Am…musings

About two weeks ago, someone who was nearly blind and didn’t have their glasses or contacts in would have thought my garden looked fantastic. The rest of us … we knew I was growing an amazing crop of weeds. Some were taller than my 5 feet 2½ inches and had trunks and root balls to rival a small tree.

I had good intentions and bought seeds months ago. But the weeds invaded early and after much thought and consultation, I decided tilling again was the way to go. I borrow a friend’s and didn’t ask very early. It’s also a beast so I can’t do it myself. S. offered to help, but it was early in our relationship, and I decided I’d rather do fun things than work in the yard. I figured we’d have plenty of time later (I didn’t get the garden in until July 4 last year … not ideal, but it worked). But S.’s summer work schedule is a little hectic and he coaches a baseball team that travels to tournaments most weekends so it just wasn’t possible.

We finally got it tilled last weekend. (It’s ridiculously hard work so thank you babe!!!) Some of the craziest weeds wouldn’t budge even with the tiller so I dug them out this morning. I bought a ton of different pumpkin and gourd seeds and will plant them this afternoon since there’s plenty of time until harvest. I plan to pitch the other vegetable seeds, but might see what plants I can find at Lowes or Home Depot at this point.

Lessons learned for next year:

• I’m going to try putting weed cloth down at the end of this season.
• Free isn’t worth the hassle … S. and I will rent a better tiller next year.
• We’ll start early, before S.’s crazy summer schedule kicks in.

I’m not ashamed to admit I’m a bit of a “Martha,” but my favorite projects, recipes, etc. are those that look or taste impressive, but really aren’t too much work. Before this year, I would have completely scoffed at making a pumpkin pie from a real pumpkin … rather than from a can. But this was the year I finally planted a garden and as I mentioned in the “seed” post, I felt like my homegrown pumpkins deserved a more fitting end than the trash.

“A Googling” I went, and found this helpful site that gave a very detailed, step-by-step guide for making a pie from fresh pumpkin. Was it as much of a pain in the tooshy as it sounds? As I was making it, I thought … well … absolutely, yes it was. But honestly, in hindsight, it wasn’t at all difficult. It just required an extra hour or so and some extra dishes (stove-top steamer, food processor, utensils).

Sure … extra time isn’t something many of us have. And who likes extra dishes? But then again, the results were pretty amazing. I think partly because the recipe on the site is good, but this pie also tastes fresher and better … brighter is another words that comes to mind … than one from a can. The pumpkin itself is beautiful after it’s been cooked and processed … especially when you see how gross the pumpkin looks in the can.

Will I do it again? Sure, but I think only with pumpkins from my garden … if I had to buy a pie pumpkin, I think I’d just get a can instead (or my neighbor is a Aldi’s shopper and they have a pretty amazing frozen pie). And, of course, it would need to be at a time when I wasn’t in a huge hurry … like say when prepping for a holiday meal.

P.S. For those of you that don’t like pumpkin pie, I recommend you try a slice warm from the oven or warmed in the microwave for 15 or 20 seconds. I’d hated it for 38 years, but tried the Aldi’s pie I mentioned above warm from the oven. It was delightful, and now I’m a pumpkin pie fan.

Yes … I’m a little behind the times. Because I like to decorate with pumpkins in the fall and keep my decorations up through Thanksgiving, I don’t carve most of them. I usually just pitch them after Turkey Day, but because I grew them in my new garden this year, the trash didn’t seem like a fitting end for some of them.

I say “some” because of the nasty worm issue that you may remember. Thankfully, my tactics for de-worming and preserving the pumpkins worked … all but one of the little orange guys I saved made it through and hit the trash just a few days ago. And the “some” I didn’t pitch were two that actually made it out of the garden without worms.

Although I tend to be a bit of a princess, I enjoy digging in to clean out the pumpkin “guts” (I guess from years of carving pumpkins with my dad as a kid), and I couldn’t resist cutting into one of survivors the minute it finished its decorating tour of duty.

