetable soup, Minestroni and with Mulligan Stew (sausage, potato, cabbage and carrots).
First thing to do wash and cut the cabbage the size you want it. Fill the steamer basket with the chopped cabbage. The bottom pan needs about 5 inches of water. Turn the fire on low so the water can start heating while you are chopping up the cabbage.
Then set the steamer in the bottom pan and turn the heat up medium high just long enough to wilt the cabbage, about 15 minutes should do it.
Next put the steamer in the sink and run cold water over it to stop the cooking process. If you skip this part the cabbage will continue to cook and will end up mushy when you unthaw it for cooking.
After cooling the cabbage put a serving size in freezer bags. How big of bags and how full you fill them depends on the size of your family and how many you are cooking for. I used gallon bags and filled them about 3/4 full. Flatten the bags and lay them flat in the freezer. This makess them easier to store and they will thaw quicker when you are ready to use them.
Bathtub Remodel
While I was working in the kitchen, Charles was working on the master bathroom. He is hooking up a tub with a whirpool. We both have disabilities, but we refuse to give up on our activities. The whirlpool should help with the arthritus and his leg that was broken in several places back in 1975. I can’t wait until I get to try it out. When it is finished I will post a follow up.
I am determined to find a way to keep on doing what I do no matter how old, or what obsticles I have to overcome.
At the end of the year it is time time to prepare the garden for winter. The last couple days I have gone out in between the rain and storms and cooler weather, to prepare my raised beds for winter. First thing is to clear out the dying vines, plants and weeds. Then I swept up leaves off the pavers and threw them on top of the dirt. As you can see in the picture below, the dirt is dark and rich great for growing anything. I will continue sweeping up the leaves and piling them up thick enough to completley cover all of the dirt. By next spring the leaves will have decomposed to the point of looking pretty much like the soil under them. We will add compost from the bottom door of our bin and the soil will be ready to start all over again.
I leave the tomato cages in the raised beds all winter to keep our dog from digging in them. She seems to think they are a great place to bury her toys. She watches me and tries to help when I plant in the spring and then watches how everything grows, so maybe she is trying to grow some new toys. You never know with that silly thing.
I had a visiter over the summer who told me I should write about how I do everything for my gardens. She grew up helping out on a farm so I thought she probably new all about gardening. So yes they had an acre garden and farm equipment and several people doing the work, so nothing like I am doing. She said she was fascinated with some of the ways I did things. She also said that she bet a lot of people would love to know the little things I do to care for my gardens and how I use what I grow. So I am sharing what I do and you can try some of the different things I do if you want, or you can share some of your tips with me for next years gardens. Just write them in the comments below.
I love to try new things and there is always more to learn. I started hearing about and reading anything I could find on organic gardening when I was 21. I had my first home that spring and so I got to have my first garden on my own. I did Circle Style organic garden and had so much food from a very small area.
The woman who lived behind me had a huge garden all in rows like you would typically see back then and she thought I was crazy. Kept telling me that she had been gardening all her life and her way was the best way. So me being me as always, being the different one in th bunch, (my sixth grade teacher told me that I was unique and I should embrace that) I ignored her and did it my way. So using a method I had read about in an old Mother Earth Magazine my first sister-in-law had given me a few years earlier, I made my circle garden.
First I used a tomato cage in the center, like the one in the picture. The cage was for compost and we threw all of our food scraps, as well as adding raked up grass and leaves all summer long. I then planted tomatoes all the way around the outside so they could climb up the cage and much closer than a normal garden. I then used three long branches and tied them together at the top. Then pushed the bottom of each branch into the ground teepee style around the cage. At the bottom of the branches I planted viny things like green beans.
Outside of the cage area I divided the circle into four sections and planted something different in each section. I had cucumbers, radishes, carrots, and all the things you normally see in a garden, but in much less space. Every time it rained, it washed the nutrients from the compost in the center down into the ground all around it and fed my little garden. I had an abundance of vegetables and canned tomatoes by myself for the first time.
My neighbor came to the fence one day to brag about all the tomatoes she had canned from her huge garden and I politely told her that I had canned slightly more from my tiny garden, which by the way was still producing more. She never had anything to say to me after that. The reason I am writing about my neighbor is not to make myself out to be so great. It is to show that you can always learn more and continue growing as you get older if you are willing. I still research and try new things all these years later.
