Finding beauty

Irish Boxer Husband claims that for the longest time, I wasn't much of a fan of cut flowers... he might be right, as I have no doubt his memory may occasionally be more reliable than mine, but I have decided that I love flowers and can't have too many of them around the house. Attached to a plant and living or in a vase, I see their glowing colors their delicacy, and that subtle iridiscence... and it makes me happy.

The growing that will happen at the end of the tunnel

Today is day 9 in the hospital, and the walls are definitely starting to cave in on me.

The incessant beeping, fluorescent lighting, doctors and nurses at all times, needles, tubes, endless medications... It all wears a person down. Not to mention I have never been away from the Irish Boxer Husband (who visits everyday), Monkey (who has been brought by once) and Lion Cub (who charms all the nurses) for this long. And the garden, too! Thank goodness for my wonderful friends who do all they can to keep me sane and fighting.

So to try and stay positive, I figured I would start planning out my 2014 growing. In a fit of just-because-I-am-stuck-here-doesn't-mean-I-can't-do-some-damage, I ordered a mess load of fruit trees. I also have all the seeds I ordered and also saved from last year's crops. So in a nutshell, here is what I am setting myself up for, existing and new:

Trees/fruit

• Low Chill Apple, 3 on 1 
• Flavor Grenade Zaiger Pluot
• Gold Kist Apricot 
• Burgundy Japanese Plum 
• Saturn Peach Tree 
• Black Beauty Fruiting Mulberry 
• Snow Queen Nectarine 
• Hachiya Persimmon 
• Fuyu persimmon
• Desert Gold Peach
• Babcock Peach
• Garden Prince Almond
• Spice Zee Nectaplum
• Meyer lemon
• Mexican lime
• Nagami kumquat
• Black Mission fig
• Hass avocado (he needs a friend!)
• Raspberries (Heritage, Fall Gold) and Blackberry (Triple Crown)
• Southern low-chill blueberries, I forget the exact types
• Sequoia strawberries

Vegetables

• Tomatillos, green and purple
• Tomato: Amish Paste, rainbow cherry mix
• Green Globe artichoke
• "Summer Melody" squash mix
• Kabocha squash
• "Mixed fingers" eggplant mix
• Bush beans: Contender, Tendergreen
• Pole beans: yard long, Rattlesnake
• Buttercrunch lettuce
• Cucumber: lemon and straight eight
• Peppers: Chinese Giant and Tam's Jalapeño
• Red orach -- very curious about this one!
• Garlic: Music, Russian Red, Elephant, CA Early have all been planted along with shallots

Herbs

• Basil basil basil!
• Cilantro, slow bolt
• Garlic chives
• Chives
• Thyme
• Maybe a few others... IBH got me a pack of seeds and many I am not even familiar with

Flowers

• Sunflowers
• Nasturtium
• Cosmos (no choice here -- they are volunteering all over the place)
• Calendula
• Wild flowers

I don't know where I am actually going to *put* all of these... But it should be an exciting summer!

Taking the time

I've probably mentioned this before, but Irish Boxer Husband and I both work full-time at demanding jobs. We have a very busy five-year-old Monkey who has birthday parties, playdates, swim lessons and school functions. Then we added a five-month-old Baby Bluebird (soon to be renamed Lion Cub, BTW) to the mix. Last year we bought a house on a half acre and proceeded to completely gut and renovate the interior... and when it was about 95% done, we started to move mountains outside to reshape the landscape completely.

All this to say, we don't have a lot of spare time on our hands. I can't remember the last time we went to see a movie -- wait, yes I do... it was more than 6 months ago -- and we've had exactly one date night since Lion Cub was born. I'm naturally an introvert, and crave peace, and quiet, and calm, so it's silly little chores like shelling peas (when's the last time you shelled peas?!?) that help me maintain my sanity.

It's been a challenging few weeks... months... okay years... but something as simple as my Lincoln peas finally gearing up into full production so that I can get more than a handful of peas at a time is what keeps me balanced nowadays.

Dinosaur plants

What a crazy month it's been... on top of all the usual, we had some extra doses of drama and chaos that made this year even more challenging. But the Monkey declaring "This has been the best Christmas ever!" made all the troubles fade into the background, even if only for a day.

One of the running jokes between the Irish Boxer Husband and I is his inability to keep a secret, especially when it comes to gifts. He had no choice but to give me this one early when I declared, a few weeks before Christmas, that all I really wanted was a plant. Well, he had one already in the mail, so out it came (and off he went to go look for something else that could still be a surprise).

