Merry, Merry Christmas Everyone

This year's Stollen! It seems like I have been making these every Christmas for the last thousand years and every year they come out differently. This year I loaded it with almonds, raisins and candied Italian citrus  with a few tart cherries thrown in for color. When I roll it out and overlap the dough it all looks so neat and tidy. Then the heat of the oven throws it into whatever shape the gods decree.
This this year's looks like a shelf in the mountains. The taste is incredible so who cares?

Never got around to designing a holiday card this year, too much havoc in my life, but just know that I have thought about you all with love and hoping everything goes well in your lives. Best wishes for the new year.

One more day for preparations....almost there!

What a wild world it was today....
Everyone and her brother decided that today was the day to shop for Thanksgiving!
Luckily, all I had to do was pick up the turkey! My darling had to fight the rudest people he had ever seen in the parking lots of Whole Foods! 
Whatever happened to 'Do unto Others?'
Doesn't apply in this town sorrily!

Happily we got everything done that we needed to do and survived!

We were fortified against the rudeness by this wonderful Rosemary Bread...

HAPPY THANKSGIVING WEEK EVERYONE!

The countdown begins............

Today's projects were bread, bread and pie crust! These fragrant beauties are Molasses-Coriander Rye bread. They go so well with turkey, actually they go pretty well with anything. Melted cheese is divine, too.

The Rosemary Olive Oil breads will be baked in the morning and the pie on Wednesday. If I have time I'll post photos as they are finished.

We are still trying to decide the filling for the pecan crust! More pecans or pumpkin? How about both in one pie pan?

We are in the middle of a white out of snow as I write.  We've had about a quarter of an inch in about 4 minutes. Won't last I'm sure.

Where does the time go?

Winter has arrived in the mountains, we've had snow off and on since November 3rd and now the nighttime temperatures are in the teens! The Arctic cold that is heading south today has brought us the most wonderful variety of birds. They stopped, frantically searching for seeds or whatever they could find and headed off to warmer climes. At one point we had a small flock of bluebirds, later a larger bird with a yellow-white breast that I haven't yet identified and then the robins, many, many robins.

And, we thought it would never end....

I mean, the Summer and the heat, oh the heat. But, end it did and Fall is here.

The rains came and took down some more leaves, they still haven't turned the brilliant reds of past years but it is a colorful and bracing Autumn.

 

I know where Al Capp got his inspiration for his Shmoos. It had to have been from the gourds that grow so well in any garden. Below are a small sample of the ones from this year's garden. I'd never grown them before and was seduced by a seed package last spring. What fun. However the varieties shown on the package and the results were not the same. I only got about half of the varieties they named. Will try a different supplier next year!

Look what I've been doing!

Sometimes gardens get very overgrown and ugly....see this photo, doesn't that look sad? The big ball of Mahonia on the right just had to go and go it did. Not without some very painful prickers sticking here and there.

 

Drum roll, please!

Look at this photo....I have a sitting area that will be fantastic in the winter as it is always warm in the west corner. Plus the view of the garden looking out is perfect.

The season's first.....

This is the first of my totally home-grown organic apple pies. They are amazing this year. The apples are huge, bug free and delicious!

Had a great do with the pie crust too! Discovered that one needs more water in the recipe at 7,000+ feet.

Thanks to the recent inch of rain and cooler nights the Swiss chard and kale are doing splendidly. The tomatoes are starting to turn red and the gourds are a huge success! I do love to have wonderful things growing in the garden. The rose are going berserk, pictures coming tomorrow.

It's that time of year again!

Totally organic and wonderful! Time to get the pie plates out and begin the season! This year we had the late frost and the top of the tree was blitzed by ice. The lower part we'd  been able to cover and these are the result. I also eliminated a great many of the apples at a very small stage according to best practices of the apple growing community! The result is larger, sweeter apples.

This was also the year we pruned, pruned and pruned some more. No sprays at all!

Stop worrying!

He made it!

Never a dull moment!

I hope you all had a wonderful and safe 4th of July weekend!

