Invasion of the Aphids

 

WARNING:  PHOTOS ARE NOT FOR THE SQUEAMISH

For the last several weeks we’ve been noticing more and more nasty little aphids on the two artichoke plants that our daughter gave me for my birthday last spring.  I’ve been hoping that the local insect population would find this easy source of protein, but it hasn’t happened. 

This morning, however, I did spot a single red ladybug and that gave me an idea:  why not buy more ladybugs?  So off we went to OSH and for $7.49 we bought a container of the little gals.  They keep them in a small refrigerator in the garden department and the bugs were pretty logy when we took them out  but very quickly got more active as they warmed up. 

This evening, after the winds died down,  Mr. B shook them out of the container onto the plants and we are now hoping for the best. 

Summer is Finally Here

With a vengeance!  Yesterday our high was 98 and today 109.  Tomorrow is supposed to be 100.  However, those in the know say we should be back to our 2010 summer coolth by the weekend.

I seem to remember that we had a couple of 95 degree days back in late June but since then it has been much cooler than usual.  Everyone on the central coast is complaining that their tomatoes just aren’t ripening.  I think that’s a result of nighttime temps being below 55.  But this little hot spell should produce enough tomatoes for gazpacho which we are really looking forward to. 

Yesterday we had the first swiss chard from our garden.  Usually summer would be too warm for good chard but not this year.  I picked all the outside leaves; hope the hot spell will be over before the new leaves are formed.

That’s My Boy!

Even 46 years ago he had a consuming interest in produce.  Here he had crawled into the pantry and found my potato bin while I was fixing dinner.
Now he is gardening in his own backyard and is doing very well.  His house is on an average-sized suburban lot which, in California, is not that big.  Plus his backyard is mostly downhill.  But our boy is persistent and has been terracing the ground to get level areas for planting vegetables.  This year all that work is finally bearing fruit, so to speak.  They are making salads with their own lettuce, cucumbers and tomatoes.  And yesterday he arrived at our house with this:

13 ears freshly picked.

Tender and sweet

Two of the ears weren’t developed properly, but the rest made a very good dinner last night.  Mr. B managed four ears, I had two and Mom ate one.  I stripped the kernels from the remaining four and added some of them to today’s zucchini.  Yum-yum.  Son suggested using the leftovers in a salad, so that’s what we’ll have tomorrow.

Speaking of Zucchini, this year we planted two squash plants from Wegman’s Nursery in Redwood City.  The reason we drove that far to buy squash plants is that we were hoping to reproduce last year’s zucchini experience.  We planted a Romanesco that, while it didn’t look like the images I found of that variety, was so prolific that we ended up with over a hundred squash from one plant.  And it was the most delicious zucchini we had ever grown.

This spring we bought one Romanesco and one Ronde de Nice.  The Romanesco looks like its images and is just as prolific and tasty as last year.  The Ronde de Nice is also very tasty and even more of a producer than the Romanesco.  We are eating squash several times a week but still haven’t grown tired of it.

Tally as of August 1: 

Romanesco = 43 

Ronde de Nice = 69

Our tomatoes are singing a sad song this year.  We planted them in May and they grew well, producing lots of tomatoes.  However, they just sit there looking green.  So far, out of 7 plants, we have only had three red tomatoes.  In addition to that, at least two of the plants that we bought from Costco have what looks like verticillium wilt.  So their days are probably numbered.  The four tomato plants that we bought at the Santa Clara Master Gardeners sale seem to be okay.  We also have a few volunteers coming up here and there from last year’s seed.  One, in the squash bed, is a yellow pear so I’m looking forward to that, if any of them ever ripen.

The exception is the little currant tomato that we planted in Mom’s waist-high planter on the patio.  That didn’t go in until early July and is rather sparse as to foliage.  But it has several clusters of ripening fruit.  Of course, being currant-size, if I picked them we probably wouldn’t even have enough for one person.  But this variety is supposed to keep its fruit until all tomatoes in the cluster have ripened.  We’ll see.

The peppers are all doing well.  We planted mostly sweet peppers this year, although I did throw in some Fresno and Jalapeno at the last minute. 

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!

A beautiful day in the neighborhood. 

