Yes!

 

We'll be having Nectarines this year! They make such good fruit tarts and we love them just sliced up with a tad of sugar. I can hardly wait.

Dinner Time

Dinner...  it was fast and it was good! I was going with the old saying, "It shouldn't take longer to fix it then it takes to eat it". 

Strawberries Glore

Every time we drive into Arroyo Grande we drive by a wonderful strawberry stand. This is one of the first spring fruits and we just love them. So... needless to say, we stop often. They are wonderful with a scoop is ice cream or...

for breakfast on french toast.Yummmm-o.

Rewards

After working the afternoon at the Butterfly grove, we decided to treat ourselves to dinner at our new favorite Thai restaurant. What a great reward.

And when we came out this was what we saw! It was just an amazing evening after a beautiful afternoon in the grove.

Let Them Eat Cake

Over the holidays our middle Grandson and I made chocolate cake. Our once a year chocolate delight! Yummmmm.

Shoes to Fill

I just love to see all the boys shoes by the door. It makes me happy. I know they are somewhere close by. The people that fill those shoes are truly special.

Our Thanksgiving Day was wonderful. We cooked 15 pounds of mashed potatoes, roasted a 22 pound turkey and had three different kinds of pie, plus all the sides to go with it. Now, we did have leftovers... but that is how we planned it!

Our daughter's shoes aren't in that bunch. She wasn't out playing football in the muddy field and she didn't get 3 footballs caught up in the trees! She wasn't the one up a ladder with a camera either.  She was helping in the kitchen with her shoes on and is equally special. I am so thankful for my kids and grand kids. They are the best!

P.S. Those brown shoes belong to hubs... they've been by the door for some 47 years. And trust me, for that I am REALLY thankful.

Apples to Apples

Apples are falling off the tree. They are ready to be made into apple sauce, dried apples or apple pies. Today I made all three. I started with the dried apples.

This handy dandy tool peels, slices and cores. It makes this whole process a lot faster. I filled up the drier with apples first, then made a big kettle of apple sauce. I saved about eight of the best apples and used them for an apple pie.

I'm sorry I didn't get pictures of the pie but by that time I had really run out of steam! I was DONE with apples for the day!

The Ultimate Salt

There are so may kinds of salt. This was brought to us by my cousin. She gathered it from lava pools in Hawaii. What a special gift!

Sunday Breakfast

Yummmmmm.  Is there a better way to start the day?

Apricot Cobbler

We picked the Apricots fresh from the tree and came in and made the cobbler. It was DELICIOUS!!

First Fruit to Ripen

The Apricots and Plumcots are the first to ripen in our orchard. We wait anxiously for them and try to leave them on the tree to ripen as long as the birds don't find them.  Once the birds decide they are ripe enough, we better pick! We do share some with the birds...they are our friends and we enjoy watching them and their little ones. We really like the Plumcots and hope our Pluot tree has fruit this year too. They seem to come off later, more like the Plums.

Blackberries for Dessert

Hubby picked the Blackberries and we are going to have them for dessert...with vanilla ice cream! Ohhhhhh, I can hardly wait.

SLO Bubble Gum Alley

There is this famous, or should it be infamous, place in San Luis Obispo known as Bubble Gum Alley. If you want to take a short cut from one of the few parking lots in down town to Higuera Street, the main drag where everything happens, you go through this narrow passage.

It's gross and I sneak through without touching anything! Many a Cal Poly student plus tourists have left their mark. It started in the 60's and just keeps on coming.

Homemade Veggie Pizza Pie

I suppose in the spirit of full disclosure I must admit that we ate the whole thing!

Curry and Rice

This was dinner last night and it was GOOD!!

This was Not for Johnny!

I did some baking today and this time it was not for Johnny, the miniature horse. Hubby was happy. The carrot cake turned out great and I tried a new recipe for the frosting. It is a cooked frosting that has flour in it and I just had to give it a try. It turned out good...not so sweet and looks very much like whipped cream. It is easy to work with and holds up well on the cupcakes.

I bet I will use this frosting again!

All the Blueberries in a Row

Over the years we have collected a number of  blueberry bushes. We planted them in various spots hoping to find the perfect place. Some of them have done good, some not so good. There are hundreds of varieties of this plant and we decided to get ours all together to better compare them. It is common to plant different varieties for better pollination.

The first bushes are leafed out and have berries set on. They are Sunshine Blue and Misty Blue. The next five bushes have no leaves or berries. We are hoping to find out if the problem is their variety or where they were planted.

I want to  make blueberry pie again this year!

The apricot tree is getting more blossoms each day. The rain has been gentle enough that it is not doing any damage to them. Maybe we will dry apricots this year.

Red Baron Peach Blossoms

This little peach tree has the most beautiful bright pink blossoms. We bought this tree a couple of years ago at a favorite nursery late in the bare root season and it was already in full bloom. I just had to have that little tree.

I don't care that it is scrawny and has yet to produce an edible peach. I don't care if it ever has fruit as along as it blooms each year. It makes me smile.

Rustic Bread for Us

Hubby baked...and he did good!!

Concord Grapes are Ripe

Does anyone know how to make these concord grapes into wine? I think that would be a fun project but I  don't know where to start. I'm going to ask hubby to do some research and see if we could have wine by Thanksgiving. Wait...they let wine age in oak barrels for a looooong time. Got to come up with a different plan. Any ideas?