It's at it's Peak and a Peek into Halloween!

Good Tuesday Morning!  It is bright and sunny and cool today in SW Virginia!  I am loving this polar vortex thing!

My garden has been amazing this year!  I didn't think I was going to have too many tomatoes and I was so wrong! 

Aren't they pretty!  I can assure you they are delicious.  I have eaten so many tomato sandwiches in the last couple of weeks that I have gotten a sore in my mouth from the acid.  Time to cut back!

Cucumber count in now at 526!!

Two gallons of jalapeno peppers have been frozen.

21 quarts of squash has been frozen and lots of zucchini bread made.

I dug up two potato plants and found these delicious spuds!  I will dig the rest in the next couple of weeks.

This is just some of the pickles, salsa, tomatoes, relish and green beans I have preserved.  By the way I canned 52 quarts of green beans!

 

This Saturday a few friends and I are getting together at my house to make Fall/Halloween Banners.  I can't wait to show them how to make these and I think we are going to have so much fun!  Here is a sneak peek of the one that I made this week

It was so much fun to be playing with all my Halloween papers and doo dads.  I love Halloween!

 

Also, in the vintage buying department, I have bought a couple of things,

Isn't this the cutest covered bowl?  I love the colors!

And I don't really collect Pyrex, but for 1.95, I couldn't leave this divided dish sitting at the Goodwill could I?  You can't see the bottom, it is yellow.

 

And this next photo is the most fun thing I have found in a long time.  I got it at the Goodwill this weekend.

An electric blue Christmas tree!  Have you ever seen anything as gaudy, tacky and wonderful in your whole life!!  I plugged it up yesterday and it works!  It has blue lights on it and I am going to use it as my Halloween tree this year!  I can't tell you how much I love this tree!  Stay tuned to seeing this baby all dressed up in her Halloween finery!

 

Hope everyone has a great week!

 

Blessings

 

Linda

Summer Fun

Good Tuesday Morning!  It is a beautiful, sunny day is SW Virginia, though we had a couple of storms roll through last night bringing some heavy rain.  I'm not complaining, we need the rain.

There has been zero crafting in the LBP house the last couple of weeks because I have been up to my ears in this:

Green Beans!  This past Saturday I spent 6 hours canning 44 quarts of green beans.  This was just the first picking.  They are ready to be picked again!

Cucumbers!  For some reason I started counting my cucumbers when I picked the first of the season and to date I have picked 303 cucumbers!  I made a small batch of cucumber relish and am going to make some more this weekend as it was very easy and tasted really good.  Mostly, I am eating cucumbers all day long and giving them away to neighbors and friends.

This tomato was just perfect.  Heavy, meaty, delicious!  The three of us made tomato sandwiches with mayo and toasted bread.  We were in heaven!

Because we can't leave my MIL at night, there will be no going away for vacation for us this year, but we did take a day trip to Abingdon, VA a couple of weeks ago, just to enjoy the scenery and get away a bit.

The Barter Theatre

And I did a little antiquing along the way.  These two cute dolls found their way home with me.  They are Christmas ornaments.

The adorable little Christmas girl figurine and the somewhat diabolical pixie vase.

We've also been spending some time on the lake 

I love living on the lake

 

And this next photo is of the super, yummy supper I made last night from the vegetables from the garden.

 

SW Shepherds Pie

Fresh green beans with new potatoes

Squash and onions

Juicy, red tomatoes

and a cucumber salad

and of course in the south, we have sweet tea.

I love summer!

 

Blessings

 

Linda



It's the Most Wonderful time of the Year!!!

Good Tuesday Morning!    Girls, I have been so busy in the garden and at work I haven't had time to hardly even look at blogs much less post!  I have a pretty big garden and I usually spend an hour at least, every day weeding, watering, etc...  But look at the bounty!

This cabbage was gigantic!  I say was because we have already gobbled that down!

The onions were also huge this year.  They have all been pulled and since I have no luck in keeping them most were given away.  I have several in my fridge in the pool house but they just don''t keep well. 

Whoo Hoo!  Look at all of this!  Do you spot those two little potatoes over there on the left?  It is not time to dig potatoes but I couldn't resist sticking my hand down in the soil just to see what I could find! 

Squash galore!  I will be freezing this today.

Cucumbers coming out my ears!  I love cucumbers.  When I was pregnant I craved them so much that once when we were at Golden Corral getting the salad bar, I got angry because people were putting cukes on their salads and I was afraid there wouldn't be any left when I got there.  So when I did get there I picked up the entire bowl of them and dumped them all on my plate!  People were laughing but I guess they knew about those pregnancy hormones!

I even have a few ripe tomatoes.  We had biscuits, country ham and fresh tomatoes for breakfast this morning.

Oh did I mention I am off from work this week?  Whoo Hoo!  Not going anywhere overnight because we can't leave my mother in law but being home is better than being at work!

A couple of weeks ago some friends and I went to a new shop on the lake to try our hand at ceramics.  I have done this before and know I am not very good at it but it was really fun.  We met back at my house this weekend for a ceramics reveal party!  One of the girls had picked the pieces up from the shop and put them in adorable gift bags for the grand opening.

Here is me with my Christmas elf.  Who would have guessed I would pick an elf!  LOL!

And here is the group of us with our masterpieces!

I also made all the girls a 4th of July favor to take home with them.

Blue and red salsa pots from the dollar store filled with bubbles, candy, sparklers, poppers, with handmade tags all wrapped up with cellophane.  Such fun to make!

I also made these cherry almond cupcakes for our party.  Of My!  Are they ever delicious and cute too.

Is your mouth watering already?

I have got to get busy and freeze this squash!

Hope you have a wonderful day!

Blessings

Linda