Friday Favorite: Curling
This Friday Favorite is for Mr Chiots. Many years ago he started watching curling during the winter Olympics, then he was hooked. He wanted so badly to learn how to play, but the only club near us in Ohio was over an hour and a half away. Lucky for us, the only curling club in Maine is only about 20 minutes from our house. Last year we went to a Learn to Curl event at the club and Mr Chiots couldn’t wait to sign up for leagues.
This year he’s curling two nights a week and loving it. I haven’t been able to get to one of his matches yet since it’s been a bit busy around here, once things settle down in December I will. One thing is for sure, Mr Chiots is in seventh heaven!
Is there any strange sport you’ve always wanted to try your hand at?
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Friday Favorite: Old Photos
Four or five years ago I went through all of our old family slides and picked the best ones to be digitized. I sent them off to a small company in California and they returned them on a DVD. Every now and then I love looking at them, there’s something so fun about them. Here are a few of my favorites (I’m the younger girl):
I’m hoping to be able to digitize a few more photos when I’m back in Ohio later this year, there are so many and it’s always more convenient to have them on the computer. Not only that, they’re backed up several places for safe keeping!
Have you taken steps to preserve some of your old family photos?
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Friday Favorite: Beets
I love beets, especially when they’re pickled. It’s a good thing, because I have a ton of them in the back garden. This row of beets is 3 beets wide and about 60 feet long. That’s a lot of beets. I’ve been thinning them out for the past month or two, we’ve been roasting them. A few of them have also gone to the pigs, who greedily chomp them down making themselves look like they committed a heinous crime. In fact, one day, I went up to water them after feeding them beets and I thought one was injured and bloody, it was just beet juice.
Not all of them will be pickled, some will be stored in the root cellar for eating, others will be stored for growing leaves for our table during the dark days of February. The weather is turning colder, while beets will last a while in the garden after the frost comes, they won’t live forever. These coming weeks will involve lots of pink fingers!
Do you like pickled beets?
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Friday Favorite: Old Gardening Books
I’m a big fan of old gardening books, and I find myself frequently purchasing them at used book stores and for only a few dollars off Amazon. One of the reasons I like old gardening books is because they often offer more in depth information than is available in new books. There are times when I get frustrated with new books because they have to assume everyone is a beginner and there are a few chapters of the basics of gardening. It would be nice to have a disclaimer that the book is for more experienced gardeners and then give me more information about the topic at hand.
My most recent vintage gardening books are both by Thalasa Cruso. I have read many of her books ‘Making Things Grow’ is one of my favorites. This time around I purchased To Everything There Is a Season: The Gardening Year and Making Vegetables Grow.
I especially like the illustrations in Making Vegetables Grow. I’m considering purchasing another book just so I can cut them out and frame them.
I’m not sure where I originally heard about Thalasa, but these two books were recommended in To Eat: A Country Life, which I read recently while traveling. I think I heard about a few others in Onward and Upward in the Garden, another vintage gardening gem.
Do you have any oldies but goodies gardening books to recommend?
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Friday Favorite: Sunny Days
This time of the year, if the sun is out, I’m out (at least if I can be). I know that soon enough the days will be short and the sun won’t be as high in the sky. I’m trying to soak up as much sun as I can to get me through winter. I’m almost ready to trade my tank tops for sweaters, just not quite. Luckily the weather is cooperating and I’ve had some really wonderfully sunny days to dig potatoes this week!
I enjoy the sun in winter too, it’s just not as strong as it is in the summer.
The laundry will also miss the heat of the sun, even the clothes I’ve been hanging out recently haven’t been drying as quickly as they did even a few weeks ago.
Do you live in an area where you notice a big difference in the strength of the sun throughout the seasons?
