GOOD FOOD AND HOBART SUNDAY

Another week has come and (almost) gone.  Yesterday was good at the farm, but hot.  Very hot.

 Came home and 2nd Man made a creamy chicken Alfredo type dish using what we have on hand.  For this one, we had some chicken breasts and thighs cut into cubes in the freezer and he thawed that out and cooked them, made a quick Alfredo with cheese, milk, a few mushrooms and then added pasta (for this we used rigatoni) and let it cook until the pasta was done.  Top with some fresh grated cheese and parsley.

With a salad on the side, it was yummy!

Hobart decided to lay around in the sunshine as it moved around the apartment, recharging his batteries or making his old bones feel good.  Either way, we just walk around him so we don't disturb him.  Because...

#notspoiled

MORE SHARING THE FINDS TRASH TO TREASURE

 Regular readers know that I have a favorite place to look for bargains...our downstairs trash area!  Our building has trash chutes on every floor and they feed into a separate room, but for boxes and other things that people can't put in the chute, there is an area (indoor) near the loading dock where people can put the things they don't want.  I've found quite a few cool items over the last few years.

This post will be a bit different though because we didn't want you all to think we just fill our place up with stuff we find.  Quite the contrary, more often than not, we don't keep what we find, we look and think, we don't have a use for that but while they may not be something we'll use, we'll gladly share with friends and coworkers who might want them.

I'll usually text or email a picture and say "hey, do you want this ______ that we found?"

Here are a couple more:

Found this just sitting there.  Always nervous to open a found piece of luggage (too much Discovery ID, haha), but it was a really nice, large, rolling Skyway hard side luggage.  It was metallic blue and in perfect shape.  In fact, it still had the luggage tag on it when I found it.

Here is it beside my car, opened.  It was clean and in great shape with zippers and compartments.  We have a nice set of luggage and didn't need this one.

Not sure why someone discarded it, maybe they used it once and didn't have the space to store it or figured they wouldn't be traveling again.  Their loss.  We found a friend who did need it!  She was actually heading out of town two weeks later and it worked out perfectly.  She LOVED it.

Also found these two artificial orchids.

Now these were pretty dusty, we're guessing probably up on a top shelf somewhere or bookcase somewhere and they moved and didn't want to take them.  Maybe they didn't match their decor.  Who knows.  Not exactly our style either, even though they are pretty, but we found someone who wanted them because they had moved and would be perfect in their new location.

Saved it all from the landfill and it all made two people very happy.  That's a win/win.

A FELINE VISITOR

In the jungle, the mighty jungle...

Well, the grass was indeed much like the mighty jungle at the farm, ha.  This was after rains and the grass needed mowing.  When we pulled up, we saw something moving so I jumped out with my phone to take a picture...

...turns out it was a cat!

I had to be quick, took a few pictures but this was the only one that came out decently enough to post.

It was a black and white cat and in all the years back and forth out there, only the second cat we've ever seen (not counting 2nd Family's cats that appeared on occasion).  It ran off into the brush and I haven't seen it since.  If we were out there regularly, I'd be putting out food and trying to tame it.  Wouldn't hurt to have a mouser hanging around the house.

2nd Family doesn't have a cat like this and they said they hadn't seen it either.  Probably feral and just passing through.

By the way, this is that same area after mowing.  Still need to clear around those trees, ran out of energy that day but it definitely looks back to normal.

No sign of the cat, probably feral and was just passing through the property.  Of course with 11 acres, it could be living anywhere.

FIG UPDATE NATURE FINDS A WAY

Well so this has happened:

How it started...

How it's going!

The fig tree that had died (read about it HERE) and was dead all the way to the ground, has come back.  After I accidentally broke off the trunk when I was checking it out, we just ignored that raised bed while we looked for a new tree.  Haven't found one yet, haven't really looked much, but now, it is starting to come back and looks pretty good!

