mamaroots

3 hours, 4 quarts, and some poison ivy

This past weekend was harvest time!  Yep elderberry traditions are forming!  I went with a sweet friend this past week and we enjoyed the midwest dirt roads, sunshine, and slow spotting of elderberries. Though we both have planted elderberry this year, it will take a while to have our own.

I processed mine on Sunday morning with the boys.  After 3 hours of de-stemming I can 4 quarts of pure beautiful berries and just the hints of some patches of poison ivy showing up.  It was definitely worth it!

These "jewels" as Jasper calls them are in the freezer as we gather the supplies for our jam making session next weekend.  There is a great article for you local folks, this is the farm where our elderberry plants came from- acres of elderberries- heaven indeed.

The boys have been buys creating some elderberry monsters that are cracking me up!  Hopefully they will be ready for their photo session tomorrow!

Enjoy your elderberries if you have them near you- delicious!  Also the back issue from Herbal Roots is a great resource- don't forget to enter the giveaway for the September issue!

monthly signs

I had an idea this weekend on an outing with a friend to harvest elderberries (more on that soon) to look at the signs around me.  I got to thinking about how often we stop and read the "signs" in our lives, or do they just become part of the clutter of our lives.  So here are a few that I stopped and paid attention to out of the tons out there this weekend.

A fun time of slowing down and enjoying the end the of month!  Speaking of the end of the month, it is herbal roots give-away time!

I am super excited to learn more about goldenrod in Sept!  I love giving you a chance to win a copy at the end of each month and share this treasure with you that Kristine from Herbal Roots and Luna Farms works so hard and lovingly on it.  She just made a calendar too that you should check out!

You know the drill my friends, leave a comment here between now and midnight on Wednesday and you will be entered into the drawing.  Follow both myself and Kristine from Herbal Roots on facebook and get a bonus entry.  Refer a friend and get one more entry.  

herbal roots zine

mamaroots

Good luck and be sure to stop by and try for a chance to win a mamaroots wood hummingbird.  He is a black chin hummingbird and was fun to make!  There is one more in the shop in case you are super smitten by him!

Enjoy the end of August- could it really be?  Of course September is one of my most favorite months! Sweet dreams all!

this moment- courtesy of my youngest photographer

{this moment} - A Friday ritual via Soulemama that I was keen on doing this week- a simple sweet moment from the past week.

a little love

 
some of the things I am just loving these days:

*heat release days when I get to go home early with boys and their friends and make cookies and watch Inspector gadget

*the feeling of seasonal shift starting to happen

*new books that inspire me- oh yes this one is all about apples!

*morning rhythms of making boys lunches with best lunch boxes ever- today was PB and H- (that would be the honey), blueberries, and vinegar chips- mmm

*some new toy sketches for fall- leaf spirits- can't wait to make these fellas!

*hunting down just the right vintage quilt top to finish into a new "quilt" for Silas' bed

How about you this Thursday- anything coming your way that is giving you a little love?

just peachy

I realized today that those "canning" peaches that I got from the local farmers at the end of the summer's bounty were not going make it too many more days from:

a- the fruit flies and sudden spike in summer heat

b- my boys who discovered a new found love of everything peach

So even though I am not getting my first canning lesson till the weekend, I knew I had to prep the peaches. That blanch method works great in getting those peaches naked and shiney!  I then went ahead and chopped up these beauties and froze them till they get made into delicious (I am thinking positively) jam soon.  

I must admit the juice running down my hands tasted pretty good!  I have settled on a lavendar peach jam recipe to try.  Anyone else have a favorite!

I am happy to report also that Silas' spider bite has turned a corner and healing well, he also requests that we plant some peach trees, I keep coming across the pits he is saving for such a planting adventure- what a peach!

weekend water breaks and spider bites

Our weekend started off interestingly; remember that water cover that the boys found in the woods this summer- well we found out at around 10:30 Friday night that water meter cover meant that the water main line for our neighborhood is in the woods and we found that out when it broke and water was gushing through the woods. 

Now luckily it was in the woods that has a pretty steep slope away from our yard and house, but nothing like a huge tractor knocking down trees and digging right outside your bedroom deck door to make for a restful night wink!

It did provide for some constant entertainment for the boys watching the repair the next day and I guess, it was one way to get a huge swath of woods cleared!  Not exactly sure what our next step will be with how this will work into our woods plan!

So being under a boil water order till late today put my jam plans on hold, so it was a cleaning day, and of course with a fresh mud pit, that meant falling behind the boys and cleaning up some mud!

