July 22nd, 2010
My Favorite Things Thursday!
For many many years I planted a vegetable garden every summer. Since I live in a rural area, I also spent many many years trying to persuade the deer not to eat my veggies. I put up fences, sprinkled red pepper, hung soap and aluminum pans.
For the past few years, however, my vegetable gardening has been limited to containers – this year we put them on a flat roof. Since I am not putting up barriers and deterents, I have been enjoying daily visits from the deer this summer.
I may have mentioned before that I set out bird seed and crittter mix for all the birds, raccoons, opossums, squirrels, and chipmunks. This year a deer family have joined the crowd. What makes that even more of a treat is that the family includes two fawns. I have seen many deer over the years, but this is the first year I have seen any fawns in the area. What is it about baby animals? They make me ooh and ahh every time!
I do try not to get too attached to the wild life. Since I live in a rural area, what I see as adorable someone else may see as dinner on the hoof. But, for this summer, I am enjoying my visitors.
(Sorry, no pictures to show off. I am not National Geographic with a telephoto lens and these deer are healthily skittish of humans.)
Sandra
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July 8th, 2010
My Favorite Things Thursday!
Okay, I plain can’t afford to do taste tests every week no matter how much fun I have. So I am sharing one of my favorite simple things – Tomatoes!
I love tomatoes so much I even put up a web page dedicated to those red ripe yummies on my other site, Bry-Back Manor. I love tomato pesto, tomato sauce, canned tomatoes, and fresh tomatoes.
I have been known to open a can of diced tomatoes and throw on some parmesan cheese and call it breakfast. Really! Just ask my husband!
One of the nicest things about tomatoes is that they can be the basis of Summer Salad dishes that can be dinner. One of my go-tos is Panzanella.
In its simplest version, Panzanella is cut bread (better to use old or stale), cut tomatoes, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar. However, the possible additions are up to the cook. I love Fresh Basil and Mozzarella. Cucumbers, Ripe Olives, or Cannellini Beans would all be delicious.
And best of all, Panzanella is another example of how being vegetarian does not mean you can not bring dinner to the table with super speed. Yum!!
Sandra
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July 1st, 2010
My Favorite Things Thursday!
I am interrupting my usual Favorite things sort of post to do another one of my favorite things – rant!
Is your SUV worth the life of a Brown Penguin? Or a Sea Turtle? Or a Dolphin?
I am old enough to remember the 1970s. We were going to reduce our consumption of oil. We were going to drive economy cars. We were going to pay attention to our energy use. What the heck happened?
We got the SUV/Minivan craze and all the mommies “NEEDED” to have one.
I am especially amused/disheartened by these bigger, better, badder vehicles that dwarf my Honda Hybrid at places like Whole Foods. They are sporting Buy Local bumper stickers. The drivers are careful to buy Organic and take everything home in their reusable bags. Apparently, the complete and total disconnect is lost on these on these folks.
I really wish that all those mommies out there who worry about what their kids eat and worry about what their kids read and fret about whether to use disposable diapers or cloth would take a moment to see the bigger picture and pay some attention to what they drive.
Is your SUV worth the life of a Brown Penguin? Or a Sea Turtle? Or a Dolphin?
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