***Tuesday's Tip*** DRIED green TOMATOES!

Ah yes, remember the days of Tuesday's Tips!?  I know I am a day late by a couple of months.... well better late than never....

It is an amazing tomato year for me.  It is hard to know what to do with them all!  I have been canning and dehydrating like crazy, as well as sharing.  I have canned sauce, soup, red & green salsa.  I haven't made a count yet.  That will come at the end of the season...whenever that may be!  In the meantime I want to share with you and amazing new way to dry tomatoes... Dried Green Tomatoes with Sriracha Sauce.  It is simple and easy...which is a blessing this time of year and ever so delicious!  Almost fried green tomato-ish.  DH really loves them!

Simple Steps---> wash your green or greenish tomatoes.  The semi pink ones work here too, no need to be fussy.  I slice mine about 1/4 to 3/8 inch thick.  Then I add a couple drops of diluted Sriracha Hot Sauce.  I dilute it 50% water to 50% sauce.  It goes on a bit nicer and is plenty hot plus, stretches your sauce when you are doing a ton like me.  I only add a few drops to the middle so there is still a green tomato flavor.  If you spread the sauce over the whole tomato slice the sauce will overwhelms any tomato taste.  I use the Excalibur Dehydrator at 140 degrees for about 14 hours.  Bag them up or start eating them!

~Recipe~

Green tomatoes sliced to about 1/4 inch

Diluted Sriracha Sauce 50/50 with water

(of try your own favorite hot sauce)

Dry at 140 for 14 hours

That is it!  I would love to hear what you think about this recipe.

Cucumbers are great this way too...even the boyo liked them!

---Shop News--- ☼ Forest & Field Happenings ☼ ~~~Gratitude~~~

My life is FULL of random abandoned.  Finding time to be here, blogging, is become more and more difficult.  Abundance calls and garden produce waits for no woman!  Right now as I type I am multi tasking.  I have dinner in the oven with a timer set.  Every few minutes I will be running downstairs to attend to things, then back up here to type a few words.  No complaints, it is amazing how much I can write in 5 minutes!  So my dear reader, please, bear with me during this busy time.  I will be here as much as I can.

 Some Days are like this

&

 Some Days are like this 

In Between all that the laundry needs doing, the meals prepared, before I know it all that wood will need to be brought in for the winter. This week I had just a wee bit of stress around all that needs doing.  The best cure for me from that kind of stress is a very productive day.  I am happy to say yesterday was such a day!  Everything in that wheelbarrow has been dealt with!

My sewing room and Etsy office are in disarray with many projects in progress.  Photos need taking, listing need doing, printing, tagging, bookkeeping....etc, etc, etc!  But I am very grateful, this month already I am averaging a more than a sale a day!!!  I counted up my sales in all 4 shops and they equal over 500 since I started with Esty in January 2012, not too shabby.

I had planned another "productive" day to get me further from my mental angst.  All started well with the reconstruction of my kitchen after yesterdays produce palooza ( got everything dealt with from the wheelbarrow...I didn't say I got the kitchen cleaned up...I am not super woman!)...when a very tall young man, who it still amazes me that he is actually, my child, came to me and asked if I would make lunch and watch a soccer game with him.  I hesitated, feeling that welling rush of stress, then he looked at me with doe eyes and said pleeeease.  He will be off to college in 2 weeks.  I enjoy soccer only because he has schooled me to enjoy it.  Without him I will never watch soccer again.  So lunch was cheese, crackers, cucumbers, tomatoes, and my famous eggplant relish.  We huddled together around his laptop and watched Arsenal barely beat Crystal Palace 2-1.  Good thing since the boyo is an Arsenal man.  And yes he is a man and I am his mother.  These moments are more rare than the perfect, purple, bug free, cauliflower.

~~~Gratitude~~~

Ah me, I so wanted to make this Gratitude post yesterday.  Well, a standing computer desk has its drawbacks....like being too tired to stand after 2 days of work!  I have wanted to blog more...lots of stories dance in my head as I go about my work.  Reflecting back to the beginning of this blog I realized I started it on October 30th a year ago.  That was after my garden sabbatical summer.  So I guess I will cut my self a break!  (Also~~~distracted by a visit from UMO boy this weekend!  Very nice bit of family time...when he wasn't visiting his girl friend ;)

It has/is being an amazingly mild autumn so far.  We have only had the lightest of frosts.  This will be the latest frost since I have been keeping records here which started in 1991!  Could let things stay outside but at some point one just has to go for it and get a big bunch of work done.  We really like to have most of the outside work finished before the local fashion statement is HUNTER orange.  So this is what we did this weekend....

Before

After

Beets, Leeks, and Rutabagas are in the cold room.  I still need to harvest my carrots but I like to pack them in leaves.  The leaves are still on the trees!  Got going on the Garlic planting today...hope to finish tomorrow...then giving the boyo a ride back up North.  The thought of North makes me long for winter winds and snow....I am grateful that most of the fall tasks are complete.  I am grateful that I love winter.

Mary Oliver (1935 - Present)

Fall Song

Another year gone, leaving everywhere
its rich spiced residues: vines, leaves,

the uneaten fruits crumbling damply
in the shadows, unmattering back

from the particular island
of this summer, this NOW, that now is nowhere

except underfoot, moldering
in that black subterranean castle

of unobservable mysteries - roots and sealed seeds
and the wanderings of water. This

I try to remember when time's measure
painfully chafes, for instance when autumn

flares out at the last, boisterous and like us longing
to stay - how everything lives, shifting

from one bright vision to another, forever
in these momentary pastures.

It is my intention, each Sunday, to share something that fills me with Gratitude. 

I write ~~~Gratitude~~~ with the wavy lines to represent the gratitude ENERGY~~~~~! 

I hope you will join me and share your gratitude moments. 