We had an amazingly wildlife filled one. First the snakes in the beginning of the week and then the birds, little Boo decided that he knew how to fly today, alas. His first foray was into our garage! He may be there still.

                                           
I hope he escaped, we moved the cars out, we put seeds for him to follow, we did everything for over an hour to get him out to his real world!

Last night, we had a tiny rain storm.....enough to make mud below the deck outside my studio. This is the sight I  saw this morning......bobcat tracks. One smart cookie staying out of the weather.

It, he/she,  usually sits in the chairs that are outside all year, snow or rain. It is a very curious animal and loves to look in our windows. The coyotes are out and about too!

Stay tuned.....perhaps our neighborhood deer and bears will also make an appearance.

Summer is here! 98 degrees today!

Summer is NOT my favorite month, too hot, too dry here in the Southwest until the monsoons arrive. But today was a wonder. It was so hot that  decided I might as well enjoy it and went outside to sit on the portal with my book. I was trying very hard to read but the resident towhees were making such a racket and flying all over the garden, bed to bed and seemingly chasing some thing. It finally dawned on me that this was their snake warning call. They had raised two little guys in the hollyhocks and were trying very hard to save them. Snakes almost favorite food....baby birds.

I looked around but didn't see much evidence that they were really in trouble and tried to keep reading, when the cry went up hysterically, whatever was now near the babies! Then I saw one of them, a Red Racer, in the lawn. It was smallish and disappeared. A few minutes later, having grabbed the ever present camera, what should appear but Sarah, she looked at me and I snapped her image.

She took one look at me and said; "Oh, it's you again!"

!

As she turned her back on me and headed over to the vegetable garden I realized that she had grown considerably and was looking for a place to have her young. I think the towhees dissuaded her from settling with us, as one of them picked up a pebble from the walk and flew over and dropped it on top of her. When she was completely stretched out she was about 5 feet long and very, very plump. How many babies? I hate to think about it. And who was the littler one in the lawn? Or do we need to mow?

After the birds calmed down I went to see what the baby birds were up to, Baby Boo was out and about, trying to learn to fly:

What a trouper, he tried and tried to jump like Mom, to no avail.

Here is his little sister, Baby Bee:

She was totally amazing during this entire episode which probably lasted 20 minutes, she never moved a muscle or squeaked. If you know towhees that is almost a miracle. I have to give those parents a lot of credit! One more day and the little guys will be flying too. I hope.

The wildfires have started here again and we hope they won't harm as much wild life as last year. Please all of you send us rain!

Summer is almost here.....

The very fragile "Nancy Reagan" rose, doing splendidly this year!

I love poppies..this one is a winner.

My "Black Beauty" hollyhocks! Self-seeded and very happy!

We have had wind, rain, hail and more wind this June. I'm amazed at how well the garden looks.

The south garden yesterday

The kitchen herb garden, everything a cook might need in the way of fresh herbs.

The vegetable garden is in the center right corner, complete with spinners to scare the birds and rabbits.

We call this the "Winter Room" as one can sit out here in the dead of winter, if the sun is shining it is lovely and warm.
 In the warmer months it is a tad hot!  An umbrella fits in the slot under the frog, cooling us all down nicely.

This post is for my wonderful 98 year old Aunt Janet!

This morning I received the most unexpected phone call, it was from Aunt Janet, she is now 98 years old! We had the best long conversation we've had in years and she was curious as to what I've been creating since last we spoke. So, Janet, these photos are for you...

Latest Long vest

Back of the latest jacket

Back of the new short vest, Japanese fabrics

Front of short vest, lined with suede


The weather here in the Southwest isn't that cold any more and so I'm able to wear these creations
all year when ever the temperature calls for their particular weight, ideal.

A month already!

I know I have no idea where time goes, I'm too relaxed and disorganized to notice that it is gone and  far away.

Anyhow, we have had a variable Spring. Warmer than most of you but one we hope will provide the fruits of our labors. It has been in the high 20's for the last couple of nights and that means that we could lose the apples again this year if it gets really, really cold.