This plant is interesting. The "dinosaur" stuff may be a little heavy on the marketing, but it was truly remarkable to see a ball of dried-out grass turn into a lush green plant in just an hour.

The outside of the box:

He actually bought two. Here's what they looked like when I unwrapped them. Not much to look at...

 Set it up in a little dish with some lava rock...

Add a teensy bit of water... and then wait all of TEN MINUTES.

Twenty minutes later, you see green, and unfurling action...

Thirty minutes later, lots of green and a pretty rosette shape...

 After an hour or so, here's how it looks. Quite a dramatic transformation for just an hour.

It actually started to mold a little bit after a week or so, so IBH put them outside and sure enough they turned right back into dried grass balls. If you want your very own, you can find it here:

The Amazing Desktop Dinosaur Plant

A Pre-historic Evergreen That Just Won't Die This one-of-a-kind plant has lived on the Earth for over 290 million years and has the ability to “come back to life” (much like the undead) over and over again for hundreds of years! Simply place this seemingly dead ball of foliage in water and within hours it transforms into a vibrant green blood-sucking evergreen. Ok, we are kidding about the blood-sucking part. It's still amazing though! It's also great for lazy folks since you can forget to water your Dinosaur plant whenever you want! It will simply dry up and hibernate for up to fifty years and will spring to life every time it is given water.

Some Interesting Tidbits about your Dinosaur Plant:

• During the Carboniferous period these plants used to grow over 120 feet tall (bigger than a T-rex)
• When dry it curls up into a tight ball so that the wind can easily roll it to a new location or cubicle, hopefully closer to moisture.
• Retains 3% of its water when it is dehydrated.
• Grows to be about 4"
• Enjoys life so much it survived the Ice Age

Kit includes:

• Live Dinosaur Plant (Selaginella Lepidophylla)
• Bag of genuine Volcanic Lava Rock
• Display Bowl

TV and Korean dumplings (mandu)

I don't watch much TV. I might have, many years ago, but nowadays our Netflix queue is completely dominated by Jake and the Neverland Pirates, My Little Pony, Miffy, and Strawberry Shortcake. Once a week though, on Sunday nights, I will occasionally watch a few episodes of something or other... currently it's Fringe.

So last night, after the kids were down and the house was quiet, I watched three episodes back-to-back with the Irish Boxer Husband. But instead of being curled up on the couch under a blanket with a mug of tea, we made mandu. It's so much better knowing exactly what goes into them, making them with the ingredients we like, and it probably works out to be cheaper. And while we made almost 200, you certainly don't have to make that many at once... though good company certainly makes it go quickly and you can easily freeze them so you never run out.

Keep in mind, you can make mandu with almost anything. All vegetarian, different meat, seafood... feel free to customize.

Korean dumplings (mandu)
3 packs of dumpling/gyoza skins
2 pounds of ground beef
1 pack of firm tofu
6 cups of mung bean sprouts
2 cups of Korean chives (buchu)
2 carrots
4 cloves of garlic
1 egg
4 tablespoons of soy sauce
2 tablespoons of sesame oil
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
Salt and pepper

Chop the chives and combine with vegetable oil, mix well. I saw this tip on Maangchi's blog and she says it helps keep the vegetables moist.

Cook with sprouts in a little bit of water in a big saucepan until they are quite limp but not totally disintegrated. It took about 5 minutes for me. Then chop roughly.

Very finely chop the carrots. You don't want to bite into a big chunk of crunchy carrot when you eat your mandu! Do the same with the garlic.

In a big bowl, mix the ground beef, tofu (you crush it with your fingers as you mix), sprouts, chives, carrots, garlic, egg, soy sauce and sesame oil. Whew! Season with salt and pepper. If you're not sure if the seasoning is quite right, I cook a tiny bit of the filling in a frying pan to taste it.

It's mandu-making time! I used the rounds, but they come in squares, too... the process is basically the same. Set yourself up a little working area with your filling, skins, a little bowl of water, and a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. And of course, your episode :-)

Dip a finger into the water and use it to wet the edge of half the skin.

Then put in about a tablespoon's worth of filling. You'll learn how much you can fit after you've done a few, and it'll start to go much faster at that point.

Fold over the skin, and press firmly to seal tightly.

Then wet the outside edge and put in three pleats to really help hold the mandu together. Otherwise, they might break open while cooking and nobody wants that!

We put ours on baking sheets to freeze. After three episodes of Fringe, we had nearly 200 made.

The baking sheets went straight into the chest freezer and I'll bag them up once they're solid.

