Useful and Fun
This past Saturday Mr Chiots and I took a spoon carving class at the Shelter Institute. We were joined by a friend who took the photo of me. It was lots of fun, a full day of fun. Our teacher carves spoons and sells them at local craft fairs. He brought along all the tools we’d need and explained the process in depth.
Mr Chiots made a small spoon and I made a spatula, both were made using walnut.
One of the reasons we wanted to take this class is to make use of some lovely apple wood we have. Hopefully I’ll be able to find the tool we need at the local antique tool store. Then we can start making spoons and other cooking utensils. No doubt friends and family will love receiving these for gifts.
Have you learned any fun new hobby recently?
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Look Out BELOW
The ice dam on the back of the house is about to let loose. I keep thinking any day now it will startle me and send the cats scurrying to find cover (which is the funniest thing). It keeps hanging farther and farther over the roofline just waiting to come crashing down.
Thankfully they’re not as big as they could be since Mr Chiots knocked them off once already. Otherwise we’d have twice as much ice falling.
It’s a nice reminder that spring is just around the corner!
Any last vestiges of winter in your garden?
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Lotsa Lettuce
I’m a sucker for lettuce seeds. When I read through the descriptions and see the beautiful images in the seed catalogs I go a little overboard. I do like a lot of variety in my salad bowl and find that five or six types of lettuce makes for a great salad.
I have found that lettuce seeds are often best to be purchased fresh each year. I used to keep them for a few years, but germination is so much faster and so many more seeds germinate when the seeds are really fresh. Now all of my leftover seed from the year gets thrown into planters in the fall that get overwintered in the basement. Then I have a nice crop of mesclun for salads in the early winter months.
On Saturday I started a flat of lettuces & endive, there are 15 varieties in all that were started this go around. There are also three other varieties in planters in the basement…..and I have another 15 that are later season varieties that will replace these when the weather warms up a bit. Then I have another 10-15 varieties that will be grown in the fall/winter. Butterheads are my favorite types of lettuce, with romaine coming in a close second. Leaf lettuce are probably my least favorite. I like a lot of crunch and texture in my lettuce. Endive and other bitter greens are also always in my salad bowl, nothing rounds out sweet greens like a bit a bitterness!
What’s your favorite kind of lettuce to grow?
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Quote of the Day
“Strange how a teapot can represent at the same time the comforts of solitude and the pleasures of company.”
~Author Unknown
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Friday Favorite: Renee’s Garden
I’ve been buying seeds from Renee’s Garden for many years. One of my favorite things about her seeds is that you can get multiple varieties in one package. This year I got the Long Harvest Broccoli that contains three different varieties in the seed packet. This is so handy for those of us that don’t want to buy three different packets of seed but would like to grow a few different varieties. I’m really interested to see how this work, I’d love to have a longer broccoli season.
The seeds are color coded as well, so you can label them as needed. These were the zucchini seeds I planted two years ago.
I’m so appreciative that Renee takes the time to develop handy things like this that are so helpful for the home gardener. Her varieties are also selected specifically with the home gardener in mind.
Do like to grow multiple varieties of the same vegetable?