Here are some photos of the apples blossoms for this year as well as the wonderful pink and white tulips. I just came inside after spending an hour watering all the plants in the south garden to protect them from the freeze. It has helped the past three nights so one hopes that this will work as well. Tomorrow is May 1 and then it should start warming up, we hope, we hope. But, the last FROST is not until May 15th normally.

Notice the extensive pruning job on the apple tree. We are aiming for larger and fewer apples this year.

We will miss you....

March can be a brutal month. I lost two very good friends in the the last week of March.
They were remarkable women who contributed an enormous amount of energy to making the world a better and more beautiful place. Carol, who was the most amazing gardener and chef and Anne who was the whirling center of energy for every group she was involved with. I was honored to have known them and also to be part of their creativity. Good-bye ladies, we will meet again one day.

Ah, Spring! Not yet but close.

THIS VINCA FLOWER GIVES NEW MEANING TO JUST A WALLFLOWER AT HEART!

It was 62 degrees here today and tomorrow might bring our first rain of the season, so I whipped out and bought new seeds and planted them this afternoon! Did my favorite Bourdeaux Spinach and Tatsoi! When I turned the soil over to make the rows to plant in, what I found was totally superb soil as a result  of having dug in 5 inches of compost last fall. Tomorrow, if it hasn't started to rain I'll add more compost to each side of my rows to dig in later as the seeds grow.

Making compost in the Southwest is one of the harder  things I've ever done in my gardening career as the lack of rain makes everything take forever to break down. With our lack of rainfall and diminishing snow covers to waste water on dead and dying plants rather than the living plants and
human uses makes no sense to me at all. There was a reason the Anasazis left!

We are running three weeks ahead of normal seasons. The herbs are all up, the tulips, daffodils, rose bushes are showing new leaves and buds are appearing on the fruit trees. Alas, it is still February!
What may we expect in March and April?

Trending now? Aging!

I love it...everything one reads is about the aging population and their little 'selfies.' Be it how they feel about getting older, writing their biographies, complaining about their ills  or just comparing notes on how badly life goes for them. Everywhere one turns these days aging is in the newspapers, magazines, books, internet and the local cafe. 

Get over it! We are all getting old, even the little kids in kindergarten....their days are numbered too. Hateful isn't it.

My dearest friend David has decided that men get crabby and quarrelsome and women just get slow! Oh, how I did disagree with him. Being an old  woman, I did agree about the crabby and self-centered old men, but we women don't get slow...it just seems that way to old crabby men!

I live in a town with an older than average population and witnessing the poor behavior of some of the elderly makes me sad. So many have little enthusiasm for our wonderful planet earth or in improving their relations with the people around them. Male or female, they tend to be self-centered, argumentative and appear to me to be depressed.  Because of this their health is impaired, cancers, heart diseases, mental illness and other scourges plague them.

Sad as it is that people have become so narcissistic that each feels they are the only beings on earth who truly feel or know and believe they are right. None of us are perfect and the older we get the less perfect we become.

Just enjoy life, one day at a time. Given the government we are stuck with in this country all of we old people really need to cool it.

63 degrees and the daffodils are coming up!

Well that was the 30th and now it's the 4th and we have snow! Lovely, very wet snow.

It was only three inches but that is enough to stem the drought a tiny bit. It was also raining for a short time and that will help even more.

I need a consensus on the poor surviving Aspen clump in the left of the photo. Those two lonely sticks. All the other trees died due to gopher holes and lack of sufficient moisture.  Should I plant more so that it looks like it should or try and transplant these to a more hospitable site? They are about  20 feet tall and probably heavy but we can move them.....so? What shall I do?

It's coming, we know it's coming......

Spring, that is.

At least a great many of us in the USA hope sooner than later.

The gardening catalogs are arriving and one of my very favorite blog writers has a new and improved web site. 

Margaret Roach's highly informative info is available to you all at: http://awaytogarden.com/

Be sure and check her out if you aren't already a subscriber. It is worth every minute of your time.