Some couples go bowling, or watch a movie, or take long moonlit walks on the beach. We make mandu!

The force is strong... within my fig tree!

I've always wanted a fig tree. Once that had multiple trunks, spreading wide, with a sculptural shape and of course -- lots of fruit. Because -- no offense, Trader Joe's -- there is NOTHING like a fresh fig.

I also had the perfect spot for it: directly between my kitchen window and the massive new steel-and-glass spaceship-like hospital they have built across the canyon that completely kills the rural feel of our home. I dreamt of a massive fig tree with broad, handsome leaves that I could look at while doing the dishes.

I picked up this Black Mission a few months ago, right before we went out of town for the weekend as our last getaway before the new Baby Bluebird arrived. Unfortunately, that weekend was unseasonably hot and dry with Santa Ana winds pushing the temps up into the mid-90s while incredibly dessicating gusts fried it to a crisp despite the fact that I had given it several soakings before we left. Every single leaf got crispy and brown and fell off my tree.

Despite my initial inclination to take it back, I asked the Irish Husband Boxer to plant it (I'm sure he felt a little silly planting a leafless stick, but I think he's getting used to my weird requests). He even set up a little drip irrigation emitter for the stick. Because even leafless sticks need water... right?

Well this little fig tree has bounced back with a vengeance! and I couldn't be happier. I wasn't sure if it'd leaf out in "fall," but apparently our weather has been mild enough that the tree didn't mind actively growing. Hopefully it really takes off and gives me my "unruined" kitchen window view -- and fresh figs! -- soon.

Who's the new little buddy who hasn't budged since yesterday?

Responsibility

I moved to Southern California a little over eleven years ago, and still remember that horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach when I first arrived. I had grown up in North Carolina, and then spent several years in the SF Bay Area before shooting down the I-5 overnight to my new home. I felt like I had arrived on the set of a postapocalyptic movie as we drove past the dust-dry and barren hillsides of San Diego in July.

Since then, I've grown to appreciate the beauty of the desert. The eager burst of new growth after the first rain of autumn, the lushness of restful winter, the hopeful persistence of green into spring. But there is no denying that we live in a dry, dry climate, and it's up to us to be responsible in how water is used.

The Irish Boxer Husband likes to say that our home looked like a Costa Rican rainforest when we moved in. He might be exaggerating a bit -- he is known to do that -- but I do remember the freshly sodded lawn that was green even in September, the slopes completely overrun with groundcover, and trees like the alder in our backyard that seemed curiously happy, given that they're native to soggy riverbanks. Hmmm.

Bit by bit, we've been tearing out unfriendly groundcover and thirsty grass. We've still got two large areas of lawn, but expanded the patio with DG, put in a totally drought-tolerant bed out front, and have been running enough drip irrigation all over to wrap three times around the block if all the tubing was laid out end-to-end. 

We've been here just over a year now, and the most recent water bill showed me just how much of a difference we've been able to make in our own water consumption despite watering a lot of new fruit trees and planting beds. While I still envy those who live in a climate where they don't have to be quite so strategic with water usage, I'm proud of just how far we've come.

Growing the family

Ever since moving in last fall, we've been slowly but surely chipping away at the previous landscaping -- which basically consisted of 'cheap plants that are green as long as you constantly douse them with sinful amounts of water' -- to make it more drought-friendly, but also more productive. I don't feel quite as bad watering a tree that gives us fruit than I do when watering a tree that doesn't do much of anything and isn't even all that attractive.

We've been on a bit of a spending spree for the past month or so, now that the weather is a little cooler and planting a new tree isn't an automatic death sentence. Meet the latest members of our family:

Our new Haas avocado to keep our Bacon company:

 

A sweet little bay laurel that traveled all the way down from the Bay Area in my brother's car (why they don't sell them down here I do not know) and hopefully will grow into a more substantial plant that gives us plenty of bay leaves:

 

A little Mexican lime tree awaiting its final home, the third of four citrus trees we're looking to line our walkway with:

 

Heritage raspberry brambles to take up residence in the new fancy schmancy trellis that the Irish Boxer Husband built:

The raspberry came from the sweetest old man at the farmer's market who sets out huge plants for only $20. Considering the number of canes shooting up from the pot and the tons of developing fruit still on the vine, the patience-challenged person in me says we got a deal!

There is autumn in the air...