Image courtesy Aggie Horticulture

There are apparently two ways to prune a fig tree.  One way is to make it into a tree form and another way is to train it into a bush form.  

Here it was after we planted it, we were letting it become more bush like before.  Since it's coming back in "bush form" again, we'll just let it grow as it wants.

Not sure if this means it is going to come back and produce fruit but at this point, we

As long as we get a lot of figs, we'll be happy.

GOOD FOOD AND HOBART SUNDAY

 Well...this weekend has not worked out like I had hoped.  Well, we had a lot of fun yesterday.  2nd Man's brother got married a couple of months ago and yesterday was their reception/party.  More on that in an upcoming post.  But anyway, we had to drive out of town a couple of hours away and so I put off the farm for today...and then it stormed and poured rain all night and has been sprinkling today.  Sigh.

So on with some good food and Hobart!

The other night, we had pork chops, peas and mashed potatoes.  Always simple but always good.

Laundry day means work to do but it also means a comfy spot for Hobart to sleep.  Because...

#notspoiled

VITEX TEXAS LILAC BACK WITH A VENGEANCE

Y'all may remember when I posted this last year.  I pruned the Vitex on each side of the porch, well, by prune I mean CUT ALMOST TO THE GROUND.

When we get the house redone, they will have to go since the new footprint will be bigger, so we weren't worried about them looking nice.  We just needed to cut them short so they were out of the way.  You can see above what they looked like when I cut them down to about 3 feet tall, a little over a year ago.

This past weekend, they looked like this!!

They are beautiful for sure but wow, they are certainly indestructible.  We have them along the driveway now and they are just as big.  After these were planted, they were watered for the first year and then never watered again.  They have been through two rare, REALLY hard freezes (almost single digits)...they survived 50+ inches of rain with Harvey...and they went through a drought when there was no rain for almost a year...

If you live in Texas and want a great flowering bush that is pretty much hands off, Vitex, also known as Texas Lilac (because of it's somewhat similar purple flower resemblance to lilac) is the one to buy!  The bees love them and so do hummingbirds.

We'll plant more of these for sure...in the right spot so it doesn't block our front door, ha. 

MORE BLUEBERRIES

Well what do we have here?

MORE blueberries!

Went out the long weekend and there were more ripe blueberries.  You can see there are yet even more in various stages of ripening.  Woo hoo!

Not a bad harvest yet again and I will confess to eating a handful on the drive back into town, ha. These bushes (we have two) are the Austin variety and from what we've read, once established, a mature bush can produces much as TWENTY FIVE POUNDS of berries! 

We're not sure what we would do with FIFTY pounds, LOL, but I'd bet we could figure out something.

Blueberry pie...

Blueberry jam...

Blueberry muffins...

Blueberry pancakes...

MEMORIAL DAY 2023

It's a rainy day here, gray and overcast.  Watching the races (though as this posts, delayed again) and eating leftovers from the weekend meals.

Speaking of, here are the carnitas:

I took lots of pictures of each step so there will be a post soon with all the details.  It's a process but 2nd Man does it the authentic way, frying the pork in lard with oranges and milk and more.

It's SO good.  We tear them up to make tacos but the chunks of meat are good just eating on their own.

We cannot let today go without saying thank you to all who serve, to the families of those who serve and of course we are remembering those who have given the ultimate sacrifice to their nation.

Thank you...

GOOD FOOD AND HOBART RACE DAY SUNDAY

It's been a nice long weekend so far.  See yesterday's post for that update.  Today is time for sharing some good food...

Yesterday we had steaks with mushrooms and a wonderful baked potato with all the fixings (butter, cheese, sour cream bacon and chives).  Also had a salad on the side and a couple glasses of wine.

On the menu today is a batch of pork carnitas with homemade corn tortillas and all the extras.

Here's Hobart doing...wait, WHAT???  What happened to his ears?  LOL!  

No surgery, we used a filter to give him rabbit ears.  Hilarious.  Even with big ears, he's...

