Posted in Uncategorized on May 23, 2018| 4 Comments »
Gail at Clay and Limestone hosts Wildflower Wednesday each month.
When I moved in over 7 years ago the wildflower meadow consisted of four-nerve daisies, prairie verbena, and mexican hats. I have since added blanket flower, horsemint, winecups, bluebonnets, black-eyed susan, tickseed sunflower and evening primrose.
I also found this alamo vine in the front yard this week. I tried planting this before in the back and it didn’t take, so glad one just showed up on it’s own.
Posted in garden tours on May 20, 2018| 10 Comments »
Kirk Walden’s garden was our second to last stop on the Fling tour. The other planners, and I were busy at Articulture setting up for our BBQ Bash and weren’t able to see this spectacular garden and view with the rest of the Flingers. Luckily, Kirk offered to let Pam and I come visit a week later. We went out first thing in the morning to avoid the heat, and beat the blazing sun.
The view is clearly the star of this space, and the design emphasizes this from every angle.
The pool is breathtaking, the higher section giving the impression of a natural hot spring.
A waterfall then flows gracefully to a larger main pool.
It is clear that each plant was carefully chosen to withstand the harsh hillside late-afternoon sun, as well as lushly complement the water. Plants include gaura, pink skullcap, russian sage, snake herb, agaves, roses, palms, gopher plants, and grasses – among others.
Thank you Kirk for sharing your garden with us!
Posted in freezing winter veggies on May 14, 2018| Leave a Comment »
Most vegetables are pretty easy to freeze, the most important thing to determine is whether the particular vegetable needs to be blanched and for how long.
Here is site which gives the times for various vegetables.
The first step is to wash and peel the carrots. Make sure all carrots are in good condition and do not have large cores.
Slice into 1/4 to 1/2 inch pieces.
Bring water to a boil and blanch carrots for 2 minutes. Place carrots in ice water bath.
Drain carrots. Even drained, it is difficult to get rid of all of the moisture. Since I use a Foodsaver, I par-freeze the carrots on a cookie sheet before individually packaging and freezing.
Label and Freeze the packages.
I will use the carrots in marinara, stir fries and soups.
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