Even though they were smaller pie pumpkins, there were lots of seeds for roasting. I found a few recipes on the Internet. This one suggested boiling the seeds before roasting them.

I was pleased with the crispy result, although I waited to salt them until after boiling so that I could add some different spices like garlic pepper.

I still have one pumpkin left. It just seems crazy to me to go through all the trouble of messing with the flesh when I can buy a can of pumpkin, but I may try a pumpkin pie just because it makes me smile to think that I actually grew something I can create a pie with.

Shorter days and cooler temps placed fall just a hair ahead of winter on my list of seasons I despised as a kid. My tune definitely changed after five years of living in Orlando and another in L.A. Orlando burnt me out with its non-stop greenness and “freakin’ Africa hot”-ness (in the words of my friend Keith). L.A. simply bored me when it came to climate … a monotony of the same temps and clear skies day after day after day (Oh, how I missed thunderstorms when I lived there!).

These days fall is a pretty close second to spring in terms of seasons I adore. And as I mentioned in my fall garden post, I love to decorate for it. My approach on Kit Drive is a mix of real and fake and store bought and homemade … or in the case of this year … homegrown. Also, at this point, my fall decs are mixed with my Halloween baubles. All in all, it makes me smile.

The gorgeous peach “pumpkin” (it’s actually a gourd) is real. I found it at Stuckmeyer’s on 141 for $2.49.

Decorating a chandelier is super easy and a really nice touch. I also do it for Valentine’s Day, spring/Easter and Christmas.

Some of these baby pumkins are from my garden. The great spider-web bowl is from Target.

I love this spider because its body is covered with soft, fuzzy, black feathers. I also have a bat like it.

I made this wreath after falling in love with a similar one that was $60 at the store. The white pumpkins and Indian corn are from Stuckmeyer’s. The orange pumpkins are from my garden.

Every fall I mourn the death of my fresh herbs when there are so many good cooking holidays in our immediate future. (This herb post is, of course, not be confused with Herb posts of the past .) I’ve always been too intimidated to try to grow them inside, but … perhaps buoyed by the success of my veggie garden … I’m going to give it a go this year.

I know humidity is an issue, and pretty much any plant I’ve ever tried to bring inside has dried to a crisp. Anyone have any tips for successfully bringing herbs or any plants inside?

I hope to nurse them through at least Thanksgiving and in the meantime, I’m enjoying the lush greenhouse look.

At 6:15 p.m. Sunday, I should have been having drinks at my neighbors’. They’d called around 6 p.m., but I was on a mission to save the baby pumpkins from a senseless crime. See … a few of them were wounded with holes about the size of pencil erasers. Usually they can be used as decorations through Thanksgiving and I was afraid the ones with the holes would decay quickly.

I armed myself with this great stuff from Stampin’ Up! called Crystal Effects … it creates a water-like look on craft projects, but is also an amazing glue that dries crystal clear. I decided it be perfect to plug up the pumpkin holes and perhaps stop the decay.

Well, the holes were caused by nasty-ass worms … that were still in the pumpkins. They didn’t like the glue so much … probably because they couldn’t breathe and started poking their heads out. I was determined to “smoke out” the murderers and quickly ran for a reinforcement … a old pair of tweezers.

By 6:30 p.m. or so on Sunday I thought I had them all, but the glue wasn’t reacting well to the fresh pumpkin and I decided to let them dry out a bit.

Three of the pumpkins didn’t make it … victims of the terrible crime. But a few seemed to be fairing well. Then tonight when I went to glue them again … two of the little pumpkin murderers had survived. One went down easy, but the other wouldn’t budge. Layer and after layer of glue and it seemed to be able to stay just below the surface and still breathe. Finally, I got it.

Two of the pumpkins are still in critical condition. I’m hoping they will pull through. In the meantime, I am keeping a vigilant eye to make sure more murderers don’t prey on my bigger pumpkins.