I think all the neighbors have gone somewhere else for the long weekend and it’s so quiet around here.  Not likely to stay that way because, although firecrackers and bottle rockets are not legal here, there isn’t enough law enforcement available to keep the hooligans from letting loose once darkness falls.  Poor Leo just falls to pieces when the booms start.

Busy Monday

I don’t have any “before” pix but this is what my pantry looked like after I spent the day clearing it out.

It may not look like it, but I got rid of quite a bit.  There was a fair amount of food well past its prime.  Some Sure-Jel with an expiration date of October 2000.  I decided not to take a chance on it lest I spoil a batch of jam just to save a few dollars. 

I also found two of these Chinois:

One set apparently came from a thrift store and still had the price tags attached.  I don’t know where I got the other one but it has two wooden pestles.  Both are out the door because we no longer use aluminum utensils but I think I’ll keep at least one of the pestles.  I have a similar sieve from Ikea, supposed to be used to drain yogurt and made of stainless steel.  Instead of a stand, it sits in a cannister with a handle.  By the way, Chinois are usually used to strain the fruit seeds and skin out when making  jam.

The reason I did all this work, aside from the fact that the pantry was such a mess I could hardly walk into it, let alone find anything, is that we are having new kitchen flooring installed Saturday.  We have lived here for 16 years and the linoleum wasn’t new then.  Every year we talk about having it done but now we’re actually doing it.  I had a really hard time choosing a design.  Everything was “faux”, either faux brick, faux wood, faux stone, faux tile, none of which really suit a house built in the late fifties.  Next job will be painting the kitchen; and possibly changing out the lights and adding a ceiling fan.  We have them in all our other rooms and it really makes a difference in the summer.

These clouds are supposed to bring us rain most of the day tomorrow, then showers most of the rest of the week.  This morning we had some sprinkles that started just after I got home from my morning walk.  This year has certainly been odd, weather-wise.  We almost never have measurable rain in May but this year the storms just keep coming.  The temps have also stayed lower than normal.

Happy Mother’s Day

 

 

 

 

 

To my mother, one of the stars of the Greatest Generation, who is still sharing her love and guidance with us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To my mother-in-law who is no longer with us but who remains fondly in our memories.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To our daughter, who has given us the gift of two wonderful granddaughters and a fine      son-in-law.

 

To our lovely daughter-in-law who has given us two beautiful grandchildren and who brings joy to our son’s life every day.

 

And to all the other mothers out there.

Keep up the good work!

Friday’s Child is Loving and Giving

Fifty years ago  our second child was born.  We named her after both her grandmothers – my mother’s first name and The Husband’s mother’s middle name.  She was a happy baby and I found her a lot easier to take care of than her older sister.  To be truthful, 99.9% of that was probably due to the fact that by this time I knew what I was doing .  When our first daughter was born I had never changed a diaper or even taken care of a baby before.  Back in those days, not much thought was given to preparing the new mother for the job ahead.  Thank goodness for the Dr. Spock book that somebody gave me, not sure just when, but certainly not soon enough for Daughter 1’s comfort.
While I was expecting, I decided to learn to sew.  I bought a used White in a cabinet for $40 and made myself some maternity clothes.  Then I decided that the new baby would need her own Christening dress and that it should be entirely hand-sewn, with white-on-white embroidery.  I don’t remember where this idea came from but through the years I’ve been prone to similar crazy ideas from time to time.

This is the pattern I chose.  Then I went to The Emporium in downtown San Francisco and bought batiste and lace, both imported from France.  Those were the days when big department stores sold a full line of fabrics and notions.

Ornate Glass Dome from The Emporium        Photo from Wikipedia

I then proceeded to cut out the fabric and stitch it together by hand.  I used french seams, which are fully enclosed, for most of the garment.  Unfortunately, the set-in sleeves defeated me.  No matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t get the gathers to lay properly.   I finally gave up and stitched them in using the machine and then overcast the seam.  I did not do a very good job overcasting the parts where the lace edging and insertions meet the fabric, so now there is a certain amount of fraying in those areas.  Also, the insertion in one area has deteriorated.  The rest of the ensemble includes a long slip and an embroidered bonnet.

 

detail of pintucks

detail of embroidery