4H Horse Show...July 25, 2009

Junior Reserve Champion

Very busy summer...

It seems as though every summer is busy. The time just flies by. Every weekend we have at least two hockey games. Jonathan and Brianna are playing in an off season league. Both teams are doing remarkably well. Jonathan's team is first in his division and Brianna's team is second in her division. They are both having a very fun time.

Natalie is riding four days out of seven at the barn. We have had three horse shows so far with at least one more before the county fair. The next show is this Saturday. Carolyn did have the sewing class. She is just along for the ride until the fair. Add all this to children spending time with friends and it adds up to a lot of time on the run.

In seven days we will all be working and attending the VBS program at our church. Needless to say, my garden is not getting the attention that it needs from me. Apparently the deer are giving it good attention. I am starting to rethink the whole idea of gardening with the persistent deer problem that we have here.

This week will be full of VBS preparation, visiting with friends, preparing for the next horse show, and all the daily activities like laundry, grocery shopping and preparing meals.

As things settle down more toward the fall, I hope to blog more consistently.

Garden grows...

Celery and basil

Celery

Celery

Peppers, chives, sage and thyme...plus a few assorted tomato plants

Little, itty, bitty pepper plant

Pictures from the last 4H Horse Show...

Junior English Fitting and Showing




Junior English Fitting and Showing 2nd Place



Junior English Pleasure




Junior English Pleasure 3rd Place

Junior English Equitation

Junior English Equitation 3rd Place

Junior English Command 1st Place

Serene is ready to go home.

Sewing Class Project: Mr. Frog

On Tuesday, Carolyn took her first sewing class at a local sewing center, Aurora Sewing Center. She made Mr. Frog. He is so darn cute. She named hers Skipper. He will be part of her county fair entries.

Yummy Saturday night supper...

Brrr, it is chilly here this morning. The temperatures dipped into the mid 40's last night. Fortunately for us, we didn't have any frost, but I believe some folks south of us did. Since it is Monday, laundry is the chore of the day. I will be back in the garden as well. My tomato bed is almost ready for planting, and my plants are more than ready to go into the soil. I have managed to make chore assignments for everyone. It has been a work in progress over the past week. I will post them another day.

I have to tell you about a wonderful dish I made for Saturday night's dinner. I was a little pressed for time, and I had not taken the steak out of the freezer far enough in advance. It was still hard as a rock. So, I was flipping through my Amish cookbooks and in Cooking from Quilt Country by Marcia Adams I found a recipe called German Apple Pancakes. I looked at the ingredients and to my delight I had them all. It is sometimes called a puff pancake. To the best of my knowledge the book is out of print, so I have included a copy of the recipe here. Just click on it to make a bigger picture.

This is a pitcure before it was served. It looks great.

Needless to say, this was a big hit. My son wasn't even here for dinner. I would have to double the recipe and use my bigger pan if I made it for all of us.

Some garden work...

Finally we have started on the beds. I assigned each child a bed to work for the summer. Right now we are just turning over the soil. My tomatoes and peppers are already to go in the ground. I did not get a deer fence this year, so I have decided to fence each bed individually. That should work for now.

Hardening off the seedlings...

Last Friday, I began the process of hardening off the tomato, pepper, and celery seedlings. This year I have had the best looking seedlings out of the last three years, but they still don't quite look like the ones from the nursery. I am hoping to get them in the ground by midweek.

Celery...

Tomatoes...

Peppers...

The peppers outside...

Tomatoes outside...