Stop Theif!!!

Harvest

I made strawberry freezer jam today. These were not raised in our garden, but they are mine now.

I am going to try to make Helen's salsa either tonight or tomorrow morning. Helen, see the blade laying on top of the handle of the chopper? The blade was inside the 'machine' in the first photo. If I was going to make this salsa to take to a party tomorrow, would it be better to make it tonight or in the morning? They are having a birthday party at work tomorrow, and I thought I would take them some fresh salsa. Clayton says to go easy on the cilantro. I guess I will taste as I go. I have 2 yellow tomatoes from the neighbors. Should I use these to give it more color? As I remember, yellow tomatoes do not have as much acid, or as much taste. I do not really like yellow tomatoes or yellow watermelons.

We should have ripe watermelons in about a week. We cut one open and it was starting to get ripe. I hope they are good. They are black diamonds except for one lone gray striped melon. And I do mean one melon. The vine is not quite as big as the black diamonds but almost and it literally has only one melon on the ten foot vine.

Recycling

These are three pieces of material I have found at 3 different junk stores. I was looking for material to cover the seats on the chairs that came with my table. I don't think there is enough of either the gold or maroon to cover 5 chairs. I thought I might make 4 of them maroon and then use the gold on the 5th chair that also has an uphostered back. Today, I got this cream colored material and I think I will just use it instead. It is enough for al l5 chairs and it will go with anything and everything. Altogether, I think I have about $7 in this material. Now I need a project for the maroon and gold. I want a window seat, but I doubt I can get George to make one. I am thinking if I find the right coffee table in the right demensions, I can just cover it and call it a window seat.




I got this chopper for 50 cents. I think it is just like Helen's, but I cannot figure out what the extra pieces are. I haven't tried it yet, but I can tell it would be easy to clean and it is easy to put together. I am going to go buy some cilantro and try to make Helen's salsa.




I got this lamp for $1.50. It was a NYOP sale at the doggie thrift store. Well, I really did not mean to NMOP. They were having a half price sale. The lamp was $5 and the shade was $1. They had a different shade on this lamp, with this shade priced by itself, but I know this shade was at one time on this lamp. Some out of tune person put the wrong shade on the lamp when they displayed it. The clerk could not find the price on the lamp and I said it is $3. But, then, she took half off of the $3. The lamp has a blue cast on my computer screen, but it is really a light shade of green. It looks like it was meant to be right here, NYOP or not.





This is tomato stuff that brother made for me from the tomatoes I gave him. I was not here when he delivered this, but I think it is salsa. This is enough salsa to last me all year.

I counted and I have 24 tomato plants. I will have plenty more tomatoes to share. I have tomatoes and gravy almost every day. Did you know that plain ole hamburgers taste so much better with a thick slice of vine ripened tomato?

Vacation Flowers

This was at one time a rose flower bed on the west side of the trailer. The roses became afflicted with a fungus. Instead of dying, they have been hanging around looking like death warmed over. And, at least a half dozen elm sprouts had taken over most of the bed. I have tried several killers here, but the roses and elms kept coming back, looking sicker with each recurrence.



With the help of the tractor, George dug everything out except the lilac and added good hill dirt for new planting.




These marigolds and cosmos are much too large to transplant, but they were crowding out my strawberries and needed to be removed. I decided to try transplanting. I was going to have to just throw them away anyway so there is no loss. I clipped the tops by about half.




Some are looking pretty good and some not so good. I have found other plants in my jungle plantings and moved them here. The zinnias had spouted in the gravel in odd places from last years seeds. I may buy some plants for here, but I looked yesterday at Wally World and did not find anything I wanted to waste money on. These, all I have wasted is effort. I am rooting my three different sweet potato vines to plant along the front edge of this . Then, when it dries up, we are going to add gravel in front of the bed to connect it to our parking place in front of the bed.

It is drizzling rain right now. We have over 6 tenths of an inch already and the sky is overcast from horizon to horizon. I started watering the garden last night, intending to continue today. God beat me to the watering job. He is doing a much better job than I do.