I enjoyed just going around and finding a few other images that brought me joy this weekend, including my newest handmade purchase from our aspiring designer neighbor friend who was selling her wares on the corner today that she worked hard on all weekend.  This was in my favorite colors, very eco, and involved many of my favorite things to do- this will be highly valued when she is designing when she grows up!

On a not fun moment of the past few days, it has become more clear to us that Silas has gotten a spider bite, though we have no proof, we are possibly holding a brown recluse guilty without trial by jury.  

I should say when you see pictures of recluse bites on-line it is shocking, and we do not have that happening, which makes me wonder if was a recluse.   So far we are keeping it contained to a size slightly larger than a quarter, he is not in pain, and today we finally have a scab instead of a open wepping spot. Thank you to all my friends with ointment, advise, and general well wishes.  I will spare you the pictures, but I am really hoping we get it all cleared up soon and it does not scar too badly.  

That's it spiders- I keep trying to make friends with you and now you bite my boy's elbow and bring out my mama bear, hence the cleaning day.  Jasper has taken up target practice and I am going for sticky traps.  Sorry spiders, we will revisit this issue.

this moment of "back to school" outtakes

In trying to get just the right back to school picture yesterday I ended up not being able to decide on the right one to post because they all made us laugh so much.  

So I present to you the back to school outtakes!  I think I got the hiccups from laughing on these!

can you guess who is happy and who is so so about going back?

some of us have are super heroes with injustice to fight, and some of us need 30 minutes more in bed!

good grief

okay just both of you smile for a second

yep- that second is gone!

ride on youngins!

Hope you had a great back to school week if you were doing some school transitions, no matter how you do your schooling with your family.  I personally like these gentle transitions!  

On docket for this weekend is some jam making time with some bruised peaches- wish me luck!

the view

So tonight is the night before school starts.  Quite a few things on my list that did not get done.  

1- did not get J's backpack warrantied over the summer- he has to use a old one of daddies till the other gets fixed.

2- did not get the new 3-tier tiffin lunch boxes exchanged for 2-tier tiffins

3- did not get the bike rack put on the car yet

but . . . they did have some really low key days here at home and they have a sense of excitement for tomorrow.  I am, well pretty comfortable with the boys heading back to school.  Jasper is an old pro as this is his 5th year at this sweet little school. 

Silas on the other hand will be entering his first year of public school and I am just a bit nervous except it is a really small school and great community of friends that go there as well.

So the view from where I sit looks pretty good.  The weather has been amazing, the boys picked mama some flowers, and dinner is getting ready to be set down and eaten.  

Here is to hoping all of you have a great start to your school year; public, private, home, and un-school- I am hoping for another year of learning about being a mama myself.

p.i.e

Yesterday provided the perfect excuse to try my hand at making pie.  Yes, my mama is amazing in the kitchen.  I grew up at her apron strings just waiting for the pie dough scraps to make cinnamon sugar spiral cookies and yes my hubby is a chef that makes one heck of a pie.  But that being said cooking is not my strength, but I was determined to learn to make pie this year!

This weekend provided the perfect reason to experiment on my neighbors!  It was the weekend before school got started and also national Can It Forward weekend.  When you combine the 2 you get pie jars! I think I may never view pie the same way.  Seriously- little cute mason jars full of pie?  

So I may not have canned this weekend, but mason jars were definitely the theme!  I used this template for the invitation to our neighbors.  I also used this recipe.  Note to self for future baking, read which size jars the pie crust is intended for.  I goofed and got 8oz jars instead of 4 oz, but I improvised and just did the bottom crusts which actually left a lovely spot to drop in the ice cream!

 

Of course it needed to have a book influence as well, and so this book helped me choose what kind of pie to make- I will not give it away how this clever little elf gets a family to make another pie, but this classic is definitely worth having on your shelf!  Warning- it will make you want some pie!

So let's see, this upcoming weekend shall it be peach or cherry pie?  Decision decisions!  I loved the jars- they were their own clever little serving container and now I can reuse them again and again.  Be on the watch this fall, there are at least 3 different cookbooks coming out just for mini pies!

calendar winner

I am all blissed out on pie goodness tonight.  Yep, I made my first pie(s) today.  I will share more on that tomorrow but I wanted to pop in and share the winner of the calendar.  It is Brandy:

brandy said...

I was just looking into to different waldorf calendars to include in our morning circle. Thank you for the beauty you share!

Thank you everyone for your kind words and tremendous support- always, my appreciation for you runs deep.  Brandy if you could e-mail me your addy to send out your calendar.  

Sweet dreams-