#notspoiled

 Regular readers know that we enjoy NASCAR and Indy races.  Today is the big day for racing.  Right now as this posts, we are watching the Indy 500.

Then later this afternoon is supposed to be the NASCAR Coca Cola 600 (the longest race of the year) but the weekend has been a washout in NC so far.  Not sure if it will happen tonight or tomorrow but right now, it doesn't look promising for happening.

UPDATE:  Postponed to tomorrow due to rain

Hope you all are having a good weekend!

PRODUCTIVE DAY

Errand day...

Bill the Truck got to drive into the big city...ok, little town, since we go to the town nearest the farm, ha.  It was inspection day for vehicle license plate renewal in Texas.  In the county the truck is registered in, all that is required is a safety inspection (lights, seatbelts, horn, etc) and with 226,674 miles on him, he passed with flying colors.  Good for another year.

They did say that the windshield wipers needed to be replaced (and they did, last time I used them to clean the windshield the rubber strips came off).  I opted out of getting them there at the place, stopped and bought some on the way back and put them on myself.

I needed to mow.  Got most of of it done but skipped a few trails.  The excess grass from last weekend (when it was three weeks between mowing) is still blowing around in the yard but it's all good, it'll be mostly gone by next weekend.

  

Not sure how I timed it like this, I just put it up when I'm done and pull out my phone and push "finish mow".  Came in at exactly one hour and got almost 3 acres mowed.  It was a good day for mowing.

The other project was to clean up the orchard area.  I should have taken a before but suffice it to say, it did NOT look like this, ha.  I edge around everything first, then take the big mower through it to get the wide swaths, then use the electric push mower to get the final areas between beds.  Then I watered it all well in case we don't have rain this week.

We always like it when it's done because it's so much neater.  Speaking of, I need to get some soil and mulch to top off the beds for this year.  I sense another trip into town for Bill the Truck, ha.

That was it for the day, back into town, steaks and baked potatoes with salad tonight, carnitas and tortillas for tomorrow (and leftovers for Monday).  Oh and 2nd Man is currently making brownies (it smells so good!).

Hope you all are having a great, long weekend.

ADDED SOME MORE HONEYBEE JARS

Almost two months ago, we posted HERE about these great limited edition jars from Ball.

At the time, I only picked up a 4 pack.  I said then that I might have to get another one.  Or two.  They had been out, but the other day they had restocked.  I decided to get two more.  That gives us a dozen which seems like a nice, even number, almost like having "a case" or something, ha.

Photo courtesy of www.ballmasonjars.com

Saw this on the website showing the jars...it's something called a Pimm's Cup (cocktail).  We'll have to look that up because it looks amazing.  Anyway, looking forward to having these jars in our collection.  They will be useful and cute, ha.

Friday is here, long weekend ahead.

BLUEBERRIES CREAM CHEESE AND BAGELS OH MY

Yesterday, we posted HERE about our blueberries and my wasp encounter.

First of all, my hand is much better, swelling is almost gone, pain is completely gone, and my knuckles are almost all the way back, LOL.

We had another small batch and put them them in the fridge.  When I gathered these big ones this weekend, we decided to use them all somehow.

I decided to make a small batch of blueberry cream cheese.  It was super simple, no real recipe; I took some softened cream cheese, put a tiny bit of sugar in the blueberries and mashed them up (the sugar to draw out moisture) and then just stirred it all together.

It turned a beautiful pink/purple color.

We toasted some bagels, spread the blueberry cream cheese all over and dropped the plump sweet berries over the top of that.  It was delicious!

When you turn something you grew into a meal, even the small harvests are worth it.

BLUEBERRIES WASPS AND PAIN OH MY

So this happened:

Look at these plump, wonderful blueberries!  Yay!  Let me go get a bowl and pick some as a surprise to bring back into town.  I pulled some from the bottom and then I decided to reach in from the top and get some...