Today was the first damp morning of the season, and it was almost disorienting to wake up to the patio (and patio furniture, eek) being wet. Forecast says there may be a bit more rain coming today. Summer may finally be over! And Halloween, the Monkey's favorite holiday, is just around the corner. You know it's happening when pumpkins start popping up around the house because we can't go anywhere without her picking out just a few to bring home. "But look, they're SO cute, can't we have one? Or two?" You'd think she was talking about puppies. But no. Pumpkins. Which might explain why, after the season, I have such a hard time cutting these guys up for pie. Because in my head, they are almost like puppies.

Yes, silly, I know.

The peas-and-lettuce Earthbox is coming along, and we've eaten salad from it a few times already. I've learned that, when growing lettuce, it's not about getting individual seedlings started and lovingly placed. It's about quantity over quality. Plant many, often... then harvest ruthlessly.

Baby kumquats!

Unfortunately no baby fruit on the Meyer Lemon despite a profusion of blooms and lots of bee activity, but maybe it will just take a bit more time...

The first batch of potatoes is looking a bit silly despite having been hilled up nearly a foot already. Oh well.

 

There are two big SmartPots of potatoes right behind it, and then 10 more pounds of seed potatoes coming in a month. The Irish Boxer Husband likes potatoes, what can I say.

And in the terraces, the rainbow chard (which is oddly un-rainbowy), lettuce-and-cosmos-volunteers, and pattypan-that-has-decided-it-likes-fall-better-than-summer are doing well.

Next up: raised bed kit is in the mail, destined to hold garlic and onions. We need to go pick up a persimmon tree. In the empty terrace, kohlrabi, beets and maybe some more kale. Because you can never have too much kale. And leeks. LOTS of leeks.

Because it's fall!

The jam-making machine is back online!

...with some assistance from the IBH, of course.

Picked up 8 packs of beautiful blackberries, and a lapful of black velvet apricots on the last trip to the farmer's market. Decided they might blend together nicely, and be complemented with a touch of warm spice... time to experiment!

The blackberries...

Popped one in my mouth and decided I did NOT like blackberry seeds, so just about killed myself separating the juice and pulp from the skins and seeds. I'm sure there is an easy way to do this, but could not think of one for the life of me, so basically forced them through a sieve with a spoon. Pretty darn primitive.

Some lovely puree of black velvet apricots...

Swirl them together in my treasured Le Creuset pot...

Add lemon juice for acidity and the calcium water that is Part I of the Pomona's Pectin process. Bring to a boil, stir in sugar with Part II of Pomona's Pectin, taste, add more sugar as needed, add cinnamon and nutmeg to taste, test for gelling, pour into hot sanitized jars, process in boiling water, seal... then leave the jars on your counter so you can caress them lovingly each time you pass by (and make all the people who visit your home jealous).

Cannot wait to start cracking into these.

Summer

I'm not a huge fan of heat, but there is something deliciously languid about long summer days. You can almost pretend you're a kid looking at three months of uninhibited freedom when you still have several hours of daylight left after a full workday. We try to make it down to the community pool a few times each week. Rachel's been practicing her crab crawl.

Teapots

We recently got IBH a Neti pot:


which, to be fair, does look suspiciously like a teapot, so IBH graciously allows Monkey to play with the "teapot" in her bath.

The other morning, IBH is using the Neti pot for its originally intended purpose, and in that moment of vulnerability (I don't know what else to call it when you've got a spout shoved into a nostril and water streaming out the other side) Monkey walks into the room, sees him doing his thing, and demands to know...

"Hey, what are you doing with my teapot?!?!?!?"

I could smell lawsuits a-brewing

Yesterday, my Irish Boxer Husband and I were talking about how people I meet seem to feel compelled to share their deepest, darkest secrets within the first ten minutes of shaking my hand. My first visit to a new primary care doctor resulted in finding out about the saga of their pregnancy successes and tragedies (and I was not there for anything fertility-related). A makeup artist I hired for our wedding gave me a dollar-by-dollar rundown on how much she gets (or doesn't get, depending on the month) in child support from her ex-husband, who is now looking to get re-married to his new (insert choice words) girlfriend but is getting laid off and while she secretly loves that the new (insert new choice words) girlfriend is going to have to be the breadwinner, she also knows this means she's not going any more child support for awhile. See what I mean? And I never pry, most likely because I'm not sure I really want to know; all this information is just volunteered...

Anyway, the IBH suggested I may need to pursue a degree in psychology so I can let people tell me things for a living. My first reaction was "hmmm." My second reaction was "wouldn't work." "Why not?" he asks. Well, because this would be me, of course:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYLMTvxOaeE