Valentines Day, Love Banner

I used some of the super fun scrapbook paper that Carrie Huisenga gave me for Christmas to make a Valentine's Day banner. Do you notice the blizzard outside?

Garden Late July

Chris took some awesome pictures of the garden today! Not much to update you on though. Snow peas are coming in and taste delicious! The bush beans finally started to blossom and we should have some to eat soon enough. The broccoli is also doing well; even the plants that I transplanted have broccoli growing on them! I think I am the most excited about that.

The carrots are getting taller but still don't have any actual orange carrots under the ground.

The Broccoli has actually started looking like broccoli. Planning to harvest when top head is about 8" across.

Summer Quinoa Stir Fry

Today we made a Summer Quinoa Stir Fry together! That is right! This is the first combined Casie Dunleavy and Brooke Perisho blog post ever!

Summer Quinoa Stir Fry

2 Cups Quinoa

6-8 Asparagus sticks chopped into 1" chunks

1 1/2 cups carrots, chopped 1" chunks

1/2 small onion chopped

1/4 cup diced green onion

1 1/2 cup butternut squash 1/2" cubes

1 14 oz can diced tomatoes

Dried or fresh rosemary

garlic or garlic powder to taste

red pepper flakes to taste

salt & pepper

Saute the butternut squash in butter or olive oil until evenly browned on all sides. Meanwhile saute the carrots in olive oil or butter until soft, add asparagus, onions, spices and saute until you reach desired tenderness. Add can of diced tomatoes. Combine butternut squash and other veggies. Allow to simmer until evenly warmed. Pour over cooked quinoa. Top with parmisean cheese. Eat!

We hope you like it!

Garden in July

The garden is still alive! I haven't killed ANYTHING yet!

Starting at the furthest west corner:

BROCCOLI: This has literally exploded. I don't think I can keep it all in this small 2'z2' box. Anyone want a broccoli plant? I am not sure how they would transplant at this point but hey, it is worth a shot! (UPDATE 7/7: I transplanted about 7 of the plants...they aren't dead yet but they don't look as healthy as they were. They are all floppy now)

 

CUCUMBERS: These are still rather small and they don't appear to be changing much so I am not sure if we will get much out of them...

 

BEANS: These started out very shaky and have finally started to grow. They are also a bit tight for space but I think that these are also too late to transplant. Over the weekend while we were in Oregon for the fourth of July they started to sprout little wispy things on the top!

 
SNOW PEAS: I have a 2'x4' box and a 2'x2' box going. The bigger box is pictured here and is doing very well. We went to buy stakes to drill into the sides of the boxes last week since the peas outgrew the little stick and string set up we had put together. The best part is all the little blossoms appearing! They are gorgeous and promise lots of peas! This big box was planted from indoor starter plants and I am shocked at how well they have done after being transplanted twice. The small box plants were all directly planted as seeds outside and but they aren't far behind the bigger box.

 

SCALLIONS: These are doing 'okay'. I remember thinking last year that I really wished they got bigger. Some of them still seem tiny. Despite this, we used some in our salsa last week and they were delicious!

 

WALLA WALLS: These are still so tiny! I might have done something wrong. I thinned them about 3 weeks ago and they haven't changed since...

 
MIXED LETTUCE GREENS: These are literally taking over my garden. I can't believe how successful the lettuce has been. It is very strong and tastes delicious. If anyone wants some lettuce let me know and I will bring you some! You can also see my lavender plant in the middle of the far box which is doing equally well. I don't know when to harvest though, perhaps after the little blossoms die? It smells so good!

 

STRAWBERRIES: These have also been great! We have over a dozen little strawberries growing and one red one so far!

 
CORN: Someone told me last week, "So much for knee high by the fourth of July"...dang cold weather we have been having...

 

Carrots: I thinned the box on the left (top) about 1 month ago. The ones I thinned are not doing as well as the plants that I left alone. Too bad because they will have more space to grow delicious carrots! The right side(bottom) is growing very great but I am not sure how big the carrots will get since they don't have much space.

 

TOMATOES: Meh.... a few blossoms but nothing exciting. Did I mention how wet and cold it has been this summer?

Wool Shrug (Ribbed Lace Bolero)

Here's a nifty little project I completed after buying 4 skeins of yarn from the Yarn Underground, in Moscow ID. The original price of the yarn was about $10/skein, but I got them on clearance for $3! The pattern was taken from a blog by Kelly Maher: http://kellymaher.wordpress.com/2007/07/04/ribbed-lace-bolero/

What a pretty little chair!

So this is neither knitting, cooking, or growing so I hope you will forgive the temporary side track:

Two weekends ago Chris and I wandered around the Mukilteo garage sale and I found a really cool chair for $2! 

 

As you can see, it started out with this kind of faded old blue and white fabric on it. Thankfully, Kelsie came over and helped me to reupolster it and now it looks amazing! (I have been calling it my happy chair because the colors are so bright that it makes me instantly happy to look at it.

 

The hardest part was picking out the fabric but I am VERY happy with my choice. I told Kelsie that I was only allowed 5 minutes from the time we walked into the fabric store until I had decided on the fabric. This one fit so perfectly with what I was thinking of in my head that I think I took less than my allotted 5 minutes! This fabric was the most expensive part of the project since I shelled out $8 for 1 yard of this gorgeous stuff!

 ALSO, at the garage sale we bought this cool old picture frame for $1.

 

Since I didn't know what to do with it I cut out some cardboard we had lying around the basement to fit the frame.

 

Actually, I didn't cut it very well and there are now huge gaps between the cardboard and the paper but that is ok. So, I fit the cardboard to the frame and kind of tried to upholster the cardboard with the remnants of the cool fabric I bought. The plan is to use it as a kind of pin board in the guest room.

So, what do you think?! I am working on making our guest room more pleasant right now so more pictures are soon to come! These two cool things are just kind of thrown up there right now but I am hoping to use them to make the room much brighter and happier!

TWO THINGS HAVE SPROUTED IN OUR garden boxes! I am super excited to have lots of baby lettuce, broccoli and shell peas popping up!

Three Garden Boxes!

Chris built us some garden boxes! We have some awesome friends staying with us this week (Amanda and Brandon Bates with their two super cute daughters Lilly and Mya) so last weekend Chris and Brandon spent a few hours picking out wood while I worked to even out the dirt where we had some bush stumps ground out. The assembly process was pretty quick and then we had to fill all three boxes with dirt. We bought 5,000 lbs of top soil that has lots of compost and good stuff to grow in. 

The end product was pretty cool and the whole thing was rather easy. Chris picked out 16' long 2"x12" boards and we had them cut to make 3 raised garden beds that are 4'x8'.

Chris and Brandon assembling box #1

We purchased LOTS of topsoil that is perfect for growing the garden. It has compost and other good stuff in it. It filled up both the truck bed and our trailer.

GOOD DIRT

So excited for my boxes!

After dinner I helped to fill the last box.

	I started to plant afterwords:

Shell peas

Strawberries that I bought, 6 plants for $2.

I am SO excited for this lavender bush!

Shell peas

This is the layout for our squared off garden. Each square is 2'x2'