Did I look before I leaped?  Nope.  If I had, I would have seen the above.

But no, I stuck my hand into the netting and...

Boom!

Got stung.  Twice on my hand.

The stings were immediate and then the itching.

Then the swelling.  Here was my hand yesterday at work.  No knuckles.  You can see in the first picture that I DO normally have knuckles, ha.

Read that swelling can last for 3 to 7 days, especially when it is on an extremity like hands or feet (now THAT would hurt, yikes!).

But I was able to snag these beauties and it made the pain worth it.  They are huge and plump and, as 2nd Man said, better than we get in the store.  I guess just like tomatoes fresh from the garden, blueberries are just as awesome.  I was honestly surprised how big they got and how truly 'blue' they really are.

We had another handful in the fridge from the last time we gathered some out there (a bit smaller).  Luckily, we have just as many left that are ripe and more unripe and the second bush of that variety has just as many coming on.  We love that we're starting to get some production from these bushes.

WEIRD WEEKEND AND BONUS HOBART

 The weekend was kind of a bust...well, I did get to mow but other things interfered.

On Friday, at work, I started getting sick.  Stomach bug of some sort.  Not sure if it was something I ate or what but suffice to say, it was not a pleasant afternoon and into the evening.  I had a terrible headache as well. I came home and went to bed about 7pm.  Slept (well, I use the word loosely) until about 11am Saturday.

Decided not to go to the farm, I was feeling a bit better but not 100%, I wanted to stay close just in case.

Sunday it was overcast and drizzly (of course Saturday was gorgeous, wouldn't it figure) but I went anyway.  After mowing a bit, I noticed it was uneven.  I'm hoping the mowing deck is just not level, I need to read up on how to re-level it.  But didn't feel up to it yesterday.

Did what I needed and left.  There was another moment of not so Zen, I'll share that in the next post.

I was feeling better but of course being Sunday, I couldn't stay too late since work comes early and I needed to rest and recover for Monday morning.

I know this is probably a boring post, just didn't have much in me when I was typing. Sorry.

As a reward, here is some bonus Hobart that we usually post on Sunday:

Hobart laid next to me on the couch most of the day Saturday, swaddled in his fluffy red blanket. Because...

#notspoiled (both of us!)

COUNTDOWN BLOCKS TRASH TO TREASURE

Regular readers know that I have a favorite place to look for bargains...our downstairs trash area!  Our building has trash chutes on every floor and they feed into a separate room, but for boxes and other things that people can't put in the chute, there is an area (indoor) near the loading dock where people can put the things they don't want.  I've found quite a few cool items over the last few years.

I found these in this baggie in a box of other things that I left behind (towels, some cracked plastic storage boxes, etc).  I wasn't sure what they were until I got them out and did some research.

They are called COUNTDOWN BLOCKS (or cubes).  The number cubes have all the numbers necessary to recreate 0-52 so it will work for any period of time on a calendar from days and months...

...to weeks and years.  They can be used to mark and keep track of the time until an event, we suppose either count down or count up.  They are heavy wood, with a nice distressed color that fits a rustic look.

It's possible they had a holder of some sort. This came with a small cardboard tray that they could sit in but it might have just been from the purchase.

We currently have them set to 23 years for our anniversary time.  Later this Summer we'll change it 24, ha.  Once we get something done with the house out there it will be fun to change it daily as we countdown different milestones.

Someone else threw them away, we find something fun to do with them and give the a second shot at life.

DOWNTOWN VIEW AT NIGHT

It's always interesting what people ask about.  A few of you have emailed us to ask what kind of view we have from the apartment balcony at night.

So here you go.

Here it is when we face toward downtown Houston...

And here is the other direction, away from the heart of downtown Houston...

It's definitely pretty.  We love seeing the buildings lit up at night.  It's cool to see during the day but at night, , well all the lights of the office buildings just sparkle like the facets on a diamond.