~~~Amen, Blessed Be, Namaste'~~~

~~~Gratitude~~~

Our world here in Freedom is full of  piles and piles.  One could see all the work or as I choose to see ~~~ the abundance!  Every 2 or 3 days I have a cart load about this size to deal with...the literal fruits of my labors!  It does keep me busy but I can't help but smile when I think of the cold winds of winter blowing and my larder full of my summer abundance.

Other piles are accumulating as well.  It is 5 more days until our son goes to college!!  I feel very grateful to live an abundant life that allows our son to pursue his education and dreams.  So you guessed it I am grateful for abundance!  You will be hearing from me more as I find my new routine that is 180 pounds lighter!

AbundanceApr 24, 2003


You can not own
a shimmering sunset,
or crystal stars of night.
You can not own
a brilliant blowing breeze,
or the spark of sweet sunlight.

You can not keep
a fragrant floral scent,
or an infant's sleepy sigh.
You can not keep
love's first embrace,
or life's ecstatic highs.

You can not possess
that time which went by
before you were even born.
You can not possess
those memories made
long after you are gone.

So experience enjoymentin each moment,
immerse in sight, sense, and sound.
Appreciate this world
for all that it is,
that's where abundance is found.




Copywright©2006 by Laura Barrette Shannon
ToltecWarrior

http://allpoetry.com/poem/1062357-Abundance-by-ToltecWarrior

It is my intention, each Sunday, to share something that fills me with Gratitude. 

I write ~~~Gratitude~~~ with the wavy lines to represent the gratitude ENERGY~~~~~! 

I hope you will join me and share your gratitude moments. 

~~~Amen, Blessed Be, Namaste'~~~

~~~Gratitude~~~

"Summer Heat"

In the summer when the days are hot,
I like to find a shady spot,
and hardly move a single bit
and sit, and sit, and sit, and sit.

unknown

It has been HOT~~~my cat, Vern, is a good example of what I have been like this last week.  Oh summer! Weeks like this last week are a true struggle for me.  Even though I had another wonderful beach day...by Friday I was spent.  Catnip would not have been enough for me to get going!  

Summer is to me when the heat & humidity reign:

THE

ITCHY

SCRATCHY

SWEATY

SLEEPLESS

HOT

BUGGY (Yes~the Japaneses Beetles have entered my dreams...sigh)

TOO MUCH LIGHT

TOO MUCH WORK

TIME

But then the HEAT broke

~~~sound of trumpets & hallelujahs~~~

I now remember the blessings of summer. I am filled with GRATITUDE and Rejoice!

Besides weed whacking and weeding ~ I harvested this today!  

~~~all is well, all is well~~~

 It is my intention, each Sunday, to share something that fills me with Gratitude. 

I write ~~~Gratitude~~~ with the wavy lines to represent the gratitude ENERGY~~~~~! 

I hope you will join me and share your gratitude moments. 

~~~Amen, Blessed Be, Namaste'~~~