So about seven years ago I finally decided to try the raised beds. I started having problems with my knees and legs, not being able to bend and stoop as I had always done. Long story short, it took several years to get diagnosed and spiralling downhill with my mobility I thought it would be a good idea to go with raised beds so I could continue gardening until the day I can no longer move.
That year the boys helped me put down the first row of cinder blocks and each year we added a little more until they were three blocks high. Now I can tend to them without stooping. Two years ago I was falling a lot and having to use a walker, so my husband put down pavers so I could use the walker and still do my gardening. Since then working with my doctor and a rhuematologist, I am finally able to get around with just my cane handy in case I lose my balance. I am determined to find a way to keep on doing what I do no matter how old, or what obsticles I have to overcome.
Three little squrrels sleeping in our walnut tree.
This is the same tree that I wrote about previously when I said it felt like the squirrels were throwing walnuts at me. I looked up at the tree when I first went outside today and I thought I saw a couple of nests. Squirrels nest look much like a birds only larger. I went back in to get my phone so I could zoom in on the nests and to my surprise all three were squirrels sleeping on the branches. Not one nest in the tree.
All three squirrels sleeping soundly in the tree. The ornery things that throw walnuts at me every fall and tease my dogs all year long. We have a tornado warning siren that goes off every Friday to test that it is working properly. It went off as I was trying to get some photos and I thought I had missed my opportunity, but no. They slept right through it. I went back in to let the dogs out and get somethings to do a little yard work and they still slept.
At the back of the fenced yard is a climbing rose. When I went out with the dogs I saw this and had to share it. It is so rare to see a rose on any of my rose vines this late in the year. If you look at the bottom right of this photo youwill see a tree stump and what is left of the hulls of several walnuts. Those same ornery squirrels sit here and chew the hulls off of the walnuts before they carry them off to store for winter. They make sure the dogs see them chattering to get their attention.
When we first moved here we had a very freindly squrrel that would get almost close enough to touch. He would chatter at us and we would put stuff out for him to eat. He lived here long enough that his fur started turning gray. That last time we saw him he looked silver from head to toe. The following year he was no long here. I suppose he didn’t make it through winter that year, but he lived longer than I think most squirrels do. I miss him, but these three newer squrrels are quite amusing and maybe they will be more friendly in time.
I spent a little time clearing out some of the tomato stems out of the raised beds. It was about to storm so I had to quit and go back in the house. I will do a little bit every day it’s not raining and have it cleared by the end of this month. If the weather doesn’t turn too cold I will rake up some of the leaves to cover the raised beds and to finish filling our compost bin. That is how we keep the soil in good shape for for planting each year.
While I was working I checked the red lettuce that I had left in the garden, to go to seed. It is finally getting close but still not quite there. I am hoping to have enough seed to plant more than usual next year. I have collected seeds from the bell peppers already. Tomorrow is another day, so weather permitting I will get a little more done then.
What a difference a week makes. Last week this tree was dropping walnuts all over. It seemed like it was throwing them at me. It was hard to keep up with throwing them out of the fenced area where the dogs play. One of my friends mentioned that walnuts are toxic to dogs so I researched it and according to PetMD and several other sources, black walnuts, which these are, cause several health risks in dogs.
By yesterday the leaves had all turned colors. Last night it rained pretty hard and this morning most of those leaves are on the ground. The leaves of all the different trees change color and drop their leaves at different times, this time of year we have quite a variety of colors. Soon there will be no more green leaves and a month from now almost all the leaves will be on the ground.
Sometimes you just need to take a walk through your own back yard.
You don’t always have to go on a trip to find beauty in nature. Sometimes you just need to take a walk through your own back yard. Since I did not need to clear out my raised bed gardens yet, I decided to take a walk through the back yard. We have three lots back behind the house, the sheds and the garage. I enjoy being outside when the weather is so beautiful. At 75 degrees and a gentle breeze it is simply perfect for me. So many changes with the onset of Autumn. The change in colors and the leaves falling everywhere. Our cherry trees have already lost all their leaves and look a bit wintery already but the leaves on the other trees appear to be taking turns changing and shedding leaves just a few at a time.
